Eternal Eden

It was around noon when we pulled off of Highway 101 to take the Three Capes Scenic Loop, which was a detour to several of the most beautiful areas along the coastline that were often bypassed by tourists eager to get to Tillamook to enjoy the infamous cheese factory’s ice cream (which didn’t really make any sense to me . . . who would go to a cheese factory looking for ice cream?), or anxious to get to Lincoln City and the monster-sized oceanfront casino.

  At least this is what Patrick had prattled on about for the past thirty minutes, after he’d been gracious enough to pull over at a rest stop so I could be free of the confines of the ill-fated dress, and into something more me. I threw the dress and heels in the garbage can that looked like an oil drum; wishing I could set it ablaze and watch the crumpled ball of brocade burn.

  We drove through the tourist area of Pacific City, and turned onto a residential street dotted and dashed with several beachfront cottages. Patrick slowed the Bronco as we came to a dead-end in the road. I was certain he’d gotten lost and would have to turn around to get back to the tourist district to find a place to stay for the night, but he turned into the cobblestone driveway of the last oceanfront cottage instead.

  Patrick turned to face William, a devious smile covering his lips. “I’m going to let you explain this next part all on your own, Brother.” His eyebrows danced, and before William could punch his shoulder, Patrick was out the door in a flash and jogging up the walkway to the front door of the house.

  I looked to William, my curiosity screaming. “What’s he talking about now? Are there more secrets I’m not aware of?”

  He closed his eyes and squeezed a forceful breath through his teeth before he responded. “I do have something important to tell you, but I wasn’t trying to keep it from you—I was just looking for the right time to explain,” he said with strained words. “There’s been so many important topics to cover lately, and this wasn’t a top priority. I should have used the rest of the ride down here to prepare you . . .”

  “It’s alright,” I said, after he looked to be searching for the right words. “You can tell me anything.”

  His hand reached for my cheek, and his eyes looked determined. “Patrick is my brother, Bryn. Not through the bonds of Immortality, but my flesh and blood brother when we were Mortals. He was born two years after me in 1760, to our parents, Charles and Catherine Hayward.”

  I concentrated on the breath I was pulling in slowly through my teeth, hoping this less conspicuous reaction would keep my mouth from dropping in shock.

  He moved his hand from my cheek and grasped my hands, giving them a tight squeeze. “My name is William Hayward, I still carry my Mortal name, although I’ve gone by William Winters since infiltrating John’s Alliance of Inheritors. I should have told you when I had you alone that first night, but it didn’t enter my mind, and it was far too dangerous to mention within the walls of the Manor,” he finished, his eyes searching mine, as if looking for acceptance or understanding from me. He had both—he had whatever he needed from me. 

  “Alright, well that wasn’t so bad, right?” I said with a light tone, knowing I’d get used to the idea in a few . . . decades. “So you’re related to that idiot.” My hand waved towards the cottage where Patrick had departed. “I can get used to that . . . since I don’t really have a choice.”  I laughed, and he joined in, but it wasn’t his usual musical, full laugh. He looked as if he was plagued by something else—some other secret.

  “There’s more,” he said slowly.

  I couldn’t control the grimace that betrayed my face this time.

  Noticing it, he hurried. “It’s not awful, really. It’s just that”—he glanced at the cottage, where a spiral of smoke was twirling into the grey sky—“there’s more family waiting inside there, too—more flesh and blood family.”

   I tightened my hold around his hands, willing them to keep me centered. More family? More flesh and blood family from when he’d been Mortal? How many more? My mind got caught up in a numerous series of questions, none of which could be verbalized fast enough before another one raced to mind, vanquishing the prior.

  All too familiar with my overly inquisitive mind and the frustrated, distressed look that accompanied this trend, he leaned forward and kissed my forehead, keeping his face close to mine after removing his lips. “How about we go in there and meet everyone, and then we’ll all do our best to answer your questions?” He pulled his face back to look into my eyes. “Does that sound alright?”

  I nodded my head, at the same time I felt a brace of panic take hold. I wasn’t sure who would be waiting for me behind that door. Would they like me? How much did they know about William and me? What would William think of me after his family met me? Too many questions to consider and worry about.

