Free Of Light and Darkness by Shayne Leighton Page A

just been the two of them, simple and unchanging.
    Maybe it made sense for Valek to be with Evangeline now. Of course it did. Charlotte could never be that for him. She wasn’t supposed to be. And Evangeline was nice. She was beautiful. She would take care of him.
    Something hard and icy stabbed at the inside of Charlotte’s chest again, and she lurched forward, balling her fists in her hair. No! She wasn’t going to accept that. She needed Valek, and she needed him all to herself. They were soul mates . That was the reason he’d found her nearly nineteen years ago in Prague. There must have been a reason. They belonged together.
    Biologically, he wasn’t much older than her—about four years. They weren’t related in the least. They practically were like different species altogether. They could be together once she was old enough. He only needed to wait for her.
    No , her logical half fought back. That was too disgusting to even think about. Why was she thinking it?
    Her heart and mind raged on in battle, neither half making any sort of victory. What was she going to say to him? What was he going to think? Charlotte couldn’t imagine her situation getting any worse.
    “Lottie?”
    The soft, familiar voice dripped like honey in the thick gardenia-scented air. She looked up to see him standing at the edge of the broken gate.
    No! Go away!   She said the words in her mind, but nothing came out of her lips that had frozen shut. Instead, she buried her face in her knees again. Wrong. It can always get worse .
    “I’m not going to go away,” Valek said aloud, answering her thoughts defiantly.
    He padded over to her with his hands up in surrender, careful, as though she were a spooked rabbit.
    She felt like she was going to be sick. This was it. The floodgates were now open. Her heart pounded in her chest as she looked at him. He had cleaned up. His hair was tied neatly back with a black ribbon. His red ascot with the Czech coat of arms scrawled in elegant gold, and brown sear-sucker vest were back in their rightful place—the buttons closed. She wanted to look away again, but his lingering, sapphire gaze kept her there.
    “What?” She sniffed and quickly wiped at her face with an already dampened sleeve. She hated when she was vulnerable. She wished she were on the opposite end of the world.
    He sat down on the scummy brim of the fountain and took her small hand in his. His skin was cool and satiny, like it always felt—dry, though with a slick sort of feeling, like the scales on a snake.
    “I am sorry, Lottie,” he said almost too quietly for her to hear. “I should never have allowed that to happen.”
    She sniffed again. “Why are you sorry?” She wriggled her hand free and folded it sheepishly in her lap. “Who you choose to be involved with is none of my business. You deserve to be happy.”
    “Do not say such things. It is without a doubt your business. I do not feel that way about Evangeline.” He pleaded for her to look at him. She refused.
    “That’s not the way it looked.” This was stupid. She felt like a jealous wife.
    “I am aware of the way it looked.” He sighed. “And I am not going to try and explain. But I promise it was meaningless. Evangeline will not be my betrothed anytime soon.” He chuckled darkly.
    Charlotte didn’t buy it. Instead, she turned her face away, the only effort she could make to hide from him. She felt him inch closer to her as she sniffled once more.
    “Please do not cry, my Lottie.” He eased one long bony finger over her cheek, wiping away a tear. She couldn’t help but completely melt inside.
    Finally, she turned to look him in the eye, which proved to be a big mistake. Her tears flowed inconsolably then and it was all she could do to bury her face in his chest, her hands knotting around the back of his neck.
    “Valek. I’m so confused. It’s not like I can hide it from you any longer. Eventually you were going to hear it.” She sobbed.
    He rested his