Forever Trilogy 3: Angel Eyes

by Quinteria Ramey;Brandon Alston

  He studied my face while I thought over his words. Then he leaned over and kissed my cheek, leaving his lips close to my ears. “I can’t help but feel like we should make the most of what moments we have. If the vampires come back…”

  “…Both of us might not make it,” I finished. There was silence after that.

  How many other teenagers were thinking about death right now? And how many of those few had actually experienced it as Darren and I both had? It was one thing to know that life was fragile, it was quite another to already be cracked.

  “Let’s do it,” I said. I tried to sound as confident in this decision as he was.

  He leaned down to kiss me, his hand finding my thigh. It certainly got my attention.

  “Just what do you have planned for this little getaway?” I asked. As my cheeks flushed, I suddenly found myself feeling very vulnerable.

  He ignored my question and asked one of his own. “Ana… you love me right, like forever?”

  He was usually joking when he questioned my feelings for him, but his face was suddenly so intense that I swallowed. His eyes were probing my own.

  “I’m completely in love with you,” I replied.

  His features softened. “Good. Tonight’s going to be a night we can remember forever. Even if something happens to me in the near future— if you can’t help me the next time— we’ll always have had tonight, okay?”

  I nodded, and he kissed me. I kissed him back, pressing my lips to his with force, perhaps too much. It was a hungry kiss, one that revealed just how much I really did fear losing him. I was kissing him like this was the last kiss we would ever have.

  Darren’s words brought London’s warning to my mind. “Either you will fail and watch Darren die, or you will succeed and see Tristan dead because of it.” I had failed, my wings had been clipped. And like she said, I had watched Darren die. I had seen it through his eyes. I had felt it with my own body. But he had venom in his system, he’d been brought back to life. Surely then, I’d found a loophole in London’s prophesy, there was no reason that he had to die again. Right?

  So why did I feel so uneasy?

  And then it hit me. I remembered what else she had said to me. “You can’t have them both, Ana.”

  I had managed to keep both Darren and Tristan alive, but somehow I knew that wouldn’t be true for very much longer. The sick feeling that emerged in the pit of my stomach was telling me one thing: I had only succeeded in delaying the inevitable. I had only loved twice in the whole history the world, and one of those loves was going to die.

  Given the fact that I hadn’t so much as laid eyes on Daemon yet, it was looking like it would again be the boy whose arms held me close.

  Chapter Three

  Burned

  *Ana*

  Eventually we were able to pull ourselves apart for long enough to join in the celebration.

  Cheers and squeals rang out from inside the large tents, accompanied by loud clinks, clangs and explosions. I couldn’t imagine what kind of show was being put on in there.

  The festival was much bigger than I’d thought. From my balcony, I could only see the large tents as they were being set up and had mistakenly assumed that was all there was. But what stretched out beyond the wall of large tents was a sea of smaller ones, peppered with booths and little food carts. Smiles were everywhere, as was the sound of laughter. It truly did seem, at least for a night, that our troubles were behind us.

  We caught up to Taylor at Chris’s booth (again, no surprise). He was sitting on a slender strip of wood, above a large vat of what had to be freezing cold water (you could see the ice cubes floating in the water, with other guardians constantly adding more by the bucket full). Taylor had already been put to work; she was passing out tickets to throw balls at the small target, which, when hit, would cause the wood to spin, dumping Chris into the bone chilling waters beneath him.

  We watched several guys from school— most of them young guardians as well— have a go at it before Darren decided that Chris was much too dry for his liking. Chris had gotten pretty comfortable up there after seeing so many fail and began to taunt the crowd.

  Darren’s first ball sailed high over the target.

  “Wow,” Chris called. “Someone’s gotten a little rusty. Guess that’s what happens when you give up your spot on the team for a girl. Makes you soft!” He stuck out his tongue at me. Taylor doubled over, red cheeked and giggling.

