Dark Angel (28 page)

Feeling nauseous, I sat up in the dark room, swung my legs over the edge of the bed and leaned forward.

Why not? Why not love Daniel? After all, at sunset today Orlando had walked out of my life. He didn’t even look back. Slam, slam, slam! Three car doors, and the first had been his. He’d driven away with a squeal of tyres, red-devil-eye brake lights flashing.

‘You didn’t even try to understand,’ I told the darkness. ‘You didn’t trust me, you didn’t love me enough.’

This fitted exactly with what Zoran had claimed earlier – that Orlando struck him as immature and selfish, that Daniel would never abandon me that way. I was alone and in the dark.

I was scared out of my mind when Daniel came to my room.

He opened the door and came in softly, pressed a switch that turned the light on low, found me sitting on the edge of my bed. Without saying a word he put out his hands and raised me to my feet.

I was in his arms, my skin against his, almost swooning.

He kissed me on the lips, his arms held me close. He kissed my neck. I closed my eyes, breathed him in.

His lips brushed my shoulder. Turning me to face him, he kept me tight in his arms and breathed soft words into my hair. ‘I love you, Tania. I’ve waited for this. I’ve been waiting since the moment I first set eyes on you.’

I turned again, kissed his mouth, sank into his embrace.

How do I describe it? Like those moments when you’re standing in the sea not far from the shore, preparing for a clear, sparkling wave to swell and sweep you off your feet. You feel the ocean’s power, are lifted in the surf and carried in pure delight. That’s how it was with Daniel.

I was on the crest of the wave, being swept away, loving the warmth of his skin, the soft wetness of his mouth. I waited for the wave to close over me in that instant of surrender.

Until I opened my eyes and saw him in the low yellow light – his own eyes open and in sharp, glittering focus watching me, waiting for me to give in.

I pulled back. ‘It’s too soon,’ I whispered.

His eyes flickered shut. When he opened them again his mood was different – harder but trying not to show it. ‘Of course,’ he murmured, keeping his arms around my waist.

‘I need some time.’

‘I know. I’m sorry.’

‘No. Don’t be.’

‘I just thought …’

‘I know. It’s me. I’m being stupid.’

‘I thought your staying here meant that you’d made your decision.’

‘It does. I have, Daniel. But it’s the first night. So much has happened.’

‘And so fast,’ he agreed, releasing me without moving away. ‘It’s OK, I understand.’

I nodded and tried to smile. I was feeling the sickening undertow, the strong pull of the ebbing tide. ‘Thank you. I knew you would. I hope you don’t think … I don’t …’

Gently he put his hand over my mouth. ‘It’s OK, Tania. It really is.’

It wasn’t OK. It was the total opposite. I hated myself that I’d been on the point of giving in. I tell you now – Orlando is the only guy I ever slept with, which you might think is unusual in this day and age, but it’s the way it is.

‘What are you thinking?’ Daniel asked.

I stepped back, pulled a sheet from the bed and wrapped it around me. ‘Nothing. I’m confused. I need a little fresh air.’

‘Not now. It’s the middle of the night.’

‘OK, I won’t go outside. I’ll stay in the house.’

He gave me that detached, deliberate stare. Thirty seconds earlier he’d been sweeping me off my feet into bed with him. ‘If you need me, I’ll be in my room,’ he said.

The corridors were empty and silent, clean and sterile as a hospital. Everyone slept.

My heart thumped as I walked and walked. My head didn’t stop spinning. If I was looking for clarity here in Zoran’s high-tech warren, I sure didn’t find it – not when the Aztec masks loomed up ahead and leaped from the wall, all staring eyes and human hair, painted red and black and white. They roared and hissed in my face, fell to the floor and splintered. I trod in bare feet over the sharp fragments, turned around to see them intact and hanging from the wall as before.

Don’t the others see this, I wondered. Doesn’t Jude see the hunting dogs leap from the tapestry? Doesn’t Grace notice when Zoran’s golden snake ornament morphs and comes alive, when Daniel’s eagle wings raise him from the ground? Am I the only one?

‘No, they don’t. And yes, you are,’ Maia reminds me in her sweet, soft voice. They don’t see it because they’re not looking for it. You do because your sensibilities are heightened; you were born with a special link to the invisible spirit world.’

I walked some more and came into the main hallway just as the sun was rising.

Grace was there with Ezra.

