Hidden Desire

by Amy Patrick

  Asher places a spread hand on Laney’s stomach and one on her head. Closing his eyes, he drops his chin to his chest, his eyes squeezed shut. I’ve never watched a healer at work, so I’m not sure what to expect.

  There’s no glowing light or anything, but there is a sound. It’s something like a hum or a vibration maybe. It starts out so low I’m not sure if I’m imagining it but then it grows louder until there is a very distinct noise in the room, evidence that it’s working. Or at least that’s what I hope.

  Asher stays like that for at least a half hour, beads of sweat forming on his brow and his face contorting in concentration—or maybe in pain. Finally he lifts his hands and staggers back, looking exhausted.

  I lean over Laney’s face, eager to see her eyelids flutter open. “Did it work?”

  There is no change in her appearance. She doesn’t move.

  “No.” Asher lets out a long breath. “I’m sorry. I think she’s in a coma. I can feel her life force in there, but it’s like she’s really far away, and I’m calling to her but she’s out of earshot and can’t hear me. Either she’s too far gone—or I’m not strong enough.”

  He’s got tears in his eyes as he shakes his head and repeats, “I’m sorry.”

  Hakon rises from a chair in the corner where he collapsed. “Let me try. We’ll work together. Maybe our glamours in combination will be enough.”

  Asher nods, takes a fortifying breath, and goes back to the bedside. Hakon joins him. They each place their hands on her now, and I redouble my efforts to strike a deal with the universe, promising to be the greatest champion for the human race ever seen in the Elven Courts, Dark or Light. I vow to pay for the treatment of every S addict on the planet, to personally crusade against its use, shoot public service announcements, go on all the entertainment news shows I hate and warn against it—anything if she will wake up.

  Again the humming noise fills the room. This time I can feel the vibrations of it in my chest. I watch in helpless silence as the healers work together to save the girl I love.

  Hakon breaks his concentration for a moment. “It’s not working,” he says. “We’re losing her. Culley—come help us.”

  I immediately put my hands on her—one on her cheek, the other over her heart. But I know it’s hopeless. I feel as if the contents of my body are being sucked down into a deep whirlpool, spinning and sinking. I can’t lose her. But there’s nothing I can do to stop it.

  “What can I do?” I choke. “I don’t have healing glamour.”

  “But you love her,” Asher says through gritted teeth, his voice strained with fatigue and effort. “If you’re ever going to tell her, now’s the time. It may be your last chance.”

  “Laney,” I start and falter then begin again, speaking around a boulder in my throat. “Laney, sweet—I hope you can hear me. I don’t want you to leave me. I need you too much. You’re the only person who’s ever truly cared for me. You’ve showed me that love is real and it’s possible. I don’t want it to end. I don’t want you to leave this world. But if you must, know that I will find you in the next one. Because... because I love you. I’ve loved you from the very start, from the moment we met. And I will go on loving you no matter what. You once told me you could read hearts. Read mine now, love, and you’ll know it’s true.”

  I lift her limp, cool hand and press it to my wildly beating chest. “This heart is yours for eternity and will follow wherever you go.”

  There is no response. No flicker of life from her beautiful face. It’s too late. She is gone.

  I crush my lips to hers in a final kiss then reach across the bed to palm Hakon’s discarded medicine pouch, drawing it close, feeling the weight of the iron powder inside, ready for the moment the two healers declare her dead.

  Hakon sucks in a sharp breath. “I’ve got something. Do you feel it son?”

  Asher smiles, never opening his eyes or removing his hands from her body. “I feel it.”

  “Culley, don’t stop now, son,” Hakon says. “Keep talking to her. She’s moving toward you, toward your voice.”

  With a sound halfway between a laugh and a sob, I drop the bag of powdered death and take Laney’s face between my palms, encouraging her to come back to me, telling her I am there for her and will never leave her side again.

