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I came out of the shower a pumpkin-free woman and started across David’s room to the door. In the adjoining room, I could hear Harry talking to Vicki, and I thought I heard David in there too, until his form shifted near the fireplace and scared the living hell out of me.

“Sorry,” he said with a laugh. “Didn’t mean to scare you.”

“It’s okay,” I said. “I’m always a bit more vulnerable when I’m naked.”

His eyes shifted to my towel as if he only just realized I was naked under it.

“You’re clean,” I noted, taking in his loose-fitting jeans and cream urban-style t-shirt. He looked good. And fresh, and he smelled divine.

“I used Mike’s shower. He and Em are still hosing everything down out front.” He looked at the book in his hand then and set it down on the lamp table near the armchair. “You want a shirt to put on to go across the hall?”

I listened to the buzz in the house—to Harry and Vicki, the other door to that room opening out right onto the hallway where I would have to pass. “Um, yeah. Thanks.”

He moved over to his wardrobe and turned on the light, his shadow stretching out across the floorboards. I could’ve just walked across the hall in my towel—the woman who raised me in my teen years and my eight-year-old son wouldn’t care—but I wanted David’s shirt. On my naked body.

The light went out and David’s bare feet appeared in my line of sight, bony and long from under his jeans. My eyes followed the slender line of his legs to the slight curve of his waist, stopping on the shirt he held out to me.

“Thanks.” It was soft and smelled just like him as it slipped down my body, and when I pulled the towel away and the fabric touched my skin, a hot rush of desire made my limbs sort of weak. It made me think about his hands, his skin, his chest, how it would feel pressed to mine. I almost told him to cancel lunch out and take off his clothes. And when I looked up to meet his eyes, I knew for certain that I wanted him to cancel. I just didn’t know how to say it. What if he rejected me? What if he said he didn’t want me, or he wasn’t ready yet? I wasn’t sure I could handle that.

When my eyes went absently to the book he’d been reading, he took a reflexive step into my line of sight, which piqued my curiosity.

“What were you reading?” I asked, walking past him.

“Nothing.” He reached in quickly and snatched the book when I picked it up. I only got to see a date on the side and a bit of handwriting inside before it was gone. But it was enough to tell me the book was, in fact, a journal I had written sometime after I met David.

I turned around, smiling competitively. “Why can’t I look at it? I wrote it.”

“It’s…” He walked toward the bookshelf framing Harry’s door. “You don’t need to see this stuff. Read a more recent one.”

“Why?” I followed him. “Is there horrible stuff in there about you?”

“No.”

“Is it bad stuff that happened to me?”

He stopped walking, keeping his back turned. “Some.”

“Why would you read it then?”

A heavy second of thought passed over him, his hand smoothing the cover. “I guess I need to see that…”

“That?”

“That she did recover—in the end.”

“Recover?” I slowly walked up behind him.

“From all she suffered. I suppose I was looking for some evidence, or maybe reminding myself, that we can come out of this.”

“Out of what?”

He turned to me, his face soft with sadness. I knew what he meant then. It never occurred to me that we were ‘in’ anything, but I guess we were. Here I was just trying to live my life, and he was standing right there waiting for it to end. Waiting for me to disappear and for his wife to come back. I nodded, but I couldn’t look at him. It hurt too deeply.

“Hey.” He tilted my face up. “What’s wrong?”

“I used to wonder if you would happily accept my death if it meant your wife would come back.”

“Ara—”

“No. It’s okay. I do get it. Really. I just…” I took a deep, shaky breath. “I don’t wonder anymore. I know now, for certain.”

“It’s not like that, sweetheart.” He wrapped one arm around me, pressing my face and my wet hair into his nice chest. “Don’t you get it? If Ara ever surfaces, you won’t vanish. I don’t want you to. I love you. And you’d still be you. You’d just have all your old memories as well.”

I rolled my face up to look at him. His vibrant green eyes smiled back down, so full of love and compassion that I smiled too, taking a small step away. Then, with a quick flip of my hand, snatched the book from his.

“Hey!” He tried to grab it, but I turned quickly and opened it. I read only two lines—something about my father being evil, but I’d referred to him as King Drake—before David snatched it back.

“I wasn’t done reading!” I jumped up in the air and tried to grab it, but he was so much taller than me. He only needed to hold it above his head so I couldn’t reach.

“I’m not letting you read this yet.” He switched hands a few times as I kept trying to grab it, laughing.

“Not fair!” I jumped again and my fingers almost touched it. “You’re taller than me.”

“And quicker,” he said. But we both knew that wasn’t true.

“Yeah, well, you’re also human.”

