Chapter 1-1
Chapter 1
The world was dark and deep. His senses were filled with the energy of the night. The black depth of it held him its sway. It pulled him and tugged him and dragged him where it would. It made him over in its image. Silver lined the shadows.
Garnett was aware of the dance between the moon's pale light and the night's’ infinite dark.
It controlled him.
It moved his footsteps and tugged at his heart and shrouded his mind in ways that no lover ever had. And yet, and yet, there was something abundantly more intimate about the way the night caressed him, touched him, aroused him.
He was at home in the night. He was at home...
Blinking, staggering forward until he met with some obstacle that fell and crashed out of his way, Garnett fell to the cold, hard floor. The light here was dim. The dark and the moon had not followed. The bright shimmer of the moon’s glow had been left behind, outside. This was artificial light. Inside light. He stretched out a hand in front of him across the smooth surface of the tiled floor. He knew this pattern; this was his floor. This was his house; he was home.
Sitting up, shaking all over like a leaf in a maelstrom, shivering like he felt he would never be warm again. Garnett blinked until his eyes adjusted. His mind was still groggy. Coming out of the Haze was always like this. Always a muddle, always a question mark wrapped in silk. He folded his arms around his body, and tried to think. His mind churned slowly.
He was Garnett Millieur. He lived...well, here, in this expansive home in the middle of a gated property only slightly less expansive than Central Park, in the heart of New York City. Thirty-four years old. Did he have...no. There was something about money, too. He hated it? Yes. He loathed money. That didn’t keep him from being the fourteenth richest man in the world.
Thinking hurt, but it helped.
Slowly, painfully, his senses came back to him. His mouth tasted like the inside of a garbage disposal. He was naked—again—and that meant he should get to his rooms as quickly as possible before any of the household staff saw him, or worse, Brendan. What time was it, he wondered. Early, probably. Like, dead of the night early. Brendan would’ve been asleep for hours. Locked in his room. Thank Heaven for small favors.
He pushed an unsteady hand back through the curls of his dark hair. His fingers were sticky.
Not wanting to see it, knowing what he would find on his hand if he looked, Garnett closed his eyes tightly. He lowered his hand. What sort of life was this, he wondered to himself.
When he’d mustered the courage, he forced himself to look.
Blood. Red smears of it coated his skin; his hand, up his arms, across his chest, his legs, too. He’d been in a bloodbath.
Oh, God. The taste in his mouth...
Getting to his feet took an effort of will that nearly broke him. Leaning on the carved wall panels for support, he just made it to the kitchen and the massive stainless steel sink before whatever was in his stomach came back up again.
He turned the water on to wash away the bile and chunks of his last meal before he could look at them too closely. They swirled away down the drain. He didn’t want to know. He shook fiercely and wished for death.
The blanket that was wrapped itself around his shoulders surprised him. He jumped but then he heard Wilson’s comforting voice and he forced himself to relax.
“There, there, sir.” The butler, Garnett’s manservant, had seen him in worse shape than this. The man didn’t even blink an eye. “I’ve got you. Take a breath, then let’s get you upstairs to your rooms.”
“The household staff,” Garnett started to complain in a weak voice.
“The staff are all in their beds for the night, sir. I’ve left strict orders that no one ventures from their rooms at night lest they disturb you. No one dares argue with me.”
Garnett believed it. Tall, thin and wiry, Wilson Sherman was probably the least threatening man to look at that Garnett had ever seen. His rail-thin body held a cold steel, however, and no one working in the mansion dared cross him, not once they’d stared into those unforgiving eyes. Wilson was head of the household, without a doubt. He was also Garnett’s oldest friend, and the only one to know his secret.
“What am I going to do, Wilson?” Garnett asked, as if the same question hadn’t been asked every full moon since he’d turned seventeen.
“You’re going to depend on me,” Wilson assured him. “As always, sir.”
They managed the stairs, and Garnett was able to shower himself into a reasonable state of cleanliness, then he dropped into his big king sized bed, exhausted.
His dreams were filled with screaming.
*
