Discover the Void Page 2

  I brushed past him, needing to free up some space between the two of us. He was crowding me, the earthy scent of the dirt that seemed to cling to him like a lover mixed with the scent of the cigarette was invading my senses and causing me to feel more settled than I cared to.

  “The operative phrase is going to be,” I pointed out, gesturing with my hands in hopes it would stop them from shaking. I turned back to look at him. “I think, if we’re going to do this, we have some ground rules.”

  “Like what?” He stuck the cigarette back between his lips.

  The fact that he was willing to humor me was a morsel I was willing to jump on.

  “Well, the fact that you can’t just, you know, have your way with me whenever you want,” I said, unable to look at him as I uttered the words.

  “You are.” His lips twitched up but it was like someone set his eyes on fire, the way they blazed with emerald intensity I had never seen before.

  “What?”

  “A virgin.”

  “And I still want to go to school,” I continued, ignoring the familiar ache in my cheeks, the way he seemed to have the ability to make me blush at the worst times.

  “Fuck that.” He took the cigarette out of his mouth and began to wave it around with his hand. “I ain’t letting you go back to that shithole, especially not with Davidson.”

  “It’s important to me,” I said through clenched teeth.

  “You want to be in a place that’s fed you nothing but lies?” he demanded. “They kept me in a crypt -“

  “You’re dangerous!” I bellowed, throwing my arms out. “Everyone knows that. They did what they had to do in order to -“

  “So, experimenting on me is okay,” he said, taking a step closer. “That justifies the means? I didn’t consent to shit. I didn’t want them to do what they did to me, but I didn’t get a fucking choice. And you’re okay with that? Miss Virgin, Miss No Fucking?”

  I clenched my teeth together and looked away. What could I say? How could I argue with that? He was right.

  But it was different, wasn’t it?

  If the experiments provided information that would help the Keepers protect humans from the demons, the shades, the heathens…that was good, right?

  I didn’t know.

  “I ain’t going to rape you, babes,” he told me, his voice dropping an octave. He stuck the cigarette back in his mouth, taking a long drag as he sucked in a breath. “Already told you I wouldn’t need to. But mark my words, we will consummate the marriage.”

  “If we -“

  “We will,” he insisted. “No school. Too dangerous.”

  “But -“

  He held up a hand and my lips suddenly glued together. I couldn’t talk even if I wanted to. I glared.

  Suddenly, I was confronted by a sense of deja vu. I had been in this space no longer than ten minutes, but only now did I realize I had been here before. The rotted wood, the termite holes, the spiders that crawled from one hole to the next without any fear of being squished by a rolled up newspaper. Even the window had that crack in the corner behind the ugly curtains.

  I had been here before.

  But how? When?

  Suddenly, Keaton popped in front of me. This time, he blew smoke out of the side of his mouth, giving me a long, appraising look.

  “You good now, doll?” he drawled.

  “Your dream!” I exclaimed, jutting my forefinger into the air. He tilted his head to the side, giving me a long look. “You took me here when I was dreaming.” I glanced around. “Where’d you get the couch?”

  “Fuck the dream,” he said dismissively. “Let’s finish the fucking conversation. The longer we’re here and you’re not married…” He let his voice trail off.

  I narrowed my eyes. “Is this where I’m going to have to live forever?” I asked.

  “Don’t sound so sad about it,” he snapped. “We could live with the other breathers if ya want. I don’t care. I’m just glad to be out of that damned crypt. And I have no plans of ever going back there, you get me? Which means no more fucking schooling from Jim Davidson.”

  “What is with your hatred of him?” I asked. I moved to the couch and dropped into a sitting position. It sagged easily under my weight. I leaned back, my neck on the cushion of the couch so I could stare up at the stained ceilings with ease.

  “We have history,” he said around the cigarette, arms crossed over his chest. It almost looked as though he was pouting, but Keaton was too intimidating to reduce his current stature as something so menial. He snapped his eyes back to me. “You got more rules you want to discuss, babes? Or can we get this whole marriage thing rolling?”