  “I love you,” I say, kiss her mouth, then say it again. “I love you, I love you, I love you.”

  Laney’s eyes open then close again. Open. Close. Asher and Hakon both let go and step back. I’m holding my breath, watching her chest rise and fall in a steady pattern. Finally her eyes open again and her hand lifts, fumbling for my face.

  When her fingertips reach my wet cheeks and smiling mouth, she opens hers to speak. Her voice is rough, but the words are distinct. And distinctly amused.

  “Boy—when you get started, you just don’t stop, do you?”

  The room fills with laughter and relief. Asher and his father embrace in a tight hug, but all my focus is on Laney.

  “I can’t stop saying it,” I tell her. “I never will—as long as we both shall live.”

  Epilogue

  “It’s okay if it doesn’t work, you know,” Laney says.

  She sits beside me in the kitchen of Asher’s family farmhouse. As she’s fully human, we couldn’t take her to Altum for the Elven healing procedure. She doesn’t seem nervous at all, but I’m a freaking wreck. What if it does work? What will she think when she sees me for the first time? Will it change things? Will she still want me?

  It doesn’t matter, I remind myself. This isn’t about me—it’s about her, making her life better, making her happy. As her betrothed, that’s my new life mission.

  “It’ll work,” I say. “I know it.”

  She squeezes my hand tighter. “But if it doesn’t... it’s okay. I already have everything I could want, even without my sight. And I already know you’re beautiful—in here—where it counts.” She taps my chest with a smile so sweet I wish we were alone in the room.

  “You’re the beautiful one,” I murmur close to her ear. “I love you.”

  Asher clears his throat. “So then... should we get started? Culley... if you wouldn’t mind stepping back?”

  I immediately do, moving to lean against the kitchen wall, watching intently as Asher and Hakon step forward and place their hands on Laney’s head, her face, over her nonfunctioning eyes.

  Asher’s grandfather, Mr. McCord is here, along with Ava, Lad, and Ryann, and Asher’s mother Jenna. Her eyes are filled with wonder and pride as she watches her son and her love working as a team.

  Hakon took a page from my book and threw himself at her mercy, seeking and finding forgiveness for his absence, confessing his true identity and the full explanation for why he had to stay away and asking if she’d still be interested in having him now that the threat of Audun’s vengeance had been eliminated.

  She was.

  As for my father, I can’t say that I miss him, but I am sorry things had to happen the way they did. I’d much rather he’d had a change of heart and found the kind of redemption and happiness I have.

  He missed out on the best part of life—loving someone and being loved in return. Even his own wife, my mother Falene, doesn’t seem too broken up about his death. Only I can see the mark she now wears as a widow. The rest of the world still sees her the way they want to—she is, after all, the source of my glamour gift.

  It’s a weird feeling being fatherless, though really, Audun Rune filled that role in name only for me. Many would agree the world is a better place without him. As for the Dark Court, Nox returned from abroad, announced that Audun was gone, and with him, his plans for Elven domination of the human race. So far, there have been few repercussions that I know of—at least in this country.

  The Light Elves succeeded in hijacking the scheduled S deliveries and destroying the dangerous product, and the S factories were converted to produce new, iron-filled pills with lesser and lesser degrees of the drug’s addictive substance
. According to Shane, the stepping-down process seems to be working for S addicts, helping them come out of their addictions gradually instead of cutting off the supply cold-turkey, which might have been fatal to them. Within a few months, those factories will be shut down entirely and his clinic along with them.

  The sunny kitchen fills with a now-familiar hum of energy, and my chest fills with bubbles of hope, making it hard to stay still. But leaving the room is impossible. I want to be the first thing Laney sees when she opens her eyes—if she sees anything at all.

  After no longer than fifteen minutes, both men lift their hands and fall back, looking to each other, then the rest of us around the room.

  “It’s done,” Hakon says. “Now let’s see if it worked.”

  “Okay Laney,” Asher encourages. “You can open them.”