“And?” he challenged, daring me to try something.

I looked at the patch of skin where his briefs showed above his jeans and where his shirt came up with his arms extended, and rushed for it. “You’re also ticklish!”

The book hit the floor hard as he folded over, but when my hands connected with his skin, my mission was no longer to get that book. I wanted him. Naked and on top of me. I wanted his breath across my face and the wetness of his lips cooling mine.

I kept digging my fingertips into his waist until he landed on the floor, then I jumped on top of him, weaving my hands through his chicken-wing arms to get to his ribs. But as I lifted his shirt, his eyes went wide and, though he laughed it off, I saw panic there right before he flipped me over and threw me down softly onto the rug near the foot of his bed.

The air was filled with breathy laughs and a kind of energy that was so vibrant and tingly I had to admit that he was right; Ara would have loved the human version of him. He was lovely and sweet and playful. I liked how his face went red when he laughed and how he sometimes couldn’t catch his breath. I liked the sound of his thumping heart—how it gave me signals about his desires, no matter what they were. And as he laid there half on top of me, my legs parted around his hips, my naked skin touching his warm denim jeans, I knew he wanted the same thing as me.

He leaned down into his hands and kissed my mouth, his nose pressing my cheek, his stubbly chin grazing mine. I parted my lips to let his tongue in, tasting him like he was a flavor I’d always wondered about. I wanted to commit all of him to memory. Even the slightly stale taste of coffee on his breath. But as things heated up and I put my hands up his shirt to push it off, he drew a very sudden breath and jerked back. “We have to stop.”

“Why?”

“I just…” He leaned forward and picked up the book off the floor. “We’re supposed to be going out to lunch.”

“Screw lunch.” I wrapped my bare legs around his hips to make my point, feeling my patch of hair go flat against his jeans.

And he just laughed, reaching to place the book on his bed. But as he extended his long body past my face, his shirt fell loose, and I got a very good look at why he was so defensive. My heart slipped into his nightmare in a singular cold flush, my mouth filling with saliva, making it hard to swallow. What on earth had he been through?

Without his consent, I shoved my hands up his shirt and lifted it so fast it was above his nipples before he felt its absence.

“Ara!”

“What happened?”

He scooted away from me and covered his scars. But they were etched into my eyes. I could map out every single one of them now and I just wanted to cry.

“Tell me what happened!” I demanded, getting onto my knees. He shuffled back as I moved closer, and when he was finally cornered against the armchair, I reached across and touched his shirt.

“Don’t. Please,” he said, pinning it down in tight fists.

“Why?”

“Because I can’t talk about it. I…”

“Then I won’t ask,” I said. “I promise.”

He shook his head, closing off from me like a scared, rigid child.

“David, please.” I shuffled a knee-space closer and let my breast fall against his upper arm, my lips a breath away from his jaw. “I need to see.”

“Why?”

“Because I care about you. And you clearly hide these from me—from everyone—”

“Of course I do, Ara.”

“Don’t.” I stopped him as he turned away, curling my fingertips around the hem of his shirt. “Not from me, okay?”

He tensed, staring with a hard face at the floor as I lifted the shirt up. The inch of skin above his jeans was perfect, as it should be, but beyond that, starting at the base of his ribs and devastating his chest, it was clear he’d been cut deeply many times. There were two thick and still-red scars in squares on each side of his ribs, and a very jagged circular one around his left nipple, as if it had been cut off and sewn back on.

He tightened up a little more as I motioned for him to raise his arms, and when he did, I saw why. Everything outside of his chest area was perfect—untouched—as though these injuries were done deliberately there to hide them. The squared scars on his ribs were nothing on the other cuts, which were very obviously stab wounds, and as I accidentally touched the thick skin of a wound, it became apparent that I’d felt a scar before. I just hadn’t realized it was a scar, nor had I realized it wasn’t normal to have a scar on his penis. My mind went back to the closet, where I’d had it in my mouth, deriving images from the touch that I couldn’t possibly have fathomed back then.

His shoulders were the worst, though—criss-crosses of angry red ridges, some white in places—and when I shuffled around to look at his back, his shoulders curled in obvious shame, my breath leaving my lungs in a barely restrained sob. Whoever did this had fun doing it—made a joke of it. His back had been carved out like a chessboard, skin left in places and taken in chunks in others. It was smooth skin versus scars, and the creator had a masterful hand with a scalpel.

“I was once regarded as the most skilled torturer in the Drakarian monarchy,” he said quietly. “Second only to Morgana.”

“This is strategic pain-causing,” I whispered, gently touching the tip of my fingers to the scars. He flinched a little but didn’t pull away. “Does it hurt still?”

