The Art of Kissing

Jessica Sorensen

THE ART OF KISSING

(A PACT BETWEEN THE FORGOTTEN, #3)

JESSICA SORENSEN

The Art of Kissing

Jessica Sorensen

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance of characters to actual persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental. The author holds exclusive rights to this work. Unauthorized duplication is prohibited.

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For information: jessicasorensen.com

Cover design by Najla Qamber Designs

Vellum flower icon Created with Vellum

1. Raven

2. Jax

3. Raven

4. Hunter

5. Raven

6. Raven

7. Raven

8. Raven

9. Hunter

10. Raven

11. Zay

12. Raven

About the Author

Also by Jessica Sorensen

RAVEN

Water is pouring over me. Warm water. Not like the water in the lake. The water that nearly took me away. The water that I almost wanted to take me away.

Let me lay here,

Deep inside the darkness,

Where I can never breathe the toxic air,

Again.

The air made of lies, pain, and agony.

The air of life.

Just let me die.

Why didn’t you let me die—

I gasp, becoming aware that I’m holding my breath as I stand underneath the waterfall of the faucet. I suck in a breath, and then another, trying to get rid of this pressure inside my chest. But it remains, squeezing and crushing, as if begging me to just stop breathing.

I thought that, after Jaxon saved me, I would be perfectly okay. I felt okay at first, but then I got in the shower, underneath the water, and it all came rushing back to me.

I can’t breathe.

I’m going to die.

Maybe I just should.

The thing is, I swear I have had those thoughts before, swear I have been in a similar situation before, when water almost swept me away from the pain forever. I’m not sure when that would have happened, though. I mean, for as long as I can remember, I have been terrified of water. I thought it was because I can’t swim, but maybe there’s a darker reason. One my parents kept from me.

Why would they do that?

I’m not sure.

I’m not sure about anything anymore.

I can’t help thinking, though, about how I keep having these images of me spending time with a younger Jax and Hunter. That makes no sense. I have never been to Honeyton before … right?

Who the fuck knows? I used to think I knew, yet I’m starting to question everything about my damn life.

Sucking in a breath, I shut off the shower then climb out.

Hunter told me there were towels in one of the cabinets, but I forgot to grab one, so I end up leaving water all over the floor as I hurry over to grab a towel.

After I dry off, I wipe up the mess from the floor then start to get dressed. I feel weird inside— lost, confused, pressurized—as I think about how, once I get dressed, I’m going to have to go out there and probably discuss how I will be moving in with the guys. Part of me doesn’t want to, not because I want to live with my aunt and uncle, but because it makes me feel like a burden. It’s something I have felt for so damn long, more than I would like to admit.

“I hate that she’s here,” I heard my aunt say the first day I moved in with them.

I was in the next room, standing there with my suitcase and a box filled with the only belongings my uncle would let me take. He had made me donate the rest of my stuff, said there wasn’t enough room in the car for it, even though he had been driving a truck.

“You know she probably killed them, right?” my aunt added, not bothering to lower her voice.

She had to have known I could hear her, and I wanted to scream at her to shut the hell up, but the words felt heavy on my tongue. Everything felt heavy.

Numb.

I had started to feel numb, as if I had bleed out with my parents in that house.

Part of me wished I had.

“No one knows what really happened,” my uncle said, and I thought he was defending me until he added, “And I have to take her in. Do I want to? No, not at all. No one wants a damaged kid like that living under their roof.”

Again, I wanted to scream, but what would be the point? It wouldn’t change anything. And, deep down, I knew he was right. I was damaged.

“Still am,” I whisper to myself as I stare at my reflection in the mirror.

I look like shit. Dark circles reside under my eyes, and my skin looks as pale as the damn snow that lined that river. And my stupid fucking chest, it won’t stop tightening. I swear the bastard is about to explode.

Just breathe, Raven.

Air in. Air out.

