Pretty Faces and Dark Places Read online

  After what felt like ages, but was probably only a few minutes, I felt a nudge on my shoulder. I turned around again to see Sophie with the biggest smile decorating her face, a sight that had always infected me and made me feel the need to mirror it. “May, there is someone I’d like for you to meet. This is William Damon.”

  After Sophie made the introductions, we chatted for a while. He seemed to be a nice guy and he had that look in his eyes as he gazed at my best friend that spoke volumes about what was inside of his soul towards her – he too was pretty fond of her. It was heartwarming.

  “Um, I’m going to go check out the rest of the party,” I informed Sophie when there was a pause that turned into an awkward silence, pointing back with my thumb to whatever that was behind me.

  “What? No way, I won’t let you go wander around by yourself,” Sophie said.

  “I’ll be fine, I won’t go far away, I promise,” I said, because I had to assure her, otherwise she would never let me leave her side.

  “Are you sure?” she asked.

  “Yep!” I offered her a small smile that grew when she hugged me tightly, as if I was going on a tour around the world or something, not just a few steps away to give her the privacy with William that I knew she must be craving. “Don’t forget to get his phone number this time, huh?”

  Her answer was nothing but a chuckle, a nod, and a smiling wink.

  Sometime later, as I was roaming around drinking another beer that had been offered to me by someone I knew wouldn’t tell my Nana – since he didn’t even know she existed and all – I saw someone that I thought looked awfully familiar. I kept glancing his way, trying to place where I’d seen him before, but I couldn’t for the life of me figure it out. I just knew that I’d seen those dark eyes and that dark straight hair somewhere before – and that was about it. The guy caught me looking twice and both times I looked away, blushing hard.

  After a few minutes, I saw the guy in question making his way in my direction. My throat went drier than an abandoned desert once I was sure he was coming to talk to me. Unlike Sophie, I was never at ease when I spoke to boys; I always turned into that awkward idiot who talked like a moron, which made boys lose interest in me eventually.

  “Hi!” he smiled.

  “Um, hi, uh …” Yeah, that was my intelligent reply.

  “Enjoying the party?” he asked, the smile still living on his lips.

  “Um, yes, it’s cool,” I shrugged and looked around at nothing in particular.

  “Is this your first time here?”

  “Uh, yes, it is,” I said awkwardly, tapping the heel of my left palm to my left thigh. “My friend Sophie came here last year, though, and she liked it a lot,” I added for no reason at all.

  “Oh,” he said. “You mean Sophia? Is that your friend?”

  “Yeah, that’s the one, do you know her?” I asked, surprised and thinking maybe he was a mutual friend or something and that was why I thought he looked familiar.

  “No, I’m afraid I never met her last year, but Kathrin’s – my girlfriend – brother is pretty fond of her. He hasn’t stopped talking about her since last year, no matter how much all of us have tried to make him shut up,” he said with a light laugh.

  “Really?” I smiled widely at his words; happy for the confirmation that William felt the same as Sophie. “She wouldn’t shut up either, not even with a fist in her mouth. Trust me, I tried!” I chuckled, now all okay and at ease because I knew he was just being friendly and wouldn’t be hitting on me, since he had a girlfriend and all.

  “I know the feeling,” he let out a breathy laugh. “I’m Matthew, by the way.” He offered me his hand and I took it, noticing that it was quite a bit colder than mine when I shook it. I smiled as I introduced myself, followed by, “Nice to meet you, too.”

  “Yeah, I know, everyone says so,” he joked, causing me to chuckle again and for the conversation to flow so nicely that I was actually enjoying my time at the party I’d thought would be nothing but pure torture and awkwardness.

  “You look oddly familiar,” I blurted out after we had chatted a little, instantly regretting the question – even with how innocent and simple the question was – when I saw how his tan skin almost paled and his smile fell for the tiniest moment before he recovered again and the smile was back on his face. A smile that I knew right then and there to be fake. Very fake.

