The Kindred Soul of Nora Faye: The Tethered Soul Series, Book 3

by Laura C. Reden

  “What are you not telling me?” he asked bluntly.

  I sighed, knowing the time had come. “I wasn’t supposed to say anything—”

  “But I’m your husband. That rule doesn't apply when we're married.” He may have been right. I didn’t know. Maybe it was a grey area, but I felt that hiding the truth about my friend’s life was doing more harm than good. So, I told him.

  “Brooklyn is a Tethered Soul, like us,” I whispered. It was only the beginning. A long moment passed as Easton’s mind bent and folded in on itself. I found it odd he didn’t blink. Not once.

  “That’s impossible,” he whispered back.

  “No. It’s not. I mean, it was impossible for me to be tethered, but here I am.”

  “Right. But Brooklyn’s not tethered, Beck.”

  “Yes. She is . . .”

  “I would know. I would sense it. She’s not. She’s lying to you. And the real question is, why?” Taken aback by his comment, I was conflicted about defending her while I felt the need to explore the plausible reasons why my friend would deceive me in such a way. There was none. She’d been a great friend to me.

  “Well, maybe you don’t know as much as you claim,” I said.

  “I know enough to know she’s lying to you. I’ll tell you that much. I’m going to talk to her tomorrow, this is ridiculous—”

  “No!”

  “I should just talk to her now.” Easton sat up, and I reached out, grabbing his shoulder.

  “No. Please don’t,” I begged.

  Easton ran his hands through his hair, and even through the darkness, I could see the distress he was in. I could feel it in the air. He was trying to protect me. Trying to do right by me. I hated myself for putting him in this position. The tension stretched between us and slinked down my body. I was tired beyond belief, but I acted out of instinct, leaning over and kissing his neck. My intention wasn’t to keep him in bed there with me, though it did that too.

  In the morning, I woke up stiff and groggy. Easton made coffee, and the clanking of coffee mugs woke Brooklyn on the sofa. She moaned and brought her hands to her head. I poured myself a decaf coffee and smiled at her misery. Somehow it felt better to know that I wasn’t the only one suffering from nausea and a headache.

  Easton and I sat down in the living room, and I thought it was kind of him to bring her a cup of coffee, even though she accused him of being a killer just the night before. It was something I wouldn’t have been able to do so easily. She smiled at him apologetically and then took the mug. Her head hung as she rubbed the sleep from her eyes. And eventually, she began her apology. “Sorry about last night, guys,” she said . . . That’s it? I waited for more to come, but she felt her debt was free.

  “So, you know that Becca Reed is Everly Beck, huh?” Easton asked. Brooklyn’s brows rose, and she nodded slowly, preparing herself for the long talk ahead of her.

  “And now, Becca Green,” I mumbled to myself.

  “If you knew Becca was Beck, and Beck was Becca, then you would know how important it is to keep that a secret. Why would you bring it up in front of Tanner?” Easton asked.

  “Tanner wasn’t going to find out. Plus, who really cares if your older brother finds out about Beck?” Brooklyn frowned.

  “He’s not my older brother—”

  “He’s actually . . . Easton’s younger—” I started.

  “Whatever. He doesn't know,” Brooklyn said, cutting us both off.

  Easton shook his head, frustrated with her energy. And I’d have to say he wasn’t the only one. “Look, Brooklyn, I know you're upset with me for getting pregnant, but I didn’t choose this. I didn’t even think it was possible. I swear,” I said.

  “See, that’s the problem, you guys. You're the blind leading the blind. How are you supposed to survive this if you're only listening to him? He doesn't know what he’s talking about half the time. You guys don’t understand that I’m trying to help you. But you make it so damn hard! Hell, if it weren’t for me, you two wouldn’t have even found each other again,” Brooklyn said.

  “What are you talking about?” Easton asked, brows furrowing.

  “I knew you were looking for her. I saw it in my dreams. And I saw Becca was lost without you. But do you know how hard it is to make someone fall in love with somebody they can’t remember?” Brooklyn rubbed her temple.

  “Actually, yeah, I do,” Easton said.

  “Why? Why did you help us get back to one another?”

