Keepers of Eternity

by kimberly

"Wait!" Julienne dashed through the electric doors. Catching him, she turned her head to observe his demeanor while putting on her sunglasses against the glare of the light. He appeared to dislike the sun's brightness, grimacing and putting on his own dark glasses, which he retrieved from an inside pocket of his suit.

  "So, you finally made up your mind." He glanced at Julienne with elaborate mockery. His tone smacked of sarcasm. "This way," he said with a sweeping gesture of his arm.

  When she looked where he indicated, the blood in her veins congealed. Parked in the space was an ice-white Porsche convertible exactly like the one James drove the night he attacked her.

  "Oh, no!" Her hands rose to cover her face. Sucked into panic's tide-pool, her vision wavered for a few terrifying moments. The world around her spun, sending her into a dizzying black void. She'd bought James the car for his birthday in May, hoping it would lessen the hurt when she asked for a separation. The wild thought that he had somehow escaped from jail and followed her to Virginia to finish the job of ending her life leapt into her mind. She froze like a deer blinded by headlights, unable to flee out of sheer fright.

  Saint-Evanston frowned in the direction of the car, then nodded in understanding. "It is a regrettable duplicate of the one your husband owned, I see. Bad memories for you." His words revealed his familiarity with her life.

  Pointing, he shifted her attention from the sports car to a metallic-gray Rolls Royce parked a few spaces behind it. Tobias waited patiently by the passenger door.

  Without actually making physical contact, Saint-Evanston steered her toward the Rolls. "I dislike sports cars, myself," he commented.

  Julienne shivered despite the sultry heat of the southern climate. So hot a moment ago, perspiration soaking her sweater, dotting her forehead, she now felt stone cold. Her heavy sweater clung uncomfortably to her body. She felt she was going to faint if she did not sit down soon.

  Tobias helped her inside, reminding her to duck her head. "Careful, Miss Julie."

  Unable to speak, she nodded and slid onto the leather seat. The interior of the car was dim, cool, shielding her from the outside world but not from her thoughts. She wished she could simply close her eyes and go on to no particular destination, just exist in a quiet limbo forever.

  "Are you going to be ill?" Saint-Evanston asked as he sat across from her, keeping a deliberate distance between them.

  "I'll be fine."

  "Then we shall go," he said. "It is time for you to be home."

  Up front, separated from the occupants in the rear seat by a pane of tinted glass, Tobias set down her case and tossed his battered hat onto the seat beside him before he started the car.

  Julienne stared warily at the man across from her. "It's not home for me, you know." She wished she could still the unease churning in the pit in her stomach.

  Morgan cut her off. "Excuse me, but it is time Cassandra was laid to rest. Believe me when I say I know firsthand old memories are not to be courted."

  "It's hard to put them aside," she admitted, "when they haunt you every single day." She pressed her hand to her forehead. "Jesus, do they ever stop? Is there any escape?"

  He casually slid his sunglasses up on his head and gave her a long, probing stare. "You can escape, temporarily," he said. "We all have poisons we ply ourselves with in search of the perfect oblivion."

  Julienne humbly acknowledged his rebuke. Was he taking an unflinching poke at her recent self-abuses? Or was he hinting toward his own personal torments?

  "But there is no perfect oblivion, is there?" Her words, wavered, sounding weak and strained to her ears.

  "There is, and it usually involves a funeral service," he observed. "Is that what you wanted, lass, to die? You stepped to the edge. Why did you not jump?"

  Julienne felt a lump rise in the back of her throat. It was a question she'd asked herself many times, one that she had never quite known the answer to. As if purposely dissecting, he'd sliced into her subconscious again with his verbal scalpel. He seemed to want to put out the pieces of her psyche for closer examination.

  "I…I didn't want to die," she stammered. "I just wanted the pain to stop." Feeling the pressures of the day's tension, she pressed the heels of her hands into her eyes. Perhaps, if she rubbed hard enough, she could obliterate every brain cell in her head. Stop thinking. Stop breathing. Stop being. She felt drained, a rag doll picked up and shaken by an enraged animal until it came apart at the seams.