  I think it was the first time I noticed how Matthew’s eyes were nothing but a sea made of secrets. I had no idea why I felt like I wanted to get to know him better, like there was a heavy weight on his shoulders that I wanted to lift up for him for a while and give him a breather. It was quite strange; I barely knew the guy. Heck, I didn’t even know him at all. Why was I feeling that way, then?

  “I hear that a lot,” he said. “Actually, my eyes are not my own; I borrowed them and I need to give them back before sunlight.”

  I laughed out loud at his reply, earning myself a few weird looks from people that I’d thought were weird themselves. I always wondered why people looked at others who were laughing. Was it because they were judging them for being loud and their inability to control themselves or the noises they made? Or was it because they wanted to see if something was funny and if it would earn them a laugh as well, along with the person who was getting the attention? I liked to think it was the latter. I’d always believed in the goodness inside of people and refused to think badly of anyone, unless they actually did something to make me think that of them.

  “Angel!” I heard a voice that was softer than velvet and deeper than the ocean saying, the single word sounding as if it repeated itself over and over again about a hundred times in the moments it took me from first hearing it to actually turning around and finding the one who’d spoken. The one whose voice lingered in the air as if it was that cool breeze on a sunny, hot day that you wished would last longer was standing a few steps away from me, staring at me with the most astonishing stare.

  I swallowed thickly.

  My breath was caught in my throat at the sight of him, and my heart began to beat faster. He was … beautiful. Really beautiful. And I was thinking that despite not even knowing if ‘Beautiful’ was the right word to use for such a sight.

  His eyes – the eyes that had a mysterious and secretive look in them as he gazed at me – were a beautiful shade of green. His skin was really pale, paler than any I’d ever seen before, his nose was just perfect, and his lips had that dark pinkish color in them that you only get when it’s snowing heavily and you’re stuck outside. He was obviously no older than twenty-five or something close to that. His hair was another story, dark brown though the fire gave it a bit of reddish at the ends of his straight locks. It was very organized and neat, and my hand just ached to touch it. To be honest, my hand ached to touch all of him. All. Of him.

  I gulped audibly when he took a step closer to me. Another step and my heart almost burst out of my chest. By the fifth step I felt light-headed, as if I was about to faint, as if I couldn’t keep standing on my own two feet. It felt as if his gaze that stayed locked with mine was the only thing that was keeping me from fainting, though it was the very same thing that had made me feel that way in the first place – I had no idea how.

  It was very strange. The pull I felt for this guy was really strange. It was like I’d known him all of my life, even without us speaking a single word to each other. It was like I wanted to bury myself in his arms and feel his closeness and the soft touch I just knew he would give me, without touching him even once before. Something was pulling me to him. He was pulling me to him. A pull that only a giant magnet could cause to metal, not hearts.

  He was standing so close that I could inhale the very sweet smell of his. A smell of musk and cedar wood mixed with something else … him. I couldn’t do anything but breathe heavily as I stared and admired the handsomeness that was him. In the back of my mind, I knew I should stop, quit staring and be a bit polite about it, but something kept me from doing so.
I just kept my eyes locked with his, almost praying with them for him to talk to me. I longed to hear his voice again.

  “Beautiful Angel,” the answer to my prayers was spoken with that velvet voice of his that made my stomach twist and turn and my breath tangle even more.

  “To the darkest piece of Hell do I go if you aren’t the most beautiful creature I’ve ever laid my eyes on,” he told me and my knees nearly buckled.

  The look in his eyes … God! That look in his eyes …

  “I could say the same,” I found myself whispering, frowning for a split second at my own comment, which I’d said without any hesitation or shyness – something that was so not like me at all.

