Chapter Twenty-Six

“I LOVE YOU, JINX.” I smiled, carefree and happy.

A decade had slipped from my shoulders, removing sins and secrets, eradicating the heavy blackness from my life.

The coffee-haired goddess with her silver eyes didn’t turn around at my declaration.

My heart skipped a beat as I scowled and moved to stand in front of her. “Did you not hear me?”

She blinked, staring at me with no recognition whatsoever. “I’m sorry...what did you say?”

“I said, I love you.”

She stepped backward, her hand going to her chest. “But...I don’t even know you.”

My temper sparked with dry tinder. “What the hell are you talking about? Of course, you fucking know me.”

Her beautiful face blanched. “I’ve never seen you before.”

Fuck, the pain.

I’d never felt such pain.

“Whatever you’re doing, Eleanor, stop it. Right now.”

True fear smoked in her grey gaze. “Please...you’re scaring me. I honestly don’t know who you are.”

“You’re mine! That’s who you are.” I went to snatch her. To shake some sense into her. But a mirrored wall bounced my reflection with warning.

A man I’d never seen before stared back. He matched my movements, mimicked my motions. Every breath I took, he did. Every twitch, he copied. Every blink, he parroted.

What the—

My heart bucked as I scratched at my jaw, staring at blond stubble and shaved head instead of my usual dark features.

Eleanor continued to back away, fog curled around her feet, steadily obscuring her.

“No!” I rushed toward her. “Wait. It’s Sully. You know me. You love me. Wait!”

She wrung her hands, desperate to get away from me. “I’m sorry. You’re confused. You need help. I’m not who you think I am.”

“You are. You’re mine, goddammit. I’m in love with you. With all my fucking soul.”

The fog continued to hug her, deleting her wisp by wisp.

Euphoria.

That’s why she didn’t recognise me.

I was in Euphoria, hiding within a different character.

Rushing to the mirror, I yanked at the blond stubble. I scratched at the bald head. I stuck my fingers in my eyes to remove the sensors blocking me from the truth.

Pinching the slippery suckers, I yanked them from my gaze and threw them to the floor. With a huge exhale, I looked at the mirror again, lightheaded with relief that I’d figured it out. All I had to do was remove Eleanor’s sensors too, so she could see me, recognise me, come home with me.

Yet...as I raised my head and stared into my gaze...green stared back, not blue. Red hair loose around my shoulders, burly stance—a highlander from the Scottish moors.

No!

I glanced over my shoulder, searching for Eleanor, ready to get on my fucking knees for help.

But the fog had stolen her from me.

I was all alone, shedding the skins of imposters, unable to find who I truly was behind so many fucking masks.

I punched the mirror.

It smashed but repaired itself; the splinters of glass reforming and changing my reflection from red hair to dreadlocks.

A man with an ear-piercing and rings on his fingers.

I howled and scratched at my face.

Another mask fell.

A new man stared back. This one bristling with a black Mohawk and heavily shadowed eyes.

“Stop!”

It didn’t stop.

The shedding increased in speed.

Over and over, masks continued to fall and appear, obscuring me from myself.

A never-ending carousel of strangers.

Greek, Chinese, African, Swedish. Every nationality. Every shape and size.

Until finally, I slammed to my knees in terror and turmoil, unable to stare into another pair of unknown eyes, so fucking lost, crippling under the defeat of losing Eleanor. 

My breath caught.

The final disguise fell away, leaving a kid standing in the rubble.

A kid I did recognise.

A kid with bruises and bumps of badly healed broken bones. A kid with a one-eyed dog at his side, covered in the wounds that’d killed him.

Pika appeared, squawking in panic, unable to figure out what’d happened to me. He flew around the boy, around and around, until he gave up and catapulted away.

The kid stared at the broken man in the mirror and said, “You gave that bird his freedom, and he stayed. You gave the girl her freedom, and she didn’t. She left because how can she trust a man who doesn’t recognise himself? How can she love a man who doesn’t deserve her trust? How can any goodness come from such lies?”

