Archer placed a finger under my chin and tilted my face up towards his so he could press his lips against mine. Never mind the fact that we were currently standing on the curb outside JFK and there were tons of people walking around us. I sure didn’t mind.

“You know, if you say good morning like that every day, I won’t mind,” I said dazedly when he leaned back.

“I’ll make a note of it,” Archer said, smirking. “Have a good day, Hadley.”

I gave an exaggerated eye roll. “Have a good day, Archer.”

Archer gave a laugh, leaning down to kiss me again, then turned and strode off through the front doors.

“So, he must be a good kisser, ’cause otherwise you wouldn’t be blushing like that.”

I glanced over my shoulder and gave Taelor a wary look as I walked inside JFK. She had a huge smirk on her face and looked all self knowing, walking along beside me.

I shrugged, clearing my throat. “He’s alright.”

“Oh, please,” Taelor snorted. “He looks like he has amazing lips.”

I stared at Taelor in amazement. “I thought you thought he was ugly.”

Taelor gave me a look akin to staring at some leech. “Ah, that would be a no. I think he’s weird, not unattractive. On the contrary, he’s quite attractive.”

“Yeah, well…” I trailed off, looking away from her. “He is.”

Thankfully the home room bell rang right that second, preventing any other awkward conversation that had been about to happen.

I was thanking my lucky stars for that one.

I bid Taelor goodbye and walked off for Mrs. Anderson’s German classroom.

Mrs. Anderson had been a little more normal of the late, ever since my conversation with her last week. She was in the habit of giving me a smile whenever I walked into home room and every so often she would say “Keep your chin up, Hadley!” when I passed her in the halls.

It was actually nice, having a small bit of encouragement now and then.

I waltzed into home room with my head in the clouds, remembering the feeling of Archer’s lips against mine.

Yeah, he really was one hell of a kisser.

I barely listened to Mrs. Anderson’s announcements. I was too lost in my own thoughts.

I was thinking that maybe, just maybe, if things went well between Archer and I until next Monday, then everything was going to turn out just dandy. From what I could tell, relationships were always a bit rocky in the beginning, weren’t they? And Archer and I weren’t really what you could call a normal couple or whatever. There was a good chance we weren’t going to make it, I knew that much. But I wanted to be with him so badly I was willing to take that chance anyway.

Wasn’t he?

I gave Mrs. Anderson an energetic wave and a bright smile as I left room. I floated my way along the hallways, ignoring the weird looks I was getting from the people at their lockers. Hell, I didn’t even mind that I was going to chemistry – the next worst class besides geometry.

But all that flew out of the back of my mind when a man walked through the class room door, brief case in hand, looking very pleased to be here.

“Hello, class. I am Mr….Smith. I shall be your substitute today.”

It was Havoc.

Silence in the chemistry lab fell immediately and the entire class stared at the guy who called himself Mr. Smith. He waltzed into the room like he owned the place, dropping his brief case onto the desk, and reached around to grab a piece of chalk off the chalkboard. He scrawled the name Mr. Smith on the board in elegant script, dropped the chalk, dusted off his hands, and turned to the rest of us with an eerily wide smile.

There was no mistaking this man for anything.

I could clearly see his mismatched eyes, the symbols tattooed on his fingers like Death’s, his freshly pressed suit.

This was most certainly Havoc.

I gripped the edges of the lab table and tried to keep from hyperventilating.

Why was he here? What was he playing at? Did he come here to finish the job himself and kill Archer?

What the hell was going on?

The girl next to me, Jessica Hartley, gave a girlish giggle, fiddling with the ends of her hair. She seemed to forget that she was ignoring me of the late and leaned over to whisper, “Isn’t he a looker?”

“No,” I snapped. “He’s not.”

Jessica snorted and rolled her eyes. “Right. I forgot you’re dating the school’s freak.”

“Har, har,” I muttered. “Share some of your oh so amusing humor some other time.”

“Excuse me, ladies,” Havoc said loudly, calling us to attention. “Is there something you’d like to share with the rest of us?”

Jessica flushed bright red and ducked her head. “Uh, no. There’s not.”

My first instinct was still to run from the room and hide and never come out until these seven days were over.

That, however, was not an option.

“Perfect,” Havoc said with another eerie smile. “Now I’m going to call roll, and when I say your name, please raise your hand.”

