Jase clucked his tongue. “I can only imagine.”

  “And I tried running away,” I told him. “I tried hiding until the surge passed, but it only made him angrier, and he’d hunt me down and hit me until I couldn't breathe—”

  “Aw, Ara.” His hands tightened on my face.

  “Until one day, I learned that if I just took a hit in the first few days of a surge, it simmered down,” I explained. “It went away. If I fought back, it fed it. If I ran, it fed it. If I just accepted one hit, not too hard, it eased it. And it would go away, and things would be okay again, and David wouldn't bleed in deep regret for weeks after.” I sighed to release all the tension. “I didn’t have a choice.”

  “What about when he was human? After you had Aubrey? Was it as bad then?”

  “No. I mean, he fell under that stupid First Woman’s Curse, but once I undid that, he was lovely. Really lovely. And I think, without the vampire as his first nature, David’s not really as dark.”

  “You think being a vampire magnifies it?”

  “As being a vampire does for many human traits, yes,” I said. “So those human days were pretty blissful and even after that, when he entered the vampire world again, things were okay. Maybe once every six years he’d have a surge. It’s not like my whole life was miserable.”

  “I know,” he said with a soft, kind smile.

  “Until Daniel came along.”

  Jase looked up from his wandering thoughts with white shock. “What do you mean?”

  “After Lily drugged us, it started happening every few weeks or even days?” My eyes widened, a feeling of breathlessness taking me back to those haunting days.

  “And it was worse than before?”

  “Yes. But as long as I didn’t fight him, as long as I let him, or sometimes pushed him to hit me within the first three days, that’s all it would ever be. Just a hit. Usually across the face. And then he’d be over it.”

  “He hit you while you were pregnant! With my son?”

  “He only hit me across the face. Never anywhere that would hurt the baby.”

  Jason rubbed his brow, exhaling. “Hex or not, I can’t honestly say I think he did the right thing by making you stay with him.”

  “He didn’t make me.”

  “Yes he did. Whether you believe that or not is irrelevant. He made you stay.”

  “No, I could have left so many times, Jase. He begged me to—”

  “I doubt that.”

  “He did. Look.” I grabbed his arm and pulled him closer, reaching up to touch his stubbly cheek. He closed his hand over mine and shut his eyes, going back with me to a dark night outside a university just a few years ago.

  Jason saw his own face through my eyes, and gasped because it was such a leap from one place to another, so unexpected, that his mind couldn't make sense of the two versions of life for a moment.

  He stepped out of his car, his mind on the evening ahead, and I froze on the spot, watching him. He wasn’t the Jase I knew a year ago. He was thicker, heavier and broader, as if he’d been eating, sleeping, as if he was happy.

  His jaw dropped when he sensed me, eyes sweeping up a moment later to find me standing here in the darkness of the cool night.

  “What are you doing here?” he barked so aggressively I drew a breath, ready for a fight.

  “Jase,” I said, my heart breaking and then swimming across the decades of love I’d carried for him, where it knitted back together as soon as I looked into those eyes. “We’ve been looking for you for a year—”

  “Well, you’ve found me.” He spread his arms out and then pressed the button to lock his car, pocketing his keys, voice thick with annoyance. “What do you want, Ara?”

  “I want you to come home—”

  “I’m not going back.”

  “Jase, we can work it out—”

  “Work what out?” he demanded, his voice high as he fought to restrain the emotion. “Lily has been cheating on me since we met, Ara—”

  “I really think you’ve got it all wrong, Jase,” I said, hoping I was right. Even if I wasn’t, Lily loved him. If she had made a mistake, they could work it out. “Elora saw it, remember? She’s seen you happy with Lily.”

  “Elora’s visions can’t be trusted. When has she ever been right? Ever! She was wrong about Lily—”

  “She’s desperate, Jase,” I told him, hoping he’d understand what this meant. If I couldn't convince him to come back... “She’ll go to any lengths to get you back.”

