“One of your powers was the ability to make vampires human again.”
“Like Queen Lilith?”
“Yes.” He held back an odd kind of smile.
“And I made you human again?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
He cleared his throat. “You always preferred a more human version of me.”
That didn’t sound like me at all. “How long have you been human?”
“A little under two years.”
So he became a human at about the same time I died. “So we were together for a really long time?”
“Over twenty years.”
“Wow.” Twenty years with a control freak. I must have been blind or bat-shit crazy. “This is messing with my head.”
My head forgot about that for a second as David laughed. He sounded so young and carefree when he laughed. It felt like forever since I’d heard that sound, and then I realized it kind of had been. “Why did you run away?”
“I thought I’d lost you,” he said.
“Lost me? You told me to leave—”
“Yes, but before I did that… See, when we met the first time, I was a vampire.” He flashed me a toothy grin, his brows going up suggestively. “And everyone thought that if I hadn’t been a vampire, you would never have fallen for me.”
“Why? You said I preferred you as a human, so—”
“Yes, but the thing about vampires is, we are very appealing. Some say that you only fell in love with me because I lured you.”
“Lured me?”
“You know how, when we hunt, we draw our victims to us by giving off a chemical?”
I nodded.
“It’s instinctual,” he added, “and I did it to you without realizing—”
“Did you try to kill me?”
“No.” He laughed. “But after that, you did seem to fall more easily in love with me, so it was a bit of a coin-toss if you would ever love me without having been lured into it.”
I scrunched my nose up. “You know, Lilithians can’t get lured, right? We—”
“You were human then.”
“I was?!”
He nodded. “I was the one that first gave you vampire blood and caused the change to occur in you.”
“Wow.” I looked at the veins in my arms. My immortality was a result of his love for me. “I was wondering about that.”
David laughed. It made me feel a bit closer to him knowing he was technically my creator. I owed him a lot. And we had a family and this entire long past together. “So… you ran away because I didn’t fall in love with you?”
“If I’m honest, I planned to leave long before that night.”
“Why? I mean, you didn’t really give me a fair chance to get to know you.”
“I would have. I could have waited ten years for you to know me, but I couldn’t watch you getting closer to other guys.”
It clicked then—all the times I was cuddling Cal or holding his hand—the reactions David had to that. I covered my mouth. He was my husband. Nothing had changed that except for the fact that I died and didn’t remember anymore. So for him, it must have been torture to watch me moving on with my life like he never mattered. “I feel like I cheated on you. How could you have withstood that—watching me with Cal?”
“It wasn’t easy.”
“I feel so bad—”
“Don’t,” he said, pausing then to take me in before he braved a quick shuffle closer. He wrapped his arm around my waist and pulled me close, tucking my head under his chin. “If anyone should feel bad, it’s me.”
“Why?”
He didn’t say anything, so I looked up at him and caught the dying flash of a very evil grin. “Never mind.”
We sat in silence for a while then, and I went through every moment of our past—the one I remembered—wishing I could go back and let myself fall in love with him. It would make this so much easier, and then I wouldn’t have to say what needed to be said.
“I can see that you obviously loved your wife—loved me, I guess,” I added awkwardly, “but I don’t know what I can offer you, David. I don’t feel any connection to her at all, and—”
“It’s okay.” He kissed my head. “We don’t need to rush anything. I had a lot of time to think the last few months, and you’re right. I need to step back and let you become you before you can become a part of me again.”
“And what if I never want to be a part of you again?”
“Then I’ll just have to deal with that,” he said. “But Harry—”
“It goes without saying.” I pulled back from his arms. “I already adore that kid! There’s no way I’m not going to be a part of his life.”
His eyes closed with relief, and a smile made the indent in his cheek deeper. I pressed my finger to it and smiled. “You have cute dimples.”
David cupped my finger and opened his eyes. “You always loved my dimples.”
“I still do.” I studied him with new eyes. “Were we happy? Before I died?”
“Very.”
“Was I a good mother?”
“The best.” A glassy sheen coated his eyes, an entire lifetime of hurt pooling behind them. “What happened to you, to us, was unfair, but you’re here, and I’m here with you after I thought for the longest time that you would never come back to life—”
“And that’s why you were so eager to be friends—”
“And to hold you.” He laughed, wiping his eye. “The free hugs scheme? That was purely so I could hold you without seeming weird.”
“Really?” I jerked forward in disbelief. “I… really?”
He nodded, smiling. “I missed you so deeply that it hurt to close my eyes at night, and they brought you back here without telling me—just threw us into a school parking lot and let the chips fall where they may.”
“And that’s why you were so weird that day?” I felt terrible for him then. “How did you not just ruin it all and grab me right then and hug me?”
“Believe me, I almost did.”
“But you think I would’ve run away if you told me who you were?”
“I’m sure you would.”