  He nodded in brief acknowledgment of her words, one that gave mute recognition to a kindred spirit.

  "The hard lesson is that if you stop feeling the pain of life, you might as well cease to live," he said after a moment's silence. "Pain defines who you are in this world. Without pain, life has no purpose. Without purpose, you might as well be in the grave, for you are of no use to anyone."

  Wishing he would cease his bitter analyses of the emotional agonies bedeviling human beings, she countered, "What about you? Is there tragedy lurking in your past?"

  He responded with a curt scowl. "None that I care to share."

  Julienne could give no response. His incisive words perched in the forefront of her mind like a pestilential bird ready to peck out her eyes. A painful sensation began to work its way up her spine. Traveling her shoulders, it snaked through the back of her neck and straight into her skull. She felt the air around her shift, the pressure on her lungs robbing her of breath. A chilling sweat drenched her, giving rise to a foul odor that assailed her senses. Fear. Her little demon had grown into a giant, knocking at the doors of her mind with ferocious insistence.

  Don't…let…it…in.

  She couldn't fully fathom the dread his words instilled, but Saint-Evanston clearly knew that dark, devouring mental netherworld. Whether it was premonition or self-preserving instinct, all warning signs were pointing the same way. Become involved with him, and he would somehow send her spiraling into an abyss where sanity was a faraway reality.

  It was a ludicrous idea, but she couldn't allay the mental pictures invading her mind. The notion terrified her. Had the troubles in her past merely been preparation toward a final descent into madness?

  Chapter Five

  Arriving at their destination, Tobias stopped the car at Morgan Saint-Evanston's direction at the open gates of the plantation to give Julienne the full benefit of the view of the house she'd spent the first three years of her life in.

  "This is your home, lass."

  Julienne leaned forward until she was practically sitting on the edge of the car seat. Head turned to the outside, she craned her neck to take in as much of the view as the limited confines of the Rolls allowed. Her hands were clenched tightly in her lap, fingers laced. Her knuckles showed white with the great stress she was levering on herself. Her stomach was tied in a thousand knots, her emotions doubly so.

  "I know I've been here before," she murmured in a reverent voice. "I wish I remembered it." Despite the absence of familiarity, this place proved she indeed had a viable past.

  Her inquisitive gaze searched the enchanting view. Inside the boundary of a six‑foot stone fence, elegant beauty surrounded a whitewashed, three-tiered manor. It nestled like a jewel amidst the splendor of sculpted gardens where an amazing variety of plants grew in lush abundance. Bluegrass stretched as far as the eye could see. The late flowers of summer were still in bloom, their delicate colors not yet yielding to the coming fall. Colorful petals quivered gently in the scented breeze rustling the long limbs of weeping willows scattered among magnolia trees and towering majestic old oaks.

  The heart of the plantation, the manor, stood like a fortress, a proud memorial of a South that had been humbled but refused to be broken. The manor evoked the spirit of the splendid antebellum era that had flourished over one hundred and fifty years ago. The ample dwelling had been founded on some of the richest earth in the state, which was one of the original thirteen in the Union, soil which in bygone days produced bountiful crops of cotton and tobacco. In the last seventy
years, the farmland had not been cultivated. Wrought iron fences led to the grounds at the back; outside them, trees and blackberry brambles mingled with wild ivy that threatened to smother everything it wound its choking stems around. Blackthorne Manor was truly isolated, gradually succumbing to the wilderness that wanted it back.

  "What do you think?" His compelling words prompted her to look into his steely eyes.

  "It's beautiful." Her words seemed inadequate to fully express her feelings.

  Saint-Evanston leaned back against the leather seat, observing her reaction. His disposition had mellowed since he left the city, but not enough to allow an easy familiarity to develop. Unfazed by the grandeur he had seen time and time again, he wore imperturbable stoicism like an elegantly tailored garment.