  I swallowed, my mouth suddenly dry. I picked my head off the couch and locked eyes with him. “You have to promise me,” I said slowly. “You have to promise that you’ll find my brother.”

  “Whoa, whoa.” He held up his hands after flicking the cigarette away. It vanished before it hit the ground. “I promise I’ll find everything I can about him and what happened. And if I can find him, I will. That’s a guaran-fucking-tee. But I’m not God.”

  My shoulders sagged. There was nothing more I could do. If I wanted information on Richard, I would have to go through with this, even if the notion of marrying Keaton made me want to wretch the contents of my stomach itself all over his rotted floor.

  “Then, yes,” I said sullenly. “I’m ready to marry you.”

  3

  Without warning, Keaton swept me up in his arms and spun me around. It was uncharacteristically sweet - like he actually wanted to marry me rather than a tool he could use to get out of his crypt permanently - and I clung to his shoulders, unprepared for the movement between us. And then he cackled, gripping me even tighter to his chest. I was overwhelmed with the scent of rich soil and night rain, and for a moment, I closed my eyes and let myself revel in it. It wasn’t…terrible, even if the soil was from a cemetery and the rain was cast to wash away sins.

  My gut trembled. I didn’t know how else to describe it. But I had no idea what that meant. Was I making the right decision? Was this the only path to find out anything about Richard?

  I didn’t know.

  It was the only path I could grasp, the only one I could do something about.

  “You know what this means, babes,” he said, pulling away from me so his eyes could find my own. “We gotsta celebrate!”

  “Do we?” I asked, tilting my head to the side.

  “Ah, come on,” he said. “I’ll take you on the best date of your life. The Night Queen has some of the best alcohol in town. Will make a breather like you’s eyes water.”

  “I’m twenty,” I snapped.

  He furrowed his brows. “So?”

  I pulled out of his arms, forcing Keaton to set me down. “I can’t actually drink,” I said. “Not legally, anyway. And what is The Night Queen? I’ve never heard of it. Is it in Ember Hollow?”

  “You think I’m taking you out in your world?” He threw his head back and laughed. “Fuck no. I’m taking you out here, in the Void!”

  Keaton led me into the bedroom. I was tense the entire way. It felt like each step I took, quicksand gripped at my ankles, trying to pull me under. Part of me couldn’t help but wonder if I shouldn’t just let myself be smothered by it all. I wouldn’t get what I needed about Richard, but I wouldn’t have to marry Keaton either.

  Obviously, Richard was the priority.

  But I also couldn’t help but wish I wasn’t in a position where I had to choose between my brother and freedom. My dumbass was going to choose my brother every time, no matter what the consequences. No matter how badly he screwed up.

  “You’re dragging your feet,” Keaton mentioned. Somehow, he had popped behind me, causing me to nearly jump out of my skin.

  I hated that he could disappear and reappear so fast, I wasn’t able to keep track of him. Granted, it wasn’t like I cared, but considering I was the one who freed him from his crypt, I felt like I had some sort of res
ponsibility tied up in him. All I needed to do was open my mouth and utter his name three times again, and I could send him back to the crypt, if I needed to. And it couldn’t be anyone else. Since I released him, I had to send him back. That was how it went.

  “I don’t know what to wear,” I said sullenly, crossing my arms over my chest. It was such an immature thing to say, but I couldn’t help it.

  “Is that it?” He snapped his fingers, and suddenly, the outfit I had been wearing before suddenly morphed into a sleek red dress with a dangerously low cut. It hugged my curves, dipped between my breasts so the skin showed, and there was a high slit running up my legs. “Jesus Christ.”

  “There is no way I’m wearing this,” I said, ignoring the way his eyes lingered on the expanse of my skin, the way the bright green smoldered into a darker shade. The way he locked his bottom lip like he was about to bite into the most appetizing thing he had seen all day. “It’s too…” I couldn’t even find the right word to describe it. My mouth went dry and no words were coming out.