  “I’m thrilled that you’ve finally made your way to me. I’m very thrilled that I’ve found you.” His words made no sense to me, but I was too busy looking into the depths of his green eyes to care about figuring out what they meant or what he was talking about. And I completely forgot everything when his hand touched a long lock of my hair, moving down to my naked shoulder and then to the feathers of my wings.

  I shivered at the feel of his cold hand against my bare skin, but despite the coldness of his touch, I felt warmth inside of me. It was unexplainable, unbelievable and just indescribable.

  “Beautiful Angel,” he said again in a low voice, so low that if I wasn’t hanging on to his every word I wouldn’t have heard it. “I adore your wings, so soft and … pure.” His gaze followed his hand that was touching my feathers while speaking, then moved to look into my eyes again. “Just like you.”

  “You’re not wearing any costume,” I said dumbly after a pause of silence, not knowing anything better to say or finding a costume to compliment in return.

  “Who said so? I am,” he simply replied. My eyes roamed down his form again, but I couldn’t see anything other than his designer black suit, almost the same as the ones William and Matthew were wearing.

  A frown appeared on my forehead. “Who are you dressed as?” I asked, thinking that maybe he was dressed like some movie character or so.

  “A human,” was his only reply.

  “Oh!”

  “Yes, Beautiful Angel,” he whispered, his face even closer to mine than it had been a moment ago.

  “And when it’s not Halloween, what are you then?” I tried to humor him, my voice low and breathy. His hand brushed my arm as he kept moving it through the feathers, making my eyes almost roll to the back of my head just at the thought of how would his touch feel if it was on my body instead.

  “A demon,” he answered. “I have wings like yours, only they are much bigger, and as black as this beautiful silky hair of yours.”

  “Uh-huh, what else?”

  “I control minds, as well.”

  “Yeah? Are you controlling my mind right now?”

  “Maybe I am,” he whispered.

  I smiled at his attempt at making me laugh, getting lost in his touch that was now roaming up and down my arm lazily, softly, and tenderly. His hand somehow wasn’t as cold as it had been just minutes ago. I blushed at the thought of how touching me could be affecting him, as well.

  “This is so lovely,” he said. “This blush, spreading all over your skin … it’s so lovely, Shy, Beautiful Angel.”

  I sighed and closed my eyes. His one hand was touching my neck very softly while the other touched my wings again. “Breathtaking,” I heard him saying.

  “My wings?”

  “All of you, Beautiful Angel,” he replied. “All of you.” When his thumb touched my jawline, my hand dropped the almost empty bottle in my hand, causing me to snap my eyes open and snap out of my dazzled mind, making me aware of my surroundings and the fact that we weren’t actually alone.

  “Oh, snap!” I cursed under my breath, and heard him groaning. I looked around at the other people at the party, only to realize that no one was actually paying us any attention whatsoever. I searched for Sophie but couldn’t find her, deciding she must be somewhere nearby with William. Matthew, though, was nowhere in sight.

  “Angel,” the green-eyed mystery called in a whisper, bringing my attention back to him, and the dazzling feeling back to my mind. It was as if he had this supernatural power to keep my eyes glued to his and my mind in a fog where it could think of nothing but him whenever he kept his eyes locked with mine or when his hands were touching me. It was really – odd. Like, he was really able to control my mind, and wasn’t only joking about it. “Do you want to go somewhere quieter?”

  Without a second thought, I nodded. He smiled a smile that made my already dazzled mind go into an almost frozen state, only managing to function if it was for something related to him. That answering smile of his was mesmerizing. I followed him, hand in hand, keeping really close, simply not able to be apart.

  We went further into the woods, away from the campfire, away from people, and it started to get darker and darker with each new step. Something was telling me that it was okay, that it would be lit soon, and that I’d be safe no matter what. But something else – a voice that was so low and fading with the second – told me that it was very wrong, dangerous and risky. I listened to the first voice, though; it was louder, and to be honest – it was what I preferred for some reason that was unknown to me.

