Dream of Me

My breathing had picked up from my mantra to instant fear. Things were happening too fast, and Noah was twisting and growling and shielding me from whoever pushed into his apartment. Gripping at the back of his shoulders, pulling myself closer into him, I just waited for this to be over. Noah promised he’d take care of me, but sometimes I think he was trying to persuade himself more than me.

“Noah Ryker Brady, you get your ass out here. Now!” A husky male voice demanded with the stomp of his foot and the throw of a random cup on the table into the wall.

I yelped in surprise as I settled into his back and pressed my forehead into the skin, my body began to shake. Why was I shaking? Who was this figure? I lifted my head to look at Noah’s flush face, his eyes dilated, and his body frozen in time. I didn’t know what to do, what to say to make him move. Still, a couple seconds later, when the man who looked just like Noah, only if you added on about twenty years, the same eyes and dark locks that twined together over those eyes, behind glasses, stared back at Noah. His glare reached over his shoulder and pieced me like a knife, stabbing me and keeping me stable as I felt something crawling through my mind, an instant headache booming over my temples. I started to stumble backwards, what was happening to me? I felt so weak and drained as I fell into the railing, allow that and the fact that Noah’s hand shot out and grabbed hold of my wrist to stable me. Was this what it felt like to have a Spade rummaging through your mind? I knew for a fact that Noah had been up in the vacancy more than once, and it didn’t hurt this badly. What was he doing to me?

I guessed this was Noah’s father, and stared at how he wore a rumpled long-sleeved maroon button-up, dark jeans, and black shoes. He was huffing and puffing as he turned his gaze over to Noah and narrowed his eyes sufficiently. Raising a hand, he backhanded Noah so quickly and so harshly that Noah’s head snapped to the side. I could see his eyes staring into his neighbor’s balcony, staring past me and unblinkingly. I opened my mouth to say something, but he pushed his thumb into the inside of my wrist, which sent a surge through my whole arm, making it known to me that I’m not supposed to talk at this moment.

“How could you?” Noah’s father screamed as his face turned a violent red, his body jolting from how heavily he was breathing from anger.

Noah’s head was still snapped to the side as he looked straight into the railing, still unblinking and breathing shallowly. “Answer me!”

“I had to,” Noah whispered slowly, wagering his words to see if his father would hit him again as he looked everywhere that wasn’t mine or his father’s face.

“My own son, branded a traitor. You have,” His father slapped him again in the same new red blotch that he had struck before, “disgraced this family! What do you have to say for yourself?”

“I love her! She is mine and I did what I had to!” Noah snapped to attention, his hand clenching around my wrist as he pulled me quickly into his back, his face livening up as he challenged against his father.

His father shook his head, “That’s not enough now, Noah. You’ll die – the both of you.”

“I’ll protect her!” He screamed back at him, taking the first step towards his father, only stopping short when I tugged on his hand to keep him close. I couldn’t stand to watch he and his father physically fight, it was hard enough watching his father hit him the way he did.

His father grabbed him by the shoulders and shook him, which ultimately shook me as well. The raspy scream of his dad filled my ears as I wrapped my arms around his waist and clung to him like a lifeline. “You can barely protect yourself, how are you going to save her from the Hierarch? How are you going to stop them from taking her when they sedate you and throw you in Solitary Confinement? Tell me, son, how are you going to do it when you drain daily because they don’t let you sleep but twice a month? Tell me!”

Noah swung one long arm behind his back and wound it around my waist, twirling me in front of him as he wrapped both of his arms around me, wrapping me up in his scent and warmth – this was what safe felt like. Noah’s next words fell out in a growl, “I said I will. I promised her, and I promised you the night you proclaimed her dead. I will protect her, Nolan.”

Nolan paced the small area for a moment as he pressed his hand over his lips. His head snapped toward Noah as he yelled, “How could you do this? How could you do this to me? How could you do this to your mother? No, how could you do this to our family?”

I was past looking up and seeing their expressions as I buried my face into the skin of Noah’s chest, my arms hugging him tightly around his midsection. I fell into ecstasy at the feel of his arms wrapped around my neck and shoulder to crush me into him. Noah turned his head down to press his face into my hair as the feelings of liveliness filled our bodies, recognizing that our very life was each other. Noah’s head lifted the slightest to growl, “This isn’t about reputation and family, this is about saving my Dreamer’s life, this is about making her feel safe, and the only place she is safe is with me, in my arms. That’s it.”

“It’s gonna be pretty hard to protect her when you’re locked up underground in the middle of East Jesus Nowhere.”

“They have to catch us first.” Noah did that voice, that raspy, lowered voice that he knew drove me insane as he spoke over my head towards his father in a threatening tone.

His father’s tone lowered to the same length as his son’s. “You know they will, Noah. Why fight them any longer? Just surrender, their price will lower. You know it will.”

Noah’s lips pressed to the crown of my skull as I tightened my arms around him and let him slowly sway me. I could tell he was looking up at his father from under his lashes because I didn’t feel his stare on me but his lips were still attached to my skull. “I’ve waited nineteen whole years to meet her, Nolan, I won’t spend another day without her.”

"Their charge will only be a small two month sentence without all of the normal attires. Why not?" Nolan's gruff voice growled towards Noah as he took one step closer.

"That's a little too close for comfort. Back off." Noah whipped his head up and narrowed his eyes at the father figure as he lurked closer.