  Through some miracle, the man beside me cared for me in a way that was inconceivable given the glaring differences between us—it was like a lump of coal placed beside a diamond. How could I ever convince his family—who I already knew would be just as exquisite as he was—that I was worthy of their acceptance . . . that I was worthy of him.

   I couldn’t.

  There was nothing special about me that would glimmer like the diamond sparkling beside me. This knowledge made my heart pound as if it was bruised. Each heartbeat throbbed with pain. I had to escape before it would explode.

   I heaved the car door open and was out faster than my Immortal legs had carried me yet. The hurt in William’s eyes had me fighting against my better judgment to lunge back into the tortuous confines, and have him hold me for the rest of eternity, not caring if my bruised heart would burst. A milli-second before I threw caution to the wind and found my way back into his arms, he stepped out of the car with his arms raised.

  “I’m sorry, Bryn.” His voice was tight with concern. “I know how much this is to take in, and I’m pushing too much onto you.” He focused on the ground, where he began toeing at the earth between two stones in the driveway. “I’ve had more than two hundred years to discover what it is I want.” He glanced up at me and smiled shyly. “That something being you. I sometimes let myself forget that you are so very new to this Immortal life and may not be ready to commit to the first man you meet—”

  “Are you serious?” I interrupted, knowing I sounded more bewildered than someone that’d just been told they’d won the lottery.

  He certainly looked as if he was serious, though. The reasoning behind this was incomprehensible, and I knew I wouldn’t be able to convince him in a bout of rhetoric—he was much smarter and more articulate than me. I thought of something he’d used to convince me of his feelings, and decided to see if it would work as well on him as it had on me.

  I marched over to him, still flabbergasted, but intent upon my mission at hand. “Feel this,” I ordered, grabbing his hand in mine and tugging it to my chest, where I positioned it over my heart. Where it throbbed with a different kind of pain now—the kind derived from the knowledge that he’d actually doubted my feelings for him.

  There was color rising in his face, and his eyes darted to the side; probably due to the location where I held his hand. With my other hand, I raised it to his face and encouraged his tilted head back to me until his eyes looked into mine. “I’ve lived every beat loving you, since I first met you.”

  Recognition started to appear in his eyes, but it was not assured. How could he not have known it had been all over the moment he entered my life? How I’d never felt so on fire before in my life. How I’d known immediately that I loved him, and not just loved him, but loved him with every single fiber of my existence—both as a Mortal, and now, as an Immortal. It was the kind of love that never gave you a moment’s doubt. The kind of love that you knew, if you were not allowed to be with the object of it, you would choose to be with no one at all. The kind of love that would make everything you’d ever done, or would do, pale horridly in comparison. It was beyond comprehension, and far beyond words.

  I felt like the wickedest of creatures a
s I realized he was genuinely unsure of my feelings for him. That he’d been tortured not knowing I would give anything for him. I would give my life—not only just in turn for his life—but even just for his happiness.

  I wanted to scream contemptuous things at myself for torturing him so, but that could wait until later. There was something else that required my immediate attention at the moment.

  “William,” I whispered, “I’ve loved you from the first day I met you, as I will the rest of my existence.”

  It was more freeing verbalizing my feelings than I’d imagined it could be, and while I could’ve gone into many other in-depth descriptions of my love for him, I didn’t need to. I saw when I laid those simple words out, the anxiety of him not knowing melted from his face, and the emotion that took its place was breath-taking. It was the most beautiful thing I’d seen.

  Minutes later, after our eyes had been unable to move from one another’s, he closed his eyes and exhaled the longest breath I’d ever heard. He leaned his forehead against mine, and I allowed his hand to leave the place where he’d felt just a handful of the beats whose sole purpose was worshipping him.

  “You know my feelings for you go beyond reason. I love you so much more than can ever be held in feeble words, but maybe . . .” He sighed again, and looked as if he was recalling something pleasant. He pulled his forehead back from mine and grasped my face between his. His eyes were still brimming with his happiness. “I love you, Bryn Dawson. I am yours, and yours alone, to the very end.”

