Prologue
Grayson looked at me with his eyes only slightly opened, while it sounded like the world was ending outside. The storm had kept us inside for more than two days by that time, and Grayson hadn’t been sleeping at all. Not that I had any idea why. For the past twenty hours he hadn’t said a word toward me. Considering we are talking about Grayson here, it was indeed a miracle.
He had seemed off the moment the curfew was enforced. They had said that they didn’t know for how long. Only that it was in our best interest to stay inside. Grayson had started to thrum his fingers about five hours into me locking the door, and one hour after there was no signal on our phones. We still had power, and some channels on the television still worked, but he checked his phone every two minutes or so. Now he had given up.
Only the lights were still working completely fine. The fridge experienced a power lack every fifteen minutes, as long as it would turn on again, I didn’t really care. I had other things to worry about.
We still didn’t know how long we would have to stay in here, cuddled in our blankets, waiting for the storm to die down.
We hadn’t been hit that unprepared, we just didn’t know that it would happen so soon. The news had said that it wouldn’t be here for the next couple of days, then, a while later, they announced that it was coming in two days. But then it hit us that night.
“Please talk to me, Grayson!” I mumbled, my eyes closing every few seconds. If I hadn’t been wearing a watch, I would have completely lost my feeling of time. It was dark, the whole time. Like the sun had left us.
Grayson shook his head, moving his head down onto the pillow in exhaustion. His mouth opened slightly for a second and I felt a flicker of hope. Would he finally talk to me?
He didn’t. He closed his mouth again, and I heard him taking a deep breath, like not talking caused him pain.
Suddenly he jumped up, out of bed and turned around to face the wall. “You need to get out,” he said, and it sounded as if he was speaking through clenched teeth. He sounded so angry, but also scared and overwhelmed. “Now!” he shouted when I didn’t move. But I didn’t see why I should. Why did he suddenly urge me to go away? Why was he suddenly so scared? What was I missing?
So, I chose to stay here. Because honestly, where was I supposed to go? I couldn’t leave, and in here we didn’t have a lot of rooms that I could have went to.
Grayson stood there, facing the wall, for a minute or two but I knew he was waiting for me to go. I could sense it, I could see it while looking at his back. His whole body-language was dismissive. From the way he moved his shoulders, I knew how deep the breathes are that he is taking.
“I said that you have to leave.” he now sounded angrier, but his voice was different. Deeper, rougher. Something I had never heard while he spoke.
I still didn’t move. And I didn’t even know how to anymore. He was all the sudden sort of scaring me.
In this environment, with the storm outside and the darkness, his behavior was frightening me. This all seemed so wrong – like it wasn’t supposed to be like this.
Suddenly he turned around, his eyes glowing in a yellowish shade. What the hell? What was happening?
This wasn’t natural, this wasn’t supposed to happen to one’s eyes. What was that, what was he?
I didn’t understand this. At all.
“You brought this upon yourself,” he said and stepped closer to me, frightening me with every step he takes. I didn’t know this side of him, this dark side – Nevermind the glowing eyes, which were purely unnatural. They didn’t fit in the picture I always had of him. They fit to our surrounding and the aura right now, but not to him.
His voice sounded so deep, so rough, so hot, but still so wrong. Yes, he naturally had a deep voice that on some occasions sounded kind of rough, like in the morning. But this was on a whole other level, this was freaking wrong.
The question that was going through my mind the most was: what is he?
He still came closer and I felt like his eyes were burning holes into my body. My body began to shiver, and I felt cold sweat at my back. My body experienced something that it never felt before, and never was meant to feel.
“I cannot control this for much longer.” Grayson looked down on me, and I scolded myself for never asking for the truth, whenever I felt like he had been leaving something out, whenever he had avoided looking into my eyes when he had told me where he was the night.
I was clearly overreacting, was the first thing that I wanted to convince myself of. The second thing was that this all wasn’t real – that this must have been a dream.
Glowing eyes were a sign of the supernatural, weren’t they?
I had watched a lot of fantasy and sci-fi shows in my life, and weren’t werewolves always the ones with the glowing eyes? But they didn’t exist. Werewolves were a fantasy, just like every other supernatural being was. So, this had to be a dream, because there was no other way to explain this. Was there?
But this felt so real, like nothing I had ever experienced while sleeping. Never did anything feel this real before, not even my worst nightmares that made me wake up drenched in sweat. This was different. This had to be real, I somehow knew it was. I couldn’t delude myself that it wasn’t.
I had always liked going to the gym and working out there, and while I was going to school I ran track and all. But if it really came to it, would I be quick enough to escape him? Probably not.
What was I saying. If he really was a supernatural being, he could follow me in a few seconds. I would have liked to forget that possibility, but I couldn’t quite rule it out yet. Honestly? I still hoped that I could manage to say that this was all some hallucination because I was so sleep-deprived. Which I was in all honesty.
But nonetheless, my feelings told me that I had to run. I suddenly didn’t feel safe that close to Grayson, no matter the color of his eyes. I had always felt safe around him, because we knew we were strong together, and could have fought anything, but that moment, I knew that this was over. That I wasn’t safe around him, and that I had to change something.
So, naturally, I ran.
And I didn’t know what to do, as soon as I reached the door. It had been locked, but that was the smallest of my problems. What would have happened as soon as I left the house? What would have happened if I stayed in the house? And of course, how far could I have run?
Apparently not further as the door. Because that was where Grayson reached me.
My heart was beating in a rate that shouldn’t be possible living with and my breathing only continued every once in a while. I was not only scared of my boyfriend, I was absolutely terrified.
His eyes were still glowing when he looked at me and something in his face seemed to gradually change with each second that I looked at him. His facial expression was horrifying. And he looked at me, like it hurt him. Like he was sorry for what would follow. Like he knew exactly what it was, but also that it was inevitable in his situation. His eyes lingered on my face for a few seconds and then wandered down my body, just as if it was his first time really seeing me. Or the last time. It was like he wanted to save it all in his brain while he took his last glance at me.
Grayson’s eyes returned to my face, wandering over my lips, my cheekbones, and returning to my eyes.
And then he pushed my head against the wall. Repeatedly. To the point that I was unconscious. And still I could feel his teeth when they were gripping into my flesh.
All cities mentioned in this novel are fictional. Still, this book takes place in North America, and the cities are located where the Los Angeles County lays.
