I felt different. I was different.
I was still locked in the black void, which dulled my senses, but I was aware I was coming into consciousness and different.
Supremely different.
Everything felt so connected—I was aware of every nerve ending, every heartbeat that surged oxygenated blood through my veins, and everything my brain was orchestrating with the rest of my body, keeping it viable and in good working order. I’d taken enough science classes to understand how the human body worked, and these were all part of the inner workings, but I’d never been so conscientious of every one of the million transactions taking place in my body each second.
It was overwhelming. There were thousands of orders and requests screaming I felt I should respond to, but I couldn’t sort through the cornucopia of disarray enough to make sense of it. Nonetheless, my heart continued to work, as did the rest of my changed body, without my commanding the large organ to pulse .5 liters of blood every 1.2 seconds through it.
Okay . . . that was weird. I certainly don’t remember ever learning that random bit of information in science class, but nonetheless, something inside me knew I was right.
And then I felt it—but this time, it wasn’t just passing through my body as it had when he’d touched me, but was originating from it.
It was the same electric-like current I’d felt whenever I’d been close to William, though the intensity and magnitude of it coursing through my body as its vessel, vacillated from pain to pleasure.
I couldn’t understand where this super-enlightened state of consciousness had come from. I was still me . . . same thoughts, opinions, musings, values and such, but I didn’t feel like me. The power, awareness, and shocking current raging through me, made me feel as if I was a stranger in my own body.
My senses finally ignited, and I was inundated by the surrounding stimuli flooding into my body with typhoon-like force. I was hypersensitive and ultra-aware to everything pouring into my awakened senses. Again, the same eyes, ears, nose, mouth, and fingers . . . but different.
“She’s waking, John.” A female’s voice flowed into my ears with crisp precision.
“It’s about time,” a male’s voice, deep and silky—like a radio talk-show host—replied.
My eyes tore open, only to widen in horror when I viewed my surroundings, and those surrounding me, with no hint of familiarity, or with any recall as to how I’d ended up here.
I was lying on my back in a four-poster bed in the middle of a room that was easily as many square feet as the home I lived in until kindergarten. I scanned my mind for the last memory I had before waking up in this foreign place. I couldn’t recall anything except for a face . . . a face that was burned into my brain.
“Hello, Miss Dawson. Welcome back to the living.” My eyes scurried to the man with the silky-smooth voice.
The female standing beside him snickered.
He glanced at the female before turning back to me with a smug smile. “Although I suppose living takes on a slightly different meaning now . . .”
As desperate as I was to speak (or to scream), I couldn’t. I was rendered speechless when I took in the full view of these two impossibly beautiful figures before me. The man was tall, broad-shouldered and had light brown hair—the kind that would glimmer in sunlight. His stance was imposing, and from the confidant gleam in his deep-blue eyes, I imagined he was not the kind of man you wanted to cross.
The female beside him was a goddess. Statuesque, thin (although her thinness was unfairly coupled with voluptuousness settled in all the right places), and had hair so fair in color it was nearly white. She exuded an air of superiority, and was looking at me as if I was about as inconsequential as where the rubber on the bottom of her knee-high, suede boots was made.
“Where am I?” I shifted up in bed, eyeing cautiously over this modern day Cleopatra and Mark Antony.
The male took a step towards me. It echoed through the mass of the room. “Settle down, there’s no need to—”
“Don’t come any closer,” I pleaded, my voice edging on hysteria as the man continued to advance in my direction.
His brow furrowed, and he gave me a look that reminded me of how my mom used to look at me when I’d said or done something she thought juvenile. “That’s quite enough. We mean you no harm,” he said, with warning in his voice.
“Get away!” This time I yelled, the hysteria coming to fruition, and my body reacted before I made a conscious request.
With foreign strength and speed, I sprung from the bed in one lithe movement, and was across the room in less time than it took the female to roll her eyes. I didn’t have time to ponder where this inhuman speed and agility had come from, because the male continued his advance to where I cowered in the corner across the room. My eyes—automatically, and without cognition—darted around the room, seeking an escape.
“Miss Dawson, everything will be fully explained once you settle down. You’ll see you’re overreacting quite extraordinarily,” the male said, sounding more irritated with each word.
My eyes found what they needed, and I ran—which felt more like flying—to the door on the adjacent wall.
