Page 59 of Mortal Desires

My eyes found Pilar, her slight frame waiting for me to say something else but what could I say?

To accept I was Pilar Morales’ soulmate was to accept I wasn’t a creation as I believed. I had a soul, a purpose. The very notion… hope I never dared to have.

“Why did you never say anything?” I asked finally.

“What difference would it make? You wanted to marry me anyway.”

“Being a husband and being a soulmate are very different things, little witch.”

“Are they?” She seemed not to know. “Both sound awful.”

My head whipped her way, trying not to let her wound me with her words. Awful? What girl didn’t dream about meeting their soulmate?

Granted, Pilar’s was a monster, but a mate was something precious beyond words. It was proof that I could never truly hurt her. Even when I dreamed of torturing her, now I knew it could never happen.

“My family is cursed, Vic,” she said softly when I remained quiet. “You met my father. It doesn’t get better than that.”

“Your father was only your mother’s husband.”

“Are you sure?” she asked.

It was different. I couldn’t believe in soulmates because it was something beyond my wildest dreams. The idea of soulmates was too pure, so I never let myself think about it. But to Pilar, it seemed like she really couldn’t grasp what it really meant. She thought any husband could be a soulmate.

“Husbands can hurt,” I said. “Husbands leave.”

“I know.” I caught the tick in her jaw.

I had to chuckle, shaking my head at the way she saw the world. So small, so limited. She was never more human than right there looking at me with defiance.

“That’s why you never cared to tell me the truth? Because you thought I was no better than Adrian?” She opened her mouth to reply but I kept going, “You thought you should hide this huge piece of information just because I was nothing but a husband?”

“I didn’t think it mattered,” she tried.

“Death has a mate? Death has a soul and you think it doesn’t matter?”

I saw the words form in her mouth but she never said any of them. She shook her head and balled her hands into fists.

“Leave.” I waved her away, creating a door in the middle of the wall.

“Vicious…” She walked my way but I was done.

I shook my head, tired of hearing her empty reasoning. I knew she never owed me honesty, but I was too angry to think rationally. I sat down on the throne looking anywhere but at the witch in front of me.

She stood there for a beat, maybe wishing I’d change my mind, maybe trying to say something else. At last, the silence was too oppressive, and she left without a word. I closed the wall as she went, wanting to be left alone.

I needed to think.

Suddenly my chest grew heavy and hot like my soul wanted to be known. It was tired of hiding. I never thought of the consequences of being alive.

Could I be killed too? How did that work in the grand scheme of things?

Everything in this realm and the others was a manifestation of beliefs, and so was I. But what if the beliefs went beyond just creation?

Maybe I had a cock only to satisfy my mate. Maybe everything was about Pilar Morales.

Before I even got inside the throne room, I heard his angry voice booming through the empty halls. I halted to a stop wondering if I should even attempt going to him when he was already this angry.

I knew he wasn’t happy about the soulmate thing, but I couldn’t start to understand his reaction. Marnie had the vision. I knew next to nothing about the whole thing. The rest of my sisters and I always tried to distance ourselves from the premonition. I felt bad for Marnie, but none of us could think about having husbands.

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