Lucius.â
Yes, it was. Sometimes I felt like I was in competition with the entire world. I wanted to be the best. Always. At everything.
âGo get some rest, Eden. Weâll talk more tomorrow.â
No point in arguing. I planned to go to bed as heâd suggested, I just didnât plan on resting. There was something I needed to do first. I pushed to my feet, closed the distance between us, and kissed his stubbled cheek.
âGood night,â I told him.
He eyed me suspiciously, since he wasnât used to me obeying his orders. âLove you.â I patted the cheek Iâd kissed and strolled to the sanctity of my room. My feet sank into the rug as I skidded around a gold lamp and into my closet. I changed out of my dress and into a black shirt and a pair of black pants. I put on boots, not heels, and crawled atop the velvet green comforter.
Moonlight drizzled through the curtains, and the sounds of the night seeped from wall speakers, offering a lazy, almost sultry tune. Crickets hummed, and cars zoomed. I closed my eyes against the programmed noise.
I was going spirit-walking.
Chapter
8
K eeping my eyes closed, I internalized my focus to the deepest part of myself, gathering my energy there. Warmth soon churned inside my stomach, leaving the rest of my body cold. Determinedly I began to push that energy forward with mental hands, the weight of flesh separating from the etherealness of soul.
A cracking sound filled my ears. Slowly, so slowly, my spirit rose out of my body. Though the feat had become easier over the years, such a disconnectionâfor that was exactly what it wasârequired intense concentration and strength.
Iâd wanted to visit Lucius so many times this past week, but had resisted. Heâd called every night to give me a progress report, and every night Iâd waited in anticipation of that call. Too much anticipation. By resisting seeing him, I had proved to myself that I didnât need to see him. He wasnât a necessity. I had myself under control, and my defenses against him were well fortified. So what that Iâd thought about him constantly today.
I took immense delight in the fact that heâd never know I had visited him.
We were located in different states, but that didnât matter. Iâd find him. Usually I had to be within a mile or so of my target because I had to walk the actual distance to reach him. That had never been the case with Michael, who I could reach anywhere, anytime. After my kiss with Lucius, I knew it would not be the case with him either.
With my spirit freed completely, I became suspended in a place between reality and death, experiencing only an ephemeral lightness. I stood at the edge of the bed and stared down at my physical body. Even though Iâd done this countless times before, I always experienced shock when I saw myself lying on the bedâthere, but not really there.
The first time my spirit exited my body had been an accident. Iâd been a little girl, only four years old, and had just discovered my parentsâ lifeless bodies sprawled in blood. In my bedroom. Iâd run from them, run outside screaming for help. Michael had scooped me up and carried me back inside, to the nearest room. My parentsâ room. Heâd placed me in their bed, said, âStay here. Donât move. Iâll take care of them,â then raced away to do just that.
While Iâd lain there, sobbing violently, Iâd heard a cracking noise, like something breaking apart. At the time, Iâd figured it was my heart. But the next thing I knew, I looked down and saw myself. I barely had time to rationalize what had happened before I floated to another room, to Michael.
Heâd never known I was there, never known I watched him. Heâd been in my bedroom, the bodies and blood goneâas if theyâd never been there. Michael drank himself into oblivion that night, his hands shaking, what heâd
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