Havoc went through the class list with ease, saying everybody’s name with a polite air, almost like he was ecstatic to be here. I felt a sliver of disgust slip down my spine when he said my name. His lips had curled into a smirk and he looked very amused.

I had said a silent prayer right then and there that everything was going to go fine and that I was going to walk out of here unscathed.

“Now,” Havoc said once he was finished calling roll. “In the sub plans, it said that you’re currently working on chemical reactions consisting of aluminum, copper, iron, and chloride?”

“That’s right,” Sadie Gonzalez giggled from up front. “It’s a pretty tough lab. We might need help with all of those dangerous chemicals, you know.”

I smacked a hand to my forehead.

I wasn’t too particularly smart when it came to science or math, but I knew well enough that copper (ll) chloride wasn’t going to kill anybody.

“Right,” Havoc said, shooting Sadie an indulgent grin. “I’m glad to be of any help. Now, class, please get to work.”

Beside me, Jessica instantly threw herself into action, grabbing all of our chemicals and safety goggles off the counter. I pulled out my chemistry notes, trying to get rid of the creepy feeling that Havoc was watching me.

“Ready?” Jessica asked chipperly when she joined me at the lab table again.

“As I’ll ever be.”

Jessica and I set to work, mixing chemicals together to try and find the mass of the reactants and the percent error from the equations we constructed. It wasn’t too terribly difficult, but it required all of my attention – most of which I couldn’t afford to give at the moment.

My hands kept trembling and I had to dig my teeth into my lower lip to keep from sobbing outright.

I’d been wondering what I would do if I ever had the misfortune of running into Havoc again. Most of the thoughts involved me kicking his ass, shouting about how I was going to save Archer and throw him into the fiery pits of hell or something like that.

As much as I’d like that to become a reality, to actually maim Havoc or something, I knew that was definitely wishful thinking. No way in hell was that going to happen.

“And how are you two young ladies doing?”

I caught the beaker of aluminum chloride before it could slip off the table and glared at Havoc as he leaned up against the lab table.

“Just fine,” Jessica said brightly.

She was shooting Havoc looks, like she found him very attractive, and she didn’t even mind the fact that he had two different colored eyes or tattoos all over his hands.

“You, Hadley?” Havoc continued, looking over at me.

“Fine,” I muttered, refusing to look up from my notes.

“Tell me, Hadley. How is little June doing?”

My fists clenched and I sunk my teeth into my lower lip. I refused to say anyone to this creep.

“You can’t evade me forever, Hadley,” Havoc continued, giving me a smile. “You only have seven days left. Do you really think you can succeed?”

“Yes,” I snapped. “Yes, I really do.”

Havoc sighed, drumming his fingers on the lab top. “That’s daring of you. I would’ve thought Archer almost losing his life in that fire would have been enough to make you leave him alone.”

I had known right from the beginning that fire had been started by Havoc, but that didn’t mean I was any less surprised hearing it straight from the source.

“Well, you thought wrong,” I said through gritted teeth. “Don’t you have better things to do than antagonize teenagers and five year old girls?”

Havoc made a thoughtful noise, dipping a finger into one of the beakers on the lab table and flicking the liquid on my notebook.

I glared up at the creepy guy in annoyance, then turning to Jessica to see if she had noticed the spilt chemicals on the table.

Jessica Hartley was frozen in place, one of her hand outstretched as if she were going to pick up the beaker at her finger tips. The sight of that was enough to make me scream and fall off my stool, but then I saw that every other person in the classroom was frozen in the same state of movement. It was eerily silent, enough to make the hairs on the back of my neck stand up.

How had I missed this?

“What did you do to them?” I demanded, looking up at Havoc.

Havoc smirked, giving a nonchalant shrug. “Oh, nothing. Just froze time.”

Of course. I should have figured that he had the ability to do something as crazy as freeze time.

“Can you leave now?” I asked as pleasantly as possible.

“Oh, I don’t know if I’ll be able to do that,” Havoc sighed, grim-faced. “This is becoming much more serious than I thought it would. You’re quite the persistent little devil, aren’t you?”

“Sure,” I snorted. “Whatever. I’m doing what I’m doing because it’s the right thing to do. Nobody should feel like they need to kill themselves. It’s not okay.”

“That may be, Hadley,” Havoc agreed,”but it’s the way the world has worked for thousands of years. To change that would mean to change the laws of nature.”

