“How was your day?” I asked. “You’ve heard how mine went.”
I rinsed the dishes and put them in the dishwasher. “My boss told me that I should get a bonus this year. I’m up for promotion.” He beamed. “I managed to create an automated program that cuts their need for contractors by a third—although that’s not going to win me points with the people who lose their jobs. I’m almost hoping someone will find a major flaw in the process so I’m not responsible for layoffs. But the good news is, even if it does work, they can’t possibly deploy it for another year. It has to be tested and retested, and the programmers working now have a run-of-the-contract clause. They can’t be laid off until their contract is up for renewal.”
The run-of-the-contract clause had been implemented, Nate had explained to me, when outsourcing had gotten so bad that unemployment in the US soared to record heights. Now, jobs had to be filled by US citizens first. Only if the employer could prove that there were no qualified applicants willing to take the job could they turn outside the United States. Corporations were still fighting against it, but popular support kept the law in full force and, in the long run, it had been extremely good for the economy.
“I’m sure it will all work out okay. How about your love life? Anybody on the horizon?”
Nate gave me a sideways glance, then slowly shook his head. “I keep looking. I meet a lot of nice women, a lot of attractive women, but I just don’t have what it takes…I want a woman who’s smart and independent, but I think I’m just too set in my ways to make room for someone in my life.”
Nate was a quiet man who led a quiet life, and was fixated on his job. Women didn’t like taking a backseat, and even though he was lonely, I suspected that until he found another computer geek to share his life, he’d be sitting alone in his house. He needed someone who shared his interests and could get as caught up in her work as he did his.
I carried the remains of the dinner cartons over to the recycling and garbage cans, trying to think of something encouraging to say.
But at that moment, Mr. Whiskers came up and leaped on the table with a loud purp.
Turning around, I took a long look at him. His long fur was fluffed out and the look in his eyes told me that something was amiss. “Great. Now what? Whisky, what’s up?”
Nate, who knew Mr. Whiskers’s true story, arched his eyebrows. “He can still sense magic at play, can’t he?”
I nodded, slowly scanning the room. “Is somebody here?”
Mr. Whiskers jumped off the table and raced into the living room. Nate and I followed. As we entered the place, I immediately saw a sparkle of light that was flickering around the room like a firefly.
“What the hell?” I turned to Whisky. “Someone’s here, right?”
He let out a low mew and took a running leap into my arms, almost knocking me back with his weight.
It wasn’t a vampire—vampires were anything but sparkly, and they couldn’t get through the wards right now. But whatever it was, it was definitely something on the magical side. I put Mr. Whiskers down on the top of the sofa, then cautiously edged over to the light as my hand dropped to unsheathe my dagger.
In a loud voice I said, “Who are you? What do you want? Show yourself.”
Nate edged up behind me. “What is it?”
“I don’t know,” I started to say, but before I could finish, a bright light flared from the sparkle and then Marsh Sheffield appeared in the room, a solemn look on his face.
Unable to believe what I was seeing, I stumbled back.
“Lily? What is it? Is he dangerous?” Nate caught my shoulder, steadying me.
I shook my head, feeling an ache in my heart I hadn’t felt in seventy-five years.
“Marsh…it can’t be you. Can it?”
“Who’s Marsh?” Nate asked.
As I stared at the figure in the room, all I could say was, “Marsh is the only man I ever loved. And he died because of me.”
Chapter 11
“Loved? But you told me…” Nate’s voice drifted off. He was looking decidedly confused.
Whisky mewed, startling me out of my paralysis. I glanced back at Marsh. It couldn’t be. He was dead. And if it was his ghost, why had he only returned now, so long after I lost him?
“Marsh, what are you doing here?”
Marsh gave me a long look, one that wrenched both my heart and my gut. He looked exactly the way he had on the last morning we spent together, tall with his black hair tousled in curls that hung down to his shoulders. His eyes—the most brilliant green I’d ever seen—still held all the pain and heartache that they had when we’d been together. It was then that I noticed he was wearing the suit he had been buried in.
