Breathe for Me (11 page)

When I first explored the French Quarter several months ago, I wandered by this shop. Aggie plucked me right off the street, leading me back here and pointing me toward the room with the voodoo shrines. “Offer one a gift,” she said, “and write your greatest wish on a scrap of paper. He'll help you.”

Though I was startled, I did as she'd instructed, hoping against hope that she was right. I still pop by regularly to offer up gifts and requests, but I spend most of my time talking with Aggie.

“You can put in your own request here,” I tell Dominic, pointing to the pile of scratch paper and pen. “Just leave a gift for whichever voodoo spirit suits your needs best—the name cards in front of them tell you what their specialty is. Even giving something small shows gratitude.” I dig into my pocket for a dollar and tuck it underneath my favorite statue.

“What did she mean by a reading?” he asks. His eyes are strange, intensely fixed on me. “Can we do that instead?”

I swallow. I haven't been brave enough to get a palm reading from Aggie. I'm afraid of what she'll tell me. Or what she won't. Not to mention the fact that she can't touch my bare skin. “I'd rather not,” I say.

“I have money.”

“Money's not the issue. I'm just…” I pause. “I'm afraid of what she'll read in my fortune.” Besides, before Dominic, no one else here has even seen my gloveless hand, much less touched it.

He steps closer to me, peering down into my eyes. “Remember our poetry topic on destiny? Maybe this can play into that. Regardless of what she tells you, you make your own future.”

I make my own future. He's right. That's what I'm trying to do—not live my life in fear, in subjugation to Sitri. But to take ownership and make things happen for me.

“How about next time?” I say, my heart fluttering beneath my ribcage like a trapped bird. I don't want to ruin today, which is as close to perfection as I'll ever get. The truth can be spoken later, when I've had a chance to steel myself against it. “So we'll have a reason to come back, together. We can go in there and make an appointment…for a tarot card reading.”

He smiles. “I like that.”

chapter eight

I
PART
THE
BEADED
curtain leading to Aggie's reading room and force my hands to remain steady. They don't listen to me; instead, they flutter nervously, playing with the loops of my jeans or the hem of my shirt. “Aggie,” I say, forcing myself to speak the words, “can we make an appointment to get tarot card readings done, maybe in a couple of days?” That should give me enough time to mentally prepare.

She raises an eyebrow at me, obviously surprised, but nods. “Sure,” she says as she waves the two of us over to her table. “Have a seat while I get my appointment book.” She pops out of the room.

Dominic and I sit down. His knee presses against mine. I close my eyes briefly and let myself just feel his presence.

After a minute, Aggie returns. “Okay, I'm free on Thursday in the evening. Will that work?”

I glance at Dominic, who nods. “Sure,” I tell her, getting out of the seat. “Thanks for fitting us in.”

Aggie scrawls in her book, closes it and looks at Dominic and me. A frown creases her brow, and she stares into my eyes for so long I start to squirm in my seat. “Sacrifice,” she says. Her speech is low, drawn-out, not at all how she normally sounds.

The air freezes in my lungs, and I stare at her for a long second. “What?”

She blinks suddenly and takes my hand, pasting on a big, fake smile. “Hm, odd. I don't know why I said that.” She releases me, clasping her hands in her lap. “Anyway, thanks for stopping by.”

But I know Aggie's seen something—she has that look in her eyes. I want to ask her to clarify what she said, but I'm petrified and can't speak. The word keeps replaying in my head. Is that the only way I can get my freedom, through some kind of sacrifice? Maybe Thursday's reading will hold more answers.

I need time to think.

I tug Dominic out of the chair. “We have to go now. Please.”

He fixes me with a confused and slightly irritated look at being jerked from his seat but thankfully remains silent.

Sacrifice
. Aggie's word silenced me, and I sit quietly the whole ride back to my apartment. Dominic doesn't speak either; instead, his eyes stay fixed on the road ahead of him as he drives.

I'm unsure of how to break the tension. I can sense he wants more from me than I can give, but I can't risk distancing him, scaring him off. Then again, I'm alienating him with my half-lies, my silence. His patience won't last forever. Which is really the better option here?

I shift in my seat, leaning my head back against the headrest. My eyes close of their own volition, and I slip into a quick, dreamless sleep.

When I wake up, we're in a parking spot on the street across from my apartment. I don't know how long we've been here, but the sky is filled with dark blues and purples. The sun has already set.

I dare a glance at the driver's side. Dominic rests back in his seat, his eyes closed. His chest rises and falls in a slow, deep rhythm. I'm afraid to move or speak, not wanting to wake him up.

“I'm awake,” he says, his eyes still closed. I feel the wall between us growing thicker, stronger, its mortar filled with mute awkwardness.

I sit for a moment, torn. I should leave, should keep him pushed away from me like he is right now. Because if freedom is going to require a sacrifice of some kind, like Aggie hinted, I'm afraid of what it could be. How far I'm going to have to go to loose my bonds. And I don't want to let him down if I can't meet the goal.

But I don't want to leave him.

The air in the car is warm, tinged with his earthy cologne. I breathe him in, relish his scent. Almost desperate to bury my face in his neck and taste his skin. I've never wanted so badly to have those sensory experiences I'm missing out on.

“I'm sorry,” I say. Two words can't pour enough of my feelings out, can't open my heart and show him how I ache for things to be different. But I can't seem to get anything else past my closed throat.

He turns his head and opens his eyes. In the dimming light, they look dark and moody. “No apologies, remember?” He offers a smile that doesn't quite reach his eyes. My heart squeezes—even disappointed, he's ever the gentleman. “I'll see you tomorrow at school.”