“Yeah, you’ve mentioned that before,” I said. “But each human is special and unique in their own right.”

“I could go on and on about a lot things with you, Hadley, but I’m not going to,” Havoc said. His voice had taken on a menacing tone and he was leaning towards me, a dangerous look in his two opposite colored eyes. “Tell me something, Hadley. Would you rather it was you that died instead of Archer Morales?”

My heart sunk in my chest and my hands turned clammy.

“N-Neither,” I stammered out. “I’d prefer it if you just left.”

Something in the look that came into Havoc’s eyes told me that I shouldn’t be pushing this unstable guy like this, but my mouth was getting the better of me and I was saying the first thing that came to mind.

“I’d love to, really.” I nearly fell over backwards in my seat when Havoc reached out and grabbed my wrist, shoving up my shirt sleeve. “But I really don’t have that much time left, do I?”

He tapped a long, thin finger on the numbered mark on my wrist, and I felt sick that he was touching me.

I tried to yank my arm back, but he just tightened his grip on my wrist, his fingernails digging into my skin.

“Let go of me,” I said as firmly as possible. “You’re wasting your time.”

Havoc raised an eyebrow, his lips curling into a smirk. “Oh, really? I don’t think I am.”

Never in my entire sixteen years had I ever felt like my life was about to end. But it was right in that moment that I thought I was going to die.

Everything seemed to stop and move into slow motion and then Havoc’s hand was moving from my wrist to my throat, and just as I was about to throw myself backwards off the stool or duck or do something to save myself, a hand shot out of nowhere and wrenched back Havoc’s arm.

Havoc’s upper body was forced down onto the table, and then Death’s furious voice rang out crystal clear through the entire classroom.

“If you so much as lay a hand on that girl, I swear I won’t waste any time in ripping you limb from limb and throwing your wasted body into the pits of Hell were you belong.”

Havoc burst out laughing. “Long time no see, Death. I see you’re still the same cheerful bloke as ever. How’ve you been lately?”

“I’m warning you,” Death snarled, tightening his grip on Havoc’s arms. “Knock it off. Leave the girl alone.”

I stumbled my way off the stool and struggled to stay standing when I watched the display between the two men in absolute horror. This wasn’t a confrontation I wanted to deal with. Unfortunately, it was one that was centered around me.

“Oh, I can’t do that,” Havoc said. He was making this all seem like he and Death were all just old friends catching up, talking about the weather. “If you get to break the Edict, I get to break the Edict.”

“This isn’t in your jurisdiction,” Death said, lowering his voice. “Don’t tell me you need to be knocked down a peg so soon. Remember your place.”

“Well, I don’t know about that.” Havoc sighed. “Hadley just reminds me so much of Lucrezia, you see, and I don’t want -”

There was a loud snapping noise that sounded like breaking bone. Looking at Death for one moment, the expression on his face actually made him seem like he was…anything but human.

“Don’t you dare say her name.”

“Oh, have I touched a nerve?” Havoc taunted, a smirk gracing his features. “It’s been over four hundred years, Death. It’s time to move on, mate.”

It looked like Death was going to say something in return, but after a moment of silence, he released his grip on Havoc’s arms and stepped back.

Havoc picked himself up, all prim and proper, dusting off his shirt, his left arm dangling awkwardly at his side – apparently it had been broken – paying no mind to Death or myself.

“Get out of here,” Death ordered, his voice dangerously low. “I don’t want to see you anywhere near her again.”

Havoc sighed, clasping his hands together. “If you say so.” He disappeared from sight a moment later, but not before shooting me a smile so eerie I felt like I was covered in slime.

I slouched against the lab table and let out a huff of air, running a hand over my face.

Neither Death or I spoke for several moments. The class around us continued to remain frozen in place. The only sound I swore I could hear was my furiously pounding heart.

“Hadley.”

“I’m okay,” I said quickly, looking over at Death. “It’s okay.”

“I hope you know I didn’t mean for this to happen,” Death said, a serious look on his face as he stared at me. “Not at all.”

“I know,” I agreed. “But it’s not your fault.”

“I sure hope you know what you’re doing, Hadley.”

“Yeah. So do I.”

Death squeezed my shoulder reassuringly and then turned to leave the room. But I had something to get cleared up first.

“Death, wait!” I called as he reached the classroom door.

