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Meera
We stepped into the glass elevator on the 84th floor. He didn't look well, his hand slightly shaking as he pushed the first-floor button.
Claustrophobia? A fear of heights? I'd like to know—very badly, in fact.
If only he could see me.
If only I could tell him—
Wait—! What was I thinking?
I'm a Shinigami, a death god. When a man dies, I take his soul, erase his memories, and usher him to the Afterlife.
I've been watching him for a few days, my usual routine before the countdown. I honestly thought this was going to be just another work day, but there's something about this man, Rowan Devereaux, that caught my attention.
Until I know what that is, I'm going to stick close to him.
He fascinates me to no end—the way his hand brushes that dark brown hair away from his green eyes, or how his brows would knit as he reads through a pile of documents in his office.
But I don't think I'll ever figure out why.
I've run out of time.
He's going to die...
...in sixty seconds.
Rowan
I think I'm going to be sick, right here in this posh, all-glass lift.
God, can this thing go down any faster?
I almost lost it the other day, when I first saw her.
She hovered just around the corner of my eye, her black hair longer than I remember. She looked just like my wife who died ten years ago—except for those blood-red eyes. There's no way this creature could be her, dogging my every step.
Why is she here? What does she want with me?
To hell with it, I can't take this any longer!
I turned around to face her.
As our eyes met, the entire building shook.
I toppled over her as the lift's glass enclosure shattered.
The last thing I saw was her anguished eyes, as her lips brushed over mine.
Meera
When our eyes locked, seconds before that devastating earthquake, my memories of Rowan and our once happy life together came flooding back.
Araseth stared at me in disbelief. "You kissed him, knowing he'll turn into one of us?"
"I couldn't bear to lose him again." I glared at my overseer. "Besides, you're partly to blame, sending me as the death god of the one person on Earth I shouldn't meet!"
Araseth looked away, shamefaced. "That was—my mistake. Let's not speak of this again. Take the fledgling with you and keep watch over him. When he starts to turn, he'll wish he had died ten times over."
I held Rowan's shining soul close as I flew high above the crimson skies.
It was a gamble I had to take. There was another way to turn a human soul into one of our kind: a Shinigami's kiss—but only if that soul was the death god's soulmate.
Will he remember our past when he wakes up? Will he forgive me—or curse me—for what I've done?
No matter, I have all of eternity now—to make it up to him.