  “I’m not going back, Ara. Ever!” he yelled, his eyes wide and his body screaming at me to back off as he turned away.

  It wasn’t working. If he wouldn't listen to reason, listen to me, then I’d have to leave it to Lily. But he couldn't avoid this any longer. It wasn’t getting any better by allowing it all to fester. For everyone’s sake, they needed to argue this out.

  I walked forward and moved to drop him under a deep sleep, but he wheeled around so fast I thought he might hit me.

  “Don’t. Touch. Me,” he warned, the intention of a madman flaring in his gaze.

  “I don’t want to, Jase, but if you don’t come with me, Lily told me to drag you home. You’re family and we have to work this out—”

  “If you move… if you blink in so much as a threat to put me out, Ara, I will kill you—”

  “We both know you better than that—”

  “Stop it!” His hands thrust out onto my arms and he shook me hard, his teeth caged. “I am warning—”

  “Whoa!” A small blonde girl came shooting out from behind a tree like a little rebel warrior and wedged herself between us. Jason let go, dread filling his face. “Hey,” she roared. “Don’t you touch her. You don’t get to touch her like that!”

  “Juliet.” Jase sighed, rubbing the bridge of his nose like he did when one of the kids asked him a difficult question.

  “No. Shut up and don’t say a goddamn word, Mr. Knight!” she yelled, hugging her books so tight her fingers were white. She glanced back at me. “Are you okay? Did he hurt you?”

  “I… I’m fine,” I stammered, still completely shocked by this fearsome little wolf. But I had someone on my side right now, and he couldn't stop me from putting him out if he wanted to protect her, which, clearly, he did. I folded my arms, smirking at him.

  “Jules,” Jason began, his pleading eyes reaching for her mind, as if to warn her to run.

  “Don’t you ‘Jules’ me, Jason Knight,” she snapped. “Call me the crazy feminist, call it an overreaction if you like, but when I see a guy manhandling a woman, I will step in and whoop some ass. I may be small”—she lifted her chin, pushing her glasses back on—“but I know kung fu.”

  Jason’s mouth popped, his eyes warming with a smile. And it all sunk in. He’d fallen in love. He’d come here to get away from Lily, but that wasn’t the reason he couldn’t come back. This little firecracker of a girl, with her glasses and silky blonde hair, had captured his heart, and in one cute move had won him over for good. Kung fu.

  Jason wanted to tell her to go away, to run as far as she could, but he was too shaken up by the sudden realization that maybe he was falling in love with her.

  “I get it,” I said, backing away. “That’s it, isn’t it?”

  “Ara,” he said, coming after me, but the girl moved between us.

  “Jules, I’m not going to hurt her. Do you really think I’d hurt her?” he asked, cut because he knew she did think that, and he just wasn't, nor would he ever be, that kind of guy.

  “That’s what it looked like from where I was standing,” she said.

  “Just…” He showed his hands then gently grabbed her upper arms and shifted her aside, coming to stand before me. I felt his connection to her fade as he looked at me, felt him cry deep within his soul as his mind flashed back for a moment to the night we made love. The night he left. “Ara, I know you all want me back. Okay? But there is more to the story than what she’s telling, and that’s why I won’t return.”

  “Jase.” My heart broke as I saw something there in his eyes—something I thought, until now, that I had only imagined. “I miss you. We all miss you. But… Just…”

  She’s good for me, Ara, Jase said in thought. For the first time, I found someone good for me, who’s never loved anyone else in her life. I’m not second to her heart like I am with you, with Lily. I can’t go back to that.

  I fought hard not to think of the baby boy in the hotel room with David, waiting to meet his father, who didn’t even know he existed. Jason was happy right now, and no one had a right to take it from him. Not even me. Daniel would destroy this, and I had to protect it as fiercely as I’d protect our baby boy.

  “I’m just glad to see you’re okay,” I said, fighting back tears.

