Page 220 of Ex Somnis

Derek nods, eyes glassy, then grabs Ridge and pulls him in for a fast, crushing hug. In the next blink, he disappears.

I gather Tessa’s flickering shape into my arms and hold on. She’s barely solid. Cocoa butter and salt, fading in and out against me, and I press my face to the top of her head. I don’t let go even though there’s less and less to hold.

“You made it,” I whisper. “You made it out, girl. I told you. I promised you that you would.”

Paul sinks onto the sand beside us, studying Tessa in my arms, then looks over his shoulder at the row of closed doors, landing on the darker one that’s shut again.

“If this is Tessa,” Paul says slowly. “Then who…”

The beach folds in on itself before he can finish.

CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

Lennon

The ceiling is back.

I wake up on the floor of Seraphine’s living room with the taste of cold air still in my mouth and a crying sound somewhere above me.

The incense is out. What’s left is only a burned-down stick, and the record has stopped. The morning is coming in gray and ordinary through the curtains.

I lift my hand in front of my face out of pure habit.

Five normal fingers.

Awake.

The crying comes again.

I turn my head toward it and find Mabel kneeling by the couch, and on the couch is Seraphine, lying on her back with her silver hair spread out, her hands folded over her chest, and every crystal she owns laid out along her body in lines and clusters, the way Jasper does it, except Jasper isn’t here.

Her eyes are closed.

She isn’t going to wake up again.

I know it before I know how I know it.

Around her throat, on the chain that was around mine when I went under, is the moonstone. My hand goes to my chest. It’s bare, the chain gone. The warmth that has been sitting against my breastbone for weeks, the little weight I’d stopped noticing because it had become part of me, gone, lying now against the still throat of a woman who isn’t here anymore.

“Oh, no.” I get up, and even if my legs barely work yet, I cross to her. “What happened? How did… shit. What happened?”

Mabel doesn’t answer right away. Instead, she reaches into the pocket of her cardigan and pulls out a tarot card, holding it out without looking at me.

“She told me to give you this. She said, “When it’s done, give it to the girl.” ”

I take it from her.

The Lovers.

I turn it over to find a note written in a looping, shaky hand.

Love him the way he deserves.

I read it twice, but the text doesn’t shift.

Awake.

I turn to look at the still-sleeping Nevan on the floor.