Page 96 of By the Pint

And we’d have to start from scratch. Things might never be as they were now.

I was grieving for either option. Even though I already knew which Casey would choose, and I understood it. It was the only option. It didn’t stop the pain of losing him.

Slowly, Casey got to his feet, blowing out a shaky breath.

“I’m sorry, Dima. I’m so sorry. It has to be—”

“I understand,” I said, wiping away his tears with my thumb. “You don’t have to explain. It’s your only choice.” I turned my head a fraction of an inch towards my ex-blood-brother. “Killian, pack Casey’s bags.”

Killian startled into action, looking for Casey’s empty cases, and gathering his things.

And don’t be sloppy.I told him.You know how he hates that.

Casey cradled my face in his hands and brought his lips down to mine. They were salty, a mixture of both our tears. Time slowed. Or it sped up. I wasn’t sure. I wanted to freeze this moment. Live between times. Just me and Casey. Forever.

“Done!” Killian announced sometime later with all the pizazz of a toddler who’d learned to wipe their own ass. “Dima, is it okay if I call you at some point? You know, after Casey’s turning? I have some things I want to share with—”

Without looking away from Casey, I slammed the lids of the cases closed. “No, it’s not okay. Don’t call me. Ever. Understand?”

Casey ignored his ‘master’ and brought his face down to mine again, pressing his forehead against mine.I don’t know what to say, he said into my mind.I wish there were another way.

But there wasn’t. He might not have another eight to sixteen years to wait for the reappointment. I understood. Didn’t mean I liked it, but I understood.

Will you come with me? he asked.Dima, I love—

“Stop!” I yelled aloud.

In six days’ time, Casey would have no recollection of me. In fact, his first instinct would be to destroy me. Rid himself of any other nearby apex predators. But that was beside the point. The point was, I would have to ‘live’ with this loss, and he wouldn’t. I would grieve a love I never got to hold, and he wouldn’t.

I thought of Mal. Losing his human mate had almost destroyed him. But at least Mal had decades with his love. I only had a few weeks. In reality, I had no right to feel the way I did. I had no claim over Casey. He was not mine. I didn’t get to grieve a relationship we never had in the first place.

He was not mine.

Don’t ask me to do that. I can’t do it. It’s not fair, I said.

How could I possibly go with him? Back to the City of the Undead? And watch him go through the prolonged agony of turning, only to be rewarded with a blank, vacuous shell of the man I loved.

Casey paused. His mind was closed off to me. He nodded. Wiped the tears from his cheeks on the back of his hand, and crossed the room to where Killian stood, avoiding my eye, but shooting me covert glances every now and then. Casey bent down and hoisted the strap of his holdall bag over his shoulder. He extended the handle of a huge metallic roll-along suitcase.

He closed his eyes and steadied his breath. “Goodbye, Dima. Thank you. For everything.”

And in his mind, he let the images flash up of everything he was thanking me for. Sitting atop the volcano and opening hisheart. Teaching him to block his thoughts. Watching wingball on his couch, the laughter, the drop of blood he licked from my finger. Riling him up in the hot tub, and again at mini golf. Fucking him hard against the wall at Dreadmourne. Fucking him gently in the car. The phone sex. The replayed sound of my own orgasm. The cuddles. The kisses. The smiles he didn’t realise he was capable of.

I held in my sob. He had no choice, and letting him see my pain was selfish and served no purpose. He couldn’t change his mind. I didn’t want him to change his mind. But I had to say something.

Moonflower, I’ll make this quick. I love you. Think I’ve loved you since the first moment I saw you. And for every moment of my eternal, undead life, I will never stop loving you. The Casey I love will always live in here.I patted my chest where my heart still beat and felt the outlines of the locket and locker key.I will find you in the future. I promise.

Casey nodded.I’m sorry,he said.You were the best thing that ever happened to Casey ‘The Temper’ Freckleman, and I love you, too.Then he turned and silently marched through the open door of his suite. Killian in his wake, hop-skipping to keep up with Casey’s criminally long strides.

I followed him to the doorway and watched as he disappeared down the corridor. Occasionally he glanced over his shoulder at me, as though giving me a chance to change my mind and go with him. But I couldn’t.

I couldn’t lose him twice.

Eventually Casey was gone. And I was left staring at an empty hall. A light flickered at the end. A bulb on the blink. The hotel was deathly silent.

I didn’t know how long I sat there gazing into the abyss before I pushed to my feet. I couldn’t stay there. Too manymemories. Too much pain. I called for Wayne, and he drove me across the city, back to my apartment.

It was nearly seven in the morning when I finally walked through the door. The sun threatened the horizon with pretty orange promises of death. Everyone was awake and downstairs, getting ready for work, or in Mal’s case, just getting home from work.

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