ofelia torres loved freedom far too much to join the cullen coven and settle down. she had the universe at her feet, she'd be stupid not to take it by storm. but when she hears her former love and the coven she chose to leave behind are in danger, s...
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CHAPTER ONE: PAST LIVES
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THERE WAS A STRANGER inside Ofelia Torres’ house. Ofelia had noticed it from a mile away, that eerily familiar floral yet fruity scent (an odd combination of lavender and citrus) that lingered through the aroma of hot blood on the afternoon breeze. She immediately grew defensive, the blood coating her lips and chin long forgotten as she dropped the warm body now limp in her grasp to the ground. He was nothing more than a monster, a man of wicked sin, undeserving of dignity as he met his violent end. She simply stepped over his awkwardly strewn limbs, tongue kissing her teeth as she glared down at his sunken features, before she set her sights where her house sat in the distance.
Only two people on this earth knew where the infamous Ofelia Torres resided. In the cruel aftermath of a war well fought, Ofelia had decided that it was better for her to go off the grid, settling on remote land where no one could find her unless she wanted them to. How this stranger had defied the law of nature, she wasn’t sure, but Ofelia was more than ready to find out. When given the option to either kill or be killed, Ofelia would take the knife and fight every single time. She had spent forever and then some stuck on this devious earth; she was tired of worshipping every new devil when she could be her own god. The devil bowed to her now, and if needed, this invader would find out the hard way what it meant to trespass upon the great doors of hell.
Ofelia’s home, much like her soul, was a barren battle ground of calculation. A simple one-storey red-brick cottage in the heart of the woods, it was perfect for somebody who was used to fleeing more than settling. A moment’s notice was all she would need to escape when the flames got too close for comfort. As she reached the dirt track leading up to her front door, she paused behind the row of bushes that protected the property line, inhaling lavender and citrus with a predatory sneer. If she listened close enough, she could just make out the faintest shuffles of lithe feet on wooden floorboards. The stranger was graceful, then. Another listen. No heartbeat, no breathing, just an empty walking talking body. Interesting. Her intruder was a vampire. Ofelia didn’t take kindly to vampires, not anymore.
Her hackles raised, she crept up to the front door, using the thick of the bushland as coverage from potentially spying eyes. The several locks that Ofelia had made sure to add as extra security were surprisingly unlocked, leaving the slightest crack between the door and its frame. No signs of forced entry, it made no sense. Charlotte and Peter were the only people she trusted with keys to her cottage, and Ofelia knew their scents like she knew her own.
‘Be ready, Ofelia,’ she thought to herself.
With a shake of her head, she pushed the door open, every movement carefully planned out. They would not hear her coming, not if she had anything to say about it. And so, unlike the stranger, the old floorboards made no sound under her feet. Ofelia had long since learnt which ones to avoid as she inched her way down the hallway to the living room. Closer, closer, closer. Lavender and citrus began to cloud her senses, leaving a sickening ache where her stomach should’ve been. It was too familiar. Ofelia didn’t like that. She’d spent a long time running from past demons, she’d rather die a forever kind of death than face them again.