He leaned against the wall and nodded toward Nate. “So, is he your new lover?”
Startled by the words—and by the fact that Nate seemed to hear them, too—I wanted to shout at him to go away, but I couldn’t muster up the heart to do so.
Instead, I stammered out a lame, “Marsh…is it really you?”
“Oh, it’s me. Where am I?” He looked around. “I don’t remember this place.”
I cleared my throat. “Do you…you do realize you’re…” How did you ask someone if they knew they were dead? The only way I could think of was to be direct. “Marsh, you know you’re dead, right?”
He blinked, then let out a rough laugh. “Oh, I know I’m dead. The last thing I remember is you killing me.”
Boom. And the brick wall hit me full force.
I slowly edged over to the sofa, where I dropped to the seat and crossed my arms over my chest. If this was a dream, I really wanted it to end. Now.
“Please, stop. I didn’t mean to. I didn’t mean to hurt you. I warned you…”
Nate slipped between Marsh and me. “You upset her. I advise you stop or I’ll…”
“You’ll what? Hire a ghost hunter?” But then, Marsh deflated, shaking his head. “I’m sorry. I…I have no clue what the hell to do. Lily, tell me what’s going on.”
“I wish I knew.” I slowly edged off the sofa again and quietly stepped around Nate. “Marsh, I’ve missed you so much. You don’t know how hard it was for me to move on.”
Nate cleared his throat. “How about introductions?” he asked softly.
“Right…Marsh Sheffield, I want you to meet Nate…Percival Nathanial Winston. Nate’s one of my best friends. Nate, this is Marsh. Marsh was my fiancé until one night when the hunger grew so strong that…that…” I paused, unable to continue.
Nate grabbed me by the arm. “In the kitchen, Lily. Now.” To Marsh, he added, “Excuse us. Wait here. Please.”
We entered the kitchen and Nate turned me around, holding me by the shoulders. “Lily, what’s going on? Who is he? You were engaged? I take it that he’s a…a ghost, but where did he come from and why?”
“I don’t know. I really don’t.” I was feeling more confused every second. It didn’t help that my heart was breaking for a second time. I had managed to stop dreaming about him, but Marsh’s memory had punished me for decades after his death, haunting my dreams and my waking hours.
“Marsh died seventy-five years ago. I warned him that he shouldn’t get involved with me. I warned him I was dangerous but he wouldn’t listen. And eventually, I couldn’t help myself. I fell in love. I knew it was stupid, but I loved him.”
Nate moved me over to a chair and sat me down. I accepted the glass of water he pressed into my hands. “How did he die?”
“We were on vacation in an alpine cabin when a freak snowstorm hit. The first couple days were fine. We had food; we had checked in at a ranger station so somebody would come looking for us when we didn’t report our return. But the snow kept falling. I needed to feed. I had explained to Marsh, tried to make him lock himself in the bathroom away from me. But…”
Marsh suddenly appeared in the kitchen next to us. “You explained to me, yes. But how was I to realize just how strong your hunger was? I knew you were a succubus but I n
ever really understood what that meant.”
I hung my head, wanting to strike him. But he was a spirit. My hand would go straight through. “I warned you.”
“Yeah. But…” Marsh let out a soft sigh.
Nate looked like he wanted to be anywhere but standing between the two of us. “You still blame Lily? You were human?”
“As human as you are, my man.”
I bit my tongue, forcing myself to keep quiet. I couldn’t let myself get embroiled in a fight with a ghost. Especially this ghost. Ever since losing Marsh, I had done my best to keep on an even keel. Fear and irritation, I could deal with. Anger was problematic, given my ability to charm and to feed. But love and regret? They might as well be dynamite in my hands.
I let out a long sigh. “The past is long gone. So tell me, what are you doing here, Marsh? Why return now? Are you out for an apology? Revenge?”
A puzzled look crossed his face, with a touch of hurt thrown in. “Lily, I would never hurt you. Even…I just wouldn’t. No, all I know is that I’m here to watch over you. Your guardian summoned me.”
