Kate Evangelista - Til Death

About fifteen minutes later, tears dry, I led the way to the front door of the farmhouse. It was dark inside. No one was home yet. Being alone didn’t bother me as much as Dillan staring at me like I was a crystal swan about to shatter. After my mini breakdown, he kept asking how I felt. So un-Dillan like.

It was the truth. I really did feel better. After all that crying, my head cleared and I saw the Kyle situation in a new light. We needed to talk. The sooner the better. If I wanted him to be honest with me, I had to tell him everything.

The quiet of the prairies magnified our footsteps on the wooden porch. I turned to take my bag from Dillan, but he had already lowered it to the floor. I studied it like it was a UFO, with some curiosity mixed with a little fear. And then, I lifted my eyes to his face. A mistake. I’d been making a lot of those lately. The striking cerulean his eyes became took my breath away. Who knew blue eyes could have so many shades?

“Dillan?” I hated that my voice trembled when I said his name.

“Shhh,” he said, and with a hand on my hip, pinned me against the screen door.

I stared at his gorgeously serious face. “Dillan, what are you doing?”

“What I should have done at Valley View,” he said.

Slowly, like the moon rising, he bent his head and kissed me. First, a tentative touch, then a second, and when I thought he wouldn’t fully commit to the kiss, his lips claimed mine possessively. Forget fireworks on the Fourth of July. The electricity that sparked every time we touched gathered on our lips and exploded. The second his tongue touched mine, the contact felt like Pop Rocks in my mouth. I couldn’t get enough of it. Heat and energy flowed from his lips to mine. Just when I thought he’d pull away, he tilted his head and nibbled at the corner of my mouth until he reached the center of my bottom lip. He parted them with his tongue. But, when I let him in, he stopped, resting the tip between my upper lip and teeth. In one experienced move, he traced the sensitive valley. It curled my toes. Only at my gasp did he go all the way in again.

Dillan didn’t just kiss. He slow danced. We moved in sync. I wanted to lose myself in him. In his touch. Right then the world seemed like such a perfect place. He had one strong arm around my waist while his other hand gripped the back of my neck. I slid my fingers up his chest and into his hair, linking them behind his neck. I couldn’t get close enough. I wanted to drown in his fire. His clean scent enveloped me completely, replacing my worries with hunger. My only concerns became taste, smell, touch. But when I reeled my senses from the abyss, I pushed him back while leaning heavily against the screen door.

“What?”

I sighed, scrunching my nose. “We can’t do this.”

He tilted his head in confusion. “This?”

Gesturing between us, I said, “You and me and the kissing.”

“You don’t like the kissing?”

“Oh, no. I like the kissing. The kissing is good.” I bit my lower lip. “I mean, I just got out of a relationship.”

“Okay.” He pulled back a little farther. “If you want me to stop, I’ll stop.”

Unable to take the cold caused by the growing distance between us, I grabbed his shirt front and pulled him back to me. He went willingly, a devilish grin on his face. “Maybe five more minutes.”

Dillan

Little Ghost of Mine

It took everything Dillan had to leave Selena that afternoon. Kissing her…he couldn’t compare it to anything he’d ever experienced in his life. Forget the shocks. If sitting on an electric chair had a mind-blowing counterpart, sign him up. He never knew a million volts felt so good. If it weren’t for the case and her grandparents coming home, he would have stayed with her all night. Unfortunately, the second he left the farmhouse, everything quickly spiraled into a dark pit of frustration.

He stumbled into his room after investigating with Sebastian, bone-tired of all the dead ends. He was no closer in finding the Manticore than when his partner discovered the first carcass. The tracks they’d previously found hadn’t helped at all besides identify what they were dealing with. The sheer expanse of the prairies was a clear disadvantage. It seemed like he and the hellhound were just running in circles.

Feeling useless for only the second time in his life, he toed off his boots and fell into bed face first. He groaned into his pillow. Screw a shower. He could do it tomorrow.

Sebastian had no leads on the Maestro either. The conjurer bastard hid himself well. After what happened at the field trip, he couldn’t let his guard down for a second. He left investigating Penny to Kyle since he knew the girl better than he did. Without a shadow of a doubt Selena was the target. He hated to be right, especially after that kiss. A danger level this high usually meant a higher class of Illumenari took over. Hell if he’d let Rainer take over now. He’d protect Selena if it killed him.

His head hurt, most likely an aftereffect of nearly draining his powers to heal himself. He took a deep breath, deciding to let go of his current feelings of failure. He needed rest. With each exhalation, he let his body relax. No point in answering all the questions tonight. Like he’d been trained, he let himself slip into the darkness.

…

When he opened his eyes, Dillan found himself on a chair in the middle of a dark room. He craned his neck every which way. A light came from somewhere because his chest, arms, and legs were visible. He tried to stand, but an unseen force tugged him back to the chair.

Keeping his breathing even, he focused on the footsteps coming from his right.

You have someone else now.

He froze. A cold sweat rolled down his spine. He knew that voice…too well. He couldn’t mistake it for anyone else. Shit. He swallowed and forced himself to answer as calmly as his rapidly beating heart would allow.

“What do you care?”

She stepped out of the darkness in front of him, wearing a white dress to her knees. She stopped a couple of steps away and hid her hands behind her back. Anxiety churned the acid in his stomach at the sight of her. In the back of his mind, he knew she came to finish what she’d started. Haunting him wasn’t enough for her anymore. But his feelings had changed. He no longer wanted to give her his life for his mistakes.

He pinched his thigh hard. Pain shot up his leg, but nothing happened. He didn’t wake up like he expected. He shut his eyes then opened them again. She didn’t disappear like before. Not a ghost. Something else. Something probably worse.

She shook her head. You’re not going anywhere.

“What do you want?”

Is that how you treat me now? She frowned, flipping her hair over her shoulder. Before, you couldn’t wait for me to end it. She disappeared then reappeared straddling his lap. Her freezing fingers wrapped around his neck. He hissed. His skin burned beneath her touch. She giggled.

“You’re not real,” he said, more for himself.

She froze. Tears flooded her eyes. He bit his tongue to stifle the urge to comfort her. She was gone, taken from him. From the Illumenari, he corrected himself. He couldn’t help her anymore and suffered the consequences. He had someone else to protect now. Someone he promised himself not to fail.

Like she’d read his thoughts, she teleported to stand in front of him. She swiped at the fallen tears. She always acted younger than she was. It annoyed him half the time. She snapped her fingers and a screen he hadn’t seen before played a movie in black and white behind her. At first, he didn’t understand what was happening until he recognized Hero’s Square. Its large column centerpiece stretched up to the night sky. Several statues flanked it on both sides.