  “Then please go,” he pleaded, and as his hand touched mine, I thought about how right it felt on my body when we made love, when we made Daniel. Everything had been ripped apart by what Lily did to us that night, but something so right had come from it, and I still loved Jase in so many ways. Walking away right now, I knew I was letting him go for good.

  “’Kay.” I leaned in and kissed his cheek, wishing so hard that I could tell him about his son and that he’d still stay here and fall in love with this girl if he knew.

  But he wouldn't. And yet he needed to be free. He needed to be away from Lily. So he could never find out about Daniel.

  “I love you. I’ll talk to Lily.”

  When I backed away, I felt him hold onto me with his heart too. He sensed the ache, he sensed the words I wanted to say to him, but he was afraid to ask. He was afraid that whatever I came to tell him would make him want to go home, and he just couldn't do that. But he didn’t want me to leave either. He just didn’t want me here messing up this new possibility.

  “I’m glad you didn’t tell me then,” Jase said, closing his eyes regretfully as we lifted out from the memory. “I learned a lot about myself while I was with Jules, and I needed that. I needed someone to love me like I was the only thing that mattered.”

  “And now you’ve lost her as well,” I said sadly. “I’m so sorry, Jase.”

  “And I stand to lose my life, too—for a brother that’s been abusing you,” he snapped. “So tell me, how does this have anything to do with my brother being an honorable, deserving man?”

  “I’m getting to that.”

  I showed him next how I went back to the hotel where David was waiting for me. I took off my cardigan and set it on the bed, peering into the cradle to check on the baby.

  “Did he need anything while I was gone?”

  “No. He was fine. Did you find my brother?”

  “Yes.” I looked up at him, eyes thick with tears. “I couldn't do it.”

  “Couldn't do what?”

  “He’s happy. He found someone, David. I was right there”—I looked back on the moment I reached out to put him under a sleep, how he stopped me because he knew what I was going to do. He was mean, cold. And it broke my heart a little because he’d never been that way with me. “I couldn't do it.”

  “Ara.” David sighed my name out, moving backward to sit on the bed. He cradled his head in his hands for a moment.

  “I’m sorry. I know how badly you wanted him back—”

  “It’s not that. That’s not why I’m upset.”

  “Then what is it?” I asked, sitting down beside him, the smell of hotel hand soap and cheap floral air freshener filling my senses.

  “I saw it all, Ara. Just now. I saw it all.” He rubbed the left side of his chest. “Do you have any idea how intense your love for him is, and his for you?”

  “I know—”

  “No, you don’t. It’s like toxic gas, like a chemical that soaks the air. It’s always there. At every family event, every Christmas, birthday. I ignore it but…” He looked up at me, a tear slipping past his lashes. “Now I wonder if I should.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I should walk away. If I am any sort of man, if I have any love for you, I should leave.”

  “Why?”

  “I hit you, Ara,” he said, kneeling down in front of me, tracing his hand over the last place he’d done it. “I can't control it even if I try. And you will eventually leave me for it. I’ll push you away. This is only getting worse. And if you wait, and he does fall for that girl, you'll lose your chance to be with him.”

  “David, I’m not ever going to be with Jason over you. Ever.” I tossed my head back, laughing.

  “See, you said it all right there are: over me. But it’s not a him-or-me decision. It’s you. Alone. You being abused. You suffering, miserable.”

  “I’m not miserable.”

  “Yes you are. And my brother, the only other man you love, is finally free of Lily. And this tired old argument will never end, because the fact is, you will leave me eventually—even a hundred years from now, after I do something worse to you—and if you didn't have me, you'd be with him. That has always been the case. Since our early days, Ara. It’s not an either-either situation. It’s… without me,” he said sadly, “there’s him.”

  I grinned, taking in his kind green eyes, swarmed with worry, and thought back to the moment the little boy in the cradle beside us had come into the world—the look of both immense pride and love that had shone within David’s eyes. That was love. Pure and unadulterated. It was David, who he is at his core, without a hex or any interference, and that was the man I married. The man I made promises to. The man I would fight for, or die.