I didn't know what to think about everything that I was learning, I didn't know whether I should be angry or scared, crying or yelling. The things Nolan was saying to me weren't a bunch of rainbows or butterflies, and the replies Noah was giving him didn't reassure me in the slightest. Clutching closer to him, I hid my face in his chest as I tried to mual over the actions and threats ensuing overhead. Somehow, I blocked the jist of the conversation from my mind as I pieced together broken bridges. Solitary Confinement. Running. Two weeks. Underground facility/jailhouse. Longer charge. If a normal charge was two months for whatever rule he broke, and we planned on running, which meant that they would throw additional months down onto us. So, if we had two weeks before they'd come for us, why weren't we on the move already, especially if we were going to get doubly charged then we should be hopping planes by now. With eyes squeezed tightly shut now, I clung to him like my lifeline, thinking of only how we were to escape such peril. That's when anger sunk into my system. Why didn't he explain to me? Why didn't he tell me that this was going to happen if he broke the law? I understood that he'd get into some sort of trouble, but not some sort of Solitary Confinement. That seemed a bit too outlandish, too midevial.

Pretty soon, I was being spun out of Noah's grasp and twisted and pulled towards the exit. I didn't understand what was happening while we jostled into the living room and I stumbled over my own footing, bumping into furniture. Looking back, I saw Noah stay perfectly still on the balcony and didn't quite understand his reaction to me being hauled away by his father who happened to just priorly be talking about how we were to be arrested. I didn't think that would sit over with him quite the way it did. He just stood there staring down at the spot where I was standing a moment ago, staring down like he was a piece of heaven standing in an impetuous hellfire. The look that crossed his face wasn't concern nor was it panicked in any sort of form; it was an impetual rage that flamed in his gorgeous aquamarine eyes, clenched his fists, and made his frame shake. Five seconds had never felt so long in my whole life as Nolan hauled me into the door when Noah came storming towards us with a quick pace that was nothing short of a sprint from the balcony edge through the large living room and finishing at the door.

Ripping me tenderly from his father's hold, he twirled me quickly until my back slammed into the wall beside the door. His hand was sprawled against my chest to pin me into the plaster as he looked from my concerned brown eyes, flecks of green and dark red swirling into the hue as I watched him switch his gaze to his father with a promise of threat to his tone. "Don't ever touch her."

"By God, she really is your Dreamer." His father whispered as he held his hands up defensively, his eyes and mouth both wide with realization and understanding for the first time in what must have been three years.

Noah turned his back to his father and pressed his forehead against mine, his eyes closing as he pushed me deeper into the wall. His voice dropped to a vicious whisper as he locked me against the wall with his body and lips on the side of my neck. "Get out of my house. I'm done with your games."

I didn't know what was happening to me as he pinned my hands against the wall by my sides and his lips left whispers from my collarbone to my earlobe. I felt locked and stunned, all I could think about was his lips on my skin and when they reached my ear, they left whispers of breath and words. The feeling spreading from my stomach and skyrocketing in every which way until it reached my fingertips and something weird began to happen. "Feel it, baby, feel it and accept it."

Something was surging through me and I wasn't sure if this was what I was supposed to feel, but I was feeling it anyway. Something was happening to me and I wasn't sure what way was up to down, left to right, right to wrong, but it didn't matter at this point because something shot through my viens in a way that forced my eyelids to close tightly and my lips to tingle in an endless wake. I tried to open my eyes, but they were too heavy and closed too tightly, like I had no control over the most of my body. A shudder of a whisper left my lips, "Noah..."

He skimmed his lips from the lobe of my ear to the edges of my lips. I could only imagine what his face looked like, but the as the feeling surged through me, I felt all of the feelings that I repressed over the last three years and everything I didn't want to admit to myself over the last twenty-four hours. His lips pressed gently to mine and something hit my eyes in a blast of heat and cold air at the same time, my body freezing at the feel of his lips against mine, breaking mine open as I felt his chilled breath fill against my taste buds. One slight fleck of his tongue against mine forced goose bumps to flee over my skin before he pulled away.

"Open your eyes, now." Noah whispered slowly, his breath jagged and his body quivering so much that I could sense his smile and the sparkle hitting against his eyes.

I found that the weight on my eyes and the breath of freezing and heat that sat behind my eyes dissipated as I finally opened my eyes up to the dimmed room. Everything was livened and colors looked beautiful and the smell of his apartment wafted with Noah's natural scent. A gasp sounded through the room and when I turned my head to the side, I saw Nolan with grey hairs that I hadn't noticed ten minutes ago. Or that his glasses had specks of dust sticking to the lenses. Or that I could see the pieces of stubble poking through his clean pores. I thought he had left, but there was no such thing of that as he stared at me with his eyes and mouth both opened wide, staring at me with dark blue eyes that made me feel like I had wronged him even more than I had with the whole of the Spade race. "She... you're... you've bonded."

I turned my eyes toward Noah who, I swore, had tears in his eyes as he wound me up in his arms. I whispered with shock sticking to my voice, "What does he mean? How does he know?"

Noah took my hand and turned me around slowly so that I was looking into an oval mirror that hung over a table against the wall. My mouth fell open and my eyebrow rose up at my reflection. Nothing seemed to change, no not really, except for the fact that my eyes changed from brown to dark red! All I could say at this point was, "Oh, dear, this is going to be very hard to hide."