by Elle Thorne
“Who was your grandmother? Your name does not ring a bell.”
Étienne dug through his memory bank of all the research he’d done on the Arceneaux. He plucked the name of a cousin that had moved far away, and long since passed. “Amelia.”
“Oh. Yes, I barely saw her after her father married the second time.”
“She spoke of you often.”
“I’m glad you stopped by to visit. What brings you to New Orleans?”
“Business. Hoping to buy some property.”
“Really? Where?”
Yours. “I haven’t determined that yet.”
“Let me know if you need any connections. I don’t get out as much, but I know a few folks.” Phillip turned his head. “Celine, where’s dinner? I’m starving.”
The meal had been surreal. Visiting with the man who had fathered him made Étienne’s head spin, and it was already spinning because of Celine’s presence. Thankfully, it was over and the older man had been taken upstairs by the nurse who’d hovered over him the entire meal.
Étienne sat with Celine on the veranda, overlooking a large maze in front with a gazebo to one side and a magnificent lighted fountain on the other side of the maze.
“I’d like to declare my intentions,” he said, taking her hand.
“It’s like you’re from another era. I love that about you.”
“Back to my declaration, Celine.”
“I’d love for you to court me, Étienne Arceneaux. I’ve never met a man like you. You…” She turned her gaze away, focusing on the fountains. “You thrill and scare me.”
“You have nothing to fear of me.” He squeezed her hand gently, hoping to reassure her. “This house is beautiful. The land. All of it.”
“Thank you,” Celine smiled. “I love it here.”
“You don’t plan to move to the big city? To be where the action is?”
“This is exactly where I’ve always wanted to be. This is where my friends are. Where they always have been.”
“Friends?”
“There is something you should know about me.”
Étienne leaned back and studied the woman he’d come to love. “You can’t change my mind.”
“I don’t want to. But I think you should know. It’s only fair that we should not begin this with secrets.”
He nodded, but found himself reticent, what with his own secrets. “What is it I should know about you then?”
She took a deep breath. “I see the ones who have passed to the other side.”
He pondered her statement. “You mean the dead?”
She nodded, her face had lost its color. “It used to frighten me. They try to get me to follow them, to join them. I wear this to protect myself.” She fished into the neckline of her top, pulled out a cross.
“That helps?”
“You don’t sound like a believer, Étienne.”
“I believe.” In other things.
Her glance said she doubted him.
“You have secrets too,” she told him.
“I do.”
Was she equipped to handle his secrets? That she saw ghosts was one thing, but that was very different from watching a man turn into a tiger.
“You will share them with me?”
“Not tonight.” He held her hand.
They sat that way, quietly, holding hands, listening to crickets and bullfrogs, the occasional breeze brushing across their flesh.
A long time they sat there, drawing comfort from each other’s touch, pulling one another deeper and deeper into the place they’d fallen.
His tiger was making soft snarling sounds in Étienne’s head. For the first time ever, the tiger sounded content, not angry, nor vengeful.
Finally, when the clock inside struck the ten o’clock hour, she turned to him, her eyes dark and liquid in the dimness, now that the candles they’d had on the table between them had long vanquished.
“I should check on Father.”
Guilt at keeping his secrets ate at Étienne as he bid Celine a goodnight.
Chapter Twenty
Two weeks later, Celine was an everyday event in Étienne's life. She was more than an event. She was his everything.
Quiet dinners alone at the Arceneaux Plantation.
An occasional dance in town.
A movie at the city's theater.
A play.
Walks in the park.
Étienne had not seen Phillip Arceneaux again. Étienne and Philip were hardly more than strangers, still. Celine had said he had been unwell, and that the doctors had been visiting more than usual.
And then, one morning, Celine appeared in the drawing room of the house he’d leased. Her eyes were bloodshot.
“Father is gone.”
He attended the funeral. A town full of people had come out to bury the man who’d been a part of the past.
They’d placed him to rest at St. Louis Cemetery in New Orleans, amongst a maze of tombs that Étienne would not be likely to find again, at least not easily, nor would he want to.
Phillip had been Celine’s father, though not by birth, but he was not Étienne’s father, though he’d sired him.
And as far as Étienne was concerned, that was that.
Historic and beautiful, ornate ironwork, marble tombs reminiscent of a Greco-Roman style, it was hard for Étienne not to contrast it with his own grandmother’s grave.
Étienne had little memory of the day of Phillip Arceneaux’s funeral, blocked it completely, for reasons he would never discus with anyone and wasn’t even sure he wanted to think of himself.
A month lapsed, a month during which Étienne was Celine’s shoulder and guardian, listening to her grieve the man who’d raised her, feeling her pain as he’d felt when he lost his grandmother.
A month of revealing no secrets.
A month before she told him, she wanted to know his secrets. Had waited long enough.
