Free Unfaithful by Elisa S. Amore

in them. It was almost as if they were actually looking at me.
    The elder James stood on the other side of the grand piano, his haughty posture effectively conveying the clear-cut division between him and his family.
    Evan had one arm hanging at his side, his shirtsleeve rolled up, holding his violin, of which I could see only the flower carved into the scroll. I stopped to examine it and thought how bizarre it was that this was actually him in the centuries-old painting. He hadn’t changed at all except that his hair was bit shorter and less rebellious. The defiant look in his eye was the same. His dark, austere, fearless gaze stared at me from the canvas, taking my breath away. I would have loved him back then too, I was sure of it.
    “Does it frighten you?” Evan’s cautious tone startled me. Who knew how long he’d been watching me from the doorway.
    “Not at all,” I reassured him. “I wish I’d known you then,” I admitted.
    Unexpectedly, my answer made him laugh. “I brought you some dry clothes.” He came into the room and laid them on the bed.
    “I imagine I have Ginevra to thank for these.”
    “I’ll wait for you outside so you can change.”
    The gallantry of his words, no matter how forced, reminded me that this was the same Evan who’d posed for that portrait three centuries ago.
    “Evan,” I said, causing him to pause in the doorway. “After your—” I searched for an alternative to the word death . “After your transformation, your appearance didn’t change. I was wondering if the rest stayed the same too,” I mumbled, awkwardly trying to make myself understood—though at the same time I wasn’t entirely sure I wanted him to realize what I was getting at.
    “That depends. What do you mean, exactly? What is it you want to know?”
    Why the hell did he always have to be so direct?
    “Um, well, I was wondering if—compared to when you were human—I mean, if an Angel can—” Could I manage to make him understand? I wasn’t so sure.
    “If he can . . . ?” he prompted, though the smile he was trying to hide spoke volumes.
    “If he can still feel the same emotions, act like a human. I was wondering if your sensations have stayed the same like your body.”
    He came over and sat down beside me, never moving his eyes from mine. “I can’t feel human emotions any more, Gemma.”
    The disappointment on my face made him smile. I’d felt his desire growing along with mine day after day, but maybe I’d been completely wrong. Maybe it had just been a reflection of my desire for him, a delusion. Was that what he was trying to tell me? “I thought—so you’ll never feel what I feel when I’m with you,” I murmured sadly. There was no point in asking him. A bitterness that I tried unsuccessfully to hide rose in my throat. I’d been fooling myself.
    “I can’t feel the same emotions I did when I was human,” he continued, looking at me intently, “but only because the ones I feel now are much stronger.”
    My heart skipped a beat, allowing me to breathe again.
    “They’re feelings a human body isn’t capable of containing. My perception no longer depends on imperfect human senses. But you should know that, Gemma. You’ve experienced it yourself.”
    I flinched at the memory Evan was evoking. Although I kept it deeply buried, it only took a moment for it to re-emerge: the sensation I’d felt when I’d left my body. I had felt freed of an enormous burden; all my perceptions—even the simple touch of Evan’s hand—were amplified hundreds of times. Every impact was stronger, more vivid, more intense. So that was what Evan must feel.
    I nodded in silence, shaken by the revelation.
    “When there’s no body to contain them, feelings expand infinitely, like they’re exploding, and they’re a thousand times more intense. It’s like the body’s an obstacle that muffles every sensation, every emotion, every desire.”
    I looked into his dark eyes and a new worry made its way