Page 101 of Wanted

The grass comes up to my waist and is sprinkled with fuzzy purple and white blossoms. It’s been so long since I’ve been so close to such a thing, my hands immediately ache with the need to reach out and touch it. To see if it’s real. To feel it squeezed between my fingertips.

But Raphael’s hold on me doesn’t loosen, keeping me pressed close to him.

To the sides, casting faint shadows that don’t quite reach us, are trees. The tallest trees I’ve ever seen. They rustle softly as if they’re purposely showing off their leaves and branches in a mesmerizing dance as they gently sway together in the soft breeze.

It’s all so… vibrant and hypnotic and full oflife, I ignore everything else until Raphael turns me back around and nudges my chin up.

Showing me a sky filled with pinks, oranges, and reds.

He answers before I can get the question of how he knew I wanted this past my lips. “I’m inside you.”

The fuzzy warmth I was momentarily experiencing chills to icy dread at this revelation. “So you can read my thoughts?”

He hesitates a split second before admitting, “Yes.”

Anticipating my reaction, his arms squeeze me even tighter, crushing me against him. “You let me in, Alena. You gave me permission.”

“When?!” I demand in a gasp.

His lips find my ear, purposely brushing against the sensitive flesh and sending a shiver down my spine. “When you begged for more pleasure.”

I jerk my head to the side, away from his lips, but he follows.

His breath caresses me as he exhales, “Everything you think, I hear. Everything you feel, I feel.”

Oh god…

How?Why?

Leaning back, he says, “Because you’re the other half of my soul.”

I start to shake my head in denial. That’s impossible. People don’t share souls…

But his eyes flash red, and the sky darkens, filling with clouds.

“I assure you, it’s very possible,” he says with a growl.

Fear slithers through me. If even half of what he says is true, if he is indeed inside my head and can read my thoughts, how can I possibly escape him?

How can I be free?

The sky darkens more and thunder cracks in the distance.

My body wants to jolt in surprise, but his hold on me is too tight.

“You can’t escape me, Alena,” he rasps as the air around us crackles and pops with the smell of ozone. “We are bound for eternity.”

“I want you out of my headnow,”I demand as a raindrop falls on my forehead.

Lightning streaks across the horizon. Then a loud boom of thunder rattles the very ground beneath our feet.

“No,” he snarls, his expression sharpening with determination. “Never.”

If he simply said no, I’d probably be able to keep my composure.

But him adding thatneverpushes me over the edge.

“Get out of me!” I scream in his face as a torrent of rain suddenly falls from the clouds above us.

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