“Stella, stop her,” the man yelled, but my hand was already on the doorknob and I flung it open, taking one look back to see both figures gliding towards me. I lunged through the door with my head still turned towards the approaching strangers, and rammed into something hard. I bounced against it, and would have fallen backwards, had not a warm set of arms reached around me to keep me upright. The arms pressed me tight against the hard surface I’d just barraged into . . . the arms that felt like they’d been created to hold me.
“Ohhh!” My hand would have flown to my mouth if my arms weren’t so tightly held against his body.
His head tilted down and his mouth fell just outside my ear. “Follow my lead,” his hurried whisper entered my body, surmounting an attack on the fear that had ensnared me. “Everything will be alright.” His head snapped away from my ear so fast, I doubt the two individuals who were nearly upon us would have noticed any transaction taking place.
“Mr. Winters, what nice timing. Good to see you awake and recovered at last. It appears you’ve brought us an overreacting, would-be escapee.” The male came to a stop behind me, and the prior fear I’d had for this unknown person, was no more. I was pressed securely against the man I’d come to accept I’d never see again, and I didn’t care about anything else. I looked up at his face, and despite the chaos that had permeated my life since I’d opened my eyes, my heart still trilled out-of-control. His eyes were anxious though, and his expression was as rigid as his body felt.
“Her screams could have roused the dead. Perhaps you could have been a little less imposing,” he responded, a half smile pulling at his lips; one that was not familiar. “I’m sure you can remember John, how disturbing it was when you awoke for the first time in such curious circumstances.” William raised a brow, at the same time releasing his clutch on me.
So this was the infamous John, much more Francis Ford Coppola Godfather-like than William had let on. Sure would have been helpful to have had the answers to my questions before I’d ended up smack in the middle of whatever William had been trying to keep me out of.
“Why don’t we all have a seat? Since it appears we’ve calmed down enough to be reasoned with.” John’s tone sounded final, as if there was no other option but what he’d requested.
“That sounds like a good idea,” William said, motioning his hand forward to the figures behind us. “After you.”
I heard two sets of footfalls commence to a far corner of the room. The eyes I’d stayed focused on since they’d reentered my life looked down to me, and the emotion that had been absent, flooded them.
“William . . . what’s going on?” My voice would have hardly registered on sonar.
With as much speed and urgency as before, he lowered his head to my ear and whispered, “I will explain everything. I promise
you . . . trust me.”
I resisted rolling my eyes. I’d heard that before.
He spun me around and guided me, with a light hand resting over my back, to a pair of modern sofas where John and Stella were seating themselves. As their eyes traced back to us, William readjusted his hand from my back to slide it in his pocket.
“Have a seat,” he said to me with a coolness in his voice I did not recognize.
I did as requested, sliding my body into the corner of the sofa. He took a seat beside me, positioning into the opposite corner, keeping as much space between us as the couch would allow. John and Stella’s gazes were penetrating. Their eyes shifted between the two of us with curiosity, as if attempting to piece together a puzzle.
Finally having a moment of quiet, I was able to ponder the string of events that had just taken place. I’d awakened in a foreign place surrounded by strangers; with otherworldly forces coursing through my body; and reunited with the man who I never dreamed I’d see again. Maybe that’s what this was . . . a dream.
“I’m John Townsend, and this is Stella.” The imposing man dressed in a tailored suit, began. “I believe you already know Mr. Winter’s here . . .” The edge in his voice led me to believe he wasn’t thrilled with this. “You are at my estate and vineyard, Townsend Manor, outside of Newburg, Oregon. You have been here, unconscious, for five days now.” He stopped, and although I couldn’t peel my eyes away from the quiet man sitting beside me, I could see John watching me with interest—as if trying to figure out a mystery as furtive as why the sky was blue.
William glanced over at me, meeting my gaze for a moment, and then turned his attention back to John. Perhaps I imagined it, but it seemed he was signaling my gaze to do the same.
“Why am I here?” I asked, turning my stare towards John.
“Maybe you should ask him,” John suggested, with annoyance written on his face, and pointing at William. “He’s the hero. He’s the one that nearly killed himself saving you.”
Something tugged at my memory when John said this . . . water . . . blackness. My face fell featureless, and every last drop of blood drained from it when I recalled, with vividness, my last memory.
“I remember . . .” I whispered, the scene flashing before me like a movie in the theatre. “But I went under—I . . . drowned.” The word sounded with an air of finality, chiming against the room’s cathedral ceiling.
“Actually, you didn’t, but if it’s any consolation, you would have if Mr. Winters wouldn’t have been so conveniently around.” John’s eyes narrowed at William, as a father would at his son after he’d done something reckless.
