“It’s not.” Evie tugged me into a hug. “I do not handle this shit as well as you do. I worry too much. And now that I know the things that happened to you, I want to impale your mother on the Eiffel Tower and let the crows eat her eyes.”
I giggled. This shit was not funny, but Evie was so spun up, and she was normally so calm about certain things.
Her lips twitched. “Fuck.” She let out a deep exhale. “Okay. Shit. I’m better. Now tell me why you want me to take you deep into the middle of a European forest?”
I explained my reasoning.
“In and out then? No shenanigans?”
I laid my hand over my heart. “I can promise no shenanigans will come from my end. I cannot guarantee anyone else’s potential for shenanigans.”
“Good enough, I suppose,” she grumbled. “You know the drill.”
She held out her hand, and a moment later, we were off.
No structure stood there anymore. I let out a curse and ventured forward, looking for anything that might help me figure out where the dwelling was. We didn’t need the upper level. I needed the basement. That’s where Mom stashed the important stuff. When we didn’t have a basement, she kept everything in a locked trunk covered with a hand-knitted blanket—one she occasionally tossed on me when a sliver of humanity managed to break through her psyche.
I was stomping through the woods when Evie hissed, “Wait.”
I stopped and turned. Magic pooled in Evie’s palms. “Someone’s here.”
A tall, pale man stepped out from the cover of trees. I stumbled back and held a hand out to keep Evie away.
“Don’t,” I warned her.
“Do you know him?”
I didn’t know him. Not really. But I’d never forget his face.
“Moira,” he whispered, his face stricken with grief and regret.
“Hello, Liaza,” I said to the vampire who turned me.
Chapter
Thirty-Five
Vampires never aged. He looked the same as when he was in that basement. Blond-haired and blue-eyed, skin as pale and smooth as marble, and long, dark eyelashes.
Looking at him now, as an adult, it registered in the back of my brain that he was beautiful.
He took a step forward.
“No.” I pushed my palm out. “No closer.”
“Who is this?” Evie whispered.
“What are you doing here?”
Liaza looked at Evie, his brows flicking up as if he recognized her. Maybe he did. She hadn’t been exactly incognito over the last couple of years.
“I come here yearly,” Liaza said, his voice hoarse. “Hoping I might one day see you again.”
I stared. “Why in the world would you want to do that?”
He held his hands out. “Because you are my greatest regret, Moira.”
Liaza bowed his head. “I have no excuse for what I did. I was a desperate man driven to do a terrible deed, and there has not been a day in my life since then when I have not regretted what I’d done.”