It seemed to be the time for Étienne to divulge. He’d become almost unable to restrain his passion and he knew his tiger could scent her desire for him, rising between the fabric of her clothing.
Sitting in the drawing room at Arceneaux Plantation, Étienne looked into her eyes. What he saw there told him he needed to. He needed to open up and let her in. He needed to introduce her to his tiger. He needed to make her his mate, he needed to make her his forever. He took her hand and they walked down the staircase and around the back, toward the cabins.
Along the way, Étienne removed his jacket, unbuttoned his shirt, and removed that as well. Celine looked at him, concern in her eyes, and yet she said nothing. It was as if she trusted him fully.
“I know what you will see will test you,” Étienne began. “But I hope it will not test what we have and who we are.”
Celine tucked her hand in his. “Nothing can. Knowing what you know about me, knowing how you accept me, surely you realize we cannot be tested.”
Étienne hoped this was true. He stopped in the middle of the path. “I think this is far enough.” He could tell from the tingling on his shoulder blades. He knew next would come the burning, and after that the bleeding.
Chapter Twenty-One
“Far enough?” Celine turned to face Étienne.
“For now.”
He put his hands on the hem of his tank top muscle shirt, then raised the shirt above his head.
Confused, Celine stared at him.
He turned around, his back toward her.
She gasped. His back was a study of crisscrossed scars, raised marks, darker than the rest of his flesh. “Who did that to you?”
“Wait. Please. No questions just yet. Just stay behind me as we walk.”
Étienne began to walk forward, slow steps, facing forward, while she watched his muscular back.
They had not gone more than half a dozen steps before the first drop appeared.
A large drop, the reddest of crimsons had formed at the edge of one of the scars.
Horrified, Celine sai
d nothing.
And still he walked. And with each step, another drop would appear. Drop, after drop, after drop, until the drops were a rivulet, a scarlet cascade of his life giving force.
And then he stopped. Turned to face her. “This is what this place does to me.”
Celine stepped closer, put her hands on his cheeks, and locked her gaze with his. “Why?”
“Before I tell you, there is more.”
The scars on his back, the blood that appeared, she would have thought that would've been enough. More than enough. But there was more. His eyes were tortured.
“Watch.” He turned away and began to walk, reaching a creek a few yards away.
She followed and stood on the bank as he walked in, turned his back to her and tossed water over his shoulders. The blood washed away, leaving in its place fresh lacerations.
No longer scars, they were now.
“How did those get there?”
Still facing away from her, he looked at Celine over his shoulder. “Not yet. Keep watching.”
And again another surprise for her, as the lacerations began to seal, closing over themselves as if someone were fast forwarding time. Now they were white scars. He turned to face her, his arms low but opened wide, as if making a presentation.
Standing next to a tree, Celine reached for it, anything to keep her weak legs from failing. “That is…” What did one say to this? Horrifying? Amazing? Confusing?
“There is more. I have to show you how I am able to heal so quickly. And after perhaps we can talk about the scars.”
The whys of this did not matter. This was the man she loved, she wanted no other man, had never wanted another man or known one like Étienne. She knew their souls were bound. Celine stepped away from the tree and into the water. She wrapped her arms around his waist, and raised her hands, her fingertips grazing the raised scars on his back.
He flinched.
“My scars. They are not new. They were…” This was far more difficult than he thought. “I was a long time ago. Ages ago.”
Celine surveyed his face. “That’s impossible.”
“Some would say seeing ghosts is impossible.”
“Then how do you… How are you… You don’t look like you’re that old.”
“I was killed by a vampire. Or almost killed. A witch cast a spell that kept me from dying, but it changed me.”
“Changed you how?”
Étienne studied her eyes. The time was now. The test had come. He’d give his tiger the reins, but not for a full shift.
“Give me your hand.”
She held it out.
Étienne took her hand, then closed his eyes, praying his tiger wouldn’t push too hard. A searing sensation in his gums, then the lengthening of bone matter signaled his canines had come in. Opening his eyes, he placed her index finger on his bottom lip, kissed it and said another prayer.
Celine’s finger rested on Étienne’s bottom lip. His eyes opened.
She gasped.
There was a rippling silver flame coursing through the light brown of his eyes.
“Your eyes,” she whispered.
He gripped her finger tighter and parted his lips, then rubbed her finger against his teeth.
She jerked her hand back. “Oh, God, you’re… no, you can’t be, you go out in the daytime. Vampires only come out at night.” She shook her head as if to clear it. “What are you?”
“Keep watching.” Étienne’s voice was almost a growl. He held out his arm, giving his tiger more leeway.
His skin began to undulate, rippling, black and white stripes forming beneath the surface.
“You’re…” She pursed her lips, eyes wide. “No. I’m too confused. I’m seeing things.”
“Do you want to see me in my full form?” Étienne barely managed to get the words out. His own voice distorted by the tiger’s presence.
She nodded.
“Trust me?” God, he was losing his voice. His tiger was overtaking him.
