CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
“WAKE UP, SWEETHEART. You’ve slept long enough.”
My legs were moving before realized I was walking, taking me somewhere with someone as my guide. I was so fucking weak I needed that borrowed strength just to get to the bathroom.
The swift motion made it hard for my feet to find the ground, and something was up with my body. I felt…different, and so damned sick. I slipped to my knees and whatever was bothering my stomach expelled from my mouth. It made me sick to look at it because it didn’t look like something any human could vomit. My body shivered on the brink of a ripping, searing pain.
I soon tasted the thickness and sweetness of liquid and felt a soft patch of skin pressed against my lips. The skin and blood smelled strongly of Calind. I was so hungry for the flavor, it was clear what I’d become.
“Drink,” Calind said, appearing the same way he did when I wanted to jump his bones.
“I thought if I became a Vorarei, the glamor would disappear.”
“You’re not,” he replied.
I shoved his wrist away. “Then why is your blood in my mouth?”
“I’ll answer in a moment, but first…see.”
He touched my head and a flash of moving images replayed in my mind, reminding me of everything I’d forgotten, and everything someone else had suppressed.
I knew of everything done to and with my body, even when I wasn’t in control of it. I knew what was in my body and that it was fighting me for control.
“To continue Claudette’s suppression, you will have to take my blood down for the rest of your life. Don’t concern yourself. You’re mostly human, as you wanted to remain.”
I shoved Calind’s wrist away, and he pressed it toward my mouth, again, with a newfound strength. “Don’t you fucking think I’ve had enough?” I asked, the irritation cutting through every word.
For some reason, the bastard was smiling at me. “She would’ve consumed you had you not been given a diet of my blood. If you don’t continue to drink, your sickness will return and she may silence you forever. Drink. My blood isn’t strong enough inside you yet.”
I shoved his arm away again. “Which reminds me: why and how the fuck am I alive if I’m still human, Calind? I didn’t want this. I was ready to die. Well, almost ready.” I hit him, and unlike other times, I drew blood. It scared the shit out of me and forced me to plant my feet on solid ground.
A vanity mirror stood directly in front of me, and when I looked at my reflection, I screamed. Not because I looked awful, but because I had never looked better. Fuck Instagram filters, who needed them now?
“If you have any power beyond inhuman strength, it’s immortality.”
A thought filled my head, telling me Calind wasn’t being truthful. Reality kicked in hard and covered my world in regret. Out of anger, my fist punched the mirror. It shattered to the wall, creating cracks.
I looked back at my hand, dripping with blood, triggering my stomach to growl. The blood stopped flowing, and the cut healed, leaving the hunger.
On the verge of my impending panic, Calind’s voice soothed me as he spoke. “I need to confess, Regan. I’ve been holding back the details of my life, and the time is long overdue for me to tell you the whole story. Because you’re aware of most of what is false and what’s true, I can share everything I hid. Are you ready?”
Absentmindedly, I slid on top of the counter and nodded to him.
He rested his back against the opposite wall, holding my gaze. “I remember being here, alone, ostracized from my family in a time many centuries from this one.
“It consumed me, jaded me, and encouraged me to build a proverbial wall around myself. Living with hate for a place—a place I had no purpose in, or a family to care for—I became uncivilized and unsocial.
“The mind can be the most crushing prison of all. I met Claudette while feeding from nearly dead soldiers in the aftermath of a brutal war. My lack of fear drew Claudette’s admiration.” He glanced at me with a lifted brow. “I suppose she told you I wouldn’t remember the truth of my existence, due to her manipulation. I’m aware she reached out to you. It’s her way.”
“She did,” I replied, my words hoarse.
“Claudette knew I was different, but she never discovered how different, and she told me she had a bigger purpose for me. She required my patience to disclose it.
“She was born to this world, not of it. A powerful queen, and unlike any human walking this Earth. She knew things, could do things, and felt things differently than any other human, and could see things in a way no other human could. To her, I was the most magnificent being she’d ever met.
“She gave me what she thought was a gift, mistakenly thinking I was human, and a purpose. We traveled, living egotistically until the industrial age came along, and then we grew our businesses together.
“When we began Executive Suites, I wanted to show people, like she’d shown me, that the world could be a better place with the right pilot. As the business grew, she adopted a new personality. She became enamored with power and money.
“She said she’d found a new purpose. A purpose I later discovered was creating you. For a time she seemed happy, and then her true nature seeped through.” He paused, rubbing his temples as though they ached. I could sense his frustration and sadness as if it was mine. “Watching the people I used, transformed by my progenies—watching how they evolved, I regretted my past decisions and severed my relationship with Claudette.