I nodded to agree with him. I didn’t know him then. And I might not know him that well now, but I at least cared about him—cared enough not to turn my back on him or leave him hurting. But back then, I owed him nothing, knew nothing about him. It wouldn’t have even been a second thought if I’d hurt him. I would have left and just viewed this as closing the book on my old life to open a more exciting one. Unless he also told me I had a son in the same sentence.
“Can I come see Harry tomorrow?”
David’s face split into a gorgeous grin. “You can see him any time you want.”
I smiled too, holding it in place as I watched David’s grow.
“You know,” he said, “I remember sitting in your room with you—just like this—when you were a teenager the first time around, trying to convince you to love me after I told you I was a vampire.”
I tried to imagine that. “Why didn’t I love you once I knew you were a vampire?”
“Because I told you that my kind are killers and that we enjoy it.”
“And I wasn’t okay with that?”
“No.” He shook his head, looping his arms loosely around his knees. “Are you now?”
“Is it bad that I am?”
His face went from passively flat to brightly grinning in a nanosecond. “Falcon said you weren’t as compassionate as you used to be.”
My eyes fell to the floor.
“Ara, that’s a good thing, in a lot of ways.” He reached over and tilted my chin upward. “Sweetheart, you were once so full of compassion for all living things that it was almost detrimental to your relationships in this immortal world.”
“To our relationship?”
“Yes, but also to yourself, because you fought so hard against what was natural to those you surrounded yourself with.”
It didn’t sound l
ike this old me was a very happy person. “Why did you stay with her—with me, I mean? It sounds like I was miserable and moody and—”
David laughed, tipping back a bit. “It sounds that way, but you weren’t.”
“What did you like about me? Why did you love me?”
He shrugged. I wasn’t sure I’d ever seen him do that. “I loved you for reasons I can’t really compare here.”
“What do you mean?”
“If I’m honest, what I loved about you before is… gone. Most of it—how we grew together and how you rose above life’s challenges—changed because of them. Everything you became is what I loved mostly in the end, and now…”
“Now you’re not so sure?”
“No. I will always and forever love you, but I need to get to know this new person.” He lightly brushed the back of his knuckles against my arm, winking at me. “It’s like dating a teenager again, no offense, and that takes some getting used to after being with an adult for twenty years.”
“So you’ve been holding on to this idea of me all this time—just waiting for her to come back to life?”
“Yes, and I think, in a lot of ways, that’s why I had to leave. I had to come to terms with the fact that…”—his voice broke to a whisper—“the girl I loved is dead. She’s never coming back.”
“I’m sorry.” I held his gaze for a moment, but in the end, I had to look away from the hurt there. His wife was dead. I felt no connection to her at all, and even though I was starting to remember that life—certain it would eventually come back—it wasn’t yet. He’d hurt this version of me. He’d ruined what might have been between us. And unless my heart remembered what it once felt, there was little hope for our future.
I wanted to end this conversation here and just quit this old life—move on from it and all the pain that it involved. But I had a son. I had Harry, and Elora. And I owed it to them to at least try to restore the family they lost when their mother died. I would never be able to promise David my heart, and I had to hope that after a few months getting to know each other, he would come to terms with the fact that his wife is dead, and move on. We would stay friends, but I didn’t like the side of him I saw that night before he left, nor could I trust him now that he’d so easily broken a promise. In my world, promises are forever. They matter.
“I will try to get to know you better, try to rebuild our friendship for Harry and Elora’s sakes, but whatever feelings I had for you once have been obliterated, David. I can’t make any promises that I’ll ever feel the same way again.”
He didn’t look up. He kept hold of his legs, one hand cupping his wrist, and nodded like he already understood that.
24
David
That hurt. Deeply.
In my mind, as I heard my beloved wife say she would never love me, I flashed back to her face on our wedding day, seeing her mouth shape the word ‘forever’, skipping forward then to days by our lake and to so many moments where our love was tested. All of it—every moment that led us here—shot through my heart and my veins like a toxin, hurting me deeper as those words in that single moment became my greatest test of all.
In her mind this girl was someone else, but all I saw when I looked at her was the woman I spent twenty years with. I breathed in deep to stifle the pain inside me, holding back the urge to cry—to sob right here on the floor in front of her. It was stupid to have ever expected anything to develop from nothing but a past we shared before she even knew me. I waited so long to hold my wife again, to tell her I was sorry for everything she suffered that day—everything I had no power to save her from—and now she was here, I was left wondering if bringing her back was the right thing.
This girl was not my Ara. She had traces of her, but only half of the heart, and just a scratch of her personality. Maybe it was the fact that she only owned half a soul now—the other half residing in its original owner. Perhaps I was more in love with that part of her than I ever realized, but for the sake of what was, I wanted to give what could be a go. She wasn’t willing to commit to love, and I would love her eternally no matter how much she changed, but I had to accept now that this would be a long and very painful journey. Again.
“It’ll be worth the try.” I tried to smile but my lip trembled. “I promise you that.”