  Ava stands beside me, bouncing on her tiptoes with excitement, and I grab her fingertips. She gives me a brilliant smile and squeezes so hard my fingers go numb.

  Laney’s eyelids lift slowly. Her pretty brown eyes shift from side to side then glance upward and down. Then she focuses on my face—she’s focusing, I know she is—before her gaze goes to the other people standing around her in a group.

  Her expression doesn’t change as she spends time looking at each person, taking in the smiles, the ages, the different features.

  It occurs to me there are three young guys in the room, all of us around the same age. She could look at Lad, Asher, and me, and have no idea which one of us healed her and which one is in love with her.

  Finally she smiles, stands, and stretches out a hand to me. “Culley.”

  Overcome with emotion, I cross the room in two steps and take her into my arms. “Yes, yes sweet, it’s me.” Taking her face into my hands, I kiss her hard, and we both laugh and then cry.

  Pulling back enough to see her face and let her see mine, I say, “How did you know it was me?”

  She smiles through glistening tears. “I recognized you. When Audun overdosed me and I nearly died, you were there. You were with me. I heard you calling to me, and I started walking toward you. I saw you calling me back, telling me you loved me. You look exactly the same.” She shakes her head. “Exactly.”

  “And... what do you think?”

  She shrugs in an exaggerated way, lifting a sardonic eyebrow and tilting her head to one side. “I guess you’ll do.”

  I laugh and kiss her again, and then she’s no longer mine alone. The others in the room come in for hugs and congratulations, all of us having witnessed a literal miracle. Lad and Ryann embrace her then each other, pulling back to stare into each other’s eyes. I’m no longer baffled or nauseated by their intense connection—I understand it now. Love is real, and it’s worth everything.

  When the celebration dies down, Hakon draws Laney and me aside. “Can I speak with you two for a moment?”

  We follow him to the relative privacy of the living room where he indicates we should sit on the couch opposite his chair. I don’t like the serious look on his face. The nerves in my stomach wake with a start and begin a slow simmer.

  “What’s going on?”

  “I want to talk to you about something. Remember I mentioned before that Elven healing glamour is not really meant for humans? That there may be side effects?”

  We both nod, and now that simmering is becoming a rolling boil.

  “I’ve seen it with my patients in the free clinic in Los Angeles, though none of those treatments were as drastic as what we did to save Laney’s life or heal her today. I’m not certain, but I still thought I should warn you both...”

  “Get to the point, man,” I demand. “I’m dying here.”

  He smiles and places a reassuring hand on my shoulder and one on Laney’s. “It’s possible—very likely in fact—that what we did to save your life, and what we did here today, changed your body chemistry and cell structure. It’s probably going to result in more than just restored eyesight.”

  “What do you mean? Is it going to give me cancer or something?” she asks.

  He lets out a surprised laugh. “No, just the opposite. What I’m trying to say is that there’s a very good chance you’re going to have a greatly extended lifespan... perhaps even Elf-like immortality.”

  Both of us sit in stunned silence, processing his words.

  “Now Laney,” he continues. “I know this must come as quite a shock to you, but I want you to be prepared, to start thinking about it. An extended lifespan is going to bring a host of complications with it. If you fail to age at a normal rate, after a certain point there’ll be a spotlight of suspicion on you, which could then put the anonymity of the Elven people at risk. Eventually, you’ll have to say good-bye to all your family and friends and move far away from them or even fake your own death as the Dark Elven people do.”

  As Hakon continues to counsel Laney about all the possible “hassles” becoming immortal could lead to, my brain fills with a pyrotechnic display of astonishment, and hope, and joy.

  Finally, she turns to me, her eyes shining with wonder and love. “Are you happy?”

  “Happy? I’m overjoyed. This is the best day of my life.”

  Her nose wrinkles, and her mouth twists to the side with doubt. “But... there is one big potential problem.”

  “What is it, sweet?”

