Dominion

by Marissa Farrar

  In another blur of movement, he was gone again, taking her soiled clothes with him. When he came back, he held fresh clothes from the laundry room in his arms. He knelt before her to help her into her clean jeans, but she lightly batted his shoulder.

  “Hey, I think I’ve got this.”

  He lifted his gaze to her, his beautiful green eyes full of sorrow. “Hush. It’s the least I can do. Let me help you.”

  She didn’t argue any further and when he finished dressing her, she allowed him to pull her into his arms once again and carry her into the living room. She hid her face against his solid shoulder as he did so, not wanting to be faced with the headless dead man ever again.

  He whisked her into the living room and deposited her on the couch. Elizabeth, waiting for her, scrambled into her arms. She held her daughter tight against her body, her face in her hair. She sensed Sebastian still standing there, watching them, and she looked up.

  “I’m so sorry I put you through that,” he said.

  She shook her head, though a painful knot bound her throat. “It’s not your fault.”

  Sebastian frowned. “What do you mean? I brought him here, I know I did. How can it not be my fault?”

  The sound of the doorbell rang through the house. Sebastian tensed, his hands gripped into fists and his eyes flared yellow. His head snapped toward the front door.

  “It’s okay,” she said. “It’s only Bridget.”

  His posture relaxed, but only just. He glanced back toward the kitchen. “I don’t want her to see the … mess.”

  “Neither do I.”

  Serenity paused, her mind racing. “She can’t get in unless we buzz her in.”

  “Okay, stall her. I won’t be long.” With that, he vanished from the room,

  Serenity kissed the top of Elizabeth’s head. “Stay here, sweetie.” The little girl lifted her face, her skin pale, her eyes appearing too large in her head. “Everything will be all right.” She tried to reassure her daughter, though she wasn’t sure how much she believed her own words.

  Chapter Twelve

  The doorbell chimed again and again.

  Standing above the body in the kitchen, Sebastian recognized the urgency in the sound. Bridget must be worried about Elizabeth and Serenity. He didn’t know what conversation had taken place between them, but he assumed Bridget managed to shed some light on what was happening.

  He hoped so, at least. He still had no idea how he’d gotten on the freeway or made it back to the house. The last thing he remembered was hiding in the shade beneath the overpass and making the decision to return to the world of shadows and darkness. The next moment, he’d opened his eyes to find himself back in his own bed.

  But even now, safely back home, he didn’t feel right. His thoughts were foggy, as though sleep-deprived or even hungover, if he recalled the symptoms of that particular curse correctly.

  He also needed to question the presence of the body. He’d killed again. This time he remembered the act, but he’d believed himself to be in that other place at the time. Only when the man died had he suddenly found himself back in the real world.

  So was the dead man from that other world or had he somehow crossed over so he appeared in both places? Sebastian didn’t know and his head hurt trying to think about it all.

  He’d never been so confused in his life.

  If he hadn’t gone back to the other world, how had he made it back to the house? The sun would have killed him within minutes if he’d tried to travel back in the daytime.

  In the other place, the sun posed no threat to him, being hidden by a thick bank of clouds. Or perhaps night always reigned there; he couldn’t be sure. Had he traveled across the city in one world only to appear back in the real world in the same place? If he didn’t have the dead man as proof, he’d wonder if the whole episode had happened at all.

  Sebastian glanced down at his hands. The dead man wasn’t his only proof. The skin covering the backs of his hands was pink and shiny. New skin. Skin that had healed after suffering severe burns from the sun. He lifted a hand to his face and touched his cheek. The skin felt smooth and soft beneath his fingertips, but as he ran his hand down over his neck, he frowned.

  Flakes of skin fell away like severe dandruff. The patch of skin Serenity noticed the previous day had grown. It now covered a large area of his neck and throat, creeping down over his chest.

  Spooked, he quickly pulled his hand away and concentrated on the problem at hand—the man he’d killed and Serenity had decapitated.

