by Rose , Renee
I still love the evil witch.
Rushes of hot and cold roll through my body, and as I blink, I swear I see the black glitter of Anka’s eyes gazing from Aurelia’s beautiful face.
I draw in several deep breaths to calm myself.
What just happened?
I exhale slowly, willing myself to relax. Did Aurelia somehow channel Anka’s ghost?
Christ, I need to find out.
* * *
Charlie
Aurelia pulls a t-shirt over her head. The heartbroken expression on her face rips my chest open, but I hold myself back from offering anything to her. Fuck, I can’t be sure I trust her. “What just happened?”
I sense her guilt, and my body turns to ice.
Tears swim in her eyes. “I-I...I don’t know. I think I must be Anka. Reincarnated.”
No. No fucking way.
Not Aurelia. Not my sweet, submissive fairy.
“No,” I roar, shoving her dresser and causing it to flip upside down and slam against the wall. “No,” I repeat, as if by insisting, I can make it untrue.
She doesn’t speak, just beseeches me with her eyes, lips trembling.
“How long have you known?”
Her eyes fill with tears. “About a week. I've been putting pieces together. I didn’t know it all. I was trying to fix it, Charlie,” she pleads.
Hot anger makes me flex my fingers. Before I even form the thought, I trace away. When I rematerialize, I’m still in the house, standing in her kitchen. As if my body, or my subconscious, refused to leave her this time.
I hear a sob from the bedroom.
Aurelia.The stricken look on her face the moment before I traced burns in my mind. But she’s Anka. My heart feels leaden.
You always just disappear, and I’m left trying to figure out what I did wrong and how to fix it.
I draw a breath. Fuck. She at least deserves a goodbye.
I return to her bedroom.
She stands in the middle of the floor, looking lost.
I take hold of her shoulders. “I need to leave, Aurelia. I need to be alone.”
“Are you coming back?” she whispers.
I stare at her, my gut clenched like a fist. I can’t speak. “I don’t know,” I say at last. The pain in her eyes closes my throat. “I have to go.”
She nods mutely.
“Don’t follow me.”
Her eyes glitter with tears.
I stand there like an idiot. There’s nothing more to say. I can’t be here, and yet I can’t leave.
A tear slips down my cheek.
I close my eyes and trace to my place.
Fuck. I can’t be here, either.
I trace downtown, then to the top of a parking garage. I look out over the city, fighting the urge to hunt and kill like a newly turned vampire. I crave violence, the taste of blood taken without consent. I hold very still as the animal within me rages.
* * *
Charlie
In my bedroom, I open the safe in the wall and remove the wooden box I’ve kept since 1865. Inside lies the ruby necklace I bought for Anka, the one I’d meant to give her the night I found her with another man. I’ve kept it all these years—a symbol of why women can’t be trusted. Why no one should be trusted.
I take it out of the box, holding it up to the light. I remember how pleased with myself I was, knowing how much Anka loves jewels. I close my fist around the gemstones, the pain of her betrayal so fresh I still smell her scent, feel the satin of her bedding.
She can’t be Aurelia. She just can’t be. They have nothing in common, except for their power. Aurelia’s not driven by ambition or pride. She gives her heart openly. She gives without asking in return.
And yet...how can I be with her, knowing she was Anka? What if Anka speaks to me through her again? I can’t trust myself not to hurt her. My hand had twitched to reach for her throat and squeeze!
I’m free of the curse, I should be celebrating. What a bitter irony to be healed only to discover the one woman I wanted to make love to is my worst enemy.
No. I don’t see how I could ever be with her without hating her for what she did. For who she is.
* * *
Aurelia
I wander through the streets of downtown, a terrible anxiety twisting and churning inside me.
It’s been three days. Three forking days, and Charlie hasn’t returned.
I moved through my days numbly, trying not to think. Caught in a nameless hell of hope and mourning. I see Charlie everywhere I look: in my boarded up windows, the overturned dresser, the bed, the sofa, the kitchen.