  “Well, now you're going to have a heck of a time getting out of singing Karaoke with me.”

  I laugh out loud. “Oh really? Well, the way I see it, there’s no rush to finish that little bucket list of yours. I mean... why hurry? We’ve got forever.”

  THE END

  AFTERWORD

  Thank you for reading Hidden Desire! I really hope you enjoyed it. If you did, would you consider leaving a review at iBooks? And if your fingers aren’t too tired, at Goodreads, too? Reviews are so important for authors and help other readers find great books.

  Never miss a new release from Amy Patrick by signing up for her newsletter here. You will only receive notifications when new titles are available and about special price promotions. You may also occasionally receive teasers, excerpts, and extras from upcoming books. Amy will never share your contact information with others.

  And check out http://www.thehiddensaga.com/ for more goodies on the Hidden series and what’s next in the Hidden world.

  The Hidden Saga

  Hidden Deep

  Hidden Heart

  Hidden Hope

  The Sway, A Hidden Saga Companion Novella

  Hidden Darkness

  Hidden Danger

  Hidden Desire

  Hungry for more from the Hidden world? Be sure to sign up for my newsletter—I’ll have an exciting announcement at the end of this year! And if you haven’t checked out The Sway yet, I think you’ll enjoy this deeper look at Nox and Vancia’s childhood connection and the inner workings of the Dark Court.

  About the Author

  Amy Patrick grew up in Mississippi (with a few years in Texas thrown in for spicy flavor) and has lived in six states, including Rhode Island, where she now lives with her husband and two sons.

  She’s been a professional singer, a DJ, a voiceover artist, and always a storyteller, whether it was directing her younger siblings during hours of “pretend” or inventing characters and dialogue while hot-rollering her hair before middle school every day. For many years she was a writer of true crime, medical anomalies, and mayhem, working as a news anchor and health reporter for six different television stations. Then she retired to make up her own stories. Hers have a lot more kissing.

  I love to hear from my readers. Feel free to contact me on Instagram, Twitter and my Facebook page (where I hang out the most and respond to every comment.) And be sure to sign up for my newsletter here and be the first to hear the latest news from the Hidden world as well as other new books I have in the works!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  I can’t tell you how much I appreciate your love for this series and all the encouragement I get from my readers. T
hank you for giving my books a chance to entertain you and touch your heart. I hope you will continue to love living in the Hidden world as much as I do!

  Huge thanks go to my lovely editor Judy Roth for her wonderful work as always and to Cover Your Dreams for another brilliant cover.

  I am forever grateful for my amazing critique partner, McCall, for her words of wisdom and huge heart. I’d be nowhere without my brilliant and hilarious Savvy Seven sisters, and I count so much on my Darling Dreamweavers and my Lucky 13 sisters for their support, good advice, virtual Prosecco, cupcakes, and cabana boys. #teamworddomination. I’m so proud of you all!

  I’m blessed to be “doing life” with some amazing friends. Love to Bethany, Chelle, Margie, and the real housewives of Westmoreland Farm. Special thanks to Mary for the walks and talks and pots of tea.

  To my first family for your unconditional love and the gift of roots and wings. And finally to the guys who make it all worthwhile—my husband and sons. And thank you to the rest of my friends and family for your support and for just making life good.

  Copyright © 2016 by Amy Patrick

  All rights are reserved. No part of this work may be reproduced in any fashion without the prior written permission of the copyright owner of this book. All trademarks are the property of their respective companies.

  HIDDEN DESIRE is a work of fiction. Characters, names, places, brands, media, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or have been used fictitiously and should not be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely coincidental.

  This book is licensed for your personal enjoyment only and may not be re-sold or given away to other people. The scanning, uploading, and distribution of this book via the Internet or via any other means without the permission of the publisher is illegal and punishable by law. Please purchase only authorized electronic editions, and do not participate in or encourage electronic piracy of copyrighted materials. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.