Part 12 (1/2)

She shushed him and glanced down the hall-her mother was trying to sleep a bit before working a night s.h.i.+ft, and the last thing Beth needed was to wake her up. They both held still for a moment, waiting-but no sound came from the bedroom. They were safe. And in the quiet pause, Beth's anger had seeped away. She closed her book, then reached over and closed Adam's, too.

”Adam, listen to me. You have nothing to worry about.”

”You don't know Kane ...”

”Maybe I do, maybe I don't. But I know myself,” she said urgently. ”You know me. Whatever it is you think he's after, he's not going to get it.”

Adam looked down and didn't respond.

”You trust me, right?”

”I do, of course I do, it's just that-”

”Look. Remember last month, when you were spending all that time with Kaia?” she asked.

A wary, panicked look flashed across Adam's face. ”Yes ...”

”And I was insanely jealous?”

”That's right, you were,” he said triumphantly, vindicated.

”And you got mad, because I didn't trust you-and you were right.”

He looked down again, deflated.

”I should have trusted you,” Beth told him, ”because I know you'd never do anything to hurt me.”

”I never would,” he said urgently. ”Beth, you know that. I love you.”

”And I love you.” She leaned across the table and gave him a soft kiss on the lips. ”And you just have to trust that. Okay?”

”So what now?” he asked.

She laughed. ”Now you get out of here and let me get my work done so that I can see you another time. Without the stupid books.”

He rolled his eyes. ”Are you sure?” he asked, coming around to her side of the table and ma.s.saging her shoulders. As always, she melted beneath his warm and sure touch. ”Because you might want to keep me around-I tend to come in handy.”

She swatted him with her notebook. ”Don't tempt me,” she begged. ”Now come on, get out.”

He shrugged and turned to go. But he didn't get very far.

”Okay, come back,” she cried. ” You got me-one more kiss.”

It was a long one.

Adam drove home. With the sweet taste of Beth still fresh on his lips-and the image of her in Kane's arms still fresh on his mind. He knew Kane-the guy got anything he wanted. Anything. Anyone. Adam had to work for everything he got; but for Kane, victory came easy. And it came often.

Beth could deny it all she wanted-she could beg him to trust her a hundred times. But he couldn't help what he knew, and what he knew was that sometimes being in love, being trustworthy just isn't enough. Yes, he remembered back when he was spending all that time with Kaia. He'd sworn to Beth a million times that nothing would ever happen. And he'd meant it.

And it's not like he was some horrible person, he reminded himself. Kaia had just been there-the wrong girl, in the right place at the right time. He hadn't been able to stop himself. Sometimes he wasn't even sure he could blame himself-it had all seemed so inevitable. Sometimes, despite the best of intentions, things just happened.

And that's what he was afraid of.

CHAPTER.

8.

That night, it seemed like sleep would never come.

Beth lay in bed, her body drained of energy, her mind spinning in circles, refusing to slow, refusing to relax. When had her life gotten so complicated? And what did it mean that the things that should have made her happy were the ones keeping her awake?

And, as long as she was asking meaningless questions that she'd never be able to answer, if she was so in love with her boyfriend, why did she sometimes wish he was someone else?

I wish I were someone else, she thought wistfully. Someone who didn't care so much about always doing the right thing and getting the job done, someone who wasn't overwhelmed by commitments and responsibilities to everyone in her life. Someone who wasn't tied down to the same guy, day in and day out, her mind whispered. To trade lives with someone, just for a day-was that so much to ask?

What would it be like, she wondered, to have Kaia's life? Not her striking beauty, or her wealth-though at the thought of a life free of skimping, saving, and scrounging, free of bussing tables at the diner and watching her parents drag themselves home from work at three a.m., Beth often felt a sharp pang of jealousy. There were people who lived life without struggling for every dollar. She'd accepted that she wasn't one of them-and while she didn't care as much as she used to, she cared. A lot. But looks, money, clothes, those were just things, possessions-Beth didn't want to have what Kaia had, she wanted, at least sometimes, secretly, late at night, to be who Kaia was. Beth often watched her out of the corner of her eye, marveling at the girl who seemed to float above the fray, skimming across the surface of life, never getting her feet dirty. It was such an alien frame of mind that Beth couldn't imagine how the world must seem to her. But on nights like this, she longed for it.

The apathetic manner, the almost inhuman poise-Kaia, she was sure, never fought with her boyfriends. Never questioned what she ”really” wanted, and whether it was right or wrong. And, Beth was sure, never worried that her life was boring, that she was boring. Kaia was just like Kane in that way-and maybe, Beth suddenly realized, that was why she was so drawn to him, in spite of herself. And she was. Drawn to him. Even though she could only admit it to herself at times like this, alone, stranded between night and day, waiting for sleep-or sunrise.