I think he knew what I was going to ask and I hadn’t even spoken yet.

He took a deep breath like he was trying to calm himself before speaking, “Lucrezia was my wife.”

“What happened to her?” I asked, not sure if I even wanted to hear the answer.

Death didn’t answer. He leaned against the door with a sigh and remained silent. For a moment, I thought he couldn’t answer. Like it was too painful to even think about, let alone voice it aloud.

“Couldn’t you do something to Havoc? Like, make him stop?” I asked, quickly changing the subject.

I wanted to divert the situation as fast as possible. I didn’t want to upset Death.

“No,” he finally answered. “No, I can’t. It isn’t in my power to do anything to Havoc.”

“Damn,” I swore. “I wish there was something I could do to-”

“You don’t need to be worrying about me, Hadley,” Death said. “Worry about yourself. Worry about Archer. You have seven days left. That’s not that much time.”

“I know,” I said, averting my eyes. “I know.”

The thought of losing Archer just wasn’t one I could deal with and being reminded of it wasn’t helping.

“I’ll keep Havoc away from you for as long as I can,” Death said, snapping me back to reality. “But watch your back, Hadley. I’m already in enough trouble as it is.”

“Oh, believe me,” I said, blowing out a sigh. “I’m definitely going to be watching my back.”

There were a lot of things I had to figure out in these last seven days. If Havoc were out of the picture, this would all be significantly easier.

 

 

“Alright, Jamison,” Archer sighed, dropping his dish rag onto the counter. “Tell me what’s up.”

I gave Archer a curious look. “What do you mean?”

He raised an eyebrow as he glanced down at me. I was bent down on the floor of the coffee house, emptying out the pastry case, but that didn’t stop Archer from crouching down beside me a moment later.

“You’ve barely said anything the entire afternoon,” Archer told me. “You didn’t even tell your friend Taelor to shut up like you normally do.”

I fought back a snort of laughter. He was right.

“I just have a lot on my mind,” I said.

And that really was true.

The entire occurrence in chemistry class kept playing over and over in my mind. Death had showed up out of nowhere just when I thought Havoc had been about to kill me and he’d saved my life. He’d said he wasn’t allowed to help me, but I’d consider saving my life helping me out.

I didn’t know what to think about that.

I was mostly thinking about Lucrezia, Death’s wife, too. I could tell from the way that Death spoke of her in that one sentence that he was still obviously very much in love with her. Havoc said it had been hundreds of years since she had killed herself. But yet he was still in love with her?

How could anybody love someone else so much like that? Loving someone in a way that defied time and space?

That’s what I was having trouble understanding.

I dropped the box of old pastries and sat on the floor, leaning up against the front counter. Archer watched me for a moment, and then took a seat beside me.

“Do you think that good people sometimes have to do bad things?” I blurted out.

Archer gave me a curious look. I stared back, looking a little sheepish.

“I don’t know, Hadley,” he finally said, staring straight ahead. “Lots of people have to make decisions that are sometimes bad. It doesn’t matter if that person is good or bad.”

“But what if somebody has to do something bad in order for something good to happen?”

“Are you confessing to cheating on a geometry test or something?” Archer asked, dropping the serious air.

“I DO NOT CHEAT ON MY GEOMETRY TESTS.”

He burst out laughing and almost toppled over backwards onto the floor. “God, I know you don’t, Jamison, but your reaction is totally worth saying that.”

“Thanks, Archer,” I said, heaving a sigh. “I’m so glad I’m such a source of entertainment for you.”

“Oh, you’re more than that,” he said, quirking an eyebrow in a way that had me flushing bright red.

“What is with you today, Morales?” I said, giving him a playful shove. “You seem…happy.”

All traces of humor left Archer’s face as soon as those words left my mouth. He gave me a serious look, his lips turned down in a frown.

“I blame it all on you,” he finally sighed. “You’ve taken my family from me and now you’ve taken my sanity, too.”

“Piss off, Archer!”

That time we both burst out laughing.

I didn’t remember the last time I’d actually laughed. So much had been going on these past two weeks or so I hadn’t thought about something as trivial as laughing.

It felt pretty good to be laughing again, in all honestly. And the fact that I was laughing with Archer made the entire moment just a little bit more special than it might have been otherwise.

“It seems like the Christmas holidays really do bring out the best in people, eh?” I said, giving Archer a nudge.