  “Maybe you’re right,” he said, taking his fingers through his wild blond hair.

  I opened my mouth, ready to argue, when his words hit me full-force. “Wait,” I said. “What did you say?”

  “I don’t want other guys seein’ you like this.” He was mumbling under his breath, eyes drawing down my body. But there was nothing lecherous about the stare. If anything, he looked intent, almost even studious. “This is for my eyes only. I don’t want to hafta pry eyes out of sockets and rip intestines from stomachs.”

  He snapped his fingers before I could say anything. In place of the dress, there were tight black jeans and a plain white t-shirt.

  “Fuck,” he muttered.

  “What’s wrong with this?” I liked the material of the clothes. They weren’t scratchy and uncomfortable. They molded to my body and felt like velvet even if they didn’t look like it.

  “You still look too goddamn beautiful,” he said. His fingers crossed his lips, chin resting in his palms, eyes still narrowed on me.

  Under normal circumstances, I would have criticized him for his words. I didn’t want the flattery.

  But Keaton wasn’t the type to flatter, and I knew this. What he said, he meant. There was no reason to bullshit me; he had nothing to gain from it. Which only made it worse. Because he meant that I was beautiful. And I wasn’t sure how that made me feel.

  “Fuck it.” He whipped up a cigarette and offered me his arm after sticking the unlit death stick in his mouth. “Well, babes? You wanna see what the Void is all about?”

  I hesitated. The truth was, I was curious. I didn’t know anything about this place, and now that I was here, I wanted to explore it. This place wasn’t for the living, but it also wasn’t exactly for the dead. It clearly wasn’t Heaven, but all my knowledge of Hell implied that this wasn’t a home for the damned either. It was kind of an in-between, a world for the dead before they officially moved onto their final resting place.

  I didn’t know anything about the world, about when souls moved on, when they didn’t. Maybe Keaton would tell me if I asked.

  I stepped forward and before I truly thought about the consequences of my actions, I slid my arm through his. His teeth hung over his bottom lip in a predatory smirk. I expected to pop to our destination - wherever that was - only to find that he led me out of the front door and over to a detached garage. He flicked his wrist and the door crawled open to reveal an old car. It had a long hood, a dark velvet color that almost looked purple, and despite being trapped in his onyx crypt for a century, the exterior shined even in the darkness.

  My mouth fell open and I couldn’t help myself as I dropped Keaton’s arm in order to run my fingers over the hood. It looked as soft and as smooth as it felt. I almost expected it to come alive just like everything else seemed to be within the confines of this world.

  “You like?” Keaton came to stand by me just a little too close without actually touching me.

  “She’s beautiful,” I said.

  “She certainly is.”

  I pulled my gaze from the car and looked over at him, his emerald eyes bright and intense as he stared at me. I swallowed, and he led me to the passenger side of the car before pulling it open. My eyebrows shot up my forehead.

  “What?” he asked, eyes crawling over my face. It was like he didn’t miss a thing, not one flicker of emotion that touched my features. “You think I can’t be polite? You think I can’t open the door for my girl?”

  And worse, he could read me like a book.

  By the time I slid into the cushy seat, his words suddenly hit me.

  His girl?

  And yet, I couldn’t bring myself to argue, to put up any kind of fight. There was no point in doing so, not when he wasn’t being…bad.

  So far, he hadn’t touched me in any inappropriate way. He hadn’t forced himself on me or even been mean. He was…exactly what he said he was: a heathen who wanted the freedom to explore the Void and, if the occasion called for it, the living, breathing world, without being bound to a name. I strapped my seatbelt on just as he took his own seat.

  He glanced over at me, snapping his fingers to start the car. It rumbled as the ignition turned somewhere. The seat vibrated underneath me.

  “You don’t need that thing,” he said, jutting his chin at my strap. “You think I’m going to let anything happen to you?”

