December
Lucy's Age: 18
Venice had put me off for a couple of days. After my third text all but begging her to meet with me, she'd finally told me that she just wasn't going to be able to see me any sooner than she'd already agreed to.
It wasn't a situation designed to calm me down. On the one hand I had Geoffrey, who might decide to scrub his emotions at any point, and on the other I had Venice who already seemed pissed at me and I hadn't even told her about my feelings for Geoffrey yet.
The nightmares came back with a vengeance and made me wish for the days when I'd wanted to see the face of the nebulous figure who'd always been so central to them. He was still there, still shrouded in shadows, but the blood and flames had taken center stage in my dreams. I got the feeling that I was trapped somehow, that I wanted to move but couldn't as the flames got closer and closer. It made for restless nights which in turn made me even more jittery and nervous about what was going to go wrong between now and whenever I finally got Venice up to speed.
When the day of our meet finally arrived, I pulled myself out of bed earlier than normal, showered, and then hurried off to the designated spot more than three hours before our scheduled time. I watched the empty bench in the park for twenty minutes before I finally realized what I was doing. Apparently I was channeling even more Geoffrey than normal because I was casing out the meeting spot.
Everything about this discussion with Venice was fraught with risk, and it wasn't just being driven by the fact that I had feelings for Geoffrey. That was an obvious problem, but from what I knew of Venice so far, she wasn't going to take the fact that Imastious was sniffing around again very well.
Honestly I wasn't taking it very well myself and this was really just my first attempt at bringing Geoffrey back from the abyss. For Venice, who'd already tried and failed so many times before, this was going to be enough to send her into a screaming rage unless I handled things just right.
Geoffrey, even the new and improved version, probably would have brought a weapon to the meet, but I didn't go that far. No matter what happened, this was at least mostly my fault. I wasn't going to kill Venice, even assuming that was possible given how much better she was than me at unarmed combat. No, I didn't want to fight Venice. I'd do the best I could with my words and then accept the consequences of having betrayed her.
Apparently I wasn't the only one who was feeling unsettled. Venice arrived twenty minutes early and looked like she was about to take up a surveillance position herself until she saw me. She gave me an odd look and then waved me over to the bench that I'd just spent the last few hours watching.
"All right, Lucy, what's got you so worked up?"
"I talked to Geoffrey on Friday and he said that Imastious is sniffing around. It sounded like Geoffrey was worried about the things that Imastious might find out."
Venice looked away from me for several seconds, and then when she looked back in my direction she was obviously not happy.
"This is what you dragged me out here for? Why didn't you just text me, Lucy? Hell, even a phone call would have been better than waiting three days to pass that kind of information on."
"I tried to tell you. Usually you can meet up with me the same day or at least the day after I contact you. This is too important to just leave to a text. We need to figure out what we're going to do."
"No, we don't need to figure anything out. I need to go find a way to pull Imastious off of Geoffrey's trail, preferably one that doesn't end up with me being bled out so that Imastious can figure out why I'm suddenly so interested in his comings and goings."
"Why are you acting like this?"
Venice didn't answer, at least not immediately. Instead I watched as she visibly tried to get ahold of her emotions.
"Geoffrey came to me a few days ago. For months now I've been hoping that he'd act on the memories of all of our time together and that he'd decide that he wanted to have that again with me. You have no idea how excited I was. I wanted to scream for joy right up until I realized that he didn't want me, he just wanted someone to take his mind off of the person he actually did want to be with."
I'd known for more than a year that Venice and Geoffrey had been together in the past, but somehow I hadn't anticipated that he might go back to her again now, after all of the time that had passed without him evidencing that kind of interest in her. I wanted to back away, to stand up and put more distance between the two of us, but I knew that would be a mistake. As tightly as Venice was strung right now there was no telling how she'd react.
"So the two of you are together again now?"
I'd done my absolute best to keep my voice from showing the raging torrent of emotions washing through me, but Venice still saw through me.
