Chapter Five Met Your Devil
Briar
T his idea made a lot more sense inside of my head than it did right now. It had seemed like a great plan all evening, getting ready, driving here, even the first twenty minutes seemed promising.
“I can’t believe I let you drag me here,” Lyra laughs, hiding her face behind her red solo cup that’s still at the same amount from the time we arrived and I poured it for her.
We were clustered in a corner outside people watching.
In my head, when I got here I was going to be a social butterfly. Lyra and I would be chatting with girls about classes or boys we thought were cute. Maybe I’d even be talking to a guy who I might give my phone number to.
That was not the case, at all.
“Okay so maybe,” I make an oof sound as someone slams into me drunkenly, muttering a sorry before continuing to walk past me, “Maybe this wasn’t the best plan. In my defense, I didn’t think the party would be like this!”
I looked out at the backyard of Jason’s house, we stood on the back patio where bodies filled the backyard and in-ground pool. It was a beautiful pool, one that made the swimmer in me envious. It was the only sport I was decent at and not even my high school had one this nice.
Well minus the bodily fluids and trash at the moment. The DJ blared music from multiple speakers around the house, and God if you thought the backyard was packed. Bodies were filling every square inch of this mansion, pouring out of the living room, kitchen, and even upper bedrooms.
I watched through the haze of the fog machine and weed, as bodies grinding together to the thumping beat.
“I told you, the kids of Ponderosa Springs aren’t normal. Everything they do, they have to do ten times harder than regular teenagers. It’s the money. Gives them all this complex that they are untouchable.” She yells over the music.
I’d practically dragged my new roommate to this place, spewing some bullshit about us trying to be something more than ghosts. This was our freshman year of college, the next four years were supposed to be the best of our lives.
I thought a party was the perfect way to kickstart that.
Obviously, I had the right intentions, the execution was just a tad off.
“I vote we leave and hit up Tilly’s diner for greasy burgers and fries, what do you think?” Lyra offers, seeing how uncomfortable we both are.
I take another look around, couples, throuples and more with their tongues down each other’s throats. Watching the sly transaction of pills in little plastic baggies. My lungs burned at the recycled air even though we were all outside, I wanted to be anywhere else but here right now.
“Hell yes—” I start but my voice is drowned out by the chant of someone’s name.
Lyra and I both shift our gazes to the roof where a guy stands on top of it, wearing only what God gave him and a lacrosse helmet.
“Dear God…” Lyra mutters, shielding her eyes just as he screams something incoherently, and propels himself off the roof and into the pool.
Those around us lose whatever sense they have left, screaming, laughing, completely submerged at the moment.
“If I never come to one of these again, it’ll be too soon,” I mutter, Lyra nods her head in agreement. Tossing her drink over her shoulder,
“I have to go to the bathroom real quick, then we can leave.”
“Do you want me to come with you? I don’t know if I trust everyone here.” She yells over the chaos.
“Yeah! That way we don’t lose each other.”
Together we make our way through the yard towards the backdoor, the heat inside the living room slaps me in the face, taking me aback a little.
It’s pitch-black inside, the only light is the silver strobe bulbs that sporadically span across the room.
It’s a snug squeeze inside, people crammed impossibly close to each other.
How does anyone even enjoy this?
My sweaty hands clutch Lyra’s as she navigates through the people best she can. It feels like we are making headway through everyone until someone jostles into the middle of us.
My hand slips out of hers, my drink spilling down the front of my shirt, and to make matters worse it’s so dim I can barely see anyone’s face.
“Lyra!” I shout over the derangement, squinting my eyes trying to catch a glimpse of her wavy brown hair and patterned shirt.
My breathing shortens, my mouth dries as I lick my lips to wet them a bit. Wishing I wasn’t wearing my drink now because my throat feels like the Sahara. I try to remain calm, not wanting to freak out, and suddenly develop a fear of closed spaces.
My feet scuffing forward, my eyes spot the front door and assuming that’s where Lyra would go too if we lost each other. There’s just a mountain of people I need to get through first.
The music changes, no longer an upbeat hip-hop song with a strange remix, instead it’s a piercing screech of a guitar paired with frenetic drums. A sudden icy breeze races down my spine, unwanted chills sprinkling across my skin.