  Darren was laughing too. “Okay Mr. Dent, if that’s how you wanna play it.”

  He tossed another ball and this one must have missed the target by mere centimeters.

  Chris crossed his arms and began to shake his head. “Think about it, Ana. This wimp could be the father of your kids one day!”

  I took the last ball from Darren’s hand. The small crowd that had gathered around his station “oohed.”

  Chris almost fell into the water just from laughing at me. “Angel or not,” he shouted. “I betcha still throw like a girl!” He was laying it on pretty thick, and the shot he took at me had brought out a roar of good natured “boos” from the spectators.

  I reached back and let the ball fly. It was heading straight for the target, but had run out of steam too early, dropping off well short of the target. But suddenly it rose again, smacking the target dead center.

  Chris’s jaw dropped. “The sign says no magic—’”

  Chris had disappeared into the water before he could finish his sentence. Given the amount of cheers that went up as a result, not many people would have heard him anyway. I gave Darren a big smile for his assistance, but he shook me off, denying that it was him that had helped me. That’s when an unfamiliar blonde lady turned and shot me a wink. I guessed that she had taken issue with Chris’s “throw like a girl” comment. I mouthed a “thank you” and she returned a smile before running up the stairs to help Chris out of the water.

  We made a couple more stops after that. First, we stopped by a small oddly shaped tent where a slender man bet us that we couldn’t “catch” our own shadows. Turns out, he was right. We only succeeded in looking ridiculous. Darren more so than I. Next, we ventured over to the largest of the three big tents. The spooky looking lady standing near the entrance warned us that we were entering a “haunted forest.” It was dimly lit inside the tent and fake trees had been set up to force you down a predetermined path. Things jumped out of nowhere and bright lights flashed at random times. Darren used the excuse to pull me under his arm. As the exit came near, the small amount of light vanished, leaving us completely in the dark. Suddenly, the lights came on all at once and we were surrounded by zombies carrying bloodied knives. Unfortunately, one of the zombies was so obviously Helena that I ended up pointing and laughing. Princess or not, the “killer” zombies weren’t very amused.

  As we stepped out of the back, Darren smiled at me. “Time to go.”

  **********

  As we navigated the deserted back roads of Old Brighton, I was tempted to slip into Darren’s mind. He’d been very secretive, refusing to tell me where it was we were going. I could tell that whatever he had planned, he was nervous about it.

  I decided to tease him a bit. “You know that I could just read your mind, right? I could uncover your brilliant little plan without you ever knowing.”

  He flashed that handsome smile of his. There was something so self-assured about it. “Do I look worried?”

  Curiosity got the best of me. I tapped into his thoughts, but only briefly— just long enough to get an image of a lake. For a moment I was confused, but then I remembered that Darren’s family owned a lake house.

  A memory played in my head— the morning of my first ride to Heathwood. My grandmother, Darren, and I were all in the ballroom, and my grandmother had taken the opportunity to run down her entire list of do’s and don’ts where I was concerned. She barely acknowledged my existence now. Anyway, I distinctly remembered her warning Darren not to stop at that lake house for any reason. I was just begi
nning to understand that Darren had quite the reputation, especially when it came to the ladies. The lake house was his little bachelor pad for all intensive purposes.

  I found myself feeling slightly bothered by the fact that he was taking me to the place where he’d romanced so many other girls in the past. But then I thought about everything we’d been through, the way he looked at me before a kiss, or the way he touched me during one… I was the girl who had tamed his heart.

  I sat up in my seat. Those pleasant thoughts had been interrupted by a violent image—flames.

  “What’s wrong?” Darren asked.

  “St-Stop the car!” I shouted.

  “Huh?”

  “Darren, stop the car!”

  Darren moved us off the road and into the short grass that flanked the pavement.

  He turned his entire body to me. “Ana, what’s wrong?”

