Chapter Fourteen

“What the hell just happened? Where’s Cade?” Eve blinked in shock. One second Cade looked like he had been making out with air and the next he had just disappeared. It was like watching an old creepy film, with bad special effects.

“Justine took him away.” Alex focused on her face, his expression humourless. “It’s time Eve.”

“Time for what?”

“Time for you to merge me into Cade’s body.” She began shaking her head before he even finished. “Yes you will,” he commanded quietly.

“No. I can’t.” She didn't know what to do. She couldn’t merge him with that body, it had too much damage.

His hands suddenly reached out and gripped her shoulders. She slowly lowered her gaze to his hands and then back to his face.

“How are you doing that?” She could feel his heat and the weight of his hands on her.

He ignored her question. “You will merge me.”

Her mouth opened but nothing came out. She shook her head. She was still waiting for her heart to start beating again. His strength amazed her and terrified her.

“Yes. You. Will.” He pronounced each word clearly. He was deadly serious and that scared her more than the idea of merging him.

She began pulling away but he was so strong. He held her in place. Then, she noticed his eyes. The blue was so clear and bright that it sent shivers down her spine. She hadn’t seen him this angry or worked up since the first time she had seen him standing in her kitchen.

“There is so much damage. What if you can’t…I don’t want to hurt…” She began shaking.

“You can’t hurt me,” he stressed, then ordered, “I need you to put me in that body, now!”

She jumped at his order and almost fell back when he released her. Then he shocked her with a prediction, “If you don’t merge me, you might as well shoot Jillian yourself because she is as good as dead without my help. Think you can handle that resting on your shoulders for the rest of your life? Or think about what Jillian’s baby could have grown up to be each time you look at your own child?”

Tears came to her eyes and slipped over the edge. He was so cruel, using her own fear and child against her. “That’s not fair.”

“But it is fair, because it’s what you deserve for being so selfish.”

“I’m not selfish,” she called back. “I just can’t bear the thought of something hurting you.” Her heart thumped in her chest and she placed a hand over it. “Or of you being trapped in that body. It would kill me if I…lost you,” she whispered the last part. She hated that she was crying and she hated it more that she had admitted feelings she had just realised herself.

If her admission shocked him, she didn’t see it. She lowered her head, mortified by her confession.

His hands were suddenly back on her shoulders, his heat seeped through her clothes spreading over her skin as he gave her a squeeze. “Nothing is going to happen to me.”

What about his leaving once she merged him? If this whole merging Alex’s soul into Cade’s body worked, once he woke and was on his feet, he was gone, he had said so himself. And then what? She went back to her normal life? The idea wasn’t as satisfying as she had once thought.

“Please Eve. I’m strong enough, I can do it,” he urged quietly.

She gave in, praying she wouldn’t regret her decision. “I hope so.”

She moved to the chair on the opposite side of the room from the door and dragged it half way down the bed until she sat staring at Cade’s knees. Dropping her bag on the floor, she flipped open the top, pulled an old leather bound book from within and placed it on the bed.

Taking a deep breath she forced the fear out and the serenity in. She needed to be calm and in control, because if there was a dead soul nearby and they heard her fear while she was calling, it would be drawn to her. Gran said the dead fed on fear.

“Eve, we don’t have much time. Cade’s body has an expiry date.”

She repeated the deep breathing exercise, pushed all thoughts of Alex rushing her and Cade’s beaten body aside, and concentrated on merging soul with body.

Untying the leather straps, Eve opened the book and began turning the pages searching for the chant that would call to Alex. “Once I begin the calling—” She continued to turn the old paper as she spoke to Alex. “—every other soul, dead or otherwise will be drawn to it. There might be none or there could be many that answer it.” She pointed to the spot across from her on the other side of Cade’s body. “Stand there.”

Alex did as she asked. “Are you going to look at me?”

She ignored him and continued searching the book. “It’s always hard to find this poem. It was scribbled down in the outside margin. You’d think after years of studying this damn thing I’d know where it is,” she babbled.

“Eve will you please look at me.” He emphasised the ‘please’ with a tender push.

She raised her head as far as his stomach and he bent down the rest of the way. He locked his brilliant blues on her.

“You concentrate on merging me and I’ll take care of any problems.”

She jerked her head up and down.

“Eve”—His deep voice surrounded her name in warmth, and chased away her growing fear—“Everything is going to be okay.”

