by I. T. Lucas
They were probably doing so for Sylvia’s sake. Ruth could only imagine what they were whispering behind her back. She was the clingy mother who was preventing her daughter from living a full life.
It wasn’t true. Sylvia was rarely coming home anymore, and if she did, it was to have a quick lunch with Ruth before going out again.
Most of the time she was staying with Roni at his place. Ruth hadn’t said a word against it. She’d even come to help nurse the boy back to health.
Sharon pursed her lips. “I think it’s sweet. Nick obviously likes you and wants to get to know you better. With no pressure, you know what I mean?”
Ruth glanced at Sylvia who was no doubt listening in.
She knew exactly what Sharon meant, and it was annoying to hear it from a newbie immortal.
Everyone thought Ruth was fragile, and that the slightest push would break her. It was a misconception. The fact that she wasn’t crazy about spending time with other people and sweating for something to talk about didn’t mean she was breakable.
Not liking something didn’t mean she would fall apart from it, but it was an effort, and it didn’t feel pleasant.
Sharon was waiting for her to say something.
Ruth didn’t know what the right answer was, so she went with what she thought others expected to hear. “I feel weird about dating a guy who is younger than my daughter.”
Sharon waved a hand. “Men do it all the time. I see no reason why we can’t.” She leaned on her elbow and whispered in Ruth’s ear. “Besides, age is irrelevant to immortals, right?”
“I guess.”
The truth was that Ruth didn’t care that Nick was so young. Well, she did care a little. In some ways, he was still immature, and yet in others, he was all grown up.
It boiled down to what made a boy a man.
In Ruth’s opinion, the number one criterion was having a steady job, or as in Jackson’s case, running a business, and being good at it, or at least dedicated to doing as well as possible. It wasn't about earning money. If a guy wanted to be a stay-at-home dad that was fine too. After all, raising children was one of the most important, toughest, and least appreciated jobs. It was about taking responsibility.
Truth be told, in some ways Jackson was more mature than Ruth, even though she was almost triple his age. He was gutsy, enterprising, and good at managing people, not to mention the best boyfriend or mate a woman could hope for.
Tessa was one lucky girl.
Could Nick be Ruth’s Jackson?
Not that Ruth could’ve handled being with someone like that. Jackson was amazing, but he was too much of everything—too handsome, too outgoing, and too charming. The guy was overwhelming. Ruth would have disappeared in his shadow.
Nick, on the other hand, was just right.
From snippets of conversations, she’d gathered that he was invaluable to Eva’s detective agency, and that he’d been supporting himself since he was seventeen.
That was more than Ruth could claim.
Up until she’d taken the job at the café, she hadn’t worked a day in her life. People might have thought that she was lazy, or a fun seeker, but it could not have been further from the truth.
What had kept her from venturing outside her home was intense social anxiety. Her modest share in the clan profits was enough to support her comfortably even when raising her daughter. After Sylvia had grown up and no longer needed mothering, Ruth had kept herself busy by gardening and sewing her own clothes and cooking.
The rest of the time she spent reading books. There was nothing she loved more than getting lost in the adventures of others and living vicariously through the heroines of her novels.
Ruth had a rich and full life, but it was all happening between her ears and not out in the real world.
It was much safer that way.
23
Robert
“Are you having fun, baby?” Sharon asked.
Robert took a few more gulps from the water bottle before screwing on the top and handing it back to her. “I can’t tell you how much I’m enjoying this.”
He was taking a break from surfing while Nick was teaching Ruth how to balance on the surfboard. As an immortal, she had what it took to master the skill with ease. The only thing keeping her from doing well was fear.
Leaning over Sharon, Robert was careful not to drip water on her sun-heated skin as he planted a quick kiss on her mouth.
“Your lips are cold,” she complained.
“Sorry about that.” He sat next to her on the sand and tilted his head up toward the sun, basking in the warmth.
Since escaping the Ojai compound with Carol, Robert’s only physical activity had been happening at the gym or at his apartment.
He missed his outdoor runs.
When everything had been feeling too tight, and the walls had seemed to be closing on him, he would get outside and pound the trails until he was ready to collapse. Doing so on a treadmill didn’t provide the same relief. Absent were the fresh smells of nature, the wind beating on his face, the scenery rushing by him, or the soothing effect of seeing living green instead of dead concrete walls.
As he was discovering, surfing was even better than running. He loved the ocean with its sandy beach. The blue and the yellow contrasted beautifully, the cold to the hot, the wet to the dry, and in the distance, the green mountains provided the living colors he craved.
But even more than the great outdoors, he loved the sight of Sharon in a bikini. He was having a hard time deciding what he wanted to do more, keep on surfing the waves, or take Sharon home and make love to her.
“I love seeing you happy and carefree.” She cupped his cheek.
“I have you to thank for that. None of this would have been possible without you.”
She chuckled. “You passed the tests with flying colors. This is your doing, not mine.”
“I beg to differ. Without you in the picture, Kian would’ve not submitted me to the tests in the first place.”