  I opened my mouth, shut it, then opened it again. I fiddled with my bangs, staring out the passenger seat window. “To be honest, I don’t know what I expect from you,” I admitted.

  He grunted. “You’re mine,” he said. There was a growl to his tone, a slight possession I hadn’t expected. Not because he wasn’t possessive, but because there was no threat. It wasn’t like Davidson was sitting in the back and needed a reminder that I engaged in a deal with Keaton. “That means I won’t let anything happen to you.” A beat. “You’re my only way up there. I’m not going to risk it.”

  “Where are we going anyway?” I asked, wrinkling my nose as I began to watch the scenery change the further Keaton began to drive. I didn’t want to admit it, but there was something about his words that unsettled me. I didn’t like the way they made me feel, but even worse, I didn’t like how I felt about it at all. I was a mess of contradictions, and I needed to sort out my shit.

  “To a bar,” he said. “The Night Queen.”

  I frowned but didn’t ask him to elaborate. Instead, I leaned back, keeping my eyes outside. This place, this city, wherever we were, looked terribly similar to earth, to any street in any city. The sky was dreary and grey with an orange tint to it. I wasn’t sure if that was because the sun was trying to penetrate through the overcast or if this was the color of the sky down here.

  There were all sorts of people who walked on the street. Some looked human, like Keaton - minus the moss growing in patches on his skin - while some looked other. One man had a fish head with legs. Another was a spider with shoes on her feet, tipping her hat as she crossed the street. Some of the humans had blue skin or patches of skin formulating other worldly patterns - one looked like she had the very stars from the sky tattooed to her lavender skin.

  I wasn’t sure how long we had been driving for since my fascination with what was going on outside the car outweighed everything else.

  Until Keaton pulled up to a run down bar with holes in the walls. Maybe a literal hole in the wall. There was a line wrapped around the building with all sorts of people - a man with a goldfish bowl and a goldfish for a head, a woman with scales up and down her long legs that trailed up past her tight dress. But they all stopped and looked at us like they recognized the car.

  Like they recognized Keaton.

  “Oh, I almost forgot.” Without warning, he snapped his fingers and suddenly, a silver band in the shape of a snake wrapped itself snugly around my left ring finger. “Before we go in.” He locked eyes with me. “Just so everyone knows you belong to me.”

  4

&n
bsp; The ring didn’t feel clunky or overbearing. I wished it had. It fit me perfectly. It was all I could stare at, even as Keaton led me past the line of curious and frustrated onlookers, all clamoring for a chance to get into this place.

  “Something wrong with it?” Keaton asked, though he wasn’t looking at me at all. He kept his eyes in front of him, careful with each step he took. “What, it’s not up to your standards?”

  I frowned, wrinkling my nose at his insinuation. Before I could respond, he reached the front of the line.

  “You out?” the bouncer said. He was as big as a hippo, with little to no neck and a nose that seemed to have its nostrils in a constant state of flare. “That’s a surprise.”

  “You gonna let me in, or do I have to demonstrate why I was in at all?” Keaton asked nonchalantly. He glanced at his nailbeds before snapping his fingers and procuring another cigarette.

  The bouncer snuffed like a horse, meaty fist on the velvet rope. It was only then did he notice me. He glanced back at Keaton. “She with you?” he asked.

  Keaton threw his arm around my shoulder. The grip he had on me didn’t match the casual tone. He held me just tight enough to pinch me, but not for it to bruise. “She’s my wife,” he snapped.

  The bouncer’s eyes widened and looked at me again. “Her?” he asked in disbelief. “You managed to bag a thing like her?”

  “You wanna let us in before I remove the eyeballs spurting from their sockets?” Keaton asked in his low, dangerous drawl. This was the tone he employed when he wasn’t fucking around.

  As much as I didn’t like the bouncer’s eyes on me, didn’t like the way they traveled up and down my body, I didn’t want Keaton to hurt him. I didn’t want Keaton to draw any attention to himself. He had just gotten back here, just gotten a taste of his freedom, and we weren’t even married yet.