Chapter 9
Chapter
Nine
ETHAN
Istumbled out of the house and shifted, my paws sinking into the cold soil. My thoughts were scrambled and all over the place, and the only need pumping through me was to run.
I tore through the Keep, heading to the back of the property where the densest part of the forest was. Blood roared through my veins as I ran faster and faster, Moira’s words pounding through my head.
I will be yours for the rest of my immortal existence.
The promise had rung through the air, her eyes glowing with intensity. She’d meant every word she said to me.
And what did I do? I ran. Branches scraped my skin and pulled my fur. I ran for miles and miles and only stopped when I was close to collapsing.
Pulling on my magic, I shifted back to human form and went to my knees.
Sarah’s face swam through my mind. She couldn’t be more different than Moira in looks. Her hair was long and golden, and she was short and curvy with bright blue eyes. Her smile felt like the sun had come out, and the way she looked at me…
I will be yours for the rest of my immortal existence.
Sarah didn’t have immortality. She didn’t even have her full human lifespan. I’d lost her far too soon and had never been able to move on.
I never wanted to until Moira had broken into my godsdamned house and left her scent all over the place.
“FUCK!” The scream echoed through the valley, years of pain in the sound.
Moira had been in the periphery of my life for a couple of years now. I’d noticed her as a male noticed a beautiful woman, but we’d never really spoken until after she broke into my house. As soon as we had, I’d become obsessed, and that was unlike me.
Moira was gorgeous and funny and wicked and occasionally violent, and I adored everything about her. While I saw instances of Sarah in Moira sometimes, Sarah had been sunshine, and Moira was velvet wrapped darkness.
I treated Sarah with kid gloves, handled her like an injured rabbit. She was human and I was a monster, and how could someone lovely like her want someone like me?
But she had, and I’d fallen for her like a meteor hurtling through the atmosphere. Like a meteor, she burned bright before disappearing into the ether a brief time later, leaving the people she touched unable to forget her.
Then Moira hit me like a nuke.
I wasn’t a lucky enough man to have two women love me in a single lifetime.
Why had the universe chosen to bless me?
But even worse, why couldn’t I open myself up the way Moira needed?
I wanted her love. I craved it. But every time I opened my mouth to tell her, all I could see was Sarah’s prone body lying buried in the woods.
So lost in my confusion and grief, I missed the snap of the branches alerting me to another presence. I spun at the hint of familiar scent in the air to see a dark-haired woman with bright green eyes smiling at me.
“Hello, handsome Lord,” Minka Belyaev purred.