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I tore open the front door and scanned the grounds, searching for my mate's familiar, beloved form. Walking around the house to the garden, I spied the pile of abandoned weeds with a slight smile. At least she’d done some work, though it seemed like the chore was not to her liking. The thought of her spiteful grumbling had my lips twitching with laughter. What I wouldn’t give to have been there to witness it.
Lifting my gaze, I searched the rest of the property, not needing long to determine she’d wandered off.
“Oh, Miss Fallon, it’s as if you’re begging me to make an example of you.”
Tilting my head back, I inhaled deeply, drawing the air into my lungs as I attempted to pick up her scent. The sharp aroma of pine. The salty tang of the sea. The damp earth. My brow furrowed in confusion. No Sunday.
“Where have you gone, sweetling?”
I strode toward the church, following the path I’d taken her down once before. It was the only other place she was familiar with on the island, so she must have come back for a closer inspection, but the lack of her essence on the wind was unsettling. As I approached the chapel, my gaze raked the surroundings, my senses on high alert.
“Come out, Miss Fallon. I’m not interested in playing hide and seek with you.” If she was toying with me, there would be hell to pay.
Stalking the grounds, I came up empty-handed and finally found myself at the bluff’s edge, staring down at the shore, the waves gently lapping against the sand. It seemed soft and almost romantic, but I knew the dangers of the sea. I’d seen this water pull a grown man under and drown him. My gut churned.
A dark shape caught my eye in the surf, a torn piece of fabric I recognized snagged on a piece of driftwood. My scarf.Sunday’sscarf.
No. She wouldn’t be that stupid.
Although... she was desperate to escape. Maybe she thought it was her only option.
My feet were moving before my brain registered the action, tapping into my power reservoir to blur myself down onto the beach below.
“Sunday, what have you done?” I whispered, my voice swallowed by the wind as I picked up the waterlogged cloth.
I held the scarf to my nose, trying to find even a hint of my mate from the fibers, but all I smelled was the briny scent of the ocean. Did she really hate me so much that she would choose such an end over captivity with me? But no... she couldn’t have left me like this. She wouldn’t. Not if she was trying to save the child.
It must be something more, something both innocent and sinister in the same breath. I could picture it so clearly. She could have been walking along the water’s edge and been taken down by a rogue wave. Swept out to sea, calling for help with no one around to save her. Could God really be so cruel?
I knew the answer. Yes. Yes, He could.
Despair flooded me as sure as the tide filled the shore. He’d taken her from me because I didn’t deserve even a stolen moment of happiness.
“Why?” I raged, shouting up at the sky. “You set me on this path. Why doom me at the last? Why make her suffer because of my failings?”
I spun in a circle, spewing my fury, chest heaving, eyes burning with unshed tears. I hadn’t cried since the day my mother took her last breath.
What was the point of it all if Sunday was going to be taken by God in the end? Why had Gabriel toyed with me, dangling my salvation before my eyes like the proverbial carrot on a stick? Had it all been a sick and twisted game? Penance for the souls I’d claimed?
I fell to my knees, stricken with grief. “Gabriel! Messenger of God! Come to me, you fecking sadist!”
The roar of the waves was my only answer. I bowed my head, despondent. It was over. I lost my beautiful girl to a watery grave all because of my limits, my flaws. She’d died, and I’d done nothing to save her.
“Caleb?”
I stiffened, her voice whispering my name the cruelest punishment of all. My gaze lifted from the sand in search of the sound. She stood there on the bluff, hair blowing in the breeze but her scent not reaching me.
I blinked, hope the most painful punishment of all. “Is this a trick? Have they sent you to haunt me?”
“What the hell are you doing down there? Is this one of your priest things? Are you praying?”
A specter wouldn’t be capable of such cheek... would it? Surely the afterlife would tame that sharp tongue of hers. Then again, if she was here to torture me, the bite of her sass would be the perfect implement.
“Sunday?”
She placed her hands on her hips, her face scrunching in annoyance. “Yes, Sunday. Who else would it be? Unless you’re keeping some other helpless woman trapped on your other islands. What are you doing? I’ve been looking for you.”
“Looking for me?” My voice was wooden, my brain numb with shock. I’d been so sure she’d been lost to me. Deep within my spiral of despair, I couldn’t wrap my mind around the fact that she was still here.
