The Soul Mate

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

My mind was wandering; I couldn’t focus on the story Maisera was telling. I had already finished my third cup of Plum Ţuică and was debating if it would be rude to get another cup before the story was over. Pitti was sitting right next to the jug so I doubted my over indulgence would be noticed in comparison to his.

“Hey.” Xan blocked my path to the Ţuică. My stomach did a little flip flop at the sight of him in a tight black t-shirt and a pair of baggy jeans.

“Hi yourself,” I said, trying to get around him but he didn’t budge and instead grabbed my cup from me.

“Sit down Trin, I’ll get it for you.”

I didn’t argue. I figured him looking like the drunk instead of me worked just fine in my book. I plopped down next to Becki my apology practiced and ready.

“Spending a lot of time with Xan,” She said before I could get a word out.

I looked at her. “Was that a question?”

“Just an observation.”

Good, I thought. Because then I’d have to ask you who, instead of your boyfriend, have you been hanging out with lately.

“He’s teaching me how to fight and shoot,” I told her.

“Are you sure that’s all?” She gave me a look that told me she wasn’t so sure.

I shot her a look of disbelief. “Why would it matter to you what my reasons are for hanging out with him?”

“He’s a manwhore, Trinity. Is that really what you want?”

Disappointment shot through me. I’d wanted to mend our friendship, not worsen it, but Becki it seemed had other ideas.

“Have you even seen Gerik lately?” She continued.

I glared at her and Gods damn her but she glared right back. “The two of you is a good thing. Right, Hockey?” She nudged her boyfriend with her elbow expecting confirmation.

Please shut up, I silently begged her.

Looking first at Becki then at me, Hockey went back to staring at the fire without answering. Becki shot him a dirty look.

“He agrees with me,” She answered for him. “Everyone does.”

Becki still hadn’t shut up when Pitti and his brother Pesha joined us.

“There is chemistry between you two, it’s obvious. Everyone can see it.”

Chemistry. I almost laughed. Talk about the understatement of the year.

“So what is this story about anyway?” I turned toward the Pitti and Pesha hoping to change the subject.

“What, ‘The Fisherman and the Princess’? It’s about some rich bitch that needs to get the stick out of her ass and remember that money and status have no place in the matters of the bedroom,” Xan answered, returning with my drink.

Pitti threw his head back and howled with laughter.

“Nice Xan.” Becki scowled at him. “I never knew you were a poet.”

“It’s a well kept secret, my little bohemian.”

“Trinity…” Becki started up again. “You and Gerik look great together. His light coloring with your dark is really beautiful.”

With a calculatingly smirk on her face, she raised her eyebrows at Xan. “Don’t you agree Xan?”

I was really starting to feel the effects of the alcohol but because of Becki’s intrusive behavior I was becoming more agitated than playful.

“Hmm…” Xan said slowly, looking truly perplexed. “I’m not sure. Let’s find out.”

He put his hand on my exposed thigh, his expression mockingly quizzical, and squeezed. Seeing and feeling his hand on me, my breathing hitched.

Pitti laughed so hard he shot liquor out of his nose.

“I don’t know about that, Becki.” Xan’s hand inched up my leg, disappearing under the hem of my dress. While he pretended to study the contrasting shades of our skin his thumb began moving in small circles on my inner thigh. I stopped breathing altogether. “I think dark and darker ain’t so bad.” Xan winked at me.

Becki didn’t miss any of it. “Xan, when was the last time you spent the night with the triplets? Ooh! Look there’s Fifi now! Let’s ask her!”

Xan’s drink crumpled in his grip. It was time to stop this before things turned ugly.

“Becki!” I yelled. “Gods damn! Look over there!” I pointed to a spot not far from us where Onyx was enjoying the comfort of Gerik’s large body wrapped around her.

“That’s who you want me to be with? The guy who is constantly alternating between me and her? Thanks,” I said, hoping I’d conveyed how insulted I felt. “Thanks a ton.”

Xan laughed until Becki looked like she was ready to start talking again. No longer smiling, he cut his eyes at her, frowning. The overall look was threatening.

“Becki tends to think monogamy is overrated, don’t you puţin sora?”

Hockey’s lack of attention to our conversation suddenly improved, as did Becki’s posture. She didn’t say another word about Gerik and I. In fact, she didn’t say another word the entire night.

I was going to have to ask Xan what he knew about Becki. As soon as I could concentrate on something other than the hand on my thigh.

