“Please?” he added. “I’d like to be with someone who spent time with Daniel at the end. I can’t explain it. I just want to make sure that he was okay. I won’t take much of your time, I promise. Just one cup of coffee.”
I had more time than he could ever imagine. I was immortal. That was a fact I reminded myself of as I stared at this appealing man-boy. Yes, he was handsome and sexy, but I could handle him. I could handle anything. My mother was the goddess of witchcraft, for Pete’s sake- the most powerful witch in the world. Some of her strength had to have rubbed off on me.
I finally nodded. “Alright. Just one cup.”
He smiled and I could swear the room brightened. I appraised his face quickly. Why was I drawn to him? I wasn’t hungry. Physically, he was handsome. Classic features, healthy vibrant coloring. My pulse buzzed in my wrist, quick and feather-light. I swallowed hard. I didn’t normally do this. There was no point. But for once, I listened to my heart, not my head. It would be nice to not be lonely for a few minutes.
Brennan held the door for me and I slipped past him, careful not to touch him. As I passed, though, I inhaled. He smelled delicious, like sunshine and man. A wave of weakness passed over me and I bolstered my self-restraint. I would not hurt him.
He punched at the elevator button and we waited, him patiently, me not-so-much. I had grown to hate the smell of hospitals, that sterile medicinal smell, and I wanted to leave here. Now. My purpose here was done and I wouldn’t have to come back for a few weeks.
With a melodic ‘ding’, the metal doors opened and Brennan gestured me forward.
“Your chariot,” he smiled.
I couldn’t help but smile back. He had such an easy, laid back way about him. His spirit seemed almost gentle. And that seemed strange because he was so huge. I hadn’t realized how enormous he was until we stepped into the elevator and I saw our reflections. The top of my head only reached his chest.
As we glided downward to the main floor, I discreetly looked at him in the mirror. He really was handsome. Broad, muscular shoulders, slim hips, sandy blonde hair that just started to flip upward at his neckline. It made him look a little mischievous. Warm hazel eyes that seemed almost like butterscotch and… were looking directly at me. He raised an eyebrow and I looked away quickly. He had totally just caught me giving him the once-over. Drat. That was the last thing I needed right now.
The doors slid open and he held out his arm.
“After you,” he said quietly.
His voice was husky and I found myself wishing I could take a bath in it. It was gentle and sexy at the same time. As soon as I had the thought, though, I wanted to slap myself. What in the name of the gods was wrong with me? I had never been so affected by a mortal. Not ever.
As I stepped past him, he moved slightly and I bumped into him. Our forearms collided, the length of my arm from wrist to elbow pressed against him. White hot electricity jolted through me and I exhaled sharply, the breath seemingly forced from my lungs as my fingertips tingled. Brennan inhaled at the same time, his eyes un-focusing slightly from the contact.
Shit.
His aura appeared to me, a vivid array of colors and my breath hitched in my throat, my lips automatically opening just a bit. His energy was delicious, sweet and pure, and I was hard-pressed to pull away. As I slid my tongue along my bottom lip, I could taste it….I could taste him. His energy was incredible. I felt an almost uncontrollable need to draw nearer to him, just a little.
I can handle it. My own thoughts betrayed me.
Before I could help myself, I stepped closer like a moth to a flame. My lips hovered just a couple of inches from his and we lingered there, like we were the only two people in the world, drawn together by an invisible ribbon of energy. My heart took off like helicopter blades and I felt it thrumming in my chest, louder with each beat until it drowned out cognizant thought.
Brennan’s hazel eyes stared into mine, the flecks of gold shining in the dim light of the elevator. I tried to focus, to concentrate on his eyes rather than the incredible pull that I felt toward him as I fought to gather the strength to move. I just needed to move away. It shouldn’t be so hard.
But as I willed my feet to move, Brennan reached out his fingers and touched mine, fingertips to fingertips.
Sensations I’d never felt before, as soft as velvet but as strong as steel, flooded through my body, filling every vein, lifting me like I was floating on the swelling waves of the ocean. It was exquisite, unique and petrifying.
“What the hell?” Brennan murmured, his eyes still frozen to mine. His voice was quiet and raspy and filled with wonder, but it was enough to break my fixation on him and I yanked away, lunging out of the elevator.
“Wait!” he called to me, his urgency bleeding through his voice.
But I was already running down the hall. I had to get away from him. Far, far away before I hurt him. Curious nurses moved out of my way as I ran and I didn’t look back even though Brennan was still calling my name.
I took the nearest exit, throwing the door open so hard that it slammed into the cinderblocks behind it and I flew down the stairs with the speed of the gods.
What the hell was that? I had never felt that way before in my life.
Typically, when I fed, I started the process at my will. It was a conscious effort, something that I could easily control. My self-restraint was never tested. It was just like kissing. I simply brushed my lips against theirs and sucked their souls right out of their bodies. It was quick and painless.
