Choices of Fate (Fate Series)

by Chavous, S. Simone

  ✧

  They spent the day locked away in Alexa’s bedroom, talking and making love. She was exhausted, but Ethan seemed to have an unlimited supply of energy. Not that she was complaining, she had never been happier, and he was doing all the heavy lifting.

  It was well after the sun went down when she woke to Ethan kissing a trail down her back.

  “Alexa, Amor, are you awake?”

  She moaned lightly in response. Having just woke up, Alexa’s shields were completely down and she could feel Ethan’s need. They had made love multiple times over the course of the day and into the evening, still he wasn’t sated. Each time they were joined, she sensed that he was holding back something.

  “I love you, Alexa. I have waited such a long time for you, and I know with everything that I am and have ever been that I love you.”

  Alexa gasped, overwhelmed and elated. Feeling bold, empowered by his declaration, she turned, rolled Ethan onto his back and climbed on top of him. She reached behind her and stroked his thick stalk as she looked down at him, searching, wondering what he needed from her.

  She raised herself up and placed his wide crown at her wet and rather sore opening. She slid down slowly gazing at Ethan until he filled her completely once again.

  With him buried to the hilt, she leaned down and spoke softly against his ear.

  “Ethan, I love you, too. I am yours. Everything I have, everything I am is yours. Take whatever you need from me. I will do anything for you.”

  He groaned hearing her sweet words and let his eyes drift to the soft thrum of her pulse at the base of her neck just inches away from his mouth. He knew when she offered herself to him like this she didn’t understand the implications. His baser self, his beast didn’t care. He needed to possess her fully. Just thinking the thought, he felt his fangs lengthen in anticipation. And then her body clenched around him, squeezing his cock like a vise and he lost the last bit of his control. He licked along the length of her vein causing it to rise to his call and closing his eyes, he struck.

  Alexa didn’t understand what was happening. It was if her pleasure had increased exponentially but instead of building from her core it was flowing down from her neck where Ethan was kissing her. As the waves of the mind-blowing climax started to subside she felt Ethan’s body go rigid and suddenly felt incredibly drowsy. The feeling was unnatural, like she was covered with a shroud and being pulled underwater. She began to panic and felt Ethan pull away from her neck, felt the sting of, oh God, his fangs retracting. And then it was dark.

  Ethan paced the room as Alexa slept, trying to understand how he had missed it. The moment her blood hit his system he knew his mistake. She was the one. The girl from the prophecy that he had spent the last two-hundred years trying to avoid. He roared up at the ceiling, knowing that he wouldn’t wake Alexa having placed her under a trance the moment he realized his error.

  This can’t be! She doesn’t have the mark. The prophecy was very specific about the mark on the right side behind the ear. My mother confirmed it last night.

  He strode over to Alexa and turned her to look at the right side of her head as she slept. Even in his state of distress her beauty overwhelmed him. He examined the skin behind her ear, wondering if the mark was simply too faint to notice, but there was nothing visible on her skin. He gently ran his fingers through her hair to move it up and examine farther down on her neck when he glimpsed a dark spot on her scalp about an inch back from her hairline. Gently parting her hair he sighed and climbed into the bed to hold her while she slept. He felt a tear slide down his cheek as he pulled her body close and let the trance lift. This would be the last time he held her and his heart ached with the loss.

  ✧

  Alexa awoke early that morning and smiled as she stretched lazily, reaching for Ethan before the images of him biting her neck came crashing through her mind. She grasped for her neck and scrambled off the bed to the mirror.

  “Oh thank God.” She sighed with relief. It must have been a dream. Though as her thoughts turned to Ethan, that spot on her neck began to tingle. She glanced down to see she was dressed in her favorite t-shirt and a pair of boy shorts. She didn’t even remember getting dressed. In fact, the last thing she remembered was making love to Ethan and him biting her, which had clearly been a dream. She thought hard, trying to grasp the memory of the last real thing that had happened the night before. It was so odd, she hadn’t been drinking yet she felt as if she had blacked out.

