The Possession (3 page)

Zach reached for me, but he didn’t look like Zach. His dark hair waved back from his face and he pulled me toward his ruffled shirtfront. His indigo eyes lightened to gray.

Ro
! he whispered,
I’m here
.

His lips crushed to mine.

Everything went black.

I don’t know how long I was out. I woke to darkness, and a cold, wet sensation on my forehead and eyes. My hands flew to my face, to the slight pressure at each temple. They landed on skin.

Not mine.

Warmth and shock buzzed me simultaneously. I froze, then struggled to rise. The pressure moved from my temples to my shoulders, holding me in place. I struggled harder.

“Daphne! Calm down,” the voice soothed. “Relax. You’re okay. Take it easy.”

Familiarity seeped into my brain. Zach.

My shoulders sagged and I exhaled, relieved.

Once I had quieted, he removed the cool wetness that had slipped across my face and helped me to sit up.

My head had been resting in his lap. The bandana no longer graced his forehead; it hung from his hand, unwound, dark, and limp. A bottle of water, cap missing, leaned at an odd angle near his leg.

My brain tried to process the scene. I remembered a flash of light. The bell! The bell on the gate had sounded and Zach and I figured the town kids were up to no good. After the flash of light, nothing.

No. That wasn’t right. After the flash of light, I saw a man. Twenty-ish, maybe. Dressed oddly. Staring. At me.

I shivered. Zach wore an old, button-down striped shirt over his t-shirt and he removed this and placed it around my shoulders. I started to shake. I couldn’t control it.

Our eyes met. He leaned forward, touching my shoulder, and I moved without thinking into his arms.

He held me, close and sure. I leaned my head against him. He stroked my hair, soothing. His heart thundered beneath my ear, and I suddenly realized what a scare he must have had, me dropping to the ground unconscious in front of him.

“I’m sorry, Zach.” Somehow it came out a whisper, though I hadn’t intended it to be.

“Well, at least you got my name right this time.”

His words startled me. I bolted up, but that put us face to face, and for a moment I got lost in his eyes. A lot could be seen there if you looked close enough. His gaze remained steady on mine, and I found the strength to ask my question.

“What happened?”

“You called me Vincent.”

I didn’t expect that. Vincent? I have never known anyone by that name.

“I don’t know any Vincents.”

Relief etched his face, then uncertainty. He lowered his eyes. I concentrated, trying to recall something, anything from those moments, that blank nothingness between the flash and my awakening.

Lips. Determined. Pressing. Knowledgeable.

Claiming.

“You kissed me,” I accused.

I didn’t mean to sound that way. I wasn’t even sure it had really happened, but the words could not be pulled back.

Zach’s eyes flew to mine and anger began to smolder there. If I had thought him even-tempered and agreeable, I was about to learn my error. You did not accuse Zach of something he didn’t do, and walk away from it.

“
You
kissed
me
,” he snapped.

The kiss was real.

“No.”

“Yes,” he insisted.

“No.”

Zach dropped his arm from around my shoulders and stood. I instantly felt the loss and wanted him back. I jumped to my feet.

“Tell me why,” I said. “Why do you say it was me?”

His eyes penetrated as they locked onto mine. “Are you really going to listen, Daphne? Or just claim to, then point at me anyway, blame me anyway?”

My heart stopped. Blame him? I wasn’t looking to place blame. I wanted to understand what had happened to me.

“I’ll listen, Zach. I need to know the truth.”

Whether my words or the need for truth did the trick, I’m not sure, but Zach seemed to reconsider his stance.

“We were facing the gate. None of the town kids were visible.” He turned me toward the gate and took his place by my side. His hand closed over mine and I twined my fingers through his. “I started to say it must just be the wind,” he continued, “but you were bleach white.”

Zach looked nervous as he retold the tale. No. Worried. Like his worry relived itself, too.

“From the lightning flash, no doubt. I don’t like lightning,” I reasoned aloud, glad to have found an explanation. I’d never fainted over lightning before, though.

“What lightning?” Zach asked.

“Th-the flash that lit up the place.”

“There wasn’t a flash—of lightning or anything else.” Zach’s words were matter-of-fact, but the worry in his eyes deepened. “Are you sure you’re okay?”

