Remembrance: (New Adult Paranormal Romance) (Heart Lines Series Book 1)

by Heather Hildenbrand

  Yellow eyes flew past where I hovered in the shadows between houses, their enlarged orbs flashing like streaks of lightning. Goose bumps rose on my skin, my body’s internal alarm system alerting me of the creature, and I hesitated only for a fraction of a second before drawing my wooden stake from my boot and sprinting after it.

  I didn’t relish the idea of leaving Sam alone with Mason Harding, but from the background check I’d ran on him after spotting him hanging around her house the other night, he seemed harmless enough. Comparatively. The danger was this asshole of a beast. Not just to Sam but to every single human in Half Moon Bay. My choice was easy.

  Adrenaline pumped through me as I ran soundlessly through the streets after the thing. My heart rate sped and my muscles screamed. I tried not to think about how quickly my strength seemed to wane lately. I had to catch him before I lost steam. I just had to.

  It launched over the fence and into the park and I followed, slowing just long enough to time my foot falls. I vaulted over the fence without stopping and then sprinted once again through the groves of trees that wound around the footpaths.

  Up ahead, fur bunched and stretched as the beast found its rhythm, eating up the open lawn in long strides. I felt my chest tighten and ache with the effort of the run and I knew: I wasn’t going to make it. For the first time in my professional career, I was going to lose my prey.

  Fuck that.

  Rather than waste my energy on trying to catch up, I decided to make him come to me.

  In the middle of the dark, grassy lawn of the city park, I planted my feet and yelled. “Hey! You want something to chew on, I’m right behind you, asshole!”

  The werewolf stopped and turned, yellow eyes glowing like street lamps in the darkness. It came for me slowly, confidently. I adjusted my stance and my grip on the stake, taking long gulps of air and trying to find a second wind.

  Judging by the size of it, I was going to need it. The thing was a monster. A mammoth with feral intentions that vibrated out of him just as strongly as the fact that he was a werewolf at all, sending goose bumps along my arms and neck all over again as it got close.

  More than anything, I wanted to pin the thing down and force it to tell me why Sam had become prey. Why it had decided to stalk her like a game of cat and mouse as she’d walked home earlier. But I knew that wouldn’t do any good. Even if this thing knew those answers, its humanity was so far gone, it wouldn’t be able to tell me.

  The moment its jowls pulled back to reveal canines, I tensed, ready.

  It sprang, mouth wide open and aimed for my throat. At least these things were predictable, especially once they were infected.

  I lurched left and arced wide with my stake, bringing it around in a circular swing that took every bit of strength I had. We both went down with me on the bottom and the wind whooshed out of my lungs as I took the brunt of the fall for both of us. I rolled sideways, sending us tumbling and used the momentum of it to bring my swing home.

  I felt the resistance of flesh against the tip of my stake and shoved harder, roaring with the intensity of my effort.

  I had this one shot. That was it.

  When the stake broke flesh, I wanted to sag in relief. But it wasn’t over yet. Using every bit of strength I had left, I shoved it deeper until I felt the stake slide into the squishy, meaty part of flesh and organs. Blood spilled onto my hands, sticky and warm, but I didn’t let go.

  The animal writhed, jaws and teeth snapping at me even as it howled and rolled in an attempt to get free of the pain coursing through it. A sharp nail raked down my arm, drawing a sharp sting. I grunted. But I didn’t let go. If I wanted to live through this, I knew I couldn’t let go until it was good and over.

  My muscles burned, my limbs and lungs screaming at me, and twice my hand slipped free of the now slippery stake in my hands. Finally, the thing stopped trying to eat my face and went still. Its yellow eyes stared, unseeing, at the moonless sky.

  With a grunt and a shove that left me exhausted, I pushed it off me and climbed to my feet. Blood coated my hands. The cuts down my arm throbbed and dripped with blood. It was shallow; that was good. Dirt and blood and grass stains covered my pants and shirt. Winded, I wiped my hands on my pants and dug out my phone.

  “Yeah, man,” RJ answered.

