I think you guys will like this chapter a lot, and I was looking forward to writing this one the most. :D Enjoy!
7. Eli
Clare still lay huddled on her bed, face hidden in her bed sheets. She suddenly heard a quiet clicking noise, and she looked up to see Eli standing by her door, looking down at her with no expression on his face.
"What happened?" Clare gasped when she saw him, though she could guess.
His bottom lip was bleeding from a deep cut, and his hair was messy and knotted. His clothes were ruffled and dirty, a hole torn at the knee of his jeans.
"I was attacked," Eli mumbled, not moving.
"By who?"
"That crazy ex-boyfriend of yours."
Clare blinked at him. "K.C.?" Eli nodded warily. "Why?"
"I'm not sure. He said something about me corrupting you…and something about me taking you away from him?"
Clare blanched. "I don't know what he's talking about."
Eli shook his head. "No matter." He gave her a hard look. "What was so important that I had to climb in through your kitchen window to get here?"
"I…and…he…"
Eli looked closely at her, and then alarm spread across his face. In two strides he was at her beside, bending down so he could be at eye level with her. "Clare, what happened to your cheek?"
"My dad," Clare choked out.
Darkness filled Eli's green eyes. "He did this to you?" he asked her, his voice scarily calm.
Clare nodded, the tears silently flowing out of her eyes again.
And suddenly his arms were around her, gripping her tightly to his chest. "Oh Clare," he whispered, kissing the top of her hair. "I'm sorry. I'm so sorry."
It was the first apology Clare had ever heard come out of Eli's mouth, and she was stunned, yet comforted by it. She placed her hands over his own and closed her eyes, enjoying the feel of being in his embrace once more.
"We can leave, if you want," Eli suggested, and Clare opened her eyes to look up at him.
"Leave…right now?"
"If you don't want to, it's fine," Eli said quickly.
"I don't," Clare murmured, and Eli's heart sank. "I don't because I'm fine being here in your arms," Clare explained softly, and Eli relaxed.
"I've missed you, Clare," Eli breathed.
Clare's stomach churned in guilt, but she just buried deeper into Eli's arms. "I've missed you too."
It wasn't a complete lie. Eli was completely different from both K.C. and Fitz, and she had missed having somebody she could really talk to. She may not have missed him as much as he had missed her, or in the same way(him missing their relationship and her missing having somebody to talk to), but she could admit to longing for him multiple times in the past three weeks.
"Clare…do you love me?" Eli asked suddenly.
Clare knew that she was automatically expected to say yes. She could feel the answer rolling on her tongue, but she couldn't seem to open her mouth and speak it. Why?
Because she'd been given so many reasons not to by everybody else.
"You're hesitating," Eli stated, and his voice sounded so broken it made Clare want to cry.
"Of course I love you, Eli," Clare managed to say, though she could hear the guilt in her tone.
"So then why won't you tell me the truth about K.C.?"
"There isn't anything to tell," Clare gasped, another small panic attack gripping her like they had the past few days.
"Clare, did we not have a conversation before about me knowing when you're lying?" Eli whispered.
"Eli, I'm sorry!" Clare burst out at last, turning and hiding her face in his shirt. "I was so overwhelmed by our relationship, I just…I wanted one with no complications. And K.C. said he missed me and that he still had feelings for me…and he promised me he would be my relief from the stress of our relationship…"
"So…you cheated on me?" Eli muttered flatly.
Clare figured now that her secret as out, she might as well tell the whole truth. "And then Fitz…Fitz said he needed me in his life, he needed me to help him be a true Christian. Even though adultery is a sin, I couldn't refuse to help him. It was so hard balancing all of these relationships, that I ended up avoiding you to get rid of one of the complications in my life."
"I'm…a complication?" Eli said through gritted teeth.
"No!" Clare protested.
"I'm making your life harder," Eli said, ignoring her.
"You're not!" Clare told him, though, in a sense, he was.
Eli shook his head, unwrapping his arms from around her. "I…I don't know how to deal with this," he mumbled, hiding his face in his hands and crossing his legs on the bed.
Clare rested a hand on his shoulder. "Eli, please. I didn't mean to cheat on you. I just needed a break."
"Then why didn't you ask for one instead of going around and dating other guys behind my back?" Eli choked out.
"I'm sorry," Clare repeated, trying to make herself sound as sincere and honest as possible.
"Prove it." Eli's voice was suddenly so loud and clear that Clare jumped slightly.
"How…how can I…?"
"I don't know. But prove it. Or I don't know if I can forgive you." Eli fixed his intense gaze on her, and Clare resisted the urge to cringe away.
Only one thing came to Clare's mind that she knew should win Eli over. As reluctant as she might be to do it, she had to if she was going to save their relationship.
Clare leaned forward and roughly pressed her lips to his.
Eli almost pulled away, wondering and almost fearing what she was up to. Was she going to play around with his heart and make him think she loved him this way?
Clare pulled herself closer to Eli and took his hands, bringing them to just over her breasts. Eli's cold hands brushed over the exposed skin there, and he realized that Clare was only dressed in a camisole and short shorts.
"What are you doing?" Eli whispered against her lips.
"Shh," she chided him, then reaching down to pull of his shirt. Eli broke away for a second to assist her, and Clare's eyes widened when she saw the black and blue blotches covering Eli's skin.
"K.C. really hurt you," Clare gasped.
