LIVING WITH EMBERS
MICHELLE IRWIN
COPYRIGHT
Copyright © 2017 by Michelle Irwin
First Edition February 2017
Published in Australia
Print ISBN:
Cover Artist: Desiree DeOrto Designs
Cover content used for illustrative purposes only, and any person depicted is a model.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to an actual person, living or dead, business establishments, events, or locales, is entirely coincidental. The following story is set in Australia and therefore has been written in US English. The spelling and usage reflect that.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without the written permission of the Publisher, except where permitted by law. To request permission and for all other inquiries, contact:
Michelle Irwin P O Box 671 MORAYFIELD QLD 4506 AUSTRALIA
www.michelle-irwin.com
[email protected]
DEDICATION
Memory is the diary that we all carry about with us.
~ Oscar Wilde ~
To Camille and Jacky, who have stuck with me to the end.
To Desi for immortalizing these characters in your beautiful art.
Keep up to date with all the latest from Michelle Irwin by signing up to her newsletter.
CONTENTS
DEDICATION
CHAPTER ONE
CHAPTER TWO
CHAPTER THREE
CHAPTER FOUR
CHAPTER FIVE
CHAPTER SIX
CHAPTER SEVEN
CHAPTER EIGHT
CHAPTER NINE
CHAPTER TEN
CHAPTER ELEVEN
CHAPTER TWELVE
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
CHAPTER NINETEEN
CHAPTER TWENTY
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
CHAPTER THIRTY
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
CHAPTER THIRTY-FOUR
EPILOGUE
ALSO BY MICHELLE IRWIN
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
CHAPTER ONE
EVIE WAS AWAKE.
Despite being over the threshold of death’s door just days earlier, she was awake and she had returned to me. The moment the confirmation of that fact had come, nothing else mattered.
Desperate to see her conscious again for myself, I raced through the fae court where we were living temporarily. When I’d left her bedside to visit with my family for my birthday, just hours earlier, she’d still been cold and clammy. Although the fae had lessened the sleeping draughts over the last day, she hadn’t woken. Part of me had considered the possibility that maybe we’d rescued her too late—that although we’d brought her back to life, she might never be conscious again. My greatest fear was that her mind was trapped, wandering in an abyss of our making.
That fear was swept away by my half-sister’s words.
As I drew closer to the healing room, I thought about the events leading up to her injury. The rescue mission to save my half-sister. The journey into the Rain’s headquarters at Bayview. The gun. The bullet. The blood. Evie’s death.
I still couldn’t say whether it had been me or my father who pulled the trigger, but it didn’t matter. The result was the same. I’d almost lost her.
I couldn’t lose her.
Except, it occurred to me that I still could. Evie’s heat had disappeared when she’d returned from . . . beyond, and I didn’t know what that might mean.
What happens when the sunbird sleeps?
The words echoed around my mind on a loop, a reminder of what I’d learned years earlier when overseas. It was the sunbird tied to Evie’s soul that had linked our lives together. If the sunbird was gone, Evie’s feelings toward me might have changed. I couldn’t be sure how she would react to me—what we’d mean to each other—and the thought of walking back out of the room with a different relationship than the one we’d shared in recent months terrified me. Everything we’d fought for and against, all the battles we’d had to end up together—could it all have been for nothing?
I hoped not, but the only thing I was certain of was that I didn’t want to lose her.
Fear of a change in our relationship wasn’t enough to slow me down though; my need to see her, to wrap her in my arms and press her against me, was too desperate.
When I reached the door to her private healing room, I shoved it open without hesitation. I called her name and her eyes cut to me. For a moment, I was able to believe that nothing had changed. Her lips tipped up into a smile, and although she was still far too pale to be considered completely healed, she looked almost healthy again. The color had returned to her cheeks at least.
Hearing the words that she was awake was one thing. Seeing her purple irises wide and attentive was something else entirely. With that simple action, she’d given me the best birthday present I could have ever hoped for.
I put aside my fear and closed as much of the distance between us as I dared. If she wanted me to stop, she could voice the words.
“Don’t do anything like that again,” I said. “I couldn’t take it. I’ve lost you more times than is fair already.” I can’t handle losing you again. I couldn’t voice the thought; it wasn’t fair to demand that she continued to love me if she no longer felt the need.
“I’m sorry, but I couldn’t just let her die.”
Her. Louise. My twin sister.
With her sacrifice, Evie had helped secure Lou’s safety. Until that moment, I hadn’t known it was an intentional act. “There was a time when she would have killed you without a moment’s thought.”
“I know,” she whispered, “but she deserves a chance to change now that she knows the truth. How is she?”
