Chapter 30 Mariella #3
I draw my knees into my chest. “So, when we’re together, after I’m recruited, I’m not—I’ve already—”
“The first time we were together, it wasn’t your first time,” he says quietly, staring at his empty hands.
I twist the button on the cuff of his shirt. How is it possible I’ll sleep with someone else while feeling this way about Parker?
He sits next to me, his mouth pulled to the side in a grimace. “Please tell me what you’re thinking.”
I’m unable to meet his gaze. “I want my first time to be with you, but you said when we have sex in the future, I’m not a virgin, so—” I suck in a breath.
The room seems too quiet, my stomach too tight.
I rush the words out. “If we do it now, what if it’s not what you expect?
” I peer up at him with my heart in my throat.
Parker’s leaning away from me, his brows drawn up. “That’s what you’re worried about?” A tentative smile builds on his lips. “Those things don’t matter.”
I don’t see how. Parker exudes confidence… and experience. “Really?”
He laughs. “Of course not.” He puts his arms around me and draws me into his chest. “Our time will come, and when it does, it’s”—he shakes his head—“everything.”
He guides me back down onto the bed, shifting so my back is flush against his warm chest. With his arms wrapped around me, I close my eyes, and the tension leaches from my body with each steady thump of his heart.
Parker stirs behind me, and I wake from my sleep. I turn to face him, his legs tangling with mine.
“Still feels like a dream, being able to touch you,” he says.
I press my lips to his. His kiss is slow and gentle, lacking the urgency of our previous encounters. We break apart and my heart sinks—he’s kissing me goodbye.
“I don’t want you to go,” I whisper.
“I promised I’d take you to see your mom,” he says. “When you’re ready.”
“I’m ready,” I say, despite my quickening pulse.
We stand from the bed, and I immediately miss Parker’s warm, reassuring touch and the scent clinging to his dress shirt as it slides from my shoulders.
I pass it to him, a flush creeping up my neck at his dilated pupils, his bronze gaze hovering over my exposed skin.
I step into my dress, struggling with the zip at the back.
“Let me,” Parker says. He steps up behind me, heat radiating from his body. “Ella, I want you to prepare yourself for the possibility your mother wasn’t a time traveler,” he says, dragging my zipper up. His knuckles brush my bare back, igniting a shiver over my skin.
I nod, my reply hitched in my throat.
Parker makes quick work buttoning his shirt and holds his palms out toward me. “You’ll have to help me,” he says. “As long as you can recall the memory, I’ll be able to take you to it.”
I slide my hands into his, and his fingers wrap around mine. “How?”
“Do you know what memory you want to enter?” he asks.
“Yes.”
“Close your eyes and imagine you’re in it now. Replay it in your mind, slowly, taking in every detail.”
I shut my eyes, the memory of my mother beside the ocean vivid in my mind. Waves rush against the shore, and the sun warms my back. My mother’s fingers are cool against my skin as she fastens her chain around my neck.
“What stands out the most from that memory?” Parker asks.
My mother pulls me into her, and the air rushes from my lungs. I can almost feel her arms wrapped around me. I was safe. Loved. And I wasn’t alone. “The way I felt in her arms,” I say, my voice wavering.
Electricity bursts to life between our palms, flowing up my arms until it’s lapping at my chest, like warm, rising water.
“Focus on that feeling,” Parker says, and my body begins to pulse.
I can’t believe it. I’m going to see my mother. Tears well behind my closed eyelids. I have so many questions for her. About our life before she died, and the handsome stranger who visited her in the hospital. I draw in a deep breath, fighting the vibrating air inside my lungs.
I wait for the feeling to overcome me, for the temperature to shift or the ocean breeze to hit me. But nothing happens. Parker’s grip on my hands tightens, and another strong wave of his power floods through me. I keep my eyes closed, centering all my attention on my mother.
“Pick a different sense,” Parker says through gritted teeth after another minute has passed.
“Okay.” I breathe in, remembering the salty ocean breeze, the sweetness of coconut sunscreen, and my mother’s fresh, citrus scent.
“Good. I can smell it,” Parker says, his voice swelling with pride.
The surrounding air presses against my skin, every cell shuddering. Parker releases my hands and my eyes snap open.
My stomach drops. We’re still standing in Parker and Rose’s apartment. “What…” I trail off at the confusion on Parker’s face.
“Something’s wrong,” he says, slightly out of breath. “I can’t access the memory. It’s as if… there’s a wall blocking me.”
My shoulders fall. “Is it me? Am I doing something wrong?”
“No. Both times I could feel your echo.” His golden eyes scour the room. “Let’s try a different memory?”
He retakes my hands, and I focus on the memory of my mother in our apartment, peeking through the curtains. I stood by her bedroom door, feet bare against the cool wooden floor. Parker’s power rushes into me, but the room stays whole around us.
“Different sense,” he says between gritted teeth.
Canned laughter hums from the TV, and cars fly past on the street below.
“Another,” Parker says.
My mother’s olive dress brushing her slender calves. The fabric swishes as she shifts her balance from one foot to another.
Parker’s grip is tighter than before, his hands clammy against my skin. We go on like this for another half hour, swapping between senses and memories, until Parker is panting, sweat beading down his brow. He breaks away, bending forward to plant his hands on his knees.
“Something must be wrong with my powers,” he says, straightening and re-extending his palms toward me. “Try picking a memory without your mother.”
My gaze slides from the hands reaching toward me to his heaving chest. “Should you take a break?” I say.
