“You protected me.”
“You are my only friend. I can’t lose you,” I let her smooth my hair. “You helped me that first… awful night.”
Helena took my hand. “The physician comes this evening. He will confirm your pregnancy. And when the child will come.”
I lifted my eyes to hers, my breath catching.
“It stopped snowing the day you arrived,” her voice shook, and I could barely hear her whispers. “The land heats at twice the speed, and I’ve heard that evidence of another sun has been discovered by our astronomers.”
“Another… sun? Two suns in the sky?”
“Only the child can bring the sun. The death of the child will keep the land from burning. That is the prophecy. Our land is burning at double the pace.”
Only the child can bring the sun. I covered my stomach through the gown, staring into Helena’s eyes.
Our child will save the world…
My child with West.
I stared at the wall, my mind recalling the last days with West. The morning we left, he made love to me…
I’d asked him for a baby.
“Oh… my God,” I realized, lying back against the pillow.
It has to be West’s child.
“You must hold your tongue, my queen. Protect yourself.” She pulled the blanket over me, touching my forehead to brush away a long strand of hair. “You have much to do.”
Chapter Four
December 17, 2014
“I do it.”
“Eva, I have to help you. The oven is too hot.”
“I do it!” She stomped her foot, nearly teetering off the wooden step-stool in the kitchen. Her wide, green eyes, so like Roam’s, stared at him defiantly.
“Daddy will help.”
“No!”
West reached for her, and she went completely slack before kicking her feet at his shins. He lost track of how many tantrums she’d had since six o’clock that morning.
Morgan came in at that moment, tossing her keys at the table. “Eva Anastasia Perry. You are going to kick your dad.”
Eva leapt from West, her crimson curls sticking to her crocodile-tear-stained cheeks. “Mo-gan!”
“Auntie Mo-gan wants you to be a good girl on your birthday. Two-year-olds listen to their daddies.” She tucked the toddler’s head against her shoulder, shrugging off her coat. West helped pull at the arms of her jacket, taking it for her.
“Thanks Morgan. It’s been a day.”
“What’s wrong?” Morgan met his eyes before carrying Eva to the table. “Listen sister, I’ve got balloons and a tank of helium. That makes the balloons float. If you’re good, you can help me. Deal?”
“Deal,” Eva giggled as Morgan tickled her sides.
“More nightmares,” he nodded at Eva as her laughter turned into a tired yawn. Lowering his voice, he kissed her forehead. “She can’t talk about them. I’m afraid of what they are… of what she’s seeing.”
“Two-year-olds have night terrors. Common.” Six months after they returned, Morgan changed her major to early childhood education. Her love for Eva was instantaneous, from the moment he placed the infant in her arms at the castle.
She cared for Eva every day while he went back to teach, and West paid for her education as well as for anything else she wanted. She was gracious, taking only what she needed and refusing the extras that he offered, like paying off her car.
“This is something else,” he lowered to the couch, and Morgan sat next to him, brushing her hand over Eva’s hair. “She woke up this morning with a deep scratch across her cheek. It healed by ten this morning.”
“Immortals have the best healthcare.” She leaned back, looking down at Eva’s face. “Sound asleep. She just wanted me.”
“You want me to lay her down?”
“In a couple minutes. Let her get settled.”
He stood up, stretching. Morgan looked away, uncomfortable with her betraying admiration of his incredible body. He wore jeans and a long sleeved, thermal blue shirt that matched his eyes, and his face needed shaved. “I have to get the cookies out of the oven.”
“Okay.” She cleared her throat, leaning back against the couch.
“Your birthday’s coming up. We can’t skip it like last year. We have to have a do-over for your twenty-first.” She heard the cookie sheets slide over the burners before he shut the oven door. “We have chocolate chip… surprise!”
Morgan laughed- Eva’s favorites were chocolate chip, and they baked cookies at least once a week.
“Twenty-one, twenty-two, what’s the difference.”
He bent over her, gently gathering his sleeping daughter into his arms. “Don’t grow up too fast,” his breath smelled like cookies, and she backed her head away, stiffening.
She watched him carry Eva up the stairs, deciding it was time to talk to him. She and Jason had broken their engagement more than six months ago, and the countless hours she spent with West and Eva consumed her life. When she would consider a relationship with West, she would immediately think of her sister, and the impacting guilt sickened her.
“Balloons. Guaranteed aunt maneuver, like Play Dough and silly string.” He rolled the switch on the baby monitor, turning it up to a rushing hum.
“Don’t forget whistles,” Morgan added, waiting for him to sit back down on the couch. When he did, she took a deep breath and turned to him. “Listen, I have to talk to you. This is messy, so hold on, okay?”
West raised his eyes, shrugging. “Shoot.”
“I’m having feelings for you, and I hate myself for them, so I need to… stop seeing you so much. There.”
He stared at her, unblinking. The silence was louder than any word he could have spoken at that moment. She turned and looked down at her hands.
“…and I can tell you did not see this coming, so I am also embarrassed.”
“Morgan,” he sat back, floored. “You can’t even know what you mean to me.” He reached for her, pulling her head to his shoulder. “Please don’t be embarrassed.”