‘You’re up early,’ Ezra said to me. His eyes were so dark and defined I thought he must have smeared them with kohl. His pale face with its high cheekbones and honed jaw was unnaturally white.

‘I couldn’t sleep,’ I explained.

‘Yeah? Grace was the same.’

I was afraid to look at her, knowing that I would see the absence, the hollowness. When I forced myself and found that I was right, I couldn’t help a gasp and a slow, sighing exhalation.

She was wearing the long black dress again, her bare arms limp at her sides. Her hair hung loose and lifeless, half covering her eyes. And she was so far gone in her trance, she didn’t seem even to see me in the grey dawn light.

‘Where’s Daniel?’ Ezra asked curtly, as if I was bound to know.

I shrugged. ‘In his room.’

He frowned and turned away.

Anyway, I wondered, why were Grace and Ezra here at this time in the morning? He was glancing around as if he was waiting for someone, showed no surprise when Cristal showed up with Jude.

Jude was another ghost, another shadow of his former self. I steadied myself again, kept a lid on my fear.

‘Hey, Tania,’ Cristal said casually. ‘Look, Jude – Tania stayed over.’

Slowly he looked at me, slowly he said hi, fuzzy and disoriented like someone waking after a deep sleep.

‘We were just talking,’ Cristal said brightly. ‘Jude was saying he can’t wait to get going with his ceremony.’

‘Yeah, and this time let’s hope there are no interruptions.’ Ezra took up the same brisk tone, taking Cristal to one side, perhaps to finalize arrangements for the evening.

I waited for them to be out of earshot. ‘Jude!’ I said, tugging at his arm. ‘Look at me. Can you focus?’

‘Tania?’

‘Yes – listen! You don’t have to go through with this!’

‘What are you talking about? Where’s Cristal?’

‘She’s over by the door. I’m asking you to listen carefully to what I’m saying. You still have a choice about tonight. You can tell them no, you want to back out.’

He looked at me as if I was speaking a foreign language and he was trying to latch on to a single familiar word.

‘You can!’ I pleaded. ‘I’m risking a lot by telling you this. You have a choice. You can leave. Are you hearing me?’

‘I hear you,’ he sighed. But his brain wasn’t computing – not at all.

And Cristal had quickly rounded off her talk with Ezra. She was back and dazzling Jude with her smile, telling him that we all had to go outside because Zoran was in the barn waiting for us. ‘You too, Tania,’ she informed me. ‘Daniel’s out there with him.’

The doors slid open and the cold air hit us. A sliver of sun had appeared over the mountains to the east but as yet no rays had warmed the land, and in the arena the horses huddled together, their steamy breath rising.

‘Zoran’s not happy,’ Cristal muttered to Ezra.

He glanced sideways, caught me listening in and gave her a warning look.

Grace was behind him, half running to keep pace. When she reached my side she leaned in to whisper slyly in my ear. ‘I heard what you just said to Jude,’ she hissed with a flash of intense spite. ‘Don’t think I didn’t!’

‘What do you mean?’ I laughed uneasily.

‘Oh, yeah, little Miss Innocent!’ Her look was suddenly focused and it was pure poison. Her voice was full of hate. ‘I heard every word and don’t think I can’t repeat them to Ezra.’

‘Grace – don’t!’ I was breathless, not from running but through fear. ‘Don’t tell him!’

‘Ha, you don’t like that, do you?’ She curled her lip and sneered. ‘You don’t like not being in the driving seat, telling everyone what to do.’

‘Come on, you two!’ Cristal broke us up. She was the first to reach the arena gate where the huddle of horses shifted and scuffed their feet in the dirt. A couple, including Zoran’s striking sorrel mare, broke away to linger out of the wind in the shelter of the barn door.

Then Daniel came into view carrying head stalls for the mustangs. He beckoned to me, Jude and Grace and pointed to a wooden box containing brushes and metal combs before he hurried back into the barn. ‘Catch yourselves a horse and brush them down,’ he told us. ‘Zoran has called a staff meeting.’

Just that – nothing more. No mention of his visit to my room, no lingering romantic looks.

‘You heard what he said,’ I told Jude and Grace. Ignoring Grace’s latest outburst, I decided I had to catch their horses for them, and handed them their brushes. Then I went across to fetch Zoran’s sorrel as rays from the rising sun hit the red barn roof and a blue jay rose from the shadows. I heard voices inside the barn and froze.