  I brought the body back to the house. Why did I do such a thing?

  At least he still had some of his strengths here, even if they didn’t seem to be up to capacity. Whatever was happening to him was slowly eroding away the things that made him a vampire—his strength, speed and beauty. He didn’t know where it would stop—if at all—and he needed to use his powers before he had nothing left.

  Using his speed, he scooped up the man’s head and body. Rigor mortis stiffened the man’s limbs. With little grace, he slung the body over his shoulder and tucked the head under his arm. Now the body had been drained completely, he didn’t have the worry of blood covering his clothes, other than a couple of smears which he could hide. He was careful to keep the severed neck pointing toward the ground and watched out for any red drips on the tiles.

  He could only image what sort of horrifying sight he made.

  He didn’t want to keep the body on the property, but he didn’t have time to take it farther. Instead, he left the house via the back and deposited the remains in the farthest corner of the grounds. A stack of bricks stood there—left over materials from when he’d needed the high wall surrounding the property repaired after a storm. He dumped the corpse beside the stack and then stood behind the bricks. With a single shove, he toppled the bricks over the body. He didn’t think the man would try to come back again, if such a thing was even possible, but at least with a ton of brick covering the remains, it’d need to put up more of a fight.

  Within seconds, Sebastian was standing back in the kitchen. He balled kitchen towels in his hands and used them to clean up the dark spots of blood, smearing the red across the tiled floor. At least the man had already been dead and, for the most part, drained when Serenity killed him again. The relatively small amount of blood meant for a faster cleaning job.

  Though he worked physically, his thoughts and emotions stayed with Serenity. He wanted to weep for what she’d been forced to do. That she’d done it because of him made him want to tear his own heart out.

  His sensitive hearing picked up Serenity, standing at the door, speaking into the intercom.

  “Everything is fine, Bridget. Just give us a minute, okay?”

  He heard Bridget’s voice coming back, terse. “Let me in, Serenity. I’m not stupid. I know something’s going on.”

  “I’m getting dressed,” Serenity argued. “I won’t be long.” She paused and took a deep, shaky breath. Sebastian heard her teeth chattering. Bridget would take one look at her and know something terrible had happened. If they wanted Bridget’s help, they’d need to tell her anyway. But there was a vast difference between telling her and showing her the result.

  He surveyed his handiwork. A team of forensic scientists would easily find traces of the man’s blood, but nothing could be seen with the naked eye, even a vampire’s naked eye. With a burst of speed, he arrived at Serenity’s side. He put an arm around her waist and pulled her against his shoulder. Her trembling began to subside.

  “Go to Elizabeth,” he said, stroking her hair. “I’ll let Bridget in.”

  “Is it done?”

  He nodded. “There’s nothing for you to worry about.”

  She lifted her face and stepped away from him, a hard glint in her dark eyes. “Don’t give me that, Sebastian. After what I just did, don’t bullshit me.”

  “You’re right, I’m sorry.”

  The buzzer went off again and Serenity shot him another look before stalking
back to Elizabeth.

  Sebastian gritted his teeth. He didn’t want Bridget here—especially not under these circumstances—and he certainly didn’t want to be beholden to her. He’d not seen the woman for a few months, as the times she and Serenity got together for Elizabeth’s sake tended to be during the day. Her betrayal had put his whole family at risk. While part of him understood that she did so in order to protect her own son, the other part would never forgive or trust her completely.

  Yet, here he was again, relying on her for help.

  Without saying a word, he pressed the button to open the big iron gates at the entrance to the property. His sensitive ears picked up the slight creak of the gate hinge as they crept open and then the crunch of gravel as Bridget’s quiet Prius mounted the drive.

  He steadied his emotions, waited until the car’s engine silenced, and swung open the front door.

  “Bridget,” he said, his tone level.

  Bridget slammed her car door shut and approached. “Hello, Sebastian. Are you going to explain to me what the past couple of minutes have been about?”

  He cast his gaze to the ground. “I guess I don’t really have a choice in the matter.”

