The Becoming of Noah Shaw (The Shaw Confessions #1)(5)

Her eyebrows lift as her lips part. “Are you serious?”

“Deadly.”

She bites her lower lip. “I don’t want you to regret not being there.”

“Won’t,” I say, slipping one hand beneath her shirt.

“How do you know?”

My mind returns to my mother’s funeral, my father staring at her coffin with dead eyes. “My father died the day my mother did. A monster took his place.”

“I know, but—”

“No, there’s nothing else. No one else. He’s gone—he can’t hurt anyone anymore. There’s no one and nothing in our way.” I pause, resting my fingers on the clasp of her bra. “We should celebrate.”

A laugh escapes her throat. “Not really your style.”

“No, but it is yours.”

Wide eyes slit into a cat’s slant. She bows her head, conceding. “Has anyone ever told you you use sex as a coping mechanism?”

“Yes, why?”

“Oh, no reason.” A pause fills the air. Then Mara arcs her body toward mine, her lips toward mine, and softly flicks her tongue into my mouth.

I’m split open with desire, happiness. We smile against each other’s skin, and I inhale the salt-sweat smell of her, kiss her again, on her throat. Collarbones. Her hands thread through my hair and mine reach her chest—she gasps, and the sound alone has me spinning with heat. It’s been only hours since I’ve looked at her this way, but it could be years, centuries, for all that it matters. I’m starved for her, all the time, even now—I want every part of her, to devour her, to inhale her, but I also want her slowly; to see her, to listen to her, to listen inside of her, and so I force myself to stop. To trail my fingers slowly over the soft skin of her thighs, and pull back to see her expression.

Just looking at her face unmoors me. Cheeks flushed, skin shimmering, lips red and swollen with kissing, her head is tilted back, throat arched under the dome. But she can feel me watching her and reels her head back up, takes my hands, and pulls them onto her hips. The sound of her silk skirt sliding up against her silk skin is like silver on crystal.

Who is she? Who is this girl who would allow me to do this, here, now? And how am I allowed to have her?

I kiss the inside of each knee and up, farther, the roughness of my cheek raising redness on her skin. Then she grips each of my forearms, rocks herself back, and in one agonising, shimmering moment, one of her hands reaches beneath the hem of her dress, between her legs. Then her underwear slips to the ground.

A sharp hitch of breath. Mine. My head tilts down to kiss her skin, all of it, every bit I can reach. Just as I feel the warmth of my breath meeting the warmth of her body, my mind seizes.

I’m not looking at Mara—I’m looking at a reflection in a distant, black, stagnant puddle below me. At a reflection that isn’t mine. And then I jump to meet it.





4


THE DIRECTION OF HIS DREAMS

THERE IS NO SOUND, NO air, as the rope strains against someone’s neck. Fingers claw at my throat—no, his throat—trying to undo what he’s done. Then, the thoughts—his thoughts, his voice—storm my mind.

Help me help me help me help me help me help me help me hel—

Above me, worn stone opens to grey sky as a murder of crows takes flight overhead. It’s the last thing I see through his eyes before I hear Mara scream my name.



I am in my body again, staring up at the veined white marble ceiling of the mausoleum, not at the sky, not at dark, wet stone. I see Mara in front of me, not emptiness.

“What happened?” Her voice is panicked, urgent, and I realise then that I’m gasping for air.

“Someone—” Someone what? My neck is still raw, and I reach for the rope that was just there.

“Did you see something—”

Images flicker behind my eyes, final still frames the boy captured before he died. Ruined stone, handmade tiles. A dead pigeon, a pile of feathers and bone in the corner of the . . . tower. He hung himself in a tower.

“He didn’t want it,” I say, knowing it without knowing how.

“Who?” Mara’s hands cup my face. “Noah, what happened?”

I steady myself on the altar, and my eyes fall on the heavy wooden door, opened just a crack. “He killed himself here.”

Mara is off the altar now and braced, her body humming with adrenaline. “Who?”

“I don’t know.”

“Where?”

“The ruins,” I say, leading her to the door.



I’ve never been able to hear anyone’s thoughts before. Gifted, Afflicted, Carriers, whatever the fuck we are—when one of us is dying, or about to, I feel what they feel—their pain and terror connects us. And I see what they see—enough to find out where they are, usually, but never with enough time to actually help them. I’ve grown used to failing them after I’ve seen and felt, and so many die—there’s an emptiness that bleeds in from the edges, fills up the space where Feelings should be. I don’t even feel guilty anymore—if it happens and I’m in public, I beg off and either invent an excuse (Sorry, PMS) or deflect and say/do something assholic. It’s exhausting, being a witness, being a fraction of a victim each time—and there have been more that Mara knows not of. I don’t lie to her (much), but I sweep dark things into the darkest corner of my mind so I can be with her, enjoy her, feel and see and hear her, because it’s too late for them. I can’t keep these memories in that corner forever, but I can close the door on them and step back into the present.