  “Cleanup,” I said between breaths. “Aisle three.”

  RJ chuckled. “Dude,” he said simply. “Location?”

  “The park. And bring a forklift. This thing isn’t light.”

  “Feral?” he asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “What color?”

  I glanced down. “Currently, bloody. Before that, light brown. Why?”

  “Damn. Not my target,” he muttered.

  “Why are there so many of these things in this town, anyway?”

  “When I figure it out, you’ll be the first to know.”

  I hung up with RJ, getting comfortable in the grass while I waited on backup. If RJ was working on getting to the bottom of these rabid werewolves, maybe we had something to talk about after all. Especially when it seemed like they were all drawn to Sam for some reason. Maybe there was a connection, although to believe that would mean accepting Mirabelle’s crazy theories.

  As a werewolf hunter, I’d seen a lot in the supernatural world, but Sam was human. And humans were exempt from supernatural drama. It was why werewolves and hunters existed in the first place. To keep the balance and to keep humans out of it. Besides, there hadn’t been anything magical about Sam before. And as different as she acted now, she was still obviously clueless about werewolves and even more scared of the unexplainable than she’d been two years ago. It was going to take more than Mirabelle’s mystical messages and intuition to convince me.

  But I’d made a deal. And it wasn’t like I’d had a better option. So, for now, I was stuck. If I wanted to survive, I’d have to start by fixing Sam. If I helped her, she’d help me—that’s what Mirabelle had promised, anyway. And I’d agreed. Not because I believed in the magical possibilities of who or what Mirabelle thought Sam might be. Not because I thought any of the legends she told me might be true. Because I was an asshole who just wanted to live. And there was a really shitty part of me deep down that just wanted a good reason to keep spending time with a beautiful girl in the process.

  The deal had been the perfect combination.

  So why did I care that by the time Samantha Knight was whole again, she’d probably hate me forever?

  Chapter Sixteen

  Sam

  My head throbbed dully, a reminder that I was alive—and still not immune to hangovers, apparently. I checked the time on my phone and groaned as I rolled over, shoving out of bed. I’d missed class, but I couldn’t bring myself to care as I stumbled to the shower. I had much bigger problems these days than college attendance, unfortunately.

  I showered and dressed in a hung-over haze, but for once, I wasn’t wishing it away. The fog prevented me from calling up the scarier images of last night’s almost-attack. Not to mention my imagination’s best work at what my attacker might have actually looked like up close.

  After drinking away all my attempts at making sense of what I thought I’d seen, the only real theory I’d come up with was Red Riding Hood’s fairy tale come to life. Maybe that douche-bag from class had rented a costume and was running around campus “eating” girls.

  I choked on my coffee at the idea and decided to stop trying to decipher what was clearly impossible.

  One thing was for sure, I was done with whatever was happening to me. I wanted to get “better” more than ever—whatever better was.

  Brittany was snoring soundly when I poked my head into her room—thankfully without a bedmate currently. Back in the kitchen, I scrawled a note thanking her for the chance to become inebriated while she’d been out last night.

  I owe you a box of Franzia. Taking your car for more. Back soon.

  –Sam

  I fished Brittany’s keys out of the bo
wl by the front door, shoving aside a box of condoms to get to them, and hurried to her car. The mid-morning sun beat down warmly and I drank it in, willing the chill inside me to be gone.

  With any luck, I’d be back before Brittany woke up, one step closer to cracking the mystery that was my own brain.

  Oracle was locked up when I arrived which meant Mirabelle had already prepared for our session. Between each of our busy schedules—okay mostly mine—it had been weeks since we’d had one. Kiwi had insisted on them when I’d moved here and begged to quit therapy—talking didn’t help when I had no idea what to talk about. I’d started these sessions with Mirabelle last year, but in that time, no real progress had been made other than dialing back the worst of my panic attacks and fear.

  Anxiety management, I called it. And I’d let that be good enough for a while. But I didn’t want to manage it anymore. I wanted it fixed. And I was sick of just waiting for it to knock me over the head like reverse-amnesia or something.

