CHAPTER 4

LIORA “Evan?” I whispered, barely able to hear my own voice over the heavy rain. My legs shook so badly I thought they might give out, not from the cold, or the rain soaking through my clothes, but from the shock of what I was seeing in front of me. Him. No… that couldn’t be right. My mind immediately fought against it. That’s impossible. I watched it happen. I saw them lower his body into the ground. And yet… The man standing a few feet away continued rubbing his jaw while I stared in shock. Same eyes. That same scar from three years ago while we were in my tiny kitchen, laughing too hard over burnt pancakes. I had turned away for one second, and he had tried to carry the pan and slipped, hitting his face on the kitchen cabinet. I had cleaned that cut myself. I knew that mark. It was him. My feet moved backward without me even thinking. My heel caught on the wet ground and I nearly slipped, stumbling hard as rain splashed around me. The man frowned slightly, then slowly pushed himself upright. Water ran through his dark hair, dripping down his forehead. Even the way he stood… the way he tilted his head slightly… it was Evan. It was exactly Evan. “You are dead,” I whispered, shaking so hard it hurt. “I buried you.” For a moment, he just stared at me. Blank. Empty. Like I was speaking a language he didn’t understand. Then his brows pulled together slightly. “You drunk, sweetheart?” he asked, voice low and rough. Sweetheart. My vision blurred instantly. Tears I didn’t even realize were building spilled down my face. I didn’t wipe them away. I couldn’t. Because Evan used to call me that. Every time I was upset. Every time I was angry. I closed the distance between us in quick, unsteady steps, my hands reaching out to grab his leather jacket tightly. “Stop it,” I whispered desperately, my voice breaking. “Don’t do this… don’t look at me like you don’t know me.” My fingers tightened even more as rain poured down between us. “Evan…” I choked out again, closer this time, searching his face like I could force the truth out of it. “It’s me.” His gaze dropped slowly to my fingers still clenched around his leather vest, like I was something irritating he hadn’t decided whether to shake off or ignore. “Stop pretending,” I whispered again, this time in a more pleading tone. “Do you have any idea what your death did to me?” His eyes darkened as his hand closed around my wrist. Tattooed fingers wrapped around my skin in a tight cold grip. “I think,” he said quietly, almost bored, “you’ve got me confused with someone else.” “No!” I blurted out instantly, shaking my head so hard my hair stuck to my face. “No… no… no… you are Evan… my fiancé.” The man went completely still. For one terrifying second, I thought he would remember. That he would finally look at me the way he used to. But instead, he smiled. Slowly. And it was wrong. There was nothing soft in it. Nothing familiar. Nothing human in the way I remembered Evan smiling at me in kitchens and late-night walks. This smile didn’t comfort. It warned. It was the kind of smile predators wore when they already knew the outcome with their prey. “My fiancé, huh?” he repeated softly. Lightning tore across the sky behind him, bright enough to turn the world white for a second. And in that flash, I saw what I hadn’t noticed before. Blood. Dark streaks running from his knuckles like he had just finished a fight he hadn’t bothered to clean up from. Then my eyes dropped lower. To his hand. To a massive ring sitting heavily on one finger. Black metal. A skull carved into it. And right where the eyes should have been, two ruby stones stared back at me, almost glowing under the storm. My stomach twisted violently. That wasn’t Evan. Or at least… it wasn’t the Evan I buried. Headlights suddenly appeared behind him. Five motorcycles emerged from the storm one after the other, engines roaring like monsters in the dark. The bikers stopped beside us and every single one of them stared at me. One of them removed his helmet slight and laughed. “Well damn,” he muttered, “Ryder finally got himself a girl.” Ryder. Not Evans. The man in front of me smirked slowly, then leaned close enough for me to smell rain, whiskey, and smoke on his skin. And he whispered. “I wish I can stand here all night and I do this with you sweetheart,” his thumb brushed the engagement ring I still wore around my neck, “but I have other important business to handle.” Still shocked at the face, I just blinked at him. “Tomorrow, when you wake up, all these is going to be nothing but a long dream for you.” My brain barely had time to process his words then his hand suddenly left the ring and rammed into the side of my neck. My eyes rolled into my skull, and everything turned black.