Blakeshire (Insight #9)(20)

“You can stay here as long as you want,” Chrispin offered.

I weighed my options right now, with Madison Marie first and foremost in my mind. There had been an epic battle at the palace tonight. Donalt was lurking. I knew if I took her to her wing, she would be safe, but I wanted it to be perfect before I did. She had to be exhausted, and even though it would not take me long to get her back to Esterious, I knew she would not rest when she got there. Apparently, she had an obsession in my palace she wanted to chase, which was fine with me. But I also knew she would use that as a distraction, place what was building between us in the back of her mind. Call me selfish, but I didn’t want to be second on her mind, not until I knew she understood the real me. The non-king Drake.

“I’m staying out of Esterious until she’s rested and strong. By then, Zander and all of you should have her wing ready.”

Marc met Chrispin’s stare, finding an ‘I told you so’ smirk.

“Apparently, Aden is coming with us, too. Where is Draven?” I asked.

“Healing.”

“Is he badly hurt?” I don’t know why, but I felt bonded to Draven. I knew his soul. I didn’t know how I knew it, but I did. I had made a vow to myself to protect him the first instance I saw him.

“No, we all just need rest. We need to regroup,” Marc said, looking away from me.

There was that underlying message again. They wanted Landen and Willow here. I had the instincts to warn Landen that he was running out of time when it came to his own people, but something told me he already knew that.

I didn’t bother to respond; instead, I walked back into the room and locked the door behind me.



Madison



I had to close my eyes for a second, find my breath. Fear was still absent, but that boy wreaked havoc on my soul. He was so consuming that when he left my line of sight, I always felt cold. I felt my soul reach to pull his back to mine. No matter how jealous I was, I could not deny how at home I felt at his side. How alive I felt around him.

Once I had regained my balance, I reached to turn off the light. I had been hiding out in Olivia and Chrispin’s house. Olivia was Willow’s childhood friend who had been attached to me since Willow came for us nearly a week ago. Chrispin was her soul mate, and conveniently one of Drake’s brothers. Long lost brother.

Drake was truly a broken soul. He had been lied to his entire life, then out of nowhere he discovered that Willow was not who he thought she was, that his father, Livingston, had in some way lived a double life. That he had a family that he never knew, tucked away in the dimension of Chara.

That would be a lot for anyone to take in, but add in the whole fight against evil and stand up to rule a damned dimension, and you had a broken man. It was hard not to have some degree of understanding for him.

There was a large walk-in closet just in front of this bathroom. One thing was for sure, no two homes in this dimension were built the same way. Olivia’s home had endless reading nooks and cubbyholes like this.

I moved past the closet and opened the door that had been closed slightly by Drake.

All the lamps in this guest room were off, with the exception of one of the ones on the bedside table—which was not how I left it. Darkness was not my friend; at least it wasn’t when I could feel fear.

I couldn’t see Drake, but I heard him and someone else’s muffled voice. Right as I went to put my shoes on, he came back in the bedroom and closed the door.

Acting as if this were some kind of regular routine, he slid off his shoes, took off his belt, and slowly started to unbutton his dark shirt.

“What are you doing?” I asked in the most nonchalant voice I could manage. How could he go from wanting to cover a temptation one moment to undressing in front of me the next?

“It’s late. I’m tired,” he said with a bit of a smirk as he pulled his shirt out of its tucked position and let each side fall open, revealing a tight black tank that amplified every firm muscle in his chest. For some reason, he decided to keep his button up shirt on as he made his way to my bag, which was on the dresser in front of the bed. He meddled around in the side pockets before finding my phone—a phone that definitely didn’t work in this dimension.

I’ll give him one thing: he was a fast leaner. He managed to find the music app, then my favorite playlist. The music was Draven and Aden’s, but it was low key, acoustic guitars and slow drums. I loved it simply because the lyrics were ones that I had written, ones that my dreams had always made me feel. Even though Draven hadn’t felt the emotions of the lyrics firsthand or in the same way, he sang them so perfectly that my soul hummed. That album was made as a birthday gift for me a few years back. I listened to it every night as I feel asleep, thinking of the boy that had inspired the emotion behind the music. Never in a million years would I have assumed that tonight when that sound would be playing, that he would be standing a few feet away.

Last night, I had fumbled with my phone, waited for when I thought Drake was asleep before I slid on my headphones and fell into the sound. When I woke up—or should I say when we were woken up—I saw that one of the headphones was in Drake’s ear and the playlist was not only set to repeat, but turned up higher than I had left it.

Which led me to wonder if he knew how special that music was to me, or if right now he was silently telling me it was time to rest.

He set the phone on the bedside table.