Eternal Shadows (27 page)

“I know,” the general said, his voice quiet.

Rhys’s silence spoke volumes of anger.

“But what I did, I did for you. For love of you.” The general spoke clearly, each word precise so he could not be misunderstood. “I did it so when she finally turned up again,” he paused for just a moment, and
I felt like all eyes were on me. “She would have something to find.”

I remembered what Millie had told me, about how Rhys had never smiled when she first met him. Desolate, Cade had said. The very definition of the living dead.

A tear rolled down my cheek. The anguish I saw in every inch of Rhys’s body now broke my heart. I knew, instinctively, organically, this was how he had been all those years ago. All I wanted was to put an end to it.

“Get out.” His voice startled me and everyone else. Not angry, but still hard and cold. “Get out. Leave us alone.”

The general was the first to leave, Aurelia at his side. Madge went next, then Cade. Millie’s gaze met mine for a moment, mixed with both happiness and fear. Then she left, closing the door behind her.

Leaving me alone with the man I had unknowingly loved for centuries.

Chapter Twenty-Two: Recognition

We stared at each other, saying nothing, for the longest time. His eyes were filled with hints of the pain that had overtaken him only a short time ago, and beside that I saw evidence of older pain, long forgotten and now remembered. But there was something else, something new. He looked at me like he couldn’t believe I existed. I knew how that felt. It was pretty much the way I felt every time I looked at him.

Slowly, cautiously, he moved. He shifted his weight so he faced me more directly. I kept pressed tightly against the wall, not sure what would happen next. I’d known for a few hours the truth of my past lives, but I hadn’t really had time to process it all. But I knew one thing—I wanted to be what he remembered. What he loved.

He stood slowly and I mirrored him, bracing myself with one hand against the wall. He took a step closer and I leaned forward just a breath.

“You look scared.” He was so quiet I wasn’t sure a human would have heard him.

“Yes.” I felt paralyzed. He kept walking towards me, our gazes never wavering. He lifted a hand as though to touch me, but stopped just short of my face, his fingers lingering in the air between us.

“You remember?”

“Just one thing. But Cade and Millie told me what they know.” He was so close, I could taste him on my lips. His scent so strong in both reality and the memory I possessed.

He moved, and this time his fingers brushed my cheek. I closed my eyes and simply felt him trace every line and feature. A second hand joined the first, running lightly over my jaw, eyes, delving briefly into my hairline. A finger ran the length of my nose.

Suddenly I felt fear, a lump the size of a tractor-trailer blocking my throat. “Am I that different?”

“Only physically.” His hands trailed downwards, lingering at my neck and shoulders. “And the obvious fact that you’re American.”

I smiled at his tease. Some of the tension that had threatened to crush my heart evaporated. “Eva was American.”

“It wasn’t the same back then.” He sounded so normal. I opened my eyes.

He was much closer than I had thought, his nose a scant inch from my own. I was so glad I didn’t need to breathe. I wouldn’t have been able to.

“What one thing do you remember?”

“Bryn,” I said. “When you asked her to marry you.”

“I asked you.”

“You asked Bryn.”

“Same thing.”

“Are you sure?” My biggest fear.

“Yes.” Utterly confident. His thumb ran over my lips.

God, just kiss me
.

“You look uncertain.” And now he looked concerned. That little line just over his right eye had returned.

“It’s a lot to take in.”

His hand started to slip away from my face. I grabbed it before I could lose his touch completely. His blue eyes flashed between confusion and relief. “You aren’t,” he said, his words shaky as he obviously thought about each one, “frightened?”

“Of what?”

He shook his head. “Everything.”

“Not as long as I get to be with you.” Truth. Every word.
Kiss me. Kiss me like I remembered.
I maintained a firm grip on his hand.

He pressed closer, pinning me between his body and the wall at my back. “I won’t let that happen to us ever again.”

My whole body ached for him. Maybe it was the memory, intensifying my feelings. Bryn’s life felt undeniably mine, and I knew now that I hadn’t longed for Rhys just in this life, but had craved him in others. “That is very okay with me.” I couldn’t think of anything more eloquent to say.

