BONUS NOVELETTE #2
The moment I stand beside him, I take a deep breath and catch his scent immediately.
Yes, this is it!
Mauro was right. It’s him.
I have found my True Mate.
His Allure leaves no doubt. He smells like hot coffee with milk, like warm cookies, the kind my granddad Silvio used to bake for me when I was a little child.
The memory is like a brief flash that fades inside me, and I know it will soon disappear completely, cease to exist. I will be erased in a matter of minutes.
"Help me. Only you can save me," I whisper.
All eyes are riveted on me, everyone’s gaping as though I’ve just materialized from the swirling snow, some apparition emerging from the blizzard.
"Save me from nonexistence…" I whisper to him, probably adding even more of a ghostly atmosphere to the scene with that melodramatic line.
Roberto seems almost paralyzed by my strange declaration, but he doesn’t take a step back. Instead, he watches me cautiously, his brows drawn slightly together, as if he’s trying to make sense of what I’ve just told him. There’s curiosity in his eyes too, a hesitant hope…
Then his nostrils flare, and he takes a deep breath.
Yeah, he must have caught my Allure scent too. Does he know? Can he guess now? Either way, I can see the uncertainty in his face as he finally asks, his voice carrying a need for confirmation,
"Are you my…?" He cuts himself off.
"I am just a shadow of him… but you can help me become fully human. Only you."
Yeah, I’m being cryptic again, but it’s simply what spills from my heart. I can’t help it. Maybe Rocco hid his secretive, romantic, and melodramatic side in me too?
I know I have to do this, so I extend my hand toward him in the simple gesture people use when greeting a stranger.
After a moment of hesitation, Roberto extends his own slender, tanned hand, and I take it between my fingers.
That’s when it happens.
A powerful spark shoots through both our bodies, our heads jerk backward, and our eyes roll back.
A wave of electric shock travels down my spine, flooding me with tremors and a strange, almost blissful, unexpected pleasure.
This is it.
First Touch!
And it happened. I found the right person, my other half, my fated mate.
The problem is that he is also Rocco’s perfect mate, while I am only a fragment of him, torn away from my original… a faint remnant of his soul that could be saved, but could also fade into oblivion.
Sweet waves of elation roll over me.
My fated mate… standing right in front of me, equally shocked, slightly trembling.
Finding him is a wonderful discovery, but it only deepens the grim awareness of what may happen, what must happen, what… I long to happen.
When Rocco goes out, so will I, because a part cannot live without the whole.
So I have to make it before the end.
"Please. Only you can give me a new life. I will disappear today, but you have the power to save me."
Roberto stares down at our joined hands, then turns toward Thorn and the other man and says, "Leave. I need to talk to this man."
"What the hell are you talking about? He’s some kind of freak—" the beta begins, but Roberto points firmly toward the door.
"We’ll talk about this later. This is too important. Please, go home."
Both men leave. Blue-skinned Thorn gives me a dark look, as if warning me not to do anything that might hurt Roberto, but that is the furthest thing from my mind.
Still holding my hand, Roberto leads me deeper into the house, toward a small, modest room with a narrow bed covered by the hide of a white bear.
A few pillows are arranged into a small nest, like shy, tentative attempts to build a sense of safety around oneself, but somehow still half-hearted.
Then I look at the solitary painting hanging on the wall.
It depicts a meadow filled with flowers…
specific ones. Snapdragons! I swallow because…
they were the flowers I loved as a child.
The flowers my granddad used to grow for me.
For a moment, I stare at the colorful picture, so strangely out of place in a home this close to the Arctic Circle, then I look at Roberto because I know I don't have much time.
I need to get to the point, so I sit down on the bed.
"I flew to Koebutze today, Roberto. I searched for you. I was told you are my True Mate by a person with the gift of clairvoyance, but my time is running out. What I’m about to say will sound crazy, but still, hear me out, please.
I am only a fragment of your actual True Mate, whose life is coming to an end right now, but you are the only one who can give me a chance to exist, to stop being nothing but a shadow and become a real human being…
" I can feel that what I’m saying may sound like rambling, but somehow I also feel that he listens and… understands me.
Roberto’s chocolate-colored eyes move over my face, and then he reaches toward me and gently touches my cheek. It’s so unexpected, I shiver, something inside me awakening under his touch.
"You know… someone else might think you are crazy. But… for months, I’ve been dreaming about you standing in my doorway and saying these exact words: I am only a shadow, let me become human… exactly that!"
"What?" I blink. A burst of intense emotion hits me. Incredible. So he had been waiting for me, expecting me?
He chuckles bitterly. "Funny. It was me who was convinced I was going nuts."
"You’re not. But you need to know that my original took the wrong path in life, a dark one, and I am the part the darkness failed to consume. Because I have the blood of magical ABOs in me, I was successfully separated from him and given redemption… or a chance at it. But only if I meet you."
Roberto listens closely, his eyes wide open, his breathing quickened.
"I know something about taking the wrong path, because I was on it myself for many years.
I know what it means to long for a second chance, even if it is only that tiny part of you that still knows things could have gone differently in an alternate reality, on a different course," Roberto whispers pensively, his fingers moving over my face, as if he still couldn’t quite believe that I was actually here, physically present beside him, not only a figure from his dreams.
Closing my eyes, I tremble beneath his touch, then lift my hands and take his other hand where it rests on his lap. I respectfully press a kiss to that hand.
"My original did something terrible today, and he will pay the highest price for it. His fate will be sealed in a moment, and along with his fate, so will mine… Give me a chance, Roberto. Please, give us a chance."
Understanding appears in Roberto’s eyes.
He knows what I am asking for. I can see it in him, the realization slowly sinking in that a pivotal moment is approaching, that everything may depend on what happens now.
And I feel a bittersweet joy seeing that he believes me, probably because he can sense me, just as I can feel every one of his emotions.
The next moment, a shudder runs through my body.
"Oh, damn!" My breath hitches. I bend forward a little, fighting to take it.
"It’s coming, Roberto… I have only minutes left to live. In a moment, a man with white hair and violet eyes… that man will kill Rocco, he will shatter him into a million pieces…"
Roberto quickly moves closer, and wraps his arms around me, resting his head against my shoulder. I breathe in his soothing scent, bring my lips to his temple, and brush my mouth against his smooth black hair.
"What do I have to do?" he whispers, "What can save you? Joining?"
"I think so… It may be the last chance. Joining can save dying True Mates. It closes the channel of energy between our souls, binding me to you. It may keep me here, bound in this world."
Roberto blinks, his tanned cheeks turning slightly red. "I… I haven’t been with anyone in years. I gave up on that part of my life," he blurts out, exhaling the air from his lungs, his hot breath brushing against my lips.
"And I’ve never been with anyone, not once, ever since I was created from him, three months ago. All I could think about was finding you… that was my only purpose."
Those chocolate-brown eyes remain fixed on my face, and the sadness and certain severity in his expression slowly give way to a shy smile.
"So… you’re real? You came to me, all the way to the edge of the world?"
I smile sadly in response. "I can become real. A real person. But that decision is yours, only yours."
Roberto nods, and suddenly he pulls off the warm fleece he’s wearing. Then his sweater, and the warm undershirt beneath it, revealing naked skin.