The more I try to will myself to breathe, the harder it becomes. I’m veering toward a panic attack—I can feel it. Usually, whenever this happens, I take a hit or do a line. Unfortunately, the water ruined what I had on me, and the rest of my stash is back at home.

I feel twitchy, like I’m about to crawl out of my skin. I need to get this panic out of me, and the only other alternative I can think of is to do something I haven’t done in a while, mostly because I turned to getting high as an easier alternative.

I start opening drawers until I find what I’m looking for—a razor. Weirdly, there’s a whole box of them. I mean, it’s not completely uncommon for someone to have them, but a lot of people don’t have a whole damn box of them. And they are stuffed in the back, beneath a bunch of other stuff, as if someone is trying to hide them.

I pick one up and hold it in my hand, just staring at it for a moment. It’s been a while, mostly because the last time I did it, I accidentally cut too deep. At least, that’s what I tell myself. The truth is that, deep inside the crevasse of my mind, where I have hidden all my forgotten memories, I know that it wasn’t an accident. I was trying to bleed it all out of me. That fucking pain that I swear has been slowly eating away at me from the inside for six years now. It gets so bad sometimes that it feels like my veins have been filled with shards of glass that nick and cut and slice away at me whenever I don’t have a grasp on myself.

Control.

For me, staying in control is the best thing possible.

The problem is that I’m living in a life where I’m relying on others.

I want to escape.

I want to be free.

I want it to be just me and myself where not a single other force can control what’s going on inside and outside of me.

As my chest starts trying to crush my lungs again, and those shards of glass whisper in delight, I put the tip of the razor to my wrist and slice.

The wounds on my side match the throbbing in the flesh wound on my wrist.

Freak.

Murderer.

Disappointment.

Yes, Ravenlee, you are a fucking walking disappointment.

I move my hand over to the sink as blood begins to weep from the open wound. It stains the porcelain white sink with droplets of that stupid pain that is eating at me from the inside.

For a moment, I feel like I can breathe.

I hunch over, my shoulders sinking and my head lowering as I take a deep breath.

Air in. Air out. Air in …

I exhale, and it’s not as heavy, all the pressure zeroed in on that wound.

I remain that way for a while, just letting myself bleed over the sink. All alone.

All alone with nothing but numbness to accompany me.

JAX

I feel like I’m about to crawl out of my skin as I sit on the sofa in our living room, bouncing my knee up and down. My mind is racing, like it’s a damn idiot trying to spring through a marathon, but I can’t get the idea out of my head. The idea that Raven is her.

Willow.

The girl I let die.

Right?

I don’t fucking know anymore and that—the not knowing—makes me feel like I’m about to burst out of my flesh.

“Jax, you need to chill out,” Hunter says. He’s sitting in the chair across from me, eyeing my bouncing knee.

“I’m trying,” I mutter, willing myself to stop the bouncing. “I just … I feel uneasy.”

He presses his lips together, as if he’s deliberating what to say. “I know. We all feel that way. But if you get too worked up …” He wavers, sinking his teeth into his bottom lip, stopping himself from saying what he really wants to say.

I can fill in the gaps, knowing where his head’s at, because he knows where my head’s at.

“I’m not going to break down,” I assure him. Although, deep inside my mind, behind the glass that keeps that part of me in control, I can feel a whisper getting through, as if the glass has started to crack.

“You sure about that?” he questions, eyeing my knee again, which I have unknowingly started bouncing again.

I stop. “Yeah.” I don’t sound confident, and he can hear it. I don’t want to talk about my fucking issues right now, though. Can’t.

Besides, I don’t know why he’s zeroing in on me. We all have our problems. Mine have just been the most focused on because of that one fucking incident.

Blood is gushing out of the wound, pouring like a goddamn prisoner that’s been unleashed.

It’s all over the place.

Staining the bathroom floor with the truth that’s living inside me.

That’s been feeding on me, like a thirsty pain monster.