He’d put Robert through the grinder—an hour-long questioning by Edna, with Arwel and Andrew present as backup. Only when all three had vouched for his complete devotion to Sharon, had Kian allowed the cuff to be removed.
Free at last, Robert hadn’t known what to do with his new privileges. The first thing he’d done was to take Sharon out on a proper date in a restaurant. But other than that he had nowhere to go.
Until now.
He owed that to Sharon as well. At first, he hadn’t been keen on an outing with the hacker and his girlfriend, including Sharon’s coworker and the immortal the guy was courting. But Sharon had insisted, and he had no choice but to tag along.
“That is true,” Sharon said. “I wish he’d offered the same tests to me. How come my word was enough, and yours was not?”
“Because you’re not a former enemy, and you have Eva to vouch for you.”
Unlike him, Sharon had been accepted into the clan’s fold immediately following her transition. But then no one had any reason to suspect her, and since she was an immortal now, it was in her best interest to keep the clan’s existence secret.
“Robert,” Sylvia called him. “Could you please convince Roni to give surfing a try?”
Other than Sharon, who’d from the start announced that she was not going to dip even a toe in the ocean’s cold water, and Nick, who had his own equipment, the rest of them had rented wetsuits and surfboards, including Roni.
For some reason, though, Roni hadn’t put his on.
“Come on, kid, it’s easy. You’re going to have fun.” He offered Roni a hand up.
“Maybe for you it is. But I’m athletically challenged. I don’t want to make a fool out of myself.”
“Take a look at Ruth.” Robert pointed toward the water. “She is doing great. And she started out with nothing.”
Roni’s face twisted into a grimace. “Fine.” He got up and grabbed the wetsuit, reacting exactly as Robert had known he would.
Robert winked at Sylvia.
Young men were the same everywhere. Their worst fear was to look bad in front of others. Refusing to give it a try now would make Roni look even worse than doing poorly in the water. Because if Ruth, his girlfriend’s mother, could do it, so could he.
He couldn’t allow himself to look more afraid or less capable than Ruth.
“Let’s take the boards to the water and paddle a little first,” Sylvia said once Roni was done putting the wetsuit on.
“How about you?” Robert asked Sharon. “Are you sure you don’t want to go for a dip?”
“The water is too cold.”
“I know how to keep you warm.” He waggled his brows.
“Take your wetsuit off. If you’re going to keep me warm, I want to feel your skin on me, not rubber.” Sharon giggled.
Ever since he’d told her the truth about the part condoms had played in keeping her from transitioning, the word rubber had become a trigger for laughter. He would never forget her expression when she’d asked him if the only thing standing between her and immortality was a rubber.
“Done.” He peeled himself out of the suit in seconds.
“Yum.” Sharon smacked her lips. “You have the best body on this beach.”
“Only on this beach?”
She looked one way and then the other. “Do you know how long it is? Miles upon miles.”
He offered her a hand up. “Ready for the water?” He pulled her up.
“I am.”
“What about this?” He pointed at the scarf thing she had tied around her bikini bottoms. “Don’t you want to take it off?”
Sharon shook her head. “I’m not about to let everyone see my jiggly butt. Unfortunately, the transition did nothing to make it smaller.”
“And it’s a good thing that it didn’t, or I would’ve been very disappointed.” He tugged at the tie and took the scarf thing off. “You should be proud of this ass. It’s the sexiest on the beach.”
“Only this beach?”
Smirking, Robert waved his hand at the meandering shoreline. “As you’ve said, it’s miles upon miles long.”
24
Bridget
“I’m going upstairs to get a cup of coffee. Do you want anything?” Bridget asked.
Victor looked up from the chart he was working on. “I want a kiss.”
She pushed to her feet, rounded the desk, and sat in his lap. “Always.”
Her new office in the keep was a converted classroom a few doors down from the clinic, and she was sharing it with Victor who was now free to dedicate all of his time to their project. All of his other jobs were done, his crew was on vacation, and she had him all to herself.
They were waiting for a word from Kian regarding the induction ceremony, or rather Victor was. Bridget was very happy keeping things the way they were. Spending her days and nights with the man she loved and admired was good. She didn’t want it to end.
But time refused to stand still.
A week had passed since she and Victor had returned from Douglas’s wedding, during which Bridget had met with Kian multiple times, but he hadn’t broached the subject of Victor’s transition ceremony even once. In fact, she was quite certain he was avoiding being alone with her because he didn’t want her asking about it.
Had he changed his mind?
There was no reason for him to do so. If anything, his relationship with Victor was getting closer and less standoffish the more time the two were spending together, mostly in an official capacity but also socially.
On top of heading the new project, and partially because of it, Bridget had taken it upon herself to organize as many get-togethers as she could squeeze in. Some at the café, and others at their newly remodeled place. It was an excellent strategy to promote teamwork and at the same time to get Victor to socialize and warm up to people.
