Chapter Ten

" I have to go out tonight."

"But it's Friday. Date night."

He makes me laugh. Date night. As if we have normal little human rituals. As if we hadn't eaten dinner together and made love after every night for two straight weeks.

Kevin finishes shaving and flexes his rippling abdominals in the mirror. They're more defined than they were last week. I'm giving him quite a workout.

I, on the other hand, probably look like I've put on weight. I step from the shower and put a hand on my hip. Yes. Fuller. I make a clucking sound of dismay. "You've been overfeeding me," I sigh.

He steps behind me and grabs my cheeks in both hands with a satisfied grunt. "Girl, you're crazy. This ass is a masterpiece." He bends down and bites me softly on one cheek, grabbing the other with a squeeze.

Another giggle. They're real giggles, not my fake "flirting giggles" that are only given for the sake of meals. I'm so full. So happy.

Kev makes me happy.

Fear squirms in my stomach. It's not good to feel so relaxed. That's part of why I need to go out tonight.

"I have a meeting with an old friend. We're on a neighborhood watch committee. I'm only scheduled once per month." I kiss Kev's cheek and walk to the bedroom.

"What time will you be back?"

I bite my lip. It's all night. The monsters (And the humans with magical capabilities) of Pine Ridge know that the three intersecting Ley Lines make this place a prize for magical energy. Dark forces love to visit—but we ensure they don't stay long.

"Uh... The meeting is down the river a ways, so I'll probably sleep at my place," I lie. "I haven't been home in days." That much is true.

"I noticed. Got you this." Kevin follows me into the bedroom and pulls something from his work bag.

He hands me a crinkling clear plastic bag and I rip into it, my surprised eyes taking in a pink and gray workout top made of stretchy mesh material. Under the shirt, my fingers find comfy gray leggings made of buttery soft material.

"I got a free voucher from the fitness shop as part of my work perks. Got that for you last night and forgot to give it to you. You look like a goddess in those little white dresses you love, but you don't have to dress up for me every night, babe. I want you to be comfortable. You uh... you want to bring some of your other clothes over? I got a drawer that's empty. Plenty of space in the closet." Kev's voice is carefully casual.

I clutch the leggings, rubbing my cheek against them. "They're like kittens. So soft."

"You like? I'll get you another one. And all my old Temple shirts are yours. Have at ‘em."

"You spoil me."

"Old shirts are spoiling my girl? I don't think so. You spoil me. My fridge has never been so full of farm-fresh goodies."

I grin, but inside, guilt eats at me. The only thing I get in terms of perks at Onyx Farms is a weekly produce box. I've never claimed it before. This early in September, it's full of tomatoes, sweet corn, butternut squash, zucchini, and a five-pound paper bag full of apples that smell so good you want to bury your face in them and inhale. "I bring nothing," soft, bitter words escape me.

"You bring me happiness. Laughs. All the history I never bothered to pay attention to in high school. Beauty. I want to mention mind-blowing sex, but I think that would sound shallow." Kev pulls on his tee and track pants, ready for work.

"I like bringing you that."

"So, you're busy tonight and sleeping over at your place. You know... I've never been on a houseboat."

I nip that hinting tone in the bud. "I was planning to pick up a picking shift at Onyx Farms on Saturday morning. You know—before I met a man who wanted to spend time with me."

Kev pouts. "Aw, you gotta work tomorrow, babe? I'm only off on weekends."

"I was going to say that you should come with me. Have you been to Onyx Farms yet? It's lovely. There's a big farmer's market in the summer and fall. Right now, it's a solid wall of apples and pumpkins." I pause and pull on the scrap of white lace that I use as a bra and the thong that matches. I don't need them, but I've picked up several little bits and pieces during the past two weeks that make me look more human since I seem to be spending more time with one.

"I can come with you to work?"

"And pick your own apples. Lots of people do. They pay to pick a peck or a bushel basket, whatever, then they go to the orchards. I'll give you the guided tour." I wink, getting dressed in my new outfit. This will be much less seductive, but much more practical for picking apples.

Hm. I don't have to seduce every day. I don't have to constantly look ready to lure a man to my bed, not knowing if it'll be my last chance to feed for a while.

Kev means security. It's an odd thought—not that I'll take him for granted.

The fear comes back. Relying on one food source is scary. But if Kev saw me with other men... He wouldn't understand. He'd be so hurt.

The thought of his pain is devastating to me.

I like this man. So very much.

Sometimes, I even think I ...

"Great! What time? Where is it? Want me to pick you up, or should I just meet you there?"

