Goddess of Fate

by Alexandra Sokoloff

  “Well, I was there,” she said. “When you got up, it seemed like something had happened or that you’d seen something...”

  “He tried to kill me,” Luke said, shocking himself. He hadn’t intended to say it at all. Even more shocking, she didn’t seem surprised.

  “Crazy, huh?” he said, meaning himself for thinking it.

  “Yes, he’s crazy,” she said seriously.

  “You mean...you believe me?” He looked at her. She didn’t seem to be joking at all.

  “Of course. It totally looked like he was trying to kill you.”

  “That’s wild,” he mumbled. “Why?”

  “Some people are just bad,” she said.

  “What should I do?” he asked, not really expecting an answer; he just seemed to say exactly what was on his mind when he was with this girl.

  “Be careful. And don’t forget.”

  “Forget?” He stared at her. “How could I forget?”

  “You’d be surprised what people forget.”

  He kept looking at her. She was the strangest girl; she seemed so sweet and...untouched, but there were times she didn’t really talk like a high school girl at all.

  “I can’t figure you out,” he said aloud. He watched her cheeks turn crimson, a lovely thing to see. She blushes like a girl, though. All girl. It made him feel...all male.

  “This is all just so weird,” he said, and she looked up at him.

  “What is?”

  “This. You. The fight. Everything. I feel like...” He struggled to put it into words. She was just watching him, totally present, as if there were nothing in the world but him. Her steady focus made him able to grasp his roiling thoughts. “I’ve pretty much lost my scholarship. I should be off killing myself or something.” He looked down at her with total surprise and realization. “But I don’t feel like it, somehow. Maybe this is the best thing that ever happened to me. Maybe I don’t want to play ball, work my ass off for another coach I can’t stand and crash into other lunkhead guys like me until I’m too tired to think.”

  “What would you do instead?” she asked, and instead of the question being accusing and confusing, it was like a door opening, a door leading to all kinds of possibilities.

  “I don’t have to start college right away. It doesn’t have to be Stanford. I’d like to do something else completely. Go dig people out from under that mudslide in India. Go build houses somewhere for a year for people who need them. Make something that would last.” He stopped in surprise. But once it was out of his mouth, he knew it was true.

  Her eyes were shining as if she were really, truly interested. Interested in him, interested in his dreams...

  “Well, there are all kinds of programs for that,” she said. “You could do that.”

  “You don’t think it sounds stupid?”

  “Of course not. I think it sounds like you.”

  Instead of wondering how she could know what he did or didn’t sound like, he was thinking that he never really stopped to think what he wanted to do. He would go along with what everyone else was doing or what it seemed like he was supposed to do, and he would always do it really well so it seemed like the right thing to do. Which had all made sense when he was a kid. But now...

  “Now I feel like...”

  He wasn’t sure how to finish the sentence, because she was looking up at him with those clear, clear blue eyes, and he mainly felt like he wanted to kiss her. He couldn’t stop looking at her. And she smelled...she smelled just like honey, which felt like it should have reminded him of something.

  “You feel like...” she repeated, but she was breathless.

  I feel like this means something, is what he wanted to say, but instead of that he kissed her.

  Her soft mouth opened under his and he had a full-body rush of hormones. This time it was different, though. This time he felt for the first time like a man kissing a woman...not even just a woman, but a goddess, a force of desire so powerful it felt divine, destined. He ran his hands over the curves of her body and he felt it was every woman’s body; she was every woman he could possibly want. Soft, so soft, and alive and yielding and waiting...and he felt a powerful urge that started from his groin and spread through his entire body, to possess her, to take her, body, mind and soul.

  “Luke,” she whispered into his ear. He kissed her neck, and felt her shaking. His mouth found hers again...

  Through the tidal roar of blood in his head, someone was speaking. It was Aurora who pulled back, leaving Luke feeling empty and hungry and disoriented all at once.

  “What is this?”