“No,” I blurt out. A sudden swell of panic overcomes me. If we leave it like this, everything will be changed. The closeness we've achieved will be shifted into a distant companionship, one that will fade into nothingness.

Trust me
, he told me before. He won't hurt me. Can I trust him with my secret? He wants to know the real me. Can I find the courage inside to share it with him, to risk his fear or scorn or disbelief?

Dominic lifts his head and stares straight at me. “What do you want, Isabel?”

I force myself to say the words that have rested on the tip of my tongue from the moment I realized I wanted to know him better. The ones I haven't even dared to speak to Samantha. “I want to tell you the truth. About me.”

He blinks, then pulls his key out of his car and gets out. He runs around the back, opening my door, and guides me out. He pauses. “Are you sure?”

I nod, then lead him through the courtyard and up to my apartment. I scope it out first, making sure Sitri isn't there, and gesture for him to have a seat. My legs are jittery, my fingers twisting each other into painful bends. Sweat drips down the side of my neck, down my back. I swipe it away, wiping my damp, gloved palm on the thigh of my jeans.

Where do I start?

“You can take your gloves off,” he says quietly. His eyes follow me as I pace back and forth. “Make yourself a little more comfortable.”

It takes a few moments to pull the gloves off, since they stick to my sweaty skin. I fling them onto the back of the chair, then take a seat there myself, rubbing my bare hands against my knees.

“Okay,” I say, willing the right words to come to me. Can I do this? Am I ready? Because once I reveal the truth to him, I can't go back. I force myself on. “I realize this is going to sound crazy, but Aggie's…word touched on a lot of sore spots. Ones that have been an issue for a very, very long time.”

He nods slightly and remains silent. His eyes are calm, his posture relaxed. He's allowing me all the time in the world to speak.

“I'm not—I'm not who you think I am.” I consider my next words. “The guy you saw in the library isn't my ex-boyfriend. He's…he's my captor.”

Dominic's eyes squint, and a frown line creases between his brows. “I don't understand. Are you in danger?”

I raise a hand. “Just hear me through. I need to spit this out. And if you think I'm crazy and walk out of here and never want to speak to me again, I'll completely understand.”

Courage, Isabel
.

I turn my eyes down to my lap and begin. “A long time ago, my parents forced my engagement to someone I hated.” Even now, after all this time, the memory of Mr. Baker's rancid hot breath in my ear turns my stomach, memories of him whispering the vile things he was going to do to me when we were married. “He was in his fifties, a widowed landowner with several young kids. He wanted a young wife to care for them. My parents thought it would be a move up for us. They said I was lucky to attract such attention.”

I draw several ragged breaths. Dominic remains silent; I can't even hear him breathing. I'm too afraid to look into his eyes, knowing I'll see disbelief. I'm risking everything to spill out these words that have festered in my gut for so long.

“But what I wanted was to be free,” I continued. “To travel and see the world. To learn and experience things for myself. Not to be attached to any one person, especially a man who would smother the life out of me by stealing my freedom.

“The night before our wedding, I hid under a big tree and cried, begging to God, to whomever was out there listening, that I needed help. And then
he
came.”

“God?” Dominic asked quietly.

A bitter laugh slips from my lips. “No.
Sitri
. He'd slipped beside me so quietly I hadn't even heard him approach. He was so kind, so empathetic, asking me why I was sad. Before I knew it, I'd told him everything.” I pause as I remember that night in vivid detail. How even the wind itself had silenced when Sitri spoke to me. “He told me there was a way out. A way to be free from the shackles and slavery of men.

“I was dumb. I didn't know better. All I saw in my haste were the immediate results. It wasn't until afterward—” I pause, gather my breath. My fingers are white from being clenched so tightly. I release them and force myself to relax, turning my eyes back to his face. “It wasn't until after I'd signed the contract that I realized exactly what I'd sold myself into.”

A fate worse than marriage. Worse than death itself.

“Sitri is a—”
say it, Isabel
, “—a demon.”

Dominic blinks, his eyebrows darting high. “What?”

“I know, it sounds ridiculous. But it's true. He granted my wish, but in the most hellish way possible. Yes, I get to travel—every few months, Sitri takes me to another new and exciting land. But he completely wipes my memory of the one before. And no man can tie me down—in fact, no one can touch me because my skin is cursed to burn any breathing, living being that comes in contact with it. And if I kiss, or am kissed, that person instantly dies.” The bitterness, the anger is spewing forth from me, and my words tumble out faster and faster. “So I lied to you. I lied to everyone. I'm not sick, but I can't tell anyone why I have to dress and act the way I do.”

He sits back in the seat, his gaze skittering away from me. “I don't know what to say. This sounds…” His words fade off into incredulous silence.

I feel him pulling away but make myself keep talking, turning my attention back to my hands. Now it's a sick compulsion to get it all off my chest. “I know. That's hard enough to swallow, right? But the worst part—” I scoff because really, it's
all
bad, if I'm being honest with myself, “—is that Sitri has given me what he considers a ‘gift'—I can tell the lifespan of every living thing that draws a breath. A constant reminder of my immortality, my ties to him. I know when every person and every animal is going to die, assuming no trauma or accident happens. I literally see how many breaths are left in their bodies.”

Hot tears flood my eyes, streak down my cheeks. I swipe them away. “So this has been my life. A bitter, vicious cycle I've been stuck in for hundreds and hundreds of years.” With the last of those words, I fall silent. I am sick, empty, drained from the liberation of telling someone my truth.

When I finally dare to look over at Dominic, he stares at me, his face unreadable. After several long moments that stretch out into eternity, he opens his mouth. “Is this true?”