The hand I held in mine settled against my neck. His other cradled my jaw, fingers weaving into my hair. That one moment dragged out for an eternity, and all I saw was his face. Nothing else mattered.

Then he kissed me. Harder than our other kisses, this one held centuries of longing, love, and relief. I could have kissed him forever. I threw my arms around his neck, holding him there. I pressed my body against his as though we could have become one. My heart drummed in my chest, thumping every time I thought the kiss would end but didn’t.

When Rhys did draw away he did so quickly, pulling back only far enough to look me in the eye again. We didn’t need to breathe, we could have kept kissing. I let one hand slide down to rest on his chest. To my surprise, I felt his heart beat beneath my touch.

Magic.

I leaned down, and pressed my ear to his chest. Rhys stood still, shocked probably, for a moment, then wrapped his arms around me. “What are you doing?” he asked.

“Your heart. I want to hear it. Like I did in the memory, when we were both human.” But there was silence beyond his ribs. He didn’t even breathe.

I heard his chuckle through his chest. “You won’t hear it like that ever again. My heart hasn’t beat in decades.”

“It beat at least once that I can remember,” I said. “And it beat just now.”

“If I could make it beat on command for you I would.” He gently drew me back up so we were face to face again. “Your heart beats quite often.”

“I’m still fresh,” I said, grinning when he smiled. “And it only beats when I’m around you.”

“I noticed.” He pulled away before I had time to really realize what was happening. “We should probably talk.”

“Or not.” Kissing was better. He raised an eyebrow, but he leaned close to me. Still, he didn’t seem too eager to exchange our current position for something else. “What is there to talk about anyway?”

“It seems to me there’s quite a lot to talk about.”

I shrugged, calculating the distance between his lips and mine. Just a short reach. I could make it before he stopped me. “Millie and Cade pretty much filled me in I think.” I bumped my nose lightly against his.

“What did they tell you?”

He wasn’t going to let this go. I guess he had a right to know. After all, it had been kept from him for so long. I kept one hand on the back of his neck, refusing to let him get too far. Especially if I was going to tell him this. I had a feeling the first thing he would do would be to move away from me. I wanted him close. “Just that after Eva died,” I decided killed would be a wrong choice of words at the moment, “you searched and searched for, well, for me, I guess. But you couldn’t find anything. So then you became depressed. Cade said it was like you had died. Millie never saw you smile until after the general did what he did.”

As I suspected, he tried to pull back. I used every ounce of strength I had to keep him where he was. He ducked his head so I couldn’t see his eyes. “I can’t believe he did that. He shouldn’t have. He promised.”

Betrayal dripped from every word. This pain was almost as bad as what he had felt physically. “Rhys.” I took his face in my hands and tried to get him to look at me, but he was still stronger. I settled for caressing every inch of his face I could touch. “Julius didn’t want to break his promise to you. If you hadn’t been so shocked you would have seen that. Millie told me how hard Cade and Aurelia worked to convince him to do what he did. But he did it for you. Would it have been better if he had just let you continue to spiral downward until you killed yourself? Then what would have happened? I’d be here without you.”

That got his attention. He was kissing me again. But in the moment before our lips met I had seen the terrified expression on his face at the notion of leaving me alone. I kissed him back until he was satisfied.

“I’m sorry,” he said finally, resting his forehead against mine. “You’re right.”

“Of course I am. I wasn’t there. I didn’t see what Eva’s death did you—”

“Thank God.”

“But I see you now,” I continued over his interruption. “And I can imagine. I’m glad the general was able to give you some measure of peace.”

Rhys had gone quiet. I waited a bit, to see if he would come out of it on his own. I had no idea what had captured his thoughts. I stroked his hair silently, trying to read him.

I saw the tear only a second before he broke away from me. He reached the other side of the room so fast I didn’t have the reflexes to stop him.

Then I realized what must have cause the sudden change.

Just as I was beginning to remember my past lives, he was now free to remember everything he had been forced to forget.

