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Because fuck.

I’d messed up.

The problem was, fucking Keira had felt like fucking Xeniya. Lord knew I’d fucked Xeniya angrily enough in college. The girl was stubborn, and I might have been a little, too.

It had felt exactly the same. Which was to say, some of the best sex of my life. Honestly, any sex with Xeniya had been extraordinary, but angry sex… that was something else.

Sex with Keira was like a long-lost memory—like coming home.

And it made me fucking hate myself because I’d promised Xeniya I’d never touch another woman.

It didn’t matter that she was dead.

I’d kept that promise for thirteen years.

Until tonight.

Thirteen years, and I’d ruined it in one foolish moment.

I hated myself for breaking my promise. Hated that I wanted to fuck Keira again and hated that I’d hurt her by calling her another woman’s name.

In summary, I had majorly fucked up.

With a huff, I opened my desk drawer and pulled out my laptop. Time for the ritual again: watching the love of my life die.

I needed to watch Xeniya’s death to remind myself that Keira wasn’t Xeniya, no matter how much they echoed one another.

Besides, I knew Keira wasn’t Xeniya, because she had no scars. Her skin was pristine. I’d intentionally pulled her dress down to check.

And nothing.

She couldn’t be Xeniya. But I still had to watch the death video as a penance for my crime of fucking another woman.

I opened the laptop and pulled up the video, my finger hovering over the play button.

But right as I was going to press play, a sharp sting bit into my arm.

I jerked back and slapped a hand over the spot as though I’d been stung by a bee. But nothing. No bug. No needle. Nothing that could have pierced my skin like that.

The air shifted beside me.

No sound. Just a presence.

My blood went cold.

The Ghost was here with me.

She appeared first as a flicker, then as something solid. I sucked in a deep breath. She was just as striking as the first time I’d seen her face up close. Elegant, furious, and frozen in time. Long waves of white hair spilled down her chest, and her purple-green gaze dug into mine.

My eyelids grew heavy, and I blinked a couple of times as the drug was pulling me toward oblivion.

Would I ever wake up again?

Hard to know when the woman standing over me was a ruthless serial killer who, for some reason, had decided to target me.

My eyelids drooped, and I tried to fight the sleep, but it was a fruitless battle. Not even I could fight a tranquilizer, and blackness seeped across my vision like ink spilling over a marble table.

And then I passed out, and there was nothing.