“Is this true, did you save me?” I whispered, my eyes amplifying.
William sighed, leaning forward and fixing his stare on his clasped hands below him. His silent answer had me reaching at my stomach from the nausea circling in it when I thought of the ocean claiming his life that night because of my carelessness.
“I think that’s our cue to leave, Stella.” John glanced at the goddess sitting beside him. She sat so close her leg that swung from its crossed position, brushed his trousers. He didn’t appear to be affected by the gilded leg caressing him, though.
“Since you’re the reason she’s here, it is your responsibility to make the initial explanations before class begins tomorrow.” John addressed William as he stood up.
“I look forward to seeing you again soon, Miss Dawson.” John’s eyes grazed over me, as a butcher would a slab of meat before deciding how best to cleave it, and then chuckled, patting William’s shoulder as he passed by him. “You know, I think I’m beginning to understand why you pulled that asinine stunt . . . she’s exquisite.” He bestowed upon me one more long stare, one about as appealing as grease mixed with lard, and exited the room.
Stella sauntered past us without any acknowledgement, although I didn’t miss the once-over she gave William as she passed him. Unsure where to direct my gaze, I stared through the open French doors across from us which lead out onto a balcony. The scents of honeysuckle and rain enter my senses.
Although I’d identified it with assured confidence, I was sure I’d never smelt honeysuckle before this. How could I know the nectar-sweet aroma that entered my nose was a delicate flower I couldn’t even identify by sight? Strange . . . like the majority of happenings occurring around me. It seemed I’d been transformed into a living, breathing Wikipedia.
I heard the door slam shut, and my eyes flew back to the man whose own eyes had storm clouds rolling through them. His fists were clenched, causing a web of veins to burst through the skin.
His expression defrosted a moment later, and he looked at me in a familiar way—a staggering way. “Why don’t you get changed,” he requested, as his eyes trailed over the silk pajamas I was adorned in. “And I’ll get you out of here and explain everything.”
The skin between my eyes creased together—a physical response to the confusion and bewilderment running like a herd of wild horses within me.
He reached his hand towards my face, and right before it came to rest on my cheek, indecision colored his face, and he lowered it back down to the sofa. I felt nauseous from the disappointment. “Trust me,” he said, nearly pleading.
Not able to deny him anything, I nodded my head. “I do. I’ll change and then we can go.”
He smiled a figment of the smile I remembered, and then stood up. “I’ll be right outside the door.”
After he’d left the room—although the intoxicating scent he left behind led me to believe otherwise—I let my eyes search around the bedroom that was as elaborate and vast as the presidential suite at some hotel in downtown New York. There was enough crystal and gold-leaf within it to have kept a family of four comfortable for their lifetimes.
I found the clothes I’d worn that fateful night, freshly washed and folded, on the dresser across from the bed. I slipped into the cotton skirt and linen top faster than I’d ever changed in my life, and faster still, I glided to the door and flung it open.
True to his word, he was waiting for me right outside my door. “Let’s get out of here,” he said. A brilliant smile exploded, like the one I remembered, and the opulence of the Manor around me paled like a dim star beside the full moon.
I fell in line beside him as he led me down the long hall of Townsend Manor. I would occasionally stop to inquire as to some piece of art work or ancient looking artifact, and true to his good-natured spirit, he would pause to answer, but his answers were hurried. He seemed anxious, if not desperate, to get me out of the Manor that resembled more a fantastical castle than an estate in rural Oregon.
We walked down a sweeping set of stairs—their glossy mahogany covered down the center by plush, ivory carpet—down into the foyer that could have held my attention for days.
William cleared his throat, distracting me from admiring the baroque like architecture around us. He motioned me through the open double-doors, and followed behind me.
His Bronco laid in wait in the circular driveway. My heart overreacted when he placed his hand over my back as he led me to the passenger side door, and assisted me in. He entered the cab with his signature grace, and we were in motion; departing to whatever location he had in mind for explaining the impossible mysteries.
He exhaled once we passed through the black, sweeping metal gates that had a cursive T embossed in the center of each one.
Feeling as unsure of what to say as he looked, I started simply. “So, this is what you meant by living off campus?” I asked, admiring the Manor from the side view mirror. Like some kind of palatial estate from the Golden Age of England, Townsend Manor was made of solid brick, although the generous, mullioned windows led me to believe the house was made as much of glass as brick. It was symmetrically designed, and a mixture of classic and gothic architecture. It rested in the center of a vast square of lawn adorned with several pathways and gardens, which were fenced in by the endless rows of grape trees.