Naturally, Victor had managed to wiggle out of inviting Brian over, claiming that the analyst had an assignment on the West Coast, which Bridget suspected was a lie. Brian’s work was done online, and there was no reason for him to travel for a job. But it wasn’t as if she could accuse Victor of that. Besides, he didn’t need the added stress.
The waiting for Kian’s word was unnerving.
In the meantime, she was building the foundation for success.
Assume the win, was her strategy.
Perhaps it could work for life and death situations as well. Operating under the assumption that all would end well and he would transition successfully, she was preparing Victor for becoming part of the clan, and preparing the clan to accept Victor as one of them.
That didn’t mean, however, that she wanted to hasten the induction ceremony.
But maybe she should.
If she truly believed, if she truly assumed the win, she should. She needed to walk the walk and not only talk the talk.
When she let go of his mouth, Victor sucked in a breath. “You sure know how to kiss, my lady.”
“Now that you’ve gotten your kiss, what can I get you from upstairs?” Bridget rose to her feet.
“Just coffee. Black.”
“I know how you like your coffee. What about a pastry?”
Patting his washboard abs, he shook his head. “You don’t want this to become flabby, do you?”
“Fates forbid.” She leaned and kissed him again before walking out.
It still amused her that he watched his carb intake more than she did. Soon, hopefully, he would no longer need to worry about it. As an immortal, his metabolism would become faster. He could go back to eating the way he had in his twenties.
Assume the win.
As if having a mind of its own, her finger pressed the number for Kian’s level instead of the café’s. It was time to confront him about Victor.
“Come in,” he said as she knocked on his door.
“Can I have a moment of your time?”
“A moment. I’m extremely busy.”
Well, in that case she should get right to it. “Victor is done with all of his outstanding jobs. He is ready to attempt transition. Are you still planning on being his initiator, or did you change your mind and I should ask someone else?”
Putting his pen down, Kian raked his fingers through his hair. “I didn’t change my mind. I’m just very busy. It will have to wait.”
“How long?”
He pinned her with a hard stare. “Other than your impatience, is there a reason for rushing it? Has Victor’s health taken a turn for the worse?”
“Frankly, I don’t know. I could run some tests, or perhaps ask him to go see his regular doctor. But if it’s going to work at all, it has a better chance to do so while he is still relatively healthy. I say that sooner is better than later.”
“Would two weeks make a difference?”
“They shouldn’t. But why wait?”
For some reason, Kian looked at a point over her shoulder instead of her eyes. “I want to do it after Eva’s wedding. Amanda decided it was a good idea to have the wedding while Annani is here for the village’s opening ceremony.”
Aha, so that was the real reason behind Amanda’s sudden interest in pushing Eva and Bhathian’s wedding date. She wanted Annani to preside over it.
Kian grimaced. “You know how much of my time the goddess requires. I’m working overtime; let me rephrase it, I’m working nonstop to clear a bit of my schedule for her visit. After she leaves, I’ll have more time.”
What he’d said made sense. But then, why was he avoiding her eyes? What wasn’t he telling her?
The most likely explanation she could come up with was that Kian thought the whole thing was futile, and he didn’t want her to see it in his eyes.
It was really nice of him to go ahead with the plan anyway. She knew he was doing it for her sake more than Victor’s, and she was touched, especially since Kian wasn’t an empathetic guy. But he knew what it meant to love someone and hope for the impossible to happen.
Whatever his reasons were, th
e overt and the covert, it wasn’t as if she could argue with him about the timeline. She should be thankful he was doing this at all.
“Thank you. What should I tell Victor? Is the day after the wedding okay?”
He nodded. “Provided nothing unforeseen prevents it.”
“Of course. Thank you again for doing this. We both appreciate it tremendously.”
“You’re welcome. I just hope it works.”
“Yeah, me too.”
As she headed to the café, Bridget felt lighter, relieved.
Not because she had a date for the ceremony but because she had two more weeks with Victor. All her brave self-talk was just that, a way to shore up her courage and do right by her guy.
At her core, though, she was a selfish woman who harbored more than one insane hope.
What if she somehow, miraculously, managed to get pregnant in the next two weeks?
The chances of that happening were just as slim as Victor’s chances of a successful transition, and her hopes for it were just as irrational. Except, Bridget the logical scientist was gone, replaced by an idiot who hoped and prayed for the impossible.
25
Turner
“Here is your coffee.” Bridget handed Turner the paper cup. “Black, no sugar added.”
“Thank you.”
She sat down on the other side of the large table they shared, unwrapped her muffin and took a bite. “Are you sure you don’t want some? It’s big. I’m not going to finish it all by myself.”
Turner eyed the pastry.
It had been so long since he’d allowed himself a taste that he wasn’t craving it anymore. The one thing that still gave him trouble was fresh bread. Especially a baguette. That was why he always refused bread in restaurants. If it was on the table, he knew he would have a hard time saying no.
“I’m good. Did you stop by Julian’s on the way?” She’d been gone much longer than a trip to the café and back justified.