Antiphon

“Very.”

“So, something else, then. I know you’re in danger.”

“I’ll be fine, don’t worry.”

But I am worrying. He reaches for me, and, as he pulls me into a kiss, I begin to calm down. My breathing slows and my heart ticks back down to a nearly normal pace.

I look up at him. “It was really creepy, Luc. Promise me you’ll be careful.”

“I was born careful. Nothing’s going to happen.”

I wish I could believe him. I look up, and my mom is staring out the front window at us. I’m sure she thinks I’ve lost it, which isn’t going to help our cause at all. Especially after the Gabe thing earlier. I sigh. “So. you ready?”

“For what?”

“You know. The whole impressing the parents thing?”

“Oh. Yeah. About that. ”

“Come on, Luc. I thought you were good with this. I really want you to be able to hang here this summer.” More so now. I want him close.

“I’m really not up for it right now. I’d rather be alone with you,” he says, and his eyes are on fire, making me tingle all over.

“What are you thinking about?”

“All the really outrageous things I could do to you-how I could make you feel if you’d let me.”

I swallow thickly and take a deep breath as he pulls me to him. “Where’s this coming from all of a sudden? You’re the one who said we couldn’t. you know.” But the thing is, I’m starting to think about some of those “outrageous things” too.

“I’ve changed my mind. I want you,” he says, his lips hot on my neck.

I tip my head back, giving him easier access. “So the whole lust thing is. what? No big deal now?”

“Nope. No big deal,” he repeats as he reaches under my shirt. “We could just slide into the backseat. ”

“Jesus, Luc! My mother’s looking out the window at us right now,” I say, pushing him away and tugging at my shirt. “Why are you acting so weird?”

He smiles wickedly. “You’re driving me crazy.”

“Fine, then let’s go to your apartment.”

“It’s sort of a mess right now. Someone let some dogs in and they got into the trash. Tore it to shreds.”

“What? Who would do that?”

“Just an old friend. Nothing to worry about,” he says with a wildly wicked grin, and, just for a second, I’m sure I smell rotten eggs. “Let’s go somewhere else. I want you where I can make you crazy.” He kisses me, hard and deep, then slides over in the seat and starts the ignition. He lays his hand on my thigh as he pulls out of my driveway.

We pull over on the corner of First and Amistad, near the park at the edge of my neighborhood. Almost before the car has stopped, he’s all over me again. I look around and see the park is nearly empty. The play structure is abandoned, and the last of the moms is just pushing her stroller across the street in the pink dusk.

I lean into Luc’s burning kiss as his touch, hot on my skin, raises goose bumps all over. After a long, deep kiss, I pull back gasping for air, my heart hammering, and hear his honey sweet whisper in my ear, “I want you so bad.” I shudder as he eases his hands under my shirt and unhooks the clasp of my bra. My hand skims across his chest and under his T-shirt. “You won’t ever forget this. I promise,” he says, and I feel his fingertips burn a track across my belly toward the button of my jeans.

And it’s then that I notice he’s on fire. Hotter than he’s been in a long time. My breath catches. “Hold up,” I say, grabbing his hand just before it reaches its target. “I don’t know where this is coming from. You’ve been telling me for weeks that we can’t go there. I need to think.” But it’s really hard to think when he’s offering me what I want more than anything.

For just an instant I swear I see rage darken his face before it smoothes into a perfect calm. “What’s there to think about? I’m tired of waiting, Frannie. I want you so much I can’t stand it anymore. I promise I’ll make it amazing for you. The things I’ll do to you. ” The rest is lost as his hot tongue slips into my ear.

I can’t focus, thinking about the things I want him to do to me, but what he said before still echoes in my head. We can’t do this until I know it’s safe for you. I take a deep breath and work to connect my last rational brain cell to my mouth. “What’s changed, Luc?”

“Me. It’s safe, I know it is. I’m human now. They can’t get to us.”

I want so badly to believe him, but that brain cell is fighting to be heard. I push his hand away from where it’s working the button of my jeans. “That doesn’t make any sense. You said we were in more danger now ’cause you couldn’t see them coming.” And all of a sudden I smell it again, rotten eggs. Oh God-brimstone. Belias?

Luc’s eyes flare red, lighting up the dark car. “Come on, baby. You’re killing me,” he says. I feel like gravity just doubled and all the oxygen has been sucked off planet Earth. Luc would never call me baby.

Holy shit! Belias. Think!

I hear Gabe’s voice in my head: If you ever need anything, you know where to come. And even though I know it’s probably a bad sign that I have so many voices in my head that aren’t mine, for the moment, I’m okay with it.

“I know where we can go,” I say, hooking my bra and trying not to panic. “We’re house-sitting for a friend, just around the corner. The house is empty. We’ll be all alone.” My voice shakes, and my heart’s trying to commit suicide by throwing itself relentlessly against my rib cage.

“Now we’re talking. Where to?” he asks, starting up the Shelby.

“Take a left here.”

I take him on a loop around the neighborhood, past Taylor’s and back past my house, pretending to be lost, before I make up my mind what to do. Then, as we drive by the house with the huge potted Christmas cactus and porch swing I say, “Here,” pointing to Gabe’s house.

“Finally. I was starting to think you were just being a tease.”

This guy is majorly pissing me off. “Just pull into the driveway.”

He pulls in and I’m wondering if I did the right thing. Am I putting Gabe in danger? Will he know this isn’t really Luc? And my biggest question, the one that’s been eating me alive-if this is Belias, where is Luc? The vision of his bloody body crumpled on the floor taunts me, and I swallow back my terror along with the bile rising in the back of my throat.

As I step out of the car, my panic slips into despair. The house is dark. What if Gabe’s not here?

Luc-a-like is around the car, grabbing me, and we start heading for the front door. It’s only then that I realize I don’t have a key, and I can’t exactly knock, since the house is supposed to be empty.

“I think the front door might be unlocked,” I say, hoping I’m right.

When we get to the door, I see I’m more than right. The door is actually swinging open, exposing the darkness within.

“Remind me never to have you house-sit,” Luc-a-like snorts.

“Yeah. well. ” My mind is racing. Maybe Gabe has something gold or silver that I can use.

He pushes me through the door and closes it behind us. It’s pitch black, and he’s all over me-hands everywhere. As I look desperately around in the dark, I don’t need to see it to remember that everything is white. No gold, no silver. No nothing.

“Let’s find a bed,” Luc-a-like rasps in my ear.

“Um. maybe upstairs,” I say loud enough that if anyone is here they’ll hear me.

He pulls me toward the stairs, lit only by a thin silver slant of moonlight crossing the family room from the window and trailing up the lower few. But as we reach the banister Luc-a-like freezes in his tracks and looks around warily.

“Whose house did you say this was?”

“Just a friend’s.”

He looks at me with a grimace, and, as I watch in the pale moonlight, he morphs into-something. In just a few seconds, he’s towering over me, the heat burning my scalp where he’s grabbed a handful of my hair. The