Chapter 7 #2
There were probably far more of those little dark marks on her legs or her stomach or her—
I shook my head, pulling myself back from the brink.
That line of thinking had been long forgotten—repressed, rather. Esme had been seventeen to my nineteen when we’d first been Matched, and she had still seemed so young.
When the years started to bleed away and Esme became unavoidable, I’d felt like an asshole for the thoughts that started to materialize.
I’d look at Esme right after she woke, her features soft in the morning light and think to myself, she’s beautiful. It took near herculean strength to stop my thoughts there.
She’d command a room with her wide smile and that look of genuine interest in her eyes, and I’d think, she’s kind. Funny. I’d thought that a lot, but forced it to stay at isolated observations, never building one one another into deeper feeling as they should have.
I’d see our Mark in the rare moments in our cabin where she’d slip past me on her way out of the shower, smelling of fresh flowers and musk, or when we were around Muli soldiers and she wore a shirt that exposed it, and I’d think, That means she’s yours.
But that lash of primal heat, the innate possessiveness expected of paranimas never followed. That was why I stopped myself.
I’d feel a little trickle of something starting to rise, and then it would calm like soft ripples across a glassy lake, only disturbed enough for a few swells of water.
It made me crazy, but it had also made me distant. I had too many priorities I was trying to juggle—stay alive for my family, fight this war, protect Esme.
Trying to sort through why I couldn’t feel the Bond had fallen to the bottom.
Now I was convinced it was those fucking pills. Because looking at her now, standing in the sunshine and looking like the most beautiful creature I’d ever seen, it seemed impossible that we’d spent eight years tied at the hip and nothing had ever come of it.
But I’d clearly lost all right to want something to come from it. That fact was only evidenced by the shift in Esme’s body language when she realized I had been staring. Her shoulders curved inwards, losing their normally perfect posture, and she crossed her arms over her chest.
She tucked the one bearing our Mark under the other, obscuring part of it from my view, as if in subtle reminder that she’d suppressed the Bond once and would do it again.
In a flash, blinding, irrational fury overtook my body.
I took a step forward on instinct, damn near running into Bellamy. I hadn’t even realized she’d been so close.
Blinking myself out of my haze, I made myself stay put as she approached.
“Morning,” she said to both of us, before turning to Soren with a soft, secret smile—a bashful version of the expression reserved solely for him.
“Good morning, baby,” Soren said, grabbing Bellamy’s face in his hands. She looked like she was seconds away from melting into a puddle on the floor. “Have you eaten?”
Bellamy shook her head—as much as she could in Soren’s hold. “I was coming to ask you the same thing. You shouldn’t be doing this much physical labor without eating.”
I was not jealous. I was a fucking adult and I would not be caught begrudging my friend’s happiness just because my Soul Mate wouldn’t look at me. The sickly green feeling churning in my gut was attributable to something else entirely.
“Come on,” Bellamy said, reaching up to grab Soren’s hands. “Breakfast time.” She looked at me, her eyes growing softer. I knew I probably looked like a sweaty, terrifying mess, but I was enjoying channeling all of my rage into destroying rocks. “You should eat, too.”
I placed a hand over my heart then forced a pout. “You care if I live or die. That’s so nice.”
Bellamy laughed loudly, as carefree as someone could manage with everything going on. “I do, in fact. Not ready to lose you as a friend.”
I laughed, though the sentiment chipped away at my bad mood. Bellamy had been a kind presence since the beginning, even through her royal haughtiness. Even then, I would have laid down my life for her in thanks for what she’d done for Soren.
As Soren and Bellamy turned to head towards the main house, where long tables had been laid out and people were gathering for a breakfast pulled together from the remnants of our food stores, I noticed that Esme was still standing there.
Maybe Bellamy had told her to wait for us.
Esme wouldn’t ignore a direct request from a friend, even if it made her anxious. And anxious she seemed to be, shifting back and forth on each foot as she was.
Feeling a sudden urge to close the distance between us, I lengthened my stride as much as I could without breaking into an all out run.
You would think I was sprinting at Esme, considering the way her face dropped.
I damn near stumbled over my own feet in an attempt to catalog my surroundings and find a reason for her sudden change in expression—surely something horrifying based on the lack of color in her face.
The only change, and it was minute at that, was that the wind had shifted, now moving downhill, from behind me down towards Esme.
It brushed her hair off her shoulders in a particularly entrancing way, but that was only a second thought to the look of absolute terror that only continued to bloom on her face.
This time, I did actually start running.
Unfortunately for me, so did Esme.