'Charlotte...Please...'
'Goodbye, Liam.' My lip trembled and I bit it as I started to walk away.
'Your scar,' he whispered. I don't know how I heard it, but I stopped. My hand touched my shoulder and my body went cold. I was six again. Blinking the past away, I slowly turned around. 'What do you mean?'
Liam reached his fingers out to me and I watched with an almost out of body experience as they threaded through mine. I didn't move. I didn't know why. My pulse throbbed in my ears. 'Please. Come with me. I'll give you answers. Just not here.'
I trembled. Everything felt surreal. 'You really have answers?' I hadn't realized until then how much I wanted them, needed them.
He nodded in a way that told me this went deeper than him running away. He knew things, secrets about me. 'How do I know you're not going to leave me again?'
Liam's body deflated with relief and a small smile lifted at the corners of his mouth. 'I won't. I promise.' A newfound energy seemed to spark through him. 'I never met anyone like you, Charlotte. I didn't even know someone like you could exist. It scared me at first, but I know what I want now.'
I swallowed hard. 'What do you want?'
Liam gave the most sincere smile I had ever seen. 'Just come with me.'
Chapter 7
I leaned my head back against the passenger seat with a groan. If Ty found out about this, any remaining shred of my self-dignity would be destroyed. As if I had any at this point. How did I get here? At least he didn't know about the panic attack. I think.
'You okay?' Liam asked.
'Fine,' I said tightly. My fingers still clutched the strap of my backpack that I now held in my lap. I kept my sights on the road. I would remain in control.
'You look a little tense.'
I turned to him. 'Well, why wouldn't I be? It's not like we don't have any white elephants hanging around the room. Car.' I winced and tried to breathe right. Okay, not keeping it cool.
Liam gave me a strange look. 'You know, you're kind of scary sometimes.'
I glared and he smiled.
Amusing.
He refocused his attention on the road, and took a turn that led us down a winding one-lane highway. I didn't know the area too well, but I recognized the river to our left. Dad and I passed it on our way back from the realtor's office the morning we came into town.
'Where are we going?'
Liam shrugged. 'No where in particular. Just thought we'd drive up around the parklands while we talk.' He motioned his head out the window to our left. 'It's a preserve, mostly used for hiking. They allow fishing but only at certain times. Hunting,' he cleared his throat, 'is forbidden.'
I followed his gaze. The vast sweeping valley of rocks and canyons woven in between thick mazes of pine and birch made me shudder. Wherever forests grew that thick, lived other things as well. The tiny hairs on the back of my neck rose and I felt cold. The river wound seamlessly up the hills and disappeared around a bend. What else could be just out of my line of vision?
'It's pretty,' I said. He peered at me as if he could see right through me. 'What?' I asked.
'You don't like the woods, do you?'
'I do.'
Liam spun the wheel and pulled the car over onto a small dirt viewpoint along the side of the bend. He didn't look at me. 'You don't have to lie to me, Charlotte.'
I opened my mouth to protest, but stopped. 'Fine. I don't like the woods. Happy?'
'No. Why would I be?' he asked with a snap to his tone.
Anger boiled within me. How this became my fault was beyond me. Enough stalling. 'Why did you leave that night?'
Liam's knuckles went white against the steering wheel and his body stiffened. 'I told you, your scar.'
The instinctive reaction to reach for the spot on my shoulder screamed, but I didn't grab for it. The thought of relapsing into some sort of delusional hysteria right now would be too much. 'What about it?'
He finally faced me and the intense rigidity throughout his body deflated. 'You aren't the only one who was attacked by a wolf.'
The effect of his words discombobulated my senses. I expected excuses. The implication that he had been through something similar destroyed my entire internal arsenal. I didn't even know what to say.
'When I saw your scar, I freaked. Your dining room ceased to exist. You were no longer human. Do you understand what I'm talking about?'
Unfortunately I did. So much so that the similarity to my earlier panic attack in the cafeteria made me eye him with suspicion. Did he know? No. Impossible, and why would he use that to deflect my interrogation? I couldn't fathom why. I had to believe it true. Besides, I never told him a wolf bit me.
'Can I see it?' I regretted my words the moment I said them. Facing the window, I watched the valley below.
'I'd rather not,' he said. I nodded, knowing all too well about the shaky state that can bring on. Then it dawned on me. Liam understood. Somebody actually knew what it felt like to live on the edge of reality and dreams, never knowing for sure if insanity or truth dictated. Of course, I was getting ahead of myself. He never said that, only that he'd been bitten. But he did have a panic attack.
'Do you ever feel followed?'
Liam looked at me like I had grown two heads. There went my theory. I couldn't help the physical slouch of disappointment, despite what that really insinuated. Why would I want Liam to be followed?
'What are you talking about, Charlotte?'
I forced a tight grin. 'Never mind.'
'Are you being followed?' He unfastened his seat belt and shifted his body completely towards me, one hand resting on the back of my seat. His sudden movement, unexpected, made me swallow hard.
'No,' I said.
His gaze hardened. I knew he saw right through me and was getting annoyed.
'Maybe. I don't know.'
'Who?' Flecks of gold began to fuse and melt together in his eyes and my pulse pounded in my ears. I didn't want him to think me crazy, but this intense interrogation scared me. I tried to shut it out, to stay lucid, and not see the sharp canines protruding from his gums in impossible ways. 'Charlotte, who?' Reality came back, his face normal.
'Wolves.'
There, I admitted it. Now he knew I was certifiable. I readied myself for the speech my parents and psychologist gave me so many years ago, their words almost as haunting as the movements of those just out of view, who waited for me in the woods. 'It's not real. You've been through a great deal of trauma. You're not well.' I shivered and my backpack fell to the floor by my feet. I shouldn't have said anything.
Liam leaned in closer and I crushed myself up against the small space between the door and the seat. I should have been fumbling for the handle, but I couldn't seem to muster further movement. 'What are you doing?'
A low rumble resonated from somewhere deep in his chest and I saw his nostrils expand. It's not real. I'm hallucinating. Oh, whom was I kidding? Ty, herself, saw what happened at my house.
'When did this start? What do they look like?'
He moved back into his seat, allowing me to breathe, but he continued to glance over at me as if the one following me hid in my seatbelt. 'Soon after the attack. Days.' I smiled tightly and gave a short chortled laugh. 'Liam, the only one following me is you. It's called posttraumatic stress. Relax.' Please. My fingers knitted between