"I start at six, before the worst heat of the day—not that it gets very hot." I don't tell him that the heat affects rusalkas more, dehydrating us more quickly. "Growing up in a cold climate, I guess I'm more sensitive to it." I don't tell him that I used to swim in freezing waters, but I try to avoid them now. Don't want to remember the cold, dark water where I used to hunt, where I fell in love, where I lost that love...

I turn and suck in a steadying breath, trying to sound as though nothing is on my mind. "Text me when you get close," I say, patting my hair into a long, rippling ponytail.

Kev stares. "Damn. You look like every gym rat's fantasy, babe."

"Ooh? Really?" I survey myself in the mirror, taking in the sight of the tight, clinging clothes, the high, sweeping tail that swings over my shoulder, and the dazzling smile. Kev scoots into place behind me, arms around my waist.

We look so different—but so good together.

"I'll be there by seven." Kev kisses my neck and I sigh. "You okay?"

"I'm fine."

" Very fine." He gropes my bottom, and that confounded shrill of surprised laughter escapes me again.

"Stop, before I make you late for work," I warn.

Kev slowly cocks his head, one eyebrow arched. "How late are we talking?"

I fall back to the bed and Kev pulls my leggings to my ankles before burying his mouth between my thighs.

I could get used to mornings like this...

"YOU, MY DEAR, LOOK radiant. Happy. Healthy. Bursting with energy. And is that a new outfit? You know, I think I've only ever seen you wearing that little white dress. It's too cold for autumn."

"The sleeveless dress did make me stand out around here, I suppose." I shrug.

"But not in the Caribbean. Will you leave in November?"

"The cold isn't an issue for me, not physically. It just brings up some painful memories."

Jakob nods. "It's why I don't go back to Poland anymore. Too many memories."

A silent moment. We squeeze hands, a show of strength. We mustn't let the past win, destroy what chance we have for a future.

I wrap my free arm around my middle, hugging the soft shirt tight to my skin. "I might spend the winter. I don't know. At any rate, I thought I should try to blend in."

"The winter? Really?" Minegold's voice is rife with suggestion, a knowing gleam in his eye. "It's rare that you spend the coldest months here." He offers me his elbow with a courtly inclination of his head.

I slide my arm through as we patrol the darkened streets of Pine Ridge. The Night Market is bustling, but we know there are enough members of the supernatural community over there to keep an eye on the "innocents." As one, we turn toward the campus, where the people come and go and alcohol-soaked hormones and youth are a clarion call for all the hungry monsters passing through.

"What will you do for work? The seasonal jobs will be on hiatus," he points out.

"I'll find something to do." My voice is short and sharp. I don't know. I haven't figured it out. In a few days, Kev could tire of me.

I could give into my baser instincts. Right now, my eyes scan the figures hurrying toward campus, bundled in their hoodies and baggy sweatpants. Three college boys. Arms full of bags from the Jade Forest, big headphones on or around their necks, and phones in front of their faces.

"They might as well wear labels that say ‘Bite Me.'" I snort in disgust.

Minegold mutters in Polish, something about the miraculousness of any generation making it to adulthood.

Another group passes them, a giggling bevy of girls with their phones out and short skirts hiked high so their legs are on display despite the mid-September chill.

"Too nice of an evening to stay inside," Minegold murmurs, gesturing to the gigglers.

The more we walk, the more we're reassured that such is the case. "It's too early for the true demons to be out. The veil isn't thin enough yet," I whisper, referring to the way the veil between the mortal and supernatural thins with the waning of the year—and it's only as thick as tissue paper in Pine Ridge to begin with.

"I wish I could be sure. You know how hungry you were waiting for the campus population to return. You have scruples. Others... Hmm. My spine is unsettled."

"You're getting old," I tease, and Jakob huffs at me, turning a sharp, fangy smile in my direction.

"If only, my dear."

"Let's split up. I'll take the campus. I blend in a little better," I say, knowing my appearance belies my advanced age. We're not supposed to split up in case something nasty arrives that's bigger than one person can handle, but Jakob nods and pulls out his phone.

"I will send out a text to the other members of the Night Watch and see if anyone else can join us."

"I still think your spine is overreacting, but okay." I give him a friendly nudge with my shoulder and hurry deeper into the heart of the campus, while Jakob turns to follow the groups leaving it and heading toward town.

As the darkness deepens and the moon rises higher, the little swaying, laughing groups sort themselves into dorms and the string of old brick buildings east of the campus. At first, they seem out of place, looking like small apartment houses until you notice the flags with fraternity letters on them.

I slide through these houses and parties with ease, hormones throbbing subtly as I watch the college students celebrating the triumph over their first full week of classes. Hands press plastic cups into mine, hands pat my hips in passing, and more than one beer-bathed frat boy tries his luck.

Nothing evil here—well, nothing besides me. Nothing inhuman, anyway. I scowl at some particularly grope-y boys and step on their feet in passing.

