Chapter 24
WE LIE WITH AVEN BETWEEN us and watch him sleep.
Our hands clasped, our eyes red from tears.
When I told Bastian Aven’s full name, he wrapped his arms around me, holding us both as he wept.
“Luc after my brother, Aven after Aventurine,” he said, teeth clenched, clear tears falling from his eyes.
I held him then. I’ll hold him as long as he needs.
At least an hour has passed, and he stares in wonder at the little being he never thought possible.
“I’m ready,” he says, so I place Aven on his bare chest, out cold, and Bastian’s body shivers. “I’m a dad.”
“How does it feel?” I whisper.
He looks down at Aven, his tiny cheek smashed against Bastian’s skin, and places his large hand gently on Aven’s back. Meeting my stare, he says, “Really fucking good.”
I text my mother two words.
It. Worked.
She sends a ton of hurried texts like:
OMG!
I NEED TO KNOW EVERYTHING!
Did you ask him about what Grandma said?
Is he okay?
CALL ME
You did it! I knew you could do it!
I’m CALLING CHANTAL
I answer everything, telling her I’m not ready to ask him about Grandma but soon. I tell her to call Chantal for the details until I can fill her in, and she does that, as I can hear Chantal’s muffled voice down the hall.
I tell Bastian that Cassius is in Santa Cruz, and I text Cassius to come over as soon as it’s dark. I’m worried my loophole for bringing Bastian back won’t work because it appears he is no longer a vampire. But I push that out of my mind and focus on my family.
I have a family.
“I’m not a vampire. I can’t feel it in my body.” Bastian says it as though he’s lost something, and I nod. “I’m hungry for food. I’m not as strong. Everything looks how it did when I drank the potion. Less vibrant. My sense of smell is mediocre. I don’t feel as strong. I’m slower.”
“Does that upset you?” I ask, hesitant to hear the answer.
“I don’t know. I think…it’s an adjustment. But I think I’m okay with it. I just feel a little lost. So confused. Are you okay with it?” His eyebrows knit together with worry for this unchartered territory, and I take a deep breath.
This is something I hadn’t thought of or considered. “I will take you any way I can have you. I know it’ll complicate things. But if it means you can be in the daylight with me every day, then, yes. Of course, I’m okay with it.”
“It’s going to take some getting used to.” His smile is tight lipped, but then his eyes flash with appreciation. “I told you, you could do anything.” His knuckles graze my cheek, and I cover them with my hand. “You are one of the goddamn seven wonders of the world.”
“I’m just crazy enough to do anything to bring my man back.”
“Your man,” he whispers, his Adam’s apple bobbing, his chest stilling.
“Come here,” he says, and I scoot closer, careful not to disturb Aven on his chest but close enough for his lips to touch mine, so softly, so sweetly—my veins fill with sugar.
The kiss deepens, the desire for him pooling in my stomach, the need for him beating in my ears like a drum.
When we part, his hand stays in my hair, looking at me in awe. “You’re so beautiful.”
“You’re so beautiful,” I repeat.
“And your hair is so long.” He pulls his fingers down my tresses.
“Pregnancy does it.”
He blinks, as if that’s the first time he’s realized I was pregnant, a look of wonder on his face. “Aster, you’re a mother. Are you okay with that?”
I clench his hand so he can feel my sincerity. “One hundred percent. Because he’s yours.”
His face stiffens, eyes growing serious. “You did it all alone. Without me.”
I bring his hand to my mouth and look deeply in his eyes. “The last words you said to me… ‘I’d do it a thousand times over. It was worth every second.’ That’s how I feel now. I’d do it all over again. Over and over. To bring you back. To have him.”
Bastian pulls his lips between his teeth, his bare chest heaving.
“When we found out he was a boy, we ran here. To get away from my coven. Because I don’t know what they will do when they find out.
Mother is back home, making the potions for the vampires and trying to figure out what witch put a protection spell on Franklin, and who helped with the fire, since it was set during the day. ”
“Your mother came back?”
“Are you ready to hear it all? I kept a journal for you to read, but I can give you the summary.”
“Yes,” he whispers. “But…I’m starving.”
He’s still in shock, still mourning the time he lost, yet so happy to be back. I will take things slowly, at a pace that’s not too exhausting.
I make him a sandwich and spend the day filling him in on everything.
From the moment I watched him die in front of me to the moment his mother killed Franklin.
I tell him about Cassius handing me over the houses.
