Chapter Forty Three-My Playground

When the spirits inside me take over, everything happens like a movie on television, except I’m walking in the middle of it all. I’m there. I see all perspectives like a General in a war room.

I was born to kill, and the blood-soaked fields of the Hexom’s land were my playground.

My skin glowed like the morning sun as the blue flames rose from my pores, and Haldir bowed his head to me. “It is my honor to see you again, Mother.” When Jacob moved to throw his arms around me to shield from the screams and projectiles bombarding us, my father blocked him from my heat. “Don’t touch her. She’s not herself now. She’ll kill you if you stand between her and her brother.”

A purr rose from inside me as the animal that I housed traced Haldir’s face with my fingers. “Let’s play.”

His hatchet was ready in his hand, and he stood by my side as he always did. “As you wish.”

The path to Teddy was illuminated like a runway, and he held off the attack on his home single-handedly. But not for long.

In the wavy spirit realm that followed me, a dozen demons awaited their turn to pierce through the sticky plasm of this world and become one with me. And when I saw the stalker with a shotgun pointed at my brother’s back, I unleashed them.

I stepped through the mist, and in an instant, I was laying my teeth into the hunter’s neck. His screams and gurgles thrilled me, and the taste of his blood made me want more.

I saw the flash from the barrel of the gun pointed at my chest and the shell that sliced through the air towards me, and I swatted it from its path like a bug. He probably would have emptied his whole clip into my chest if my father’s hand ax hadn’t sunk deep in his skull.

My brother’s entity, wrapped in the dapper gentleman’s clothing, winked his black eye at me, and nodded to the woods around us. “Burn it.”




With a wiggle of my fingers, the trees that encircled us smoldered until thick black smoke climbed into the sky. The cries and yells of the cowards hiding under the woods’ lush cover were like music, and I swayed to their panic serenade.

We met each of them as they left the woods, and my twin and I ripped the intruders to shreds with our always watchful guardian behind us.

As I passed through the fields of my brother’s home, I pointed my finger gun at every strange face, and they became pillars of ash that blew off into the air.

I didn’t notice the men with guns surrounding us, not that it would have mattered in the state I was in. But before I could devour the human pointing his rifle at me, my Alpha ripped him from his feet and made a meal of his throat. Watching him eviscerate the hunter, I finally understood our connection. We were the same. Killers, monsters.

Logan thought he wanted someone like his mother to help him lead his people, but what he needed was me.


We killed together like we were meant to, and when I called back the flames and the smoke cleared, my demons left me. I spun around to see the body-littered fields until my eyes found the one I came with. “Jacob.”

My feet beat across the ground as fast as my ballet flats would take me, and I fell at the feet of the blood-covered man struggling to get to his feet. “Oh, no. Jacob. No.” I pulled him into my arms, but his wet skin slipped through my hands, and we both crashed to the soft grass as he crushed me underneath him.

Two hands separated us, and Logan tugged him to his chest. “I got you, Jakey.” Like Jacob weighed nothing at all, the Alpha moved across the lawn until Teddy ran to him and placed his hand on his shoulder. The three of them fell away, and the black whirlwind swallowed them whole.

Covered in my husband’s blood, I laid there while medics ran to the injured and dying, still watching the charred embers of the mist being carried off into the darkening sky.

Freckled hands pulled me to his chest and flipped me onto his lap. Like he did when I was a baby, Haldir rocked me in his arms. “Are you hurt?”

Fingers wiped away the blood and tears from my face as he searched my eyes. “Tess? Talk to me.”

My head shook no, but I couldn’t speak for once in my life. I caught my brother's scent on the air and felt the whoosh of his wind wrap me up inside it. Our three heartbeats were the only thing in the darkness until the emergency room floor was against my feet, and Logans rushed to my side.

“Tess?” His fingers trembled above my bloody body like if he touched me, it would be true.

Haldir shook his head. “She’s in shock, I think. It’s not her blood.”

Logan snatched me from my father’s grasp, then rushed me through the hall and kicked the door open. With arms as soft as pillows, he laid me on the bed then his hands pushed the sticky hair from my face. “Look at me.”

For weeks, I’ve seen his face everywhere, but now that it was before me, all I could see was Jacob. “Jacob.”

“Shh.” His lips touched mine, and his voice was almost a whisper. “He’s in surgery. They’re taking good care of him.” He said words he wanted me to hear, but I noticed the worry in his voice as his hands hovered over my body, and he sniffed my skin. “Why did you come back here, Tess? You could have been killed.”

His mouth moved all over my skin until he collapsed into my neck. My fingers tugged through his hair, and I finally caught my breath again. “I had to see your face again.”

The doctor came through the curtain and cleared his throat. “Sir.”

The warm breath left me, and the stern leader returned. “I want a full set of tests on her. Everything.” His long finger rose into the air. “When I say everything, I mean everything. If she has a cold coming on, I want to know about it.”

The doctor lowered his head and back out the doorway as Logan appeared over my face. “Go to sleep now, Sweetheart. I’ll wake you when I hear something about Jacob.”

In the distance, I heard the thunder and the rain trickle to the ground outside. While my heavy eyes bobbed up and down, Logan whispered to me until his voice faded off into silence. “I love you, Tess.”