Shattered Promises 02 - Fractured Souls by Jessica Sorensen (motivational books for students TXT) 📕

Alex is kneeling down on the tile floor, his arm resting on the side of the bathtub. “Are you feeling better?”

I rub my hand over my face as I sit up and the water beads down my skin. “Where are we?” I have bruises and open scratches on my skin, along with traces of dirt.

“At a friend of Adessa’s beach house,” he says. “In Maryland.”

I hunch over, drawing my knees up to my chest. “Did Aislin transport us here?”

He nods, rubbing his hand down my back. “She did—you passed out before she even got started.” Water drips from his hand onto my skin as he rubs the dirt off me. “Or more like zoned out. Your eyes were open, but you… but you were gone.” His hand wanders to my arms where he begins washing off the dirt off there, too. “I think you might need to take it easy for a while.”

I rest my head on my knees. “I need to save my mom and then maybe I can get this stupid star’s energy out of me and be normal for once.”

His hand slides over my cheek and I stare at him as he combs my damp locks out of my face. “You need to rest. You’re doing too much.”

“After I save her.”

“Gemma—”

“Alex, please,” I beg. “I can’t stop thinking about her… I dream about her all the time and she needs my help… she needs me. She could help us, too. She could know something about the mark and your father—she could know a way to stop the vision I saw from happening.”

“But what if she doesn’t?” He shuts the faucet off. “It’s such a long shot.”

I raise my head and turn sideways in the bathtub, grasping onto the sides. “I’ve dreamt about her and I’m not even sure if it was a dream. It could have been real. She said she could help me—that she knew things. Just like she told your father before he forced her into the lake.”

He wipes away some of the water dripping from my eyelashes with his thumb. “But they might just be dreams.”

“But they might not,” I whisper. “Nicholas said I was powerful and could do amazing things with my power if I was taught right, like travel and see visions without a crystal. What if I can communicate through them to? What is she’s communicating with me?”

His finger slides down the brim of my nose and to my bottom lip. “All right, but I’m going with you.”

I nod. “I know. Since you were in the vision with me when we were bargaining with the Queen, I’m assuming you need to be there.”

He reaches for a washcloth on a small shelf tucked in the corner near the sink. “And I’m making you rest for a day.”

“Alex, I don’t—”

He places a finger over my lips, the washcloth balled in his hand. “Rest, or no deal.”

I narrow my eyes, but on the inside I’m less irritated, understanding that he’s worried about me. “Okay, one day,” I say against his lips.

He nods and then dips the washcloth into the bathtub of water. “Now, lean back.”

I glance at the soaked washcloth in his hand. “Why?”

“Because,” he leans in and brushes his lips across mine. “I’m going to wash off all those cuts that damn Faerie put all over you,” he says in a low voice.

I do what he says and lean back, resting my head against the back of the tub, the water flowing over my body. I’m completely naked except for my locket and my muscles feel like I’ve just ran a marathon. Yet, with each touch of his hand, I start to feel better as he moves the washcloth over my body, wiping away the dried blood and mud as he cleans off the cuts. I swear it feels like he’s washing away the icky feelings I’ve been experiencing and the memories of what I did to Nicholas. I feel cleaner, more relaxed, more in tune with him. He’s touching me everywhere, even when he’s not, the magnetic bond syncing our bodies together.

I shut my eyes as he works the cloth over my neck, down my chest, over my breasts. I groan, curving upward, but I don’t open my eyes, even when his hand moves to the inside of my thighs. Just when I think I can’t take it anymore, his hand and the cloth leave my body. Seconds later, he combs his fingers through my hair and begins washing it as he tenderly tugs at the roots.

When he finishes I open my eyes and look up at him.

“Feel better?” he asks, tossing the cloth aside.

I nod, unable to look away from the longing in his eyes. “I do. Thank you.”

He stands to his feet and reaches for a towel on the hook near the door, and then he takes my hands to help me to my feet. Like he did back at Adessa’s house, he helps me out of the tub and then dries me off. After he secures the towel around me, he carries me to a bed in a room with floral walls and French doors that open out to a deck. The view from the deck is breathtaking; golden sand, amazingly blue ocean and the glistening sunshine. Although I barely get to appreciate it because, as soon as he lays me down on the bed and my head hits the pillow, exhaustion overcomes me and I fall into a deep, dreamless sleep for the first time in a very, very long time.

Chapter 24

Maryland is very humid. The air is so heavy and dense that it feels like being in a sauna. The little blue house is secluded near a rocky beach where the ocean constantly roars against the shore. It’s my first time seeing it and, while I enjoy it, I know that there are many other things to worry about at the moment. Like saving my mom.

Aislin puts