“The guilt is eating me up. I have to go away for a while, from you… I hate that it means leaving Eva, too.”
“I’m used to waiting centuries for Roam. These two years have been the worst, longest two years of my life. But I can’t give up on her. I have to find a way back to her.”
“I get that. I don’t want you to give up.”
“I can’t imagine my life with anyone else.” The resolve in his voice was clear. “One time I could- with Laurel. But Roam is all I will ever want.”
“I want you to feel that way. That’s why I’m going,” she pulled away, sighing. “Jason and I finally feel… over… and I can’t move on with my life when you’re in it… the way you are in it.”
“I’m so sorry, Morgan. I never considered your feelings- feelings that are completely natural, and you shouldn’t be embarrassed about. I’ve been too focused on Eva.”
“West,” she tilted her head. “We’re cool. I’ll be back. Promise.”
He looked down. “When are you leaving?”
“Tomorrow. I can’t skip out on Shorty’s birthday.”
He stood as the doorbell rang, brushing his hands against his jeans and looking out the window. “UPS. Did you order something?”
“No,” she watched him go to the door and accept a small package.
He carried the box to the table. “No return address. But I recognize this handwriting.” Puzzled, he pulled at the tape, tearing the package open.
Inside the cardboard was a jewelry box, small with grey velvet and a hinged top. She watched him open the lid, staring at the diamond engagement ring inside.
“Roam,” he dropped the ring and reached into the cardboard box, pulling at a folded piece of white paper.
He held his breath as his eyes touched her beautiful handwriting, evenly spaced with tall, thin letters.
My baby Eva,
I hope that you know me. In the small time that I knew you, I have lov
ed you more than anything in all of the worlds, and I will always love you this much.
Your father gave me this ring; please keep it, and I pray that you find the great love that I had with your daddy someday.
Be strong, my beautiful girl.
Love,
Mommy
“Oh my God,” Morgan read next to him, reaching for the box. “West, there’s another note inside.”
He reached for the second paper, and she watched his breathing accelerate as his entire body tensed.
Roam will give birth to my child in early September.
I finally found something to do with her other than kill her...
And she is so accommodating.
-Troy
Morgan jumped backwards, flattening against the wall as West grabbed the table by the edges, hurling it over with a strangled cry. She winced as he reared his elbow back, sending his fist into the wall under the stairs.
“West, stop,” she reached for him, but he was already crossing the room to the back door, slamming it with a force that shook the house. She waited for Eva’s cries through the monitor, and when the house remained silent, she followed him to the backyard.
She found him standing barefooted in the snow.
“Two fucking years,” he growled as she got closer. “The things… I imagined…,” he stopped speaking, his shoulders shaking.
“Thank God she’s alive,” she whispered, the cold December air adding to Roam’s bittersweet message. “And she is having a baby… maybe she’s okay.”
He took a step forward, out of her reach. “She must have been so terrified. And I did nothing… I couldn’t save her.”
“Maybe she saved herself,” Morgan kicked at a fallen branch. “She’s alive, and she is having his child, and she said good-bye to Eva in that letter. It sounds like she did what she had to do to survive.”
He turned in the afternoon sunlight, his eyes glassy. “I’m sorry for behaving like that, inside. I’ll clean up. You don’t have to stay.”
She walked to him, raising her eyes to his. “Hey. We’re family. I’m here for you.”
“I just want to be alone.” His words, colder than the air, chilled her.
She shivered, glancing back at the house. “Are you going to be okay? With Eva?”
“Of course I will,” he snapped, and then softened. “I’ll call you later.”
“Okay.”
After she pulled away, West straightened the table and hung one of Eva’s most recent paintings over the hole in the drywall. When he checked on her, she was sleeping soundly in her white, wooden toddler bed, cuddling the yellow bunny that Morgan had given her for her first birthday.
A child. He imagined Troy’s hands, his mouth, his body on hers, and fought to control the powerless rage brewing inside once more. I should never have left without her… I should have left Laurel there.
Whenever he thought of Laurel, guilt gnawed at his stomach. Again and again he regretted going back for her, even though he knew it was the right thing to do. Ultimately, he felt like he traded Laurel’s life for Roam’s, and he would never forgive himself.
Never.
Her letter talked about the love that they had, in past tense, as though she’d already accepted that there was no way back.
She’d have turned nineteen years old in July.
“Daddy!”
He jumped to his feet, skipping stairs to get to Eva as she cried. He scooped her into his arms, whispering and comforting as she screamed.
“You’re okay, babe, just a dream,” he soothed, carrying her down the steps.
“Mommy took me,” she cried, her high-pitched voice an octave lower through her tears.
“Mommy took you?” He conversed gently, settling on the couch. “Let’s watch Pooh, okay?”
“Mommy took me to the hill… and the train.” She pronounced her r’s as w’s, something Morgan worked with her to correct, but West loved.
“The train?”
He stopped reaching for the remote, looking down at her suddenly.
The hill…
Her broken words connected in his mind, and he gripped her tightly.
“Eva…,” he carried her to the laptop at the counter, opening a browser window and typing quickly. “What’s this?”
