It's a Long Way Down

Chapter Nine: Missing Chapter

I slowly picked up the book, sitting on my bed, dinner long forgotten by now. I started to read the book from where I left off. Soon finding that it jumped from Chapter 5 to Chapter 7. I turned back to the table of contents and saw that Chapter 6 was scratched out there as well.

"What?" I said to myself, "What are they hiding from me?"

I thought I'd ask Sodo later if he found his book and see if I could read the Chapter put of his book. I finished reading the rest of the book, shutting it just as Sodo walked in.

"Knocking is a thing," I told him, annoyed at the hidden Chapter. He just put his hands up in surrender, "You missed dinner. I wanted to see if you were okay."

"I'm fine, just a little frustrated," I told him. His eyes saw the book on my bed, his first question being, "So you know now?"

"Know what? Because there's an entire chapter missing from the book and I don't know what it is," I told him. He furrowed his eyebrows, taking the book from my bed and turning the pages. I thought I saw disappointment flash in his eyes before he handed the book back, "The one Chapter I really need you to read they got rid of."

"Chapter 6?" I asked. He nodded, "Yeah. It's just... really important that you read it."

"If my book was returned, maybe yours was? I can read it from there," I told him. He just tossed the book onto the bed as he said, "If they took that Chapter from your book, my money's on the fact they did it to everyones. But now I know what they're trying to hide from you."

"What is it?" I asked. He shook his head, "I still can't tell you."

"But Sodo, if we have no way of me reading the damn Chapter you might as well just tell me," I told him, getting off my bed. He shook his head, walking away. I just walked right up to him, grabbing his shoulder and turning him around, making him look at me, "There's no way I'll find out about any of it now, Sodo. What is it? What are they hiding? Why can't you-"

I was cut off by him grabbing my hands and pushing me up against a wall with my hands pinned up above my head making hy heart race. Sodo said in a low tone, "Just this simple gesture gets your heart racing. You want to know why?"

I simply nodded as he lowered his head to my neck, placing a feather-light kiss in the crook of my neck, a familiar shiver running down my spine as he said, "You want to know why that makes you go crazy?"

"Please," I whispered as he ran a hand down my side, stopping at my hip, giving it a small squeeze, "Why my touch makes you heat up like a fire?"

He lowered his hand, running it up my thigh, "Why no matter what I do, your body yearns for me?"

I nodded once more as his hand went up to my throat, tracing it lightly with his fingers while my head tilted back as if it were an instinct. Then, as fast as it had happened, he moved away, standing by the door now as my hands dropped by my sides while he said, "It's nothing that I would be able to tell you without not being able to hold back. If I tell you, not many words will be said. That's why you need to find a way to read that Chapter. It will have all the answers."

"Sodo-" I all but whimpered. I craved his touch. My body was on fire. I needed him. He just shook his head, "You have to find out on your own, Ember. I'm sorry."

He then left the room as if nothing had happened just now. My heart was still racing, my chest rising and falling as if I just ran a marathon. The heat in my body becoming unbearable, despite being a fire ghoul. I pushed off the wall, immediately entering my bathroom, turning on the water in the shower and I just stood under it with my clothes on.

"Fuck!" I yelled as I punched the wall in frustration. The things that ghoul could do to me and I had no way of finding out what it was. I leaned my hands on the shower wall as my head fell forward. Whatever it was they didn't want me to know, they were going great lengths to keep it from me.