Author's Note: I am so sorry this update has taken me so ridiculously long. Life and/or other stories seemed to get in the way each time I planned to continue writing this piece. Again, I am so very sorry and I do hope I don't disappoint!
As usual, I don't claim ownership of any kind for the song in this chapter.
Chapter 7
-Welcome and Farewell-
Friday (Same Day) 3:45 p.m. Durnom, Varsity Club
The brothers had to pick up speed in order to keep up with the girl they'd so recently met. They didn't know her at all but she seemed to have no difficulties speaking her mind to them whenever she felt like it. And on the drive over to the club, she'd had plenty to say about how they needed to go faster and how she couldn't wait to see Chase. This really had Caleb reeling about the things he knew about Chase Collins, and what he conceivably didn't.
Upon entering the place, Chase was easy to find as he was up on the stage doing his thing. The guy's voice truly was amazing. Whether he was smart or completely stupid remained to be seen though. After all, there were homicidal maniacs running about, with a clear intention of causing terrible harm to Chase, and yet he was up front and center in a very public place where those psychos had found him once before.
Filing into the building and finding themselves a place to stand at the back of the crowd, they waited and looked on as Chase continued to perform a song for the fair sized crowd in the middle of a weekday. A low profile was most certainly not at the forefront of the man's mind.
"Fate, seems to recreate. I just cannot escape. Something holds me down and makes me act a way I can't explain. Even now I can feel it coming over me, choking me. As I'm falling behind, you can say you know me. But you have no clue what my dreams could show you."
The music throbbed and grew, nothing but the song. It had to be part of Chase's power immersing and blending into the song, right? What else could explain how every single person was focused entirely on the performance on stage and nothing else?
"Lies, as I try to stay clean. And I try to stay sober. This is taking me over. And my dreams complicate it. No... I just cannot let this go. No... I tried so many times to tell you. No... I just cannot let this go. I just cannot win. I see you..."
His gaze accidentally found Selene amongst all of the faces in the crowd and he genuinely looked startled to see her. But he was talented. He smoothly let the surprise melt away back into a solemn stare, finishing out the song with his eyes remaining glued to her the entire time. He was singing to her. Perhaps he'd been singing to her all along.
"I see you, you, falling away. I see you, you, you... Killing me softly. I see you, you, falling away. I see you, you, you..."
Caleb wondered how Chase went about choosing his songs. He wondered if it would be inappropriate to hit the guy for taking up too much of his thoughts and bringing up so many questions. Chase wasn't one to go around expressing himself freely and it was annoying when he wanted answers. This was the guy who had pretended to be someone else for quite some time around him and his friends. This was the guy who tried to kill them one time, and then saved them another...
The crowd began to break apart a bit as the show was over. Music from the sound system came on to replace the void left behind with the club's obvious money-making talent now leaving the stage. Caleb watched him move along the edge of the club, moving around the thick of people that were closer to the center than anywhere else. Then he was near them, at the bar speaking to the bartender. He must have asked the guy for a water because it was what was slid over the flat surface to him after a moment. Caleb waited but the guy wasn't making any indication he would be coming over to them or acknowledging their presence so he figured they would have to be the ones to approach.
Chase didn't seem happy to see them. He might have even looked angry that they were there. But any anger or reluctance he might have been feeling quickly faded when Caleb moved aside to make room for Selene as she pushed through the four Sons. He watched as the two met one another's eyes once again. This time though, the obvious strong connection that had been between Chase and Selene when she first walked in during his performance was gone. This time there was a distance there, not in her eyes, but in his. Caleb could tell he was trying to hide it when he forced a polite smile. The smile was one that would have fooled him and his friends in the past. The guy was great at displaying a disarming and charming smile on a whim. But that smile wouldn't fool him anymore. This time he knew to look in the eyes for the truth. And soon, he would perform the soul stare on him. If Chase agreed to it anyway. If the Fifth Son chose not to accept the offer Caleb was about to extend...
"Chase." Selene finally said, suddenly appearing shy and nervous.
He looked down and away, then slowly back to her. "Hey."
She slapped him, actually slapped him across the face. He did nothing to try and stop her and he seemed to be thinking he deserved the hit. The next thing, she was wrapping her arms around him, holding him tight. Well there was a mind fuck.
