Chapter One
"If looks could kill," I think to myself as his familiar coal-like eyes penetrate my hazel ones. I feel paralyzed for a moment as his cool hand creeps up my arm while the other reaches for my chin but I shrug it away.
Feeling captivated by his gaze, I try to look away from him by focusing on his arms which are long and slender yet muscular, and his hands, hard but gentle. But he cups my chin again more firmly and brings my gaze back up to him.
"You will be mine," he whispers. Goosebumps seem to crawl down my spine as I take in his eyes once more. I want to run, but I can't. There is something drawing me to him...perhaps it's his piercing eyes compelling me to stay or his modelesque features...whatever it was it felt magnetic.
His hands suddenly search for my arms, sliding them around his neck.
As much as I want to get away from him as he is a complete stranger, there was something alluring keeping me to him. It is as if my mind is disconnected to my body and someone else is taking over. I am just in the passenger seat along for the ride.
"No, you are not being compelled. You are free to do whatever you please in this realm," he says, reading my thoughts.
I suddenly look down at my feet and back up at him, trying to move but still can't.
"Then why can't I move," I ask him at last.
He moves even closer to me, taking up what little space we have between us and I feel his solid abs against my stomach. His lips become so close to mine that I can practically feel his cool breath and I think he is going to kiss me at that very moment, so I close my eyes in anticipation but instead his lips glide to my left ear.
"Because you don't want to," he whispers, the closeness of his melodic dark voice sending my body into a frenzy.
Before I can even think of what to say next, everything goes completely dark like the ending of a scene in a movie and I wake up to the sound of my mother screaming in my ear.
"Kore it's time to wake up now," she barks.
I groan, rolling over in my bed, desperately trying to hang on to the dream, but she begins to push me back and forth so I will have to get up.
"Fine I'm up, I'm up," I say to her, pushing the covers back and looking at the clock to see that it is barely 5 am.
With a growl, I run into the bathroom and get ready for what I know is going to be another long, uneventful day. I don't even understand why I have to wake up so early when all I will be doing is hanging under my mother's nose all day.
To say my mother is a bit overprotective is an understatement. When I was younger, I thought it was great. She was my superhero, and she was just showing how much she loves me but now that I am older, I know that it is so much more than that.
Like this morning after I am done in the bathroom for instance, I tell her I am only going to pick flowers in the meadow and I will be right back. She knows how much I love to pick flowers especially when they are full and in bloom. My favorites to pick out are the pink orchids. They only come out one time a year and that's in the early spring. Their scent is just so lovely, and it makes my nose tingle a bit but in a good way.
My mother, being the overbearing worrywart that she is, has to come along. She claims it is only because she wants to pick some daffodils to post in her kitchen window, but I know it is just to keep a close watch on me. She doesn't like picking flowers as much as I do and I think she even hates it because most of them make her sneeze excessively.
She likes planting and growing produce more than anything else. She actually grows plants and produce for a living and makes quite a few bucks doing it. We live on a farm, a very secluded and desolate farm, but a prosperous one nonetheless. In fact, we haven't had a season yet where our crops have never grown or dried out. Even in winter, we manage to do alright.
Even though she tells me to wait for her, I walk out unto the meadow anyways and run towards the pink orchards, mesmerized. They seem to glitter in the sun and I can't help but pick the first one I see and take in its sweet fragrance.
A bumblebee flies around me and I am instantly captivated by it before it dives into one of the sunflowers, taking its nectar, and then flying off, away from the meadow, away from the land---something I wish I could do.
When I see her come out of the house, my whole demeanor shifts. I go from being abundantly tranquil to melancholy. I don't smile when I'm around my mother not because she doesn't like it when I smile but to show her how unhappy I have become and how the only time I am joyful is when I am out picking flowers.
The wind blows her long blonde hair back as she comes towards me and she smiles as she gets closer to me.
"Ah, the flowers look amazing this season. You must have the golden touch my dear," my mother says, extending out her arms for me to come into. The nerve. She expects me to embrace her after I begged her repeatedly since I turned twelve to let me go out into civilization and make real friends instead of the ones I make on forums like Reddit discussing characters from Netflix, but she has subjected me to learning social skills through talking with my homeschool teacher, YouTube and Netflix....yeah right. But my inner guilt kicks in and I give in, hugging her while rolling my eyes behind her back.
