Without thinking, I began to move toward the painting, my earlier facade quickly forgotten.
“Mom,” I whispered, tilting my head back to look up at her. I swore she met my gaze, that if I reached out and touched her hand I wouldn’t feel oil paints and canvas but rather the warm, smooth surface of her skin. Her slender fingers hooked through mine, the smell of her perfume as she leaned in to whisper some gossipy thing or another.
My mother, in all of her radiance and humor and beautiful brutality, was here.
Hanging on the wall of the Lycan estate.
Suddenly, I felt a warmth at my side that made me jump. Startled out of my reverie, I glanced over to see Isaac staring up at the painting with a drink now in each hand.
“That’s your mother, isn’t it?” he asked, and I nodded. Wo