  He finally focused enough to see Val standing on the bricks of the courtyard, legs stretched out to eternity under the microskirt of her cheerleader’s uniform, dark hair spilled down her back. She was furious.

  She tossed a look toward Aurora that Luke couldn’t interpret, and then bore down on him. “The minute I turn my back, you’re off with someone else?”

  Luke was struggling to get his bearings. “Since when are we going steady?”

  Val looked shocked, and injured. A good look for her; although any look was a good look for Val when it came down to it. But this injured thing made Luke and probably any male want to leap to her defense, or lie down and die for her, one of those. Luke felt guilty and annoyed and turned on all at the same time—it was confusing.

  Val looked Aurora up and down. “So this is what you call helping him? You’ve managed to get him kicked off the team...”

  Aurora turned red and now she looked ashamed. It was weird actually; they were acting as if they knew each other or something.

  “She didn’t have anything to do with it,” Luke protested. “And I’m not off the team. I’m just on the bench for tonight.”

  “On the bench tonight, with a scout here just to see you,” Val pointed out.

  “Well, yeah.” Luke shifted uncomfortably. It was kind of a disaster.

  Val’s face softened and looked calculating all at the same time. “It doesn’t have to be that way, though. Not if you don’t want it to be.”

  “Oh, they were pretty final about it.” He laughed shortly.

  “They can’t keep you from playing tonight,” Val said. “The whole team—the whole school—depends on you to win. And everyone knows the scout’s coming just to see you. Your glory reflects on everyone. I think we should go have a talk with Coach.”

  “We? Should have a talk with Coach?” He glanced toward Aurora, who had gone silent. She stood watching with wide eyes, but she was staying out of it, which seemed weird. But after all, it was his fight, wasn’t it?

  Is it a fight? he asked himself. He looked from one girl to the other. It was almost like there was something else entirely going on, something a lot bigger than just playing in a game for one night.

  But before he could follow that train of thought, Val was speaking again.

  “I think you should leave the talking to me,” Val said. “He’s probably cooled down by now and he’d be willing to listen to...reason.” That pause between “listen to” and “reason” said volumes, especially considering that she’d smoothed her hands down her skirt as she’d said it. Another thing everyone knew about Coach was that he was partial to the cheerleaders. And Val—well, no one ever said no to Val. Maybe she really could pull it off...

  Suddenly his scholarship didn’t look so far out of reach anymore.

  “You think?”

  Val looked hurt again. “Luke, you know I’d do anything for you.”

  He hesitated. But it was feeling like he’d just lost his head for a minute, with this talk of digging people out of mud and building houses to figure out what he really wanted. He wanted to play college ball, and move up to pro ball. Everybody knew that. It was his destiny. Wasn’t it?

  Luke looked toward Aurora, but Val slid up to him, and pressed her body into his. “Let me help,” she said softly. “We go talk to Coach, and once we’ve cleared all that up, then you can take me out to discuss Homecomin
g.”

  Luke had a strong feeling he had forgotten something—something vital. Val always seemed to scramble his brain like this. He looked behind her to see Aurora standing in front of all those roses, watching them.

  He raised his hands helplessly. “I guess I should go try. It’s a Stanford scholarship, after all,” he added, feeling confused and a little desperate.

  “I think you should do what you want to do,” Aurora said, and her voice was steady, although he could see there were tears in her eyes. If there was anything that made Luke unable to function, it was girls’ tears.

  He wanted to go to her; he wanted to run away. He didn’t know what he wanted, but she was saying he should do what he wanted...

  What was it he wanted again?

  “Come on,” Val said, deciding it. She laced her arm through his and he could feel her thigh pressed against his...and he started walking.

  * * *

  Aurora watched them go, her heart breaking. Even though she was technically immortal, she felt as if she were going to die. Loki appeared beside her and started rattling on, blithely uncaring about her upset..

  “See? There’s no changing destiny. A mortal like that is always going to be a mortal like that. Especially those warrior/jock types. Always thinking with their...”