That, I was not expecting. “What are you talking about? What guardian?”
Marsh shrugged. “I have no idea. I just have this gut knowledge that someone concerned about you summoned me to do what I could.”
My heartache subsiding in the wake of my bewilderment, I asked, “Where were you before now? After…I mean…” The words just felt way too odd in my head, let alone try to verbalize them.
“I don’t know. I have no clue how long I’ve been dead. I don’t remember much after I died—in fact, it’s a blur, almost like gray space. It’s funny though. Now I realize how much I took for granted.”
That I could empathize with. “Most people take a good share of their lives for granted. The universe is vast…but most people seem to focus on one narrow sliver.”
I stared at the table, wanting to think. Truth was, I worshipped no gods and was indebted to no one. So who was this guardian? Then there was the question of Marsh himself—very few people knew about him. Even fewer knew the full story. Dani did, but she would have consulted me before summoning him. Other than Dani, most of the people who had known about Marsh were long gone from my life.
“How can you not know who summoned you?” I looked up as he stood there silent, waiting.
“It wasn’t like being called into the principal’s office and told I had crossing guard duty. No, I don’t remember anything before I showed up here. I just know…like I know my own name, that I’ve been sent here to protect you.” He sat opposite to me, and I found it disconcerting to see the wood of the chair through his body. He looked so corporeal, and yet he had a vaguely translucent sheen to him.
Again, guilt and regret stabbed at me. “I warned you that it’s deadly to love a succubus. I told you to get out of my life—”
“How could I, when I loved you so much?” His shoulders slumped. “Leave it. We’ll never fully resolve this. What year is it? I don’t even have a clue how much time has passed.”
“Try seventy-five years. You died seventy-five years ago. I’ve done my best to forget you. Now that’s shot to hell.” Feeling raw and broken, I marched to the cupboard and poured myself a good-sized slug of rum. Whisky waited till I sat down again, then jumped on my lap, purring loudly as he rubbed his head against my chin.
“Aw Whisky, what the hell am I going to do?” I scratched behind his ears, the soft tufts of fur tickling my fingers.
Whisky remained silent, his eyes fastened on mine. As he held my gaze he gave one soft mew and then began kneading my chest gently, claws retracted. I buried my face in his fur, hugging him as I fought tears. Everything was unraveling.
After a moment, I sat back with a sigh. “Marsh, do you mind waiting in the other room for awhile? I just…need a minute.”
“Sure.” Still looking confused, he vanished before I could say another word.
Nate peeked in the living room and then gave me a nod. “He’s there. You never told me about him, Lily.” He settled in the chair Marsh had been sitting in. “I didn’t know you’d been…”
“In love? And with a human? Yeah, my biggest mistake.” I slowly raised my gaze to meet his. “I thought everything would be safe. I avoided him but Marsh kept pursuing. I worked out of an apartment in California, playing the high-class call girl for the Fae and Weres, who were still in the closet. I told Marsh what I was. He was the only human who knew. And I warned him about the curse. ‘Any human who falls for a succubus will end up dead,’ I told him. But he refused to listen. And I liked him, so much…and the more we hung out…”
“You fell in love.”
“Right. Love.” I spat out the word. The one thing I wanted and couldn’t have. “It was like diving into the deep end of the ocean—I just kept sinking. Finally, I gave in. It was lovely at first. But the longer we were together, the harder it got. He hated that I was sleeping with other men, but he tried to shoulder through it. I couldn’t deny my nature any more than I could stop breathing. Finally, we went away to the mountains for a winter skiing trip to try to work things out. We were supposed to be gone a weekend. We rented a cabin and took plenty of supplies, but a blizzard roared in and kept us housebound for over a week. We would have been fine except…”
“Except you got hungry.”
“As the days passed, I warned Marsh to lock himself in the bathroom at night. He knew what was happening. But he was stubborn. He was convinced that if I fed off him—lightly—that we would be fine. But I knew better. The day before the snow stopped, my hunger grew too strong. I lost control. He refused to believe I would hurt him.”