I wanted to kill the boy, to stop his awful message, but he stepped out of the mirror...he became me.

His voice in my skull.

His past hopes and dreams crushing me with disappointment. “It’s better she’s gone. She’s safer this way. Don’t you agree?”

A single tear rolled down my cheek as Pongo—the dog I’d tried to rescue only to sign his death warrant—disintegrated into dust. The voice of my adolescent self echoed through my bleeding chest. “Everything you love dies, Sinclair. Everything you treasure is gone. That’s your true curse. The one you can never run from.”

The bed shook.

The villa creaked.

The air boomed with explosive thunder.

My eyes tore open. My body leapt upright, ready for battle, primed and on high alert.

Earthquake? Tsunami?

Eleanor.

I dropped my fists, no longer ready to fight an imaginary demon but needing to touch the girl I loved. I held out my palm as she scrambled across the mattress toward me. “Sully. What the hell was that noise?”

“I don’t know.” Keeping her close, so fucking thankful she was still with me and the nightmare was over, I dragged her to the deck and outside.

Dawn had already begun, shoving back the stars, making way for sunshine and another tropical day. No rain. No lightning. The boom hadn’t been thunder from the many angry storms we endured.

The waterfall continued to cascade. The blue pool serene with its glittering ripples.

So what the fuck woke us?

Almost as if the universe heard my question and decided to give me a precise and definite answer, another crack sounded, followed by the terrifying reverberation of war.

Boom.

Fucking boom.

A plume of smoke rose in the distance, kilometres away but black as cloying death.

Fuck.

Fuck.

Fuck!

Letting Eleanor go, I bolted back into the villa and snatched my phone from the sideboard. Cal answered before the line properly rang. “I heard. Already got pilots yanking on their pants. I’ll meet you at the helicopter.”

My heart smashed against my ribs. “He’s going to fucking pay for this.”

“I have no doubt.” Cal crashed into something, probably hauling his own clothes on.

I looked down at my naked body. A body that’d been inside Eleanor. A body containing a heart that’d believed it was worthy of some goddamn happiness after so long.

Turned out, fate wasn’t done tormenting me yet. Or torturing those I loved.

“I’ll see you at the helipad in seven minutes,” I hissed.

One minute to dress.

Six minutes to bolt down the sandy path from Nirvana.

It was a fucking eternity.

If Drake had hurt anything...Christ.

He’ll pay.

I’ll make him pay with every droplet of his toxic blood.

No mercy this time.

No fucking leniency.

He’s dead.

Throwing my phone on the bed, I stormed into my wardrobe and threw on whatever I reached first. Slacks and a white t-shirt. I grabbed boots instead of expensive loafers.

Eleanor intercepted me as I came back out. She’d pulled the sheet from my bed and wrapped it around her gorgeous body. Her eyes were as wide as I’d ever seen them. Behind her, black smoke thickened up the sky.

Shit!

“Sully. What’s going on?”

Grabbing her by the shoulders, I marched her to the mattress and shoved her down. “Stay here. Don’t go anywhere.” Stuffing my phone into my pocket, I swiped a shaky hand through my hair.

I split down the middle.

I didn’t want to leave her.

But I cursed every moment she held me back.

She popped up from the bed, amplifying my panic, bleeding into rage. “Sit down, Eleanor!”

Her cheeks pinked with matching temper. “What the hell is going on? Tell me. Let me help—”

“You can’t help.” Backing away to the door, I imprinted her to memory. The nasty pain from my dream had ghosted into reality. This felt like a goodbye, not just a short parting.

This felt final.

She held up her hand, stepping toward me.

I bared my teeth. “Do not leave my villa. I have to deal with this.”

“Deal with what?”

“My motherfucking brother,” I snarled.  “He’s attacked Serigala.”

Her terrified inhale was the last sound I heard as I turned and charged from my villa.

I turned my back on my future to protect my past.

I chose animal over human.

Meek over immortal.

Creature over soul-mate.