Dark Side of the Moon (The Lost Royals Saga Book 2)

by Rachel Jonas

Liam

  There was no easy way to go about this. The heightened uncertainty left me anxious.

  These were delicate circumstances. Evangeline’s heart was on the line. With her truth just a few floors above, I wasn’t sure she was ready to receive it. However, I made her a promise, said I’d always tell her the truth no matter what. That’s what she wanted and I would honor my word.

  However, I was starting to wish there was another way.

  I wandered inside her thoughts. Although I couldn’t see through her eyes like she could mine, it was still convenient having ties to her once again. Earlier, when trying to explain how this came to be, I knew the moment the reality of our bond strengthening startled her. But it was true. She wouldn’t always be able to deny what she felt. It was powerful, overwhelming at times.

  I knew because I felt it, too.

  “Can you meet me?” I asked when I felt us connect.

  “Sure. Everything okay?”

  I hoped this wasn’t a lie. “Yeah. Everything’s fine.”

  “Where?”

  This wasn’t a conversation we could have out in the open. “My room. As soon as you can.”

  “Be there in a few.”

  The tie severed and I continued to pace, trying to get the words together. In the two minutes it took for her to knock, I still hadn’t come up with anything.

  Time was up.

  Seven o’clock—that’s when Elise would be expecting me to bring Evangeline and it was already well past six-thirty. I waited until the last possible minute to break the news to her, but only because I knew there was a chance she’d take it hard.

  And the last thing I ever wanted to do was hurt her. Even if doing so was out of my control.

  She smiled despite her rough day. The details of it were still a mystery, but from what I gathered, she had a run in with someone and both faced consequences. As badly as I wanted to, I didn’t get involved.

  She was beautiful tonight, just like all the others. Her damp hair hung past her shoulders in tight spirals. Before now, I’d only ever seen her wear it straight and … the sight of her like this overwhelmed me. It was like we’d gone back in time and I was staring at the old Evangeline.

  The one who belonged to me.

  “Come in,” I exhaled, stepping aside. She walked past wearing a loose-fitting t-shirt and black shorts that stopped midthigh. I locked us in and smothered the fire she triggered inside me. A fire no one else could ever put out. A fire that had nothing to do with my dragon and everything to do with being a man in the presence of a beautiful woman. One I just so happened to be in love with.

  She looked around the room, not realizing I was undressing her with my eyes.

  “Wow. It’s so much more spacious than mine,” she said with a smile. “And you’ve got a sitting area.”

  I glanced that way, toward the makeshift living room, and wrangled in my thoughts.

  “You’re welcome to have a seat.” I gestured toward the couch and when her dark eyes caught mine, I began to dread this even more.

  “Thanks,” she said quietly.

  I waited until she was settled before dropping down into the chair across from her. To stall, I inquired about the altercation first.

  “So, you’re picking fights now?” I asked with a smile.

  She grinned and I hoped it meant she was in a better mood than earlier.

  “No, but, according to my instructor, we dragons are totally capable of living up to our reputation. You know, the whole ‘loose cannon’ thing.”

  I nodded when a laugh slipped out. “Indeed. Learning to control it is essential, but it isn’t always easy,” I explained. “You didn’t shift, did you?”

  With a sigh, she shook her head. “No, it didn’t get that far. I was just tired of her knocking me around like some ragdoll.”

  “What’d you do? Push her?”

  When Evangeline bit the side of her lip, I knew I guessed wrong. “Not exactly. I um, kinda elbowed her in the nose.”

  My lips pressed into a thin line as I fought the urge to laugh again. “You … wow. Just zero to sixty, huh?”

  Her light-brown cheeks tinted red when she shrugged. “It felt like the right thing to do at the time.”

  And I was sure it did. “We’ll work on it,” I promised. “What else did you learn today?”

  She found the question funny. “What am I, a kindergartner?”

  I suppose I was a bit overprotective. Until I knew she could hold her own, I probably wouldn’t change. Maybe not even then—side effect of losing her once already.