After a litany of rules and warnings and a pair of bright orange earplugs, Xan finally let me do live practice rounds with both the pistol and the rifle. My aim was atrocious, yet to my astonishment, he wasn’t berating me about it or making any sarcastic comments about women using guns. In fact, he was smiling an awful lot.

Seeing Xan smile for the first time, a real smile instead of his typical wolfish grin, was sort of a shock. I had stopped talking mid-sentence and just gaped at him, causing his smile to turn into a scowl. He stomped away after that.

The Sava men joined our practice. Stefan, an experienced hunter, was showing me techniques with a rifle he claimed Xan did not know. Surprisingly, Xan seemed to find that funny rather than insulting. Stefan was everyone’s surrogate father.

While making a bullet ridden mess of the piece of cardboard Xan had propped up between two sawhorses, I noticed Hockey gesturing at me.

“Huh?” I pulled out an earplug.

He slammed a clip into the empty handle of his pistol with a loud crack. “Becki,” he repeated, “Have you seen her today?”

His hat was pulled down low and he was refusing to look at me, leaving me unable to gauge his facial expression but by the tone in his voice I knew he wasn’t happy.

“No,” I told him.

“And yesterday?” He asked. “Did you see her?”

“No,” I said, realizing where this conversation was headed.

“Is she sleeping at home?” He pulled the trigger. I put my earplugs back in and waited until he emptied his clip to answer him.

He turned to me, expecting an answer. I so badly wanted to lie to him and spare him the hurt I was about to cause but I couldn’t. No one deserved to be kept in the dark, constantly lied to by the people they trusted. It was wrong and did nothing but cause pain.

I blew out a breath. “No, she’s not. I’m sorry,” I said to him as gently as possible. I reached out to grab his hand as a means of support and was caught completely off guard when he pulled me into an awkward hug.

“It’s not your fault,” He whispered. “It’s mine.”

“Trinity!” Xan snapped. I jumped away from Hockey.

Forehead to forehead with me, his eyes narrowed, Xan growled low in his throat. “What are you supposed to be doing right now? Practicing? Or…” He glanced at Hockey, “Hugging strange men?”

I laughed. “Strange men?”

He growled again.

Backing away from him, I asked, “Are you channeling your inner bear?”

He stalked forward. “Maybe.”

Hockey glanced between us, his expression curious. I glanced back at Stevo and Stefan, who were also watching Xan continue to advance on me. I shoved at his chest, “Stop it. Everyone is looking and you’re acting like a jackass.”

Snorting, “You should know me well enough by now fată. I don’t give a shit what anyone thinks.”

The end of my flip flop snagged on a hole in the ground and I started to fall backwards. Xan caught me before I fell and pulled me close.

“Trin, what’s an Até lover?”

“Huh?”

Warm breath tickled my ear as he nuzzled his cheek against mine. “You called me that the night we were attacked. An Até lover. It’s something bad, I’m guessing.”

He nipped at my ear. I simultaneously shivered and shuddered.

“Até is the Goddess of mischief,” I whispered.

“Is that all?” He asked, laughing. “What about Eros? I don’t remind you of him?”

A man who knew his Gods. My heart triple timed it.

I shook my head vehemently. “No way. Maybe Ares.”

He was still laughing when his teeth caught my ear again.

“Fuuuck me….” Pitti said loudly. Where had Pitti come from?

“Language!” Stefan snapped.

“Who cares about language?” Stevo said. “Xan’s gonna die cuz’ Gerik’s gonna murder him. It’s gonna be a bloody, messy death.”

“True, frate,” Pitti replied. “There might be anything left to bury.”

“Does anyone know how this is even possible?” Hockey asked, always the voice of reason. “Doesn’t she…belong to…Gerik?”

I frowned at that last comment but all coherent thought fled as soon as Xan tugged me behind a large grouping of Pine trees and began trailing feather light kisses down my neck. Using just enough pressure to feel pleasure from and yet not repel.

“I’m sorry Trin; I didn’t hear you, say that one more time for me. How do you clear a malfunction?”

I groaned and rolled my eyes. Xan was a stickler for making me answer the same question about fifty times a day.

“Wait at least ten seconds before trying to clear it in case it’s only delayed. Then pull back the slide. Release the slide and fire. If that doesn’t work, take out the magazine, eject the round and give you the gun, oh wonderful master of mine.”

He was smiling, I knew I was right. I stuck my tongue out at him and did a happy dance.

Xan gaped at me. “Never do that dance again fată. Promise me.”

“I can’t make promises I won’t keep, Gypsy. But I will tell you-

I trailed off as soon as I realized where we were. I had been so caught up in our conversation that I hadn’t been paying attention to where we were going. Xan was holding the door to his trailer open for me.

