Cursed (The Spellbound Series, #2)

13 | A Terrible Tale or Two

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Chapter 13 – A Terrible Tale or Two

The M6 growled softly as it sauntered along the I-295, heading north through Freeport. Hayley sat behind the wheel, hands firmly cupped around it, her eyes occasionally glancing at the GPS screen that pointed the way back to Edgewood. Melissa watched curiously from behind her, and shifted in her seat to better accommodate the still-sleeping Anson, whose head she held in her lap.

In the few hours that had gone by since they'd arrived at the beach, Melissa had garnered a fairly strong sense of Hayley's personality. She was quite straightforward and confident, even abrasive at times. Melissa considered herself to be self-assured on occasion, but not quite as much as Hayley. She certainly wasn't as comfortable in her own skin, either.

So the way Hayley was seated now intrigued her. She seemed cautious, which Melissa deemed an understandable position for a person driving someone else's car. Granted, she herself hadn't had the opportunity; Cameron still hadn't allowed her, the latest reason being the mistrust of her driving skills. The most she'd ever done was move her Aunt Vera's car into the garage.

Vera! she thought with a start. Her aunt was probably worried sick about her. Melissa disentangled her fingers from Anson's blonde hair and instinctively reached for her pocket, with the intent of checking her phone for any missed calls. Her hand collided against the pocketless fabric of her sweatpants. She then realized that the last she'd seen of her phone was when she'd left it on her end table after Anson had shown up.

Melissa exhaled slightly. She needed to get a message to Vera that she was alright, before the woman went beating down the police station doors. She quickly reached across for Anson's pocket and slipped her fingers inside, and smiled when she felt the glass of a screen. You could trust Anson to always have his phone with him – that, or a four-hundred-page novel. She pulled it out, quickly typed out a text message saying that she was fine and on her way back home, and sent it to her aunt's number.

She put Anson's phone back and returned to stroking his messy hair. As she did, her eyes wandered to Cameron's slumbering figure. She had a full side-view of him; the back of his seat was slightly lowered to support him. One arm was across his chest, his hand resting on his shoulder, and his head lolled lazily to its side. It was the most peaceful she had seen him in a while.

"It must be hard," Maddie said. Melissa looked to her right, where the red-haired siren sat with her hands on her knees. Her beauty was undeniably stunning, Melissa noted, but she didn't feel any pull towards her. She guessed that the effects didn't work on females – but then again, here she was under the siren's curse, except drawn to her boyfriend's brother. She hardly had the experience to be making any assumptions.

"Dealing with all of this, I mean," the girl continued. "But you actually recognize that you're under the curse - people are usually oblivious or in denial when confronted. You're handling it unnaturally well."

"You should've seen me last night," Melissa chuckled, albeit emptily. She could remember Cameron cowering in front of her as she slowly compacted his brain. "I have moments like this, when I'm... lucid. Aware. When I know that what Anson and I feel for each other isn't real. But I still can't bring myself to feel guilty about how it's all hurting Cameron..." She sighed. "Sometimes I wonder if it would be better if I was completely under the curse."

Maddie shook her head. "No, it wouldn't be better. No curse is a good thing, trust me. I'm just grateful that yours can be broken."

Melissa frowned. It sounded like she was referring to herself. "Are you saying that your being a siren is a curse?"