  “Sorry. Just thought I’d ask.”

  It looked like she felt bad when I apologized.

  “No, I don’t mind. I just … it’s sweet that you care,” she said, quietly blinking before she looked away. “I ended up sitting out the rest of the session as part of my punishment.”

  “Part of your punishment?”

  She nodded. “Apparently, I’m not allowed to go topside for a week.”

  I heard the term used a few times today among other instructors and monitors.

  Across from me, Evangeline was quiet. Too quiet for her to only be upset about not getting to participate in this facility’s idea of glorified recess.

  “Something wrong?”

  She glanced up and sighed when I pulled her from her thoughts. “I just … I found out some disturbing news today. Although, it really shouldn’t have surprised me. Things have been sucking a lot lately. Seems to be the default setting of my life—sucky.”

  I leaned forward, elbows on knees as I focused, intending to listen to whatever she’d share next. Her mouth moved to speak, but no words came. While I should’ve been wondering what it was she hesitated to say, instead, I stared at her lips. My mind wandered back to a time she didn’t remember and, therefore, felt like I dreamt it.

  Beautiful didn’t even begin to describe her. Then. Now. From head to toe, top to bottom, inside and out … exquisite. I knew this to be a fact because I spent a great deal of my existence mesmerized by her.

  Even when she was gone.

  The measure of my restraint was an illusion. I was as weak as any man in the presence of the only woman he’s ever loved. From dawn ‘til dusk, the only thing I’ve ever wanted more than my next breath was her. Only I knew what a thin line I walked—holding back from touching her whenever she passed—her hand, hair, face. Keeping my distance was nothing short of a miracle. There was once a time she welcomed the idea of the closeness between us. Now, she seemed hellbent on resisting it.

  The thoughts evaporated when her voice broke the silence.

  “Ran into someone I knew today,” she began, immediately piquing my interest. “I used to see a counsellor in Chicago. My parents made me go after finding out I was adopted. But, apparently, she was one in a long list of watchers someone placed in my path to make sure I didn’t, inadvertently, spill any information to the outside world.”

  She stopped and it wasn’t lost on me that she looked more distant than usual. Her body was here, but her mind was someplace else.

  Maybe several places.

  I was aware that watchers existed, but their missions were never clear. They were most often lycans, but sometimes dragons who’d been put in a specific place to keep tabs on a specific individual.

  There was no doubt in my mind that the person who’d appointed these watchers was none other than Elise. And the timing of it all couldn’t have been worse. I was hoping to soften Evangeline up to the idea of meeting her mother, hearing her out, but I was almost positive my job had just gotten a whole lot harder.

  “Sometimes, it’s like I matter and don’t matter all at the same time,” she uttered in a daze. “Someone’s gone through a lot of trouble to monitor my life, but thought little enough of me to leave me out in the cold.” Her eyes glazed over as she stared at nothing in particular.

  How was I supposed to go about telling her that this mysterious someone she spoke of was now here in the flesh and hoping to meet h
er, explain some things to her?

  “Evangeline, listen,” I began. At the sound of my voice, a glassy, brown stare came my way. Her expression was solemn, but sweet as she waited for me to go on.

  “I, um…”

  I couldn’t do it. The words simply would not leave my mouth. I couldn’t add to the heap of pain and confusion she’d already experienced today.

  “What is it?” she asked. There was a vulnerability in her voice that made me hyper-vigilant to protect her. Even more so than usual. However, as she watched me with innocent eyes, I recalled the promise she asked of me. One that came at the height of her being tired of the lies others had told; tired of being kept in the dark. What she requested was that I never become one of those people.

  Now, what felt impossible to say a moment ago, felt impossible to keep in.

  She tipped her chin up when I stood, turning her head as I rounded the coffee table between my seat and the couch where she rested. I sat on the cushion beside her and she drew in a sharp breath like the close proximity made her uncomfortable. But I wouldn’t move. With what I had to share, I needed her to know and feel she wasn’t alone.