“Yes, thi
s is what I meant by living off campus,” he answered, keeping his eyes adhered to the twilight stricken road before us.
“Well, it’s a little nicer than the OSU dorms I guess,” I said, trying to lighten his mood. His tight smile of response was proof his mood could not be so easily lifted.
A few minutes went by in silence, and my patience had its fill. “Where are we going?”
“You’ll see—we’re just about there.” As if on cue, he turned onto a narrow dirt-road, and the Bronco bounced over the intermittent potholes, until he pulled over onto a patch of grass sprouting with weeds.
“We’re here,” he announced, gliding out of the door.
I looked around at the unimpressive landscape which was almost fully bathed in darkness. “We are?”
I opened the side door and stepped out. The tall grass tickled my bare legs.
“Follow me,” he whispered, when he came up beside me.
He led me down a trail that someone would have a hard time sticking to if they were unfamiliar with it, and when I was sure the endless trees and stretch of trail would never run out, we emerged through the thick layer of growth.
“Wow,” I muttered, as I took in the moonlit lake before us. It was so calm it looked like a mirror, reflecting every single star, planet, and orb in the night sky. What looked like an enormous house rested on the edge of the water in front of us.
He grabbed my hand, and I felt my face flush from the shock coursing through my body from our combined touch. As if suddenly aware of something, he looked at my hand in his, and then into my emotion-filled face. He released my hand.
“I’m sorry about that . . .” he whispered, sounding ashamed—probably because he didn’t want to give me the wrong impression. The hand that had felt so right in his fell like a dead weight at my side.
“Come on, I want to show you something,” he said, before gliding off in the direction of the lake.
The wooden dock groaned in protest beneath our footsteps as we traversed over it, heading towards the long, white houseboat resting in wait at the end of it. He untied a couple of mooring lines and hopped onto the back of the boat’s deck. He held his hand out to assist me.
I looked at him with hesitation, this day only growing more unusual.
“It’s John’s. Don’t worry . . . I’m not planning on stealing someone’s boat for a midnight joyride,” he teased, extending his hand towards me again.
I accepted it, and leapt onto the boat beside him. “This is . . . nice,” I underemphasized, admiring the boat that wasn’t quite as opulent as the Manor where its owner resided, but somehow more elegant. Its lines were sharp and aesthetically pleasing, and the cabin area was covered in windows tinted black. The wood deck shined like a sheet of ice.
“It is, isn’t it? I thought tonight’s revelations would be a bit more enjoyable from the deck of this.” He glided open a slider door, and stepped into the cabin of the boat. I looked up at the stars, searching for the brightest one I would use to make my request tonight.
“Would you like a tour, or perhaps something to drink?” he asked, sounding like he was stalling, but there’d been enough stalling—I needed answers.
“No, thanks,” I answered, plopping down on one of the lounge chairs decorating the expansive deck area.
I heard a sigh breathed with such force, my eyes were torn from the star where I was making my wish, to the person who was the reason for the wish.
He was standing in the cabin doorway, his hands raised and grasping the door frame, with head bowed and eyes closed. “I’ve got so much to apologize for, Bryn. I can’t even imagine where I should begin.”
My mission of staying calm and focused flew off with the breeze. I rose from the chair and walked to where he stood looking anguished.
“What in the world could you have to apologize for?” I asked, wishing he’d open his eyes to look into mine so he could view their disbelief. “You’ve saved me from death . . . or severe bodily harm, not once, but twice now. I’m the one that should be apologizing for inconveniencing you and putting you in danger.” My voice grew more frantic over each syllable.
His eyes snapped open, and his head tilted up until they met mine; they were smoldering with conviction. “Inconveniencing me?” he repeated, sounding disgusted. “Is that what you think saving your life feels like to me?”
This time it was my eyes that couldn’t meet his, so they withdrew to the gleaming, blonde-colored teak below.
His hand wouldn’t allow their escape. He lifted my chin upwards until my eyes had no choice but to meet his. “I would have happily exchanged my life for yours on any one of those occasions. As I would again.”
I nearly trembled from the fierceness in his voice, and why his ardency should have left me silenced, I had to ask, “Why then? Why have you risked so much for me over and again?” Perhaps he was a martyr, or perhaps a saint, but neither of these were the answer I wanted—the one I hoped for.
His face contorted, and his words came out sounding as if they’d been tied up to the back of a truck and sped down a gravel road. “Don’t you know why?”