  Glancing around the room, she couldn’t find any sign of Ethan. She opened the door and walked out into the hallway, calling out to him, but the only response came from Tilly who was pawing at the door to the balcony.

  “Sorry girl. I didn’t mean to kick you out for the whole night. You probably need to go for a walk, huh?” She turned back into her room and grabbed a pair of comfy jeans, sliding them on as she head towards the kitchen to get Tilly’s leash. As she approached the counter she saw the note.

  Alexa,

  I do not know what to say to you now that will make this easier. Please understand that I would never intentionally hurt you, and everything we felt is real, though you may find that very hard to believe at present. My only wish is to protect you. That is why I must leave. I wish I could explain, but it would only make things more difficult. You deserve the chance to choose your life, a normal life that would never be possible with me. Please remember your promise. As much as you may hate me for this, I am begging you to keep it. You have my heart now and forever.

  E

  Alexa felt light headed. The note slipped from her hand and glided to the floor as she crumpled to her knees.

  CHAPTER 7 - A Desperate Search

  After sitting in stunned silence for several minutes, Alexa hopped up and grabbed her iPhone. She scrolled to Ethan’s name and clicked on it, heart pounding as she waited for the ring that didn’t come. A recording came on notifying her that the line was no longer in service.

  Alexa put the phone down and forced herself to venture outside only briefly to walk Tilly before she grabbed the note and crawled back in bed. She read it repeatedly, going over every line in detail.

  What does he think he needs to protect me from?

  She went over every moment she had spent with Ethan in her head, remembering the feeling of conflict she had sensed at times.

  That was about his family, his parents, and he said they had come around after he visited them, didn’t he?

  But she had felt it after that, right before she told him she was a virgin. She had been so anxious about telling him that she didn’t give him a chance to finish what he wanted to tell her.

  A normal life? What a joke, I’ve never had a normal life. How is he giving me a choice? He is taking my choice away, he decided this all on his own without even talking to me!

  Tilly stayed by her side as Alexa remained silent in thought, occasionally laying her large head across her stomach, silently offering comfort as she had always done. When she brought home the gangly and extremely clumsy ten week old Tilly over three years ago, Alexa hadn’t known how important the Great Dane would be in her life. Somehow, the dog’s company and affection had made Alexa’s loneliness bearable the last few years.

  Alexa climbed out of bed and paced around her apartment, unwilling to accept this. She had to find him, not only for an explanation, but to convince him he was wrong. She knew they were supposed to be together, with every fiber of her being. He wanted to give her a choice. Alexa already knew it wasn’t her choice to make, it wasn’t his either. Their hearts had made it for them. Looking back, Alexa realized she was in love with Ethan from the first moment they met. It was as if their souls had already known each other for a lifetime. Time was insignificant, loving each other was inevitable. It was fate.

  She nervously twisted the diamond hanging from her necklace and an idea came to her. Ethan had donated money to the zoo. She didn’t know where he lived, but someone at the zoo would have his information, they would nee
d to send him a letter to document the donation for tax purposes.

  She quickly dressed and took Tilly for another short walk before hopping into her Lexus and driving to the zoo. As she approached the entrance she was surprised to see the same girl from that night at the window.

  The girl looked up at Alexa, recognition and something similar to disgust evident in her expression.

  “Hi, I don’t know if you remember me,” Alexa lied, “ was here the other night, with Ethan, uh, Mr. Kellar. I was wondering if I could speak with the gentleman that escorted us into the zoo for a moment.”

  “You mean the president and CEO? May I ask what this is about?” she asked in a less than polite tone.

  “Um, well, it’s kind of private.”

  “Well Mr. Ross isn’t here yet. He won’t be around for another couple of hours. Is there something I could help you with?”

