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Ren stood behind the wall beside the door to the living room. Grabbing my arm, he pulled me to him and kissed me. “I love you,” he said, staring into my eyes, like he had so many times, knowing I couldn’t say it back, and not knowing if I ever could.

Cupping his whiskered jaw, I held his gaze in return. “I love you, too.”

He sucked in a sharp breath.

I smiled up at him, gave his hand a squeeze, and stepped into the doorway, staring out at Xavier’s distorted figure. “Looking for me?”

His head lifted, and with a growl, he shot to his feet. Shaking, he strode straight for me, moving from one realm to the next as if it were nothing. His fangs had elongated, his features inhuman with pain and also hunger. “You’ve been a very naughty little witch, Jasmine, hiding from me,” he said panting.

“I know it’s crazy, but the idea of letting you torture me to the point of death only to bring me back from the brink and start all over again wasn’t really something I was in a hurry to experience,” I said.

He stopped, his lavender eyes so pale and bright and full of twisted rage that I wanted to step back, retreat. “You shouldn’t be able to hide from me, not in my own world. I searched everywhere for you. Tell me where you were?”

He took a step forward, and I took one back into the living room so I was even with Ren. I could see a tiny bit of apprehension in Xavier’s eyes. He didn’t know how I’d evaded him, and he was obviously afraid if he came at me, I might vanish again. “You have blind spots, Xavier. Places in your mind you’ve walled off. Did you know your mind is just like this…” I held my arms out. “Like your home. And the emotions you’re afraid of, you’ve walled off so thoroughly that the rooms are blind spots. Spots that are completely outside this hidden world of yours.”

“You escaped?” he asked, his eyes narrowing, then shook his head. “You think I’m fucking stupid? If that were true, you wouldn’t be here.”

“When you were a little boy, you did lots of bad things, didn’t you? Things that scared your mother.”

He stilled, completely, unnaturally.

“You scared her, disgusted her so much that she’d lock you in a room to escape you.”

“No,” he snarled. “You’re wrong.”

“You made up monsters, hideous creatures that you imagined protecting you, monsters that would kill anyone who tried to stop you from doing the sadistic things you loved to do.”

“I don’t know what the fuck you’re talking about.”

“I can show you, if you want me to. They’re on the fourth floor, Xavier. They’ve been up there a very long time.”

He was breathing heavily.

“Do you ever go up to the fourth floor, Xavier?”

He frowned. “No.”

“Did you even search for me up there?”

His chest heaved and he started to shake, confusion, rage twisting his face.

No. He hadn’t. “Why? Why do you think that is?” I needed contact usually to work my magic, but I reached out for him now and slid the tendrils of my power around him, not enough he’d notice but enough to press at the wall in his mind, the wall he’d locked all those memories behind.

He shook his head. He didn’t have an answer. He didn’t know why he avoided the fourth floor, and now the memories were pressing against that wall while I pushed with my magic from the other side.

“You were a bad boy, Xavier, and that’s where bad boys go.”

He roared and charged me.

I stumbled back as he ran at me, and Ren exploded from his hiding spot, knocking him to the ground. He went at Xavier like a wild beast, his fists connecting with the dhampir over and over again.

Xavier was taken by surprise, and blood spilled from his nose and ran down his chin. He roared and swung back, missing, then tried to shove Ren off. But Ren wouldn’t be moved. They rolled across the floor, Xavier’s mouth open, fangs extended, trying to bite and tear at Ren, who shoved him away. Xavier jumped to his feet and staggered. Ren pulled his knife free and charged the other male.

Xavier’s eyes flared bright purple, and he threw a hand up. Ren was thrown out, outside the barrier of Xavier’s realm. Still in the same room, but not here. Not with me anymore.

“Run, Jasmine!” he roared, unable to see or hear me but knowing I could still hear him.

Through the distorted air, I watched him spin away and run for the front door. I knew exactly where he was going—to the attic, to get back in.