Thisis all a goddamn fucking dream. An idealistic, fanciful, unattainable one.
Jesus Christ, I’m deluded.
I need to face my family. I have no chance of any type of future with Jude while I’m a ghost. I don’t know what I expected to happen when I came back. How I thought this could ever workout. I was driven purely by this painful compulsion to see her. To be near her.
Nothing else mattered.
For the first time in three years, I was living in the present, and not the past. And now I don’t know what the fuck happens next.
“Slade?”
I turn sharply at the unfamiliar female voice.
A woman with ice-blonde hair and a pregnant bump stares at me.
Fuck.
Her eyes don’t widen as she studies me. If anything, they relax in confirmation, like she expected to see me here.
“It was you I saw at the wedding, wasn’t it?”
My heart is threatening to rip its way out of my chest, and I can’t do anything other than stare at her.
“I feel this energy whenever Sterling talks about you,” she continues, unperturbed by my lack of response. “It’s so strong… so…” She tilts her head to one side. “Now it makes sense.”
I swallow, but my throat is so dry it takes a huge effort.
“You’re married to my father,” I state.
Her eyes brighten at the mention of him. “I am. I’m Halliday.”
“Halliday,” I echo, my eyes dropping to her belly. She must be due soon judging from the size of it.
“Sterling and Sullivan have gone mad. They’re checking all the CCTV from the store, all the cameras around the city they can get access to. It’s only a matter of time until they find you.”
I search for the warning that’s missing from her tone. But her eyes match her voice, both full of…concern.
“Whatever the reasons, they love you, and they’ll forgive you.”
“They blame me,” I say.
She looks taken aback. “Why would you think?—?”
Her phone rings, and she pulls it from her bag, glancing at the screen. “It’s Sterling.”
I’m already stepping past her when she grabs my hand and presses something into my palm.
“Courage and truth. Please come to them soon, they’ve suffered enough,” she whispers, before answering the call.
I don’t slow down until I’m three blocks away. Only then do I uncurl my fist and look at what she gave me.
Inside my palm is a small blue-and-gold-flecked crystal.
34
JUDE
“What’s that?”