  I reached for her hand and she didn’t pull away despite the war I was well aware my touch always seemed to spur within her; the conflict that made her eyes wander away from mine every time. It was all a sign that some part of her felt for me. Whether she would ever admit that, I wasn’t sure.

  With incredible uncertainty, I divulged the information I held. Not because it was the easy thing to do or even because I thought now was the best time. I did it because I gave her my word and had never broken a single promise made between us.

  “I don’t know how to say this.” After the first sentence left my mouth, Evangeline’s gaze was on me again and I noted how she breathed differently—erratic, like she was anticipating the many places a statement like that could go.

  “I recognized someone yesterday. One of the staff members.”

  Evangeline’s lips pressed together like she was stopping herself from interjecting.

  “What is it?” I had to ask. Did the look mean she already knew? Maybe her mother’s face was familiar somehow?

  A deep breath and a nod came before the answer to my question. “I saw you watching her,” she explained, her voice sounding quieter than usual, like she wasn’t sure it was okay to admit that she noticed. “It was kinda obvious you two had history.”

  History was one way of looking at it, so I confirmed. “We did. A very long time ago.”

  Evangeline nodded again and there was a look I couldn’t place.

  “I went up to her office this morning,” I explained. “She was already expecting me. We got to catch up a little bit, but she wants to meet for dinner, but first, I just—”

  “Stop,” she interjected, shaking her head just before forcing a tight smile. “I really, really appreciate you caring enough to tell me this yourself, but you don’t … you don’t owe me any kind of explanation,” she stammered. “Who you decide to have dinner with or … whatever … it’s your business. Really, it is.” She was trying to be so delicate with her words, but had clearly misunderstood.

  My brow tensed with confusion and I smiled a bit. “Um … what?”

  Her shoulders rose and fell when she let out a breath. “I’m saying it’s cool if you, you know, wanna start seeing her.” I was too dumbstruck to reply. “I mean, I know you and I had something before, and I know we both … feel things sometimes still, but … that doesn’t mean you can’t live your life.”

  There were so many flaws in that statement, in her way of thinking, I didn’t even know where to begin. If she truly knew the extent of our bond, if she really understood how deep our connection ran, the commitment between us …

  The grip I had on her hand tightened and I felt the gentle pulse of her racing heart where our fingers were locked.

  “Evangeline … tens of thousands of moons have risen since I lost you,” I shared. “And, with each one of them, my last thought before closing my eyes to sleep … has always been you. No one else.”

  She stared for several seconds, the brown centers of her eyes warming more and more until finally blinking.

  “I thought … weren’t you trying to say—”

  “There’s only ever been you,” I reiterated, cutting her off.

  Her eyes narrowed and it looked like a laugh was on the verge of slipping out.

  “You expect me to believe you’ve been alone for hundreds of years, pining over me like in some fairytale?” A smile ghosted on her lips and my heart thundered inside my chest at the sight of it.

  I held her gaze and shed some light on my truth.

  “When you’ve experienced love as pure and raw as I have … you know better than to try recreating it. If it’s ever lost, if that love is ever stolen from you, the only choice you really have is to pray the loss doesn’t eat you alive.”

  It felt like my chest might explode when her lips parted and, for that split second, her defenses were down. So, while she was open and vulnerable, I allowed myself to be, too.

  “I’m aware that I might be waiting for you in vain,” I admitted, “but … that choice to wait, that decision to not bother searching for a replacement, it’s something no one can take away from me. Not even you.”

  Her teeth sank into her bottom lip as my confession lingered between us.

  “I…”

  Words escaped her and I hoped she knew I hadn’t said these things to make her swoon or to cloud her head. I said them because that was my reality. She was my life.

  I still had her hand and hadn’t forgotten what I needed to tell her.

