Haunted by Your Touch Read Online Free Page A

disappearing from my vision into the sky. I ignored the thumping of my heart and went nearer, thinking that although it wasn’t made up of rock, it looked like the sheer face of a cliff. Once we were only a dozen feet from it, my horse sidestepped away with a nervous neigh. Truth be told, I was rattled by the sight of it, too. I hadn’t seen it since that night, when I’d stared in horror as a section of it had parted to let Ashton—still clutching Gloria—through. If not for Rafael, I would’ve been next to vanish into its surface, never to be seen again.
    Physicists had an explanation for barriers that separated the multiverses from one another. They called it M theory, hypothesizing that the membranes dividing up the dimensions were invisible. In that, they were close to right. They
were
invisible, but only to humans. If you had demon blood in you, you could see them plain as day, and this one was huge.
    I climbed off the horse, still holding the reins so the animal couldn’t bolt away, to walk over and trace my hand over the cool surface of the barrier. If I’d been a Pureblood, I could have parted this with my power, pulling me and anyone I had a hold of through the gravitational field separating the realms. But if I were a Pureblood, then I would have been a ruthless predator like Ashton, snatching away Partials to feed off of. Making sure my victims were young, because the life essence from youth had more power to nourish me.
Bastard
.
    Some powers would never be worth their price.
    “Get away from that.”
    At the first syllable, I whirled, aiming my gun, but then I recognized Rafael’s voice and froze instead of squeezing the trigger. Damn it, thatwas twice I’d almost shot him tonight! This time, not a single twig had snapped, nor had any other noise preceded him to warn of his presence. He was so silent that if I hadn’t been staring right at him, I’d have sworn no one was there.
    “You think something’s on the other side, just waiting to pull me through?” I asked, very softly.
    I couldn’t see his features, but I could make out the pinpoints of light in his eyes, like specks of stardust in the dark.
    “You never know.”
    I stared at him as I moved away from the barrier. Rafael looked more like a compilation of shadows in the almost nonexistent light. Him, the barrier, the woods… it all served to make the rest of that memory come roaring back.
    Something big crashed into us, driving me and Drew off the horse onto the ground. For a second, I was stunned, and dirt lodged up my nose, making it even harder to breathe. Hard, heavy forms tumbled over me before rolling away. Over the furious sounds of a struggle, I heard Ashton’s shout
.
    “Drew! What’s going on?”
    Couldn’t
breathe!
I rubbed my nose with my bound hands, trying to dislodge the dirt from it. My chest burned with a pain that made every other ache fade into insignificance.One nostril cleared and I took in a staggered breath that wasn’t enough, not nearly enough. Lights began exploding in my vision as a rushing noise filled my ears. Ashton shouted something else, but I couldn’t make it out this time. Through my narrowing vision, my eyes focused enough to see him. Ashton’s back was against what looked like an enormous wall, holding up a lantern with his other arm tight around Gloria
.
    And then a slit appeared in that wall behind him. Ashton melted into it, still clutching Gloria, both of them disappearing even as I screamed into my gag. A hard grip seized me, flipping me around, crushing me to the ground as I tried to scramble away. Then air—luscious, beautiful air!—filled my lungs as the duct tape was torn from my mouth and I sucked in a breath that ended on a sob
.
    “Gloria
!
”
    “Why were you there that night, Rafael?” I asked, staring at the man who’d killed Drew and saved me. “What were you doing in the woods at just the right moment?”
    Silence, then his shoulder moved in what might have been a shrug.