Elena really was a goody-good shoe. Lucian would love her. I was really worried about the rest of Paegeia when this sort of news would become public. They were going to force Paegeia down her throat. That was for sure.
“What is your favorite color?” I asked, as her floral scent still caressed my nose. She smelled fantastic and just perfect. Not too strong and sweet. Just somewhere in the middle, perfect.
“Green,” she said, and looked around.
“Green?”
“Yes, forest green.” Her dark blonde hair was up in a messy bun today, and she wore a thick blue scarf around her neck.
“Are you saying that because trees surround you, or is that really your favorite color?”
“No.” She chuckled. “It’s really my favorite color. Yours?”
“Depends on the day and mood. I love colors.” I smiled, but telling her now that forest green was my favorite too, well, I doubted she’d buy it.
“Okay, what is it today?”
“Forest green.”
She laughed and shook her head. She had the most beautiful elfin ears. Not that they carried a point at the top, but they were long and delicate. It suits her oval face.
She was still nervous, and I couldn’t believe that she never skipped class before. It was fun.
“Favorite holiday?” she asked.
“Christmas,” I answered.
“Why?” Her piercing green eyes, the same as her father, carried just as much curiosity about me as I had about her.
“Because it’s the one day that is peaceful.”
She nodded slowly, thinking about my answer. “So, I take it that your life isn’t peaceful?”
“I’m a bit of a mess.”
“No, you don’t say.” Her sarcasm dripped from her tone, and I chuckled. I looked away from those glossy, kissable lips as I wondered how they would feel against mine.
“Not what you think. I’m more in a rebellion stage, and I guess that is the main reason my dad asked me to come with him? Make me feel useful.”
“Useful? You are eighteen, Blake. What responsibilities do you have to make you feel useless at this age?”
“Good question, but I’m afraid you are not ready yet for that answer.”
“Ugh, now you sound like my father.” She had the same gentle eyes as King Albert, and right now, they were slightly drawn, sad.
I squinted. “What do you mean?”
She shook her head and huffed. “Nothing, forget I said it.”
It was a slip-up. Did she know about dragons?
“Please, I’m going to die of curiosity if you do not tell me.”
She laughed. “You won’t. It’s just his job. Sometimes I feel he is not totally honest with me, and when I ask him straight out, he gives me that answer. That I’m not ready yet.”
Shit, Jako didn’t tell her? My father would not love this. “So, what does your father do?”
“I told you he has a high-security job that needs him in other places from time to time.”
“Three months?”
“Yes, three months.” She smiled. Her body and facial features changed. She didn’t look at me at all.
“You’re lying to me now?”
“No.” She smiled. “Why do you want to know?”
“I’m curious.”
She took a deep breath and shook her head.
“You can trust me.”
“I don’t know you that well, Blake, and from what I’m seeing, I’m not completely sure that I can trust you.”
My lips curved. “What, because I smoke and drink?”
“Yes, those are not excellent qualities.”
“It’s just a habit, Elena, says nothing about my character.”
“I beg the difference.”
“So, you’re going to ask me to stop drinking and smoking now?”
Her gaze flickered to mine. “You would do that?”
“I might. It depends.”
“Depends on what?”
I chuckled again, and she growled in frustration.
“Fine, don’t tell me.”
“So, what is it going to take for you to trust me, saving your life?”
She laughed. “You think my life needs saving?”
“I don’t know. You seem like a damsel in distress. Maybe you don’t even know it. Maybe that is why your father doesn’t want to tell you the truth?”
She stared at me. I hit a nerve.
“Did I say something wrong?”
“No, you might have just said something right, for once,” she mumbled the last part, and went immediately into thought. She hugged her gray coat that she wore over a shirt and a pair of jeans.
“You think that is why your father moves every three months?”
“I told you my father is in a high-security defense job. No, it’s not why we move every three months.” She was lying again. The high-security job was just a cover story. She did not know why they were moving. This was making this situation twenty times worse.
“Then why did you zone out on me?”
She laughed. “Can we please change the subject? You are way too observant than I thought.”
I shrugged. “I’m great with reading people.”
“Mm, I can tell.”
I chuckled. “Okay, fine. The subject’s changed. Favorite music?”
“Everything. I love music. Yours?”
“Mine,” I said.
She gasped. “You write music?”
“I’m in a band, or was. We had a bit of a fall out before I left.”
“Can you play an instrument?”
“A few.”
“Oh, man,” she whined, and I laughed. “You are the ultimate rocker, aren’t you?”
“I don’t know about the ultimate rocker, but yes, I love to perform.”
“Are you any good?”
“I guess you will have to see.”
“Are you signing up for the school play?”
I gave her a raised eyebrow look. “No, I’ll die before I’m going to star in a school play. You haven’t answered a question, what is your favorite holiday?”
“Halloween. My dad used to take me trick or treating. It was some of the best memories I had, and I guess it’s why Halloween is my favorite. Christmas is somber in our house, and we really do not celebrate the rest.” She sighed.
