Finite: A Dark Paranormal Romance (The Sephlem Trials Book 4) Read online

  That’s unnerving.

  But, I don’t know if I wouldn’t give everything to have my parents back, to hug Mom again and laugh with Dad once more. I’d pay years off my life to stand before them and apologize for getting them killed, for not fighting harder for them.

  The taste for blood in Caige’s eyes, in that monstrous dog’s drool. . . I’d pay it all to take him out. He’s played a part in countless losses, and I’ll always believe that it was at the direction of Lunis. Fucking Lunis. Maybe he has a thing going with the Qualms and hired Caige to help. I don’t know, maybe I’m speculating, just looking for an excuse for why anyone would go the lengths they have. None of it makes sense.

  Breathe Me

  Thawed and warmed by the fire, I’m restless. I turn onto my back, then my side, and then onto my back again. The fire’s died, but the wood’s still crackling and the smoke still rises. Green illumination from the clock on the bookshelf and the silvery wash of the moonlight saves me from the darkness in the living room. I try to force myself to sleep, but my mind’s busier than midday at Grand Central Station.

  I sigh, snatching the blanket off me. I get up, stuff my feet in my sneaker, and pull on my hoodie. Easing the front door closed, I listen to make sure I’ve not awakened anyone. Little Nathan’s downstairs hanging out with a friend. Carmen and Laine are upstairs in the sitting room. She reads him a book about a crazed father who tried to hide the gifts of his twin daughters. I don’t hear Olar and Lana, but seeing as no one is coming for me, I leave for a stroll.

  The night’s peaceful, but chilly, though the wind is light. The air’s still sour. Every breath I suck is tart and never cleansing. But I’m growing used to it. Again, I remind myself, I’m okay.

  I walk a couple miles from the house to the pier that’s still quite lively this evening. I pass the small clothing and antique shops, the house-like hotel, and the restaurants on the bank. Down the pier, that stretches far over the lake, I drag my feet, counting the number of wood planks it takes to reach the end where I rest my arms against the damp wood railing and overlook the water.

  I’ve not been here in quite some time, since Mom, Dad, and I visited on a whim when we were waiting for the Dinner and a Sailboat trip. It’s rounding eleven thirty, and the lights to the businesses are shutting down, but the pier lights break the night.

  A gust of wind kisses my cheeks and sends my curls brushing my neck. To my left, a couple takes a spot near to me. In the pier’s corner, she’s Rose, and he’s Dawson, soaring in the heavy wind that’s bringing in even colder weather. They giggle and make out, finding their warmth in each other.

  I wouldn’t mind barfing.

  Sighing, I turn away and head back, telling myself I’m cold, not jealous.

  I make it to the end of the pier, to the concrete walkway, and a familiar voice catches my ear. “Good boy,” he praises.

  I glance to my left, past the pier to the beach. His voice boils my blood. I ball my fists, nails scraping over the scars on my palm as I try to keep my anger buried.

  The pier lights shut down section by section, slowly welcoming the darkness to flood over the bank. I squint, trying to get a better look at him, and my body takes over, forcing the film over my eyes. I easily make out the monster and the man.

  Hair short and black like his dog, skin tan as though he spent hours on the beach, and voice as smooth as honey. Caige.

  He comes my direction, a leash-less dog leading their stroll. I lift my hood onto my head and walk their direction. We pass each other and our gazes meet. My eyes are cloaked, likely mirroring the moon breaking through the clouds. My expression, what I believe I’m displaying is a scowl, maybe hate and a promise to murder. An expression I used to see on Nathan where his muscles were relaxed and the deadly glare in his eyes swore it all.

  I must have it right.

  Caige takes off.

  He climbs a flight of stairs leading away from the beach and hits the sidewalk of a main road, sprinting with his dog at his side.

  He won’t make it out of my sight. I race behind him, shedding my hoodie to pick up speed.

  His dog scrambles to a stop and whips around. It plants its feet and grows two sizes bigger . . . It snarls, drool dripping from oversized fangs. Eyes glowing eerily from the light of the moon, the monster snaps a massive bark that barges a thrust of wind against me.

  I chuckle. “Well aren’t you repulsive.”

