Page 57 of Revive
Had he?
His lack of recollection must have shown on his face, because Xane grunted at him. “You sent Alle some messages telling her what you wanted to do to her while she was walking alone at night, and I told you not to be so dumb as to do it there. Even if you weren’t listening, I’m sure you haven’t entirely forgotten that.”
Given his current fixation on that particular fantasy he couldn’t stop himself from grinning, and he had actually forgotten Xane objecting to his choice of location, or rather it’d slipped his mind. Now that he thought about it, he did recall his friend having a good long rant, but he’d been too hung up over the idea of even seeing Alle at the time to pay much attention to the details. “Not sure you gave me a reason.”
“I just told you, it’s dangerous.”
That was such a non-answer. The sort of shit grown-ups spat at kids. Don’t do this because it’s not safe. Don’t do that because you might get hurt. Just because I do something doesn’t mean you should.
Well, sure, but equally, just because you don’t do something doesn’t mean I shouldn’t. Nor did it equate to there being a valid reason for the rule.
“There isn’t a goddamned place on this island that isn’t dangerous.” He slid again and wound up with a wet foot.
Xane didn’t reply. He stomped through the remains of the seaweed forest, then studiously ignored him while he played fetch with the dogs. This was the best beach on the island, but there were easier ways to reach it. Much easier ways.
It wasn’t until the dogs were lolling about with their tongues hanging out that Xane finally planted his butt down beside Spook on the sand. He hitched up his left trouser leg. “This is why,” he brushed his thumb over a pale S-shaped scar along his shinbone. “I swear I’ve told you this story. Nine years old, broken bone, parents who didn’t fucking notice I was missing.”
Yeah, he was familiar with the tale. He couldn’t remember if it was Xane or Ric who’d first recounted it. He’d heard it from both of them several times, but he recalled being outraged by it. What had it been, a couple of days Xane had been missing before Ric stumbled on him?
Xane was fighting for composure, but failing to keep the hurt off his face or out of his voice as he spat, “Thirty-eight fucking hours, I sat alone in that chasm. So maybe listen when I tell you it’s dangerous, and don’t go noodling along there like it’s no big deal.”
“I don’t think you ever specified the exact location that you broke your leg.”
Xane sighed hard through his nose. “Yeah, well now you know. It was in that sodding ravine, and no bugger came. I screamed myself hoarse, Spook. It’s a miracle I didn’t die from fucking exposure.”
Thus it made perfect sense why he wouldn’t choose to go there, but didn’t necessarily make the location inherently more treacherous than anywhere else. It wasn’t because Xane’s parents had been out looking for him and had failed to find him that he’d been stuck there alone and injured for all that time. They hadn’t been looking at all. They hadn’t even noticed their nine-year-old was missing until after he’d been found.
“You’ll stay away from there, right?”
Yeah, he wasn’t promising that.
“Spook?”
“What?”
“It’s not the place to play games. I’m deadly serious about that. It’s a place out of nightmares.”
Xane’s nightmares, though, not his.
“Got it.”
“Good.” Xane rolled his trouser leg back down. “You and Alle are good together. Don’t do anything dumb to sabotage it.”
Right. Good advice. Except, she’d literally told him she wanted him to stalk her and play sick and twisted games with her, and where better to do it than somewhere no one else was going to go. Where Xane wasn’t going to go?
Shit! He started tallying the for and against on the figmentary whiteboard in his brain again, where he added a brand-new entry in the ‘Fucking Hell Yeah, We Should Do It’ column—highly unlikely to be overheard and interrupted, thus lessening the likelihood of having to make awkward explanations,.
Not that he was definitively agreeing that he and Alle should do it.
No matter how enticing he found it.
The items in the against column were still significant. He didn’t know if he could expose himself to that extent yet.
-20-
Allegra
As was ever the way with Spook, he pushed plans for his birthday and what they might do off into never never land. So, the days crept by and the album got closer and closer to completion. Xane’s sexy vocal track prompted at least another three impromptu make-out sessions; it just turned the mind in that direction. There was no more fucking in the studio though. Someone, unknown who, actually put up aNO FUCKING FUCKINGsign, and as it was unclear whether one of the band had done it or how seriously they meant it, the rule was being adhered to.