  She brushed past him into the house. “No, you don’t.”

  He gritted his teeth and followed her inside. Whatever else he thought, he was responsible for what he’d put Serenity through and the danger he’d put Elizabeth in. He didn’t believed Bridget still posed a threat to Elizabeth and knew that she truly regretted what she’d done and had no choice in the matter. But the situation was complicated and he’d never feel completely comfortable about having her in their lives.

  Even so, if they didn’t have her right now, they’d be lost.

  Bridget dropped her purse on the hall console. “Where are they?” she demanded.

  “We’re in here, Bridget,” Serenity called from the living room.

  The older woman turned the corner, Sebastian close behind.

  Serenity was on the couch, Elizabeth tucked under her arm. Elizabeth didn’t register Bridget’s arrival as she normally would—by diving into her old nanny’s arms—but instead stared into the distance, as though a spot on the far wall dominated her attention.

  “Elizabeth?” Bridget smiled down at her, her head tilted slightly to one side. “Are you okay, honey?”

  Elizabeth didn’t answer.

  “I think she might be in shock.” Serenity glanced down at her daughter, worry etched across her face.

  “I’m not surprised,” Sebastian muttered as he crossed the room, brushing past Bridget. He crouched beside the couch, on Elizabeth’s left, and reached out and stroked the little girl’s hair. Elizabeth continued to stare, neither flinching nor leaning into his hand.

  “Sweetie, the grownups need to talk in the kitchen for a minutes, okay? We won’t be long. Why don’t you try to have a little nap?” He took a soft chenille throw from the back of the couch and pulled it over her legs. Elizabeth shifted beneath the blanket, drawing up her feet and lowering her head to one of the cushions.

  Serenity gave her daughter another anxious glance, but Sebastian put his hand out. “Let her rest, we need to talk.”

  Serenity nodded and slipped her warm hand into his. He pulled her from the couch with ease, though she still seemed reluctant to go. With his arm around her waist, he guided her to the kitchen, Bridget leading the way.

  Bridget stopped at the kitchen’s breakfast bar and turned to them, her arms folded across her chest. “So are you going to tell me what’s been happening here? What’s wrong with Elizabeth?”

  Sebastian gave Serenity a slight nod to tell her it was okay by him if she told the story.

  Serenity took a deep breath and said, “Elizabeth and I fell asleep on the couch. When we woke, there was a dead man in the room. Only, he came back again. He was dead, I’m sure of it, but he got to his feet and tried to attack me. I cut him … with a knife. I cut off his head …” Her voice trailed off in a horrified whisper as she recounted what she’d done. “I didn’t have any choice.”

  “And Elizabeth witnessed this?” said Bridget

  “I told her to hide and cover her ears, but I don’t know how much she saw or heard.”

  “Perhaps we should take her to a doctor,” said Sebastian.

  “And say what?” Serenity shot back. “That she witnessed a man coming back to life and possibly watched her mother hack his head off?”

  Sebastian winced at her choice of words, but she was right. What could they say to a doctor? While he knew a couple of doctors would happily take a decent amount of money to write a false diagnosis of Xeroderma pigmentosum—the genetic skin disorder he used as an excuse in order to fit in with normal society—to give to the authorities, taking a traumatized child to them was a whole different matter. Understandably, when children became part of the equation, people got nervous.

  Bridget spoke up. “The best thing we can do for Elizabeth is put a stop to what is happening.”

  Sebastian’s head snapped around to survey his ex-employee. “Tell me, what exactly is happening, Bridget? Fill me in, ‘cause I sure as hell don’t know. I keep losing periods of time and I’m experiencing the strangest dreams or visions or … something. I woke up to find myself out in the daylight!”

  Serenity and Bridget exchanged a glance.

  “What?” he insisted. “Tell me!”

  Serenity stepped forward and covered his hand with her own. “You’ve got a demon inside you.”

