I did not shift my attention from the sloshing golden liquid. “Ezra?”
Instant. “I’m not drinking one. I haven’t made that decision yet.”
Antonio barked, “Cahal, talk some sense into your fucking son before I beat the living shit out of him.” A pause, then his tone changed to calm. “I say that with much respect, of course.”
Cahal snorted softly. “Just get your kid to drink it. After she does, mine will soon follow.”
Antonio’s head teetered from side to side. “You’re probably right.” His lips parted…and he made that gurgling sound I had become so accustomed to hearing from him. Golden eyes narrowed. “Just drink the damned thing.”
Carefully, I picked just one vial. I lifted it to eye level. I stared. “Why would Elder Harcourt do a memory wipe on us…only to give us the memories back?”
Antonio gurgled once more. Growled. Shook his head. “You don’t havetimefor this.”
My eyes met his. “What do you mean?”
“Just. Drink. It.”
I stared. Blinked. “What happens next intime?”
His lips pinched, not a word uttered.
Tearing my gaze away from him, I peered…at my husband.
He gazed back, his spring green eyes dead set on mine. “It’s your choice.”
Slowly my chest rose and fell. “Okay.”
Chapter Fifteen
With my eyes on my husband’s, who was a stranger still, I popped the cork on one of the vials.
Breathed in once deeply. Out came the breath just as gradually.
Then I closed my eyes and lifted the vial to my lips.
I drank it down in one shot.
My body jerked as corked spells and time washed through my veins in a chilling rush. Flashes erupted behind my closed eyelids.
Scenes…somanyscenes.
Feelings…somanyfeelings.
My body convulsed as the missing pieces of my life replayed in a continual loop, invading my mind with reality. Everything I hadn’t known that was in my past. Every cherished moment I now remembered. Every heartache I had known was now a part of me again.
What radiated the most…was my love for my husband.
My heart broke time and again, then blistered with agonized adoration. It pumped deep within my soul. The blackness that had consumed me was flooded with nothing but pure, gut-wrenching love.
The vial dropped from my fingertips as I sucked in a harsh breath.
My eyelashes fluttered in the night breeze, while hot tears, which I hadn’t even known I had shed, were cooling against my cheeks. My chest ached with a new madness to embrace my husband and never let him go.
Ezra wasmine.
Directly behind me, Elder Merrick sniffed the air, his words whisper soft. “It worked.”
Goddamn right it did.