It didn't matter, of course, because she was with Adam. Good, solid Adam. They were two peas in a pod. A perfect match. She knew that. She loved that. And yet ...

He was the only boy she'd ever dated. The only boy she'd ever held. Not that she was bored. She was just ... curious. And if she could, for just one day, abandon herself, if she could leave good, dutiful Beth behind, if she could borrow Kaia's mind, Kaia's life-then she could know what it felt like to live without consequences, without guilt, to take whatever she wanted, to have it all. Just a one-day vacation from her cookie-cutter life, from always doing the right thing. That was all she asked.

Just one wild day.

And one wild night.

What had happened to her wild nights?

Sprawled across her Ralph Lauren sheets, her comforter kicked to the foot of the bed, Kaia opened her eyes with a sigh. She'd kept them closed as long as she could, hoping she could force sleep to come, but it wasn't working. She just wasn't tired-how could she be, when it was only one a.m. and she'd spent the night, like every night before it, lounging around her house?

Kaia's body was designed for a different life-she'd trained it well over the years, and by now it expected a steady influx of loud music, flas.h.i.+ng lights, hot bodies, and cold drinks. Every night-all night. That had been her old life in her old world. She'd done her best to pretend that it had all disappeared when she left: the city, the social scene, her old friends. She preferred to think of it all as frozen in limbo, awaiting her return.

But when reality hit, it hit hard. The city was still bursting with life, her ”friends” were still partying till dawn-and the only thing frozen in limbo was Kaia. She hated them for it, and she hated her parents for causing it. Most of all she hated the hours she spent every night, alone in the dark room, staring at the ceiling and wis.h.i.+ng she could do something about the endless, deep quiet seeping into her bedroom from the desert outside. She could play music, turn up the volume on the TV, it didn't matter-somehow the desert silence managed to drown it all out. Made it impossible to forget how still everything was, and how empty--just like her life.

Most of the time Kaia clung to her memories of the past, to her hard-edged city persona, clung to it with a death grip, for fear of forgetting who she was and where she'd come from, fear of turning into a small-town zombie content with the simple life. But there were moments, fleeting but sharp, when she just wished she could let it all go. Everyone else in this stupid town was so happy, so satisfied-what must it be like, Kaia wondered, to be able to inhabit such a narrow world without feeling like the walls were closing in?

What must it be like to be Beth, too timid to complain about what you had, too dim to wonder if there might be something more? Kaia had been spending a lot of time recently watching Beth, wondering how her mind might work-and sometimes, to her horror, she'd actually wished she could, just for a moment, switch places with the girl. She had such a picture-perfect life-loving parents, loving boyfriend-all the things Kaia had never wanted, never thought she needed. And it was true, she didn't need someone lying beside her, holding her, whispering that he loved her and that everything would be okay. She didn't need to know if her mother missed her, or if her father would ever stop home for more than a night. That kind of thing was no more than a security blanket for the Beths of the world. It was just that late at night, alone and empty, Kaia sometimes wished she were one of them.

Beth, she was sure, didn't stay up nights desperate for excitement, searching for trouble. Beth wasn't constantly bored, restless, always on the hunt for the next hot spot, the next hot guy. Beth didn't spend every minute wis.h.i.+ng she were somewhere else, doing something else. Being someone else. No, when your life was placid, when you had what you wanted, no more and no less, you slept like a baby. It was only when you were dissatisfied, when your life seemed empty and you had nothing to fill it with, that you tossed and turned. Until finally, as always, you gave up on sleep and turned on the light.

Adam awoke with a start and flicked on the light, gasping with the relief of escaping a nightmare. He didn't remember much of it, only that it had featured Beth and Kaia-and it had left him drenched in a cold sweat. He sat up in bed and took a few deep breaths, trying to wash all traces of the nightmare out of his mind so that he could safely fall back asleep.

His sleep had been filled with nightmares for weeks. They'd started the night after he slept with Kaia, and ever since Kane and Beth had started spending all that time together, his dreams had only gotten worse. Too much stress, he told himself, lying back down on the mattress. Adam had always liked to keep things simple. But now? Nothing was simple, not anymore. Certainly not his relations.h.i.+p with Beth. That was a minefield. When he was with her, he struggled over his every word, agonized over every action, searching fruitlessly for the magic combination that would put right whatever had gone wrong.