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I ran my fingers over the engraved text, wondering about the people who lived such isolated lives. Caleb had been one of them once upon a time.
“What kind of life did you have, Caleb?” I whispered into the silence.
The village loomed before me, small and run-down, with stone buildings lining a main street of dirt framed by rock walls. In the distance, plots of land divided by the same walls dotted the area. Homes. Farms. People.
Hope still burned inside me at the thought of humans I could talk to. People I could eventually convince to help me. As I slowly made my way through the town, an oppressive weight filled the air. Grief overshadowed everything around me. Bad things happened here; I knew that. Caleb had said as much.
This was like stepping back in time, but I supposed that was exactly right. Remote locales like this were often decades behind the rest of the world.
Still, I’d expected to find more signs of life. So far the locals were making themselves scarce. Other than a few shadows in the windows and twitchy curtains, I hadn’t come across anyone else.
“I guess you aren’t a fan of strangers here.”
Kelly had been skittish and basically ran from me the second she could. I’d just have to keep coming around until the villagers got curious enough to confront me. Hopefully it wouldn’t be with pitchforks and torches.
When I reached the end of the main road, the cobblestone turned to dirt, though the trail continued onward. To my right, the tree line thickened, signaling the start of the woods, while the church loomed above me on the left. I could just make out the path I’d taken to the beach ahead of me, letting me know that I’d managed to circle back around in my wanderings.
I wasn’t ready to go back and face him—or the weeds I’d left in the ground. Under the guise of wanting to explore my surroundings, I took a narrow, overgrown trail before the hill that led to the church. The light was fading quickly, casting the world around me in a gloomy violet hue. My road forked, and instead of heading toward the church, I turned and found myself standing outside an old cemetery. Vines curled around the rusted iron gate, pulling it open to suit their growth.
Curiosity piqued, I moved into the graveyard and its neat rows, drawn to the first of the stone markers despite myself. As soon as I reached it, I noticed that the roar of the ocean and wail of the wind were toned down. Hushed. Like even nature itself knew better than to interfere with the sleep of those that lay beneath the earth.
Nervous laughter bubbled out of me as I glanced around me, feeling very much not alone even though I was the only living soul in sight. “Get it together, Sunday.”
I passed through rows of headstones, some so weathered they couldn’t be read, others covered in moss. None of them looked recent. The oldest date I found was 1922, but with the state of some of the markers, it was impossible to know for certain if that was the last time anyone had been buried here.
My heart stuttered as a tall marker in the shape of a weeping angel caught my attention. Drawn to the figure, I approached, breath caught in my throat as I read the name etched into the base.Gallagher.
“Caleb,” I whispered, an ache taking hold. I approached the large plot, which held far too many graves. All dead within a year of each other, some as young as a few months old. Was this his family? His mother, Siobhan? Nolan, his father? And the others, more siblings than my heart could bear to name. Not all of them died in the plague. Too many tiny graves were clearly stillborns or barely out of infancy. Life had been so much harder back then.
Poor Caleb...
My eyes shifted back toward his house, and my entire body went rigid when I noticed the soft glow of firelight in the windows.
Shit. Fuck.I’d been out here too long. Night had fallen while I’d been visiting with the dead, and he’d awakened.
I was in so much trouble.
ChapterEleven
CALEB
“Where the fecking hell are you?” I muttered as I paced in front of the hearth, my nerves shot from the combined anxiety of Sunday not being here with me and the hunger I hadn’t sated in days.
I used to be able to go without. To deny myself blood and starve for weeks—months even. But I’d fed on her too many times. Reawakened the demon inside me. Now there was no going without. I needed to quench my thirst like the monster I was. On this island, that meant hunting animals in the dense forest that made up the central part of the land. But I couldn’t leave until she was secured in the house.
I could just go outside and demand she come in, but I was also attempting to give her some space. Despite her hateful diatribe the other night—most of which I deserved—I wasn’t trying to imprison her.
When this was all over, if I succeeded, I wanted her to have a place to grieve and recover. A place that had become her sanctuary, if not her home. I’d leave her here with a little bit of me as a reminder that it wasn’t all lies and deceit. It’s why I wanted her to take ownership of the garden. To give her the opportunity to fall in love with the land. To forge her own place on this island so she wouldn’t see it as just another metaphorical tower she’d been locked away in.
I loved her fierce independence, even though it often impeded my plans. Once I was gone, I’d at least be sure she was safe here. Even if shewantedme dead.
But I wasn’t dead yet, and like it or not, I’d given her an order to be indoors by sundown. An order she’d disobeyed. I’d tried to be lenient. To allow her to do as she was bade and return to offer her apologies. I was tired of waiting. She needed to learn.
She needed to be punished.
My hand flexed with the rush of desire that singular word sent through me. Memories of my palm connecting with her round arse had my cock hard in an instant. Fuck. This would turn into much more than a punishment if my body’s reaction was any indication.
All the better.