  He was right. The spoken words held more power than I could have imagined, and I felt my joy paint its bold colors across my face.

  The sun had moved a noticeable distance in the sky before we were able to force our eyes from one another again. William sighed reluctantly when his eyes left mine, regret apparent in them. Reaching into the Bronco he pulled our bags out with one hand and reached for mine with his other. He turned towards the pathway leading to the front door.

  “Shall we?” he asked. My smile was answer enough for him. “That was a good line, it seems as if I’ve heard it somewhere before . . .” he said, eyeing the location where I’d held his hand to me.

  I smiled, remembering. “It was, wasn’t it? It was the best thing I could think of to get it through your thick head that I don’t need two hundred years to realize I’ve never wanted anything more.”

  A clearing of a throat in front of us broke our smitten gazes. “You guys can ogle at one another inside here too . . . in case you want a change in scenery.”

  I didn’t have to turn my eyes from William to identify who was speaking. His teasing tone would have been identifiable standing in the center of the New York Stock Exchange.

  I wasn’t sure how long Patrick had been waiting for us, and hoped it hadn’t been since he’d first hopped out of the car. His uncomfortable expression and reddened face was telling that he’d probably been privy to more than William or I would have liked.

  “All ready to meet the Haywards, Bryn?” Patrick asked, as we stepped through the doorway.

  I nodded my head. “As ready as I’ll ever be . . . Brother.” I punched him lightly in the arm, and he mocked falling under its absent power. William’s face lit up, maybe at my casual acceptance of Patrick being my brother too . . . one day.

  The inside of the weathered cedar-slat cottage was inviting, warm, and personal. The walls were plastered with framed photographs, so much so, the sky-blue color of the walls barely seeped through.

  Some were old and showing their age; like the portraits you saw of great grandparents that were tucked away in attics. Some were recent, printed on silver paper. No matter the age of the picture, they all contained the same faces, although the faces remain unchanged. His face was easy to find, and in many of them. I wanted to stop and look at each one; to experience the pieces of his past, but he persuaded me forward with a tug of my hand in his.

  I heard the gentle cadences of several voices coming from a room in front of us. The voices sounded cheerful and comfortable, and then the scent of baking bread—banana-nut if my carb loving nose was correct—permeated the house, and my fear and hesitation over meeting the Hayward family, diminished some.

  Patrick strolled in front of us with his hands in his back pockets. He was no longer in his black suit, but had changed into a pair of faded jeans, a grey polo, and was bare footed. While I’d previously thought the black suit was fitting and natural on him, I realized, seeing him now, I’d been wrong. This look was much more Patrick. This picture was more fitting of a little brother I could imagine William having, as opposed to the confident man dressed in black who headed up John’s acquisitions department.

  Patrick hadn’t been witness to the entirety of William and my episode in the driveway, as evidenced by his wardrobe change, and I was immensely gratefully for the mercy of a little brother wanting out of a stuffy suit.

  William wrapped a strong arm around me, and shot one last smile of reassurance my direction before we rounded the corner into a large open kitchen, where the pleasant voices and smells were coming from.

  There were four others grouped around a large dining table, and they were surveying me with as much interest and curiosity as I was them. The two females were seated next to one another, one of the males stood behind them, and the other male towered in front of the table, with arms crossed and a wary look covering his face.

  I managed as warm a smile possible given the discomfort I felt from the giant of a man looming in front of me, as if positioning himself between me and the three strangers behind him.

  “At ease, soldier,” Patrick chuckled, addressing the tower of a man before us. “She’s just a newbie and quite harmless.” Patrick reciprocated the light punch I’d given him. “She doesn’t even have any crazy cool gifts we’ve identified yet.” He looked at me factitiously. “Isn’t that right . . . Sister?”

  I resisted the temptation to roll my eyes at him, not wanting to immediately offend his family. Patrick’s reassurances didn’t relax his brother in the slightest.

  William stepped in, making the introductions. “Bryn, this is my older brother Nathanial.” He nodded at the mass of a man, still staring at me as if I was an unwelcome intruder into their happy family. He reminded me of the Incredible Hulk, at least in terms of his size and scowl—he wasn’t green, thankfully.