I ignored his question and asked another. “Was it the man, then? Tell me the truth, Zach. Did he hit me or something?”

“What man? No one was here but us. It’s just us.”

I bit my lower lip, thinking it over. Zach still held my hand, but he looked out beyond the tractor, into the woods. Suddenly, he huffed.

“Look, Daphne. We were standing like this, no one was out there. I looked at you, you looked awful, like you were sick or something. When I asked if you were okay, you looked up at me, but your eyes were funny and you started to fall.” He tilted my face up toward his as he spoke.

God, he was cute. My heart began to pound. I nodded, keeping my silence, hoping he didn’t notice my hand getting sweaty in his.

“I tried to catch you.” Zach released my hand and threw his arms around my waist, leaning toward me. I leaned away.

My slamming heart stopped as my arms involuntarily wrapped around his neck to keep my balance.

“That’s exactly what you did.” His voice sounded odd now, kind of rough and low. His eyes moved from my eyes to my lips and back again.

A flutter started in my chest. “Zach . . .”

“No . . . you said . . . Vin—”

Our mouths met, lips connecting softly as we both closed the distance, then firmer, lips buffing as we explored the connection. I moved closer. Zach’s hands pressed my back. A fleeting zing zipped a direct path from my lips to my stomach, quaking me.

A lightning strike for sure.

Zach pulled away. “I should get you home.”

That kiss was nothing like the last and we both knew it. He was right. We should both go home. Nodding agreement, I turned aside and bent to retrieve our tools. Dizziness swept over me and I teetered.

Zach took me gently by the arm. “Leave it. I’ll come back for them later.”

I let him lead me to the tractor. I couldn’t climb onto the flatbed, though. When I tried, my leg started to shake so badly that I nearly fell. Before I could try again, Zach spun me toward him and lifted me with ease. He placed me carefully on the flatbed and pulled his shirt closer about me then stepped quickly away.

My eyes felt large and round in my face as I watched him move toward the tractor then climb onto the seat. Before he could start the engine, I called out, “Zach!”

He twisted in the seat to face me. I reached a hand toward him, desperate that he not refuse me. “I don’t want to sit back here by myself.”

I threw a worried glance toward the cemetery and when I returned my gaze to Zach, he was already walking back to the flatbed. He stopped between the two pieces and pulled a tool from his back pocket. He fiddled with something. I heard metal clink on metal, then he straightened and offered me his hand.

“C’mon.”

I slid my arms through the sleeves of Zach’s shirt, so it didn’t blow away, and managed to slide down from the flatbed, my knees only buckling slightly as I hit the ground. I followed him to the tractor and he climbed back onto the seat.

It wasn’t very big or very high, but my legs still seemed to want to ignore my commands. He moved his foot aside and his body forward, so I could get a better foothold to climb aboard. Once I had started up, he grabbed my arm and pulled me the rest of the way. I swung up behind him and placed my hands on my thighs as he started the engine.

The tractor lurched forward, leaving the trailer behind. I had to grab him by the waist to keep my balance. He glanced back but said nothing.

We bumped along through the trees. The rough terrain kept me firmly plastered to Zach’s back. A chill fingered its way up my spine, but as we moved farther from the cemetery, I relaxed. He squeezed my hands lightly where they now locked over his stomach.

He drove the tractor out of the trees and across the lawn, right up to the lighthouse keep doorway. I jumped down before he could, and backed several paces away from the tractor.

“Thanks. I . . . thanks.”

Zach climbed down from the tractor despite the fact that I’d made it perfectly clear he didn’t need to. He advanced a few steps. He may have looked thin, but he was solid and strong beneath that shirt and I didn’t dare touch him again. I reached for the doorknob, one eye still on him.

“You sure you’re okay, Daph?”

My mind switched gears, back to the problem as he surely saw it. I kind of liked that he worried about me, and hated that I’d made him worry. He’d had enough for one day. We’d both had enough.

“I’m sure. I’ll . . .” I opened the door and slipped inside. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” The words rushed out and I slammed the door shut. I didn’t move from it until I heard the tractor start and the engine sound slowly fade away.

A half hour later I heard the tractor again. From the window upstairs, I saw him stop just outside the tree line. He swung down from the seat, the strap of my canvas bag slung across his chest.