At work, I remembered how he calmed Tommy. How I’d been wrong to mistrust him. I think of his cool stares, the sardonic twist of his lips, the arrogance which had been more an act than anything.
Anka doesn’t return, and yet something in me has changed. I seem to know French, for one thing. And I feel wiser, like I absorbed Anka’s life experience to become more of an “old soul”.
I read the rest of the books Charlie bought for me and found my magic has grown even more powerful, perhaps from Anka’s integration as well. I worked in my garden, using the light from my hands to support the growth of my new plants, and I watched them respond, doubling in size in just two days.
But I can’t keep waiting for Charlie.
I need to find him. I need to convince him Anka’s gone, that I’d never hurt him. I could not take it if Charlie never came back. I need to fight for him, even though I have no idea how I’d manage a relationship with a vampire.
I stake out Eclipse but see no sign of him or the other vampires. Just the big tattooed biker dudes—the shifters. And I doubt they’d care about a missing “leech.”
My only lead is his secret lair. The bunker at Sombrero Peak. I just need a ride.
With a sigh, I pull out my phone and dial Gwen.
* * *
“This is so exciting!” Gwen gushes.
I fiddle with the fake yellow daisy in the little holder on her VW Beetle’s dash and slump in my seat. I don’t need to respond to Gwen. She’s been making little exclamations this whole time. Apparently this is a “girl’s trip,” and we’re having an “adventure.” Gwen even packed a picnic basket and a white-and-red checkered blanket. Her whole life is Instagram worthy, but I don’t think it’s an act. I think she really is the sweetest person alive.
I’d be in the mood to play along if I wasn’t so worried about Charlie.
“Turn left here,” I instruct and sit back for the rest of the ride. Sombrero Peak juts out of the cacti studded dessert. I don't know exactly where Charlie’s bunker is, but I’m hoping I can find a private road that looks vaguely official.
I hold the image in my mind, and as we reach the foot of the mountain, I see exactly what I’m looking for.
“There.” I point to an old dirt road. There’s a rusted out sign warning us not to trespass.
“Are you sure?” Gwen asks, but she’s already following my directions. Gwen’s yellow Beetle rolls down the road, kicking up thick brown dust. Her poor car’s going to be covered. I make a mental note to pay for a car wash when we’re back in town.
The road ends at another huge yellow and black sign with the nuclear symbol stamped on it.
“Okay, this is it. You can stop here.” I instruct.
“Okay.” Gwen sounds unsure, but the Beetle glides to a halt. “Is this where you want to picnic?”
“No...um…” For a second I wish I had a vampire’s power of mind wiping. But I don’t want to do that to Gwen. “Can you do me a favor? A huge favor. I need you to drop me off and go back home.” I’m already out of the car. Something tells me I need to hurry.
Gwen rolls down the window on the passenger side. She gnaws her lip. “But what about you? How will you get back?”
“My friend will give me a ride.” I cock my thumb in the vague direction of the nuclear sign.
“What friend?” Now Gwen is suspicious.
“A guy
friend. Remember, I told you about Charlie?”
She perks up. “Yes!”
“He’s really handsome and mysterious. I think he’s super rich, but he hasn’t been in a relationship for a while because the last woman he was with burned him.”
“Oh no,” Gwen is totally buying this story. Which is good because it’s pretty much the truth.
“He’s very private and eccentric, which is why he lives out here. But he brought me here the other night.” I take a deep breath. “We shared a wonderful night together, and I thought we were meant to be. He even said I belonged to him. But then he disappeared.”
Gwen nods vigorously. “He got scared and retreated. He’s afraid of intimacy. He opened up to you, and he knows you’re the One, but he’s been hurt before. I read a romance novel with this exact type of hero last week.”
“Uh, yeah. Good. So...I just know we’re meant to be.” The words tumble out of my mouth, and I feel how true they are. Huh. “It’s Fate. We’re soulmates.”