  I didn’t answer. I felt half in a trance. I opened the car door and stepped outside. A sparsely filled wood stretched out before me and the sounds of animals reached my ears. I could also hear Darren closing the driver side door behind me.

  “Ana, what is going on?” he asked.

  I didn’t turn around. “There’s something here,” I replied. “Something I need to see.”

  “Out here?” he asked. “There’s nothing but woods.”

  “Wait for me,” I replied. “I’ll be right back.” I entered the woods at a full sprint, sidestepping the thin trees as they appeared in front of me. My heart was pounding in my chest, but not because of the run, really, more because of the fact that I had no idea what it was that I needed to see back here. I just had an overwhelming feeling that whatever it was, it was important. I didn’t have to travel very far before I reached a small clearing.

  I knew instantly where I was. If I continued through the slender trees on the other side I would reach the lake, and on the other side of that was my family’s estate, where the Halloween Festival was still going strong. I could hear the soft hum of the music from here. Normally there would be a cabin with me in this clearing, a sort of hidden monument to the love affair that Tristan and I once shared. But there was only ash and charred wood in its place.

  The cabin had been burned to the ground.

  In the three weeks since we’d seen one another last, Tristan, it seemed, had come back to Brighton.

  Chapter Four

  Commitment

  *Ana*

  It was hard to feel comfortable again after seeing the cabin reduced to a memory. I couldn’t imagine the amount of anger it must have taken for Tristan to do something like that. Those memories, our time together, those were things he had cherished. My heart still ached whenever I thought about the fact that he had returned to an empty hotel room after setting the wildfire that had forced the vampires away. He must have felt like I had used him, especially after I’d told him that even if there was a way to keep him alive after killing Daemon, that I would still choose Darren. I tried to reach out to him so many times since that night, but he wouldn’t respond. Though unintentional, I had hurt him again. Only this time it felt different. I got the sense that like so many other things, I had reached my limit. I had hurt him for the last time.

  I didn’t feel like talking when Darren had caught up to me, and he didn’t press me on it now that we were back in the car and headed toward the lake house. Seeing me visibly upset, he’d asked me if I wanted to go home but I shook my head.

  The car was silent when we finally turned off the road and onto a thin and twisty driveway that reminded me of home. Instead of guards, there were trees spaced evenly down the lane, each leaning forward as if to take a peek into the car. It was bitterly ironic that the large house we arrived at had a log cabin façade covering the exterior.

  “Wait here,” Darren said.

  I nodded and he stared at me for a moment. He was totally confused by my sudden change in attitude, and his concern showed in his eyes. Finally he sighed and stepped out of the car. I watched him run the short distance to the front door, and then disappear inside. Lights came on inside the house and it truly did look beautiful all lit up. Once the last light came on, I assumed that he would be right out to get me, but that wasn’t the case. I found myself waiting alone in the car for a quite a while, and I decided to give contacting Tristan one more shot.

  “Tristan!” I felt my mind latch onto his, and his thoughts rushed into my head all at once. They frightened me. Hunt. Kill. Feed. These weren’t the thoughts of my Tristan, but of a predator. The realization that followed gripped me, shook my entire body, and sent me running from his mind. I shivered in my seat. Tristan had done the thing I had most feared, he had given in. He’d fed his hurt and pain to the monster inside of him. Tristan was now… one of them.

  **********

  Darren was smiling when he returned to the car. With one hand, he opened my passenger door, careful to conceal whatever it was he was hiding behind his back. That boyish mischief had returned to his eyes, and he instructed me to close mine.

  “Why?” I asked. His confidence had long inspired my stubbornness.

  He rolled his eyes. “Oh would you just play along?”

  I closed my eyes. “You can’t worry about Tristan again tonight,” I told myself. “This is our time. Me and Darren’s. He’s the one I chose.” The words had gotten the thoughts of Tristan out of my head, but my heart still ached. Severely.

  A blindfold. That’s what he had been hiding. It was soft and fuzzy and it tickled my eyelids when he wrapped it around my head.