  “You're an idiot,” I said.

  “What?” He frowned, but it was atop a half smile.

  “You idiot.” I grabbed his cheeks and leaned in. “I am never leaving you. You can beat me brainless and I will still be here, right up until it’s no longer the hex making you do it. Right up until you, my sweet David, are the one who hits me.”

  “That will never happen.”

  I leaned in to kiss his soft lips, ignoring the stale taste of coffee on his breath. “Then I will never leave you.”

  “Do you think that’s true?” Jason asked, bringing us back to the present. “Do you really think you will never leave him?”

  “I can’t say. I know I can if I want. I know he’d support my decision with all of his heart. But I still just don’t know if I ever could.”

  “I think you need therapy. You may be immortal, but that’s a classic case of beaten wife syndrome.”

  “It’s not.” I laughed to myself. “I’m not, nor have I ever been, the type of woman to be beaten down by someone. I will admit, I was at the end of my tether before all of this nightmare and kidnapping began, and I had spent maybe a millisecond thinking about taking a break from him, but only because it was so frequent at that point, but…”

  “You’re afraid of being alone,” he said accusingly. “You always were. That’s why you haven’t left him.”

  “Oh, that’s bullshit, Jase,” I asserted calmly, because I didn't need to fight over something that wasn’t true. “I haven’t left him because I love him. It has nothing to do with being alone.”

  “I think it does—”

  “I can be alone,” I assured him. “I don’t like it. I’m the kind of woman who needs that one close person, a life partner, I guess, or a best friend. And there’s nothing wrong with that. It doesn’t make me needy or diminish my sense of independence—”

  “I know. I wasn’t saying that. I just… I think it was a major factor in your decision to stay.”

  “But it wasn’t, because…” I looked up into his caring green eyes, feeling mine sparkle with tears in the sun. “I wouldn’t have been alone, and we both know it.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “After I saw that vision of our alternative life, and I saw how you reacted to that future too, I knew that if I ever did leave him, if it ever got that bad and I couldn’t stand one more day, I’d have you,” I said boldly. “I knew you’d leave Lily for me.”

  At first, his eyes sparkled with love and affection as he heard that, but then it all burned away with cold frustration. “Then why are you giving him my soul? You love me so much its intoxicating to others when they feel it around us. And you know David will eventually wear you down and make you leave—”

  “I don’t know anything, Jase.” I looked down at my feet, stepping back from his arms. “I don’t know what will happen between me and David in the future—if we maybe do break up for a few decades, get some space, clear out the hurt and then come back to each other—but it has to be me and him. It will always be that way, unto death.”

  “My death.” He pointed to his chest, leaning forward, and then sent that finger off to aim at nothing. “Not his.”

  “It’s not like you’re not willing, Jase.”

  “I’m willing to do it in a world where I don’t have you, Ara.” He gently took my arm, drawing me closer to make his point. “But after what you just told me, how can you expect me to just lie down and die!”

  “And how can you expect me to love you if you won’t?” I said, and the honesty struck him right in his heart. “You’d be forcing me to kill David—”

  “No. I didn’t do this. Lily did! This is not my fault.”

  “It’s not mine either, or David’s.”

  Jase sighed, running his hands over his silky brown hair and flattening it down before it all stood up against the wind. “You know what, fuck my fucking life,” he said in a breaking voice, turning away. “I fucking give up.”

  “Jase?” I called. “Jase!”

  But he didn’t turn back.

  * * *

  We could fight. We could scream and yell and cry, but within a few hours, we were always friends again, as if nothing happened. I felt like maybe we should talk about it all, but what was the point? We were both trying so hard to just live out these days, enjoy time together, and not get caught going around in circles with the same argument.

  Jase sent me an easy smile as he hopped up out of his chair, almost knocking a pawn down on the table between us.

  “Careful.” I straightened it.

  “Sorry.” He laughed. “I’ll be right back.”

 

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