Page 66 of Stalked By Seduction and Shadows

Yet, unless I wanted to rely on those born vampires to lead me to Isabella, I would eventually need to re-enter the fighting ring. Because while both of these current options were stupid and almost guaranteed to end in my destruction, I needed to act on one of them or my guilt would eat me alive.

When we reached the peak of the hill, stopping to sit on the white stone staircase before the temple, I took a deep breath.

“Snow, I need to tell you something,” I said, my stomach twisting into knots.

The closer we became, the more imminent her abandonment felt. But each time I expected her to reject me, to tell me I was worthless, duplicitous, lazy, slutty, or anything else my sister had imprinted into my brain, Snow did the exact opposite.

It was confusing, the way she continued to include me in plans with her coven friends. Even though I didn’t belong with them, not a drop of magick in my veins. Or the way she encouraged me to use my seduction tricks at work and to show her how to use them herself. Everything about me that Isabella hated, Snow accepted without a single attempt at changing me or criticizing me. Well, except when it came to Rune, but that was out of reasonable protectiveness.

I thought Jaxon had been a fluke, though not even he had shown me the unconditional positive regard that Snow had. There were still parts of me that I hid from him, that I’d learned he wouldn’t understand or didn’t care for. I still loved him with my entire heart, and I hoped he was living out every single adventure we’d dreamed together in our stifling small village.

But this relationship with Snow was different, scary, more terrifying than a room full of vampires in bloodlust. It was cracking me wide open. It was showing me the truths that Jaxon had tried desperately to impart year after year.

The way Snow made me feel so secure, seen, and accepted only made worse the heartbreaking understanding that Isabella only ever made me feel the opposite. I’d thought it had been because of who I was deep inside, or maybe because I’d done something wrong that I couldn’t remember. But if Snow could treat me this way, then Isabella could’ve too.

My sister had chosen to treat me poorly. Everything Snow accepted, Isabella had scorned. And that hadn’t been inevitable. Not at all.

My lip quivered, and Snow turned to face me. Her smile fell, and when she reached for my hand, I let her show me the tenderness I’d always craved from my family. She brushed her thumb over my skin.

“You okay? What is it?”

“I came to Aristelle because my sister Isabella was taken by vampires to be sold in the slave trade.”

Her eyes widened, her forehead creasing as she studied me. “Oh my gods, Scarlett. I’m so sorry. But why didn’t you tell anyone?”

I shook my head. “Many reasons, and I don’t know if any of them would make sense to you. First, because I didn’t want you to think I was stupid or insane for thinking that I could somehow find and save her. Which I still do—believe that I can—that I have to.”

Below us was the sparkling cityscape of Aristelle in all its heavenly glory, like a reflection of the cosmos above. At the feet of the goddess all humans descended from, bathed in starlight and before the most gorgeous view of the whole city, I felt myself crack all the way open. The words poured from my lips in an untamable flood, breaking through the dams I’d long ago constructed to protect me from any more betrayal and heartache.

“Because it should’ve been me,” I whispered before my voice became stronger, more resilient, just as I’d been made to be over the years. “It should’ve been me, but they took her instead. And not only do I know it’s crazy of me to go looking for her, and especially to play dangerous games with powerful vampires in my quest to do so… but I’m also starting to painfully understand, deep down, that she would’ve never done any of this for me. In fact, I think if it had been me they’d taken, she only would’ve been upset that she no longer had me as a steady source of income.” Tears spilled from my eyes, the aching wound of my perpetual loneliness opening back up to bleed all over my poor new friend. “She probably would’ve said that I deserved my fate.”

Snow shook her head as my words slammed into both of us. She never let go of my hand. “Why would she think that you deserve something so horrible?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “I wish I did.”

“I’ve noticed something when I’m watching you,” Snow said slowly, drawing my eyes to hers. “Sometimes, when you’re really excited about something, or you’re deep in that zone you enter in Odessa when you’re working the room—there are these lapses, as if you realize you’ve flown too high. You clip your own wings. You push yourself back down. You reach to cover yourself, to hold back your true thoughts and feelings. No one is ever born with that instinct; that’s something we’re taught. Abusers don’t just drain us of our light. They also condition us to dim it for them, even when they’re not in our lives anymore.”

I shook my head. “She wasn’t abusive,” I said quickly. “She had to take care of me, while our mom was physically sick and our dad was mentally unwell because of it. Then, after they were both gone, she took even greater responsibility. She always made sure I was taken care of.”

“Physically,” Snow said gently. “But it’s not enough to take care of a child’s basic needs. The emotional self is just as important. Did she make you feel safe? Did you feel like you could lean on her when you were upset? Did she provide you with comfort? Praise? Physical affection?”

My right fist was clenched so tight my fingernails were digging in. I was suddenly itchy, hot, and uncomfortable under the weight of Snow’s gaze, even though the autumn night breeze was biting.

“Some of those things, sometimes, at least right after Dad died, and we were on our own. But then, no, never.”

My mind traveled back, remembering all the times I’d walked in the front door of our cottage singing, only to be told to quiet down. All the times my small hands had reached, and I was brushed away. All the times I’d cried and been told there wasn’t any room for my pain, not when Mom was sick and Dad was catatonic.

I stared at the twinkling city instead of Snow’s eyes. “But how could Isabella know how to nurture me emotionally when our parents didn’t either? She was a child too. I know I’m supposed to hate her, but I don’t. I can’t.”

I expected Snow to get angry with me like Jaxon had when he’d tried to convince me of Isabella’s evil, but she didn’t.

Snow watched the city with me, giving me distance. “You don’t have to hate her. You don’t have to feel anything that you don’t feel. Resentment is a hollowing emotion. I think holding on to it can be a way to perpetuate our pain.”

I’d never get used to Aristelle’s beauty. It was yet another thing I was supposed to detest, but I couldn’t bring myself to. In a strange way, it already felt like home. Maybe more than Crescent Haven ever had.

“Do you think I’m crazy for thinking I can save her?”

“No,” Snow said. “I think she’s damn lucky to have you as her sister. I think anyone would be lucky to receive love like yours.”

---