Chapter 73 AURORA

Panic rising, I dug around for the papers.

I knew they were in my top desk drawer. I’d been so specific about leaving them there.

Then I saw them – not in a drawer at all, but on top of a paper-organizing tray.

I wanted to snatch them up, but the paper was old, yellowed, and brittle with age.

Carefully, I lifted them and set them in the center of my desk.

“You found them, then?” Dane asked.

I flicked my eyes to him, then back to the papers. “That wasn’t where I left them. I’m certain of it.”

Dane frowned. “Are you?”

“Yes,” I insisted. I flared my nostrils and scented, but without a wolf, there was no way I could tell if someone had been in here.

Seeing me, Dane did the same. Then he shook his head. “There are no scents here but you and your pack.”

I gritted my teeth. “I know it couldn’t have been one of my people. I trust them completely.”

“Do you trust them more than you trust your own memory? Because either it was them, or you were mistaken about where you put the papers.”

I wavered, uncertain. I knew who I suspected: Evelyn.

My eyes went wide. There was a chance – and not a small one – that Dane could scent Evelyn in here, and he just wasn’t telling me.

I searched his face, trying to gauge whether or not he might be lying to protect her. It would be far, far from the first time. In fact, I’d be much more likely to believe he was lying to protect her than I would that he’d tell me the truth.

“There’s no scent here that doesn’t belong?” I asked, carefully watching to see if I could catch him in a lie.

“No,” he said.

I pressed my lips together and nodded. Outside my windows, it was full dark. I was suddenly so tired. I wanted desperately to be with Dane and to trust him, but my mistrust of myself and the years he’d spent as my enemy made it so difficult.

“You should go,” I said. “I’m… unnerved by this. I’d like to get some sleep.”

Dane looked from me to my bed. The way he did it made my entire body heat with desire, but I’d made up my mind.

“Fine,” he said. He wasn’t exactly rude about it, but I could tell he was frustrated. I didn’t blame him. If he was half as needy and aching for release as I was, “frustration” would be putting it mildly.

He walked up to me and bent to kiss my lips. I turned so he got my cheek instead.

“Aurora,” he growled.

I put my hand on his chest. His heartbeat was strong and steady beneath my palm. “Soon, Dane. I swear. I want you, too. But like you said earlier, things are complicated.”

He lifted my hand and pressed a kiss to the sensitive skin of my palm that sent fire burning down to my center and nearly made me change my mind. But I held strong.

“If you touch yourself tonight, think of me. As for myself… I won’t know release until I’m inside you. Don’t keep me waiting long.”

Then he was gone, and I was left alone, trembling for more reasons than one.

I hardly slept that night for obvious reasons. There was no release for me, because nothing could compare to my need for him.

I woke several times, sweating in my twisted sheets. The fifth or sixth time, the sky was finally gray with dawn.

Sick to death of trying to sleep when sleep only held dreams of Dane that ratcheted my need up to something like pain, I went and sat at my desk.

I flicked on the lamp and took the papers in my hand.

I wasn’t sure where my power to translate had come from, only that I’d had this journal for most of my life, and its symbols had been meaningless to me almost the entire time.

Then, one day after the twins were born, I opened it again and found that I could read it.

Well, “read” was a simple way of putting it. When I looked at the page, the symbols would start to waver. Sometimes the lines would seem to shift into words. Sometimes it would be more like… a feeling of meaning in my head.

Staring at the book for too long would give me a headache and make me nauseous.

The best thing to compare it to was the way heat distorted the air around it – like the air around a fire or above the pavement on a sunny day. The magic of this book was like a fire; so strong it distorted the very air.

I didn’t know if I could read it because of the distortions, or in spite of them. All I knew was that no one else was capable of doing so.

This morning, the pages revealed very little. I could tell they both detailed ceremonies for imbuing the chosen with the goddess’s power. Each chosen had a different job. I could also make out some of the instructions. I wrote them down, then leaned back and rubbed my temples.

Another book caught my eye: the journal I had kept when I was younger. I’d been too afraid to open it and read more, afraid of finding out the depths of how evil I had been before losing most of my memories.

I closed my eyes and put my head down on the desk. The movement made the pearl pendant dig painfully into my chest.

“I don’t even think I should have you,” I said regretfully as I took it off.

I set it to one side, then laid my head down again. The night hadn’t been good, and I just wanted to rest for a moment…

Sometime later, I jerked awake.

“How long did I…?”

I thought I was asking the question to an empty room.

Instead, there was a woman sitting in the chair on the opposite side of my desk.

Pale, beautiful, with lilac eyes.

With a gasp, I realized it wasn’t another woman…

It was another version of myself.

“Aurora DeVere,” she said, and leaned forward with a wicked smile. “It’s time for you to move over and let me out.”

“Who are you?” I asked, terror coating my heart in ice.

Her smile grew. “Sweetheart, I’m you. The real you. I’m Ann Reed.”