proximity, her hunger for him.
“You sense something.” Again, she felt that ripple of surprise that he should guess along those lines. But then she remembered that he would know a thing or two about witches. With his mother—what she was, what she had been—of course, he would understand her behavior.
“Nothing’s wrong. Not really. I just woke abruptly, but I do that some times. Habit, I guess.”
“Do they come to you at night?” he asked, clearly disbelieving her protests.
She said nothing for a long moment, considered pretending that she didn’t even know what he was talking about, but then why bother? He knew. He understood.
She shrugged one shoulder. “Usually,” she whispered, thinking of the slithering shadows that had pursued her over the years. She remembered each of them the moment they revealed themselves to her in their hideous forms. Shadows no more but their true shapes.
“C’mon. Talk to me, Darby.”
And she wanted to. God, but she wanted to. She wanted to unburden herself, unload and share something, anything with another person on this earth. And not just anyone. Niklas.
“At night,” she whispered, her fingers brushing her lips, marveling at how they still tingled from that kiss, how they tingled just because she was around Niklas, talking to him, confiding in him. “That’s when I’m most vulnerable. When they usually come for me.”
“And this is how you survive it?” He motioned with his hand, gesturing to the room, but she knew he meant the frozen, arctic world outside. “You live where they can’t get to you?”
“My mom shot herself when it became too much. The demons appeared to her everywhere, every day. They were tormenting her, driving her mad. At the end, it was all the time. Day and night.” She closed her eyes, almost hearing her mother’s sobs and pleas through the walls again, begging for them to leave her alone. “She couldn’t keep a job because her employers thought she was some freak, jumping at every shadow, talking to empty space. Breaking down in tears. But why am I telling you this? Your mom was one of us.”
“Yes.” He nodded. “She was.”
Was. Darby stared at the hard line of his profile. “Then you understand?”
“It was never that bad for her. She was always happy to be alive. Happy to have me, happy for every day. I never saw her surrender to despair. They could have been bothering her. She just never showed it.”
Darby grimaced. “You were lucky then. Maybe your mother was stronger. Or maybe they just really wanted my mother. She was a unique witch with multiple powers.” She shook her head. “I don’t know. Maybe Mom was just weak. My aunts are strong. They can ignore demons for the most part.”
He slid her a measuring glance. “You’re strong, too,” he pronounced. “So why are you way out here all alone? Why aren’t you with your aunts?”
She shifted uncomfortably. “My situation is different. I had to leave.”
It felt intimate, almost cozy, both of them whispering to each other in the near dark. In their separate beds, but inches apart. If they stretched out their arms, they could touch hands, graze fingertips. She felt deceptively safe in this moment, as if they were more than two people thrust together out of necessity. As if maybe they wanted to be together.
And maybe that’s why she confessed to him that very thing that had haunted her for so many years. “Once a demon took possession of me while I slept … and I tried to hurt someone. A—a friend—” Her voice broke as she recalled that moment she awoke years ago, holding a pillow over Sorcha’s face. In that moment she’d known she had to go. Had to flee all her family and friends and live a life of isolation where she would never harm someone she cared about again. Since then, she’d never lived anywhere where water didn’t freeze.
He cursed low. “Has it happened since then?”
She shook her head. “No. But I don’t exactly surround myself with people. I can’t risk it again.”
“Maybe it was a one-time thing.” There was no mistaking the ring of hope in his voice, and it warmed her heart that he would even care.
“Maybe. Or just living where it’s so cold a demon won’t visit for very long has kept them away.” She sighed. Hope was a hard thing for her to manage. She hadn’t felt hope in years. “Good thing I don’t mind cold weather too much. I’d rather ski than surf any day.”
His lips