“I didn’t see Claudette again until shortly before she was murdered. She disclosed her concerns about a project tainted for another purpose—an equally selfish purpose. She said she couldn’t leave what she’d created unprotected, and felt she was a target, and that she and her project might face destruction if she remained closely tied to it. Her words were a lie—a cunning game to get me to meet you. She told me you were nothing more than a shell, someone who deserved the fate she had laid out for you.
“At the time, I didn’t know Claudette had a latent hatred for me and was trying to create a weaker version of herself with human DNA. A short time ago, I discovered she was the center of the chaos, creating the world she wanted by pitting her people against each other. The woman wanted nothing other than total destruction. And your father’s quest for eternal life made him her enemy.
“The robbery at his home was an attempt to find information on the project. Certain individuals knew your father was breaking the law by conducting human cloning and genetic experiments, altering DNA, and intermingling technology with human lives. When you broke into his home, I watched you, keeping my presence hidden while standing right beside you. I knew you were more than Claudette said you were. You were being controlled by her.”
“I didn’t know your story,” I told him, “but I know mine. Claudette told me everything. How I grew up. What I am—or was. What she was. Here’s my problem—she seemed fucking powerful and practically invincible. She said she was the pure Vorarei, not you. How can you suppress her when she’s stronger than you?”
“She was never the only pure Vorarei on Earth,” he told me. “I’m equally strong, maybe stronger. For centuries I hid the extent of my power from her, and it’s why she will never be a danger to you as long as you continue to take in my blood.”
“I wish I could be pissed at you for all of it, maybe even a little scared, but I’m not.”
He stepped forward and embraced me. “If I misled you, it’s because I didn’t want you to feel horrified or endure the pain of the truth. As I did before, I feel inclined to give you everything you want, everything you desire while I maintain the ability to protect you from anyone or anything that wishes you harm. It will never change.”
“Knowing what I was and what I did, you could’ve let it happen and been done with it.”
“Do you know why I agreed to marry you?” He didn’t wait for an answer. “I’ve become self-aware of the reason behind why I endured and fought against my nature in your name. I granted you the heaviest demand, because I now know you are meant for me, and never truly meant for Claudette’s purpose. Having you with me, alive and well, is not something I’d ever take for granted.
“We can move on from the cruel truth and get to what matters. Our dream doesn’t have to end. Whatever you want, it’s yours. The question is, can you get past your anger over some things I’ve done and tell me what you want?”
I recalled the times he made me forget. I couldn’t stay pissed at him. He had a reason for doing everything, and it was always for my safety. Claudette and her need to fuck with my head had no other reason than to serve her own selfish purpose.
I suddenly remembered one of the many things that bothered me the most. “Am I honestly still human?”
“Mainly human, with a few benefits, but yes.”
“Will I have your or her kick-ass powers?”
He waited a tick before he shook his head. “It’s no longer a possibility.”
“Had she changed me, would I have them?”
“Yes. Have you changed your mind, Regan? Is that what you want?”
I looked at my healed hand and shook my head. “I can barely deal with being super human.”
“Together we have the greatest resource, the one you wanted the most.” Touching his forehead to mine, he whispered, “There isn’t anything I wouldn’t do for you. I would lie, steal, and murder to be with you and keep you safe.”
As I touched his face, a flood of passion swarmed my brain with warm, fuzzy thoughts. It was such a crazy good feeling I closed my eyes and sank into it, enjoying it. “You say the craziest and sweetest things when you open up and show me you have a heart underneath that hard and sexy fucking body.” As the feeling faded, I remembered the only other person in my life I gave a shit about other than Calind. “Emile…I have to—”
Calind wrapped my body tight in his arms. Words weren’t said aloud, but pushed deep into my head until I only knew his thoughts and words. Never look for him. Forget about him. He’ll be fine without you, and you’ll be more than fine without him. I am your world. Never forget it.
I glanced at my unflawed hands and back up to Calind. Anger, apprehension, disbelief, mistrust, and regret filled my thoughts before, but now it all disappeared. Whatever I was worried about must’ve not mattered—whatever it was.
“Regan.” Calind fit my chin over his fist and angled my head upward to face him. “What do you want?”
I wanted the dream to be real, and to have more time to enjoy it.
A slow smile spread across my lips, becoming contagious for Calind. “You.”
My reality sucked.
I wanted the fantasy.