Blood of Eden

Chapter 25

Katherine sat, curled like a child, in the big leather chair for hours, her mind a vat of churning questions and images, while she waited for Quinn to return. Never one to be patient with being kept waiting, every second that ticked by on the clock pushed her one step closer to the edge of her limit.

She had been afraid of her own instincts lately. Quinn's presence in her life had realigned her priorities and the process had been confusing.

That had been a huge mistake.

She didn't regret falling in love with him or knowing him as her soul mate, but she should have known better than to dismiss her gut feelings about what Raphael had said about her, what he had called her, and Quinn's knowledge of it. Quinn knew something, something important that he was keeping from her, and in the depth of her soul, she knew that for sure.

Katherine's stomach clenched and she felt a rise of gorge that she suppressed with a swallow from the warm and almost empty can of Pepsi she'd forgotten about hours ago when Damien had first mentioned the word Geliget.

There was something about the word, about the story, that resonated with her, which was weird because she'd grown up hearing tales just like that one and none had ever felt... predestined.

Every instinct she had was telling Katherine that she'd just found the root of the mystery, the tip of the big secret that the man she loved was keeping from her, and that she would find the answers she needed with Quinn.

It was strange, though. The ache she expected to feel at the prospect of Quinn's betrayal wasn't coming. She felt a sickness in her stomach that she couldn't quite place, but she didn't feel as though she'd just lost her soul mate. And that's what it would amount to. If Quinn had been playing her from the start, he would be lost to her forever. She would never forgive him and she would never again trust herself.

Katherine's heart and soul screamed against the very thought of Quinn as a possible traitor to her and her family. There must be a reason that he would keep who he was, what he was, a secret from her. That is, if he really was one of these Geliget, if they even existed. If they didn't, if everything that had happened was somehow explainable, then she knew without a doubt that Quinn would have those answers for her.

Done with suppressing her instincts, Katherine grabbed onto that certainty with all of her soul and pulled it close to her, like a shield, protecting her from examining any other possibility. Then, with that shield tucked securely around her, she waited.

♀♀♀

His footfall was quiet, would have been silent to human ears, but she knew the moment he approached the front door of the apartment.

She heard him open and close the door, then click the lock into place and slide the deadbolt across. She stayed silent and waited.

Katherine knew he'd scented her when he stopped just short of the living room and turned to stand in the doorway, his body illuminated by the light he'd just turned on in the porch.

"Katherine?" He sounded strange, sad and bone weary. She couldn't help but feel a tinge of worry for him before she pushed that feeling down and allowed all of the pent up frustration of the day fill her. She reached over and clicked on the nearby lamp, needing to see his eyes when she asked him if he was a traitor.

"What are you doing in here? Is everything okay?"

He stepped toward her, raising his hand up to shield his eyes from the bright light of the lamp, but stopped suddenly just before her. Katherine could tell the moment his eyes acclimatized and he could see her own expression of anger, fear, and desperation.