But with Brennan… I certainly had no intentions of stealing his soul, yet his aura had appeared with just my touch. He was young and vibrant and alive and I wanted him. I wanted him like I had never wanted anything else in my life. My need for him had filled me up, distracted me, overwhelmed me. I had never felt a connection like that before.
It was startling.
Amazing.
Terrifying.
Because it was incredible. Emotion had flooded my body, pulsing through my heart… waking it from an ever-long slumber. And because of that, I could never see him again. My curse made me dangerous.
I killed everyone that loved me.
Chapter Two
The icy waves crashed against the shore of Lake Michigan, then receded back into the lake only to rear their liquid heads to crash again. The silvery light of the moon shone onto the surface, refracting against the rippling sheen like shattered black glass.
I sat on the top of a nearby bluff, inhaling the crisp night air and allowing it to rustle my hair from my shoulders, raising goose bumps along my bare arms. I always felt the best at night because the moon energized me. I literally felt stronger as the moonbeams caressed my skin.
There was a good reason for that. My mother, Hecate, was not only the goddess of witchcraft. She was also the goddess of the moon. Everything magical, dark or lunar-based fell within her realm. And by extension, my own.
“What are you doing out here?” a quiet voice asked from behind me. I sighed, knowing who it was before I even turned around. Ghosts fell within my mother’s realm, also. And because of that, I could see them. Turning, I gazed at my friend Gaia, who just so happened to be one.
“I’m soaking in moonbeams,” I answered. “What are you doing out here?”
Gaia’s brown hair was coiled at her neck and she was wearing an elaborate ancient Roman dress because that is when she last lived. Not being able to change her clothes for the past couple of thousand years truly vexed her but she refused to cross over to the Underworld. She was terrified of the unknown. She was proving herself invaluable to me now though, as I tried to outrun my father.
“I’m just checking on you,” she muttered as she perched on her heels next to me. “Why you like to sit out here in the sand, I’ll never know.”
“Why you hover above it like you’re trying not to get dirty, I’ll never know,” I answered. “You’re dead, you know.”
“That hadn’t escaped my attention,” she smiled. And I had to laugh.
Gaia was slightly snobbish and pretentious, but that was just a product of her upbringing. Her father had been a wealthy Patrician and she had been born with a silver spoon clutched in her hand. She really did mean well. She had been with me for a while now, ever since she realized that I could see her. She stayed because she enjoyed living vicariously through me. She also enjoyed changing with the times. She had roamed the earth for two-thousand years as a spirit and her attitude and speech had adjusted accordingly.
“You really should cross over,” I told her for the millionth time. “The Underworld isn’t a bad place. I’ve been there. I should know.”
“Really? If it isn’t so bad, then why did you run from it?” she asked with her delicate eyebrow raised. The moon bathed her face in silver light. She wasn’t beautiful, but she was a handsome girl with a lot of attitude. She was witty, funny and because of my present circumstances, she was my only friend.
“You know why,” I muttered. “For one, I’m not dead. I’m a demi-god. There’s a big difference. And two, my father, the evil soul-sucking, blood-drinker that he is, is trying to kill me so that he doesn’t have to go back. He can find me too easily in the Underworld.”
Gaia’s features twisted into a delicate scowl, as she sat with skinny hunched shoulders.
“I still don’t understand what exactly is going on. All these years and you’ve never really wanted to talk about it. Why did your father curse you?”
I stared at the water in front of me, watching as it peacefully ebbed and flowed, as I remembered my father’s treachery. Swallowing hard, I waved my hand and my memories appeared in front of us like a shimmering movie. Gaia’s eyes snapped as she leaned forward to watch.
I was with my mother that day and it was a beautiful, sunny afternoon. I was standing outside of her sparkling crystal cave while she had been bustling about inside. My father, Mormo, had appeared quietly, his long black duster swirling around him like mist. His face was pale, his hair dark.
“Hi, father,” I greeted him uncertainly. It was unlike him to appear only to me. He had never shown much interest in me at all, he usually only visited my mother. I was an inconvenience to him.
“Hello, child,” he replied solemnly, his pale face expressionless. “I need your help with something. Would you help your father?”
I could remember even now the cold pit that had formed in my belly. I knew that something wasn’t right. But there was a magnetism there- he had drawn me to him and I couldn’t resist. It was the same effect that I now had on others. It was part of the wretched curse.
Against my better judgment, I had taken one shaking step toward him. And that was all it took. Mormo whisked me away to the Underworld where we stood in front of the three Fates and Hades himself.
“You willingly offer your daughter to me, to stay with me here in the Underworld, in exchange for your freedom?” Hades had asked him, his face slightly incredulous. With his back to a flickering fire, Hades appeared even more handsome than he actually was, which was an impossible feat. He was heart-wrenchingly attractive.
Mormo nodded. “I bring her here to exchange for my own life.”