  My fire snake slithers from my palm without an inkling of fear, but a strong determination that makes the dog cower. It retracts its steps as it barks at the fiery serpent tauntingly slithering toward it. There’s no escape for this mangy mutt. The snake strikes and twists the dog in its clutch before quickly devouring the pooch. The dog quickly burns down to nothing as it passes the snake’s jaw and it’s reduced to nothing, not even ash.

  I leave them and continue after Caige. He’s taken the diversion to elude me. I scan the vacant street, finding him racing to a nearby alley.

  My speed is not what it used to be. It hurts like hell to push myself so hard, but I race down the street and into the alley, getting close enough to snatch him by his shirt and yank him to a stop.

  I catch Caige by the neck and slam him to the ground. He goes down with a satisfying crack of his spine.

  A light flickers above us, and a mixture of yellow and blue churn in his eyes, reflecting the light like twinkling stars.

  Elbow spiked high in the air, fire blazing my fist nearly blinds me as I throw a punch forward using all my might.

  He dodges my attack and shoves a kick in my stomach. Healed and back on his feet, he twists around to flee. Vines sprout from my arm and catch him by his legs, sending him face-planting on the concrete. I straddle him, knees to the slimy concrete, and I send flaming blows connecting with his flesh. His body swelters, and his burning flesh is satisfying, though the scent burns my nose.

  Payback smells good.

  Burned, bloody, and with no more fight, Caige groans. I pant, seeing my bloody knuckles as I reach for Caige’s neck. I’m nowhere near done with him. I will my snake to wrap around his body and tighten its hold around his neck. I rise to my feet, and he’s forced to his.

  Heaving, I struggle to catch my breath as I ask, “Why? Why did you kill my mother?”

  Caige’s neck boils and blisters under the clutch of my snake. He hisses. “If you’re going to kill me, just kill me. We don’t need to chat.”

  “Why,” I emphasize, “did you kill my mother?”

  “I was told to!” He struggles to get loose. “No one wants you while you have ties. Now, you’re a solo act. Just the way you’re needed.”

  I flinch at his statement. “What the hell is that supposed to mean?”

  Slowly, he’s starting to heal, skin scabbing before turning into smooth flesh. “All the shots were called from in-house. Start there!” The light of the fire snake illuminates his even face. “Get this thing off me! It’s hot!”

  “In-house. . ?” There’s no way that’s true. Everyone in our home was on our side. “Liar! Who ordered the hit on my family?”

  “I’ve already told you!” He jerks in my grasp, and I struggle to keep hold of him. I release him, and my fire snake jolts into action, slithering down his throat. He’s bloody sludge in seconds.

  My snake circles around me, then rises to my height. I pet its head. There’s fire in its eyes, and its tongue a flickering flame. “Listen, you have to learn interrogation tactics. We’ll never learn anything from anyone if you keep blowing them up.” It slithers back into my palm. “Geeze. Now how am I supposed to find out what happened?”

  I kick a chunk of Caige off my shoe. “At least this ass clown is dead.”

  Relieving? Maybe not. But what I needed? Undeniably.

  I jog back to the beach and grab my hoodie. I pull it on and tug on the hood to hide the splatters of blood I feel spotting my face. I sit on the sand, watching the water glisten. “The call came from in-house,” I repeat. “But who?” I whi
sper. Who in our family would’ve called this hit on my family?

  It would be no surprise if someone of our bloodline turned on us again. I should expect it after everything we’ve been through. But someone who lives with us? I don’t know if I can swallow that pill. We’ve gone through so much already.

  I sit outside, in the cold, a while longer, watching the water turn to ice where the sand meets the shore. When the sand begins to wet my butt, I head back home. Once again, I have more questions than I do answers. That nothing I was hoping for is quickly turning into everything with this new news.

  Nicest Things

  I lay in the bed, sheets pulled over my head, confusion flaring. It feels like the weight of the world is on my shoulders. I’m still at square one, knowing nothing, no closer to figuring out this mystery. I don’t understand what it means to open my eyes when my eyes have been open the entire time. And I have no idea what my capability of seeing has to do with the Qualms, or why they want me. Then the girl at the restaurant said for me to help her too. Help her how?

