Free Remember Me (Storm Lords Book 1) by Nina Croft

him.
    And see where they went from there . She would learn to cope with the fear.
    She couldn’t sleep, though. Instead, she climbed out of bed. Cade’s blue silk shirt lay across the chair. Phoebe picked it up, held it to her nose. For a minute, she breathed in the scent of him then she shrugged in to it, smoothing the silk against her sensitized skin.
    This must be Cade’s apartment; she hadn’t even realized it existed. Now she explored the rooms. It was beautifully—if sparsely—furnished, the décor masculine with little in the way of superfluous decor ation. He liked neutral shades, with bold splashes of color.
    Phoebe wandered through the open-plan living area, found the kitchen, and walked through a door into a small windowless room. There was no furniture other than a single straight-backed chair, pos itioned facing the wall.
    And on the wall hung a huge painting. It was the first painting she had seen in the apartment, and she moved closer to look.
    The picture showed a woman in a simple red tunic dress, her long blond hair in a braid down her back. Her face was lifted to the sky, and she was smiling, her dark brown eyes filled with love.
    Across the top of the painting was written the name: Eleni.
    Phoebe reached up to touch her own face as she took in the features of the woman in the painting. Identical t o her own. A cold solid lump congealed in her stomach, and bile rose in the back of her throat. She swallowed it down. There would be an explanation. She sank into the chair and stared for long minutes searching the woman’s face.
    There was no doubt; it was like looking into a mirror.
    She was a perfect image of Cade’s dead wife.
    It all made sense now. That first day in Afghanistan, he’d stared straight into her eyes as though he recognized her, but it hadn’t been Phoebe he’d seen. That was why he had reacted to her, probably why he had saved her. He had arranged this whole charade because she reminded him of his wife.
    Did he have any feelings for her at all? 
    No.
    It wasn’t Phoebe he wanted, but this Eleni. He had even said her name when he kissed her that fi rst time.
    Phoebe was nothing but a substitute for his dead wife.
    Why was she so surprised? She had suspected something wasn’t right. His feelings had been too quick, too intense. Deep down she’d known there was something else going on.
    Swiping away the tea rs, she allowed the anger to build inside her. Anger was better than the pain tearing at her heart. Suddenly, she was fiercely pleased that she hadn’t told him she loved him.
    ***
    “I have to do this,” Bryce said. “I’ve tried, but I can’t stay here.”
    “We can help you.” Cade wasn’t sure he spoke the truth. He’d known this was coming. The darkness had awoken when they had been torn from the women they loved and thrown into the Abyss. Lilith had shown them how to focus the power, how to use it for destruction an d chaos.
    And for many years, they had reveled in that madness, rampaging across the earth in their need for revenge. Only the revelation that perhaps there was a chance they could win back the women they loved had returned them to sanity.
    Now the darkness slumbered in all of them, and they did what they could to gain some hope of redemption and the chance to be whole again.
    But Bryce had failed his own testing, and his wife had been lost to him forever. Now he fought the darkness constantly. How could you f ight the demons when they were inside you? “I’m beyond your help and I won’t bring you down with me.” Bryce turned to Torr. “No mortal man can harm me. No mortal weapon can end my life. But you can.”
    Sadness pulled at Cade—Bryce wanted to die. How bad the pain must have become. He glanced at Torr, saw the same sadness in his friend’s eyes, followed swiftly by resolve. Suddenly the humanity was gone and Torr stood before them in his real guise, a demon of the Abyss—The Destroyer. Black wings curved at his sh oulders, his