Page 49 of Cursed Lifeline (Eternal Love)

Forty Eight

Esme

song: blood sport | Sleep token

My door bangs loudly against the wall as I rush quickly inside and slam it shut. Locking both deadbolts, sweat pools on my brow as I rest my head against the wood. Breathing out a small sigh of relief, I immediately slump to the floor. Glancing up, I study the slider door to the back patio across the room just as a figure emerges from the shadows.

Felix.

We watch each other for a moment through the glass, saying so much and yet nothing at all as the moon illuminates our fated meeting.

Pushing slowly to my feet, I hesitantly make my way to the door. Each step I take, Felix takes one closer. When there is only glass that separates us, I raise my hand to the cold barrier and place my palm timidly against it. He gives me a sad smile and does the same, placing his palm over mine on the opposite side.

When can we be together? - my mind asks his.

My heart breaks when he mouths one word.

Soon.

The wait is killing me, I tell him through my thoughts. His eyes grow sad. His hand flexes angrily against the glass and presses harsher into mine. I don’t think I can take it one more time, Felix. To die and come back to life. Wait for you to find me. To have such little time together before it ends and like a nightmare, it starts all over again.

His forehead falls softly against the sliding door and he lets out a deep sigh that fogs up the glass.

“Esme,” he whispers. “What do you think all this does to me? I’m alive for decades, centuries, before you ever come back to me.”

“It doesn’t have to be this way.”

His eyes raise and the violet of his irises glows deep as his jaw sets sternly in place.

“There is no other way,” he adamantly states.

Shaking my head, I close my eyes as my thoughts are pulled to another life. They circle around a truth he’s not telling me. But before I can remember what it is, the recollection leaves just as quickly as it came.

“Our only hope is to break the curse,” he whispers sadly.

“Don’t you think I should be the one to decide which way I want to die this time, Felix,” I argue.

He shakes his head and places his other hand on the glass. Holding my shaking palms against his, I cry, “There’s something you’re not telling me. I know it.”

“Let me in, Esme,” he growls.

I shake my head no. Even though I’ve longed for this meeting over the months he has spent stalking me, I won’t bend and do as he says so easily. Not without answers. Eyes cast down at my feet, I cry, “I don’t want to die again.”

“I’m doing my best to protect you in this life like I haven’t in our others. Why else do you think I’ve stayed away?”

Bitterly, my gaze snaps up to his.

“I won’t break my vow again to keep you safe.”

“There is a way, Felix.” He violently shakes his head no as puzzle pieces click into place in the deep recess of my memory. A dais. An evil witch. A secret revealed that would stop all of this once and for all. “There is a way we can finally be together forever. I remember now.”

“I won’t do it, and no other of my kind will either, unless it is over my dead body.”

My heart breaks. A desperate sob shakes my frame as I say, “If it were reversed, I’d do anything to keep us together. Why won’t you do the same?”

Instead of answering me, Felix demands, “Let me in, Esme.”.

Holding my palms against his, the glass starts to warm from our touch.

“I’ve let you in before, Felix. Twice. It didn’t help. In fact, it made things worse.”

“This time will be different.”

“For who? Me? The only way you can make this life any different from my last is if you change me.”

“Not going to fucking happen, Esme. Now, let. Me. In.”

I shake my head at him in disbelief. If he genuinely wanted us to be together, why wouldn’t he do this?

“Esme,” he growls. “I won’t ask again.”

“You have to help me defeat them this time, Felix,” I cry.

His jaw sets harshly.

“I’ve never promised you anything less before. Hell, I’ve spent two hundred years in between your lives trying to find a way to win. I’m always trying, always thinking of ways I can keep you safe. And just so we’re clear, none of those ways include changing you. So get that out of your stubborn head and let me in, damn it.”

I shake my head no.

“I think you should leave.”

Hurt fills his eyes. He leans away, but doesn’t take his hands off the glass.

“Let me in, baby,” he softly cries, sensing my heart closing off from his.

I take a step back and whisper, “No.”

Anger fills his expression.

“Esme,” he warns. “I said…”

“Get lost, Felix,” I yell. “Maybe if you did, I’d have found another way to beat the curse centuries ago.”

His eyes flare with a mixture of outrage and shock. In all the memories I can place of our lives together, I’ve never been so harsh or bold. When neither of us speaks after a moment, I turn and stalk off toward my bedroom but don’t get more than two steps away before the glass behind me shatters.

Startled, I quickly turn back around. Shards of what’s left of the slider litter the ground. The glass glistens like glitter as the moonlight catches it, and I realize my only barrier to succumbing to my feelings is now broken at the hands of a man who once promised to always keep me safe but repeatedly failed. With newfound resentment, I glance back up, cross my arms over my chest, and snap, “You bastard! That was my only defense against...”

“Nothing can come in unless you invite it, Esme. You know that. Now, invite me in, damn it.”

“Why?”

“So I can watch over you.”

“You’ve done a good job of watching from afar,” I mumble, “Stay away. Hasn’t that been your mantra, Felix? Why complicate things now when our lives are finally running more smoothly?”

“Time is quickly running out,” he insists. “New developments suggest Ember is as good as found. It won’t do to watch you remotely anymore.”

I take a deep fearful breath.

“Let. Me. In. Esme.”

Defeated, and understanding he may have a point, I nod as my heart bends to his wishes like it always did in lifetimes before.

He studies me in the dark shadows of my apartment, and says, “You have to say the words.”

“Please come in,” I whisper, reciting the first words I ever said to him over two hundred years ago. “Make yourself at home.”

In a flash of bright light, Felix suddenly towers over me as a strong wind blows past, electrifying the air. The shards of glass lightly bang together behind him. Like wind chimes, their tinkling adds to the current rushing around us as the sliding door magically pieces itself back together.

Staring into Felix’s eyes, I try to tell myself this isn’t right. I shouldn’t have invited him in. We shouldn’t be caving once again to the undeniable pull between us. But instead of pushing him away, I lift my hand and hold it eagerly out to him.

Linking his fingers through mine, memories that haven’t surfaced in this lifetime yet come crashing to the forefront of my thoughts. I hold my breath as Felix’s predatory stare locks on mine.

“In your first life, I was graced with a taste,” he growls, coming a step closer. “In your second, I worshipped you and held us both on the edge of giving into each other completely. Do you wish for more in this life, Esme? Because fuck, baby, I can’t go another day without you.”

“Yes,” I whisper desperately as I stare into his hungry gaze.

Picking me up, Felix tosses me over his shoulder and says, “Wish. Fucking. Granted.”