My senses widen. My skin tingling, breaths settling deeper in my stomach.
My ears almost twitching at every tiny sound.
I know this sensation. I’ve been trained to notice it, even when other people don’t recognize the subtle feeling of being followed, I do. You have to always trust your gut as a thief, knowing the right time to strike is just as important as the skill itself.
So I think, actually, I know there is someone here watching me. I turn swiftly, checking my left and right, everyone is caught up in the elation this party has given them.
Someone blows a cloud of smoke in my face, making me cough, waving my hand to clear it out of my vision.
My body flinches back, my heart sinking to my feet, spooked from what I found. The strobe light catches the angles of his face in glitches. One second he’s there, the next it’s darkness.
He comes to me in sections, like a jigsaw puzzle.
His broad shoulders were sheltered by black leather, a white shirt plastered tightly across his chest, stretching against the rigid muscles that lay beneath.
The perfect swimmer's body. Tall, wide, all tapered to a fitted waist. I find one of his hands suspending by his side, as he props himself up against the wall his boot keeping him there.
Lengthy legs covered with dark-washed jeans, a standard for college guys, minus the wallet chain that hugs his pelvis and it makes my lungs throb with adrenaline.
There are a least twenty people from me to him, enclosing him on both sides, yet he sticks out. I’m unmoving, continuing to piece him together. My mouth starts to water, my hands sweating profusely and there is a thumping inside my stomach.
Smoke from his cigarette creates a veil of mystery around his face, the strobe revealing him gradually. I catch the veins in his dominating hands, protruding, lingering too large fingers that are embellished with silver rings.
I shudder unconsciously, blotches of blood clinging to his knuckles. He’d recently connected them to someone’s face and I wasn't sure if it thrilled me or scared me. Someone who could put up a fight? Or someone violent by nature?
I was so curious. My nosey self wanted more. More than the pieces of him I could see. That was until I started putting together the edges of his face. The beat in my stomach dropping south, crawling between my legs.
I clinched my body together, biting harshly on my tongue.
The harsh scowl that adorns his otherwise angelic face, sucks the breath out of me. How anyone so handsome could look this bitter, was beyond me. I’d always been good at math, angles, points, and numbers.
Everything about him was flawlessly proportioned. Aligned, sharp, and intense.
Dark hair, the color of onyx. Dark eyes like strings of licorice, sugary enough to eat and tart enough to make you sick. It wasn’t one of those instances where you thought someone was looking at you but really they were looking somewhere else.
His eyes left no question. He was staring at me.
But it was the shade of his heart that scared me. Such a terrifying level of black varnished the organ inside of his chest that recycled blood over and over again. It made me wonder if I sliced him open would his blood even spill crimson?
The lowest part of my abdomen quivered from dread, from desire.
There was a gravitational pull in his appearance, luring me in.
But I could feel the sensations that rippled off him like a stone in a still pond.
He was filled with ruckus, anarchy, violence personified and it struck a chord in me that hadn’t been plucked in a long time.
Fear.
Hot-blooded fear that boiled in my throat, ate at my skin, and gave me the sudden need to run, far, far away from him.
While my brain was moving on high alert, screaming to leave and hit the road.
My body had an entirely different reaction. It was refusing to leave his gaze. The outside of me, frozen. But the inside buzzed. The feeling stuck between my legs intensified because there was something about trouble that I'd always loved.
When the strobe light went dim for a split second, relighting the room, he was no longer leaning on the wall. Now he was a few lengths closer to me.
One second he was there, the next he wasn’t, only to reappear another inch closer to me.
He was an apex predator on the prowl for something to feast on. Something he could sink his teeth into and shred apart by the seams, stoking his need for the hunt and curing his hunger.
I wrap my hand around my wrist, digging my nails into the soft flesh of my arm. Forcing myself to stay put. I needed to see what would happen.
What he would do.
Another burst of light and then, I could feel him in my space.
He was so very close to me. Sucking up all of my oxygen. Looking over my body. Just another step forward, just another inch, and I could touch him. Smell him. Feel his presence tenfold.