  Julienne used his retreat into silence to examine her impressions of the man thus far. It seemed to her that he was taking great care to remain aloof and detached. Moreover, he couldn't quite conceal the fact that he was ambiguous about welcoming her element into Blackthorne's fabric. She wondered why he'd even bothered contacting her. Was it because he harbored a deep guilt about the past? Perhaps a past he could not let go of until he'd made amends with Cassandra's daughter?

  To better take in the sights outside, she lowered the tinted window. He shot her a glance of disapproval as the day's brilliance flooded the dim interior. He lifted a hand to visor his eyes and frowned, indicating the open window with a wave of his hand.

  "Please, caile, the sun irritates me."

  Julienne gave him a questioning look. She'd noticed he had an aversion to the daylight when they'd exited the airport. Given his pale complexion, it was clear that he did not spend his days out-of-doors. Perhaps he was allergic to the elements, or had vision trouble. She closed the window, asking, "How many years has the Blackthorn family lived here?"

  He lowered the hand shading his eyes. "Over two centuries, since the bloodline emigrated from Hibernia."

  Julienne's forehead wrinkled over the unfamiliar word. "Hibernia?"

  "What the Romans called Ireland," he replied. "Look at your flame-red hair and green eyes. You hail from good Irish stock."

  Julienne smiled, pleased by his offhand compliment. She felt the ice between them thawing a bit. He was slowly exhibiting some acceptance of her without flinging a verbal barb immediately after.

  "I want to know more about my family." A wistful tone colored her words. "What an incredible history this place must have."

  "Indeed, it does." His expression was finally showing a bit of interest and animation.

  Encouraged by his reaction, she urged him on. "Tell me about the house. It's magnificent."

  Saint-Evanston shifted so he could look directly at her, crossing his legs and lacing his fingers around one knee. "The foundation of the manor you see now is built of stone quarried in the late sixteenth century. It has burned down several times through its history, once in the Revolution and twice when the Unionists set it afire in the war between the North and the South. In all the fires, only the original stone walls were untouched. Blackthorne Manor was rebuilt a final time at the turn of the twentieth century."

  "Quite a history," she commented.

  "I know it extensively." Saint-Evanston pinned her under his direct stare. "And stories about the ancient Blackthorne clan abound. The local people claim Celtic druids created this place as their sanctuary."

  "Druids?" she asked. "As in witches and the like?" She recalled her encounter with the woman in the airport. They destroyed your mother with their practices. You're next. Mark my words. She was sure she hadn't misheard. Were the practices she spoke of…witchcraft? Surely, the idea was ridiculous. After all, this was the twentieth century, not Salem during the witch trials.

  "And the like," he replied vaguely. "Many believe their occult influences linger here to this very day." He did not offer clarifying details.

  Mulling over his last comment, she reached into her purse and extracted her first cigarette since boarding the flight to Virginia. She removed the last one from its rumpled pack and placed it between her lips. "You mind?"

  Saint-Evanston gave a conciliatory wave. "If you must. Please continue."

  "Thanks." While Julienne searched for her lighter in her purse, she asked, "Do you believe the stories?"

  She glanced up to see a shadow of unease cross his features. As quickly as it had come, though, it vanished.

  "I am half-Irish," he answered. "We believe all tales of supernatural lore. It is in the blood."

  "Ah, I see." Finding the lighter, Julienne lit her cigarette. She doubted he believed at all. Morgan Saint-Evanston didn't strike her as the type who'd have the patience for elaborate rituals, be it established church or pagan. He struck her as one more analytical, ready to debunk myth rather than create it. She also suspected that he did not go out of his way to accommodate people who did not interest him. Allowing people to perpetuate the tales probably amused him.

  "By all means, pound another nail into your coffin," he said dryly.

  "As fast as I can." She coughed when the first smoke hit her lungs.

  "Then far be it from me to let a lady indulge alone."

  Saint-Evanston unexpectedly leaned forward and snagged her cigarette. Tearing off the filter and discarding it, he lifted it to his lips and took a deep drag, exhaling a cloud through his nostrils with the finesse of an experienced smoker. Settling back, he gave a quick artful wink through the drifting curls of smoke.