She nodded, blinking away the burning she felt in her eyes and scanning a few more pages, she caught sight of the small print. “I found it. Are you ready?” She looked up.

It was a stupid question. His face was void of all emotion, the muscles in his arms and chest flexed, his hands were clenched into fists and he was deeply focused. Oh, he was ready. He gave her a curt nod.

In the delicate yet smooth pitch Eve used on her patients, she began reciting the poem.

“Hear me.” The words were spoken in an endless flow of an awkward language. “Hear me call to you, Alex. Listen to my words and put your faith in me. I call to you.”

He had no idea what language she was speaking but understood every word.

“I call to you Alex. Allow me to unite body with soul so that both are whole. You are the essence of life. Bring your light and join with the strength of this body. Without your warmth the fire that is within will never be.”

Alex felt the feathery touch of Eve’s voice flow over him. Her words were drawing him closer when he suddenly felt the most foul, stomach-turning sensation. He blinked and it was gone.

Once more, he concentrated on Eve, peace washed over him again and he almost sighed. Eve had a beautiful, sultry voice. The way it brushed over his skin caused a need so deep he wanted nothing more than to bury himself in her body and get lost in her for days. He felt his lips curl up at the thought, when that vile sensation flooded him for a second time. His stomach tightened and he fought against the overwhelming nausea. The feeling was so strong, so…there was only one word that came to mind…evil. Something pure evil was near. It was so heavy and all consuming, that he was sure it would crush him if he allowed it to.

Fighting against the seductive pull of Eve’s voice, Alex peered over his shoulder in time to see a dark, muddy figure hovering in the door. There was no face or clear definition that resembled anything that used to be human, only black inky holes where eyes and a mouth might have been. It moved into the room and glided towards him.

Eve stopped her chant. “Oh no,” she breathed. “I feel it. Like the last time.”

The fear in her voice cut through his haze and he turned fully to face the soul.

He cocked his head to the side when it stopped. He shook his head. The soul screamed with rage. A deep accented, male voice pushed above the screams—“Ours, ours.”

Alex shook his head again. “Mine,” he growled. The word a clear cut warning.

This time, the screams of rage became stronger and the muddy figure, hovering inches off the floor, began to twist and coil in on itself. What looked like its attempt of an arm, separated from the rest of the figure and pointed at him. “Be ours. Be one.” The voice that rose above the screams was distinctively female this time. It pointed to Eve. “Kill.”

Eve shook, she couldn’t help it. She felt it—the dead soul—and not because the room was suddenly freezing, although Alex could have been the cause of that. She felt the rage and the hate and the complete and utter evil filling the room. She focused on Alex. The ring of light that surrounded him was a light blue and increasing in strength. His fists were clenched at his side and his legs were braced apart. She suddenly heard him growl, “Mine.”

She was right, it was a dead soul, it wanted the body and by his posture, it looked like Alex was blocking its way. Alex shook his head a second time and she almost jumped from the chair when the room began to vibrate. She grabbed Cade’s legs to help secure his body to the bed when a low menacing rumble swirled around them. This was scary. The vibrating in the room intensified and so did the growl. She realised then that Alex was the one responsible for both. In the blink of an eye Alex lashed out. “Both mine!” he roared and shot forward.

Her heart was in her throat and her entire body was shaking. The anger radiating off Alex was heart-stopping, she had never heard anything like it before. She hoped she never heard it again.

As fast as the room filled with evil, it emptied, taking the cold air with it. Alex turned to face her, fists squeezed tight and body rigid. She met his intense gaze just in time to see the last flickers of blue fade away. It was almost the same colour as the blue that surrounded him.

She swallowed hard and sat back on the chair.

“Finish it,”—his voice was low, rough, and not to be questioned—“time is running out.”

The command snapped her out of her stupor. Her hands shook as she reached for the book.

“I plead—” Her voice cracked and she cleared her throat and took a slow deep breath. She began again—“I plead to you Alex,” she spoke in Gaelic. The words rolled off her tongue in one long sentence. “Use your heat to warm this cold shell. Give it heart so that it may love. Give it emotions so that it may laugh and cry. Give it spirit so that it may fight and endure.” The light that surrounded Alex became even brighter as he bent over the body lying on the bed.