And the reason for the general’s actions would be foremost in his mind.

Eva’s death.

“Rhys.” I didn’t move, afraid I might scare him off. He leaned against the far wall, both hands curled into white-knuckled fists. It was strange to see him so broken down. He had always been so strong for me through everything. I hoped I could be strong enough for him. “Rhys, look at me, please.”

A dent formed under the force of his one fist pressed into the wall above his head. It clearly took great effort for him to open his eyes and turn his head towards me. The grief in his blue eyes nearly killed me.

As quick as I could, I moved to him, wrapping my arms around his waist and burying my face in his chest. “I’m sorry you have to remember all that,” I said.

He didn’t hold me right away. Instead I felt the trembling in his body as he tried to relax. “I’ll be sorry when you have to remember it.” His voice was strained.

It did scare me, the knowledge that eventually I would remember Eva’s horrible death—her murder. But I couldn’t think about that now. I needed to get Rhys functional again. I needed to make him see that everything was all right, as it should be.

“I can remember it as long as I don’t confuse the past with the present.” I lifted my head so I could see his face. “I’m alive now. We both are. And this time I’m immortal. Everything’s fine this time.”

Finally his arms settled around my waist. “Yes.” He took a deep breath and when he exhaled most of the tension went with the unnecessary air. “You’re alive.”

“Don’t forget it.”

“I won’t.” He set his head against mine.

I breathed in the scent of him, reminding myself that this was real. I thought back to the single memory I possessed and compared it to this moment.
Everything so hopeful, so perfect. I had to ensure that things worked out the way they should have this time. Bryn had wanted her life with Rhys, I could give it to her. I could have it for myself.

“So what happens now?” I asked, half afraid of the answer. I couldn’t quite think of Bryn as me, but I didn’t like the idea of sharing Rhys with two other versions of myself, either.

“I don’t know.” His voice still held a hint of the pains he’d suffered in the recent past. “I suppose you must have questions. We should talk.”

Talking again. Meh. I didn’t want to talk. Talking could lead to scary places. Places where I didn’t measure up to the women of my past lives. This is exactly why the general and all the others had waited before revealing this truth to us. “Are you sure about this? I mean, Millie said one of the reasons they didn’t tell us was because they wanted us to have the chance to create something without the influence of the past. Now that you remember…do you still like me?”

His laughter filled my room, and my heart fluttered briefly. My throat closed up at the same time, just in case he wasn’t laughing at something I would find funny. “Kassandra, what would make you think that I didn’t really like you?”

“Well, nothing. You made it quite clear that you liked me.” All those stolen moments. “It’s just, well, Bryn and Eva aren’t me.”

“You said you only remember one thing.”

“I do, but—”

“Then you don’t know them yet. Trust me, you are quite obviously the same person.”

I pulled my head away from his so I could better see his face. “Really?”

“Yes.”

“How?”

“What do you mean, how?”

“How are we the same? Are we even the same age?”

He leaned back against the wall, furrowing his brow and pulling me forward to rest against him. “What does age have to do with it?”

“It was simply a starting point.”

“Bryn was seventeen, Eva was nineteen.”

“You’re a fiend, robbing the cradle like that.”

“It’s only an issue now, not back then.”

Ha ha. I was right smack-dab in the middle of them both. He couldn’t make any cracks about my age. Besides, I would have been happy to age a few more years to catch up to him. Though, just for the entertainment value. “And how old are you again?”

Not a twitch in his expression. He knew I was up to something. “I was twenty when Julius changed me.”

“Cradle robber.”

He rolled his eyes. “You’re so dramatic.”

“American,” I defended myself with his usual quip. “So how else are we the same?”

He took a deep breath and was quiet for a moment. I could see him thinking, and I could see the frustration grow in each line on his forehead.

“Is it hard to remember?” It occurred to me that maybe his memories weren’t so instantly recovered.

“In some ways.” He smiled at me, but it didn’t hide the pain that he carried once again. “But as for recalling the memories, it’s more like…digging through an old box of belongings. I’m not sure what to look for, so I’m not sure what I’ll find.”