CHAPTER 38
BELLE
“Katrina!”
She held the tail of her green dress to the side and tilted her hip, her other hand carrying a tote. “Surprise.”
“Surprise? How? What? You’re a fucking witch?”Bitch.
She barely kept her balance in those nine-inch heels as she walked on the grass to the willow tree. “Not justawitch, sweetie. The one who helped those dickheads save your life.”
My eyes widened, and my jaw fell. I didn’t care if I looked like a lemur or a lame ass hyena. “You were a teenager when I met you.”
“Yeah, that was a spell that made me look like a teen. You know, magic is what witches do.” She reached me and gave me a fucking hug. “How are you holding up, sweetie?”
I pushed her off me. “I… You’re unbelievable. All this time you’ve been lying to me, and my mom.”
“Oh no. Your mom was a witch too, from our coven. I sent her to take care of you after your parents passed away. It was very sad that she died.”
The French Quarter in New Orleans. Of course.“You know what happened to my parents?”
“Cursed bloodline. They died in an unfortunate accident, and now are guests in Damien’s…realm.”
My head was going to explode. I revolved in circles, peering at the darkness and the creatures that turned my life upside down. “I need a fucking minute.”
“Take your time, sweetie. We have all night,” she said.
My whole life was a lie. Everything was never mine. I had no control. No choices whatsoever. Every minute was designed to bring me to this one. Every person was fit in it to deliver me here.
To Damien.
The devil that played us. Broke us all.
To have his queen.
And it only took two hundred and fifty years. In his time, it was nothing.
Well played, Damien. Well played.
I breathed in the air, savored its taste, felt the coolness fill my lungs. I touched the grass and the tree, smelled the flowers, watched the moon. I stared at the people I loved, memorized their features, their scents, the rhythm of their heartbeats.
I kissed each one of them and licked the taste. I laughed and then cried. And I felt the love in my heart, said my goodbyes and felt the ache, carved it all in my mind before my soul. As I might never feel any of that the same way ever again.
My breath shuddered on my lips. “I’m ready.”
The boys and I held hands in a circle while Katrina got sage and strange stones out of her tote. She placed them in a specific order, said some voodoo words and lit the sage.
My soul was being ripped out of me, torn into a million pieces and then sewed together with the souls of my past lives. I’d become Rena and all her reincarnations all at once, and I saw their lives, the happiness and the sufferings.
And the choices they had made.
Katrina peered at me. “Have you made your choice?”
This was it. The one moment I truly got to choose.
The decision that would either start a happy life for me or end mine and Rena’s forever.
Joshua, Alec and Kayden beseeched me with their glistening eyes under the moonlight. Damien’s red stare blazed at me, a genuine smile on his face, one you saw on the faces of grooms while Here Comes the Bride played at their weddings.