  There’s movement on my bed and shuffling from someone crawling toward me. Jason rips the sheets back and snuggles beneath them before yanking them back over our heads. “Hi,” he giggles. Jason’s big night blue eyes outlined in gray like his uncle’s beam at me.

  “Hey, big guy. How are you?” He’s warmed up to me and no longer screams like a tornado siren when we talk, as long as no one mentions Nathan. Jason doesn’t like talking about the deceased, that includes bringing up his father. One of his growing Burdened abilities is a wail that comes incredibly close to busting the eardrums. For the time being, it’s uncontrollable. But he’s learned how to shift thanks to Olar, and he loves it in his tanned skin and clear nails. He also prefers his softer hair that he’s so proud of, he sweeps it across my face every opportunity he gets.

  “Is today your off day?” he asks.

  “Yep. No class, no work. I’m just going to lie down and rest.”

  He frowns heavily and knits his bushy eyebrows. “I’m not a fan of rest.”

  “Aren’t you? Well, what do you do when you get tired?”

  He jumps up and jabs his hips with his fists. “I never get tired, Tracey. I’m Superman! I can stay up all night and all day.”

  I tackle him with tickles, and he turns into a fit of laughs. “Well, Superman, some of us don’t have that superpower.”

  He grabs my hands, stopping my tickling. His joyful expression washes away quicker than it came. There’s a stomach-turning sadness in his childish voice as he says, “My mommy doesn’t have that superpower. Today, she’s not gotten out of bed at all. I tried to give her some of my strength, but it didn’t work.”

  I sit back and pull him on my lap. Taylor has yet to live through Justin’s death, I’ll never forget that day either, but most days are better than others. Hugging Jason, I say, “I’m sure you made her feel great. She may just be tired and need some sleep to let the energy you gave her re-energize her.”

  His eyes spread wide with interest. “Sleep gives you energy too?”

  “Yep. Sleep and food!”

  “Maybe I should make her an apple pie!” He jumps up and bounces on the bed. “That’ll do it!”

  I laugh. “How about we go out for some ice cream and buy her an apple pie, and she can have it when she wakes up?”

  Jason plops down on the bed with his legs crossed. “Good idea. But you’ll have to get on some clothes. You’re still in your PJs, Tracey.” He laughs, tugging on my t-shirt.

  Looking over myself, I nod, agreeing with him.

  After dressing and breakfast, Jason and I head out for ice cream and in search of apple pie. For a three-year-old, he’s well versed and can keep up a conversation without missing a beat. We’ve talked about every kid show that comes on in the morning and afternoon, every plot of each children’s book on the bookshelves, and how long it took him to match his socks after the last time they were washed. “It took a quadrillion days, Tracey. And that’s because the drier ate a few of them,” he says.

  I clean strawberry ice cream from his mouth before we leave the ice cream parlor. When we’re all clean, we head for the bakery a few doors down, and oh boy if I knew there were so many kinds of apple pies, I would have agreed to bake one. An hour later, Jason decides on Dutch apple pie and a cherry pie, and we head home.

  I park in the driveway and help Jason from the backseat. He rushes to the house and shoots up the stairs when we make it in. “Mommy, Mommy!” he calls from the hall. “I got you some apple pie! And it’s delicious! We got to taste every pie in the bakery! It was like a hundred of them, Mommy!”

  Closing the front door, I listen for Taylor’s footsteps to cross the floor, but not even the bed creaks.

  Jason knocks on the door and rattles the locked knob. “Mommy! I said I got you apple pie!” His excitement dwindles. “Mommy?”

  I come up behind him. “Hey, big guy?” He turns to face me, his hand extending to meet mine. “How about we go downstairs and read that book we got from the store? Mommy will come down when she wakes up.”

  Sad eyes match his frown, but Jason nods. I walk with him downstairs to the family room, and we settle on the loveseat. I crack open How Joey Crossed the Tracks, and two pages in, Jason’s knocked out. I lay him flat on the seat and cover him up with the blanket resting on the armrest. Sitting on the floor with my back to the chair, I trade his book for one of my own.