"You're such a good daughter." She says patting my head and giving me a kiss.
"Yep your good daughter locked in a penitentiary," I say under my breath as I walk back towards the flowers.
"What was that, honey?"
"You're the best mom of the century."
As I mend some of the older flowers, and pick some out, I feel her staring down my spine. She comes closer and stands over me, watching as I pick the flowers one by one. I hate it when she does this and she seems to do it a lot lately.
I remember when there was a time she wouldn't even look at my paintings I made at school. When she completely ignored me and would do anything for me to shut up but that was a long time ago---when we lived in society.
Sometimes I think she moved out here just so we would be away from the rest of the world. I mean she doesn't really have any friends besides Mrs. Rogers and I wouldn't exactly call her a friend given that she's my homeschool teacher. It took a while for her to warm up to Mrs. Rogers but after ten years of her being my teacher, she is more than a friend to us now. She's practically family now and she keeps us in on everything that's going on in the real world. If it wasn't for her, I'd probably go insane.
Sadly, next week is going to be my last week with Mrs. Rogers for I have gone through all the criteria to take the GED exam. I try not to think about it because once she is gone I will have no one. Mrs. Rogers encouraged my mother to let me go off to college or at the very least go to a technical school, but my mother almost shunned her for saying that. I would do anything to go away to school, to get away from my mother for a while, but she will never let me go. So instead, I will be taking online courses.
"Why are you so sad," my mother asks me suddenly, tucking some of my light brown hair in the back of my ear. That is another thing I hate and I immediately cringe. She just smiles, and I walk towards the farm. She follows me, saying, "You should be happy. In two weeks, you will be eighteen, a college student, and my trainee."
I almost shudder at the thought of that. Being her trainee is the last thing I want. It would mean I would have to stay here for the rest of my life or until she died but my mother is young and healthy so that would be years from now. She had me when she was only seventeen, something she never told me, but I figured out when I took a quick peak at her driver's license when I was eleven.
If I couldn't bare living with my mother now, how would I handle another seventeen years plus?
I don't really know how to respond so I just nod and walk into the house. I also gave up having a cordial conversation with my mother a long time ago outside of agriculture or my homework or the weather. If I do say something to her outside of that, it is only to answer a question she has asked.
Suddenly Mallow, my big fat gray cat, comes out and rubs himself on my leg. I smile and gladly pick him up. He does this whenever he wants to be pampered. Besides Mrs. Rogers, he is the only one I have here that keeps my mind from going into the deep end.
"Next Saturday I will be going into town to pick up some pomegranate seeds. I was thinking since you are of age now, I will let you stay here," my mother tells me.
I look up in shock for she has never let me stay home by myself. Either she asks Mrs. Rogers to come over or I must go into town with her.
"I think I can trust you to stay put and not wander off anywhere right," she says eyeing me suspiciously.
I give her a quick serious expression and nod, reeling inside.
"I'm trusting you to be responsible and moral, so please do not leave this house. If you do there will be dire consequences," she says, her emerald green eyes staring holes into mine and making me cringe a bit.
I gulp and turn away from her, heading up to my room with Mallow in my arms. I know exactly what those dire consequences will be for I have broken her rules once before and the punishment was almost inhumane...no TV, no internet, no Mallow or even going into the meadow.
Walking into my room, or what I like to call my fortress of solitude, I put Mallow down and walk over to the balcony, which is the one thing I like about my room. I can see all of the meadow from my balcony and it is quite beautiful.
The cool breeze blows my hair briskly out of my face and I close my eyes, tears slowly dropping down my face. I wish that I could get away from my mother, from this farm. I would give anything to leave, even if that meant...dying. I take a look down and see that it would be a nice long fall, probably enough to kill me. I contemplate this as the wind stirs harder into my face.
I consider my suicide for a few more minutes and then, being the chicken that I am, decide to go back inside and live the rest of my miserable life a slave to my mother's plan.
Turning towards my room, a huge gust of wind comes my way, closing the balcony doors in my face and I hear a whistling noise that almost sounds like a voice.
"Kore," the familiar voice-like wind seems to whimper out and I turn around expecting to see someone there but no one is there.
I shrug and open up the doors and head inside, feeling a chill suddenly go down my spine. The same kind of chill I felt in my dream this morning.
A/N: Quick s/o to murmurare for the book cover! It's amazing sauce! Thanks a bunches!!!