Chapter 68 Jules
Jules
“So you’re saying you were kidnapped by a vampire king?” Tasha asks, her eyes wide, one hand frozen halfway to her wineglass.
“A Vampire Don,” I correct automatically. “Big difference.”
“Right—because it’s set up like a Mafia family?” Sophia asks, brows climbing toward her hairline.
“Families—plural,” I say. “There are six of them. The Vampires, the Shifters, the Dragons, the Demons, and the Fae.”
“And the Necromancers,” Hanna adds quietly.
Every head turns toward her. She’s gone pale again, the color draining from her freckled face.
“Okay, nope,” Lucia says flatly. “That one sounds fake. You added that to mess with us.”
“I wish,” Hanna says. She presses her fingers together in her lap. “I really, really wish.”
“So these are just…gang names?” Naomi asks cautiously. “Like branding?”
“No,” I say, firmer now. “They are legitimately paranormal creatures. Not metaphors. Not cosplay. Real.”
“You mean…” Mari’s voice drops, eyes shining. “Like the kind we read about in our books?”
“Exactly,” Hanna says. “And I know it sounds insane, but I saw it. I was there. I was touched by it.” She shivers.
“We both were,” I add. My stomach twists, remembering the Bone Gates and the cold, skeletal finger reaching for Hanna’s forehead.
“Well,” Naomi exhales slowly, “this just sounds completely crazy.”
“But we know you wouldn’t make something like this up,” Tasha says immediately. She looks from me to Hanna, her expression softening. “Either of you.”
“We were so worried about the two of you,” Yelena says. She pushes a hand through her long, silver hair, her usual polish slipping just a little. “I opened missing persons cases on both of you. I had timelines. Contacts. I was about to escalate.”
My throat tightens.
“I guess you’ll have to cancel those.”
“I will,” she says briskly. Then softer, “But don’t ever do that to us again.”
“Believe me,” I say, “Leaving the Human world and being sucked into the Shadow Realm was not the plan for either of us.”
“I mean,” Lucia says slowly, “You’re telling us you were abducted because of your…blood?”
“Because I’m curvy,” I say. “Lucian—he said he saw me in this magical mirror thing. The Crimson Eye. And he knew my blood would be…valuable to him.”
“Wow,” Sophia whispers. “That’s crazy.”
“Yeah—that’s the other thing,” Hanna adds. “They love curvy women over there. Worship them, really. Which is why—” She swallows. “Which is why I nearly got my soul siphoned away.”
That opens the floodgates.
Questions fly. Overlapping voices. Shock, disbelief, fear.
“What do you mean, siphoned?”
“Like—permanently?”
“Are you okay now?”
“Did they hurt you?”
We’re at Tasha’s house for almost three hours, talking, explaining, backtracking, and explaining again. A few of the more practical members—Naomi, and Yelena—ask hard questions. They need timelines…proof…logic.
So we show them.
Hanna brings out the clothes Lucian sent her home in—fabric far too luxurious to be anything she bought herself. I lay out the token Whistler accidentally left behind, watching it glint strangely under the light.
“This thing opened a hallway where my bedroom door used to be,” I say quietly. “I walked through it and left this world behind.”
The room goes silent.
“So…” Naomi says at last, rubbing her arms. “Are you ever going back?”
I hesitate.
“I mean,” she continues gently, “it sounds like you got pretty close to your vampire guy.”
“To Lucian,” I correct again, automatically. My cheeks get hot with a blush. “And no. I’m not going back.”
Lucia frowns.
“That sounds final.”
“He didn’t try to stop me leaving,” I say, forcing the words out evenly. “In fact, it was his idea that I come back with Hanna. He said I’d wanted to leave from the beginning.”
“And did you?” Tasha asks.
I don’t answer right away.
“I did to start with,” I say at last. “But, well…he grew on me. The whole place grew on me.”
“Well,” Hanna says, shivering, “I know I never want to go back. I can still see that skull mask when I close my eyes.”
“You were literally being stalked by Death,” Mari murmurs, looking horrified.
“Exactly,” Hanna says. “Which is why I’m done. No more Shadow Realm for me—ever.”
We talk a bit longer, until yawns start spreading and people start glancing at their phones, muttering about early mornings.
I don’t mention that I don’t have a job waiting for me. I don’t want pity—not tonight. I’ll worry about everything tomorrow—today is almost over and I’m so, so tired.
On the drive back home, I try to push everything out of my mind…especially the way my heart still aches when I think of Lucian.