"Why did you go? I don't understand why you would go anywhere without me," she murmured into his cheek.
He copied her low tone with his reply. "There was something I had to do."
It took conscious effort, but she detached herself from Chase. "What? What was so important you would leave to another school, another town, and not say a word to anyone?"
"My father-"
Before he could get anything more than that out, Selene interrupted him. "Your dad? Was it because your parents died that you had to leave that house?"
"They were not my parents. You know how I felt about them, Selene."
Caleb was spending these moments looking back and forth between the pair of them. From what he'd learned during his brief visit to Haversfield, the Collins hadn't loved much of anything, except appearances and wealth undoubtedly. It was obvious Chase hadn't shared with his friend what must have been a very terrible childhood, if Doris was to be believed, which she probably was since she had no reason to lie.
"Well, I mean, sort of. You told me they weren't very nice... But they're your parents. They loved you and that has to count for something."
"The people who adopted me felt many things towards me, and none of them came close to love."
Selene drew in a sharp intake of breath. She was surprised, confused, uncertain. She glanced around at Reid and Tyler, Pogue and himself, as if the answers she desperately sought would be there. They didn't know much, but they knew enough that something hadn't been quite right at that house they visited, and it showed on their faces now.
"I'm sorry, Chase. I didn't realize. You talk to me, you tell me things. But you never said anything about home. I'm so sorry. I should have known. I think, in a way, I did know. My parents always were saying how it was a shame you grew up in that home. I didn't realize. I'm such an idiot. I'm so sor-"
Chase kissed her, brief but tender. He stepped away from her almost immediately following the kiss, clearing his throat and shuffling uncomfortably. Finally, his gaze settled on Caleb.
"You brought her here, because she likely tracked you down. She's persistent like that. But all of you here... What do you want?"
"What do I want? I want you to join the Covenant."
The protests and rapid demands as to what precisely he was thinking, were not unexpected in the least. The beginnings of an argument concerning the issue was made nonexistent when Chase answered, immediate and certain.
"No."
This, too, was far from an unexpected response, and so Caleb smoothly went into his explanation without acknowledging he'd already been declined.
"I mean, technically just by being born you're a member. But join officially, and it's for real. We'll be connected completely. If one of us is in danger or hurt, all of us will feel it. We do this, we can also communicate across distances with our voices and images, put right into our minds."
"Infinitely useful if that guy comes looking for any of us again." Reid added, spoken as if the thought had just come to him, which it probably had.
Tyler stared like his friend had grown a second head. "Wait, are you actually agreeing with accepting Chase into the Covenant?"
"He better not be." Pogue declared. "And you need to rethink this too, Caleb. We know nothing about this guy, except that he went psycho not so long ago, and hurt a lot of people."
When Caleb didn't say anything, didn't even look at him, he apparently felt the need to elaborate. He sighed in his head when his good friend began to count on his fingers, things he was well aware of already. It was better than direct yelling he supposed.
"He killed that guy at the party, he put a spell on Kate that put her up in the hospital, he put me in the hospital, he kidnapped Sarah, and let's not forget how close he came to killing you-"
"Shut up!" Caleb shouted in dismay.
He'd just seen what Pogue's words were doing to Chase's friend, someone who likely meant more to him than a simple friend if the kiss was anything to go by. And the eyes. They kept staring into one another's eyes to find the unspoken words. He knew what that could be like. It happened between him and Sarah often enough.
His words had come too late. Selene burst into tears, audible crying for only a second before she was wiping them away, clearing her throat to regain her composure. Now she was shaking her head. This time, the words she had to say, did surprise him. They absolutely shocked him.
"It's the power. He can't help it sometimes. An addiction can be so strong. Sometimes you find something that you need, and you can't let it go, because it comforts you, it builds you up, makes you strong and brave. It makes you better and you can't go back to anything else."
She was fingering a silver chain around her neck. It was a long chain and whatever was at the end he couldn't see, tucked beneath her shirt. Caleb wondered if it was really Chase she was talking about anymore.
The words just came to him to try and comfort Selene, perhaps to reassure himself as well. This girl needed some truth, some reality, and fast. Chase exposed his power to her, but said nothing about his past. This was something he could do for her to help with how much she was obviously reeling about being blatantly uninformed.
