Page 59 of Haunted Nightmares
“I did.”
Wraith chuckles morbidly as he lets me go, his mask slipping firmly back in place. “Silly little filth.”
Annoyed and ready to smack him, I follow my mate as he grabs the small basin off the table then moves to the kitchen sink. “Really? That’s it?”
“I’m done playing with you.”
“You’re doneplayingwith me?” I might really hit him, he’s making me so angry. Especially because he won’t give me the time of day when I know how bad he wants to.
Wraith nods, setting the basin in the sink, the water filling it while he gives me his back. “You stink.”
Oh my god!“Because you smeared troll blood on me!”
“So? You still reak of rot.”
“So do you! Your arms are covered in the samerot.” Is he being a huge brat or is this part of the madness shit Declan was talking about? I know he’s been even more difficult to deal with but my gods, this is ridiculous. He’s like an insolent toddler with the attention span of a goldfish throwing a fit because he needs a nap and refuses to take one. “I’m going to strangle you.”
“Good luck with that.” Wraith turns, not looking at me as he blows past into the hall. “I doubt you’d be able to get a tight enough grip and for all we know, it could unlock a new kink.” My jaw goes slack as I watch him lumber away. “Pity there’d be no exploring it before the madness takes me.”
Snapping out of my momentary stupor and storming after him, I clench my fists at my sides and try to keep my power from discharging. “You are such a fucking hypocrite. The contrarian in full denial.”
“Can’t you see I don’t give a shite?” My stubborn asshole of a mate tilts his head as he faces me, that sardonic, empty grin painted on his lips. “I don’t want you here,Zephyr. This is a useless waste of both our time.”
“Is it really?”
The dickhead just nods.
“If this is such a waste, if you’re not a hypocrite of the highest level, then why the hell did you turn our bedroom into some sort of fucking shrine to a mating that you seem to give a shit about now?”
Wraith is in my face before my next breath, growling deep and low in his chest. “Donottest me, female.”
My eyes narrow to slits. “Donotlie to me,king.”
We stand there for a few moments, staring each other down, breathing heavily as the air around us becomes almost electrically charged. I can physically feel the battle raging inside him, my light working hard to crack his darkness. And I know he’s not going to back down, not until he gets what he wants.Right now Wraith has no fucking clue what that is outside of protecting me becausethatis what this truly is all about. Not repeating the past, keeping me safe by keeping me away. In his eyes this is a second chance to make sure I don’t get wrapped up in his war but if he’d just talk to me for two minutes Wraith would see that I’m at the very heart of it, just like he is.
“You claim you don’t want me, you’re even trying to send me words of disgust through our bond but you have to acknowledge our love in order to use that bond,” I say with a satisfied smirk. “And if you didn’t still long for it so deeply, didn’t still love me as much as I love you, you wouldn’t have gone out of your way to make sure nothing happened to that room while the rest of this house crumbled around it.”
Clenching his jaw, Wraith’s stare doesn’t waver. “You, that room, those things, they mean nothing to me.”
“Right. Let’s do some housekeeping then.”
Spinning away from him, I run toward the staircase, taking the steps two at a time while avoiding broken boards and gaping cracks. I almost laugh when I hear him follow me, my mate barking a bunch of shit I don’t need to listen to and when I lift my hands to use my power to blow a hole through the plywood blocking our bedroom, I do. I laugh like a maniac.
“You’re crazier than I am, female, and you will pay for any damage you cause.”
“Oh, please,” I say with a giggle as I quickly round the bed, the sheets still jumbled from when we were torn from them so long ago.He really hasn’t touched anything here.“None of this matters to you, right? So why preserve it?”
Reaching behind me, I take a few steps toward the St. Andrew’s cross and let my hand find the center, splaying my palm against the lacquered wood. I make sure Wraith is watching me as I shrug one shoulder then mumble a very not genuineoopsas it catches fire.
“Are you daft?” My mate shouts as he rushes toward me, his shadows quickly extinguishing the flames as I leap across the bed.
“None of this matters!” My easel and brushes start sparking, my robe on the chaise begins to smoke, and I start to both laugh and cry while this stubborn as an ox male quickly tries to put them out one by one. “It’s all just part of that nightmare you were talking about.”
Little fires keep popping up all over the room as I start to lose control of my emotions; my paintings are melting, jewelry crackling and popping under the heat. I angrily swipe at my tears as Wraith puts out each item I try to eliminate from our history, and that’s when it all hits me.
My death, losing Wraith, our time apart. It all comes crashing down on me for the first time since I’ve been back and the way the sobs wrack my body has me staggering toward the wall.
I didn’t have the chance to deal with things while I was in Duat or Aaru, it wasn’t possible with the way I was just thrown into my fate. I wasn’t given the chance to grieve, wasn’t allowed to process how horribly and abruptly my life changed; how my life ended. No, I just had a bunch of gods and goddesses info dumping until I was blue in the face and by the time they were done, I was already here actively carrying out my mission.