  I read the first line of the first chapter, ‘It was easier to ignore than it was to forget.’ I sigh, but consider if this is at all possible . . . to ignore. Laying my head back on the chair, a glimmer on the bookshelf catches my eye. I roll my eyes at the hourglass and open the book back to read the next line.

  The hourglass continues to glimmer, taunting me for my attention. The more I try to avoid looking at it, the more it heckles me. Even when I draw the book nearer my eyes to eliminate my surroundings, the droplets of sand landing and rolling down the sandy hill sound over the silence.

  The dawning sunlight beams through the window, casting a shadow of the heart on the wall of the brown bookshelf it sits on. Standing, I stomp across the floor and snatch the damn thing from the shelf. With all my might, I smash it against the floor. Its shatter is soundless. The obsidian heart and skull, once enclosed by the glass, look up at me, burning in my eyes and clawing at my heart.

  I expect the contents to dissolve as I recall them doing before. They don’t. The heart and skull sit among the sand, and I want for them to do something magical.

  Maybe tell me the secrets to the universe. . .

  I reach for the skull and snatch my hand back from it being scorching hot. Willing my right hand black, enabling the resistant texture of my palm and fingers, I’m able to pick up the skull without it burning. When I lift it from the floor, the sand shades black from the clear crystal it was.

  ‘He who is possessed, yet can bear a heart of love to accept the wicked soul,’ reads across the back of the skull. If a person is possessed, they can’t bear a heart because they don’t own that heart. The heart belongs to the body—the person—the entity influenced. Maybe that’s the catch. Because something can’t happen, that’s what makes it special that it’s happening. Or, is it like being Burdened where they are, in a way, possessed, and to start, they have their own hearts until they mate and undertake the heart of their mate or give their hearts away. But what does it mean to accept a wicked soul? The one who’s possessed or the one who bears the heart of love?

  I set the skull on the bookshelf, putting death aside and moving on to love. Assuming the heart symbolizes love. The heart’s rough and hot like a rock of lava, and in an instant, as I steady it in my grasp, it bursts into a gray smog. The cloud crowds my face. I swat at it, gasping, shocked by the eruption. The smog snakes through my nose and the smell of lavender calms my senses, but a stinging, unsettling sensation stabs me in the chest.

  The clear crystals and shards of glass charge after me. I jump back, scraping
my nails over my arms, hoping to get the scabby feeling off me. Tripping over the rug, I fall backward, back hitting the floor. For a second, I’m surrounded, black and clear crystals blanketing my body, the thick gray cloud smothering me. It pins me to the floor, and I gasp for air, clawing at anything around me to pull myself free.

  Then there’s nothing.

  I’m free, scrambling to my feet, scraping my hands over my arms and legs. Checking my surroundings, I scan the room for the shattered glass, the skull, or the heart, but only the skull sits on the bookshelf, empty eyes boring through mine with the last of the sunlight beaming off the obsidian.

  What the hell was that? “Hallucination maybe?” I test the idea aloud. An odd presence that seems to be coming from within me rather than around me, the hair on the back of my neck standing on end. The eerie feeling makes me straighten my spine and become eager to find . . . something.

  I scavenge through the bookshelf and rip up the rug. I move the furniture around and snatch the cushions from the sofas. “Where is it,” I hear myself mutter but have no idea what I’m searching for. “It’s not here,” I say after dropping to my knees to see the room at a different angle. My voice echoes around me, and I feel out of body but I’m very much present.

  “You okay, Tracey?”

  I whip around, meeting Jason’s tired eyes. “Yes. Of course, big guy.” Picking him up, I carry him to Olar’s room. I knock. Olar pulls the door open, rubbing his eyes. He yawns. “You mind keeping an eye on Jason until Taylor gets up? I’m running out for a bit.”

  Taking Jason, Olar asks, “Where you going?”

  Shrugging, I say, “I’m not sure exactly. I just need to go. I’ll call if I need you,” I beat him to his offer.

  “Fine.” He goes back in the room, leaving the door open and lays Jason beside him.

  I hurry downstairs. I don’t know what it is I’m hunting for, but my body’s taken over, forcing me to find it.