  Granny greeted me at the door, rubbing against my leg and almost getting stepped on as I mumbled a hello and hurried back to Mirabelle’s office.

  “Hey,” I said, pausing in the doorway to check out what sort of setup would be part of today’s attempt.

  Normally, Mirabelle set up a circle with candles or a pallet on the floor with blankets that she deemed right for “Spirit to connect.” Even though I always responded with a reminder this was therapy, not a fortune-telling. She almost always ignored me when I said that. Today, though, nothing looked different.

  Mirabelle sat at her desk and smiled. “Hello, Samantha.” She gestured to the chair across from her.

  I sank into it, not bothering to hide my confusion about the lack of props. “Are we going somewhere else today?” I asked.

  “Not physically, no,” Mirabelle said and I shook my head at her typical-Mirabelle answer. “But you should know that I’ve decided this will be our last session together.”

  “What? Why?” I asked, straightening.

  “You are very dear to me, Samantha, as is your aunt Kiwi, which is why I agreed to this favor in the first place. But, like I told her on the phone, I cannot help someone who doesn’t want to be helped.”

  “That’s ridiculous, Mirabelle. Of course I want to be helped. That’s why I’m here. I’ve been asking for answers for over two years now.”

  “You’ve been asking for logical answers. Answers that fit your understanding. Believing what you can see. But in limiting what you’re willing to experience, you’re denying the other half of the universe. Rejecting another piece of yourself. It’s yin and yang, Sam. Believing is seeing but conversely, seeing is believing. I asked you to work for me to expose you to those possibilities slowly. But you remain closed. If you can’t open yourself to that—”

  “I can,” I said quickly, scooting to the edge of my seat. “I promise I can. Please don’t give up on me.”

  My eyes burned with gathering tears. Mirabelle was the only person in my life that knew my issues. That I struggled to keep calm every time the bell over the front door dinged with a new customer. If she gave up on fixing me, I had a feeling I’d always be broken.

  “Please,” I repeated in a whisper.

  Mirabelle’s shoulders sagged and she reached for my hand where it gripped the edge of her desk. She took it in her own and squeezed. “Close your eyes,” she said simply.

  I did.

  Mirabelle took a deep breath and I did the same, knowing she wanted me to focus there without being told. I’d attempted meditation enough times with her to know the steps. I did them now without conscious thought. Breathing in and out. Slowly. Slower. Slower. Holding the air in my lungs as long as possible. Focusing on the sound and rhythm of it until I was fully grounded in this moment. In the feel of her hand in mine.

  The sound of my lungs expelling breath.

  “In the year I’ve known you, Sam, I’ve come to love many things about you. Your energy is bright, your light one-of-a-kind. Honor, loyalty, capacity for kindness and caring, compassion… all of these are pieces of you. But there is another side. A darker, harsher nature that compels you to dismiss what you cannot control. I see it in the way that you berate yourself for what you don’t understand. About the world, others, and especially about your own mind. But you are wrong. You are not broken, Sam. You are devoid. There is a piece of you gone missing. A piece that must be retrieved in order for you to ever feel whole.”

  I sucked in a sharper breath and forced it out slowly, concentrating on her words more than my breathing pattern now.

  “You feel the resonance of my words, don’t you?” she asked quietly.

  “Yes.”

  Admitting it was a shock felt all the way down to my toes. For two years, I’d been running from this. Because every time I scooted close to it, fear had me skittering away again.

  “Do you feel the missing parts of yourself?” Mirabelle asked. I felt her hand over my heart, pressing gently. “Here?”

  I shoved the word out again, determined to be honest. To face it all. “Yes.” My voice broke.

  “The void you feel is your own spirit, your own nature having been removed. When this void exists, the wound exposed must be healed through blood.”

  “Blood?” My eyes flew open and I stared at Mirabelle. “As in through death or violence?”

  “Blood. The life force inside you. Only you can fix this, Sam. I’ve told you that. And only in your own time.”