  Sebastian stepped back, his hand slipping from hers. He frowned, shaking his head. “That’s crazy. I’d know, wouldn’t I? Sense it somehow.”

  Bridget interjected. “The demon is only present when you’re not. Two consciousnesses cannot be present in the same moment.”

  “So, is that where I’m going—in my dreams? To this demon’s world?”

  “Those aren’t dreams, Sebastian. What you experience is real, but just not in this reality.”

  “I go there when the demon is present here?”

  Bridget nodded. “That’s why you can’t remember doing things, like killing those men. You’re not the one committing those acts, it’s the demon. The demon is also the reason the bodies are reanimating. When you kill, the reason they come back as these … zombies … is because a tiny part of the demon inside you is being passed over to them. Call it transference, absorption.”

  Sebastian stared at her and then ran a hand through his dark hair. “Jesus.” His hand continued down the back of his neck, touching the patch of skin that now covered most of his neck and throat and was quickly spreading to his chest. “What about what’s happening to me? About this—” He held out his hand, flakes of skin crumbling from his fingertips. “And me losing my strengths?”

  “It’s all the demon’s work. Each time the demon is here and you are there, it takes a little more of your immortality.”

  “You’re saying I’m going to die?”

  By his side, Serenity gasped.

  “Yes, Sebastian,” Bridget said. “That’s exactly what I’m saying.”

  Serenity reached out and took his hand once more. This time he didn’t pull away. Her warmth comforted him and he suddenly battled the compulsion to put his arms around her and lay his head on her chest. To listen to the steady thump of her heartbeat, to absorb her warmth. To feel safe and loved.

  If his existence was over, he’d never see her again—her or Elizabeth. He’d never considered the possibility that he might go before them. The thought of never seeing them again filled him with a crushing sadness.

  Serenity squeezed his hand, hard enough to hurt, and he lifted his gaze to hers.

  “You’re not going to die,” she said fiercely, her dark eyes burning. “You hear me? Keep fighting this and don’t give up. We won’t give up on you.”

  He drew strength from her passion and straightened his shoulders. After everything Serenity had gone through, the least she deserved was for him to fight. He just needed to make sure she unde
rstood what she was getting herself into.

  “What about what I put you through? I brought a dead man here. Someone who attacked you!”

  She stared into his face, earnest in what she said. “I’ll cut the heads off as many zombies as I have to until we get this sorted.”

  The lack of control frightened him. He was scared of what he was capable of when he wasn’t the person steering the ship. This demon could rise to the surface at any moment, pushing him down. What if it attacked Serenity or Elizabeth? He already knew the demon liked to kill, it had proven as much the last two times he’d been gone. What was there to stop it from hurting the people he loved?

  The possibility of being pushed down to that other level, only to wake up back here in Los Angeles with Serenity or Elizabeth’s body in his arms absolutely terrified him.

  Could he voice his fears to Serenity? He didn’t want to scare her. However, he was the one who needed saving right now and he was looking to her and Bridget to do the saving.

  “Bridget,” he started. “Is there any kind of spell to help protect you all from me when I’m … not here?”

  A look passed between the two women.

  “You’re scared the demon will hurt us,” said Serenity.

  He nodded. “More than I’m scared of dying.”

  “You wouldn’t hurt us,” Serenity said quickly, as though she were trying to convince herself as much as him.

  “You don’t know that,” he shot back. Serenity glanced away and his heart tightened with fear and pain.

  “A spell to protect against vampires?” Bridget asked.

  “Or a spell to protect against demons.”

  “If such a thing existed,” Serenity said, “couldn’t we use it on Sebastian?”

  She shook her head. “I’m not strong enough. If I was, I’d have used it back in New York.”

  The atmosphere tensed as they were all reminded of that terrible time when they’d almost lost Elizabeth.

  Sebastian watched as Serenity went to the door, crossed the hall and peeped in at Elizabeth. He understood her reasons for checking on their daughter at that moment—anytime he was reminded of the fragility of children, he felt the need to make sure his own was safe and well.