“And you drained him.” A look of understanding crept into Nate’s eyes. “What happened?”
I shook my head. “I couldn’t get out; the snow was too deep. I sat with his body until the forest rangers reached the cabin. Marsh…it looked like he’d just had a heart attack. That’s what the medical examiner put down as his death. Everybody tried to console me, to tell me how brave I was. I couldn’t stand their pity, knowing I had killed the man I loved. As soon as I could, I left town. That was the first—and last—time that I ever let myself get involved with a human.”
“Now I understand.” Nate leaned back, resting his hands behind his head. “Now I get why you’re so careful.”
“I can’t let myself love, because I’ll destroy everything that is good and beautiful about the person. My nature precludes monogamy.”
The truth was, if offered the chance, I’d give up my nature in order to allow myself to be loved. No matter what species I was, I would still be Lily O’Connell. Even if I were to suddenly lose the need to feed, I would still be myself. But there was no power on earth that could strip me of the drive. So I adapted. I learned to live with the reality that I was born for passion, but not for love. Unfortunately, convincing my heart wasn’t so easy.
Nate reached out again, but only to lay a light hand on my shoulder for the briefest second. “Are you okay, Lily?”
“I’m lonely, Nate. But I guess that’s just my fate in life.”
Nate straightened, staring behind me. I turned to see Marsh, watching us.
“How long have you been there?”
“Long enough. Lily, I don’t want to hurt you. I should have listened to you. I don’t think I realized until now what your life has been like all these years.”
I ducked my head, not wanting to see the pity in his eyes. “Yeah, well…water under the bridge. It is what it is. I’m a succubus and I’ve learned how to keep my heart locked up.” After a pause, I asked, “So, how long are you here for?”
“I don’t know. I can’t leave. Whoever summoned me bound me here for now. Don’t ask me how I know. I just do. But I’ll try not to get in the way.” His lips swept into a tentative smile. “Friends? For now?”
The last thing I wanted was to face my past on a daily basis. But here it was, staring me in the face. “Yeah, friends. But I still want to find out who brought yo
u here. And what you’re supposed to be doing.”
“All I know is that I’m supposed to follow you around and warn you if anything happens. I’m not sure exactly what’s going on but apparently you’re in danger.”
“You can say that again,” I mumbled.
Nate snapped his fingers. “Could Wynter have summoned Marsh? You are part of her court.”
“Wynter? No, I don’t think so, but I can find out. I’m heading out there tomorrow morning, after I talk to Shayla.” Yawning, I glanced at the clock. “I need to sleep, and you do too, Nate. Did you want to stay here tonight? I know Dani said your wards are okay but…”
“But two are safer than one? And you’ve fed well, so you’re not hungry. Yeah, I might take you up on that.” He stretched. “Mind if I take one of the guest rooms? Your sofa’s nice but it’s not that comfortable.”
“That’s fine.” I turned to Marsh. “If you’re supposed to guard me then I guess we might as well make use of you.”
At that moment, I realized that Marsh didn’t even know vampires existed. He had no clue about what the world was like now.
“Listen, I don’t have time to fill you in on everything that’s gone down since you died, but I want you to keep an eye out through the house. If you see anything…a black mist, a figure or a walking shadow…anything that seems out of the ordinary, then wake me immediately.”
He nodded. “I’m rather looking forward to finding out how the world of today is compared to when we were together. I can’t believe it’s been so long. Seventy-five years? Really?”
“Marsh, the world has changed in ways you would never have dreamed. I’ll tell you all about it tomorrow. Until then, keep an eye out.”
After a quick Q&A, I learned that Marsh couldn’t manipulate physical objects. I turned on the TV so that he could watch the all-night news station. That would give him some clue as to how much the world had shifted.
And with that, Nate and I headed upstairs. We searched the bedrooms, then without another word past goodnight, shut ourselves up for much-needed sleep. Luckily, the night passed without incident, and by morning I felt a little bit of hope in my heart that maybe, just maybe, I could turn things around.
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