  Nathanial didn’t nod, blink, or say anything in response. He just kept his eyes fixed on me, until one of the women got up from her chair, came around the table, and laid her hand on his arm. His eyes didn’t move from me initially, but then she whispered something in his ear and he slowly began to relax, moving his eyes to her and unfolding his arms.

  William continued, “This is Abigail, Nathanial’s wife.”

  Abigail looked at me as she forced a smile. “How do you do?” she said conventionally, but it was obvious she’d only mustered up this politeness out of courtesy to William. She was of average size, and had black hair that hung like a velvet curtain down to her waist. She reminded me of what one would consider timeless beauty, and next to Nathanial’s roughness, they created a picture of opposite extremes. Abigail’s eyes moved from me as quickly as she’d laid them there, and went back to her seat beside the other female.

  I pressed closer into William as my discomfort grew. His arm tightened around me. This wasn’t going as well as I’d hoped.

  William introduced the next male. “This is Joseph, the youngest of the brothers.” Joseph met me with an easy smile, full of acceptance and happiness. He lit up the room with it. When I looked at him fully, I gasped. He was a near clone to William.

  Patrick chuckled. “Look familiar?”

  I ignored him, and continued to revel over the likeness. Despite the baseball cap, it didn’t hide the nearly black hair that held a promise of wave in the way the long tufts curled at the ends. He had the same lips that were full and precisely drawn, and the same chiseled facial features—although Joseph’s were a little softer arou
nd the edges, not quite as defined as someone more senior—and while the eye shape was the same, full and deep-set, Joseph’s were dark-sapphire blue. He couldn’t have been more than eighteen or nineteen when he’d been Immortalized, I guessed.

  “And this is Cora, Joseph’s wife.” William motioned to the final woman sitting at the table, explaining where that shade of sapphire blue came from.

  Cora was small framed, and had shoulder-length, golden-blond hair. Like Joseph, she met me with a brilliant smile, and her sapphire-colored eyes sparkled with vigor. Cora bounced up, and upon standing, I realized how much more petite she was than she’d looked sitting down. She placed a quick kiss on the side of Joseph’s cheek and danced over to where William and I stood.

  “I’m so happy to see you, William.” She beamed at him, like an adoring sister would at her older brother. She gave him a hug that held nothing back, and then turned to me, wrapping her tiny arms around me with just as much completeness. “I’m so glad he found you,” she whispered before releasing me.

  I looked at her puzzled—there’d been something hidden in her words I didn’t understand.

  She noted my confusion, and distracted herself by reaching for the bags in William’s hand. “Let me take those. We’ll put Bryn in Patrick’s bedroom tonight.” She grinned at Patrick. “You’ll have to make due with the sofa tonight, I’m afraid,” she said, prancing off to a couple of closed doors behind us.

  Patrick whined beside us, where he was sitting up on the counter riling through the kitchen cabinets, muttering to himself again, “Some kind of homecoming this is.”

  William walked forward with me in tow. “Good to see you again, Nathanial. It’s been too long.”

  “You say that every time,” Nathanial replied, smiling crookedly at William. With the softer expression, I was struck by how much Nathanial looked like Patrick—although much larger and scarier. Nathanial patted the side of William’s arm. “We were worried about you. It’s nice to see you again.”

  William glanced over at Abigail. “Nice to see you too, Abigail. How have you been?”

  I was hoping that perhaps Nathanial and Abigail’s welcome for me had been indicative of subdued personalities, but when I saw the warm smile grace Abigail’s lips at William’s greeting, I knew the cool welcome had everything to do with me. “Quite well, thank you. We’ve missed you.” Her deep blue eyes matched those of her husband’s, and I felt awkward realizing the pale blue that lingered in mine—a sign to all of my innocence.

  “So this is her, huh?” Nathanial asked William, but stared pointedly at me.

  “Yes,” William answered, his tone full of love and pride. “This is my Bryn. The one I’ve told you all about for so long.” His eyes looked into mine. They were full of something so wonderful it became difficult to keep my composure.

  Nathanial nodded, as if understanding exactly what William had said.