“How is she?” I couldn’t believe Evie. She was so worried for my sister even though it had been Evie who had been shot. Who had died. Yet her concern lay with the welfare of my sister who a few weeks ago would have killed her on sight. “I would think you’d be a little more concerned about your own well-being.”
Evie frowned and met my eye with a clear challenge. “That’s not an answer.”
“Of course it’s not. You’ve effectively been in a coma for almost a week and you ask how she is.”
“But I’m not any more, am I? I’m awake and talking and clearly okay for the moment, so can you please just answer my question?”
I told her what I dared about Lou’s new-found faeness and the peace that the two of them had forged without words. Evie’s true nature wasn’t a concern for Lou, not anymore. I was certain of it. How could it be with everything we’d learned?
As soon as I’d finished telling her about Lou, Evie immediately leapt into questions about everyone else that had been in the room with us as we stormed Bayview. She was more worried about them than the one person who really mattered in it all—the one person who was most grievously injured.
“You shouldn’t be so
concerned with everyone else,” I whispered, as I moved closer. I couldn’t meet her eye as I said the words because it led into the parts of the conversation I was most stressed about. “You died, Evie.”
“Obviously I didn’t,” she said, forcing a chuckle and patting down her torso. “I’m still here.”
I reached for her cheek, caressing it despite the pain it caused in my almost, but not quite, healed palm. “You did. You were shot and you . . . you died.”
Just saying the words made me relive the moments when I thought I’d lost her. When I had lost her.
I might lose her still. Not to death but to heartbreak.
“You lost so much blood and you couldn’t breathe. You began to burn. I came so close to losing you forever. I couldn’t lose you.” I can’t ever lose you.
I wanted to force her to tell me that it was all okay, that nothing had changed, and most of all, that she still loved me. I wasn’t sure how to find the words without sounding like a crazy man though.
Her fingers came to rest on the back of my hands and she took care as she guided my palms away from her face so that she could assess the damage I’d done to myself. I allowed her to do what she needed to. It was delaying the inevitable, but the lingering pain of the healing wounds was nothing compared to the loss of her love.
“What happened?” she asked.
“I couldn’t let you burn.”
She traced small patterns delicately over the fabric on my palms, and then her gaze trailed along the wounds that littered my arms. “You pulled me from the fire?”
I was too afraid to meet her eyes. “I couldn’t let you burn.”
“You could have died,” she admonished.
I bit back the mirthless laugh that rose in my throat. As usual, I was explaining to her that she’d died, that the fire had reached for her and almost consumed her body, and she was telling me off for risking my life to save hers. “You were dead. I had no choice. If I had to, I’d do it again. After you were free of the flames, Mackenzie stepped in and revived you.”
She continued to watch my hands for a moment, and then her gaze lifted to my face. In her eyes was an unknown emotion. It could have been love, but it could have equally been pity. Is she going to tell me again that I shouldn’t have done it? Or is she going to ask me to leave?
Her arms reached for me, but I couldn’t welcome her touch. Not when I didn’t know whether it would be the last time I’d be granted it. I wasn’t sure I could handle her rejection from the comfort of her arms. Drawing away from her hold, I found the back of my neck with my palm.
“There is something else I need to tell you,” I admitted before revealing the change in her temperature. In the days she’d been asleep, the fae had discovered she was back to a normal human temperature. Ever since, the question of whether the sunbird had returned to sleep, or perhaps been consumed, had plagued me. I hoped Evie would understand my concerns when I asked her how she felt.
“I feel . . . cold.”
Her words were confirmation of what I’d feared. The sunbird was gone. Whether she’d burned up in the fire that I’d rescued Evie from or had returned to slumber in Evie’s body, I didn’t know. Although I guessed that the now subdued flames in Evie’s fiery aura meant the sunbird still resided in some piece of her. Our auras still reached for each other, but did that signify that her love was still alive or was it muted like her light? It didn’t matter though—all that mattered was what came next and the way she answered the most important question I could ask her. “And how do you feel . . . about me?”
Her gaze swiveled to mine as she raised one eyebrow in question. “Is now really the most appropriate time to discuss our relationship?”
It might be the only time, I thought bitterly, but couldn’t voice that. “I need to know how you feel,” I said instead. “If anything’s changed, I’d rather you just rip off the bandage now and tell me.” I swallowed down the lump forming in my throat, unsure whether I could continue with the words in my head, but I had to. I have to know how she feels, and she has to know she’s free if she wants to be. “I won’t hold you to any promises you made while under the influence.”
“Why would anything have . . .” She trailed off as understanding—and pity—dawned in her gaze. She reached her hand out for me again. “You think this changes how I feel about you?”
