Chapter Sixty-Five
Lilith
“Enough,” Asher growled. “I said enough.”
A humming ceased abruptly.
“You don’t have to be so dramatic.” Despite Aunt Jacqueline’s nagging tone, there was a note of terror.
Lilith’s face rested on something cool. The ground?
The scent of rich soil and grass overwhelmed the delicate fragrance of honeysuckle.
“Lilith.” Asher’s voice again. Softer this time. “Lilith, talk to me. Open your eyes.”
Were her eyes still closed?
Gentle hands took her shoulders and rolled her to her back.
The world rolled with her and Lilith groaned. A flutter of air tickled over her brow.
She blinked her eyes open to find Dragon sniffing her face and Asher only an inch behind him, concern in his eyes.
“Thank God,” he whispered.
She tried to speak, to say his name, to assure him she was fine, but she couldn’t get her teeth to stop chattering. A violent spasm wracked her body.
Strong arms came around her, pulling her toward a wall of warmth and the scent of clean laundry. Dragon lay the length of
his body against Lilith’s leg, rumbling with the force of his purr.
She absently recalled having once read that cats purred when they healed. Was he trying to heal her now with the force of
his love?
“I have you, Lilith.” Asher’s voice was velvet in her ear. “I have you.”
She closed her eyes and rested back against him, borrowing from his strength until the trembling in her body finally stopped.
“Why is she still so hard to see?” Asher asked in a tentative voice, as if worried about frightening her.
Lilith’s eyes flew open, barely able to make out her jeans atop the dark grass. A sob bubbled up in her chest and emerged
as a pathetic whimper.
She was still disappearing.
“We don’t know if what she found has helped,” Aunt Jacqueline replied sadly. “Only time will tell. If Sybil still dies…”
Asher’s embrace tightened on Lilith, so protective, it made her want to cry. “Let’s get back to the house. Can you walk?”
“I think so?” Lilith’s voice was thready, even to her own ears. She tried to sit forward, but exhaustion overwhelmed her.
Asher got to his feet and bent over, scooping her into his arms.
Lilith gave a little shriek. “You can’t carry me like…like a damsel.”
“I have to make up for not catching you when you fainted in the manor that first day.” He managed a small smile, too tense
to make his words as flirtatious as he likely meant for them to sound.
“Wait till Essie hears about this—” Lilith broke off at the sudden splinter of pain in her chest. Because Essie wouldn’t remember anything about Asher.
Because she wouldn’t remember Lilith.
Lilith’s head lolled groggily against Asher’s hard chest by the time they arrived at the house. “I hope I’m lighter because
I’m invisible,” she muttered, half asleep.
“You weigh almost nothing.” Worry tinged Asher’s reply as he settled her onto the couch. She lay back on the soft surface
and closed her eyes to keep from crying.
“Is there nothing you can do?” Asher asked urgently of his aunt.
“I’ve done all I can,” Aunt Jacqueline replied in a whisper. “The rest must happen in the past. I have no control over that.”
A shiver of fear trembled to life in her core.
“Lilith…”
She opened her eyes to the timbre of the familiar masculine voice and found Asher crouched by the couch.
“I’m here.” He reached for her hand, which had miraculously healed. He hesitated only a second before cradling it in his warm
fingers. “I’m not leaving you.”
She nodded, her throat too tight to speak. Dragon hopped on the couch with her, curling up on her chest, his entire body vibrating
with the force of his purring.
“When you arrived, I never expected this,” Asher confessed.
Lilith’s lips lifted in a sad smile. “That makes two of us.”
“I’m glad you came,” Asher said softly.
“Me too,” Lilith replied, her voice thick.
“When you’re visible again, I’d like to take you out…if you’d like—”
“I’d love that.” Lilith smiled to herself. “Not just being visible. I mean going out with you.”
“I’d love that, too.”
“Come on the couch with me.” She used the couch to sit up slightly to make room for him, careful not to disturb Dragon.
Asher sat on the couch and Lilith leaned back against him, secure in his embrace. From the floor, Toby grumbled at being left
out.
The quiet reassurance of Asher’s body against her, the rhythmic purr from Dragon, and surviving being slingshot between the
past and present was more than she could bear. Her eyelids were too heavy to keep from closing.
“I’m tired, but I don’t want to sleep,” she murmured.
A hand gently brushed over Lilith’s brow, sweeping away a lock of hair. “I’m not leaving you.”
Despite his words, his fingers trembled as he touched her face. “I’ll see you in the morning.” Asher spoke so quietly, Lilith
almost didn’t hear him.
With the last of her energy, Lilith replied, “I really hope so.”