"It's nothing," Eli murmured, pressing his lips back to Clare's. He fell onto his back, Clare on top of him. Her body lay in between his legs, her fingers intertwined into his hair. Eli wrapped his arms around her torso, kissing her more fiercely.
Clare broke away and sat up for a quick second, pulling off her camisole. Eli watched her in amazement, trying to process that they had finally gotten this far in their relationship. Clare reached down and began to nimbly unbutton his ragged jeans.
"You don't have to do this," Eli murmured to her.
"I-I want to," Clare said, stumbling over her words. Nervousness coursed through her body and numbed her brain, but she knew she had to do this. If it was the only way to get Eli to trust her, then she had to.
She just had to.
"Clare Diana Edwards! Open this door!" a muffled voice shouted from downstairs. Clare listened as her mother banged on the front door some more, but it was no use. Clare was not going to let her back in, at least not now.
Her head was rested on Eli's feverish chest, which rose and fell quickly as Eli attempted to catch his breath. Clare had one arm draped over his waist, the bed sheets hiding his body past that. The bed sheets were pulled up and around her chest, for she was too discomforted to keep her naked body exposed to her boyfriend.
Eli's eyes were narrowed to slits, a light sheen of sweat covering his face. "She's been banging on that door for fifteen minutes straight," he mumbled.
"Fifteen? I didn't hear it start up till about five minutes ago."
Eli chuckled. "Maybe I have better hearing than you. Or you were too distracted to notice…"
Clare's cheeks automatically flushed with color. "Uh…"
Eli laughed a real laugh this time. "You're adorable, Miss Edwards."
"Does this mean you forgive me?" Clare asked, almost inaudibly, sitting up a little.
Eli winced, for she was putting pressure on a bruise on his chest, and Clare lay back down. "Was this…your first time?"
"…Yes."
"Then I forgive you."
"What did my virginity have to do with your decision to forgive me?"
"I had wanted to be your first. This proves…that you didn't completely betray me," Eli explained, and Clare squirmed in guilt. "You saved yourself for me, Clare, for this moment. It means a lot to me."
"Oh," Clare whispered.
What had this meant to her? Did it mean she loved Eli enough to go this far with him? Or had she just done what she had to do to get Eli to stay?
As Clare pondered this, her mother's voice again rose up to them. "Clare!" Helen had taken on a tone of worry. "Honey! Please open this door! Your father's gone now!"
"You really should let her in at some point," Eli muttered wearily.
"I'm afraid to."
"Clare, she didn't…she wasn't the one who hurt you. Besides, I'm here. You're safe," he assured her.
"I know, but…they don't want me to see you anymore. That's why they were arguing."
"Why?"
"My dad saw you and K.C. fighting, and he thinks you're dangerous for me to be around, or something like that."
"And why did he slap you, exactly?" Eli questioned.
"Because I told them no."
"Clare you…you defied your parents? For me?"
"I think it's becoming a habit."
Eli smiled faintly, then quieted into thought. "What if…we ran away?" he suggested quietly.
"R-ran away?"
"It's the only way we can be together, and I've got a car. We could pack your things now and -"
"But my mom's still outside waiting for me to open the door."
"Well…let her in, and then just come back up here. We can wait until late when she's asleep and then sneak out. You'll never have to deal with your parents again, and we can be together forever," Eli urged her.
Clare frowned. "Eli…we don't even have any money."
"You think I can't take care of that?"
Clare sighed. "I don't know."
"Well, just think about it," Eli begged her, then yawned. "I'm going to sleep. Wake me when you make up your mind." Eli unwrapped his arms from around her and turned over onto his side, back to Clare. After a few minutes, Clare could hear light snores to signal that he was asleep.
Clare glanced at her clock, which read 7:30 at night. The sky outside was already dark, and Clare made sure Eli was asleep before slowly climbing out of her bed.
She picked up her cell phone and walked into her bathroom, closing the door silently behind her. Taking a deep shuttering breath, she flipped open the phone and began to dial.
"Hey, you've reached K.C. I'm out right now, but I'll call you back. You know what to do at the beep."
Clare stifled a sigh and waited for the beep to come. When it did, she whispered. "Hey, it's me. Clare. I was calling to tell you that I think I've made my decision." She was talking fast, her voice urgent. "I really wish you'd answered your phone, but oh well. Just…please, call me back. If I don't hear from you by midnight tonight then -"
Suddenly she heard only a dial tone, and she bit back a groan of frustration. The machine had cut off her message. With a shake of her head, Clare began to dial the phone again.
"It's Fitz. You know what to do."
"Why is nobody answering their phones?" Clare muttered, annoyance prickling through her.
She left Fitz the same basic message, this time getting everything she needed to say out. She closed her phone when she was done, and then sat down on the closed lid of the toilet seat.
What was she to do?
Eli wanted to run away with her, have it forever be the two of them. Clare wasn't sure if that would put her in the same suffocating situation she'd recently been in, but if it did, there would be no way out.
She really needed to talk to Fitz or K.C. She needed help making this decision. Clare didn't know what she wanted.
And then the answer became perfectly clear. Clare knew exactly who she needed all along. Who had been her perfect match. The one who had stuck by her all along.
How could she have been so stupid?
Author's Note: :O Who did she pick? Well, you will all have to wait and see. One more chapter after this one! Review, please! :)
