Page 17 of Slayer

“I expect you to disappear. Missing person. Never found,” he told me and then grasped my arm and began to drag me toward the flour mill on Mallon Avenue.

Panic flared, bright and sudden.

“Wait. I don’t understand. Others live here, like me. You’re not telling them to disappear.” I yanked out of his grasp.

He gave me a side glance, his jaw ticking as he clutched his sword tighter in his fist and scanned the streets before us for potential threats. “No. You’re a hunter. Hunters live in Veil Haven. Humans live here.”

The word hit like a slap.

It was at this point that I realized this whole charade had gone too far.

“Humans live here.” He was saying I wasn’t human!

CHAPTER

FOUR

Asher had just insinuated I wasn’t human and I was crashing out. I slowed my walking, the streetlights blurring as my eyes burned. “Listen, this has been wild, but I can’t do this anymore. I’m on drugs or something. This is all a trip.”

He glared at me. “Really? After everything you’ve seen?”

Shame crept in, heavy and suffocating. I began to back away from him, suddenly aware of how wild this all sounded when laid out plainly. Feeling so embarrassed for buying into it. The people he’d been killing all night were figments of my imagination. How convenient that there was no blood or bodies left over.

I was going home to sleep, and in the morning, I’d tell Rae everything and commit myself for psychiatric evaluation. There was no shame in getting help for something like this. I needed help. I could see that now.

“Stella, please believe me. If we split up, you’re dead,” Asher said, and I swallowed hard.

Fear twisted in my chest, but stubbornness rose right alongside it.

“Then it really will have been a crappy birthday.” I turned away from him, walking back toward the park. My mind was set. I couldn’t play into this anymore, or I’d lose it.

My legs felt heavy, like I was trudging through water. I wanted to go home. I wanted sleep. I wanted to tell Rae about all this and google what might be wrong with me.

I needed this all to make sense.

“Stella!” Asher reached for me, and I ran.

“Stay away from me!” I screamed, tears filling my eyes as terror gripped my heart.

The night swallowed my words. Truly, I felt like I was having a psychotic break from reality, and I was terrified. Would this be my life now? Was Asher even real, or was I walking down the street talking to myself?

One of the most terrifying things about being an orphan with no birth history was that you didn’t know anything about your genetics or medical issues to look out for. Was my aunt diabetic? Did I even have an aunt? Was there a history of panic disorders or ADHD? Was my mother somewhere right now talking to a vampire hunter named Asher as well? If that was the case then I wanted help—needed it. I wanted the doctors, the treatment, the drugs that would balance my brain or whatever magic mental health workers did to help people like me. My breath came in ragged bursts as I pulled out my phone and texted Rae, fingers shaking so badly I nearly dropped it.

Stella: Rae I’m scared. I…think I’m seeing things that aren’t there.

No response.

She probably went to sleep.

A sob tore from my throat as I ran harder across the bridge that hung over the river and back into the park. Cold air burned my lungs, tears blurring the lights into streaks of color. The couple was gone now, and in minutes, I was back at the SkyRide.

I slowed, wiping my tears with the back of my sleeve and trying to ground myself. The urge to collapse right there was overwhelming. I considered just admitting myself to the ER. I was definitely having a panic attack at this point. I couldn’t settle my breathing, my heart was racing, and my hands shook as I tried to calm myself down.

I was about to head for the park exit when three people suddenly appeared before me.

I yelped because they were nearly identical.

Triplets.