Pureblood's Forbidden Love

settling into place. Wisps of steely fog clung to the manicured lawns and empty streets, c

side me, Ryder and Cass paused as well, exchanging an apprehensive glance that I noticed only peripherally. My gaze w

of dread and simmering malice. A pit of vile nausea swirled in my hollow belly, threat

horror still lurked etched into the mortar and timbers, souvenirs from the harr

crumpled, bloodied tableau of my dad's broken body lain in defiant repose. The way that towering, demonic anomaly had

as the full-body recollection of trauma overwhelmed my senses

against my shoulder in a reassuring line of warmth and su

es as I fought for any semblance of poise or composure to fortify me. Stumbling forward anot

empering my anxious momentum. "Just take it slow, maybe scope things out before committing to a plan. But...if t

of insight to unkink this Gordian spiral was an imperative, overriding any childish squeamishness

he tremors attempting to compromise my steps. Whatever macabre truths awaited in those haun

y realities lying in wait just on the other side of its drywall veneers. Ever closer, my reluctant caravan of

the revelation stretching out in diametric oppo

y to each blade, I froze in consternation so severe that Ryder and Cass nearly bowled me over. My jaw went slack, b

suffusing its stucco surfaces. In a bizarre, almost saccharine display, a fresh bluebird family had alr

haunting the afterimages seared behind my eyelids. More damningly, the bay window that I distinctly recalled blown out in a spiderw

ned after a beat of terse, bewildered

ngertip, absorbing the lack of shattered edges or day-old residue to mar its perfe

on a long exhalation of perplexed frustration. "L

he last vestiges of paralysis, I stumbled ahead towards the walkway on

at the unthinkable sight awaiting me there. My sandaled foot knocked against a water

cured shrubbery bordering the doorway, garlands of freshly-bloomed roses perfuming the air in cheerful abandon. My other

nascent awareness. Bloodshed and mayhem had erupted into being right there in the foyer, manifesting the

ess hellish loop through the smoldering embers of my sanity itself. And in their wake, the fr

sound of movement from within galvanized me with a fresh electric charge of trepidation. More chilling still was the muffled, melodi

't be, co