In all, it was the most memorable camping trip I’d ever taken. No doubt. Between the hurricane and this living nightmare, I could’ve made a living appearing on talk shows and writing a book about my experience. I’d be set for life.

If I thought they would let me live through it.

A tear trickled down my face, from the corner of my eye to my temple. It soaked into my hair, just like so many other tears had since Hecate—another interesting name—left me on the bed.

A comfortable bed, anyway.

I only wished she would’ve let me have control of my body again. What difference did it make if I was able to move around or not? It wasn’t like they hadn’t locked me in. I had heard the lock click, loud and clear. There was no getting out.

God forbid they let me use the bathroom like a civilized person.

This had to be hell. That was it. I had died during the hurricane, after all, and now I was suffering for every bad thing I had ever done.

Only I never thought of myself as a bad person. I had always tried to do the right thing. I had tried to be decent and kind. I’d always let people merge into traffic in front of me and I never even held it against them when they didn’t wave in thanks. I was the sort of person who used to go out of my way to hold doors open for others. I even volunteered at the food bank every holiday season, packaging meals for families in need.

I was hardly a saint, but did a person as nice as me deserve to go to hell?

If this wasn’t hell, I didn’t want to know what was. The sensation of not being able to control my body, no matter how I struggled to move, was torture like I couldn’t have imagined. That and the feeling of having another consciousness in my brain, sort of pushing me aside so it could go through my memories.

I would’ve shuddered if I could have, but then that wasn’t possible. I couldn’t move anything but my eyelids and mouth, just like before.

The room must have been soundproofed—no, the entire compound. Was that the right word for it? My eyes had been open and looking back and forth throughout the entire climb to the cave mouth, then the long and winding tunnel which led back down to the heart of the mountain itself. So far beneath the surface.

And there were others here! Lots of them! I hadn’t seen many—a blonde girl, a redhead, even a little boy, but I’d lost count of all the doors we passed on the way to this room. So, so many doors. Did each of them lead to a room like this? If so, how many people were housed here?

Not just people, either. Hecate was not just a person. She had to be some kind of sorceress.

My mind tried like crazy to reject the idea, but I couldn’t keep from coming back to it over and over. Sorceress. Did such a thing even exist? It had to. I was living proof. No normal person could do what she had done to me.

What she was still doing.

It stood to reason, then, that Owen knew who she was. What she was capable of. Fat chance of a person keeping something like that a secret. Heck, he was staying here, in this underground bunker or whatever it was. That right there was a red flag. Who lived inside a mountain if they weren’t completely nuts?

He knew it, and he must have been okay with it. What was he doing here otherwise?

What if he was one of them? Like her? I couldn’t wrap my mind around the idea, though I had to admit there was a good chance of it. He wasn’t like anyone I had ever met, that was for sure. Maybe he was a sorcerer.

Just saying it to myself made me want to laugh. But I couldn’t.

Another tear leaked from the corner of my eye, instead.

How long was she planning on leaving me like this? And what would she do once she was finished with me?

Maybe being left alone wasn’t so bad, after all. The alternative made me sick to my stomach. No way were they going to let me go free after this. How could they? I already knew too much.

If I wasn’t dead already, I would be before long.

I wasn’t a praying person, at least I hadn’t been for much of my life. Funny, how situations like this brought out even the most latent spirituality in people. Please, don’t let me die like this. Please, there’s so much more I wanted to do with my life.

Please. I need to see him again. He might help me understand things.

Barely a moment later, the lock clicked again.

My heart jumped, then clenched. What did this mean? Were they coming for me? Was this the end? I didn’t want to believe it, though I hoped at the same time that if this was indeed the end of my life, they would at least make it quick.

I hadn’t really done anything wrong. I didn’t deserve this.

The door opened. I strained my eyes, trying to see who was coming in. I could just barely see out of the very corner.

And what I saw sent relief flooding through me—that, and the sense that I was in control of myself again. Like I had been frozen in ice which suddenly thawed to nothing and left me able to move again.

“Oh, thank God,” I whispered, pushing myself up on the bed while Owen rushed over.

“You’re all right, lass?” he asked, looking me over as he sat down.

“Define all right,” I whispered, flexing my arms and fingers, turning my head from side to side. “Please, don’t let them do that to me again. I don’t think I could take it. Has anyone ever done that to you?”

“Not that I can recall.” He took my face in his hands.

Not something I would’ve expected, but I appreciated it. I didn’t know until he touched me how much I had needed to be touched. Comforted.

“I was worried sick about you.”

“What about you?” I covered his hands with mine. “Are you okay? You look like hell.”

“Thanks,” he grimaced. “I feel like it. I’m worn out, but I’ll live.”

“What is happening?” I whispered. “Are they listening in on us right now?”

“Not that I’m aware of.” He offered a soft smile. “I cannot tell you how sorry I am, lass. I would have spared you this if I could have done so.”

“What is this, though? What aren’t you telling me?”

He took a deep breath. “To begin with, what you carried in your backpack wasn’t as worthless as you were led to believe. In fact, it’s quite precious to a certain group of people.”

“Hecate,” I whispered.

“Yes, for instance,” he nodded. “And her sisters.”