  "Hey!" she protested. "That's my last cigarette."

  "My first in three years," he countered.

  "So, you were a smoker." Julienne was secretly delighted. At last, he was showing a bit of personality. She would have gladly sacrificed a whole carton of smokes if it meant he would lighten up and pull that feather out of his uptight ass. And he smokes without a filter, she noted. Damn, he must like them strong.

  "Filthy habit," he opined, ignoring her statement. "I can see you are going to cause me to resume this vice."

  "So, who says you have to start again?" she demanded.

  "Weak of will." He reached toward the ashtray and flicked off the ash. "I cannot resist sin."

  "I see," she said, as if in serious thought. "Since your Irish half is wound so freaking tight, it must be the other half luring you into such temptation."

  His expression turned into a question mark.

  "You're half-Irish and what else?"

  "Why do you wish to know?" A hint of suspicion clouded his dark eyes.

  "You said it first. Jesus, can't you answer a simple question without trying to talk your way out of it?"

  He considered the cigarette in his hand, watching the thin haze it emitted drift up and dissipate. "To assuage your curiosity, I am also Spanish. Basque."

  "Born in Ireland?"

  His easy mood vanished. "For the love of the gods, caile," he said in exasperation. "Of course, I was born on the old sod, as were most of your Blackthorne ancestors. Now, are you quite satisfied?" His brisk tone made it crystal clear that he did not want his privacy further invaded.

  Julienne pulled back, reminding herself that thawed ice could also be dangerously thin. She was treading too heavily and had aroused his pique.

  "If you were as old as I thought you'd be, I could understand your stern nature," she volleyed back airily. "About fifty, aren't you?" Verbal revenge for taking her last cigarette.

  He executed a pointed draw on the cigarette and sent a stream of smoke her way. "I assure you I am nowhere near that age."

  "Fortyish?" She reached up and indicated the curtain of hair across his brow. "The gray gives away so much," she grinned, amused over his irritation. She had fired over the port bow and scored a direct hit.

  "The ifrinn, hell, it does!" He pulled down a portion of his longish bangs to survey them. Sighing, he swept his hair away from his forehead. "Fine. I will accept your assessment. I am old."

  "Vanity is a sin, too, isn't it?" she inquired innocently. It was almost impossible to
keep a straight face. Grief, but she was beginning to enjoy this carefree jesting. She was truly fascinated by this man and recognized that his humor, when he allowed it freedom, was dry and cutting. She was no longer taking offense at his sniping remarks. He was honest, brutally so, and she admired that. She wished she could be such herself.

  "May we forego the discussion of my age and turn the talk elsewhere?" He took a long last drag off the cigarette before crushing it out in the ashtray.

  "Of course," she giggled, then assumed a fittingly serious expression. "I'm sorry, really. I just expected you to be, well, older." A hurried working of mental math told her that if he were only coming up to forty, he'd have been sixteen, maybe a bit younger, when she was born. It was not entirely impossible, from a biological point of view, for a teenage boy to impregnate a young woman. Cassandra was only eighteen when she'd given birth.

  "You are recalling me from the perspective of a young child," he reminded. "Naturally, I must have seemed old to you even then."

  "Taller, too." Julienne could not resist the jab.

  His stern face relaxed for a moment and he rolled his eyes with pointed exasperation.

  "I just want to know a little bit about you," she continued. "Is it so terrible? We are…" she hesitated, almost afraid to say aloud the last word, "…family."

  "Curiosity killed the cat."

  "Satisfaction brought it back."

  He inclined his head in silent acknowledgment of her swift comeback but offered no accompanying smile.

  "What about you and my mother?"

  The words popped out of her mouth before she could stifle them. She was relieved. She'd finally gotten the courage to ask the question. His expression harbored a shadow of guilt before he visibly donned his mantle of poise. "What happened is a long story."

  She could have sworn his tone was laced with regret and longing. Had she hit a nerve that was still raw? "Going away from here killed her."

  "I did not force her to leave." His voice was low, patient. "She went of her own will."

  "She cursed your name. You know that."