“No.” He shook his head. “I was healed at Loslilian General by some first-class surgeons and some advanced vampire medicine, but this is the best result they could get. It’s just sensitive because no one’s ever touched it before.”

“Has anyone seen it?”

His head moved in another no. “There were the few that rescued me from the tombs, but…”

“But?”

“There was a lot of blood. No one really knows the true extent of the damage.”

I slid my hand around to his stomach and pressed my cheek to his shoulder. “I’m sorry this happened to you, David.”

“It was far less than…” He stopped, and I got the sense that he wasn’t sure whether to say ‘than you suffered’ or ‘than my wife suffered’.

I gave him a firm squeeze with loving arms, afraid to move in case he closed off again and refused to talk to me. A door had been opened, and I wanted him to finally tell me what had happened to them in those tombs.

“What are you doing?” He turned at the waist to look back at me when I slipped his phone from his pocket.

“I’m calling Mike.”

“Why?”

“Mike,” I said when he picked up, ignoring David. “We’re not coming down for lunch.”

“Oh. Everything okay?”

“Yeah. I… uh… we just need to talk, is all.”

“Got it. Say no more,” he said. “We’ll take care of Harry.”

“Thanks, Mike.”

“Anytime.”

When I hung up the phone, David had a worried look. “Why did you do that?”

“Because…” I shuffled around on my knees to the front of him, relaxing down onto my legs after. “You’re going to tell me why she chose to etch a chessboard into your back, and then you’re going to tell me what happened here.” I pointed to the jagged nipple scar. “And here”—I aimed my finger to the squares on his ribs—“and then you’re going to tell me why you look so haunted when you mention what she did to me.”

“To Ara.” He sat down on his butt, head in hands, elbows propped on his knees.

“No.” I knelt up and pulled his hand down. “To me. I don’t remember what happened, but it did happen, and one day, it might just come back and hit me. I need to know so it won’t be such a shock when it does.”

He considered me for a moment, one eye slightly narrowing before he shut them both and sighed. “Morgana placed a hex on me once—made me hate you. We almost broke up over it. When I found out, I beat the flesh off her face with my bare hands.”

“Literally?”

“Literally.” He held my gaze with firm resolve, regretting nothing. “I did things that I’m not proud of that night—things I felt were justified at the time, but that I later felt like a monster for.”

“What kinds of things?”

“I…” He cleared his throat.

“David, just say it.”

“I cut off her breasts with a scythe.” He shuddered then as he broke down for a moment, burying his head again. When he finally found a voice to speak, he kept his face hidden between his knees. “I forced her to play a round of chess to decide which parts of her I’d cut next. Pawns were limbs—every time she lost one, I’d cut a limb. Knights were… orifices—”

“Okay. I get it.” I patted his arm. “So you were brutal.”

He nodded. “I made sure she suffered. And when she got the chance, she returned the favor tenfold.”

I watched him cry for a moment, taking in his rounded shoulders and the way they quivered. He never really cried in front of me—it was something he avoided at almost all costs. I’d hear him in his room, but he always got away from me before the tears came, so to see him like this was hard. One part of me wanted to comfort him, but the other part knew he needed me to give him space.

“What are the squares?” I pointed to my own ribs. “Why have you got those?”

“She carved out runes in the ancient language,” he said, looking down at the scars. “They were heinous words, and the surgeon at the hospital removed them.”

“Why? What words were they?”

“Unworthy King.” He pointed to the lower rib cage. “This one here was a word that, in translation, means evil or bad father.”

“Why did she do it where no one would really see?”

“It’s to do with nature’s branding—the traditional points of Marking. The ribs are kind of a sacred place, close to the heart, and we wear our most true markings there.”

My eyes moved to the two scars on his left rib. “What did those ones say?”

“Demon,” he said, but stopped when he pointed to the next scar, his jaw going stiff.

“What is it?” I shuffled a little closer, but it was no good. He’d gone tight again, and pale. His stomach sunk and lifted rapidly—the only outward sign that he was battling with something.

“David, please.” I touched his arm, sending soft pulses of calming energy into him.

“Theft of virtue,” he whispered in a crackly voice.

“Theft of virtue?”

“Translated into our language it means… rapist.”

I drew my hand back, unsure if I heard him correctly. “It means what?”

His head flipped up and he tossed his hair off his face, his tongue pushing into his cheek. “You heard me.”

“Did you…” He held my gaze firmly. “Did you rape her when you punished her?”

“Do you think I did?”

“No.” I shook my head, my eyes wide. “And not one bone in my body would ever believe that.”

“She did believe that,” he said. “Or at least she thinks I ordered her to be raped.”

