Since coming back from the meeting with the wolves a week ago, I had been on edge. More than usual.

Alex kept me in the dark, and princes I had once considered allies—Cain, Phelps, and Gray, especially—wouldn’t tell me anything out of fear of the new lord of the castle. I had thought about contacting them and asking them for their allegiance, but since they were avoiding me now, I decided to wait. Luana, who was sound asleep in her bedroom now, didn’t tell me why she wouldn’t look at her alpha and what he had said to her before we came back, even though I had brought the subject up twice now. Thea hadn’t sent me messages to meet her, or to let me know she was all right. I hated that.

I stopped pacing the living room and reached for the bottle of blood on the coffee table. It was empty, damn it.

A deep, dull tug started inside my chest. I knew this tug. I had felt it before. It was Thea. It was my longing, my feelings for her. It was the crazy bond between us.

I had to see her.

Right now.

I had no idea how I would reach her inside her coven, but I had to try.

Determined, I turned to the door.

I halted when a murky, shadow figure appeared in front of me.

The hair on my arms stood on end and I took a step back.

What magic was this?

“My Prince,” a faint voice said.

I frowned. Where had I heard this voice before?

The murky figure gained the shape of a person. A young man.

Realization downed on me right before his face came into focus. “Thomas!”

He bowed his head to me. “Hello, my Prince.”

I stared at him, mouth hanging open. “A ghost? How …?”

“I’ve been trying to contact you for a few days now, my Prince, but it wasn’t easy to get a hold of this form. Being a ghost is harder than it looks.”

Though I knew ghosts existed, I had never seen one before. “But I thought … why are you stuck here?”

“It seems I have unfinished business,” Thomas said. The shock of seeing him as a whitish, semitransparent form still hadn’t passed. “I confess that when I was alive, something bothered me, and I think once I solve it, I’ll be allowed to move on.”

“And what is that?” If there was anything I could do to help him, I would.

“I need to find out who killed my parents,” he said. If I had a beating heart, it would have stopped. “A vampire killed my parents that night, my Prince, and I need to find out who it was. Once I find out, I’ll be able to go on. I’ll be able to be reunited with my family. Since you’re the one who saved me, I’m hoping you will help me find out who killed my parents.”

“Thomas …”

“I know, my Prince. I know you’re busy dealing with Alex, and nothing would please me more at the moment than seeing you take him down. It would feel like revenge, and I’m sure I would have some peace with that, too.”

“Yes, Alex …”

“Now that I seem to have more control of my form, I vow to be a faithful servant. I’ll spy on Alex and the other princes for you and find out anything that can be used against them.”

I clenched my teeth. “That would be good,” I muttered.

“I’m running out of strength to hold on to this form, my Prince,” Thomas said, as if he had been a ghost for decades and knew how it all worked. “I’ll lurk around Alex and tell you all I find out once I’m able to contact you again.”

“Yes, but—”

Thomas’s ghost blurred and faded like smoke.

I stared at the spot where he had been a moment ago, still shaken.

I plopped on the couch as guilt and shame rushed through me.

I didn’t know how Alex was conducting the feast now, but before it was rare that entire families were invited to the castle. Usually, it was one person per family. But a fourteen-year-old Thomas had come with his parents.

That night, I had had an argument with Alex that left me seeing red. Despite my will to gain control over my rage, I snapped. Fury took hold of me, but as I was about to take it out on Alex, I smelled the blood coming from the ballroom.

The warm, sweet blood.

I had no control. I jumped off the balcony and took the first human who crossed my path.

I only stopped when I tripped over a young boy curled in a ball in the middle of the ballroom. So small, he had been missed by Dorian and Albert, who loved to feed on kids. I was about to walk away when arms wrapped around my legs.

“Please, help me,” the boy said, burying his head on my knees.

It broke me.

It all broke me.

The control snapped into place along with the same guilt and shame I still felt now.

I carried the boy away from the ballroom and treated him like a son, like a brother, for two years.

Until he was killed last week by a crazy vampire.

Only I could end Thomas’s curse and send him away, but how could I tell him that I had been the one who killed his parents?