Page 2 of Wrath

“NO!” I cried as grief, fury, and pain warred for dominance.

Something fizzled in my chest. I couldn’t put my finger on what it was, but everywhere it touched, it burned.

I was onfire.

“No one but me will love you now,” a deceptively sweet voice declared.

A moment later, Aaliyah came into view, looking almost ethereal in her shimmering white gown. Her blood-red hair mirrored the color splattered across the walls and floor.

My sister stepped forward until she stood directly in front of me and then knelt down, her eyes sparkling with a malicious type of joy that made me want to dry-heave. “I will have your heart. You won’t have any other choice.”

I gasped, and pain ripped through me.

Shock held me immobile as I stared at Aaliyah’s hand—which was currently in my chest.

She smiled—a sickeningly loving smile—and slowly removed her arm. In her palm lay my still-beating heart.

“See?” She tilted her head to the side as she studied the organ. “I told you I’d have your heart.”

I began to scream.

“Z! Z! Wake up, dammit! Z!”

The voice jarred me awake.

I bolted upright in bed, blinking rapidly, desperately attempting to clear away the residual fog from my most recent nightmare. My skin felt clammy, and an incessant pounding beat between my brows.

“Dev?” I asked groggily as I struggled to reorient myself to the here and now.

I was no longer in Aaliyah’s palace of horrors.

I was with my mates, on a boat, sailing across Lake Meade.

“I’m here.” My genie mate waved his hand, and one of the candles nearby erupted into purple flames. The fire illuminated his eyes, making them appear almost luminescent. Shadows danced across his olive complexion. “Did you have a bad dream?”

“I suppose you could say that.” I rubbed at my eyes as a yawn threatened to tear my jaw apart.

The last thing I wanted to do was relive that nightmare. Even thinking about it sent pinpricks of panic racing down both of my arms.

I shivered and huddled farther into the blanket. “What time is it?”

Devlin glanced towards the clock hanging opposite the bed. “A little after two in the morning.”

“Way too fucking early for you to be yapping,” Bash exclaimed from my other side. His arm encircled my waist as he nuzzled the back of my neck. “Go back to sleep.”

I tapped his wrist impatiently. “Let me up.”

“Make me.” But Bash relented with only a tiny sigh of irritation, rolling onto his back and throwing his arm over his eyes.

I crawled out from between the two warm bodies, trying to ignore the sudden, persistent chill that invaded my system. I missed their heat almost instantly.

“Where are you going?” Devlin asked with concern, sitting upright in the tiny bed the ship’s captain, Phineas, allowed us to use.

“The bathroom.” I kept my voice low since Bash had already fallen back asleep, his breathing deep and rhythmic.

Devlin nodded and then shifted onto his side, his long lashes fluttering against his cheekbones.

I allowed myself a moment—just a moment—to study the two.

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