“With my life.”
That was the key that gave him the permission he needed.
Within seconds, and with very little sound except a slight creak and a crunch, Étienne’s tiger was in his skin.
Étienne kept his eyes downcast. He didn’t want to see the horror in hers. He’d do nothing if she meant to leave him. He’d do nothing at all.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Celine didn’t move. She wasn’t sure she could move if she’d wanted to.
Right there, next to her, in touching distance, a white tiger stood before her, more magnificent than any being she’d ever seen.
The tiger’s gaze was cast down, his eyes focused on the ground between them.
This was the man she loved. This was how he conquered death, with the help of a witch.
This was her Étienne. More than anything, he was her man. She needed no ring to make that be, it simply was, as sure as the sun was above and the moon would follow, this was the man for her.
Who else would she have, a woman who saw ghosts? A bubbling laugh of joy rose in her throat, but before she could release it, she noticed that Étienne’s tiger still was not looking at her.
She bent low, kneeling, looked in his tiger’s eyes, now a dark blue color. She leaned in, breathing the same air the tiger was breathing.
She reached out, wrapped her arms around him, his fur thick and luxurious, his muscles rippling beneath her fingertips.
And still, though she’d looked in his eyes, he refused to raise his.
“Étienne.” Her voice was not much more than a whisper, carried on the breeze, nearly eclipsed by the creek’s gurgling.
He huffed, a gentle sound that released a puff of warm air, striking her on the cheek.
“We are together. Forever. There will be no others. Can you turn back to yourself so we can talk?”
The tiger made a chuffing sound, and before her very eyes, once more, the man she loved appeared.
Later, she would dwell on the sounds and the visions of his morphing from one form to another, but all she could do now was drink in the vision of him.
“You are not bothered by the tiger?” His voice was hoarse.
“No. He is… He is you. Tell me about the scars.” She touched his shoulder, saddened when he flinched. “Sorry. I did not mean to hurt you.”
“No, it is not your fault. You didn’t hurt me. I’m… no one sees those. No one touches those.”
“Tell me about them,” she said, though in her heart she knew what she would hear, and she knew hearing it would break her heart, just as thinking it did.
And so Étienne told her of the cruel overseer, of his grandmother’s death, of the vampire, and the witch’s saving spell, and that he’d lived in the North for a long time. He had more to tell, but he paused, drained.
“The place you lived? When you were not free?” Her voice was filled with emotion and hollow with pain.
“Arceneaux Plantation.”
A tear had made its way from the cage of her lashes and wend its way down her cheek.
“And…” She paused, rubbing her temple, chewing on her bottom lip. “And your father? Your mother? If your grandmother raised you, what happened to them?”
“My mother died in childbirth.”
“Giving birth to you?”
He nodded.
“Her name?” Now she chewed on her finger.
“Olivia.”
“Olivia Duchene,” Celine said.
“How… how could you possibly know that?”
“When I was cleaning out my father’s paperwork, I found his journal, I saw it, once from long ago. He was younger than I am now. He was in love with a woman called Olivia Duchene. Then she was gone from his life. He wrote that he never loved another woman like that.” She froze, her eyes wide. “But you… No. You can’t. You can’t be his son. You’re too young. He…” Vigorous headshaking. “No. It can’t be.”
Étienne took her hands. “It is.”
“So
your grandmother’s name was not Amelia?”
“No, it was Marguerite, the stone at the grave where I was the first time you met me.”
“Father never knew about you?”
Étienne shook his head.
“Oh, the heartbreak. The heartbreak of those lives.” Celine burst into tears.
“No, love. Do not cry. Do not be troubled. Those times are past. Phillip and my mother…” He exhaled deeply. “…they lived the lives they lived, based on…” Another exhale. “I cannot carry my anger forever. I have to find goodness. I found goodness.” He kissed her temple, his lips brushing the soft hairs, his nose taking in the scent of this woman, his tiger relishing her essence as he breathed it in. “I found you.”
“I never imagined anything could be like this. Never.”
“It can be so much more, if you’ll be mine.”
“I already am.” Her eyes glistened, her tongue ran the course of her bottom lip.
“Ah, woman. You know not what you do to me.”
“I’d like to know. All of it. Everything.”
Étienne did not need more of an invitation.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Étienne’s breath was warm on Celine’s neck. A shiver washed over her. Her body on fire for him, she ached for his touch, and a yearning gathered somewhere south.
Her need for Étienne was fierce. Étienne awoke a part of her that needed to be taken and claimed by him. She could no sooner deny herself the pleasure of Étienne than she could her own breaths.
He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. His lips dove in, taking hers, conquering, claiming. She pressed against the muscled length of his body, drew her fingertips across the scars, traced them lightly.
His need for her pressed between them, a demanding, pulsing reminder.
Celine wrapped her arms around his neck, her knees weak, and her body quivering.