I did; he was a good man, an honorable man, and despite trying to remove his presence from my life, he couldn’t turn his back on me when my life needing saving yet again. Suddenly, the act of balancing the hundreds of spinning plates I had been all day, became too much, and they all came crashing down at once.
“Please, William, I need to know. What’s going on?” I whispered.
He half smiled, but it wasn’t the least bit convincing. “You’re not going to answer my question, are you?” he asked, but only waited a few heartbeats before recomposing himself. He released his hands over the doorframe and turned to depart into the cabin.
I followed after him, and up a set of stairs that led to the roof of the houseboat where the steering wheel and control panel (that looked too simple and inadequate to control a boat of this size) were located.
He breezed to the control column and flipped a few switches and checked a few gauges. He did this with the familiarity of someone who’d done it a thousand times before. I stood back, a careful observer on the expansive rooftop adorned with overstuffed outdoor furniture and an open fire pit. I heard the engine come to life, and lights exploded all in and around the boat.
William took a seat behind the wheel that looked no different than that of a car’s, and turned to me. “Would you do me the honor of accompanying me in the co-captain’s chair?” he motioned towards the seat beside him.
I smiled. “Take her out to sea, Captain.” I took a seat beside him, happy for the momentary break in the serious stuff, but I knew it couldn’t last.
His face lined and his body tensed, as if preparing to be hit by the weight of a semi. “Before I explain everything, may I ask what conclusions you’ve arrived at to explain all of this?” he began, his eyes narrowed towards the luminous lake in front of us.
There’d been many explanations rolling around in my mind since I woke up hours ago, but none of which seemed likely, or unworthy of laughter if I verbalized them. He turned his eyes from the lake to me, and unleashed the hypnotic qualities they possessed, forcing my answers into the air of a spring evening. “I’ve got a few,” I started, staring back at him as I mustered up my confidence. “Maybe I’m dead and this is some kind of afterlife . . .” This seemed the most likely and least absurd, so I’d started with this one.
William nodded, looking thoughtful, but returned his eyes to the lake. “What else?”
I exhaled, hoping it would diminish my nervousness in admitting to him my crazy thoughts. “Maybe I’m in a coma and this is some kind of never-ending dream created in my unconscious state . . . or, maybe I’ve had a complete break with reality and created this all to keep my mind from going off the deep end,” I paused, biting my lip before I could speak my final theory—the craziest of all. “Abducted by aliens?” I confessed, sneaking a sideways glance at him to see his reaction.
>
Another half smile formed—one that was shameful decorating his face when I knew what it was capable of—and then he turned back to me. “All good, logical theories,” he said, a faint glimmer sparking in his eyes. “But not correct.”
I felt semi-relieved knowing I was wrong, but only until a new unease presented itself when I thought of other explanations. “What is the correct answer then?’ I asked, feeling my water works twisting to the on position. “Because something very big has happened to me.”
“It has,” he replied, nodding. I couldn’t look at him because I didn’t want him to see the traitor tears forming in my eyes, but I could tell he was watching me carefully. “How do you feel?”
“Fine,” I answered slowly, wishing I could be irritated with the gorgeous man beside me, confusing me with his disjointed questions and answers.
“But, different. Right?”
“Yes,” I answered, mentally tabulating all the ways I felt different.
“How so?” he asked immediately, not letting the air settle between my answers.
“Stronger . . . and . . .”
“Yes—” he encouraged.
“More attuned to everything around me . . .”
“Good, Bryn—what else?” He rested his hand over one of mine, sending the electricity flashing through me, reminding me of the most impressive change.
“There’s something . . . new flowing through me.” My eyes squeezed closed with the concentration I was giving the topic, searching for the right way to explain this foreign phenomenon.
“Yes.” He breathed, sounding relieved. “You’ve changed explicitly.”
“What do you mean?” I asked, turning my hand up in his so I could curl my fingers between his, not caring about the pain it would cause me later. I needed to touch him now in the midst of all the confusion, and he seemed willing to meet this need at present.
He pressed a black knob at the top of the panel, and I heard something screech to life. “This is a good spot,” he announced, as the anchor continued its downward spiral to the bottom of the lake.
He glided up from his chair, as seamless as an elevator in motion. “Why don’t we go back down to the lower deck and I’ll explain further. There’s a nicer view down there.”
I looked up at the stars spread like a private showing just for the two of us and the sprawling lake below, and couldn’t imagine how the lower deck could offer a better view, but didn’t disagree. The best view would be wherever he was.