  “Because she was lost. And she was my friend—” Brooklyn spoke to Easton but stared directly at me with her deep brown eyes. “She’s the only friend I’ve had for so, so long.”

  “How long?”

  Brooklyn pried her eyes off me and looked to Easton, her eyes softening. She sniffed in a broken breath of air and then began a story even I had never heard. “I was born in 1450 in Early Modern Europe. I was a gifted child. Dreaming big dreams that told the future. By the time I was five, it was clear that my future was anything but bright. They called me witch.” Brooklyn took a sip of her coffee, and her eyes fell unfocused to her lap.

  “Even my own family was afraid of me.” Brooklyn cleared her throat, pushing past the memories. “In 1457, at only seven years old, I was burned at the stake in front of my entire village. I watched as my very own sister cheered along with the angry villagers as my skin lit fire and I burned from the outside in. To this day, it was the most horrific, excruciating death.”

  Goosebumps covered my arms, and shivers split down my back. My chest heavy with sorrow for what she had experienced. I knew she was tethered, but that was about all she had told me. Now I saw why she didn’t want others to know. It was a story she rarely wanted to relive.

  “Born again the same day, I woke in a wicker basket on a doorstep. As I grew, my dreams were more vivid, and I often spoke of them when I was young. My parents were more loving than my first and shielded me from the villagers until I made one fatal mistake. I ran into my sister. All my rage poured out of me as the memories flooded my mind. She’d betrayed me more than anyone had before. I ran to her, telling her about the terrible man she would marry and all the horrible things he would do to her. I told her how she would die, and I screamed the day it would happen. She took one look at me amongst the villagers and called out at the top of her lungs. ‘Witch!’ she screamed. I was taken immediately. That’s when the cycle started.”

  “Oh my god, Brooklyn. I’m so, so sorry,” I said, my hand heavy over my heart.

  “It was over two hundred years later when the infamous Salem Witch Trials began, and by then, they were hanging witches, not burning them. I used my dreams to warn the folk of their impending doom. Time after time, they would rat me out, and we would hang together. That’s when I decided I wouldn’t use my gift to help others anymore. I became cold-hearted. I had to. It was the only way I could survive. But it was no way to live.” Brooklyn said, and Easton nodded with a heavy heart.

  Brooklyn took a deep, shaky breath and shrugged. “I’m not that way anymore, though. I only wasted a few lives before I started helping people again. And to be honest, having a friend like Becca has helped me a lot. I wanted to help her find her soulmate. Her love. And when I met you, Easton, I wanted to help you too.” Brooklyn’s voice was shaky.

  “I don’t understand. Why do you think that’s all going to change? What does having a baby have to do with any of this?” Easton asked. My stomach dipped, and I knew right then and there that I didn’t want Easton knowing that fate was calling. Brooklyn’s eyes flickered to me, and I gave a quick shake of the head. I didn’t have it in my heart to tell him my second chance was fleeting.

  “Our friendship isn’t doomed, I just felt . . . threatened. Like I would lose her. I mean, having a baby just takes up of all your time. Who is going to go shopping with me and such?” Brooklyn joked. “I’m going to get some more coffee. Do you want any?” She asked.

  I mouthed “Thank you” to her, and she responded with a small smile
.

  “Yes, please.” Easton handed her his mug and then turned his focus on me. “But, Brooklyn, one more thing. Why did you call me a killer?” Easton continued to pry.

  “Well, you know. I told you that part. That you two died in my dream. Remember? I told you.”

  “Yeah. But that was our past life. I thought you knew that?” Easton said.

  “Yeah. Um, Becca told me that bit. And you know, my dreams change all the time,” Brooklyn said from the kitchen.

  “So, everything is good? As far as your dreams go?” Easton asked.

  “Oh, yeah. I haven’t even had one since I talked to you last! That was before you asked Becca to marry you, remember? It’s honestly nothing.” Brooklyn came back into the room with two mugs of coffee. She wasn’t being honest. I knew that much. She had dreams every night. Sometimes about people she hadn’t even met yet. And they always came true. Every single time.

  “Thanks,” he said, taking the coffee. “Brooklyn?” Easton’s expression shifted. “If you 're a Tethered Soul, then how come I can’t see it?”