He headed toward the tool shed and reached it just as my aunt came around from the garage. She called to him as she let Rowdy into the keep, then crossed the lawn to the shed.

Zach would tell her what had happened. I had to hear what they said. I flew down the stairs, but would never know their conversation.

Rowdy, usually my co-conspirator and doggie BFF, snarled, a low menacing sound, and refused to let me out of the kitchen.

The sun streamed through my window, a plus and minus to having the eastern view. Sure, I could look at the ocean every day on awakening. The blue-silver heave of deep water mesmerized. The woofing hiss of wave meeting land soothed the soul beyond any other known sound. And haunted one’s dreams as thoroughly.

An eastern view also meant first window to greet the day.

Did I tell you I’m a night person? Good thing, because last night I hardly slept at all. I couldn’t stop thinking about the incident in the cemetery. My mind kept twisting around and around it and I still couldn’t make any sense of it. I would finally fall asleep only to awaken and start all over again. Even a cup of warm milk hadn’t helped.

Now the sun beamed into my room, spilling across the bed and pillows and into my face.

I flipped onto my stomach, bunched a pillow beneath my chin, and closed my eyes. The sea lulled. My mind wandered. I started to doze and Zach stole into that twilight. I brushed my thumb dreamily across my lips, remembering.

Rap, rap, rap.

I jumped hard and nearly gouged my cheek with my thumbnail as I cranked my head toward the door. The knock sounded louder than it actually was, I’m sure, being so totally unexpected and all. Struggling to sit up, I called, “Yeah?” and untangled myself from my sheets.

The door cracked open and Aunt Dwill’s head poked into the room. “You’re up. Good. Can I come in?”

At my nod Aunt entered and crossed to the bed. She deposited a glass of orange juice into my hand, and a kiss onto my forehead. “Morning, sweetie.”

“Morning, Aunt.”

I watched her gaze dance around my room, checking. It stopped briefly on my comforter, one corner wedged at the bedpost, the rest a tortured heap on the floor. She fixed her eyes on mine.

“How are you this morning, Daphne? Do you feel okay?”

I had drawn my legs up and she perched on the mattress at my feet.

“I’m fine, Aunt. Why do you ask?” I sipped my orange juice, knowing full well why she asked but needing her to start the subject, to say Zach’s name.

“I understand you had a bit of a problem at the cemetery yesterday,” she answered.

“A problem? Uh . . . Oh, you mean . . . I guess you could call it that. I fell.”

She turned on her ‘hard-nosed aunt’ look. “That’s not what Zach called it.”

I frowned, staring into my juice glass. “What did he say?”

“That you fainted. That is what happened, isn’t it?”

My guilty look when I lifted my face to hers gave me away. She patted my foot. “Get dressed. I’ve got a few plants to put in by the drive, then we’ll have a picnic.” She rose from the bed and shot me one last look once she reached the door. “We’ll talk.”

“But, Aunt!” I called out and she paused. “I can’t. I’m supposed to . . . I have to work at the cemetery today. It’s not done.”

She tilted her head at me, and I’d swear she tried not to smile. “The cemetery can wait. I already told Zach I was keeping you close to home today. I gave him the day off, too.”

Aunt Dwill closed the door. Disappointment settled on me like a cloud, then relief trickled through. If Zach was sorry we’d kissed, I wouldn’t have to know until tomorrow. I could spend today dreaming. And worrying. And replaying.

Guess I’d better get dressed. I slid from the bed but didn’t head toward the closet or the hall. I crossed to the window. Just beyond the grilled panes, if my view skipped across the patch of yard to the light, past that to the tumble of stone that spilled down the cliff and bordered the water, I could gaze on the sea itself.

My eyes settled there, on the deepest blue of the swells, on the quicksilver edge to their crests. It reminded me of him. Of Zach. A known unknown–like the sea, like its waves, like his eyes. Colors that beckoned. Depths to be explored.

I turned from the window. Aunt would be back soon.

By the time Aunt Dwill returned from her chore, I had showered, dressed, and was in the kitchen packing our picnic. She washed her hands at the sink, directing, “Pickles. Just put the jar in there, and the pickle fork. Are the dishes back in the basket? I thought I re-packed it.”