I forced a smile. All I wanted was a yes or no answer, but I would explain for hours if it would help her reach a positive conclusion. “I hope it hasn’t, but based on what I’ve read, I can’t make any assumptions. I don’t want to make an ass of myself thinking something that’s not true.”
“How can you even ask that?” Her smile beamed as she asked the question.
Hope bubbled in my chest, but I had to be sure. “I don’t want you to feel obligated if things aren’t the same for you anymore.”
Without allowing me to retreat again, she caressed my cheeks and guided me closer to her. I was mesmerized.
“Clay, absolutely nothing about us has changed for me.”
“You’re sure?”
“Of course I am.” Her thumbs tracked the bags under my eyes with the lightest of touches. “I still love you with every bit of my body and soul. Besides—” She kissed one side of my mouth. I closed my eyes as the perfection of the smallest graze of her lips rushed through me. “—you saved my life.”
I was going to say that of course I did. Even if I didn’t love her with every fiber of my being, she’d done so much for my family in that room that I would have been obligated to do everything I could to save her in return. She pushed her finger to my lips to silence me before I could utter a single word though.
“You pulled me from the fire,” she whispered before pressing her lips against the left-hand corner of my mouth.
Her small kisses were more than I’d dared to hope for when I’d entered the room, and they were causing reactions in my body that were completely inappropriate considering her circumstances.
“I can guarantee you that there is absolutely no one in this world that I could ever love more than you.” She pressed her lips fully against mine.
The moment her tongue pressed forward, my desire spiked. If only there were some way we could prove our love so that neither of us would ever have to doubt again.
I could think of only one way to guarantee we wouldn’t be apart. As the idea grew in my mind, I wanted it. By the time the words formed, it was no longer merely a solution to an issue. Rather, it was something I wanted more than I’d ever desired anything before. If she agreed, we’d leave the room with a relationship completely different to the one we had before, but for all the right reasons.
Drawing away from her just far enough to get the air I needed to talk, I said, “Despite your stubbornness and need to save everyone—even at the cost of your own life—you make me so happy, Evie. Marry me?”
She laughed in response.
Although it had been an on-the-spot decision, I hadn’t expected her to find the concept amusing. Maybe I’d misread the kissing. Obviously my confusion and doubt were printed on my face.
“You’re serious?” she asked.
“I wouldn’t joke about this sort of thing. I’ve lost you more times than I can count. I want to make you officially mine because I can’t lose you again.”
“Okay,” she said, hesitation in her voice It could have been the surprise my question had caused. At least, I hoped it was just because of her surprise.
“Is that a ‘yes’?”
Her lips lifted into a grin so wide that every lingering doubt was washed away in an instant. “Yes, it’s a yes!”
My own grin easily matched hers, especially when I considered that Evie had a healing room all to herself—a fact I planned to take advantage of to celebrate our engagement properly.
It didn’t take long for Evie to stop the celebration to kick my ass about not telling her that the fae enchantment hadn’t worn off before I went into Bayview. My head drooped as I recalled the way
I’d put everyone in danger by assuming the enchantments would wear off at any moment, unaware at the time that they likely never would.
Her admonishment practically echoed Eth’s, but I knew both came from the same place—their concern for me. I tried to explain to her my new assumptions, that I would always be trapped somewhere between being fae and being human. If anyone would be able to understand it, Evie could. The fact that I was part fae wouldn’t change anything for her either.
Now that I’d learned her feelings for me hadn’t shifted, I was more secure in our relationship than I’d ever been. She loved me as I loved her, and together we would face any challenges.
My life had changed so much in a little less than twelve months. A year earlier, I’d thought a reunion with Evie was impossible. With Evie, my fiancée, in my arms, everything was perfect. When I looked back on the twists and turns we’d taken to find our way to perfection, I knew every one of them was worth it.
There was no way I would ever forget the path that had come so close to splitting us apart forever but that had ultimately led us closer together than either of us could have dared dream. Whatever life threw at us next, I was certain we’d be able to face it together with a united front.
CHAPTER TWO
BEFORE LONG, EVIE yawned and her eyelids drooped. When that happened, I left her to get some more sleep—apparently a few days wasn’t quite enough.
After making my half-sister, Mackenzie, and Willow, the other healer helping Evie, promise that they’d come get me the instant Evie woke again, I headed to find something to eat. With our lives in the best shape they had been since we’d left our little hideaway in Sweden, the things I’d been neglecting crept back in—like a need to eat and sleep.
I’d barely reached the dining area when Aiden, my cousin and one of Mom’s highest ranking guards, intercepted me.
“The queen has requested your presence in her chambers.”
Living with Embers: (Son of Rain #4) Page 1