Page 92 of Into The Light

We clanked our glasses together and I let the bitter liquid rush through my mouth again. My face puckered, but it was better the second time.

“Jonas?” I called. “Two more.”

Emilia squealed her delight and tossed her arms around my neck.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

Aiden

The pounding in my head drummed me awake. “Good God,” I muttered as I fought to open my eyes. It took a second for them to adjust so I could make out the shapes in the pitch-black room. Another strange thing I struggled to adapt to... the absence of my superior night vision.

With a grunt I pushed myself to sitting. Memories of our rum-filled day flashed through my mind and I cringed thinking about how many of those little brown shots I’d had. A half dozen at least. After being so against them at first, in the end Emilia was the one trying to stop me from ordering more. We’d laughed our way back to the bungalow while the sun set, and I’d realized she was surprisingly strong the way she supported my weight as we stumbled back. Her tolerance for alcohol had also been impressive. She’d, as Jonas put it, drank me under the table.

I smacked my lips together trying to rehydrate my dry mouth. Rubbing my head, I turned to check on her before getting up for water. I furrowed my brow when I noticed the place beside me looked empty. Squinting my eyes, I looked closer thinking it was just harder to see her without my night vision. The clouds moved and the full moon lit up the room. Now there was no mistaking it... Emilia wasn’t in bed.

“Emilia?” I called out, pausing to listen for her response. Maybe she was just in the bathroom.

I stood up and walked across the glass floor and stopped when I saw the bathroom door ajar and no sign of Emilia inside. My pulse quickened as I looked around the room and then moved out to the deck.

Nothing.

She was nowhere.

“Emilia!” I called again, desperation trembling in my voice.

The weight of the silence answering me felt like a giant hand crushing my heart. I tried to get my hearing to work, focusing all my energy to listen for her.

Nothing.

That helpless sensation I had felt in the ocean consumed me again. I stood alone on the deck, searching the emptiness with only the sounds of my pounding heart and the lapping waves to fill the silence.

Trying to calm myself, I rationalized she likely went to shore for food or perhaps aspirin to combat our hangovers, though I wasn’t sure why she wouldn’t have just had it delivered. I walked back into the bedroom and saw her cellphone sitting on the dresser. Doom pierced my gut when I saw her Birkin bag propped up on the chair. There was no way she would leave it behind... she loved that bag almost as much as she loved me.

“Where are you?” I whispered as I paced the room. I closed my eyes and pictured her face. Instead of seeing her soft smile and blue eyes lit up with life, a vision of her face twisted in terror flashed through my mind and I snapped my eyes open.

The vision felt real. Like I was seeing her. I closed my eyes again, focusing all of my energy on my connection to her.

I sat back with a start when it happened again. Like the crackling of a fuzzy movie, I saw her face again for only a second. I heard her call out my name.

And there was no doubt in my mind now... it wasn’t a hallucination. I had seen Emilia.

Even when I was a vampire, I had never had psychic abilities. But I was sure it wasn’t just in my head. It was real and happening now.

Emilia is in danger.

And I had no idea how to find her.

Agony tore through me and I roared as I swiped the empty glasses off the table, sending them crashing against the wall. As that powerful energy pushed through me, I felt the flickering of my powers crackling back to life. My hearing picked up a noise before puttering back out. My breath trapped in my chest while I tried to do it again.

Tried and failed.

“Fuck!” I screamed. It tore through my lungs with such a force that my body shook.

Aiden!

There! I heard her again in my mind. I dug down into the rage and the pain and let it rip through me. As that energy coursed through me, my powers flickered in and out like a broken light bulb trying one last time to illuminate the room. I saw flashes of her face, heard my name, and finally... I sensed her. Desperate to get to her, I raced to the door, my senses pulling me somewhere, though I had no idea where. I’d never experienced this before, but I knew I needed to follow the powerful pull that would lead me to her.

I ran down the wooden docks, my urgency pushing me forward while my hearing flickered in and out. Listening as I sprinted across the sand beach, I heard her. And not in my mind this time. I heard her. I stopped and listened, my hearing focusing in until I heard her begging... begging for her life.