  I’d heard these words, or some variation of them, a hundred times before. I’d dismissed them every time but today my desperation had me turning over each phrase and idea for some hidden meaning I’d somehow overlooked before. I focused on Mirabelle—her breathing, the rise and fall of her chest. The air inside the room. The charged space between us.

  My chest ached for her words to be true. For something to click or change or finally make sense. I thought of last night and my pulse sped. “What if I don’t have time?” I asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  I told her about the footsteps I’d heard. The chase. Seconds away from being assaulted, Mason’s appearance. How he’d saved me.

  “It’s not the first time I’ve felt something out there,” I admitted. “Watching me or keeping close. I feel it often but more and more lately, it’s there. Just out of reach.”

  Mirabelle’s eyes narrowed and this time, when she spoke, there was a note of knowing. “Your mind is trying to protect you from it,” she said. “But you have to let go. Give it permission to remember. To stop repressing.”

  “I’ve tried,” I insisted, my voice rising. “I don’t know how.”

  Mirabelle shook her head and squeezed my hand harder. “You’ve tried the mundane. The world you can see. But you’ve denied the spiritual plane even as it has tried reaching out to you again and again.”

  “I told you, Mirabelle. I don’t—”

  “Here. Take this.”

  Mirabelle shoved something into my hands and my palm exploded in sensation. Pin-pricks, as if it had just woken after a Sleeping Beauty sort of enchantment, jabbed at my palm and fingers from the inside out. Heat shot from wrist to elbow, my skin reddening around the stone that sat in the center of my palm.

  I cried out and almost dropped the stone but Mirabelle grabbed my hand and held it closed with her own, forcing me to deal with … whatever this was. The beads she wore around her neck shook with the effort to hang onto me and keep me upright.

  “What is this?” I asked, gasping for air.

  “Proof that you are shutting it out. See how it demands to be heard?”

  “But how did you know this stone?” I pressed, fear making my confusion overwhelming.

  “I saw it,” she said simply and I knew for Mirabelle that was enough. For me, it only made things more complicated.

  Tears stung my eyes, leaking down my cheeks before I could stop them. A cold sweat broke over my face and hands, my pulse pounding in my ears until the roar of it drowned out everythi
ng else. Including my own sobs.

  “What’s happening to me?” I asked, yelling over the noise that I wasn’t sure was all in my head.

  Mirabelle only held tighter to my closed hand. “The spiritual plane wants to communicate, Sam. Listen. Feel.”

  The room around me tilted and my stomach rolled. Black dots danced at the edges of my vision. Numbness crept up my legs followed by piercing pain. Exhaustion—like an injection of anesthesia—took over, winding through me too fast to fight.

  I slumped in my chair and finally, Mirabelle released her hold. My hand sprung open, and the stone fell to the floor—along with tufts of fur that had appeared out of thin air. Again.

  I blinked, the exhaustion and pain all fading now that I wasn’t holding the stone anymore. Slowly, I came back to myself. Breathe, I told myself.

  Mirabelle stared at the floor. It took me a moment to realize it wasn’t the floor that held her attention but the fur. She looked around at it and then back at me with wide eyes.

  I dragged in breath after breath, confused and off-balance and trying to figure out what had just happened. Whatever it was meant something. I still felt the same. Knew the same things. Didn’t know what I didn’t know. But there was a crack in the foundation of the walls I’d unwittingly built in my own mind. Everything felt…closer. Like an appointment that was always just “almost here.”

  “Sam?” Mirabelle asked, still darting glances at the fur rolling toward the air intake underneath the window. “What…?” She couldn’t even finish her question.

  “That’s been happening for a while,” I admitted, my voice wobbly. I rubbed my palms on my pants and swallowed hard, willing my stomach to settle.

  “How long?” she asked, looking stricken.

  “A week or so?” I guessed, suddenly uncertain of the timeline. Or what day it was. “Do you have anything to eat here?”

  Mirabelle ignored the question which probably meant no. “Sam, you have to tell me these things.” I opened my mouth to argue but couldn’t think of anything good enough. And frankly, I didn’t have the energy. “Pick up the stone.”