He kept my hand in his, and led me down to the lower deck. “Will you do me a favor?” he asked, pulling me to the edge of the deck.
There was no favor he could ask of me that I would not give. “Of course.”
“Take a look.” He kneeled down on the deck, encouraging me down with him.
I shot him a confused look, but I kneeled beside him, keeping his gaze as I leaned over the flat glassiness of the lake.
I shrieked the moment I saw my reflection.
My eyes . . . but they didn’t look like mine anymore. The familiar grayish-blue was gone and a color—identical to William’s—had replaced the original hue. My body started trembling, making the reflection difficult to view. “What happened . . . they’re not mine . . .” My voice was shaking too.
He wrapped one arm around my trembling shoulders, and leaned into me. His magic, yet again, served to soothe the emotions running amuck.
“They’re still your eyes. They’re just a different color now . . . they’re like mine,” he said, holding me tightly.
“They are?” I whispered with a shaky voice, trying to find the calm I needed from looking into his anxious eyes.
“Yes. Believe me, I would know if they weren’t. You can’t imagine how many times I’ve dreamed—” He stopped abruptly, and his face twisted before he turned it away from me.
With my body still locked to his, the shaking ceased, and I took a more introspective look at the foreign eyes staring back at me in the illumed water. They were still my eyes; wide-set and ringed with lower lashes longer than my uppers. They were just a very different color; a lovely color . . . his color. Contrite as it was, I was thrilled in this tiny characteristic that tied us together; despite whatever happened to have changed them so.
I leaned back from the edge of the deck, confident the eyes in my head were still the same, and sounded calm when I turned to him and asked, “What’s happened to me?”
He sighed. “There are two kinds of beings that inhabit this world,” he began slowly, looking like the weight of a million lives rested on his wide shoulders. “We are all born into it as Mortals—fragile, subject to aging, ailments, and death—but there are some along their Mortal journey whom are wholly and eternally changed . . .”—his eyes closed as he inhaled, looking as if preparing to unleash some horrible secret—“and they become . . . Immortal.”
I felt the color leave my face, and the night sky above his head spun like a top, creating white circles from the spinning stars.
“That is why I was told I could not be with you,” he said, opening his eyes into mine. “Because you were Mortal and I was . . . not,” he finished, sounding as if he’d just admitted the worst of sins.
“Were?” I emphasized, not missing his use of the past tense in my Mortality.
He nodded. “Yes, Bryn. You’ve crossed into the realm of those who live forever. You’ve entered the realm of Immortality.”
I let his words enter me, and simmer with their implications. I wanted to be terrified, outraged, and upset. I wanted to feel the kind of disbelief one should feel when being told something as outlandish as this all was. I wanted to scream and hit and kick my way back to the place wherever reality had abandoned me . . . but none of these reactions came.
I was as calm and at peace as a dormant volcano. There was lava—red hot and explosive—flowing within me, but it wouldn’t explode. It kept me warm, alive, and at rest. I’d known from the first moment my eyes fell upon him that he was different—categorically different from anyone I’d ever come in contact with, and after spending the time I did with him, and all of the mysteries accompanying him . . .
“Say something, please,” he murmured, when the minutes continued to count off while I took the tornado in and viewed it from the center.
I couldn’t explain why I felt so at peace with his revelations that were more the thing of legends, fables or fantasies; but I saw the puzzle come together as the pieces of the mysteries surrounding him from the beginning, to my waking up this morning, came together. “Well, I suppose that explains a lot of things . . .”
His lines of concern flattened under the bewilderment that came next. “You believe me?” he said, looking at me as if he questioned my sanity.
I shrugged. “I trust you,” I answered simply, not able to further verbalize what my conscious couldn’t even understand.
His eyes only grew wider. “And none of this bothers you, then?” he asked, his voice growing as well. He lunged up from his kneeling position and broke into a bout of pacing behind me. “The fact I’ve forever changed you without your consent. The fact I left you with no explanation as to why? The fact you nearly died because of me?” he finished, looking as if he was shouting at the moon.
I shivered from his intensity before I could answer. “No, none of it does,” and as I said the words I’d conjured up to reassure him with, I found they were true. I didn’t want to admit to him why it didn’t matter to me, so I broke into my first question of what would likely be a million to come.
“How did you find me that night in Newport?” I asked, recalling what John mentioned regarding William saving me that night, although I had no memory of it.
I stood up and strolled over to the same navy and white stripped lounge-chair, and plopped down. Given my tendencies towards passing out when an excess of overwhelming information enters me, I thought I’d better keep low to the ground.