And when we found out Aven was a boy, Chantal and I ran here after our mothers almost killed each other.
How Cassius came and brought me the autobiography he had started writing, but I don’t bring up the part about my grandma and what she whispered in his ear.
I decided to wait on that. He’s already so overwhelmed, and I don’t want him even more weighed down with any expectations.
He studies how I take care of Aven. How I feed him and change him.
How he likes to be bounced up and down while swaddled tight.
He watches how I get him to sleep and place him in bed with me or in his bassinet with eyes full of a wonder and joy I wish I could bottle, could save for any person on the worst day of their life.
“It’s true. I never told you that I wanted a child. I made that joke about it…Aventurine eyes. He’s ours.” He looks to where Aven sleeps on the bed, then back to me.
“Can you believe that?” I ask, crawling into his lap on the floor.
His nose travels up my jaw, just below my ear.
“That smell,” he says, gripping the back of my t-shirt tight.
“Vacation. I missed you so much. In that place I was stuck between. Heaven or hell, or God knows where. I just floated around. But it wasn’t months; it was moments, clips, and highlights of my life.
And most of it was with you. And I thought I couldn’t take it anymore.
I would have to rip through heaven and hell to get back to you.
I needed you.” His fingers grip my hips as he whispers in my ear, causing goosebumps to erupt over my body.
“Do you think that’s where vampires go when they die?
Just float through a never-ending sea of nothingness? ”
“I don’t know. I hope not. I hope the universe knew you would come back, so it tucked you away somewhere until the time was right.
” My hand slides up his jawline, clinging to him.
“God, I missed you. Every day was torture, but I held on to hope that the spell would work, and you would be back with me. Hope is what got me through it.”
Grabbing my chin, he pulls my mouth to his, our lips moving against each other slowly and deliberately.
He groans, his erection under me, and my entire body sings, but my brain can’t fathom this.
Cannot comprehend that he’s in my arms and that I can make love to him again.
It’s too much to take in, and my heart booms.
“Bastian,” I whisper, our lips parting, mouths panting. His lustful green eyes fuse to mine, begging to give me what I want. There’s a knock on the door, and Chantal pops her head in.
“Cassius is here,” she says, then takes in our positions and faces. “Oh, sorry.”
“It’s fine!” he says, overly exuberant because his brother is here, and I realize it’s night. It’s been ten hours since I’ve had Bastian back, and there’s another important reunion on the horizon.
I stand, adjusting my clothes as Bastian looks at me anxiously. Aven stirs, so I pick him up just as Cassius enters the room.
Time stands still, as though Cassius is made of stone, his expression void of emotion, his body stiff as a wall. He watches Bastian slowly rise, taking in the face of his beloved brother.
“Baz?” he finally chokes out, his jaw ticking, eyes searching Bastian’s face.
Bastian smiles and simply says, “Caz.” That smile I am in love with brightens the entire room, and Cassius marches like a soldier going into battle, grabbing the back of Bastian’s head and pulling him into an embrace.
I shut the door behind me, leaving them to their reunion, and put Aven in his swing in Chantal’s room.
He’s such an easy baby, eyes barely opening as I buckle him in and then nodding off to sleep once I start the swing.
I don’t know why I’m surprised to see Marlowe in the living room, sitting across from Chantal, tears spilling down her face.
There’s an urgency when she looks at me. “I’m just a human, and I’m not used to this kinda shit. You really brought him back?”
I look at Chantal, who shrugs, so I nod.
“Yes.” My eyes burn from tears, wishing I could close them for a moment.
I wasn’t expecting Marlowe to be here, and I don’t know what to think of her, to think of a human who has no power, no self-protection like I do.
Why would she purposely begin a love affair with a vampire like Cassius?
I have a fondness for him, but I can’t imagine him as a boyfriend.
“Thank you,” she says, causing Chantal to secretly roll her eyes.
“It’s all he could possibly want in the world. Bastian was everything to him.”
The old me would say I know, but I don’t. I bite my tongue instead because that’s the heartless thing I would say in the past. If Marlowe is part of why Cassius has softened, then I’m grateful to her for that.
We sit in silence for a few minutes, all too overstimulated to have a proper conversation, and the human in the room is probably internally freaking out. But then she finally looks up at me as if she has something important to say.
“I haven’t properly thanked you for saving my life.” Her finger taps on the mug in her hand, and Chantal’s eyebrows rise in amusement.