**Updated every Saturday**
He'll have to break all the rules to keep her, but first she has to break just one and let him in...
It's taken four years, but Anna Fray has finally put the past behind her. Mostly. She fills her days working in a bar and...
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As Atticus held the door open for me, I cast a glance towards the bar. Callum was watching us from the doorway; his neatly groomed eyebrows raised, and his lips pursed in a stifled smug smile.
I shook my head as I rolled my eyes. I knew what Callum thought he saw, but I also knew how wrong he was. He'd mistaken a shared conspiracy for attraction. It was an easy mistake to make, but it wasn't one I could correct him on. I would take his knowing smiles and suggestive glances this time because it was safer that telling him the truth.
Atticus and I walked in silence as we climbed the steep hill towards the main road. For me, it was a necessity as I huffed and puffed in the cool night air. He didn't seem to have the same issues, instead he almost glided beside me. His soft breath billowing into the night at intervals unaffected by the sudden burst of cardio.
"I thought of another question today," I gasped as we turned onto the main road. It was only six in the evening, but the city was already starting to fill up with revellers.
"Does that mind of yours ever stop?" he chuckled as we weaved through the steady stream of couples and groups looking for a good time.
"Sometimes," I replied. He didn't need to know that such a thing was only possible after an indecent amount of alcohol. That only then, would the vicious voices in my head stop and let me sleep.
I cleared my throat and pushed on. "I was wondering, how do you tell what a person is? How do you decide if they're light or dark?"
My day of people watching had sparked my curiosity.
"It's like a sixth sense. Sometimes we can see it. Other times we feel it in their touch."
A memory of his reaction when we first touched ran through my mind. He had acted so strangely, and then he'd disappeared for the rest of the week. I had to know why.
"Which am I?"
I asked the question, but I was pretty sure I knew the answer. In the same way that I could give a good guess as to what Callum would be. The memory of the man falling off his stool was a perfect example. Callum and I had both laughed at his misfortune, snickering behind the bar and revelling in his bad luck. It wasn't good, or right, or kind, but we had done it on instinct.
Emma hadn't. Even now, if we mentioned it, I could guarantee she'd touch a slender hand to her mouth with wide innocent eyes and profess how awful she'd felt for the man. That kind of empathy just came naturally to her. It always had and I knew it always would. It was just who she was. In the same way Callum and I had a darkness to us. Callum's may have been more superficial, but it was still there.
So, I knew what Atticus would say, but I was curious nonetheless.
He paused before he answered, an internal debate evident in his cautious eyes.
"Come on, Atticus. You can tell me," I teased.
"I'm not sure," he said tentatively, flashing a side glance towards me as we turned towards home.