Watch me bleed.

Watch my pain.

It won’t fucking stop.

Part of me doesn’t want it to.

“Jax,” Hunter says carefully, his voice tearing me from the memory of the day I nearly bled to death. I was trying to bleed the pain of my past out of me. What I realized that day, though, as I lay on the floor, struggling to breathe, was that the only way to be painless was to be lifeless.

Pain equals life.

Death equals stillness.

Sometimes, I don’t know which one is worse.

“Please don’t start with me,” I tell Hunter. I can see all over his face that he’s about to try to shatter through that cracked glass wall. “I can’t handle it right now.”

His expression softens. “I’m not trying to push you. I just want to make sure you’re okay.”

I shrug. “I’m fine. She’s okay, right? So, why wouldn’t I be?”

“Who’s okay?” His tone carries speculation.

Who is she?

Raven?

Willow?

“You tell me,” I say, my damn knee bouncing again. This time, I just let it be. I have to. I have to let the restless out somehow.

Hunter swallows hard and lifts his hand to his face, resting it against his lips, probably trying to discreetly keep hidden whatever expression he has on his face.

I don’t say anything else. Like me, Hunter has his own issues of dealing with the things that eat away at him, and I don’t want to push him to break his own glass wall.

Zay walks into the room, then. He looks like he doesn’t give a shit about anything, as if he doesn’t have a care in this miserable world. It’s all an act, though he will tell you differently. But Zay is probably one of the biggest liars there is, even lying to himself most days.

He takes one look at Hunter and me and pauses, assessing us closely, then frowns. “You two need to get your shit together,” he states, making his way farther into the room.

“We’re not even doing anything,” I mutter, raking my fingers through my hair.

He cocks an eyebrow at me. “Don’t feed me that I’m okay bullshit. I was there the night it all happened, remember? I know what your face looks like right before you’re about to push yourself off that ledge.”

I smash my lips together, wanting to argue, but I can’t think of a good counterargument.

“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell him,” Hunter chimes in, propping his boot-clad foot onto his knee.

Zay shifts his gaze to Hunter. “Maybe I should be giving the same lecture to you.”

Hunter’s brows crease. “What the hell did I do?”

Zay just stares at him until Hunter rolls his eyes, shakes his head, and mutters something incoherently under his breath. Then Zay shakes his head before dropping into the chair closest to the fireplace. “I don’t know why you guys are even acting like this. Raven’s fine.”

“Is she?” I mumble, picking at the black fingernail polish on my thumbnail.

“Why wouldn’t she be?” Zay asks in a bored tone.

“Um, because she nearly died,” Hunter says, giving Zay an incredulous look. “Plus, if she is her—”

“We don’t know it’s her,” he cuts Hunter off. “And I really wish you two would knock that shit off. You can’t just assume things. It’ll only lead to you two breaking the fuck apart when you realize you’re wrong.”

“If we’re wrong,” I mumble, staring at my fingernails. “And I don’t think we are.”

Zay heaves a sigh. “Whatever. I said we’d look into it, and we will. But, right now, we have about a hundred other problems to worry about, starting with what we’re going to do with her.”

I glance up at him. “I thought everyone agreed she’s going to stay with us?” Panic starts to take a hold of me again, those cracks inside my mind splintering.

I can’t let her go again.

Not if she’s her.

I can’t lose her again.

“Did we discuss?” Zay challenges with an arch of his brow. “Because I kind of felt like you two decided what you wanted and pushed me into it.”

“Oh, stop fucking pretending you have a problem with it.” Hunter gives him a dirty look. “We’ve known you forever, man, so this whole I-don’t-give-a-shit-about-anything act doesn’t work on us.”

Zay’s lips twitch in annoyance. “Why would I give a shit about some girl I barely know?”

Hunter leans forward, resting his arms on his knee. “And what if it is her? What if Raven is Willow?”

The Art of Kissing