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“Wow,” Tobias says, so softly I almost miss it.

“Ring performance, maybe even silks. We’ll try that later,” Kenan interjects, his eyes gleaming. “That’s your act. Aerialist. That’s what you’ll do tonight.”

“But ... I can’t, not in front of people. I don’t know how —”

Not to mention, I still have to find out more about Evelyn. I know I heard her voice last night, but perhaps she’ll show up again. Maybe she didn’t find an act, and so she’s behind the scenes somewhere?

“Yes, you do,” Tobias interrupts my thoughts and steps closer. “You were beautiful.”

Heat coils deep inside me at his words, an unwelcome blush rising to my cheeks.

“You’re just saying that,” I mumble, unsure why all my confidence seems to slip away from me when he’s so close.

“I never say anything I don’t mean,” his hand reaches up, hovering just inches from my face as if touching me might make me shatter. “The way you moved, I’ve never seen anything like it. Even if you don’t understand it — it’s what you were meant to do here.”

Chapter 13

I stalk down the hallway, trying to take a moment for myself before I go practice a bit more. All of this is crazy, insane even ... it doesn’t make sense how I was able to do what I did. Nothing about the past twenty-four hours makes sense. I take a turn, continuing to find my way out of this maze that is apparently behind the Big Top. How I even almost escaped the night before, I don’t know. Pure adrenaline. Because even now, it’s like a pull on my arm when I go in the direction I’m not wanting to … I think?

I stop to take a breath, running my hand across the brand on my arm as Tobias emerges from the darkness like a wraith, the shadows seeming to cling to him. So much for being alone. He sidesteps me with grace as his fingers brush against the stamp on my wrist, a bit of the coolness that I’m learning to associate with him seeping through it. “What if I told you,” he breathes, his lips grazing my ear, “that every mark tells a story, and yours has just begun?”

His gaze pierces through the shadows and, below it all, I see the danger that lurks within those ocean depths, like sharks waiting to eat me whole. I fear I might let them.

“Then I would say bring it, I’m not afraid.” The words are lies, but I refuse to let anyone here know that.

“Perhaps you should be,” he leans in until his breath ghosts over my neck, making me gasp. My heart thunders, but before I can gather my thoughts, he’s gone.

Now I’m starting to understand why Kenan said to “stop the spooky shit” last night. I wonder if that is something they can all do, or something that only Tobias can? He seems to move within the shadows, appearing and disappearing just as easily as walking through nothing more than a smoke screen.

I navigate the maze of The Carnival grounds, finding my way back to the training area they had me in earlier, and decide to try the aerial silks they had added just before I declared I needed a break. Earlier on the ring I felt free. Without the pressure of Kenan or Tobias around me, I want to see if these might have that same releasing feeling.

The soft fabric drapes around me as I climb, pulling my body into the air where gravity can’t touch me. Where I can pretend that this fucked up world below doesn’t exist. Heights never scared me — I was always the first to climb the tallest tree or leap from the highest point of the swing set while the other kids watched. Evelyn wasn’t like that. My sister preferred solid ground beneath her feet, stability in all things.

Until she came here, a random act I feel changed everything. So much for her favoring stability.

I swing softly, learning how the silks feel wrapped around my wrist, the way they bite when I adjust my weight. It’s not as intuitive as the ring was, but I’m managing not face-planting on the floor below. I’ll take the win. My muscles strain as I twist, wrapping the silk around my leg to secure myself.

I close my eyes, surrendering to the sensation, like when you are floating in water and you’re just there, weightless. It’s a calm I haven’t felt yet in the short time I’ve been here. I drift downward, stopping just feet from the floor, letting my body hang loose in the cradle of the fabric.

“You need to trust your body,” Kenan’s voice booms around me, breaking my solitude.

My eyes snap open. I hate how he and Tobias can sneak up on me, and now he stands staring at me with such an intensity that it makes my skin prickle. His gaze travels slowly up my suspended form, assessing, calculating.

“Easy for you to say,” I retort, trying to ignore the stupid flutter in my chest. “You’ve had years of practice.”

He moves toward me. “And you’ve had hours ... yet here you are defying gravity.”

His hands reach up, finding my waist before I can respond. His strong fingers press against me through the fabric of the leather pants. He adjusts my position with firm confidence, his touch lingering longer than it should.

“Your core needs to be tighter,” he grumbles, “everything flows from here.”

I tense my abdomen, trying to focus on what he’s saying instead of how close he stands. “Like this?”

“Better,” his hands slide higher, just beneath my ribs, “but you’re still fighting it. The silk might not be as easy as the hoop, but it isn’t your enemy.”

“Neither is gravity, until I fuck up and fall — then it kills me,” I say.

A low chuckle rumbles from his chest. “Feisty,” he says as he spins me slowly to face him. One of his hands remains on my waist, the other gripping the silks above my head, pulling them together so I’m trapped, my wrist clutching to the same fabric to keep me up. Our faces are inches apart now.