I Died Loving Him. Now I'm Back

Selene's POV

I read it four times before the words stopped moving around on the page.

I know what you remember, Selene.

No name on it. No mark. Just six words and a guy who disappeared before anybody could get a good look at him.

I stood there in my doorway holding a note that had basically ruined my whole month, and I felt every bit of control I'd built up over the last two weeks just walked right out the door.

Someone knew. Not guessed. Knew.

I turned the paper over twice, looking for anything else. A mark. A smudge. Something. There was nothing. Whoever sent it was either very careful or very confident, and neither option made me feel better about my odds.

I didn't sleep. I sat by the window with a blade across my knees, watching the trees until the sky turned gray, and by morning I'd gone through every option twice and landed on the same two names both times. Damon, who said basically the same thing in that clearing two nights before. Or Camille, who I hadn't even met yet in this life, but who once told me, pretty gently, that I wasn't needed anymore right before she killed me.

I told Mara everything that morning. Not all of it, but the note, the clearing, the four words on the wind.

"Someone knows," she repeated, reading the note again like the words might change if she looked hard enough. "Someone actually knows what you remember, which means you have to actually tell me what that means, Selene, because I'm done guessing."

"I can't. Not yet."

"You said ‘soon’ two days ago."

"I know what I said."

"So?"

"So I need a little longer."

"That's not an answer, that's a stall tactic. I've known you for nineteen years, Selene, I know the difference."

"Maybe it's both."

"It's definitely both." She sighed and pinched the bridge of her nose the way she does when she's trying not to lose her temper with me. "Fine. But when you finally do tell me, I get to say I told you something was going on weeks ago and you get to admit I was right."

"Deal."

"I want that in writing eventually."

She folded the note and put it in her own pocket instead of handing it back, which is basically Mara's way of saying I'm keeping this and you don't get a say.

"You should tell your dad," she said.

"And say what? That someone sent me a note about a memory I can't explain?" I shook my head. "He'll lock me in this house until the wedding. I need to actually be at that dinner, Mara."

"You need to not get yourself killed before it."

"I'm being careful."

"You were alone in the woods at midnight two nights ago. That's not careful, that's the opposite of careful, that's practically an invitation."

I didn't have a good answer for that one.

"Whatever this is," she said, quieter now, "I hope you know I'd believe you. Whatever it turns out to be."

I almost told her right then just to see if that was true. I didn't.

The next few days blurred together. I trained until my arms hurt and Mara stopped going easy on me. Theo came back from his own digging looking pale.

"Kane's land borders three packs," he said, dropping into the chair beside me. "All three lost their leaders in the last ten years. Fires. Accidents. Real good timing, if you ask me."

"That's not a coincidence."

"No kidding. I've been saying that for the last hour, keep up."

"Sorry. I was thinking."

"About what?"

"Nothing important."

"You say 'nothing important' the way other people say 'extremely important, do not ask me again.'"

I didn't argue with that, mostly because he wasn't wrong.

"You know," he added, tapping the papers against the table to straighten them, "you've been disappearing a lot lately. Long walks. Weird hours. If I didn't know better I'd think you were meeting someone."

"I'm not meeting anyone."

"I didn't say who. I just said someone."

"Theo."

"I'm just saying. If you were meeting someone, now would be a really strange time to start, considering you're two weeks from a betrothal dinner."

"I'm not meeting anyone," I said again, which was technically true, since nothing about the clearing had been planned on my end.

He shrugged like he didn't fully believe me but wasn't going to push it further, and went back to sorting his papers.

Six days before the dinner, a second note showed up. This one came in daylight, hidden inside a basket with the seating charts. My hands went cold seeing the same handwriting again.

You are not the only one who remembers. Watch her eyes at the table. She is more frightened of you than you are of her.

Watch her eyes. That had to mean Camille. But if Camille was writing these, why warn me instead of just finishing what she started?

Unless it wasn't her at all. Unless it was someone who knew both of us well enough to see things neither of us could see in ourselves.

Two nights before the dinner, I went walking again, close to the house this time. I made it about halfway across the yard before a shape peeled off the wall in the dark, and my blade was half out before the moonlight hit his face.

Damon.

"You shouldn't be here," I said in a calm tone.

"You say that like you have any room to talk. You're the one standing outside at midnight for the second time this month."

"That's different."

"Is it?"

"I'm not the one sneaking around."

"No. You're the one following people into the woods and then acting surprised when they notice." He glanced at the blade like it was mildly interesting instead of dangerous. "If I wanted you dead, Selene, you'd already be dead. I've had my chances. I'm not here for that."

"That's supposed to make me feel better?"

"It's supposed to make you think." He paused. "Which you clearly are."

"Why do you even care whether I think or not?"

"Because the next move is you walking into that dinner blind, and I've watched that particular mistake get made once already. I don't feel like watching it twice."

My heart raced at a faster pace. "What does that mean?"

"It means we're out of time for tonight." He nodded toward the house behind me. "Go inside before someone notices you're gone."

He didn't come any closer. Just looked at me for a while then turned to leave, and for a second I thought that was it. Then he stopped.

"One more thing," he said, in a low tone that I had to lean in to hear. "The fire wasn't the only thing I lied about."

And then he was gone.