“Oh,” Gwen has her hand over her heart and stars in her eyes. “You must go to him.”
“I am. That’s why I’m here. I’ll be okay, but I need to do this alone.”
“Of course.” She nods. “Get your man.”
“I will. I promise.” I shut the car door and back away. I stop to awkwardly wave goodbye, hoping she’ll get the message.
“Use protection!” she trills and hits a button to roll up the window. She puts the car in reverse, and in another minute, she’s gone.
That went better than I thought it would. I make a mental note to buy Gwen more romance novels. Then I turn and hike past the sign, disappearing into the creosote.
“Goll darn it, Charlie,” I mutter, shading my eyes to look up at the mountain. Dusk is falling, which is good. I need Charlie awake, so I can yell at him.
Darkness falls, and I stop to hold out a hand and call a ball of light onto my palm.
“Help me find him,” I whisper. Tingles spread through my body, and I sense the direction I need to go. And not five minutes later, I literally stumble across the rusted-out iron platform lying among the creosote.The top of the bunker.
Charlie is in there. I’m sure of it.
From the outside, it’s not much to look at. Just a bunch of metal panels in the ground. One of the panels has been moved aside to reveal a staircase. Which is weird because Charlie can trace in and out of his home. He doesn’t need to exit through the door. The only reason this panel would be open is if someone else is here.
A chill runs through me.
I jog down the stairs. “Charlie?” There’s a door at the end that’s hanging half off its hinges, like someone broke it down.
Oh fork.
I push open the broken door and freeze.
The three vampires from the fight in the alleyway are gathered in the living room, holding Charlie down. One of them wears a leather glove and holds some sort of silver cup in his hand, which he thrusts against Charlie’s bare belly.
Charlie hisses, and I hear the sound of sizzling skin as the silver burns his flesh.
“We can go on all night. Hell, we can go all week. Eventually, you’re going to tell us where your pretty little fairy is.”
“Fuck. You.”
The vampire strikes Charlie across the face with the silver cup, leaving another terrible burn.
I cover my mouth to hold back my scream.
Charlie catches sight of me, and his eyes widened. Before I understand what’s happening, my belly lurches sideways, as if he was hypnotizing me. He doesn’t complete it, however, because in the next instant, his torturers also see me, and the leader blurs directly in front of me.
I keep my gaze away from his, hitting him with a ball of light. My powers have increased; this time my weapon knocks him back on his ass.
Charlie roars, struggling against his two captors. “Aurelia, get out,” he yells. “Leave me!”
I send another flash of light at one of the vampires holding Charlie, and all four vampires in the room bellow in pain.
An idea occurs to me, but before I can move, the gloved vampire blurs behind me and picks me up by the neck, slamming my face up against the wall and pinning me there.
Pain explodes in my cheek and nose.
Charlie roars with anger.
I try to cast another ball of light, but the radiating throb in my face consumes too much of my energy.
The vampire twists my arms behind my back, holding both my wrists in one of his, the other hand pressed against my nape.
“Aurelia!” The anguish in Charlie’s voice brings me back.
He cares.
And I came here to fight for him. The ape holding me thought I needed my hands for magic, but I don’t. I picture Charlie and surround him in a black bubble, its walls too dense to penetrate.
“Aurelia, what are you doing?” he shouts.
I flash the brightest light I can imagine into the room—light as bright as the sun.
Terrible screams filled the air, and my skin grows hot where the vampire had been holding me. I squeeze my eyes closed, my own vision blinded by the intensity of the flash. I spin around, but can’t move, my retinas burning from the light.
“Aurelia! What’s going on? Get me out of this damn bubble!” Charlie’s furious protests bring me back, and I release him from the black sphere.
He rushes forward, then stops, looking at the piles of ash where the vampires were. I stare, round-eyed.
“Did I...kill them?”
Charlie looks at me, a grim expression on his face. “Yes.”
“I’m sorry,” I say inanely.