“I found out you were in trouble that night—I knew you would be in
Newport,” he said, his voice tight with emotion. “I drove there as fast as I could . . . I was so worried. It had been dark for hours, and I couldn’t feel you anymore.”
I didn’t understand how he could have known I was in trouble, or where I was that night, but I remained quiet—saving my questions for a time when I wasn’t so focused on wanting to alleviate the anguish coming from the man pacing in front of me.
“I couldn’t find you at first, so I just kept running up and down the beach . . . searching for you. Desperate to find you before—” His voice caught, and he cleared his throat before continuing.
“And then I saw you,” he whispered. “It was the most overwhelming sense of relief I’ve experienced—spotting your tiny head so far out in the water—knowing you were still alive. I only saw your head for one fraction of a second before it fell beneath the water, but that was all I needed—just that one miracle.”
An owl hooted its song in the distance, sounding as cragged and wretched as a crow’s squawk in comparison to the honey-coated words streaming from William’s mouth. “I dove into the water and swam to you, but I was no longer filled with dread. Once I saw you, there was no way you were dying in the ocean that night. Your life was saved the moment I saw that dark, bobbing head of yours out there.” His anguished face managed something that resembled a smile, and for the first time since his retelling, he looked at me. He grimaced as he watched a tear cascade down my face. “I can’t stand to see you cry.”
“I’m fine . . . it’s just hard reliving that night.”
“I know. I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you sooner,” he said, ceasing his pacing.
I shrugged, trying to look as blasé as one crying girl could sitting in front of the man she’d forever love without reciprocation.
He turned his eyes to the sky above, and I wondered if the most brilliant star in the sky could ever shine like he did: I doubted it. “I got you to shore and tried to bring you back. You were so blue, and your heartbeat so faint. I tried everything within Mortal life-saving standards, until there was no other option than to try . . . an Immortal one.” His back was to me, but the tension in his voice was apparent in his body as well—the muscles lining his back trembled through the cotton of his shirt. “I was so focused, I didn’t immediately notice that they’d found us—”
“Who found us?” I interrupted, sitting forward from the back of the chair.
He turned back to me, and the previous anguish on his face had been replaced by a blank expression. “Do you remember the two men from our day on the beach?”
I tensed at the mention of them. “Yes.”
His brow furrowed, and his jaw clenched tighter as he spoke. “Do you remember me telling you they were there that night to remind me of something?”
“Yes . . . what did they remind you of?” I asked sharply, my dislike of the two men growing more advanced.
“I had no right, technically speaking, to enter your life—”
“What do you mean you had no right?” I interjected. He had every right . . . any right, to enter my life however he wanted.
“The world of Immortals is strict, Bryn—we are governed by codes that are not very forgiving. One of the most important of these is that we are not allowed to interact with Mortals as I was with you,” he admitted. “It was nearly impossible to leave you that night and go with them, but I made that choice in order to keep you safe, knowing I would come back for you as soon as I could.” He stared out into the quiet water without seeing. “But they were watching me carefully . . . I couldn’t get away, and I wouldn’t risk anything happening to you.”
The residual waves lapped up against the side of the boat. I tried to match my breathing to the steady beat, to keep me from hyperventilating from the accounts being told.
“Not that my flawless plan worked anyways. I left to keep you safe, and you found yourself in the worse kind of danger the very next night, and now . . . here you are, in the midst of all this.” His carefully managed tone had grown frenzied, matching his reignited pacing.
I wanted to run to him, to bridge the space between us and beg him to explain what he was saying . . . what he was meaning—but I kept my vigil over the lounge chair.
“You didn’t leave because you didn’t want to be with me?” I whispered, instantly ashamed I let my growing hope have physical power.
His pacing came to an abrupt stop. “Of course not—is that what you thought?” He asked, sounding astonished; but I couldn’t allow myself to hope. I couldn’t recover from the disappointment if I allowed hope to enter my life again.
“But, the letter . . .” My lip started to quiver.
“What letter?” he asked urgently.
“The letter you left for me. The one that said you were leaving and”—I cringed and braced myself for saying the words—“you didn’t want to see me again.”
The sound that came from him was terrifying; a low, guttural rumble resonated in his chest, rolling into a controlled bellow that skated across the lake.
“It was them,” he sneered, after his verbal earthquake.
“Who?”
“Thomas. Dante . . . or another goon like them,” he said, quivering from the hatred spilling from him.