“Ordered it?”

“I left her in the cell that night.” He pointed off to the side, as though she was in the opposite corner of the room. “I did nothing other than cut her and beat her. I didn’t rape her. And I didn’t order anyone to do it.”

I nodded, touching his wrist again. “I believe you—”

“Don’t.” The green in his eyes vanished behind a thick layer of tears, his gaze unwavering. “Because I am guilty of rape.”

“What?”

His next attempt at words broke away to sniffles and he wiped at his eyes with the back of his wrist. “I am guilty, Ara. And that’s why she branded me.”

The air became thick and stale and my bones felt like lead. “Who… did you…?”

“My wife,” he said in a breathy burst of anguish. I almost didn’t hear him, and when the words sunk in, I wanted him to repeat it, but I knew he wouldn’t be able to. I sat stunned, unable to speak because I couldn’t figure out in what scenario he would rape his wife—his very beloved wife.

“I lived with what I did for days until Elora came to see me in the hospital,” he added. “I thought I’d gone insane—that I acted out of madness for the pain I was in after the torture…”

“So this was in the tombs?”

He nodded, tucking his head between his elbows. “When Elora said she’d slept with Falcon, it all made sense—the liquid Morgana fed me beforehand. Why would she give me water? Why would she give me anything that would offer comfort? And then, because it happened just after she fed me that water, I realized what it was…”

He wasn’t making much sense, going back and forth, and so upset I could barely understand him, but I think I caught on. “So… you were drugged, like Elora and Falcon?”

He nodded.

“And you raped Ara because of that?”

He nodded again, sobbing into his arms.

“Then, David…” I crawled in between his legs and lifted his face with both hands. “You’re not a rapist—”

“She screamed. She begged me to stop. And I didn’t.” Fat droplets of tears landed on my bare leg where it rested under him, David taking a second to get his voice back. “I didn’t care that she was screaming. I didn’t care that she passed out. How does that not make me a rapist? I went—I did that to her. I hurt her, I was on top of her, just fucking her over and over until I was…” His jaw set stiff and two jagged breaths entered his lungs involuntarily. “Done.”

My hands fell from his face one by one, weak with devastation.

“She wouldn’t have known I was drugged. She thought I did that by choice. I—”

“No.” My soul bled as I realized how awful that must be for him. “She knows your heart. Even I know your heart. I know what you’re capable of and, David.” I lifted his face, holding his cheeks firmly. “You are not a rapist.”

“Then what am I? Because I did fuck her against her will, Ara. And she was cut open at the time.” His mouth turned down and his eyes fixed on the horror on the other side of his mind. “Morgana cut chunks out of me”—he motioned down to his groin—“and when Ara begged her to stop, she did it to her.”

“Do you mean…?” I wasn’t sure I wanted the answer. “She cut her down there?”

He nodded, his hand tightly squeezing his mouth as fat tears rolled out, unopposed, over his wide, fixed eyes.

“And she wasn’t healed when you…”

He shook his head. “I could feel her cuts separate every time I entered her.”

I covered my mouth, deeply sickened.

“We were both bleeding so heavily it gushed at times. And it hurt—so much I can’t even describe. I just…”

“David, you need to listen to me.” I took a deep breath, having no idea what I should say. This horror, this is why he needed absolution from her. He needed her to look him in the eye and tell him she forgave him. Nothing I ever said would be enough. “Remember how you killed Jason’s pregnant girlfriend?”

He laughed, looking up at me. “This is a hell of a time to bring that up.”

“I know, but… bear with me.” I got up on my knees so our faces would be in line. “Ara forgave you, right, because she loved you and because she understood why you’d done it.”

“And?”

“And she might not have known you were drugged, but she would have known there was a reason you did that to her.”

His eyes stayed on mine, ears reaping my words hungrily as though none of this had ever occurred to him.

“David, she knew that wasn’t you. This girl you’ve all told me so much about, she doesn’t just understand you out of love or the years you’ve been together, she knows your inner truth. She knows who you are at your core—”

“She begged me not to hate myself,” he said absently, his expression shifting from the tight twist of regret to the looseness of realization. “I didn’t make sense of it at the time—”

“Then make sense of it now, because she’d damn well forgive you and you know it.”

He coughed out and then buried his brow in his arm, his shoulders shaking though no sound came from his lips.

“Look, I know it won’t mean anything to you, but I forgive you,” I said firmly, meaning it. “I know you, David, and I know you would never do something like that. I know you’re so sorry that you can barely even breathe sometimes. But from the very bottom of my heart, you need to know that I forgive you.”

