Cyan took a few steps away from me and smoothed his hands over his scalp, examined his tapering fingers. “I need you,” he said.
Then, before the sirens came and the police officers arrived, Cyan took my heart. From my body. A body that had always been perfect because it had been alive.
* * *
I think of my nine deaths, my nine lives. There had been my life up until Dash left me and Darcy London had his baby. There had been Jarell and Dean and even Carlton, whom I might have loved in spite of his harmless fetishes and his potentially harmful wife. There had been the loss of Cyan before I realized who he really was. Scott’s death had been the most brutal loss of them all. I had died at my thirty-seventh birthday party, severed, ultimately, from Bree and, worse, from Skylar.
Now there are no more lives left. All that I have is this—my love for the living, and for the dead.
Love is not the monster, not at all. True love is the thing that makes life bearable. That reveals life’s beauty. Love is the monster’s opposite.
I will watch over the ones I love, I tell myself—in this undefined vortex of time, in this place between life and death, while I still have a will, while I can still think thoughts and create this final inventory of sorts—as I cross over and turn into particles of light above the Pale Motel. As I spin in the vastness of the universe where bodies matter not at all. I turn and turn and turn and fall, into union with the ones now gone, with the love I never recognized before.…
Acknowledgments
I would like to thank the following people for their help: Karen Clark, Laurie Liss, Brandie Coonis, Denise Hamilton, Jessa Marie Mendez, Christopher Bird, Jeni McKenna, Michael Homler, Lauren Jablonski, Jessica Preeg, Jessica Hatch, Joan Higgins, Charlie Blakemore, and Jeffrey Hirsch.
Also by Francesca Lia Block
Lay Me Out Softly: Stories
The Elementals
The Island of Excess Love
Love in the Time of Global Warming
Love Magick Anthology (editor)
Pink Smog
Roses and Bones
The Frenzy
Pretty Dead
Wood Nymph Seeks Centaur: A Mythological Dating Guide
Quakeland
Ruby (with Carmen Staton)
Necklace of Kisses
Guarding the Moon
Nymph
The Waters & the Wild
Blood Roses
Wasteland
Echo
The Hanged Man
Violet and Claire
The Rose and the Beast
Girl Goddess #9
House of Dolls
Open Letter to Quiet Light (poetry)
How to (Un)cage a Girl (poetry)
Fairy Tales in Electri-City (poetry)
About the Author
FRANCESCA LIA BLOCK is the acclaimed author of many books, including the popular Weezie Bat series and The Elementals. She is the recipient of the ALA Lifetime Achievement Award, among other honors, and is published all over the world.
This is a work of fiction. All of the characters, organizations, and events portrayed in this novel are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.
www.stmartins.com
Cover design by Lisa Marie Pompilio
Cover images: woman © Jean Fran / Trevillion.com; roots © ifong / Shutterstock.com; neon letters © Alhovik / Shutterstock.com
eBooks may be purchased for business or promotional use. For information on bulk purchases, please contact Macmillan Corporate and Premium Sales Department by writing to MacmillanSpecialMarkets@macmillan.com.
The Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data is available upon request.
ISBN 978-1-250-03312-3 (hardcover)
ISBN 978-1-250-03311-6 (e-book)
e-ISBN 9781250033116
First Edition: September 2014