  “Wait!” Patrick roared behind us, jumping down from the counter and marching over to where we stood. “This is her?!” He glared with accusing eyes at William, inches away from his face.

  William met his younger brother’s surprised expression with a flabbergasted one of his own. “Yes, of course this is her. Who did you think she was?”

  I felt like I’d been left out of some important telling of a joke. I was present for the punch line, but none of it made sense without the prelude of the joke. What did Patrick and Nathanial mean . . . was I her?

  Patrick was still gaping open-mouthed beside us, his head flying back and forth between William and me. He was making me dizzy.

  Not looking like his bewilderment would abate anytime soon, William spoke up. “Nathanial, Patrick, Joseph?” They all turned their heads to him. “Could we excuse ourselves for awhile? I’d like to have your thoughts on some important matters.”

  I shot him a worried look. While I figured I could make due with Cora, I was terrified to be left behind with Abigail, and her disapproval that was wrapped up in the shell of her courteous attitude.

  William turned to me and ran his thumb down my cheek. “Only for a short while. I’ll be back soon.” His soft touch soothed me, giving me the kind of courage that could get me through a week alone with Abigail locked in a coat closet. “I need to speak with my brothers about a few things. Will you be alright here for awhile?”

  An angelic response came from behind us as Cora flitted back into the kitchen, “Of course, she will be. I’ve got oodles of questions for you, Bryn!”

  She commenced grabbing each of the brothers and pushing them towards the glass slider door which led out to the sandy shore. “Get out, go on.” She grabbed William by the cuff of his shirt and began dragging him away. He placed a hurried kiss on my lips before he was pushed through the door. Cora grabbed Joseph last, and was kind enough to give him a sweet kiss before she scooted him out the door with a smack on his backside.

  When the last brother had been thrown out onto the sand and the slider door was fastened securely behind them, Cora flew over to me and grabbed one of my comparatively large hands in her tiny one. “I’m so happy to meet you. The real you!” Her eyes were dancing with excitement. “William’s talked about you non-stop for eons and I was almost beginning to believe like the rest of them—that you were just a figment of his imagination . . . a happy place his mind had created as a safe haven from the deaths—”

  “Cora!” Abigail scolded, her eyes ablaze.

  Cora shot her a confused glance, which then turned indignant. “Settle down, Abigail. She has a right to know.” She pointed outside towards the forms of the brothers that were growing smaller as they walked down the beach. “If he’s too big a lug-head to admit to her how important she’s been in his life, that’s not my fault.”

  Abigail sneered at her. “That is his business. You should know better than to interfere—William knows what’s best for him and this family.”

  Again, I was reeling, trying to keep up with the conversation I felt disjointed from. I reached for Cora’s shoulders and grasped them tightly. “Slow down, please. I’m lost,” I pleaded. “Can you explain?”

  Her eyes sparkled brighter. “Of course, I will. Why don’t you have a seat and I’ll grab us something to drink.”

  Happy I’d be enlightened soon, I released her shoulders and selected a chair.

  “Abigail, would you like some iced tea?” Cora sung from the kitchen. She didn’t wait for Abigail’s answer before she danced back to the table seconds later, carrying three tumblers of tea. She sat one in front of me and handed another to Abigail, and sat down in the chair beside me.

  She took a sip of her tea and tilted her chair towards me, lifting one leg up to curl it to her chin. “So what do you want to know?”

  “Ummmm . . . how about you start at the beginning?” I said, not knowing where the beginning was.

  She took another sip before beginning. “Has William told you about his gift?”

  I wasn’t sure which one of the many she was referring to, but took a guess. “Do you mean his ability to Foretell Mortal’s deaths?”

  She bobbed her head and continued, “When William was first Immortalized, he was horrified by his Foretellings. To him, they were just dark, evil visions that never left his mind. He couldn’t escape them, and was too young to be able to divert himself from them. Joseph’s told me about how miserable and lost William was the first few decades of his Immortality . . . how he became a slave to his Foretellings.”

  I ran my fingers down the sides of my glass, which had started to sweat small beads of condensation. The cool beads of water sliding underneath my fingers helped center me from the torment I imagined William suffering early on in his Immortality.