One arm came out of the tight fold he was in and wrapped my shoulders, drawing me in to the tear-moistened surrounds of his face and his chest. I exhaled deeply, feeling more connected to him now than ever before, and just sat there in his arms, letting him grieve. I wasn’t sure why, but after a few minutes I cried too. His grief was just so heavy, and I so badly wanted to take it away. Everything he’d suffered hurt me as deeply as if I’d been there with him, and the only relief I’d get was in the form of tears, sitting here with my shoulder against his heart, my legs tucked up and his arms safely around me.

He stopped crying then and cupped my jaw, angling my face up, and as he pressed his lips to mine, I wrapped my arms around his neck, angling my body inward. I knew what was in this kiss; I knew it was relief and pain and loss and longing and I knew, most of all, it was a thank you. Somehow, something I said had released him from his burden in some way. Maybe I would never know what it was, but I could feel it. I could feel the weight had lifted.

But with this kiss, and with the way he moved out from under me and lifted me up off the ground, I had to wonder if he was kissing me, or his wife.

He laid me on the bed and my body warmed with the possibilities, staying cautiously cool in case this ended. Right now, I was more naked with him than I would ever have imagined myself being, my body covered only by his t-shirt, his body covered only by jeans. But I wanted it to happen. I just wanted him to be here with me. At least for my first time.

His hand slipped along my bare leg then and up the shirt, making me scared and excited in a very intense kind of way. A cool breeze moved in between my legs as he shifted back off the bed and stood there, unbuckling his belt.

Based on the cruelty I’d seen him exude in the past, a part of me wondered for a moment if he was going to spank me with it, but he tossed it aside and slipped his thumbs into his jeans, moving them down his hips.

I looked away. His bed felt so soft under my skin that I shifted my legs a little to let it touch every inch of them, my ribs lifting high with each deep, ready breath. I wasn’t just ready for sex—ready to feel him inside of me. I was ready for him—to feel the way his skin felt against mine. All of it. Every inch of flesh on his body touching mine at the same time. I wanted to be hollow, to evaporate and let him breathe me in. But I wasn’t ready to see the scars I knew were on his penis. It touched my leg as he bent forward and lifted the shirt up my body, exposing my nakedness for the first time. My first time.

His eyes narrowed when he took me in, though, as if something was missing, but he didn’t say anything. In fact, he didn’t even ask if I was ready for him before he parted my legs with both hands and then pressed his body down on me, driving himself smoothly and quickly inside.

My insides were so wet and ready that, as he slipped in, I gave nothing more than a small grunt, but my heart broke a little. It was obvious now that he was here with his wife, not me—not a girl who was essentially a virgin. But he deserved that, didn’t he? One night with her after so much pain. So it was technically my first time. Big deal. What was going on here was more important than that.

I curled my fingertips and ran them down his back, pressing deeply but gently into the flesh, feeling the knots of his scars all the way down. When our eyes met again, David cupped my cheek firmly, searching for something inside my gaze. Maybe for his wife. I smiled softly, losing my control then as he went deeper and the tip of him touched something in me that sent warm quivers through my hips.

“Ara.”

“What?” I opened my eyes to his sexy laugh and his gorgeous smile.

“You need to be quiet. We live with a bunch of immortals.”

“Oh.” My eyes widened for a second. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be sorry.” He leaned down and kissed me once. “I like it when you get carried away.”

“You say that like we’ve done this a hundred times before.”

He stopped instantly and withdrew, leaving behind a very warm, wet feeling. “Oh my God, Ara…”

“What’s wrong?” I shuffled to the end of the bed where he sat with his head in his hands. “David, what’s wrong?”

“I’m so sorry.”

“Why?”

“I acted on autopilot.” He turned back and touched my leg. “I forgot this is your first time.”

“So you…” I looked timidly at his hand on my knee. “You were here with me then?”

“With you?” He turned fully to face me. “What do you mean?”

“I… I thought maybe you were—”

“Doing that to relive my past?” He looked shocked. “Ara, I would never do that to you.”

“I didn’t accuse you of being a jerk for it, David. I understand, I—”

“Sweetheart, I miss my wife. No. Scratch that, I miss being able to talk about old times or share memories with you, but you are her. I don’t see you as anyone else. And I know you do.” He clutched both my cheeks firmly, bringing his forehead to mine. “I know you want me to as well, but to me, you’re my wife. Yes, you’ve changed. Yes, we had to fall in love all over again, but the fact is, I do love you.” He gave my face an affectionate little shake. “I love you for who you are now and who you were then. And if I think back to the girl you were when we met the very first time, you’ve changed since then too, and I still love that girl. I will love the girl you become in twenty years’ time, but you will always be my Ara.”

