Dalliance in Darkness ( Dalliance #1) Read Online Free PDF

over again hoping that each new pass over would undo all the misgiving and suffering that I associated with it. I was going to go out tonight with friends, what little I had left, but it wouldn’t feel right – there would have been a weight on my shoulders invisible but there. Always there.
     
    I didn’t know what to do, all I knew was what I didn’t want to keep feeling – but it washed over me time and time again and I would lounge in this lagoon of memory and misery like it were the sickly comfort of an old friend that caressed me with one hand and pressed the blade to my throat with another. Guilt. That’s what it was. Drowning me drop by drop.
     
    I was so quiet, as I had always been; for fear that someone might hear me – that by some off chance a stranger or a neighbor might hear my sniffles. The doorbell rang and I flinched. But my lethargy wrapped itself tight around me – not much different from my blankets. I ignored the airy ring for several minutes before a familiar voice called out to me.
     
    “I know you’re in there,” James said. It had been almost a week since I heard anything from them. But I had lost my interest in what they had to offer, I didn’t want to be here anymore – I couldn’t bring myself to wake up another day when I left so much behind that day. Still, I got up dressed in my jeans and shirt – my hair still a mess – and unlocked the front door.
     
      James was illuminated by the lights of the apartment above him, with both hands in pocket and a withering smirk on his face. He could plainly see that my eyes were red. “You okay?” He asked.
     
    “Fine,” was my curt response. I hated looking weak. “What do you want,” my voice was dry and tired, I wanted nothing to do with anything.
     
    I could tell he was concerned, though why exactly… it’s not as though he knew me. He shifted slightly in his place. “It’s not what I want,” he corrected.
     
    “Well I don’t give a shit,” I tried closing the door but James persisted, putting his foot in the way. James put his hand on the door and didn’t say a word, simply looked into my eyes. They reminded me of memory’s forgotten, enthralled me with a warmth and a danger. I had gotten myself involved too deep with something I thought I could outsmart.
     
    “Darlin I was told to be pushy,” he swept a hand through his curls. “Insistent,” he said. “But not force anything on ya, not that I would even if he told me to,” James looked down at his feet and raised a brow. “Others would,” he assured and looked back to me. “I’ll tell you right now from experience that whatever it is…” his eyes scanned across my room briefly. I felt paralyzed, not wanting to interrupt with a single word.
     
    “... Whatever it is you want or you need Dean’ll help ya get it,” James briefly touched his face as I gave him a defeated sigh.
     
    “Everything that once was?” I said. “It can’t be anymore.” I tried not to let the quaver in my voice break through, but it came unwanted regardless. “I can’t just spin the wheel and win; I can’t just wake up and have it back. Nobody can bring that back.” I looked away and sent myself further away inside, not wanting to feel the sting of coming tears.
     
    James put his middle and index finger on my cheek and nudged me back in his direction. “I’m not here to sell ya lies,” the words came from him strained. “They tell ya to let go of grief, like it’s something you can put down or back up on a shelf. But it’s not like that, no, it’s not like that at all,” his voice darker and pain laced in the last of his words.
     
    He brought his fingers away from my cheek. “You live with it, you endure it – it’ll color your character and not just a part of it but all of it. Makes you something you’re not.”
     
    “What if it just—“ I covered my face and sniffled. “What if it just, just I don’t know reveals something that you are?” I