Not just any memories. Memories of love. Kyla shook her head at me and I shrugged. I didn’t have many choices at this point, and if I didn’t figure out a way to save Samael’s life, I wouldn’t be making any more memories with him. The thought stabbed into my chest, arrowing down into my gut. I faced the Dearg Due.
“We have a deal.”
Her eyes somehow turned even darker. “Very well.”
She took another step toward me, and Kyla leaned her body against my legs, a silent support. She was also getting into position in case she needed to rip the Dearg Due’s throat out. I sent her a warning look and she ignored me, her eyes on the Dearg Due as she got within touching distance.
The Dearg Due raised her hands, and I forced myself to sheath my Mark II. I definitely couldn’t be trusted to have it in my hand while she rifled through my mind.
The Dearg Due seemed to be aware that I was battling for control, because she kept her movements slow as she raised her arms. She held her hands up in front of my face, a question in her eyes.
In spite of my terror, I had to acknowledge her respect. This creature who had once been a mortal woman had never once been asked for her consent. So she waited for mine.
I nodded, and she placed one hand on either side of my head, over my temples. Her hands were like ice, but they slowly warmed, and memories began flickering through my mind like pages in a book as she searched for what she was looking for.
There was Samael, standing in front of me when we first met. I was cornered, bleeding, and entirely aware that I was about to die.
“This is the male you chose?”The Dearg Due murmured in my head.
“Your opinion is noted,”I snapped.
A low laugh. I grit my teeth and then she was moving on.
There was our first kiss, in the shadows of my apartment building. He’d taken me by surprise, and I’dmeltedfor him. The Dearg Due obviously had access to my inner thoughts along with those memories, because she let out another creepy chuckle.
“Yes, I believe his wingspan must be enormous.”
“Fuck you.”
Her hands clamped tighter around my head. And there was the moment I’d decided to save him. I was sitting in my car, debating whether to let him live or die, and looking back at it now made my stomach twist.
“Interesting,”she mused.
“If I wanted your commentary, I’d ask for it.”
Then we were in the field. I lunged for Samael, throwing up my shield. Hoping to give him enough time tolive. The Dearg Due snarled.
“Stupid girl.”
“Would you not have done the same for the peasant boy you fell in love with?”
Silence.Then her voice turned frigid.“Yes. And yet he never came for me. That should be lesson enough for you, witchling.”
I flinched at the mockery in her tone as she dared to call me one of the pet names Samael had given to me. I’d heard him say that word in every tone imaginable, from disdain to disgust, desire to delight.
“I could take that from you,” she said sweetly. “But I think there is more.”
I shuddered. Dimly, I felt Kyla press against my legs, a sound like a yelp leaving her throat. It brought me back to the present, reminded me ofwhyI was allowing this.
There was Samael, showing me his own memory of Lucifer slaughtering his family. It was the first time I’d gained a glimmer of understanding into why he was so overprotective, and just one of the reasons for his control-freak nature.
She moved on.
Samael and I were standing on one of the balconies outside his ballroom now. I’d just learned I wasn’t unseelie.
My gut twisted in real time as I experienced the realization that I’d outlive Evie. That Samael had known what I was.
“Delicious.”
