Page 231 of Shifting Hearts 1
Bobby leaned forward. “He did call you, Jace. I was with you. That time in Denver. You got that strange call. He asked if you told someone about the way you two meet.”
The memory slammed into me. That call. Shit. That was her. My gaze found hers, and the weight in my gut turned heavy and sick.
“So he called you,” she said hoarsely. “It doesn’t matter, though. You wouldn’t have remembered me.”
“I would’ve known you if I saw you.” My voice shook. “You’re my Lockpass, Morgan.”
Her jaw clenched. “It’s Natasha now.”
“I don’t care what you call yourself. You’re still my Lockpass.”
Her eyes hardened. “Not this time.”
The room fell into silence. Gabby’s breath sounded harsh in the stillness. Then she spoke. “Tell them.”
Morgan’s gaze flickered toward me. “The dreams I had on the cruise line when I first started losing it. Do you remember?”
It was her. My throat tightened as I nodded.
“I used to see myself as a vampire,” Morgan whispered. “I never told you because it sounded insane. The visions stopped after Asim took me. But years later, I started dreaming again. This time about her. About Blaze.”
I nodded, throat tight.
Her eyes shifted to Ryan and Em. “Please, can you give us a couple of minutes?”
Em’s face crumpled. “You want me to leave?”
“Em, please.”
“No,” Ryan cut in sharply. “If you’re really our mother, I need to know why you couldn’t come back to us.”
Morgan’s voice trembled. “It’s not a pretty story.”
“I don’t care,” Ryan shot back.
“You say that now,” she sighed, shaking her head. “But later you will. And… it doesn’t matter anymore.”
Gabby touched her arm, steadying her. “It will be okay. Just tell them.”
Morgan sniffed and nodded. “Fine. I lied. I told you she had red hair. She didn’t. The reason I couldn’t handle those dreams… was because I sawmyselfdoing them.”
Gasps echoed around the room. My chest constricted. What was she saying?
“They weren’t dreams, Jace,” she said softly.
“No.” I surged to my feet, pacing the length of the library. “No, you’re not that thing. You’re not that monster.”
Her eyes glistened. “I was tethered to this life. The coven he delivered me to had a mistress. I’d never seen one that large.”
Dom frowned. “The one in the South? That was your coven.”
She shook her head. “No. I was just her weapon. She hated my human life, hated what I was. I was a terrible nightling, never good enough to do what she wanted. Her hatred only grew. She tried to kill me, over and over. And every time, someone stepped in to save me. People who cared for me. People I killed in the end, because I didn’t remember them.”
My voice broke. “What do you mean you didn’t remember them?”
Her gaze cut into me like glass. “You had one fucking job, Jace. Kill her. Make sure she was dead. Not leave her half-dying so someone else could turn her.”
“What are you talking about?”