  “Several decades after his Immortalization, William had a dream of a young woman, and to his great surprise, it was not a Foretelling of her death. For the first time, he’d dreamed an everyday sort of dream of this woman, and that was it for him. The small ray of light he needed to get him through the dar
kness had arrived, and he clung to it. His life was lived from one dream of her to the next—the dark visions taking place in between, the price he had to pay to see her again.”

  I noticed Abigail shift stiffly in her chair, making her disapproval known with pursed lips and crossed arms. Her iced tea sat untouched beside one of those shiny black cell phones that doubled as a handheld computer.

  “William became strong, able to make judgment calls and decisions for the greater good of the Guardian believers and his family—unhindered by the bonds Nathanial and Joseph had formed with us,” she said, motioning to Abigail and herself. “Sure, Patrick’s never been United, but he’s too flighty . . . too indecisive. William became the natural leader of our family and the Guardians. His strength, intelligence and devotion to our mission made him the obvious choice. The quiet rumors started to go around that he was the one—”

  Abigail’s assailing disapproval for whatever direction Cora’s story was taking, was materialized through the hissing that came through her teeth. She sounded fierce, and I was not the only one that saw her that way. Cora’s story took an instant about-face.

  “About fifty years ago, William grew more distant from the family, spending more time away . . . for months on end at times. He excused the time away due to the missions he was sent on, but we all knew there was something else going on.”

  The timer went off on the stove and Cora bounced up to remove the rectangular, bread pans from the oven. She removed them with her bare hands, not even flinching at the 350 degree heat burning hot on the metal pans. She continued, while removing the rounded loaves from their tins onto cooling racks, “One day, the boy’s father followed him on one of his commissioned missions—”

  “Whoa . . . did you say his father?” I said with bewilderment. This family was getting larger by the minute. “As in, his biological father?”

  Cora glanced over at me and a smile of apology crossed her face. “I thought William would have told you about his father . . .”

  Abigail huffed in her seat, but Cora continued, ignoring her, “Yes, his biological father. Charles is the Chancellor of our Alliance of Guardians.”

  My eyes widened somehow even more—not only was William’s family pretty much perfect, the head of it just so happened to be one of the most powerful Immortals in existence. Great, nothing like feeling like I was in love with the son of a priest-slash-king-slash-ruler of the galaxy . . .

  “Charles followed William on a mission, and he discovered the truth for William’s extended absences and increasing distance from the family.” Cora looked up at me through her full, light-brown lashes, and she sighed wistfully. “He was looking for her . . . searching for her.”

  So this had been the woman Patrick had referred to yesterday. The one he was sure William would never get over until he met me. The woman I didn’t want to know anything else about, but my darned curiosity wouldn’t allow me to ask Cora to stop . . . not to say anything more about this mystery woman William had spent his life dreaming of and searching for.

  “Charles was furious—he told William he was on a fool’s mission—that this girl didn’t exist, and if she did, he would never find her. She was lost in time and he would never know if she’d already existed, or if she hadn’t yet, when and where she would exist. Even if he did manage to find her—against all odds—how could he ever be with her when she was a Mortal?”

  I gazed out the slider doors to the ocean waves yards in front of the cottage, and then down the shoreline where the four brothers had disappeared. I wanted—more like I needed—to be in his arms right now. To be convinced of his love for me, and assured that his decades of devotion to some nameless woman didn’t matter to him anymore. That the scars she’d left behind no longer held sway in his life since I’d entered it. I needed him to whisper those three words I thought would sound so insignificant next to the way I felt for him into my ear, over and over again . . . for at least ten years.

  “It was following this argument with his father that William took on one of the most dangerous missions our Council dared to call out to our Alliance—infiltrating the inner circle of the Inheritor’s most dominant and prestigious Alliance. He volunteered for it readily. He said he was eager to face death if he and this dream woman would never meet, and that he might as well put his death to good use by gaining valuable information.”

  A chill ran through my body at the thought of William dying. Would the world continue on as usual with the greatest of its creation gone? I was sure it wouldn’t.