  “Oh, Loki, go away,” said a familiar voice. “You’re not needed here. Go cause havoc somewhere else.”

  Aurora looked up through a mist of tears, and saw Lena waving a hand at Loki, brushing him away. Loki looked from one to the other. “Oh, well, if it’s a sister thing...” He stepped onto his skateboard, did an expert kickflip and vanished.

  Lena sat beside Aurora. She didn’t put an arm around her, but she sat so close their sides were touching, a steady, comforting presence. Aurora could smell her light spring perfume.

  “He went with Val,” Aurora said, and dissolved into tears. Her heart was breaking, her world was ending, and even though she knew some of it was just all the stupid raging emotions and sensations of a teenage girl, it was almost too much to bear.

  “I know, sweet,” Lena said. “Remember, he’s just a boy.”

  “Loki was right.” Aurora sobbed. “I didn’t make any difference at all. He still chose football and Val.”

  “You don’t know what will happen. Seeds are planted in the past that blossom in the future.”

  Aurora looked up, with a faint shiver of hope. “It felt like...” Aurora paused, grasping for what she meant. “I thought he was going to go another way.”

  “The seeds are planted,” Lena said. “You can only wait and see how they grow.”

  * * *

  That evening on the football field, Luke threw four touchdown passes for a total of 399 yards, leading the team to a 41-7 victory, while Tomasson raged on the sidelines.

  Luke stood in a daze in the end zone as the crowds in the bleachers went crazy; people were throwing scarves, hats, cups, popcorn boxes in the air. He felt hands pounding his back, his helmet, everything, while the roar of the crowd filled his ears.

  Stanford was in the bag, the scholarship was in the bag, Val was in the bag, everything was in the bag.

  There was only the very slightest nagging feeling that he’d forgotten...something.

  Chapter 7

  Luke woke slowly to the roaring sound of a crowd cheering, a very pleasant memory. His body was stiff, sore all over from the game.

  He opened his eyes, expecting to see his bedroom at Nona’s house.

  He sat bolt upright.

  He wasn’t in his bedroom at Nona’s house, but in some rustic hotel suite, with French doors opening out onto a balcony, and a view of trees so big and majestic he thought he was still dreaming.

  Even more disconcerting—now that he was more awake—he was realizing he was a grown man. He had a man’s body, a man’s beard stubble, a man’s...everything.

  What? When did that happen?

  And then the teenage feeling started to fade, and he realized he had been dreaming.

  A dream so real he still couldn’t shake it; he really felt like he’d just spent an entire day back in high school, with every single second intact.

  He was so disoriented that it was another moment before the real events of the night before started to come back to him.

  He started to twist around in bed and winced at the pain in his thigh and arm. The injuries were definitely real.

  He turned his body more carefully to glance around the room—and drew back in shock.

  She was there, right in front of him, sitting on a footstool beside the bed, red-gold hair spilled down her back, looking at him.

  He was stunned into silence, but then instinct kicked in and he shoved his hand under the pillow, feeling for the Glock he’d secured there last night. It was there, solid and reassuring. He didn’t draw it, because he didn’t feel threatened exactly, even with the potential kidnapping aspect. But he had to get to the bottom of all this.

  “You’re here,” he said, partly just to say something.

  She looked surprised. “Of course. I’m not going to leave you.”

  She really was beautiful in a way that didn’t seem quite human. Not like a supermodel, but there was a radiance about her, a...truth, maybe, was the word he meant. He could smell her, too, that honey scent, and under the covers he felt himself stir in response.

  “I had the craziest dream,” he said.

  Which was crazy itself actually, the fact that the dream was bothering him almost as much as all the rest of it, including the fact that he was even still alive after having been shot point-blank. He moved his arms and legs tentatively, testing them. He felt battered, but it was more the feeling of—well, it was more the soreness of a really good game than of life-threatening injuries.

  You better thank your Norns you were wearing a vest, he thought, and then did a mental double take.

  Did I just say Norns?

  “What was the dream?” Aurora asked.

