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I blinked once and was standing outside. A black wolf stood by a light gray one, a little bigger than the other. They slowly crept toward me, but I didn’t feel threatened or fear for my life. They were enchantingly beautiful.

The gray wolf was so close I could feel its breath on my arm. It nudged me as I looked over at the other, but I wasn’t sure what they wanted me to do. “What do you want?” I asked.

He lifted his snout as the other joined in, howling toward the moon above us. It was dark, and a cool breeze fanned my skin. Their howls echoed in my ears. As their voices rang, I looked down at my hands. They were glowing bright green. The light was shining, and the feeling was so powerful it nearly took my breath away.

I sat bolt upright, gasping for air and clutching the sheet close to my body. Maurice was sound asleep when I looked over at him. I wasn’t sure how deep of a sleep a vampire could get. Was he resting his eyes, though, or off into his own dream?

I slid out of bed, entered the balcony attached to the bedroom, and looked out at the water. The waves crashed onto the shore, rolling over each other and thinning out as the tide pulled up and the current brought it back to the deep sea. The full moon beamed down on the water’s surface, creating a shimmering glow. The moon was almost as bright as it was in my dream.

I brought my hands up to my body as I had done in my dream. I held my palms out in front of me, focusing on the feeling I had just moments before I opened my eyes. Then my fingertip glowed ever so faintly.

Holy shit.

The more I focused on them, the more intense the glowing became. It grew until my hands radiated emerald green. My body felt a lustful hunger that I didn’t know existed.

How powerful am I?What does this power even do?

A noise stirred behind me, and I concealed the light. A moment later, Maurice joined me on the balcony, wrapping his arms around my waist. I thought I would be excited about what I had discovered, but I had a sinking feeling in the pit of my stomach that told me I needed to keep this a secret from him. When I awoke from our attack a few days ago, he had told me I was a witch but that the ability to use those powers was taken from me.

No. It’s all a lie.

Unless whatever happened to me was no longer working. I could use my magic again. My God, it felt incredible. The surge of strength from the power was intoxicating, and I felt a part of me come back to life in that light.

“What are you doing out here, babe?” Maurice asked. His grip tightened around me, pulling me closer to his body as his hands brushed up against my breasts through the silk of my nightgown.

I stared at the moon as if I were drawn to it, like a moth to a flame. There was a world out there that I didn’t fully know or understand. Slowly, memories began coming back to me about my life with Maurice, but that was it. Everything outside that box was still missing. I knew my name and places I had been to with Maurice, but what about me? I had no memories of whoIwas. Who was Mercy beyond this relationship? What did I do as a hobby? Was I funny? Serious? Kind? Do I have a family?

Why were memories of activities I’d done with Maurice and my feelings for him there but nothing else?

“I couldn’t sleep … bad dream,” I explained, looking over my shoulder.

Maurice’s fingers trailed over my bare skin, brushing my scar and sending a shiver through my body. I had once asked him about the scar on my chest, but Maurice just shrugged and said it was from a car accident when I was twelve. He had refused to talk about it since then.

He held me close, pulling my backside toward him. It was no secret that it was one of the parts of my body that he loved the most. I could feel his hardened cock press against me. It was an effect I seemed to have on him often.

“Do you want to talk about it?” he asked.

I shook my head. “I’m going to grab some water and go back to bed.” I wiggled out of his grasp. “I’ll be right back up.”

When I turned around, it was hard to decipher the expression that flooded his face. It was an odd mixture of hurt and anger, but I didn’t stop to make him feel better. I left him standing on the balcony and headed inside.

Upon entering the kitchen, I grabbed a glass from the cabinet and filled it with filtered water from the fridge.

I looked around the fully furnished family room. Maurice had told me that a local furniture company had set up the house a week ago, so we didn’t need to worry about unpacking anything aside from our personal belongings that would show up from the moving truck in a few days.

I hadn’t been able to explore the new house yet. We got in last night and turned in early due to the exhaustion brought on by our travels.

The house was dark, and not just because it was three in the morning or because all the lights were turned off. They had painted the walls a deep gray, the furniture was all black, and the dark cherry floors were highly polished. From each window hung black, thick drapes, which I assumed were to black out the sun for Maurice’s benefit.

I didn’t mind the dark colors—they felt warm and inviting—but they created a haunting feeling around me. A strange, dark home I had never been to. It wasn’t mine, not really. Maurice wasn’t my husband. I didn’t work. I was a stranger inhisspace, whether he wanted me there or not.

There was a thick door at the end of the hallway. It differed from the others—dark brown with three silver locks, and there wasn’t even the tiniest crack between the bottom of the door and the floor. The handle resembled a car’s steering wheel but was made of metal.

A vault?

I stepped toward the hall that led to the door right before I heard someone clear their throat behind me. I jumped.

“Maurice doesn’t like to keep his money in a bank. The safe is off limits,” Jade said in a harsh tone.

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