  Alexa stood there for a moment as other patrons filed around her to the next admission window. Hell, what did she have to lose?

  “I was wondering if you could give me some information…on Mr. Kellar. I lost my phone and it had his number in it and he, uh, he left his watch in my car. It looks expensive, so I really want to get it back to him as soon as possible. So he doesn’t worry, you know?”

  “Hmm, well, I’m terribly sorry,” her voice dripped with sarcasm, “but we can’t release any personal information about our patrons.” She had a satisfied sneer plastered across her beautiful face. Unable to help herself, Alexa listened in, hoping the girl would think of something that could help her find Ethan.

  I knew it. There is no way Ethan Kellar was really with her, I mean look at her. She’s a freaking mess and he can have any woman he wants. Hell, he didn’t even seem to notice me at the zoo’s charity ball and I looked a-mazing. He has to be gay, that’s the only explanation. In all the times I’ve seen him he’s never been with a woman, except her.

  Alexa snapped her shields back in place. Clearly this girl wasn’t going to help her find Ethan, and the last thing she needed right now was to hear how far out of her league he was. She was however grateful to hear that Ethan hadn’t been dating anyone else recently.

  “Yeah, well thanks anyway.” Alexa didn’t wait for the snotty girl to reply before turning and heading back to her car.

  After she climbed inside and closed the door, Alexa leaned her head back against the soft leather seat and sighed.

  Now what, Alexa?

  Since nothing immediately came to her, she decided to head home, open a bottle of wine and take a nice hot bath.

  ✧

  Sliding into the warm water, Alexa immediately felt some of the tension in her body start to dissipate. She took a large gulp from the glass of cabernet sitting on the edge of the large jacuzzi tub and picked up her pen. Trying to be organized and practical, she was an accountant after all, she had brought a pen and notepad into the bathroom to brainstorm ideas for locating Ethan. Keeping herself occupied and focused on a task helped to dull the ache in her heart that resulted from Ethan’s absence.

  The process was actually soothing. She began listing various ideas, the first, and most obvious of which was a Google search. Of course, someone like Ethan wouldn’t simply have his home address and phone number listed in the white pages, but maybe she could find something about where he worked.

  There’s probably a website for his family’s foundation, that would have an office address, maybe a business contact number.

  Alexa bit her lip anxiously as she considered what she would say when she found him.

  She gripped the dolphin pendant in her fingers, finding comfort in the tangible representation of her relationship with Ethan.

  Straightening her spine slightly with determination, she turned back to the search and her notes.

  If the internet search proved fruitless, she would try going to the club where they met and asking around. Surely he had been there before, and a man like Ethan didn’t go unnoticed. As a last resort she would return to the zoo and attempt to get a personal meeting with the President, but she really didn’t want to risk facing the bitchy blonde again and looking like a desperate stalker.

  Feeling confident in her plan of attack, Alexa slid a little further into the water and really started to relax. She picked up the remote to the iHome on the vanity and clicked on the first song in a new playlist on her iPod that she made the night she met Ethan. She had searched for hours looking for the song that they had danced to, the lyrics were in another language, she believed it was African, but never found it. She did however find a variety of other songs that made her think of Ethan, which comprised the list that was now flowing through the room.

  As she lay there, listening to the slow, sexy beats and soulful lyrics, she started to think about how it felt being in Ethan’s arms on the dance floor that night. She closed her eyes, touching the spot on her neck that had started to tingle and thought about Ethan’s mouth there against her skin. She moved her fingers down along her neck between her breasts, coming back up to circle each of her hardening nipples. All the while she kept imagining her hand was Ethan’s skilled mouth. She continued down, sliding her hand under the water and slipping her fingers between the engorged folds of her pussy. Her hips bucked up involuntarily when she grazed over the sensitive bundle of nerves that was begging for attention. With all the tension and emotion of the day, it was only a few moments before the powerful climax flooded her body. The sexual release prompted another kind of release and Alexa suddenly started sobbing uncontrollably as all of the emotions she had been holding at bay came crashing down.