“There are more of her around this place?” I wrapped my arms around myself and shuddered.

He grinned. “She’s one of the good ones, I can assure you. She’s very sorry for having to debilitate you. Perhaps she overreacted a bit, I’ll grant you, but this is a new situation for all of us. She knew not what to do. She only knew she had to do something.”

“Why? Why me? I haven’t done anything wrong.”

“She didn’t know that, and I was hardly in a position to speak on your behalf.” He held my hands, rubbing my knuckles with his thumbs. “I wish there was an easy way to explain everything. I wish I had the words.”

“She’s a witch.”

“She is,” he confirmed, not even looking or sounding surprised that I’d blurted it out. Like he was expecting it. Well, he wasn’t stupid, and he knew I wasn’t, either.

“She has other witchy sisters.”

“An interesting turn of phrase.” He chuckled, though there was no humor in it. “Yes. She does. And the diadem which your family has possessed all these many centuries belonged to her ancestors. They came to the New World over a thousand years ago, just as in the legends you heard. Those unlike themselves considered them a threat, and wanted their treasure,” he added.

“The diadem,” I whispered.

“Among many other items, aye. Either the curators your father dealt with were unaware of the presence of witches in this area—understandable—or they dismissed the legends as nothing more than the stories told to children at bedtime. I couldn’t say. Or perhaps…” He shrugged.

“Perhaps what?”

“Perhaps there is still enough magic surrounding the thing that it—for lack of a better expression—protected itself. That might explain why my touching it affected me so. The magic still present in the runes was enough to knock me out.”

“Why you, though? I’ve handled it a hundred times, and I saw my father do the same thing more times than I could count. Why didn’t it ever do anything to us?”

He wasn’t as forthcoming this time. I sensed his hesitation, watched as his eyes shifted back and forth. He was searching for something to say.

My heart sank. “Just come out with it, already,” I begged. “There’s nothing you could tell me that would top what I’ve seen so far.”

As it was, I couldn’t say whether I believed half of what I’d already heard. But it was better than thinking I was dead and this was my eternal punishment.

Besides, he was with me. I could stand it as long as he was with me. The simple pressure of his hands over mine was enough to give me strength.

“I can’t tell you everything yet,” he decided with a grimace. “I’m sorry, but you have to trust me. Even if Hecate wants to wipe your memory—which I have no intention of allowing—”

“Wait.” I pulled my hands away. “What did you just say? You can’t be serious.”

“I’m sorry, but that’s what she intends. As I said, I plan to stop her. She’s not unreasonable. I’m certain I could manage it.”

I watched his eyes move back and forth again. “Wow. You’d make a terrible poker player. I hope you never plan on going to Vegas, because you’ll lose your shirt.”

“What does that mean?”

“It means I can tell when you’re lying. Or at least when you’re unsure of yourself. You get all shifty-eyed. You won’t look straight at me.”

He shrugged, sighing. “Because I can’t bear this. I can’t bear to think of you not remembering anything about…”

My throat tightened when the realization hit me. “I won’t remember you.”

“Right. You’ll remember nothing of this. You might not even remember ever having the diadem in your possession. I’m uncertain of what Hecate plans.”

“You said you’re going to talk her out of it, though.”

“I intend to try. I don’t want to lose you.”

Even in the middle of the most confusing, inexplicable night of my life, the tenderness in his voice broke through. “You mean that?”

He smiled, and it lit his face. He was beautiful, like an angel, and his smile was just for me. “I do, lass. Whether you like it or not. I don’t want you to forget me, and I know I could never forget you. Not even if Hecate and all of her sisters did their best to make me forget. I would always know you.”

He took my hand and placed it over his chest. His heart beat against my palm—strong, steady, true. “I would have you here,” he explained. “When someone like myself finds someone like you, someone they feel this… inexplicable connection to… there is no forgetting. You would always be there.”

“I know what you mean,” I managed to croak out, even with emotion threatening to choke me. I could hardly believe what I was hearing, but it was no more unbelievable than anything else that had happened.

And I liked it. I wanted it. That helped.

He stroked my cheek. “I am so sorry to have caused you any unhappiness or fear or pain. I would rather you never suffer so. I would give my life to see to it that you never knew anything but happiness. Safety.”

I believed him. I believed everything.

And that was why I leaned in, taking the back of his neck in one hand and pulling him in for a kiss. What did I have to lose? There was a chance I wouldn’t remember any of this, and I wasn’t about to forget him without knowing what it meant to be in his arms.

He caught my mouth with his, hesitant at first. When I wrapped my arms around his neck, though, all hesitation dissolved. He took me in his arms and pulled me close, holding me tight while he kissed me slowly, deeply.

The fluttering in my stomach seemed to extend itself throughout my body, making me tingle and tremble. But I wouldn’t have stopped for anything. It was the sweetest feeling I had ever known.

And I would have to forget it. What sort of cruelty was that?

I tried to push it out of my head in favor of savoring the moment. Maybe the last moment we would ever have together. I held him tighter with that in mind, sighing when his hands slid up and down my back, sinking my own hands into his hair and willing myself to burn everything about him into my brain—his musky scent, the sweetness of his lips, his warmth and strength and everything that made him irresistible.

This was all we’d ever have.