“Give it a conscience so that it may know the difference between right and wrong.” She took a breath. “I ask of you Alex. Allow this shell to shape a new identity. Guide it gently through the years with all the wisdom you have earned.”

For the last part of the poem she had to drop her voice and give him a command. What if he didn’t follow it? Alex is so stubborn. “I command you, Alex.” She put as much strength behind the words as she could. “Complete this union, fuse with flesh and bone and no longer will you dwell alone.”

The light that surrounded Alex lit up the room, so bright that she had to close her eyes from the glare. When it finally died down, she turned back expecting to see Alex standing there frowning down at her, but he was gone.

She slowly shifted her eyes to Cade’s body.

She scanned his face for signs of movement and then his body. Nothing. She wouldn’t know anything until Cade or rather Alex opened his eyes. That was if he could open his eyes.

The hand closest to her clenched the sheet and Eve shot to her feet, she scanned his face a second time and staggered back, her jaw dropping open. The scar that ran through Alex’s left brow appeared on Cade’s face. Next she saw Cade’s lighter hair darken to Alex’s black and then become light again. At the base of the bandages wrapped around Cade’s chest, a small scar the exact size and shape of a bullet wound appeared on the right side of his abdomen. Eve slid her eyes to his right shoulder—she felt her mouth drop open as a bullet scar appeared there as well.

Alex was filling Cade’s body, making it his own. She stumbled back when he opened his mouth and inhaled a deep breath. Cade’s thick arms rose and he rubbed at his face with his hands displaying the bottom half of Alex’s unit’s tattoo.

Eve took another step back, tripping over her bag and landed hard in the chair. The scraping of the metal chair caused Cade…Alex to jump. Eve froze like a deer caught in headlights but was jerked out of her trance when she heard loud voices in the hall. Reaching for her bag, she quickly jammed her book inside and was standing by the end of the bed when the nurse came around the curtain.

“What was that light?” she asked crossing to Cade’s body.

“I’m…” Eve’s voice cracked again. “I’m not sure. I was next door here, finishing—”

The nurse cut her off. “Mr Taylor?” she called out forcing his arms down. “Detective Taylor can you hear me?”

Eve stood and stared in horrified amazement when Cade…Alex opened his eyes. They weren’t Cade’s brown as she was expecting, they were blue, they were Alex’s blue. So it was easy for her to see them clear across the room, he lifted his head and pushed up on his elbows ignoring the nurse’s protest. He was trying to look at her, she could see him moving his head but the nurse kept blocking his view and he finally pushed her out of the way.

He stared at her for a moment, then a slow easy smile claimed his face. It was a triumphant smile and she waited for him to say ‘told yah’. He didn’t, but he did seem happy to see her.

Her heart jumped and she felt a nervous laugh build up inside her. She didn’t know what to do. She was shocked and thrilled that Alex had been able to merge with Cade’s body. That he had been powerful enough to ward off the dead soul and still heal Cade’s wounds. It was so nice to see him in a body even though it wasn’t his, he was solid now. He could touch…her heart jumped again…and be touched. On that same note, she was terrified that Alex was able to pull it off and merge with Cade’s body. The man had confessed to her that his job entailed eliminating people who were a danger to society. He had killed many, many people. And she had helped him merge into a body, setting him free.

She took another step back. The smile dropped from his mouth as he studied her. A startled voice came from behind her and she jumped, turning in time to see a second nurse enter the room and rush over to the bed, checking the pulse of the body Alex now claimed.

Eve automatically stepped back as more people entered the small room, and did so again even when the flow of people stopped.

This was insane. Not five minutes ago she was concerned he would vanish from her life and not look back. Now she was concerned that he knew who she was. Still, she wanted to go to him, tell him how relieved she was that he was okay. But she was afraid of who and what he was. The conflicting emotions were too much, she turned and glanced over at the door, she needed to get away.

As the nurses fussed over him, Alex watched her quietly, his head cocked slightly to the side.

She backed away again angling herself towards the door. This was too much. Fear was now the only driving force. She froze to the spot when his face went dark. He slowly shook his head, a warning in his eyes.

Oh my God, he knows. Eve swallowed the hard lump of fear in her throat and turned away. That fear drove her hard and she walked faster than ever before. Her heart pounded nervously in her ears when the elevator took a lifetime to stop on her floor. She rushed in almost knocking down an elderly lady and turned expecting to see Alex walking down the hall towards her.