His Ara. I actually liked the way that sounded. I liked that, even without being who I used to be, I could still be his Ara. It made me feel safe that he would stand beside me no matter what.

David shuffled a bit closer then, and my eyes took in his nakedness, seeing it for the first time in perfect daylight. Morgana had cut thick chunks out of his penis all the way down, but the doctors had obviously filled them in and left them as smooth yet wiry scars. When I felt them in the closet that one time, I just thought that was normal. And I didn’t care so much what it looked like, but I couldn’t even imagine how much that would have hurt.

“Don’t look,” he said, lifting my face. “I don’t want you to think about that.”

I shut my eyes tight, trying to erase it.

“Does it bother you—the scars? Can you feel them when I’m in you?”

I shook my head, not ready yet to open my eyes.

His hand rested alongside my face and I felt his breath brush my chin when he spoke next. “Did I hurt you?”

“No.”

“But you’re a virgin—”

“Technically.” I opened my eyes, smirking at him. “But not physically.”

His eyes widened. “Oh.”

“You didn’t know that?”

“I…” He looked down at nothing. “I guess it makes sense now.”

I laughed. “My body didn’t regenerate as a completely new body—”

“Then why are your markings missing?” He nodded to my ribs.

“My what?” I touched myself softly, and it was only then that I actually noticed the tattoo on his ribcage—a long line of fancy scroll in words I didn’t understand. “Like yours you mean?”

He nodded.

“I never knew I had one.”

“You had several.” He took my hand and pressed his thumb to my ring finger. “There was a black band here as well—a marking placed there by Lilith”

“The queen?”

“No. Her grandmother.”

“Why would her grandmother put a black mark on my finger?”

“It was supposed to be an eternal reminder of the love you had for me that I would never return to you, but she was wrong.”

I studied my finger, wondering where the mark had gone, remembering something from a dream I once had. “Maybe it will come back when all my powers do.”

“Or maybe it won’t.” He capped my hand. “Nor will the mark of your promise.”

“My what?”

He showed me his rib. “Lilith is the new queen now, and my brother the king. Perhaps mine will fade with time too.”

“What does them being on the throne have to do with anything?”

“We got these markings the day we made our promise to serve as royals to the monarchy.”

“Royals?”

“No one told you yet?” His brow hung low over wide eyes. “You don’t know?”

“Know what?”

“Ara, we were King and Queen.”

I sat back a bit, letting that sink in. And then so many more things made sense, as if I’d known the facts all along but hadn’t really had time to process them. I looked at his scar, where the rune depicting “Unworthy King” had been.

Of course. If I once had the soul of Lilith, was a descendant of hers, then I was, before she was resurrected, the only true and rightful queen—also since I was the daughter of the Drakarian King. How had that never occurred to me before now? Brett was a member of the Queen’s Guard. My guard. No one had ever said otherwise and yet I never made that connection.

“Who put the marks there?” I pointed to his tattoo.

“The mother of nature, I guess.”

“Then did she take them away because I’m not running the show now?”

“I don’t know.” He smoothed his thumb over where I imagined my mark once was. Then he leaned a bit closer and pressed my ribs, angling them to the sun coming through the window, focusing on them intently. “No. It’s still there but it’s faded.”

I narrowed my eyes at it, but I couldn’t see. “So maybe it’ll come back.”

He looked away in thought. “It could be to do with your memories—maybe because you don’t know who you truly are.”

I shrugged. I really didn’t care right now. David was naked and even with his body covered in scars, he looked sexy and I just wanted to lay back down with him on top of me. I shuffled sideways and closed the tiny gap left between us, letting my leg fall against his.

“If you become a vampire again, will the scars fade?”

He nodded. “If we cut them cleanly away, yeah.”

I nodded too, realizing we’d have to turn him sooner than later. He couldn’t live like that. It wasn’t fair.

“Ara?” he prompted.

When I looked into his eyes, he motioned down to where his hand lifted mine, gently moving it away so he could part my legs.

“Do you want to continue?” he asked. “Because if you—”

“Yes.” I jumped up and wrapped my arms around his neck, my legs around his waist. “I want to.”

David laughed, and as he threw me down on the bed, landing between my legs, I caught a flash of his gorgeous grin, all sharp and sexy with those pure white fangs. I knew he couldn’t read my mind anymore, but as I angled my head to lengthen my neck, he read my body language—knew I wanted those teeth in me. He’d never break the skin, but as he bit down, my nerves raced around like a wild wind, making my lower spine tingle.

“God, it’s been so long since I’ve done that—to anyone,” he whispered.