“Yes, Virgina, there is a Santa Claus,” Archer said in an abruptly serious voice.

“Uh…what?”

“C’mon, everybody knows that saying! You know…from the New York Times?”

“No.”

“Hn,” he grunted. “Just for that, Jamison, I don’t think I’m going to get you anything for Christmas.”

It felt like I’d just been doused in ice cold water.

“You were going to get me a Christmas present?” I gasped, my jaw dropping.

“I have to be the doting boyfriend, don’t I?” Archer asked, looking offended. “I wouldn’t want these past two days of dating go to waste, right?”

“Well, thank you very much, but I haven’t even gotten you a Christmas present! You shouldn’t -”

Archer smirked. “Got ya.”

“Very funny, Archer.”

Thinking back on this moment years from now, I’ll probably never know what made me act so impulsively. I was guessing it was because I’d been driving myself crazy trying to get close to Archer and now not minutes before, I’d been laughing and joking with him.

Archer caught on a second later, tilting his head as I leaned towards him so I could press my lips against his.

The more I kissed Archer, the more I was beginning to see why people described kissing as melting or being consumed by a really good sort of fire or something.

It felt like I was melting against him the more we kissed, the more I had the urge to be as close as possible to him. My fingers curled in his hair and I barely gave myself any room to breathe.

Call it insane or irrational, but I had this urge to make sure that Archer was actually here and not somewhere else. That he was here, that I was actually touching him, and that he wasn’t some fleeting image in my head that was going to disappear as soon as I opened my eyes.

I could tell Archer was enjoying the kiss just as much as I was. His hand at the small of my back made me feel like I was burning and the fingers he kept brushing over my cheek made something in my stomach curl as well as comforting me at the same time.

Just when I thought we were about to both burst from lack of oxygen, a rather surprised voice said, “You know, when I asked you to clean up, this isn’t what I had in mind.”

It took an immense amount of strength not to drop my head in shame and run off to hide in some closet.

Regina was standing in the doorway to the kitchen, a Tupperware bin balanced on her hip, an amused expression on her face as she stared down at Archer and I on the floor.

“S-Sorry,” I stammered. “We were just…”

“Taking a break,” Archer finished for me.

Regina raised an eyebrow, unconvinced. I could’ve sworn that there was sort of a satisfied look in her eyes as she examined us.

“Anything you two want to tell me?” she asked, a smirk breaking out across her face.

I looked at Archer in absolute horror.

“If you don’t count the fact that Hadley and I’ve just started dating, then no, we have nothing to tell you,” Archer said briskly, getting to his feet.

He leaned over and grabbed a cherry Danish out of the pastry box while I stumbled my way to my feet and then he walked through the kitchen without so much as a backwards glance.

“Archer Incitti Morales! Didn’t I teach you how to be respectful to women?” Regina called after him, looking astounded.

Archer waved a hand over his head and replied with something in Italian that made Regina do one very dramatic eye roll.

“I hope you whip him into shape, Hadley,” Regina said, sighing heavily. “The Lord only knows he needs it.”

“So…you don’t mind the fact that I’m…that I’m dating your son?” I said awkwardly, rocking back on my heels.

Regina burst out laughing and nearly dropped the Tupperware container she was holding. “Oh, heavens no,” she chuckled, wiping at her eyes with her shirt sleeve. “I’m thrilled my son finally got off his ass and got himself a girlfriend. You must really like him, don’t you?”

That was the last thing I was expecting Regina to say.

I managed to keep the blush working its way to my face to a minimum and not fall over backwards into the pastry case.

“Yeah,” I admitted embarrassedly. “I do.”

“Just be good with him, okay? I couldn’t stand to see Archer let down again.”

I promised Regina that I would do my best while I silently agreed with her. I honestly didn’t think I could see Archer let down again, either.

Archer was a good person that had a lot of bad stuff happen to him. He deserved to be happy.

I really don’t know what made me think to ask Archer that question about good people having to do bad things. But I was beginning to think that sometime in these next few days, I was going to be faced with a bad decision. Like, a decision I’d have to make to talk to Archer about his father.

 

 

 

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First and foremost, I just want to thank each and every person that’s fanned me these past few days! It means so much and I’m so thankful for all of it!! 😀

School is almost out!! So that means hopefully I’ll be able to write a lot more. Yay.

Soooo…..what do you guys think of this chapter?