As I continued to stand there staring, saying nothing, his eyes darkened.

“I’ll see you tomorrow then.” He turned abruptly and disappeared. The screen door closed behind him with a slam.

I stood there alone, wishing I could just walk away before things got even more complicated. Or difficult. Because if I went in there things were definitely going to become more difficult. At least for me.

Regardless, I couldn’t leave with him thinking I’d left because I didn’t want him. Not when, in reality, I felt the opposite.

Taking a deep breath, I opened his door and found Xan sitting on his kitchen counter, smoking a cigarette, wearing only his boxers. He glanced up in surprise.

“Forget something?” He asked, blowing out a stream of smoke.

His skin was still damp with summer sweat and exertion from practice. The lingering scents of bonfire smoke and gin that always clung to his body hung heavy in the air. Bringing up his arm, he took another drag of his cigarette and exhaled. I watched as the muscles in his biceps flexed with the movement. My belly tightened in anticipation. I wanted him and I wanted him now.

“Fată?” He said, his lips twitching.

I didn’t know what to do. It hurt too much to kiss him and yet standing here looking at him, half dressed with his long hair falling over his golden brown chest, it was hurting not to. His smile slipped. Sliding off the counter, he stubbed his cigarette out in the sink.

“Veni la mine, frumos,” He said softly, crooking a finger at me. My stomach took a wild leap into my throat and my breathing became labored as I approached him.

His lips hesitated near mine and, oh Gods, I desperately wanted for things to be different. Sensing my hesitation, instead of kissing me he changed course and went for the sensitive skin on my neck. As his kisses grew urgent, the urge to force him away from me began to flare.

But before I knew it his hands were skimming the curve of my hips, his fingers biting into my skin through the thin material of my dress as he roughly pulled me closer.

The shadow of his beard was rasping delightfully against my skin as he nuzzled and kissed his way down my neck.

When the ribbon holding the back of my dress together loosened causing the sleeves to slide off my shoulders, I arched into Xan, rubbing my bare breasts against his chest.

I felt him hesitate.

I dug my fingernails into his back. “Please,” I whispered.

Pushing the dress down over my stomach and past my hips, I let the soft material puddle on the floor at my feet. Suddenly tense, he closed his eyes at the sight of my naked body.

“Xan?” I whispered, unsure of why he wouldn’t look at me.

I gasped as he grabbed my shoulders and muscled me through the small doorway of his bedroom. My knees buckled as they hit the mattress, causing me to fall backwards. Crawling over me, he gripped my hips, and pressed our bodies together. When his mouth closed over a nipple, I shuddered.

Not out of pleasure or pain, but horror. Everything inside of me screamed that this was wrong, that to let this man touch me intimately would cause nothing but devastation, to me, to him and to Gerik.

So terrified by my thoughts, I couldn’t speak. Grabbing handfuls of his hair, I yanked, desperate to pull him off of me.

I was still shaking when he covered me with a blanket and lay down next to me. Ashamed and embarrassed, I looked away. “I’m sorry,” I croaked.

Instead of answering me, he pulled me over him, gathering me in the crook of his arm. He pressed my head down over his heart. “Trin… It doesn’t matter.”

I stared up at him in shock. “But it does!”

He just smiled and pushed my head back down.

“No fată, it really doesn’t.”

“But-

“Shh…”

We lay there in silence for awhile. Both pillowed and sheltered by the bulk of his body I eventually began to relax. At least I could touch him, talk to him and be near him. None of those things felt wrong.

When I felt comfortable enough I ran my fingers down his stomach and encountered a large puckered scar to the right of his groin.

“How’d you get this?” I asked.

“Bike accident.” He replied, kissing my forehead. “A guardrail decided to jump in front of me, it was the damndest thing.”

I looked up at him, realizing how much I still didn't know about him. “Tell me more?” I asked.

“What? About the accident?”

I shook my head. “No, your motorcycles. Your life outside of camp. The friends you had. Your dad. All of it, I want to know all of it.”

Xan stared down at me through puzzled eyes, saying nothing.

“What’s wrong?” I asked him, hoping I didn’t cross the line by bringing up his father.

“Seriously?” He asked. “You really want to know about all that shit?”

Now I was really confused. I’d asked, hadn’t I? “Yes,” I told him. “I really do. I know you performed stunts with your bikes and that your Dad is a half Blackfoot Indian, right?”

He nodded still looking bewildered. I pulled on a few of his dreads. “So then, Gypsy, tell me more.”