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The man before me turns away from the windows and when our eyes meet, I rush forward.
It’s not possible. It can’t be.
With a gasp, he falls to his knees, gazing up at me with wide lavender eyes. Eyes I’ve gazed into a million times. How is this happening?
“Cillian,” he whispers.
“Lorenzo?” My chest seizes as I touch his cheek. “By the gods, it’s you.”
“You’re…you’re not dead.”
“You’re not dead.” I drop to my knees as well. “Lorenzo.”
The two of us can only stare at each other in shock and amazement. He exhales, and as he does, my eyelids flutter as his scent swirls around me. I must be dreaming.
“Then I must be dreaming too,” Lorenzo says, showing that our connection is still very much intact. “There is so much to say. So much to tell you, but first, the reason I’m here.” He rises effortlessly, holding my hand to help me to my feet.
His touch immediately heals a wound inside me. I can’t believe he’s really here. As we sit on the small couch in the room, a thousand thoughts and memories cloud my mind. The scent, the memories, I wasn’t imagining any of it. Lorenzo was near.
He is still the most beautiful man I’ve ever seen. Still smells like paradise. Nothing about him has changed at all—understandably—but his impact on me is as fresh as the first time I laid eyes on him when our maker brought him to our home. I was the first vampire our maker kept. Lorenzo was the second.
“Yves Orpheus,” Lorenzo says. “I would never have connected that name to you.”
“Damiano Honore. Beautiful.”
“I chose the French spelling of my last name as a memorial of sorts.”
“The same reason I chose Yves. To remember our time in France.”
“And Orpheus?”
“I saw it on an opera house passing through Europe.”
“You always loved opera.”
“Yes.” I squeeze his hands in mine. “I can’t believe you’re real. I’ve been plagued for months by your beautiful face, wondering why fate would torture me so, but here you are. In my very backyard.”
His eyes soften. “You felt me? Still?”
“Yes. You couldn’t feel me?”
“I thought…” He smiles. “Honestly, I thought I was going mad, or that it was because of…” He sighs deeply. “Because of Hadrian.”
“How could that madman affect us now?”
“He lives, Cillian. As sure as you and I live, so does he.”
TWO
Yves
“Lives? That’s ludicrous. I would know if that were true.”
“He blocked us. I only know because of an interaction between him and a member of a friendly coven near where I live in Spain. He told me all about it and that Hadrian is very much alive.”
“I saw him burn, Lorenzo.”
“He didn’t die. There’s rumor he sometimes goes by Adrian Spencer now. I don’t know where he’s been, but I know where he’s going. That’s why I’m here. Why I found the council. I never imagined I would find you too.”