  The phone in front of Abigail jittered over the table from it’s vibrate mode. “Excuse me,” Abigail said formally, grabbing up the phone and exiting the room. I heard her answer it before she shut the door of the room she entered.

  “She’s a Coordinator,” Cora explained, as simply as one would say their husband was an accountant.

  My eyebrows must have pulled together, because she further explained, “Abigail’s Station is a Coordinator—she’s the one that takes the calls whenever a Foreteller has a vision. She gets the information to the right people and assembles the team.”

  I nodded my head, but didn’t want to ask any questions as I normally would whenever a new tidbit of Immortal information was presented—I needed her to finish William’s story before I was ripped in half by the anxiety.

  “A week later, William was gone, only occasionally able to check in with us to let us know he was alright. Patrick left a year later, practically begging for a commission similar to William’s, and our Council—greedy from the valuable information William was forwarding to them—was all too eager to let another brother from the same family infiltrate John’s circle of Inheritors.” Cora returned to her seat, and placed her hand over mine that was still wiping vertical streaks down my glass.

  “Is this too much information for you, Bryn . . . am I giving you too much at once?”

  I raised my eyes to look at her. There was no denying her genuine concern for me. “No, I’m fine. Please continue,” I said, attempting a smile.

  “Alright,” she said, patting my hand affectionately. “We all moved here about ten years ago, splitting our time between here and our home in Montana. We wanted to see William and Patrick, and since they could only steal away from John and his crew for a day or two at most, we purchased this home so we could all meet here and be a whole family again from time to time. Things had been pretty quiet lately—no real news of anything good or bad happening up there in Newburg—until one night a couple of weeks ago, we got a frantic call from Patrick letting us know William had been caught interacting with a Mortal. He was panicked, not knowing what punishment, if any, John would have dealt out to William. Joseph and Nathanial got so worried they were planning a trip up to Newburg to rescue William and take Patrick with them, back to the safety of our Alliance and aborting the entire mission.”

  This was the part in the story I was familiar with. I was the Mortal William had been caught interacting with. I was the reason the family had nearly called off the entire mission William and Patrick had fought for so many years. I felt a sickness swirling in my stomach as I let my mind wander to what could have happened if Joseph and Nathanial had tried to escape with William and Patrick. Who could have been hurt, or much worse?

  “Patrick called us a few days later and explained what had happened. You can imagine our surprise when we learned of William’s additional gift.” Cora’s eyes widened and she shook her head, as if she still wasn’t certain she could believe it. “Patrick said he’d call us back when he could, but assured us that both he and William were safe and well for the time being, so Nathanial and Joseph stayed here and we waited. We didn’t get another call until last night when Patrick called and told us they’d be making a stop here today, and they’d have one other in tow.” She smiled as she pointed at me. “I could tell Patrick had no idea who you were—why William had risked so much to save you—but we all immediately knew who you were once we heard the whole account.”

/>   Cora’s face lit up like a child’s would at the conclusion of a fairy tale when the happy ending is revealed. “You were her . . . the one he’d searched the world generations for. He’d found you, beyond all possibility and all reason, he found you.”

  Her smile was blinding, but I was too stunned for it to take effect. I felt like a punch had just been delivered into my gut. My breath was swiped out of me and my mind was wiped clear of any rational thought. All I could hear was Cora’s voice in my head repeating, You were her . . . he found you.

  I was the woman Patrick had been referring to yesterday. I was the woman he thought William would never get over, and, beyond every miracle, I was the woman he never would. It was too much to process, too much joy to take in at once. It overtook me in waves, with growing speed and frequency.

  My body . . . my heart, couldn’t take it all in, and as I felt the instinctual response taking hold of my mind and body, all I could see was the image of his face above mine. He was wet, like he’d just been on a swim, and the starry night sky loomed above his perfect face. He was looking down at me, unequivocal concentration surrounding the aura of his face, while the center radiated with love.

  My William screamed, “No, Bryn. Don’t go . . . stay with me.”

  And as I felt my body rocking back in the chair, before my mind shut down temporarily from the overload of emotions running within it, I recognized this vision of William was not a dream; but when he’d pulled me out of the ocean that night and tied me eternally to him when he shared his Immortality with me.