  “See it?” Brooklyn cocked her head to the side.

  Easton nodded. “I can see just how long one’s lived. I can see the pain they carry like rings inside a tree trunk. It burns around them like a burning ball of embers.”

  “Oh, that. That’s not what you think it is, Easton,” Brooklyn smirked.

  “What are you talking about?”

  “Hazy? Kind of yellow, orange glow? Sometimes angry looking?”

  Easton shrugged. “Yeah. It’s how we Tethered Souls know each other. And you don’t have it.” Easton’s tone became accusatory, and I slinked back into my chair.

  “Let me ask you this, do you see that on Becca?” They both turned to me, and my eyes dropped to the floor.

  “Well, no—but that’s only because she’s young. There aren’t years of pain there, let alone much memory of it,” Easton said, and I recoiled. Though it was true, I didn’t like being talked about in terms of what I had and hadn’t remembered.

  “Exactly. She’s not tortured, Easton. And neither am I. What that warm haze really means is that you are a Tortured Soul. A Tortured Soul can be a Tethered Soul, and more often than not, they are. It takes centuries to build up that kind of pain. The kind that is so deep it invades your energy. But what you fail to see is, a Tethered Soul doesn't have to be a tortured one.”

  “What—What are you talking about?” Easton’s forehead creased with disbelief, and I didn’t know what I had thought about it all. I knew one thing, though. I wasn’t tortured. The thought of living forever wasn’t negative to me at all, and I struggled to see how it ever could be.

  “While it’s true that I was tortured for many, many lives, I’m not anymore. I’ve made peace with my past. I no longer want to move on from it. Honestly, it’s what makes me who I am, and I think I’m pretty great. I want to live forever! I’m happy, and you can’t see that smoldering ember around me, Easton, because it doesn't exist in me.” My eyes flickered to Easton.

  “And you? You’re happy too?” Easton asked me, his eyes holding my own.

  “I . . . I mean, you always talk about how it’s a curse, and I’m just not sure I feel that way.”

  “You don’t?” Easton was taken aback. “God, Beck. You used to be so tortured. You used to be afraid of the dark because that’s when you would be alone with your thoughts. You used to hurt yourself because the physical pain was easier to take than the pain in your heart. Don’t you remember any of that? You don’t carry that with you?” Easton asked.

  “Honestly, I don’t remember ever feeling that way. I think it’s sad that I ever did. I think it’s sad that people feel like that now. But if you asked me if I thought getting to live forever was a curse, I just don’t think it is, and I might go as far as to say it could be a gift. I mean, I’m having babies. It has to be a gift, right?” I asked.

  Easton nodded his head slowly, then looked back to Brooklyn. “So, all the Tethered Souls I’ve seen before,” Easton began.

  “Those are just the ones who don’t understand yet. They’re lost,” Brooklyn said, setting down her empty cup of coffee.

  “Lost Souls. . .” Easton said beneath his breath.

  “Yeah. Like you. . .”

  “Like me?” he asked.

  “Yeah. You feel like there’s no point; you want to move on but can’t. You don’t know your purpose here.” Brooklyn shrugged like it was simple, and Easton nodded his head, deep in his own thought.

  “I do feel that way,” he said.

  “Yeah.” Brooklyn ran her hands through her hair, and I could tell she was getting ready to leave.

  “I’m a Lost Soul . . .” Easton said to himself, eyes unfocused in the middle of the room. It was going to be a long day. It was then, when I knew we made the right decision not to tell him about the way out. I wasn’t sure he could handle it. Would he race to make his life perfect so he could leave this world behind? Would it be disingenuous? Or would he sabotage himself like I had planned to all along so he could stay behind and care for our children? I had made my decision, but I believed it was best for him to make his on his own and in due time.

  “Well, I think that’s my cue. I’m going to go. Oh, one more thing. Can I still call you Becca? Or—” Brooklyn weighed both her hands in the air.

  “Yeah, oh yeah! Um . . .?” I furrowed my brows, trying to think back to when Brooklyn had become a popular name.

  “Don’t you dare call me, Beatrix!” Brooklyn said, pointing her finger at me. And had Easton not looked so sad, I might have laughed out loud.