“Bite harder,” I insisted, shutting my eyes and closing out the rest of the world.

David moved his hands from under my back then and slipped himself inside of me, taking both my wrists above my head and pinning them there. My insides tightened around him, calling him deeper, a feeling so intense I didn’t notice the flesh at my shoulder pop open until I smelled blood. My eyes widened with tension, but David didn’t even flinch. He rolled his body against mine, drinking my blood down as it gushed from my flesh, so I let myself go. I shut my eyes again and held onto him, moving my hips to take him as deep as my body desired.

I could feel my blood making him harder, coursing through his veins and altering things inside of him, even making him warmer.

“What will that do to you?” I whispered.

“What?” He leaned back a bit, his mouth and chin washed with red.

“My blood.”

When he smiled, red lines showed in his otherwise perfect white teeth. “It doesn’t have much power, really. I might feel a bit stronger and more energetic, if anything.”

“What if I drink yours?”

“It’ll burn,” he said, as if I should already know that. And I did. But he was once a vampire. It was possible for him to retain some of his supernatural abilities, so maybe the blood wouldn’t be so bad. He must have caught on then, because his expression changed. “And I don’t heal, remember? If you cut me to drink from me, I’ll be nursing a wound for weeks.”

Damn it. He had a point. “Then I guess I’ll just have to settle for sex—until we can get you turned back.”

“Turned back?” He relaxed his body against mine, readjusting his arms where they were obviously getting tired holding him up. “Are you saying you actually want that?”

I nodded, shifting my leg where his skin pulled mine a bit. “Sooner rather than later. You’re twenty-two in a few days. I’m still nineteen, technically—”

He laughed, cutting me off, dropping his head down so his hair tickled my brow. “Really? You’d really rather me vampire than human?”

I winced. I know his Ara always wanted to see him human, and a part of me wanted to wait until I had all my memories back before we turned him so I could relate to that desire, but soft and sweet and funny as he was in human form, I needed the vampire. It was great drinking from Cal, but it did feel weird. He was a friend, and when I placed my mouth on his skin, I felt more for him—as David had warned—the feeling slipping away the second I stopped drinking.

It wasn’t that I didn’t trust myself, but I just didn’t want to feel that way. In fact, I did, but I wanted to feel that way with David. “I think we should turn you back after Elora’s wedding next week.”

His warm breath moved across my nose from beneath his smile. He brought his arm up and rested it on the pillow just above my head, and I could smell the subtle mix of sweat and spicy cologne, feel his chest just inches away from my lips until he folded down, so his lips came to mine.

“Then we best enjoy each other now. This could be one of the last times we make love while I’m a human.”

I wrapped my legs up over his hips, paying close attention to how he felt inside of me, and to the fact that he was actually inside of me, deep and full and hard.

“After this,” he said breathily, moving again, “you should probably sleep at your own house for a few days, just until after the wedding.”

“Why?”

“Because I won’t be able to hide this from anyone. I know you want to take things slowly, and if I’m to respect that, I need some space from you.”

“Why?” I made him stop, my hands pressed to his waist.

“Because I won’t be able to keep my hands off you. We’ve opened a door here, Ar,” he said, and I wasn’t sure he’d ever called me ‘Ar’. “Not just making love, but…” He glanced back to where we’d been sitting when we spoke. “It’s taken a lot of discipline not to show my affection for you, and now that the door’s open, I won’t be able to keep myself in check.”

I’m overjoyed, he said in his mind—something I knew he didn’t mean for me to hear. How can I be anything but a perfectly happy man after this?

“You think everyone will notice?”

He laughed. “How can they not?”

“Okay then.” I used my hands to make his hips move again. “I’ll go home tonight then. But I have to stay over the night before your birthday.”

“Why?”

“Duh!” I widened my eyes at him. “Because it’s your birthday the next day!”

He laughed, nodding. “Agreed.”

Mike plonked down like a weighted sack on the couch beside me and turned his head so I could see his mischievous grin. “So?” he said.

“So what?” I focused on my book, trying to ignore him. But it was pretty clear at this point that he heard what David and I did in bed this morning.

“So when are you telling the kids?”

“Telling the kids what?”

“That you’re back together.”

“We’re not.”

“Not what?” The air changed, went colder.

“Not telling them.”

“But you are, though, right? Back together, I mean?”

I looked up from the words on my page to his caramel eyes, and smiled. He smiled too.

“It needs to stay between us, okay? Just in case he turns evil again and I’m forced to leave him.”

He frowned. “You think he’ll hurt you again?”

“I think I’m smart to be careful,” I said. “Just until I’m sure. Because he’s lovely right now, but I’ve seen him put on an act in the past.”