"Don't give me that innocent act, Lucy. I know. I've known for weeks now. I even tried to give you a heads up of what you were in for the last time we went out to eat, but you weren't ready to hear it. I thought that I could deal with this because I saw it coming, but I also thought that you'd come tell me when you finally realized that you had feelings for Geoffrey."
"You knew all along?"
My voice came out as something less than a whisper, but Venice nodded. Some of the tension seemed to have gone out of her now that the issue of her, Geoffrey and I was out in the open finally. She was feeling better, but my sense of betrayal, of me having betrayed her and of Geoffrey having betrayed me, hadn't vanished.
"Yes. I knew it was a possibility all along, but the last time we sat down together it was obvious to me that you weren't interested in what's-his-name precisely because of your feelings towards Geoffrey."
I knew I was close to tears, but apparently Venice could tell too. Moving carefully so as not to startle me, she reached over and patted my arm.
"I didn't sleep with him, Lucy. I wanted to. You have no idea how badly I wanted to, but I didn't because I knew how it would make you feel."
Her admission pushed me over the edge and I started crying. "I'm so sorry, Venice. I've tried not to fall in love with him. I've tried so hard because it's wrong on every level. He's not just some random guy, he's yours. Not only that, he's what? My dad?"
Venice pulled me into a hug. "I told you already, Lucy. The heart wants what the heart wants. You can't help that any more than I can help my feelings for him. As for the other, Geoffrey isn't your father, not really. There's no blood relationship there and you barely saw him at all growing up. Besides, the Geoffrey you're falling in love with now isn't really the same person as the one who paid Renworst to raise you."
"I know. It just still seems wrong to have let myself get to this point. How are you handling all of this so calmly?"
Her shrug was eloquent all by itself, but she took pity on me and answered my question. "I'm not, not really. I may look serene on the outside, but I'm probably just as big of a mess inside as you are. It gets a little easier with time. Like I said, I saw this coming a while ago. I thought about all kinds of things that I could have done to try and head it off before it got to this point, but ultimately it comes down to the fact that you are good for Geoffrey."
I tried to shake my head but she stopped me. "It's true, Lucy. He's coming back to himself much faster now than he ever has before. I'm kind of a selfish be-otch, but if I have to choose between a dead Geoffrey or a live Geoffrey who's with someone else then I guess I choose to have him be alive and happy with someone else."
I wiped the tears away from the corners of my eyes and shrugged. "I don't know why I'm such a baby. It's not like anything has been decided. With Imastious looking like he's going to cause problems, there's not even any guarantee that we'll get him out."
"There's no guarantee, but there's still a chance. I meant what I said earlier. I'm going to go back home and spend some time thinking about ways that I could distract Imastious. With a little luck I should be able to buy us some more time."
I felt the tiniest ray of hope start to shine forward into the future, but Venice held up a warning hand before I could get carried away too far.
"One thing needs to be clear between us, Lucy. I'm not giving up on Geoffrey. Not on getting him out from under Imastious' thumb, or romantically either. Right now we both have roles to fill, but if we get him away, take him somewhere safe where he can start to trust me again, then I'm going to do everything I can to win him back. I consider you to be a friend, but the heart wants what the heart wants."
"I understand. That might even be for the best, all things considered."
Venice nodded. "You're more right than you know. There are lots of dark places inside of Geoffrey that you're not ready to become acquainted with, Lucy. I'm not saying that to hurt you, but because you need to know what you're setting yourself up for. Geoffrey isn't an easy man to love, not even when he loves you back."
"Do you really think he does? Love me back, I mean."
It wasn't a very fair question, not considering what it would cost Venice to give me an answer, but I needed to hear it. She waited for several seconds before sighing and nodding.
"Yes. He's of two minds about it or he would have already acted on his attraction to you, but he is falling for you. That much was obvious to me the last time I saw him."