  ✧

  Alexa awoke the next morning feeling confident and determined. She dressed for work quickly in a smoke colored Armani pants suit and black patent leather Manolo Blahnik pumps. It was one of her favorite ensembles, and definitely one of the benefits of being single and living in a city with a low cost of living.

  She decided the night before that she would put off her search until after work, hoping that given the time Ethan would come to his senses and be waiting at her apartment when she returned.

  She hadn’t even gotten her computer booted up before Jenny sauntered into her office, a long list of questions and thoughts about Ethan bouncing around in her head.

  Did she go home with that guy? Why would he pick her and what the hell happened up at the bar? I wonder if she fucked him. What’s so fucking special about her? Shit, I love those shoes.

  “Hey, Alexa, what happened to you the other night? I don’t know if you saw, but I guess there was a fight or something up at the bar, and we couldn’t find you after that.”

  “Yeah, I saw. There was some drunk guy at the bar starting trouble, and I took that as my cue to head home. Don’t you remember, I was already about to leave before that guy came over?” Hoping to avoid further inquiry from her coworkers, Alexa thought it best to act as if nothing had happened with Ethan. “Anyway, Eli, or Ethan, or whatever his name was offered to get me a cab. He did, and then I went home.”

  “Oh, well did you give him your number or anything? Did he ask you out? I mean, come on Alexa, I know you’re like shy, or don’t date or whatever, but that guy was seriously hot. You had to be interested.”

  Alexa crossed her legs as she turned in her chair to face Jenny. After all, she was Jenny’s superior and they weren’t really friends, even if Jenny tried to fake it. These questions were completely inappropriate in the office. “Listen Jenny, I appreciate your concern, but my personal life is just that, personal. I prefer not to discuss it at work and I really have a lot to do today, as do you.”

  Fucking bitch, Jenny thought before saying. “Oh, yeah sorry, I was just curious, you know.”

  Alexa replied coolly, “It’s fine. I appreciate you including me in social activities, but let’s just keep things professional while we’re in the office, okay? How are you coming along with the TCH Industries tax work-papers? I would like to review those in the next day or two so we can meet the client’s deadline.
”

  Oh fuck, I haven’t even started that. “They’re coming along fine. I’ll have them to you tomorrow or Wednesday to review.”

  “Great thanks, Jenny.”

  Alexa turned to her computer without waiting for Jenny to say anything further. She felt a great deal of satisfaction putting Jenny in her place after the way she treated her Friday night and for all the nasty things Jenny had thought about her over the years. She usually didn’t hold any of it against her. Jenny was actually the senior employee by two years and really took it hard when Alexa passed her up.

  Alexa had moved up extremely quickly, making manager after only three and a half years with the firm. Being a telepath definitely had its perks. Of course she was incredibly smart, but knowing what was expected without being told went a long way.

  The rest of the workday passed without incident. At exactly five o’clock, Alexa opened up her internet browser and typed “Ethan Kellar” in the search field. After quickly browsing through the search results her confidence began to wither. Nothing jumped out at her.

  She continued to browse through several pages of results, finding nothing useful. After about an hour running various searches, Alexa slammed her laptop shut, packed up and headed out, deciding she would just have to drive to the club and ask around.

  Alexa walked into the building and headed through the crowd straight for the bar to a bartender that she recognized from that night. The place was surprisingly busy for a Monday night.

  The girl looked up from wiping down the bar as Alexa approached and took a seat. “What can I get you, hun?”

  “A glass of cabernet, thanks.”

  “Coming right up.” She quickly returned with a glass that she filled from a bottle of one of Alexa’s favorite labels. “Hey, weren’t you here Friday night?” She asked as she pushed the glass towards Alexa.

  “Um, yeah, I was. Work happy hour,” she said before taking a healthy sip of wine.