  “I do have history with the woman, but not the kind you were thinking.” Her brow lifted when I stopped there, and it felt cruel not to just come out with it, but equally cruel to just drop the truth into her lap and expect her to cope. “The dinner invite wasn’t just for me, Evangeline.”

  Now her expression reflected the confusion I fully expected.

  “It was for both of us,” I went on. “That woman, Elise, she’s … your mother.”

  *****

  Evie

  The room swirled around me.

  Those words.

  They didn’t make sense. I didn’t have a mother; not one with the same blood as mine coursing through her veins.

  Mine was … she was dead.

  My hand felt hot against my forehead when I pressed it there, squeezing my eyes shut. I recalled the woman’s features. How I’d missed the resemblance was beyond me. She didn’t look anywhere near old enough to have a daughter my age, but that wasn’t a surprise. I just couldn’t wrap my mind around this.

  “Evangeline,” Liam said sweetly. “Say something.”

  What was I supposed to say? “I don’t understand. I thought—”

  “So did I,” he cut in. “And she thought the same about me, following the war. I don’t have all the answers yet, but I thought dinner might be a good time for both of us to ask our questions.”

  I stammered a bit and then got the words out. “Did she know who I was when she saw me, or not until you told her?” I asked.

  Liam’s expression dimmed a bit and the glimmer of hope behind his eyes faded completely. “I think you might have misunderstood.”

  My eyes narrowed. “Misunderstood what?”

  I was more aware of my hand in his because he squeezed it gently. And this time, when he spoke again, I felt a shift from budding excitement and nervousness to anger.

  “She’s the one who brought you here. The one who brought you back.”

  “She … what?”

  This wasn’t adding up. All this time, I imagined the culprit to be someone who cared very little for me. Someone who saw me as a means to an end, the answer to the Sovereign having absolute reign. But, then again, who’s to say these things weren’t still true. Maybe this woman, Elise, was all these things and more. Who’s to say this wasn’t exactly her agenda?

  My face felt te
nse and my eyes burned. If she was the one who brought me here, that meant she was also the manipulator who put the watchers in my life, the one who moved me from Chicago to Seaton Falls, the one who, despite knowing exactly where I was at all times … let me believe I didn’t belong anywhere.

  A sudden burst of heat in my gut made me think I’d go up in flames. The last few years of my life had been filled with so much hurt and rejection. All because I was the girl who came from nowhere. Only, that wasn’t entirely true. I did come from somewhere, from someone, but that someone decided to play puppet master from behind the curtain.

  I loved my adoptive mom and dad with everything in me, but I couldn’t lie and say a huge part of me didn’t long to know my real parents when I found out they existed. And this woman, whoever she was, stole that from me. She created this void in my life and then stood back while it grew and grew until it hollowed me out. And to top it all off, her summoning us all here to this facility was, inadvertently, the reason Baz ordered the witches to make my parents forget me.

  So much of what had been taken from me, was taken from me by her hand.

  I shook my head before speaking.

  “I won’t meet her.” Getting to my feet, I explained why. “She doesn’t get to siphon all the important things out of my life, one at a time, and then expect me to suddenly be on her schedule. That’s nice that she wants to talk to me, nice that she wants to tell me everything … now. But where was all that when it counted?”

  Where was the explanation and the lifting of the veil when I thought I was going crazy? When I started dreaming about a guy I’d never met, but felt completely drawn to? Where was that when I had to leave all my friends behind and start over?

  I was a pawn to her.

  The thought of being moved around on someone’s chess board had always been in the back of my mind, despite not knowing the full scale of her plan. Only now, I had a face to put with the hurt.

  I swiped at tears with my arm as Liam stood too, holding me in place so I couldn’t escape.

  “You know I’m always on your side, right?”

  The question was frustratingly simple, and I sighed instead of answering.

  “So, you also know I’ll support whatever decision you make, but … all the answers you’ve been waiting for? The ones even I can’t give?” he added. “She’s got them, Evangeline. All of them.”