Page 63 of Eternal Devotion

“But it was all bullshit. Childish adventures. Stories.”

I’d gone to the mansion on Dany’s request to show the house. I remembered it clearly. Had the man who appeared out of nowhere, the man with whom I’d wandered rooms and subsequently shared relations, been a ghost?

“No.”

Memories flooded back like a broken dam. The brain fog vanished in its entirety in the same fashion and with the same rapidity as it had done at Mill Dam.

Tendrils of fog licking at his feet. I’d never seen him eat or drink. Icy skin, pale as an Arctic landscape. Flaming red lips. Burgundy eyes like a rich glass of Bordeaux. The way he walked and never made a sound, even on creaky wooden floors.

Stumbling to my feet, legs shaky, I spun and faced the bedroom, then turned toward the stairs, unsure which way to go. Run, my brain screamed. Get out! But I wouldn’t. I couldn’t.

“Where are you?” I shouted, feeling ridiculous, yet more and more certain the longer I sat with it that ghosts were real and one was toying with my head.

“Mordecai!” My heart pounded as I shone my flashlight in both directions, anticipating his arrival, yet fearing it, too. “Show yourself.”

He didn’t appear, and after several long minutes of anxious waiting, I aimed for the bedroom, throwing the door open with such force that it collided with the wall. First, I stormed to the window and tore back the curtains, drenching the room in crisp autumn sunlight.

The canopy bed and its messy covers told a story of debauchery. Mordecai had fucked me in that bed. I remembered it. The surreal quality of our coming together. The intensity. Burgundy eyes staring down at me. Luscious kisses that I couldn’t get enough of. Sensations like I’d never felt before.

My logical mind screamed and thrashed and yelled for me to get a grip. It wasn’t real. It wasn’t possible. I was losing it. A better explanation existed, and if I looked hard enough, I would find it.

But no.

No. I was definitely sick. This was a horrible fever dream, and when my temperature came down and I was lucid, I would laugh at the stress-induced nightmare.

Bolting from the room, I raced down the hallway, clomped down the unsafe stairs two at a time, and burst into the bright light of day, gasping cold air into my lungs. Trembling, I got in the Jeep and slammed the door, tearing away from the house at high speed, determined to put myself to bed. It would all be better in the morning.

But no.

It was not better in the morning.

15

Mordecai

I was weak.

Depleted.

It had been three weeks since I’d left home and crossed an ocean to find and rescue my uncle. Three weeks since I’d fed. My kind tended to satiate those cravings nightly or at least several times a week. I’d always been atypical due to self-loathing and stubbornness. The voracious need that crawled under my skin was usually something I could manage. It didn’t get unbearable until the four-to-five-week mark.

I once went seven without feeding, but I suffered badly. My skin shriveled and dried, my hair thinned and fell out, and I was unable to use powers, even after resting in my soil. My body had shut down and was moving into a state of torpor when Cristofer dragged me out of my self-imposed isolation and forced me to eat.

I nearly killed the poor human with the frenzied way I’d fed, but knowing my repulsion for causing the change, Cristofer had stopped me in time. Because of that experience, I didn’t allow myself to go more than five weeks between feeds. Four was a challenge but doable.

Three was typically a walk in the park, but not when I was supposed to stay at peak health. Not when the intent of my mission was to engage in a potentially dangerous rescue operation against human hunters. Not when using my powers was paramount to success.

The roar of cravings ripping through my system was far more intense than usual and making it hard to concentrate. My abilities were unreliable and took more effort to use, leaving me weak and vulnerable. Resting recharged me to a point, but it wasn’t enough.

Each night after sundown, when I took to the sky or walked the city in search of clues or signs that my uncle was near, I was only half lucid, my concentration shot. I found myself standing outside Ensley’s flat more times than not, wondering how I got there and how he was getting on.

I entered a few times in the dead of night to watch him sleep. Often, he wasn’t there, a discovery that soured my already rotten gut. Was he with someone else?

When he was present, I lingered beside his bed, regretful at what I’d done, yearning for something I couldn’t have. Visiting was a terrible idea considering my voracious urge to feed and the undeniable feelings I’d developed. It only made him harder to resist. Hence, after the first few days, I stopped going inside for fear that I might lose control.

I never, ever fed from a lover.

By week two, I abandoned my visits altogether for Ensley’s safety. With my abilities compromised, my search for Iulian was proving difficult. If I was to succeed, I would need to give in to the blasted curse.