Chapter One
Lenora
“Neverletthemseeyou bleed, Lenora.”
Mom’s quiet warning whispers through the numb cavity of my skull. A steely reminder that I am an Usher, even if merely by name alone, and that name carries a weight I must shoulder even when my entire world lies in two perfectly carved holes at my feet.
Born together.
Died together.
I suppose I should take comfort in that, if I weren’t filled with unimaginable heartbreak.
And rage.
They were taken from me. Brutally and violently. Torn from my life with the cruelty of a child ripping the wings off a butterfly. It was done with intention. The purpose: to rid the world of one more Usher.
They got lucky and claimed two in a single blow.
Eliah, beautiful, gentle Eliah, with his poet’s heart and eyes that saw beauty in a dark world that doesn’t exist.
And Ames. Bold, stubborn, a fighter with a smirk that could break hearts miles away.
Both devastatingly beautiful, and mine. They had been mine. My very reason for living. My only purpose to remain here on this mortal plain. Without them…
“Lenora.”
Gentle weight settles on my shoulder. Firm. Guiding. Pulling me back and around. Boots crunch on snow and ice. The only sound amongst the dead.
Uncle Marcus peers down into the face I tilt up. The twin pools of stormy gray kick my knees out from under me, and his arms hook instinctively around my waist, holding me flush to the solid weight of him.
He is the very picture of what my boys would have looked like in a few years. The future I will never see. They had the best partsof their father, a fact I always appreciated because Uncle Marcus is the very definition of a man. Strong, masculine, unyielding in his convictions. A ruthless businessman whispered about by other men with fear and reverence.
But then he’d smile, and the thunderclouds in his eyes would become liquid silver. The hard lines soften into a smile that can melt everything inside me.
“He’s the devil and just as pretty,”Mom once said, and I agree.
Only, seeing him now. Looking into eyes the mirror of my boys’, a sob rises in my chest. My entire body shudders with the effort. I am hooked by the hot well of tears and my throat closes so the sound that escapes is the tortured whine of an injured dog.
“Doucement, mon p’tit,”he whispers in the sweet lilt of his mother tongue, the hypnotic drawl of sweet Creole into my temple. “Easy. I’m here.”
He is.
For now.
Until they take him like they took my parents. My boys. They will take him from me, and I will be eternally alone.
The final Usher standing.
“Uncle Marcus…”
“Shhh. Not here.” A gloved hand brushes my cold, wet cheek. “Chin up, Linny.”
I’m trying, but how am I supposed to care about anything when there’s nothing left? When the will to live has left me and it’s only his arms holding me together?
Leather cased fingers brush my stiff ones. Pry them apart. Free the crushed roses from my bloody palm.
“Linny.”
