Page 40 of Luna's Forgotten Vow

But Soren strokes it like he loves it. "If you do ever let me in, let me into your bed, it'll be the first place I come on."

His words send a violent shudder through me, heat pooling between my legs so fast it's dizzying.

Soren chuckles darkly, like he can smell exactly what that just did to me. He leans in, a day's old stubble rubbing against my cheek as he whispers, "When I take you the first time—because I will—it will be when you're completely healed, so you remember what my bruises feel like."

My teeth sink into my bottom lip and feeling dangerously reckless, I lean forward, letting my fingers brush against his still very hard erection. "You promise?"

He barks a startled laugh and turns the last second to kiss my cheek. "I promise." He pulls back and shrugs off his jacket, draping it over my shoulders. "Wait for me outside. Someone's here."

I hear it then, the quiet footsteps outside, almost inaudible. I don't ask before turning around and pulling the doorknob.

And I come face to face with Ronan Callahan.

The world sways.

Not in the way it does when I stand too fast or when exhaustion makes my vision swim, but in a way that feels deeper, like my body is reacting to something my mind can't grasp.

He is striking, in a way that unsettles more than it soothes. But that is not what holds my attention. It's his golden brown eyes and the way they look at me that unravels something deep in my bones. Like he's seen me bare, inside and out, andownsthe knowledge of it.

A sharp, twisting pain blooms in my chest. A horrifying twin of it traveling up my spine. My ribs feel like they're caving in.

I don't know him. Ishouldn'tknow him. But my body betrays me—my breath catches, my pulse spikes, and a strange, twisting ache knots itself in my stomach.

The way his gaze moves over me—slow, possessive, a little too hungry—sends something sharp down my spine. There's familiarity in his eyes, something that crawls under my skin, something I can't name.

And like a wound that has never healed, the awful, wrenching pain in my head strikes in full force sending me forward, shoulder knocking into his as I flee from him.

It doesn't make sense but my body knows. Itremembers.

I claw at the necklace on my throat and tear it off. But I still can't breathe. The fancy lights and decorations blind me as I try to find my way to my bedroom. To my meds. But I can't get my bearings right and everyone's in twos and fours.

"Are you alright, Seraphina?" someone asks beside me. It's Eric. But...where is he?

I blink rapidly, trying to dispel the multiple images around the corners of my eyes and in a bid to hold onto something, I slam into someone.

"I'm sorry," I whisper, feeling something wet drip down my dress. "I—I'm sorry?—"

The woman screams. It's a loud, blood-curdling sound, you would think she saw a ghost. I force myself to focus, force myself to take in more than her blonde hair intricately woven around a silver crown in the shape of leaves and branches. I see fear in her brown eyes. I see her skin has gone deathly pale.

I've never seen her before either, but something must be terribly wrong with me, because I begin to hyperventilate. Especially when she whispers so low, I'm unsure how I even heard her. "T-this isn't real. You're dead."

A dizzy spell hits me then, so severe, I clutch forward blindly, hand landing on her arm. She screams again and pushes me off her.

And again, I'm falling.

The golden lights flicker around me, switching out with the darkness of the woods where the accident had happened.

I see him, Matt, hovering above me, and his words echo in the walls of my mind again. "Shit. What do we tell the Luna?"

And the last thing my mind recalls before it blacks out is the last name that had come to mind before I felt death embrace me that night.

Luna Kaida.

CHAPTER 14

SOREN

"WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS?!"

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