Dark Debt (Chicagoland Vampires 11)

“I am not Persephone,” I said, raking nails across his face again. “I’m already a vampire, and you can’t hurt me!”

“Merit!”

“Stop using his voice!” I screamed it at the top of my lungs, slapped him hard, would have done it again except that I felt a different viselike grip around my wrists, and the sound of another voice, raining down like freezing water.

“Merit! Stop!”

The world rushed suddenly back, covering and choking me as I tried to rise through the tumult and break the surface.

As suddenly as it had begun, I was back in our bedroom. I sat atop Ethan’s chest, his hands around my wrists, his face striped where I’d raked my fingernails across his skin.

And his eyes were wide with fear.

Chapter Twelve

TRUTH AND CONSEQUENCES

I made an animal sound, tried to pull my wrists away from his grip. “I hurt you. Oh God, I hurt you. Let go,” I cried, and his hands flashed open.

I scrambled off the bed, backed toward the corner of the room. I didn’t stop until the wall was cold against my back.

I slid to the floor, hands in my lap, fingers bloodied from scratching him, the stain clear even in the dim light of the lamplit room. I stared at the blood on my hands until my body began to shake with an emotion I couldn’t name. Fear? Violation? Mortification that I’d hurt the man who’d given his life for me?

“Merit, what’s happened?”

My gaze flashed to Ethan. The scrapes had already begun to fade, but they were still there. Taunting me. Reminding me. “I hurt you.”

“I’m fine,” he said, throwing away the covers and standing up. “What’s happened?”

My hands began to shake, and I crossed my arms, tucked them against my sides. “Balthasar. He was here. I was with him.”

Ethan’s gaze darted around the room. “No one was here. He wouldn’t have been able to get past the ward.”

I shook my head. “He took me somewhere. Together. In a room, an old room, a French room. It was old-fashioned. And then he looked like you.” My voice shook, sounded far away. “He looked like himself, and then he looked like you.”

Ethan looked as though he wanted to touch me, wanted to move forward, but I shook my head.

“Stop. Stay where you are.”

I could feel the panic building again, filling my chest with iron, squeezing my lungs as if I’d never get a lungful of air again.

“Breathe, Sentinel.”

But I shook my head. Not to disobey, but to protest. My head began to swim, my vision fading at the corners as panic swamped me.

“Sentinel.” Ethan’s voice, his tone, was like a slap to my mind. “I gave you a direct order, and I expect you to follow it. Take a breath!”

I sucked in air through painfully tight lungs.

He took a step closer, visibly flinched when I pulled back farther.

“Stop.”

“I won’t come any closer,” he promised. “But I’m going to hold out my hand. You can take it when you’re ready. Each time you inhale, you squeeze. Each time you exhale, you squeeze. All right?”

I nodded. Ethan reached out his hand. It took effort, but I slowly lifted my shaking fingers to meet his.

“Inhale slowly,” he said, and I squeezed his hand as I sucked in air.