“And you think this is an act?”

“I just don’t know. I mean, I don’t know him well enough to know exactly what he’s capable of, especially when it comes to his wife.” Which wasn’t entirely true. I was just afraid because it was all so perfect, and it just felt like nothing perfect ever lasted. I wasn’t ready to fall one-hundred percent and be left in tatters if he fell out of love with me.

“Got it.” He put both hands up. “I won’t say a word to anyone.”

“Will Emily?”

“She doesn’t know.” He tapped his ear. “She’s human, remember. No immortal ears.”

“Oh.” I nodded, relieved.

“I only heard it because I popped upstairs to get my phone,” he added with a laugh. “So what about Falcon, does he know?”

“No, it’s all pretty new still,” I said, shutting my book. “We didn’t really mean for that to happen, and I’m not sure it will again.”

“Why wouldn’t it?” He sat back, his arm along the couch behind me.

“Things moved along too fast. I don’t regret what happened, but I feel like…”

“You need to take a step back?”

I nodded. “I just need time and space to process, is all. So I’m gonna spend a few days at home—”

He just grinned again, as if he knew everything and I had no idea. “How does David feel about that?”

“He suggested it.”

Mike raised one brow at me. “I find that hard to believe.”

I shrugged. It was what it was.

The mood changed then, and Mike slid a bit closer, talking in a much quieter voice. “So he told you, huh?”

“Told me what?”

“I’m one of only three people that know the full extent of the damage on his body,” he said. “If you two got down-and-dirty, then you must have seen the scars.”

“So what if I did?”

“Well, if you saw them, there’s no way you didn’t ask about them.”

I set my mouth hard. “If he hasn’t told you, then I—”

“I’m not asking for the juice, Ar,” he said, softly whacking my knee with the back of his hand. “I just wanted to know he’s okay—that he’s got someone to talk to now.”

I softened. “Yeah. He’s okay.”

Mike nodded, looking out the glass doors to the courtyard. “Can I ask one thing?”

“Mm?”

“Did he tell you about the runes?” He pointed to his ribs.

“Yes.”

He nodded, looking out at the courtyard again, tense, as if a question was weighing on him. And I caught on. If he knew the extent of the damage, he must have known what those words said.

“You don’t believe that, do you?” I said, laying my book aside.

“Believe what?” He turned to face me, his brows lowering when he caught on. “I don’t want to, but he went through a pretty rough stage, went really dark, you might say—”

“Really?” I sat forward. “You really think he’s capable of rape?”

“Look, I love David. He’s like… well, maybe more than a brother to me. He always will be. And that means I love him for both the bad and the good. If he raped Morgana, Ara, then you need to tell me—”

“Why?” I started getting defensive. “You know about the runes, so you either believe it or you don’t—”

“I don’t, okay.” He shook his head, insulted. “But he’s been like a vault ever since. He hasn’t uttered a word of what happened in those tombs, and if he did rape Morgana, and that’s why she tortured you both, then the blame he’s gotta be carrying would be immense—”

“She thinks he ordered it,” I said. “She was raped in the cell, and she thinks that either David did it or that he ordered someone else to do it.”

Mike sat back, running both hands over his face. “Shit.”

The pale face of a dark-haired beauty flashed through Mike’s mind then—I saw it like a thought in my own head—and I gathered that it was Morgana. But the scene was all wrong. He was smiling with her, holding her hand. He’d had feelings for her once.

“I didn’t know she was raped. She never…” He swallowed hard.

“You feel bad?”

“Responsible, I guess.”

I studied the poised tears in his eyes. “Why?”

“Before that… Morg and I were close. Very close. I only ended things with her because she put that hex on David.”

“Well, don’t feel too bad.” I sat back, folding my arms and looking outside. “She got revenge. And David’s not a rapist, okay? So don’t ask him about it.”

“I won’t.” He sat quietly for a minute or two then, but I could hear the cogs in his brain turning. “Did he say what happened to you? In the tombs?”

My mouth tried to lie but my face said it all. Mike just nodded again, cupping my knee in a show of support.

“You don’t have to tell me. I’m not here to interrogate you, Ar. I was just hoping he was all right. And that you’re all right.”

“We’re both all right.” I offered a smile. “We’re in this together now. Even if I don’t remember any of it.”

He smiled back. “Okay then. Well”—he hopped up, pressing on my leg for a push—“if either of you need a third party to lend an ear, you know where to find me.”

“Thanks, Mike,” I said, picking up my book as he left the room. But I didn’t read another word of it. My thoughts were miles away in a tomb under a place I once called home.