Blood Bound (Permanently ON-HOLD)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE; The First of the Hayes Clann was Toxic.

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Love blinds us to faults, but hatred blinds us to virtues.

- Iba Ezra.

Juliette

I miss Adrian Warren.

I realise this as images of him flit across my closed eyelids like an old movie. Still pictures of him on his bed, guitar in hand. Moving scenes of us at Blood events throughout our childhood, our adolescent years. Text messages, phone calls, video calls between his sister, him and I.

Too many days and nights as a kid were spent watching Adrian play his guitar. Addy was always so unimpressed by his musical genius, so she'd saunter off somewhere with one of her cousins or a towny kid while we were at the Lake House. I'd sit in Adrian and Addy's shared room and I'd listen to the gangly boy play his guitar with precise fingers and a frown of concentration on his face.

He'd play Smoke on the Water or Wonderwall which he told me – and I believed – were the hardest to play and that he had mastered the guitar. But as we got older and our days at the Lake House ceased and our time spent together were Blood events or random holidays he could get his Nana into agreeing to let us spend, I realised that he had truly mastered it and could play anything I wanted.

And he did.

And when I didn't know what I wanted he'd write me a million songs and tunes and sing and play those for me, too.

It's really no wonder I loved the boy.

It's no wonder why I spent too many nights staying up late to text or call him, or why I imagined the tall boys I kissed and let touch me at parties were Adrian, or why I listen to Wonderwall sometimes and cry because if he wasn't a Warren and I wasn't a Soren and we didn't have soul mates, we would be together.

But I can't let the self-pity destroy me because, me and Adrian? We're illegal.

But for some reason, Heath and I aren't.

oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00oo00

My head is in Heath's lap and he is petting me like a dog. He doesn't know I'm awake, I don't want him to. I want to lie here with my eyes shut and think. But I don't want to think because all I can do is think about sad things and I can't be sad right now. I can't be angry at Heath for getting us here or sad because Heath is my soul mate because it'll swallow me up.

I need to be strong.

So, with a sigh, I peel my eyes open and look up at Heath. His eyes flicker down to me and he gives me a slight smile when he sees I'm awake. Not a smirk or a glare, an almost smile that I hesitantly return.

"Thank you." He says, and I nod.

"You're welcome."

I don't move because my limbs feel heavy as shit and I've lost so much blood and my vision is swimming. He must feel slightly similar, because he doesn't move either. He just looks up at the sky and rubs my forehead.

His actions cause tingles to run across my body. My words from early come back to me, how I told Heath I don't want him to die because I want to see why we're soul mates, what it's like, and I really do. I want to understand what it feels like to be with someone who is made for you. I've only ever seen it, never experienced. There's so much I have to learn about it, so much I have to do.

And Law is so crippled with grief after losing his soul mate that I don't know if I could handle that.

So I realise – much to my utter horror – that I need to be nice to Heath Hayes. That I need to stop being so defensive and argumentative, and that maybe, if I'm nice to him he'll be nice to me. We need to somehow... get over it.