He clicked on an image of the Johnstown Inclined Plane in Pennsylvania. She reached for a cookie from the sheet on the stovetop.
“Cookie please!”
“What is this, Eva?” He pointed to the screen again. “I’ll let you have a cookie in just a minute.”
She looked at the screen as he pointed, and he felt her hands grasp for his shirt, balling the material nervously in her little fingers. “Mommy’s train.”
He reached for a cookie, carrying her to the booster chair at the table. “Mommy’s train…,” he repeated, already dialing his cell.
Morgan answered on the second ring.
“Hey Perry. Want me to come back?”
“Eva dreamt of the inclined plane. She called it ‘mommy’s train.’ Morgan, Eva passed through… we couldn’t without Troy, but Eva passed through on her own.”
Silence spread over the line, and he thought he’d lost her. Finally, she spoke. “It makes sense… It makes perfect fucking sense… how could we not have seen?”
He glanced at the clock. 4:15. “I need to think.” Possible scenarios ran rampantly through his mind, but each one involving Eva filled him with apprehension. “Morgan, please come back. I’m sorry.”
“Don’t apologize. I’ll be right there.”
He set the phone on the counter, turning to Eva. “Did you see Mommy?”
“Mommy and Daddy,” she smiled, her mouth filled with bits of cookie.
He counted the months since they’d been back. Twenty-four months…
She’s spent almost three months in hell with Troy.
Chapter Five
The very idea that I carried West’s child again gave me the courage that I thought that I’d never find.
Taking care of myself became my first priority. Eating was still difficult; the nausea was slowly going away, but under the stress of Troy so near, I had little appetite. He came to me just as often, but was more careful not to hurt me, for the benefit of his child.
I read the Biography of the Immortal King, shocked to find that he was only twelve years old when he took to the throne. His father was killed in battle, and he had no siblings. He was seventeen when the betrothal was signed, and I married him when I was sixteen.
The prophecy was not detailed in the book, but references to the ‘adulterous queen’ and ‘traitorous knight’ showed up around his eighteenth year. I noted there was no mention of the ‘two-faced, sneaky brother,’ and wondered if Logan’s story was clear in their history. When the world ‘shook from the core’ (I assumed this was the day the universe split) Troy was still in his eighteenth year.
Troy allowed me to solve the civil disputes even after my outburst, and I began to look forward to the court and the people who were presented to me. Troy and I were the entire judicial system, and when he was absent, I was far more vocal with the confidence of power.
The first case presented to me was a couple with a young child, no more than eight or nine months old. The mother insisted that, though the father was paying a form of child support, he had no right to see their child. “If he does not wish to be with me, he cannot be with my baby.”
“My queen,” the young man began humbly, bowing before me. “I pay for my child. I fathered this child. Is he not mine to raise as well as hers?”
I curled my fingers over the elaborate arm rests of the throne, looking between the two of them. “Do you have some kind of… divorce papers? A child support agreement?”
“Yes,” he responded. “I am to pay every month until the child is twelve years old.”
Twelve? The woman scowled at her ex-husband, gripping the whining child to her chest. “He has been a day late three times.”
“I get
my pay on the third-…,”
“Please, wait,” I stood, trying to arrange the yards of fabric at my waist with some kind of decorum. “Sir, your papers will be revised to show support until your son is eighteen.”
“Eighteen years old? That is well over the legal age-…,”
“Do not challenge the queen,” an officer of the court took a step inward from the side, his dark eyes threatening. The man clamped his mouth shut.
I nodded once at the officer, thankful for his interruption. Clearing my throat, I held my palm up ceremoniously. “The laws for the entire kingdom will change. Eighteen. And you will work out a schedule with your ex-husband,” I turned to the woman expectantly. “At least three days a week that he may see his son. Or I will work it out for you both.”
They both bowed, ushered away by the guards. I imagined them being interviewed in the hallway like old episodes of The People’s Court.
Troy received my new law with passivity. “Eighteen. Old enough to fight in my army and make a child of his own. I suppose, my queen, under the authority that I have awarded you, that is your call.”
Dumbstruck, I stared at him, unable to believe he was allowing me to change a law that he had passed himself centuries ago. “You… will let me change this?”
He gathered stack of folders, dropping them into my arms. “You may need a secretary.”
I nearly lost the stack, just making it to the table in Troy’s office before letting the folders fall. “You don’t have computers?”
“Too much freedom,” he shook his head, leaning against the immense, wooden desk. He crossed his arms over his chest, staring at me intently. “Are you enjoying your power?”
Taking a step back, I looked down at my feet. “Thank you, my lord, for giving me some… objective.”
He curled his finger, indicating that I walk to him. I steadied my breath, moving within his reach. His fingers coiled around my abdomen, his eyes meeting mine. “Do you truly feel that our child is… disgusting?”
Choose your words. Think. Don’t speak.
I covered his hands with mine, exhaling slowly. “You are… twice my size… and have killed me many times. When your fingers are at my neck… my lord,” I halted cautiously, searching his eyes, “I have only my words to retaliate with.”
Rise (Roam Series, Book Three) Page 4