* * *
I came home like a battle-worn soldier, welcomed by the embrace of my closest friend.
“I take it things didn’t go so well,” Mike said.
Safe in this place of sanctuary where we’d housed our worries for the past year and a half, I cried. All the hurt that girl rained down on me poured out onto another man’s shoulder.
Hours passed, and we talked at length, sitting in the dark den as the sun came up, but it did nothing to ease my pain. I’d damaged what might have been with Ara, and I couldn’t take it back. There was just nothing more to be said now than, “Shit. I fucked up, didn’t I?”
“You gotta stop saying that,” Mike said, stretching out the ache of sitting still for so long. “We’re going round in circles here, mate—”
“You didn’t see the look in her eye,” I said. “The pity. The anger. The hurt.”
“I can relate, you know,” he said. “She can be so unintentionally cold when she’s telling you how it really is.”
“No shit.” I sighed, rubbing my face. “It was so hard not to cry in front of her. I fucking hate being human, man.”
“Why didn’t you just cry then?” Mike sat forward, bracing his elbows on his knees. “You know Ara—she probably would’ve fallen in love with you right then.”
“Nope.” I shook my head fluidly. “That girl is not my Ara. I didn’t believe Falcon when he said she had half the compassion she used to, but it’s true. She’s different, Mike—too different.”
“Is that because of the soul, do you think?”
I nodded, the muscles in my face loosening with deep thought.
“Do you think you’ll ever love her the same?”
“I’m cursed.” My voice broke. I touched my chest as if the source of my pain resided there. “I’ll love her even if she sleeps with my brother again.”
Mike sat back, face dropping when he realized.
“I’m human now,” I added, “and I never imagined just how…”
“Confining the curse could be?” He finished for me, flashing a curt grin. “Trust me, I know.”
“It’s hard, you know. I gotta wonder if I’d love her the same if I wasn’t cursed.”
Mike thought about it for a moment, pursing his lips. “I think you would. You always loved her—no matter what.”
I nodded.
“And the way I see it,” he added, “if you’re cursed to love her, and she can love you back… the better for it.” He sat back, laying his arm along the top of the sofa. “Suffering the cruelty of a life without her love when you’re under her curse is more than any man can bear—just ask Falcon.”
I nodded at first, remembering then that Falcon’s attraction to my wife had been kept between he and I since the day I first realized it. And I made a promise that it would stay that way, so I tried to play dumb. “He’s never indicated—”
“No, he wouldn’t.” Mike tapped the corner of his eye. “But it takes one to know one, if you know what I mean.”
After a moment of thoughtful silence, I dropped the facade and just went with it. If Mike had figured it out, who was I to deny it any longer? “How does he do it?”
“He is a man of great self-control.”
“He’d have to be—to be caring for her the way he is and not unintentionally use that position to seduce her.”
Mike shook his head. “He’s too good a man for that.”
I nodded. I knew that. I wouldn’t be, on the other hand. Loving her like this—more intensely than I had without the damn curse—I would go to any lengths to win her love in return. And if I were Falcon, I would have seduced her by now. “Fuck this curse, man.”
Mike laughed
, sitting forward again. “I have said that many times, my friend.”
“It’s clouding my vision.” I rubbed my eyes. “I can’t think straight.”
“Maybe that’s the lack of sleep. You are human now,” he reminded me.
“Yeah.” I laid back, closing my eyes for a second. “Maybe I should become a vampire again.”
“Why?”
“For one, she clearly prefers vampires to humans.”
“What makes you say that?”
“Just hold a conversation with her,” I said. “And two, maybe ditching the damn heartbeat again might break the curse.”
“No. Nope. It won’t.” He propped his hands behind his head, slouching back. “I speak from experience.”
“Yes, but you’re Lilithian—your heart still beats. Maybe without a heartbeat—”
“She’ll still be in your veins, David—in your blood. You will never be rid of the curse.”
I tried to think of an argument, but there wasn’t one. He was right. “Fuck.”
Mike laughed. “I second that sentiment.”
25
Ara
David didn’t return to school—to his human life. What was the point, I suppose? He was only ever here to be with me, and I’d made it pretty clear last night that I wasn’t interested that way. But I had a lot of questions for him—like how old he was in human years and what he did for a living when he wasn’t pretending to be a teenager—but they all had to wait until the end of a long and painful day of school. I finished my work quickly, as if by rushing it I could make the bell toll sooner, but it didn’t, and I ended up sitting and staring blankly at the wall, wishing I could see Harry and look at him as my son for the first time. I tried to remember his face, but it had been so long since I saw him now that I kept mixing it up with a kid on a TV show that I watched.
At lunch, I sat outside the conversations with my friends, a part of me feeling suddenly like a forty-year-old woman sitting in a group of teens. None of their trivial problems mattered to me anymore, and the final straw came when Cal walked past and said hello to everyone but me. Not only was I literally too old for this juvenile bullshit, I now felt too old for it.
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