Page 246 of Shifting Hearts 1
A low growl rumbled from his throat before he spun on his heel and left. Cassandra stood for a long moment, watching him retreat, her expression unreadable, before she returned to Morgan.
Morgan gagged, blood spilling from her lips, the price of her overfeeding. Cassandra knelt beside her, brushing her hair back tenderly. “There is a limit, my Firebird. You must learn when you are full.”
Steven stepped forward, speaking to Cass in low Spanish. “Why doesn’t she remember?”
Cass’s eyes darkened as she answered. “I don’t know. I swear, I don’t know.”
“Cass,” Steven pressed, “if you are doing this?—”
“I am not,” she snapped. “Why would you think that? I told you, my abilities died the night Jericho nearly killed me. I’m half the woman I once was, Steven.”
“So her forgetting is what, mere coincidence?”
“It must be,” she whispered. “I would have let her go. I swear it.”
But I knew the truth Steven refused to see. Abilities didn’t die.
He huffed in frustration and led Natasha back to her chambers. I followed at a distance, though my eyes stayed fixed on Cassandra. It didn’t matter that she went by a different name now, beneath the mask, she was still the same dangerous woman she had always been.
The yearsthat followed were brutal to witness. Morgan became Cassandra’s everything. The lies she whispered to her were endless, even about the marks on her back. They hadn’t disappeared with the change. If you asked me, that was karma. But Cassandra was a master at hiding the truth, even from those closest to her.
I hated watching their games, their frolicking in her bed. It infuriated me to my core, and the fact that I could neither escape it nor change it kept me constantly on edge. Morgan grew more sadistic with each passing day. Life meant nothing to her anymore. I saw it in her eyes. My love was gone, and in her place stood something worse than the boogeyman.
Hatred hollowed me out as I watched what she became—how she toyed with her coven, how she manipulated them like pawns. She was becoming more like Adrienne every day. And I hated Adrienne with every piece of my soul.
“She did this for you, Jace,” I reminded myself again and again.Remember what she sacrificed for you.
I clung to the hope that Morgan wasn’t in this monster, that if she ever remembered who she truly was, she would burn Cassandra alive and come back to me.
One night, I closed my eyes, trying to block out the sound of their laughter, Morgan’s moans and complaints as Cassandra brought her to her knees with practiced cruelty. I couldn’t bear to watch it. It sickened me to my core. Morgan had never been drawn to women, but she believed every poisonous word Cassandra fed her. The witch’s hold on her was as strong as it had once been on me.
“Stop. Stop.” She shoved Morgan away.
Morgan growled, low and feral.
“You know I don’t like that,” Adrienne said.
“Why? Why don’t you like it?” Morgan snapped back.
“Tell her, Adrienne. I dare you,” I egged, leaning forward.
She only shook her head.
Morgan slammed against the post of the bed and it splintered. “I want to know.”
“Calm your temper,” Adrienne said.
“Then tell me. What are you hiding from me?” Morgan demanded.
“Nothing,” she snapped.
“I don’t believe you.”
“You think I’m lying to you? I would never lie to you, my love.”
I snorted, unable to help the bitter laugh that rose in my throat. Yeah, right.
“You had someone before me,” Morgan pressed. “She did that, didn’t she?”