Jako, what are you doing? Was it because of this colony that was chasing them? Why did he never tell Elena? Now that was the question of the century.
“You don’t celebrate the others?”
“No.” She smiled. “Please don’t ask me why? My dad is paranoid because of his job.”
“The high-security job?”
“Yes,” she spoke slowly. She must have picked up that I didn’t believe that at all.
“It’s fine. You will tell me the truth when you are ready.”
“Why do you think that I’m not telling you the truth now?”
“I’m great at reading people, Elena. I already know your quirk when you are not completely honest.”
“Shut up.”
“It’s okay. I get you do not trust me yet, but you will. Soon, with your life.”
She chuckled again. “My life does not need saving.”
I raised my eyebrows at her. “I love to disagree.”
“Why do I get a feeling you know more than what you are supposed to? Who are you exactly, Blake?”
I chuckled. “I don’t think you will believe me if I tell you. Maybe your father is right about one thing.”
“Try me.”
“Oh, so now you want me to trust you, but you can’t give me the same courtesy?”
“It’s not the same.”
“It’s exactly the same, Elena.”
“Okay, fine. Whatever. You are freaking me out just a little.” She folded her arms again, closing off her body.
“Sorry, I didn’t mean to. I’m just fucking around a bit.” I smiled.
“That is not nice, Blake. That says a lot about your character. Taking my insecurities and messing around with me.”
“Oh, so your dad and how you feel he is hiding something from you are insecurities now?”
She grunted again. “Why do you do that?”
I chuckled. “I told you, I want to know you, Elena, but you have walls.”
“And there is a reason for that, I told you, opening up to people only leaves me with heartache when I have to move again.”
“Heartache is part of life.”
“That it is, but too much heartache is not good.” She sighed.
“So, his moving around has taken a toll on you? You spoke to him about it?”
“Yeah, many times, and he just keeps telling me he has no choice.”
“Why did your mother leave?” Was it Tanya?
“I would love to know that, too. Maybe she was tired of moving around.”
“Then why didn’t she take you with her?”
“That is another question I would love an answer.”
“Sorry I didn’t know.”
“It’s okay. You couldn’t have known.”
“You think it’s because of what your father does?”
She nodded. “It could. He didn’t want to tell me, so she might have figured it out.”
“And yet she didn’t take you with her? That makes little sense.”
“Maybe she didn’t want me.”
“That is just ridiculous.” I tried to make her feel less unwanted, and she chuckled.
She was really complex. I get why Jako was doing this, but I didn’t understand why he was so paranoid that they didn’t even celebrate other holidays.
“So, do you have any friends here? If you move around, you must be a newbie too?”
She nodded. “No, I learned the hard way that I’m not privileged enough to have friends.”
“Stop feeling sorry for yourself. It’s your choice.”
“It hurts when I have to leave, and I told you my father is paranoid. Telling him about you will not happen?”
“Why not?”
“Because he would dig up everything he can about you and make you feel uncomfortable.”
I laughed. “Let him. He might be surprised by what he finds.”
Elena smiled again. She looked so much like her father. She had his smile and eyes, but there are definitely parts of queen Catherine in her too. Her chin for one, and her cheekbones.
They would’ve been great parents.
“You are not afraid of anything, are you?” she asked.
“Nope?”
“We are so not concentric, Blake.”
I chuckled at her art terms. “Concentric?”
“A common center. We don’t share that at all.”
“Why do you say that?”
“I’m afraid of everything. The things I know, the things I don’t know.”
“Tell me what terrifies you? The things you know.”
She took a deep breath. “You?” she muttered.
My lips curve. “I terrify you.” Well, she wasn’t wrong. She did not know the beast that was lingering inside of me.
“Yes, you. I have known you for about three days, and I can’t seem to escape you, whether you are with me.” She shut her eyes, and I laughed. She slipped up a lot.
“You think a lot about me?”
“Come on, Blake, all the girls think about you. The last time I checked, I was a girl. What terrifies me is that I seem to be the focal point of your attention.”
“Why?”
“Because in less than three months, I won’t be here, and I’m never going to see you again.”
“You really believe that?”
“It’s been my life for the past fifteen years. Yes, I believe that.”
“So, you don’t think that I would keep in touch?”
“It’s not the same, and you know that.”
I chuckled, remembering what my dad told me about my looks. “And that terrifies you?”
“Yes, it does. I’m not good at saying goodbye. It’s one reason I do not make friends. It’s hard on me.”
Silence lingered.
“So as much as I enjoyed this, please, just stop, okay. Just leave me alone, because I do not think it’s easy to say goodbye to someone like you.”
She got up and put her backpack over her shoulder.
I couldn’t get up or follow her. I couldn’t even tell her to stop. It was as if an invisible force were holding me in place and locking my lips.
No, this cannot be happening.