  “Promise,” I said, opening the front door, my eyes still large with shock. Beatrix.

  “Love ya,” Brooklyn said, passing by and kissing me on the cheek. “Oh, and do me a favor, dear, give Tanner my number!”

  Chapter 18

  All the leaves had turned orange and fell to the ground. Now the trees were nothing more than naked branches in the frigid winter air. Easton had packed on quite a bit of muscle training to become a police officer, and my belly had grown to an astronomical size. I was riddled with back aches, heartburn, and a terrible case of the waddles. But at least the nausea had broken and never returned.

  My appointments with Dr. Faye had all been great, and when the time came for him to disclose the twin's sexes, I chickened out at the last minute. I covered my eyes as he laughed. He ended up writing it down on a piece of notepaper and stuffed it in an envelope for me to take home in case it kept me up at night. He said it happened often, and he didn’t want a call in the wee hours of the morning unless I was in labor. And you know what? It did keep me up that night. And had I not thrown that envelope in the trash when I walked out of his office, I would have ripped it open the very first night.

  Brooklyn and Tanner had started officially dating after a re-do dinner at our house that ended with a goodnight kiss. It worked out kind of perfectly, because they ended up spending a lot of time at our house, and it felt like we were a family. In time, Brooklyn and I asked Easton if we could tell Tanner about our past lives, but he had a firm opinion on that, and since they were brothers, we had to let it go. She ended up telling him about some of her dreams, though, and he thought they were quite interesting. Brooklyn claimed he just didn’t understand, and maybe it was better that we never told him about being tethered.

  I thought about baby names often and had quite a list going. Brooklyn liked to sneak god-awful names on the list when I wasn’t looking. And one time, I wrote Beatrix on there as a joke. She didn’t find it as funny as I did. I spent a lot of time at the park, reading. Chloe and Wes hadn’t come very often since he called me Everly, and I didn’t blame them. But today, when I sat there with Brooklyn, I had a feeling in the pit of my gut that they might show. Brooklyn told me it was just indigestion.

  “Do you remember when you told Easton that your dreams changed all the time?” I said, before taking a sip of my hot cocoa.

  “Yeah.”

 
“Was there any truth in that?”

  “No. They never change. And often, as the event approaches, the dream becomes more frequent.”

  “Have you had the dream of me dying again? You know, since the first time?”

  “No. It was just the one time,” Brooklyn said.

  “Would you tell me if you did?” I asked. I knew the second she paused that I would never get the full truth from her. I wondered how much she hid from me, even to this day.

  “Honey, I’m going to tell you what I think you need to hear. And most likely, not an ounce more,” Brooklyn said. At least she was honest.

  “Why did you think we could change my fate and live forever if you had already had the dream?” I asked.

  Brooklyn shrugged. “I guess I thought it was worth a shot. I mean, I know the formula. The ticket out of here . . . I just figured that if you knew it too, you would make a different choice for yourself. But you are so stubborn, Becca. You were always going to do your own thing.” Brooklyn rolled her eyes like I was the most exhausting friend on this planet, and I smiled behind my cocoa.

  “You mean like, I would just live the most boring life ever known to man? Or like, I wouldn’t bring my pregnancy to term?” I asked, the thought leaving a sour taste in my mouth.

  “Yeah. It’s a choice, you know. I just didn’t expect you to choose them over yourself or Easton.”

  I frowned. It was honest but cutting. They definitely heard it, too, because I got a sharp kick to the ribs. I moaned and twisted in on the bench. “Well, I do. I choose them. And I’d do it all over again.”

  Brooklyn chuckled. “You haven’t even met them. . .”

  “I don’t have to!” I rubbed my belly.

  “You don’t? What if they’re assholes?” Brooklyn laughed.

  I rolled my eyes. She clearly didn’t have the motherly instincts that I had. But before I snapped something rude back to her, I remembered a time before I was pregnant. I probably would have thought the same thing. “They probably will be,” I said, causing both Brooklyn and I to laugh. “Oh, stop, stop! I can’t laugh anymore. It hurts too much. It all hurts!” I choked out as I looked for a place to set my hot cocoa.