He wraps me in his arms, squeezing too tightly. “I’m not.” But then he releases me again, as if remembering who I am. Who I was. “I told you not to follow me.”
I draw a breath and shut his front door. “I know, but I just had to talk to you. Please, Charlie—you can’t hold me accountable for something I did in a past life.” When he doesn’t speak, I say, “Or maybe you can, but I’m telling you I'm sorry.”
He continues to say nothing, just looks at me with the same expression—as if I’m dead to him. But no, I know he cares. He just refused to give me up under torture. He must feel something for me because he isn’t the gallant type.
I try to explain my thoughts. “I don’t know how karma works, but I think we met again, so I could fix this, to heal the rift between us.”
He swallows and nods once.
“It’s not going to happen again... is that what you think? I would never hurt you.”
A muscle in his jaw twitches like he doesn’t believe me.
“Please, Charlie, I need you. I never wanted to be magic. You came along and showed me my power and turned my world upside down. I can’t do this without you.” My eyes fill with tears. “I want to be your little fairy again. Please?”
Nothing in his expression changes. “Come here,” he beckons.
I walk to him. He wraps my hair in his fist and pulls my head back, his fangs lengthening as he looks at my vein. As if in slow motion, he lowers his head to my neck, trailing a sharp fang along my vein. My breath comes in quick pants, my heart racing.
Fork, how well do I really know Charlie? Would he drain me to get even with Anka? Maybe he didn’t turn me over to the other vampires because he wanted to destroy me himself.
He lifts my head and releases me all in one swift motion. “Take off your clothes.”
My gaze snaps to his, heart leaping. Has he forgiven me? Or is this an evil torture? It doesn’t matter. I just begged to be his. I wanted to prove my faithfulness, my trust. To be his submissive. I shuck my clothes, dropping the articles at my feet one by one.
He watches with glittering eyes.
“Kneel.”
My belly somersaults. A game. This is our game. I drop to my knees.
“Hands behind your back.”
I grasp my wrists behind my back and lower my head submissively.
Charlie crouches beside me,
stroking my hair back from my eyes. I see emotion this time, but before I identify it, he lunges, tackling me onto my back, his hand cupping the back of my head to protect it from the floor. His fangs strike my neck, and he drinks, pushing the bulge of his clothed cock between my legs.
Relief, love, passion, pour through me. I exhale and wrap my legs around his waist. I twine my arms around his neck and close my eyes, allowing the motion of his cock beneath his jeans to drive my passion.
The scrape of his jeans over my vulnerable bits comes as a pleasured pain—the more it digs into me, the more I want to feel it. I follow the sensations until I come from the friction against my clit, a small release, but satisfying just the same.
Charlie licks my wounds closed. “Did I say you could come?”
My belly flutters. Our game. “No, master.”
“You’ll be punished for that.”
I shiver, excitement and heat flushing through me.
He rolls me to my belly. “Bring your knees up under yourself.”
I rise to my hands and knees.
“Did I say you could use your hands?”
His imperious tone makes butterflies flutter in my stomach. I lower my head and torso back to the carpet, dropping my arms beside myself.
“Reach back and hold your cheeks open.”
I suck in my breath, realizing his intention. I reach back, taking one buttcheek in each hand and pulling them apart to expose my most private of places to him.
I hear a zipper and wait, the butterflies flapping their wings.
He rubs the head of cock over my pussy, and I relax, relieved. But as soon as he dips inside my slick channel, he withdraws and pushes against my back entrance, using my juices as the only lubricant.
My anus contracts. “You’re too big,” I pant. “It won’t fit.”
“Relax, little fairy.” He wraps an arm under my waist and moves my hips forward and slaps my ass. I let go of my cheeks and squeak, trying to catch myself with my arms. There’s no need. Charlie holds me easily suspended as he gives me another spank then another. My pussy drips from his dominance. I hold still, relishing his mock punishment, knowing we both need this.