"Come upstairs, baby," one smooth seducer pours a shot into my cup. He's sporting broad shoulders, a baritone bedroom voice, and his black curls are shaved into intricate patterns. He winks at me, all perfect teeth and predatory eyes.

My insides throb harder at the resemblance to Kev and the thoughts it conjures up, but I press my cup back into his outstretched hand. "No thanks. Not hungry." I smile, and I see something panicky flash in his eyes.

Dear me. Sometimes alcohol dulls the brain enough that it sees the truth. I wonder if he caught sight of my shark-like grin?

Part of me hopes so.

The rest of me hauls my slightly more padded ass through the door as my phone vibrates against my hip.

Minegold: Robbie and Leo will join us. Their set is just finishing at Jax Alley. I told Leo to meet you by the campus footbridge and Robbie will meet me by the cemetery.

Marina: All right. I'll walk the riverbank. No nasties in the frat houses. Well, only the human ones.

Leo is a werewolf, silent and taciturn, stocky and shorter than his Adonis of a vampire bestie and bandmate. My mind falls into old patterns. Wouldn't I love a two-course meal of those talents?

I shiver, and a sick feeling hits my middle.

Stop. Leo's wife is probably the most powerful witch of the century, and she's currently pregnant with twins. Robbie's wife is pregnant, too, and what's more, she's part-succubus. She needs everything her husband can give. Behave.

But the scolding is all fake. And the idle thoughts about sexual desires feel... forced. I try to picture Robbie with his sexy London accent and his skin as white as mine all carved into perfect muscles—and nothing. Leo, with his intense, brooding eyes and his strong, square jaw... nothing.

I think of the way Kev smiles at me when I catch him drinking orange juice straight out of the bottle and my insides rebel completely. I want to text him and beg him to meet me by the footbridge, pull him into the woods, and bend over in front of the sturdiest tree I can find.

Marina: I miss you. I might come over late. Very late.

As soon as I click send, I get a text back.

Kev: Good. Miss you.

Kev: I'm on a video call with my parents. They're in California with my brother at a big swim invitational. They're tossing around scary words like "Olympics."

Marina: That's amazing!

Marina: When will

I stop texting and turn, senses flaring like the fins of a startled fish.

Moans. Heavy, pained moans mixed with excited, sexual ones. My stomach twists and roils with memories. I look around and realize I've wandered down to the water's edge and kept walking toward the darker, wider part of the river, called to it by ancient ties, bound to water like humans are bound to air.

But my feet suddenly still and my body is frozen in shock as the glistening figures at the bottom of the bank.

Todd.

What's left of him.

And...

"Sister?" I choke out, the spell of surprise breaking, hurtling me forward at a run.

Another Rusalka looks up at me, skin as pale as mine but eyes far darker, form more skeletal, and her smile stained with blood.

"There you are...betrayer."

IT'S BEEN A LONG TIME since I saw one of my kind. I wonder if I ever looked like that—some spectral, hollow thing, sick yet seductive? I don't think so... I remember us as being much more beautiful, soft and sleek, water beings meant to tempt a man's most primal hunger. "Let the human go."

"Gladly." The rusalka in front of me drops Todd's hand—and it falls, wrist up, lifeless. "He tasted rotten, anyway."

She's just fed, and yet she's wheezing and weak, sinking deeper into the water. I toss my phone and sandals on the bank and wade in, shuddering when I look at Todd. Once handsome, his face and throat are now a mangled mass where the rusalka mauled him with her deadly kisses.

"You will pay. This is my home. Pine Ridge is safe! A refuge. We do not kill here—don't you know there are other ways to live?" I demand, shedding my shirt as well. In my bra and leggings, I slide like a seal through the water.

Her laugh is weak and sounds punctured, as though air passes through her ribs instead of her throat. "Ha! Easy ways for you to live, not for the rest of us. You are not feeding our king, and so he grows desperate for sustenance!"

"One little demon not sending him a few souls a month isn't—"

"One little nothing!" My sister lunges at me as I find my balance on the slippery, soft mud of the river's floor. "There are so few of us left. Look at me! I'm the only one left with enough strength to make this journey to find you and tell you!"

"Tell me what? How few?" I blink, momentarily stunned into dropping my guard.

"Start sending him souls. Send him dozens, hundreds, quickly! He's killing us all to raise himself in time for the hunt."

The hunt? My blood is never as warm as a human's, but it suddenly goes ice cold. The Hunter's Moon is when Koshchei returns to this plane from his demonic hibernation, taking his "handmaids" to birth a new crop of servants. He's a giant parasite who breeds with his own offspring to make more, always to feed his massive appetite for souls.