  “Not too tight, is it?”

  I shook my head.

  “Good.”

  With his hands, he took me by the shoulders and helped me out of the car. Then he led me to the slender walkway that we followed up to the front door. I could feel my stomach turning inside me. I hated, hated, hated, surprises.

  Again, I had made an assumption and been wrong. I assumed that once I crossed the threshold into the lake house’s interior, the blindfold would come off. It didn’t. Instead, I heard Darren close the door behind me. He took me by the hands and began to lead me through the house. He thought it hilarious when I nearly killed myself on a fold in the rug.

  It felt like we’d been walking for miles before I felt the wind on my face. Apparently we had reached the backdoor, and stepping through a doorway put grass under my feet.

  “Where are we going?” I asked.

  “We… are almost there,” he replied with a chuckle.

  We continued through the grass, with Darren taking a hold of my waist as we stepped down a sloping hill. Once the ground leveled out, he whispered. “We’re here.”

  I felt my heart speed up as his fingers worked the blindfold’s knot on the back of my head. Only, once he had gotten the ties loose, he didn’t remove it right away. Instead, he was holding it in place over my eyes, keeping me in agonizing suspense.

  That suspense had proved to be too great. I reached up and pulled the blindfold down, revealing a long wooden dock that stretched out into the lake. On the very end, a table had been set up, encircled by a sheer linen curtain. Small specks of light flashed around the lake— fireflies— giving the air an added magic. An image of me and Tristan on a boat popped into my head, but I quickly dismissed it.

  “So… what do you think?” he asked.

  I tried to play it cool, but I couldn’t stop myself from smiling. “I think it’s amazing.” Seeing Taylor and Aspen again, the Halloween Festival, this time alone with Darren, it was just what I needed. Tonight couldn’t have been more perfect. Well, save for you know what.

  “Race you there!” Darren took off toward the dock and I followed, in hot pursuit. He let me catch up, which should have been my first clue that something was up. He was highly competitive. The instant I drew even with him on the dock, he wrapped his arms around me and fell backwards into the lake.

  The lake was shallow here, so once I was able to stand up, my neck and shoulders were above the water. I turned my head around, l
ooking for Darren’s head to pop up next, but it never did. As soon as worry began to settle in my chest, I felt something pull me back under.

  I wasn’t prepared for that. My feet had gone up over my head, throwing off my orientation so that I literally had no I idea which way was up. I felt the top of my head contact something solid— the bottom of the lake.

  The issue of needing to breathe was beginning to become a problem. I swung my arms around, attempting to get a solid fix on where the floor of the lake was, all the while determined not to panic. When my arms failed to contact anything at all, fear took hold of me.

  And then he was there. I felt those strong arms of his wrap around my waist, lifting me upwards until my head surged above the water. My starving lungs swallowed the air in huge gulps.

  “I’m so sorry,” Darren apologized, taking a hold of my face with both hands. He leaned his forehead into mine and repeated his apology over and over again.

  “It’s okay,” I said finally, once my lungs had recovered enough to allow for speech.

  “I’ll never let anything happen to you, okay. Know that. As long as I’m here, I’ll always keep you safe.”

  I nodded, rubbing the hands that cuffed my face. “I know that, Darren.”

  “I love you,” he said next. “Always.”

  “I love you too,” I replied. “Always and forever.”

  He smiled. “And you’re always saying I’m the one who’s too competitive.”

  We were soaking wet when we finally sat down to the table. It was a fitting way to commemorate our time together given our history. On the very first day we met we had spent some time in a pond, splashing one another until our arms got tired.

  An enormous steak filled up the plate in front of me, accompanied by some steamed vegetables and bowl of macaroni and cheese.

  “I cooked this, you know.” Darren sat back in his chair looking very proud of himself. The water had made his clothes stick to his body and it was easy to appreciate his thickly muscled physique.