Chapter 21: Shadows of the 19th Century
You’re a long way from the safety of your dreams, Katherine," a voice purred.
It wasn't Noah’s steady, protective baritone. This voice was like silk over a heartbeat, laced with a jagged edge of malice.
Ethan.
She spun in her desk chair, her hand instinctively reaching for the silver pocketknife she’d kept under her pillow since the disappearances started in town. He was leaning against her wardrobe, looking every bit the ghost of a 19th-century gentleman displaced in time. His dark eyes tracked the movement of her hand, a slow, mocking smirk spreading across his face.
"Noah told me to stay away from you," Ethan said, taking a languid step forward. The distance between them vanished in a blur of motion that her eyes couldn't quite follow. Suddenly, he was inches away, the scent of expensive cologne and old copper filling her lungs. "But he always did have trouble keeping the things he loved."
Katherine’s heart hammered against her ribs—a frantic, rhythmic invitation. Ethan tilted his head, his gaze dropping to the pulse jumping in her neck. He looked at her not like a man looks at a girl, but like a starving man looks at a feast.
"You smell like legacy," he whispered, leaning in until his cold breath brushed her skin. "And a little bit like fear. It’s an intoxicating mix."
"I’m not afraid of you," Katherine snapped, though her voice betrayed a slight tremor. "How did you get in here? This is the second story."
Ethan’s smirk deepened. He didn't answer. Instead, his eyes fixed on the silver knife in her hand with a strange, fleeting look of recognition. "Give it time, little Hunter. By the time I’m through, you won't know if you want to kill me… or if you want to see how far the dark really goes."
"What is that supposed to mean?" Katherine demanded, tightening her grip on the knife until her knuckles turned white. "Is that a threat? Did you break in to kill me? Are you nuts? Of course you are. I don't know why I asked," she scoffed.
"What, little bird?"
"You broke into my house."
Ethan reached out, his movements agonizingly slow. He didn't grab her; instead, he used a single finger to trace the line of her jaw. His skin felt like polished marble—beautiful and unnervingly cold. Katherine shivered, her body betraying her by leaning into the touch even as her mind screamed that something about his biology was wrong.
"Kill you?" Ethan stepped even closer, his chest nearly brushing hers. He was tall enough that she had to tilt her head back to meet his dark, swirling gaze. "Such a waste of a pretty face. No, little bird, death is far too permanent for what I have in mind."
"Then what?" she whispered, her breath hitching. "Why are you following me? Why are you in my bedroom?"
Ethan’s eyes darkened, a predatory hunger flashing in them that Katherine mistook for simple obsession. He leaned down, his lips ghosting against the shell of her ear.
"Noah thinks he can keep you in the light," he murmured, his voice a low vibration that made her toes curl against the hardwood floor. "He thinks if he hides the monsters, you won't become one. But I see the fire in you, Katherine. I see the blood of the men who hunted us—the men who kept the world 'safe'—flowing in those veins, and I wonder..."
He pulled back just enough to look her in the eye, his thumb brushing over her lower lip with a terrifying tenderness.
"Wonder what?" she breathed, caught in the gravity of his stare.
"I wonder how loud you'll sing when the cage finally opens," he said, his smile sharp and cryptic. He didn't explain the "us" he had mentioned. He didn't give her an answer. Instead, he just winked—a devastatingly human gesture from a creature she was beginning to realize wasn't human at all.
"Go to sleep, little Hunter," he whispered. "Dream of the woods. I know I will."
Katherine blinked, the cold air hitting her eyes, and in that split second, the space in front of her was empty. The window was shut and locked, the latch undisturbed. The only proof he had been there at all was the lingering scent of sandalwood and the frantic, uneven rhythm of her own heart.
She stood frozen in the center of her room. Her sanctuary, which had always felt like a place of safety and soft pillows, now felt like a ribcage closing in around her.