He shakes his head. “What do you think we did at Neurovida all day long?”
My stomach knots at his cold tone, but I retake his hands and shut my eyes.
Drawing in a deep breath, I search the void behind my closed lids for a memory.
The darkness seems to stretch forever, like a black, infinite tunnel.
The booming sound comes easily, intensifying until it’s hitting me from all sides. A cold shiver skitters through me.
Parker’s grip on my hands tightens. “What are you…?” he mutters under his breath, his energy rushing through me.
The room presses in on me, as if I’m a square being squeezed through a tight, circular space.
The sensation eases, a gust of cool air conditioning igniting pebbles across my skin.
My heart rate accelerates, my breaths now quickened, adrenaline-fueled pants.
The silent space surrounding me is thick with tension.
We’re no longer in Parker and Rose’s apartment.
A bloodcurdling scream pierces the air.
“Fuck,” Parker yells, yanking his hands from mine. Electricity erupts beneath my skin, and the bedroom reappears. Parker stumbles away from me with a gaping mouth.
“What was that?” I ask, my heart thrashing against my ribs.
“Why did you do that?” Parker’s face is pale, his eyes squeezed shut as if he’s in pain.
“What was it?” I ask again, but Parker remains silent, running a hand through his hair. “Please, Parker. I need answers. That was a dream I’ve had since I was a little girl. What happens to me?”
Parker slumps onto the edge of his bed, and I perch beside him.
He’s silent for a beat with his head hung, then he turns to face me.
“I think… that was the day I lost my powers.” His voice turns raspy, as if each word scrapes against his vocal cords.
“You were hurt, Ella. But now I have my powers back, Rose and I are going to stop anything from happening to you.”
“Why didn’t you tell me?” I sit up beside him. “Why keep these things from me?”
“Because I’m selfish. And it’s easier when you’re you, not a time traveler or an Alpha, and you’re here and safe.
” He cups my cheek, rubbing his thumb over my cheekbone.
“I want you to live in the now. Knowing things about your future will drive you crazy. Please trust me, everything’s going to be okay. I’ll make sure of it.”
I nod, wanting to believe he’s right.
He stretches his hands toward me. “Let’s try visiting another memory of your mother?”
“Okay,” I say, resting my palms on his.
I repeat the same process as before, focusing on the darkness behind my eyelids before recalling the warmth of my mother’s embrace beside the ocean, but the seaside park doesn’t appear.
Another thirty minutes later, Parker groans.
His hair’s sticking up at odd angles from the excessive number of times he’s run his hands through it.
“I don’t understand why it’s not working.
There must be something wrong with my powers.
I’ll go and speak with McGregor. Maybe there’s something in his journal about losing skills or—”
“It’s okay, Parker,” I say, despite the fierce ache in my chest.
“No,” he says, his voice breaking. “I promised I’d take you to see your mom.”
“I guess I’ll have to go and see her myself… once I learn to travel at Neurovida.” I don’t know when I made the final decision. I guess deep down, a part of me always knew. I can’t explain it, but something is pulling me toward Neurovida.
Parker stills, his eyebrows furrowing as if he’s heard me wrong. Then his mouth pulls into a wide, dimpled grin, and he rushes toward me, lifting me off my feet. He holds me against his chest, engulfing me in his scent.
“I’m going to miss you,” he says into my ear, and he lowers me to the ground.
His hands slip into mine and my fingertips tingle, as if they have their own burning need for his touch.
“When will I see you again?” I ask.
“At Neurovida, when you’re recruited.” He smiles, but no dimples appear.
My heart sinks. It isn’t fair. Our time together has barely begun. I bump my shoulder against his. “But I’ll never see you again.”
“It’ll still be me. I’ll just be younger.” He laughs. “And dumber.”
It might still be him, but his past self won’t remember me. He won’t know me the way Parker does. He’ll be a stranger.
Parker reaches up and brushes the tears from my cheeks.
“I know this is hard, but I can’t keep showing up and disappearing from your life.
It wouldn’t be fair to you, and you’ve seen what being here for so long did to Rose.
Little by little, you lose pieces of yourself.
I don’t want that to happen to me. I need my mind clear for what’s ahead of me. ”
I nod, but inside, my heart’s breaking.
“I’ll travel from here,” he says, his amber eyes dim. My heart rate doubles.
This is it. I’ll never see him again. I’ll never have the chance to ask him my questions, to learn about his life before Neurovida, his fears and his dreams, to love him the way I want.
He tucks my hair behind my ear. “Promise me you’ll live your life to its fullest until Neurovida?”
“I will,” I say, pressing my lips to his.
He cups my face in his hands and kisses me tenderly, as if his touch might shatter me into one hundred tiny pieces.
When he lets me go, his brows are drawn, a sudden coldness about him.
“Rose will kill me for telling you, but you need to know. We were betrayed by a man named Matthews. He was one of us. Or at least, we thought he was. He turned Neurovida against us. When you meet him in the future, don’t trust him. ”
I nod. “I’ll see you in two years.”
He presses a kiss to my forehead, his warm gaze filled with an emotion I can’t place. “Goodbye, Ella. I love you.”
Hands balled into fists at his side, he lowers his head, and his body blurs. Then he lifts his head—and there’s that roguish smile that still makes me weak at the knees. “Hey, Ella? Before I forget, when you meet me at Neurovida, go easy on me, okay?”
“What do you mean?”
“Like I said, I was an idiot,” he confesses, and before I have the chance to blink, he’s gone.