  Luke opened his mouth to say it was none of her business, that he was getting the hell out of there and returning to civilization immediately so he could get busy finding out who the hell had tried to kill him last night...

  And instead, what came out was, “I was back in high school.”

  She leaned forward, listening in a way that made him feel that he was the only person in the universe. Also, she looked familiar somehow.

  “And?” she prodded.

  The maddening thing about dreams was that they faded so quickly. What had seemed crystal clear to him just moments ago was now infuriatingly out of reach.

  She seemed to sense his frustration. “What’s the one thing you remember most?” she asked.

  “A guy on my football team was trying to kill me,” he said promptly, and immediately was staggered that he’d said it.

  “That’s very scary,” she said neutrally.

  “It freaked me out,” he admitted. “Of all the things I could be dreaming after yesterday...”

  He stopped, overcome by a rush of memories: walking in the dark labyrinth of stacked containers, the white-hot searing of bullets entering his flesh, the glimpse of his blond attacker’s rage-filled face...

  The image of that face melded with the rage on his blond teammate’s face...

  “Tomasson,” he said aloud, in shock.

  “What?” she asked. But it wasn’t because she hadn’t heard, he realized; she was prodding, drawing it out. “What about him?”

  “He was in my dream...this guy from high school. But I think it was him on the pier last night. Tomas Tomasson. He shot me.” He stared into space, then shook his head to clear it. “No. Can’t be...”

  But as he stared into his memory, he realized it could be: that white-blond hair and ice-blue eyes. It was the same guy, younger. Unless he was going crazy...

  “I think it was him,” he said aloud.

  “Sometimes dreams show us things we need to know,” she said.

  Maybe a lot of people would dismiss that
as mumbo jumbo, but not Luke. Like most cops he was a big believer in instinct; it had saved his ass more times than he wanted to count. But...

  “It would be one hell of a coincidence,” he said aloud.

  He threw back the sheets, and winced again at the sharp double stabs of pain from his arm and thigh. He glanced down at the bandages swathing the wounds, and suddenly remembered how she’d cleaned his wounds, the heat between them in the bathroom.

  Focus, he told himself. “I need a computer,” he said. He needed to access Tomasson’s criminal record, and any other information he could find on him. He could log on to various databases with a high-speed wireless connection, but he was reluctant to use his iPhone.

  Because I think someone might try to track me? Is that really what I’m thinking?

  She had said something and he looked at her.

  “I’m sure there’s one in town,” she repeated. “There’s no business center in the lodge—I already checked.”

  The lodge. That’s right. They were in the Sequoias, for some mystifying, mystical reason.

  He looked around for his pants. How they’d gotten off him to begin with, he wasn’t sure, although it wasn’t an unappealing thought to speculate on.

  As if she knew what he was thinking, she blushed, and stood abruptly. “I’ll let you dress,” she said, and moved to the French doors, opening one to slip out on the balcony. He had an urge to grab her hand as she passed by, pull her down on the bed with him, and she shot him a startled look as she passed, as if she knew what he was thinking.

  But he refrained.

  He reached for his black jeans and found them crusted with dried blood. Gonna need some clothes, too, he thought as he limped into the bathroom. He looked into the mirror and stared at himself, the swaths of gauze wrapped around his biceps and thigh. Nothing was bleeding. He’d been incredibly, miraculously lucky. And the sutures were working like a charm. He was impressed.

  “Just eight lives left, pal,” he muttered to himself.

  But a shower was going to be problematic; he’d have to enlist some help. He felt a smile starting at the idea.

  She was standing at the railing when he stepped out on the balcony. Maybe the dizziness was from his injuries; God only knew how much blood he’d lost last night. But he swayed on his feet at the sight of the forest and the bay, taken aback by the beauty and the sheer power of the spot: the massive, ancient trees all around them, the sweeping view of the isolated bay. It was timeless, gorgeous. He closed his eyes and breathed deep of the loamy smell: salt water and cedar and the faint honey of her skin.