"The first time he came to Ipswich, he wronged us in a big way. No one is disputing that he did some terrible things. Things I will be the first to admit and say, have not been forgiven."
He locked eyes with a shifting and nervous man who he couldn't help but see as a guy who was still just his age. They were eighteen, a far cry from being full blown adults in the minds of the majority out in the world. Which made it unbelievable what they'd all been through over the past months, or even over the past few days.
"But I also remember how much he did to protect us, all of us, the second time he came to Ipswich."
"I already said no." Chase insisted. "Do you think the place I want to be is with people who hate me?"
"Well you seem fine not being with the people who love you."
If not for the low hum of the general club noise all around, they might have been able to hear a pin drop with the sudden silence that fell upon them.
"Selene..." Chase murmured. His eyes avoided hers, but she wasn't looking for his anyways.
"You know how I feel about you, and I know how you feel about me. Still, we're like this?"
Caleb was seriously beginning to wonder how he'd got himself and his friends a front row view of a relationship falling apart. This was really not how he'd foreseen his Friday going. Find Chase, try and convince him to join their covenant. That had been about the extent of his planning. And his friends tended to listen to him why?
"Selene, I left because I had to get out of that place and because my father asked me to help him. I didn't see it as a choice because it was my father. I was being a stupid, angry kid and not the man I hope you will one day see."
He'd said it all rapid fire like. Caleb suspected it was in fear of her not giving him the chance to say what he clearly needed to get out.
She stared at him, his gaze still firmly rooted to the floor. Caleb had the guilty thought that this was better than any television show he'd ever seen.
"You say that, like you think we have all the time in the world."
Sheesh, beauty truly was devastating in this case. If this was a break up, or a reaffirmation of an assumed break up months ago when Chase vanished from his hometown, Caleb didn't want him and his friends to be star witnesses of it. He ran a hand through his hair and then cleared his throat loudly.
"Reconsider the offer, Chase. I promise even if we can't forgive you right now, we don't hate you."
He felt Pogue's heated glare before seeing it, but didn't pay it any more attention than a brief flicker of his eyes. His focus was on the proposition he was to extend, because it was the right thing to do. Chase was a Son of Ipswich. He could belong somewhere. It felt right.
"If you join, you have people to watch your back. You'll have not only friends, but brothers. The Covenant is a family."
"The catch?"
Ah, yes. Chase was a bright boy.
"There will need to be trust. I'll need to perform a soul search after the ritual that ties you to each of us."
"Like I said, n-"
"You should join."
Chase wasn't alone when his surprised gaze fell upon Selene. Caleb was becoming more and more impressed with this girl by the minute. Woman would be a more apt term he supposed. It was obvious she was smart and mature, and could most definitely hold her own.
"Join, Chase. You shouldn't have to be alone."
Now he was frowning at her. Caleb wondered if he was wondering whether there was a deeper meaning behind that sentence. He didn't get long to wonder.
"Well, I should get going. I still need to get a room at the inn in Ipswich if I'm to stay."
"You're staying there? In Ipswich I mean?"
She shrugged. "For tonight at least. Too late to drive back now. I hate the dark."
Caleb was watching Chase's face, and it looked like he wanted to say more, but then he seemed to remember his audience. It was like seeing a wall rise up. That was how good Chase was at pushing everything down, hiding everything inside. The soul search would take all of that away, Caleb realized. He hoped it would do him good, exposing everything, but it was also a very real possibility there would be an adverse reaction.
When Selene walked out, Chase finally leveled his gaze at each one of them in turn. He kept his gaze on Caleb when he got to him.
"Okay. I'll join. What else am I gonna do?"
Not exactly the picture perfect response he would have preferred to reassure the boys, but it would do.
Outside the Flying Crow Inn, the only place for visitors to stay in the small town of Ipswich, a motorcycle pulled up just after four in the afternoon. The driver parked it in one of the spaces near the back of the small lot, removed his helmet and a hefty looking duffle bag, and carried both inside. He got a room for himself, number of nights indeterminate, and shared that he was from Haversfield, and he was looking for a friend.