But there is a Hunter's Moon every October, and he only rises every few centuries. It can't be this year. It is too soon. She must be wrong.

"I owe him nothing. I will never send him souls," I hiss, forcing my sister's arms down. "What is your name? What... Why did you come here, really? It can't be simply to find me and tell me off." I look at the mauled body on the bank and turn pleading eyes back to her. "You can change. Be forgiven. This is a place where you don't have to take lives to survive. There are hundreds of willing men who gladly share their life force." Well... a few hundred, anyway. If you eat sparingly. If there's only one rusalka who needs to be fed.

Even in the midst of the tumult, I realize that I've taken myself out of the equation.

I have Kev.

And when he's gone... When it ends...

Huh. There's an aching resignation in me, like there was after Gregor died, only this one is much more final. If I can't have Kev, I don't want to find others to replace him, even for the sake of my own survival. Maybe that will change in time, but right now, I cannot picture ever sharing my body with another.

"I am Darya, traitor." Fingernails like claws rake across my arms as she makes another desperate grab for me. "You live here in your clean little strip of river, dressed like a human, while the rest of us have been killed by pollution, by desperate sharks, whales, and seals who can't catch other prey, by humans and their wars... There are maybe twenty of us left, when there used to be hundreds. If you were still with your sisters, you'd know this! Even if we feed daily, Koshchei is draining us until we're shadows of ourselves, desperate to rise one last time."

I shake Darya's hands off and backhand her with all my might. She sinks below the water with a cry—but in seconds I feel her bony fingers on my ankles, dragging me under and towing me to the bottom, hand working their way up my body until they clamp around my throat.

"I can't kill you because you are the key to saving us all! Start feeding him now so we can survive another day. He's already drained some of us to death!" Darya's knees press into my ribs as she speaks underwater, an easy feat for a rusalka. Her eyes are glittering black pearls in the dark water, insanity and hunger giving her a burst of unexpected strength. "When the Hunter's Moon rises, so will he—and you will be his lone handmaiden this time—the only one strong enough to bear his seed." Her grip relaxes as a look of peace settles over her features. "The new spawn will save us. Will help feed him. We'll survive if you're quick enough. Most of us will still be alive if you begin to appease him now. Look! Look at my hands." Darya lifts them from my throat and shoves them in front of my eyes.

They're no longer simply white. They're filmed like a frog's belly, slightly translucent.

She's telling the truth. Koshchei is draining his spawn to preserve his own life, killing and controlling us from the demon realms as he always does. I'm only immune because I've severed the bond by refusing to send him souls. Still, it would be a different story if he were here, in this realm.

"You can live like me," I whisper, clasping her hands. "Free from him. He can't steal what you don't have! He needs souls. Don't send them to him!" I reach for her face. "The others—"

"The others warned me you were a fool! We knew you took a human lover for pleasure, for months. You abandoned your sisters!" The hands are back to clawing, but her strength fades fast.

I move to the surface with strong, swift kicks, knowing that a weakened rusalka will struggle more on land than water. "I loved him," I spit as my head breaks the surface, followed closely by hers.

"Marina?" A low, masculine voice calls my name from the area of the footbridge.

Leo.

"Look, there are people who can help you, help the others. I—"

"You don't listen. You don't learn. Even after we killed your big, clumsy fisherman, you didn't return to the fold. Stupid bitch," Darya pants in my face as her lungs struggle to breathe the air above the water. "Koshchei will have fun teaching you your place—and if I live, I will have fun teaching your daughters what they owe their elders for their mother's sins!"

My eyes no longer see Darya's bony face, which seems to be growing more emaciated by the minute.

All I can see is Gregor's face, so white and still, so cold beneath the sheets of ice.

For some reason, I see Kev's face beside his, and little girls that have his caramel brown skin and laughing smile.

My loves. My daughters.

It doesn't matter that they can never be, should never be. Something in me breaks, and the demon unleashes.

With a shriek that would put a harpy to shame, I tear into Darya's shoulder with my teeth, ripping flesh and spitting out foul-tasting blood as I work towards her throat.

Vengeance is mine, saith the Lord.

But I'm only a demon, and I break the rules.

"Marina! Marina? Jakob, you'd better get over to the river by campus," Leo's voice is a distant whisper over our combined screams and the thrashing that leaves a red sheen on the water.

In seconds, a stocky figure with glowing golden eyes is beside me, pulling Darya's lifeless body on shore, hauling me up after as I sob and shake.

Leo puts Darya's body beside Todd's. "She killed him?"

I nod.

He stares between the limp remains and me. "Family?"

I told you Leo was a quiet sort of man, didn't I? I nod again.

"Fuck. That's not good."

"You have no idea," I whisper before the tears win again.