After his passing a few years prior, the house sat vacant and fell into disrepair while the estate searched for an heir.
One had finally stepped forward and it was that heir Tasha had come to see.
She eyed the crumbling front steps and lack of hand railing but climbed the steps nonetheless. Boards creaked and bowed beneath her as she crossed the porch to the front entrance, its protective outer screen door hanging to the side by a single hinge. She knocked on the weather-beaten wooden door and waited.
A large group of crows took flight from a field adjacent to the house, startling her. The black birds cawed and squawked to one another, flying farther out to field, and Tasha remembered reading the technical name for a flock of crows was a “murder.” She’d never understood why and seeing so many so close to a house made the hairs on the nape of her neck prickle.
She knocked on the door again. “Hello,” she called. “Anyone home?”
Only the distant call of the crows answered her.
Tasha stepped around a missing board to reach one of the windows near the door. She cupped her hands to the side of her eyes and pressed her face to the torn screen, trying to see inside.
Heavy curtains blocked her view. She tried the windows on the opposite side of the entrance and discovered their broken panes had been boarded over from the inside. Sighing, she returned to the door and knocked a final time. “Hello! I’m Lieutenant Tasha Lockwood with the Jefferson police. If you can hear me, please open the door.”
Again, no answer came from within the house.
“Shit,” she muttered. She pulled a business card from her pocket, wrote a brief note asking the homeowner to call her, and stuck it in the crack between the door and the jamb.
She retraced her steps to her car and hesitated as she opened the door. For a moment she thought she saw movement in an upstairs window. She caught sight of it again and realized it was simply drapes blowing in the breeze from an open window. She slipped behind the steering wheel and headed back to Jefferson, cursing Damian for sending her on a wild-goose chase.
Today was the second day the police had come to his door. Peter knew it would only be a matter of time before they returned. He’d hoped to have more time to prep Alexandra before leaving this town to start their new life together but it wasn’t meant to be.
He thought of how much work he had before him. He would have to accelerate his plans to separate her from Varik. It carried a risk of damaging her beyond repair, but it was a possibility he must accept nonetheless.
Peter slowly opened the bedroom door, careful not to wake Alexandra. She was finally his to possess. He slipped into the room and crept to the side of the bed.
Her breathing remained steady and unchanged. The last rays of sunlight from the window turned her auburn hair into a blaze of deep reds, mahogany browns, and copper. Beneath closed lids, he imagined her gold-rimmed emerald eyes sought him in their rapid-dreaming movements.
Watching her sleep, he ached to touch her, to climb into the bed and make her his for always.
But he couldn’t. Not yet. She had not yet given herself to him willingly and he wouldn’t accept her any other way. Much work needed to be done before their bodies could finally join the way their souls had already combined so long ago.
First he had to purge her of Varik’s influence.
He kissed her forehead, closed his eyes, and inhaled her exotic scent of jasmine and vanilla.
She moaned and shifted in her sleep.
“Soon, my darling,” he whispered, smoothing her hair. “I promise.”
He straightened, made his way to the door, opened it quietly, and slipped into the hallway beyond.
As he closed the door, she shifted in her slumber once more, mumbling incoherently but one word struck like a dagger to his very core.
“Varik …”
Rage surged through him, hot and blinding.
He stormed up the hall to his own bedroom and flung himself onto the low, narrow bed. Beating and strangling his rival wasn’t enough to sever their bond. He’d known it wouldn’t be, but he’d foolishly allowed himself a small hope that it would at least weaken it. As soon as he accessed the Hall of Records and used the information he’d gleaned from its vast store, she would forget all about him.