  “Hey!” I heard a woman calling, and Green-Eyed Mystery turned around, his hand still in mine when he replied with, ‘‘It’s me.” We were standing in the dark, but I could make out her form in the faint light that the fire provided.

  “Where are you going?” she called.

  “Somewhere quiet,” he called back then looked at me for a moment before adding, “I found my soulmate.” He smiled and I frowned, then he squeezed my hand lightly and I had to smile as well.

  “Yeah?” she kind of squealed her question.

  “Yeah. She’s an angel!”

  Though she wasn’t that close to us, I could hear her frightened gasp as she took a step back, causing me to frown again at her reaction. Green-Eyed Mystery chuckled and his hand left mine for a second, only to be placed over the small of my back as he pushed me gently forward a few steps until the girl was able to see me. I heard her sigh of relief and saw the smile that spread on her beautiful-but-hard features when she saw me.

  She waved her hand in a you-almost-got-me motion, shaking her head before saying that it was good to see me and then leaving. Not nice, but good. Yep, it was weirder than I could possibly say.

  “Who’s that?” I asked him.

  “Kathrin, my sister,” was his answer.

  Was that the same Kathrin as in Matthew’s girlfriend? Did that mean that he was William’s brother? I had to admit that they had the same eyes and skin tone. I couldn’t wait to tell Sophie.

  When we walked some distance and I thought it couldn’t possibly get any darker in the woods, I found a very old cottage right in front of me, something that looked as if it had appeared from nothing. And when we entered, there was so much light that it almost hurt my eyes, though I didn’t know if it was because it was a very strong light or because I’d spent the last fifteen minutes or so in the dark.

  The cottage on the inside was nothing like the outside; it was occupied with very nice furniture, though it was small. There was a king sized bed, with a set of two arm chairs, a love seat, and a couch in front of it. There were paintings on the walls, but I couldn’t understand what they were. They had something like rain and wind, something dark and shadowy … it wasn’t easy to even look at without getting chills.

  One painting, though, caught my eyes more than the rest and I had to look at it longer. The background of the painting was shades of dark red, red and orange. Like fire. Or maybe lava. I saw something that I liked to think were black eagles or maybe they were bats or black birds of some sort. I couldn’t tell for sure because I was only able to recognize the wings, not the body of the bird itself. It seemed that those birds were making their way down to some half-naked girl that was lying on her side, on a floor that seemed to be made of gray and bl
ack ashes. My heartbeat sped up just looking at that painting. It was – scary. So dark and frightening. I felt sorry for the girl, and wondered what that painting was referring to or speaking of, but didn’t know if I wanted to know the answer, so I didn’t even dare ask the question. The answer could be as scary as the sight of the painting itself. Or even scarier.

  “It’s better in here, isn’t it?” Green-eyed Mystery asked, his hand still holding my own, never leaving it even while I took my time exploring the cottage with my eyes and observing the paintings. I couldn’t help but notice how warm it had become – very, very warm.

  “Yes,” I said, not knowing what else I should say. His hand was touching mine, and he was so close. The trails he was leaving on my arm with the fingertips of his other hand were making me light-headed even more than I already was. And it felt as if I’d do anything he would ever ask me to do no matter what it was.

  What on earth was happening to me? What the heck was I doing for God’s sake?!

  I still heard that little voice telling me how wrong this was and how I shouldn’t be doing it, but I kept it at bay and didn’t do anything to stop what I was going, not even when his lips touched mine, kissing me with so much passion and adoration. My knees did buckle then, and his strong arms surrounded my body, keeping me on my feet and hugging me to his body.

  It felt as if I was in another world when his tongue made its way into my mouth and I was able to taste him. His moan matched mine and the feel of his arousal against my stomach made me sure that I wasn’t the only one who was affected so powerfully by this. His hands were roaming all over my sides and naked upper back, while his lips left mine to kiss wherever he could reach of my neck and shoulders. I was a limp noodle in his arms.