‘What do you mean – she said no?’ Zoran snapped. He really wasn’t happy, as Cristal had said. ‘I thought you understood – no was not an option!’

‘She said she needed more time,’ Daniel explained.

‘Oh, really.’ Ezra’s sarcastic tone made it plain whose side he took. ‘So you accepted the rejection and backed off?’

Daniel tried to shrug off the criticism. ‘What was I supposed to do – force her?’

Ezra laughed. ‘Yeah, what’s wrong with that? Anyway, you’re supposed to be number-one lover boy and you’re seriously asking me for advice?’

There was a pause and I pictured Daniel physically squaring up to Ezra until Zoran interrupted with, ‘Enough, you two. Daniel, I gave Tania to you because I knew she was more of a challenge than the others. I saw that from the start and I thought you were up to it.’

He
gave
me to Daniel? Did I hear that right? And what was I – some kind of object to be handed around? I felt a spark of anger then a sickening thud of disgust in my belly.

‘I trusted you to get it right,’ Zoran insisted then waited for Daniel to defend himself, which he did.

‘OK, but you can’t rush Tania. And listen to me, Ezra – everyone here except you knows we only use force as a last resort. Tania should give herself of her own free will. We all know that’s how it works best.’

Still they were discussing me like a deal they hadn’t managed to broker and I felt sick to my stomach at how close I’d come to giving in.

‘So what did happen to your famous charm?’ Cristal came in with a needling voice.

‘Enough again!’ This time Zoran injected steely anger into his tone. ‘Tania is hard to read, we all know that, and it’s what makes her interesting. With the others – with Oliver especially – it was easy, like taking candy from a baby. Likewise and to a lesser extent, Jude. Grace was more difficult. A little force was necessary – we accept that, Ezra.’

The bruises! Now I understood how she’d got them – at certain points she’d obviously put up a fight against Ezra’s focused, cold-hearted seduction. No date-rape drugs had been involved, just pure brute force. Poor Grace. That’s all I could think as I stood there and pictured the whole thing – those two words: poor Grace.

‘But we need another victim, the sooner the better,’ Zoran reminded everyone.

‘How about the kids who were here last night?’ Ezra suggested. ‘There was the one called Holly.’

‘No time,’ Zoran decided. ‘Anyway, Tania is a difficult challenge, and that’s exactly the reason I want her.’

‘So, Daniel, what exactly are you going to do to make it happen?’ Cristal demanded, pushing him to a point when I was sure he would snap. ‘Whatever it is, try and make it a double celebration with Jude. Do it tonight.’

He didn’t answer and in the silence that followed I heard footsteps heading in my direction. Quickly I pulled myself together and buckled the collar around the mare’s head. By the time Daniel emerged from the barn, his face dark and angry, I was alongside Jude and Grace, brushing dust from the sorrel’s coat as if I’d been busy all along.

Crying inwardly for Grace, I had my back turned so I hoped no one could see that I was shaking from head to foot, that I felt battered and dirty and used, disgusted at the thought of letting Daniel lay his hands on me ever again.

I
n one completely new and unexpected way I was out of danger.

Never, Daniel! I thought. From now on, never in a million years!

The way they’d talked about me in the barn – like an object – the way Daniel had played me all this time with his soft words and lips made me burn with shame and fury. And to think, in spite of what I’d suspected and witnessed here at the lodge, I’d almost,
almost
fallen for it!

Stupid, dumb-ass birdbrain! Superficial, gullible schmuck, almost sweet-talked into my own destruction!

But at least, I reminded myself, I’d pulled back at the moment the wave broke. I’d said no and now I was safe. From Daniel, I mean. In every other way, I was in so much trouble I couldn’t even begin to measure it.

‘You like working with horses, Tania?’ Zoran asked me as he strolled out of the barn after Daniel. He was back to his old jovial,
mein host
manner, playing the game.

He spreads his wings like the blue jay, his black beak stabbing the air. He rises in a cloud of mist above the rooftop. Dark destroyer, evil incarnate. I will never look at you again without seeing the beast beneath the skin
.

‘I haven’t had the chance to find out,’ I answered. ‘This is the first time I’ve been this close.’

‘Then you’re a natural,’ he told me before he ordered Grace and Jude to come into the house with him, Cristal and Ezra, which left Daniel alone with me and the mustangs.

‘This is another reason why you should hang out here a while.’ Daniel picked up where Zoran had left off. ‘You could help me tame these wild horses. I could teach you some techniques.’