I nodded, trying to reconfigure things in my head; trying to not rush to the conclusion that my heart longed for. “Okay . . .” I muttered, the only response I could manage.
“Okay what?” he repeated, looking at me with expectation on his face.
“Okay . . . none of that matters anyways,” I whispered, turning my eyes down. It didn’t change the way he felt about me, and it didn’t change the way I felt about him. One measly little detail as to who created a letter didn’t change anything.
“What do you mean, none of that matters?” he asked, and from the escalated anger and bewilderment in his voice, it only coaxed my eyes further down.
I braced myself before confessing what I knew I had to . . . so there would be no regrets later. I stood up from the chair to make my admission, the substance of it making it impossible to reveal from a seated position. “Because I’m here with you now,” I said, looking hard into his eyes.
His breath caught. “Are you saying—that after everything I’ve done to you—you still care for me?”
I nodded my head, feeling the tears returning. “From the very first time I saw you, I cared for you in a way that terrified me . . . in a way that still terrifies me.”
“Still terrifies you?” he asked, taking a step towards me.
I nodded.
“I left you without an explanation, Bryn,” he shouted, charging to the front of the deck and gripping the steel rail with force. “You almost died because I got to you nearly too late. I changed you because I was selfish and couldn’t stand the thought of you not existing in some way—”
“Stop it, William, right now. There’s nothing you can say, or do, to change the fact that I do . . . and always will care for you.”
His face changed then—it surged from darkest night to mid-day sun. He looked at me for one long second, before taking several hesitant steps toward me. He paused and turned away, looking undecided, but when he turned back to me and his eyes met mine with an emotion that incapacitated me—I had my answer.
He crossed the space between us, never dropping his eyes from mine. Taking the final step, his arms secured around my waist and he drew me against him. My body flashed with the current surging through me having him so near.
“I know I told you that our first date was the best day I’d ever had, but I’m afraid today has taken its spot,” he said, somehow managing to pull me closer to him.
“Why?” I whispered, my throat tight from the hope that was becoming more convincing with each passing second.
“Because—against my deepest fears—you’ve just admitted to me that you still care for me,” he whispered, reaching his hand up and melding it against my cheek. “As I do you.”
“Come again?” I w
hispered.
He let his hand fall from my face to grab one of my hands. He lifted it to his chest and placed it over his heart. “Feel this.”
I did—it was the most wonderful thing I’d ever felt.
“I’ve lived every heartbeat caring for you since I first saw you,” he said.
“You want me?” I repeated, my bewilderment not abating, but growing.
“I’ve never wanted anything more.”
He took my face in his hands, and summoned it up until his lips rested over mine. Before my body could react, he removed his lips, and I was greeted with the face that was glowing with the intensity I remembered.
He polished over my bottom lip with his finger and I tried to let the moment catch up to me. William still wanted me. Whatever events had taken place to convince me otherwise, here he was before me, admitting it with his words and his body.
I didn’t make a conscious decision, but very suddenly, my lips found their way back to his. I pulled him close, and he pulled me even closer—as if we were trying to make up for the time we’d lost during our separation.
When it felt like the moment would crush me from its power, I separated my lips from his, although their removal did not extinguish the secondary responses. Our breaths raced in uneven beats, our hearts even faster. The urge to escape into his hold again became over-powering, so I took a couple steps back, not trusting my willpower. He mimicked my actions, taking two impressive steps back and grasping the metal railing behind him.
“I should still be begging your forgiveness. You made this far easier than I’d anticipated,” he said breathlessly. “I was prepared for merciless gravelling and relentless begging for at least a decade or two.” He smiled, sending my heart unto another fitful bout.
“So . . . were you serious about all that Immortal stuff? My afterlife theory is starting to sound more likely given that kiss.” I said, taking a few more steps back in response to the smile on his lips that was wreaking havoc on my resolution.
“I won’t argue that this feels like the best kind of afterlife, but I assure you”—he released his hold of the railing and crossed the space separating us. He reached for my face and his thumb traced my lower lip again—“that you are as Immortal as they come.”
He laughed after reviewing the speculation wrinkling my face. “Come on, I’ll give you a few things to consider.” He pulled me into the cabin. “Get changed, we’re going swimming,” he announced, flinging open a door at the end of a long hallway. “You should be able to find a swimsuit in the dresser over there. I’m going to get changed and I’ll meet you back on deck.” His voice was exuberant now, as if sorrow had never muddied it. He kissed me again, too quickly for my liking, and then shut the door behind him.