Ties That Bind: The Bellum Sisters 3 (paranormal erotic romance)

by Grey, T. A.

  “She’ll die in the process.”

  Alrik looked over his shoulder at the seer. “Then so be it.”

  The seer’s merry laughter echoed around him as he stalked away, his next quest on his mind.

  Chapter Three

  Abbigail stretched her tight muscles as she got out of the car. The sun was entirely too bright today as if it was trying to sear her eyeballs. That’s what she got. It wasn’t the sun’s fault she hadn’t been sleeping well. She’d never been a great sleeper. she was one who woke at the slightest of noises. Her mother said she was paranoid. Whatever she was, she had a hard time sleeping and it didn’t help that she lived alone. At least with a roommate she felt some added comfort and could sleep mildly better.

  Abby pinched her eyes nearly closed to hide the brutal sunlight and grabbed her mail from the mailbox. She pulled out a stack of mail, flipping through the white envelopes as she strode back towards the house.

  “Bill, bill, wrong address, junk, junk, more junk...” she muttered. She paused as her gaze landed on the last envelope. The envelope was tinted yellow, the paper thick and scratchy like parchment. It certainly didn’t look like any kind of envelope she’d ever gotten before. Then again, the companies that sent out junk mail did seem to be getting more creative ways to open their trash mail.

  In tall black cursive letters on the front read: To Abbigail Krenshaw, then listed her address below in the same unique scrawl that looked like something from an older era. No return address. Just a stamp. She flipped the envelope over and her brow drew down in confusion. A black seal covered the vee-closing of the envelope.

  Apparently this was no envelope you licked closed. Certainly not something you’d see from a credit card company trying to get you to apply. She fingered the material and touched the seal feeling the waxy material under her fingertip. She couldn’t make out the seal. It just looked like something official. It had two poles curving left and right on the outside with a regal bird’s head in the middle. Peering closer, she corrected herself. Swords, not poles. She could just make out the handles and the edge of a blade if she looked hard enough but not any details of the bird’s head.

  “What the...” she said under her breath.

  Just to make sure, she flipped the strange envelope back over and ensured that it was indeed her name on the letter. Yup, sure was. A strange feeling filled her, starting in her gut and working up to the back of her neck until the little hairs there stood on end.

  She had to sit down for this. She headed back to the house and plopped down on her sofa. Dropping the rest of the mail on her chipped coffee table, she propped her feet up on it and leaned back to inspect the letter.

  She hadn’t noticed it before. Had been taking in too many other things on the letter, the handwriting, the seal, but now she noticed it. The worn look to it. As if it’d been crumbled again and again or passed between many hands. Where the envelope should be smooth and firm the paper was wrinkled and weak, one bottom corner curved up from being bent.

  “I’m stalling,” she muttered.

  Gathering in a deep breath, she flipped the envelope over and peeled back the seal; it popped off with a soft snapping sound. A heavy ball formed in her gut. It was almost as if she knew what it was before she even pulled the letter out, which had to be impossible. Maybe a part of her did know, could feel it.

  She pulled the yellowed letter out of the envelope, folded thrice. It too was wrinkled, crumpled. This paper was much thinner than the envelope, softer but not wrinkled as the enveloped was. The front and back were covered in writing of the same elegant, heavily-inked hand.

  It took effort to keep her hands steady, but she managed it as she parted the folds and opened the letter.

  She read through it slowly, her feelings so confused she didn’t try to control or understand it. As she read the last word on the page, her chest twisted so tightly it was as if was being wrung like a wet rag in someone’s hands. She took deep breaths, then read it again.

  Dearest Abbigail,

  I’ve started this letter so many times only to throw it away.

  What does a man say to his child? His child whom he’s never met, but watched from afar. I’m afraid, dear Abbigail, that there is no way for me to tell you any of this gently. I only hope that you read this and that you can understand.

  I met the love of my life many, many years ago and I lost her. Taken, stolen from me. She’s been lost for a long time. I was nearly lost to despair, even with my own three girls to raise. I think that made it even harder. I couldn’t break down like my heart wanted to. I couldn’t hide or leave them to search for her. I had to be here, because they’d lost someone special too. That woman was my wife, my Protector, Mary Bellum.

  One day a new light entered my world. It was so unexpected. I don’t know if I could even describe it. My children made me happy, filled me with love, but there was and will always be a gaping hole in my heart. Nothing could fill it, or so I thought. Because the day I met your mother all of that changed. It was like I could breathe a full breath of air for the first time in so long. I wanted to fall to my knees before her and cry in joy. Naturally, that wouldn’t have been very brave of me, so instead I asked your mother out and she said yes.

  She said yes. She changed my life.

  Then, something else that I’d never thought possible happened. She had a child. Our child.

  I can still remember the feeling. It was like so much happiness and joy had been shoved into my chest it might burst. I didn’t know if I could contain it. It was then that I asked your mother, not for the first time, to be with me truly. To come, bring you, and be with me and my girls. She said no.

  Her reasons are between her and me and while I nearly hated her for her decision, I accepted it because I could still be with her. But she had one stipulation: I could not be around you. I wish I could tell you in this letter why, but that is for your mother to answer. Please forgive me. So many times I’ve wondered if I should have pushed her, made her let me have the family I wanted, but she didn’t want it. I couldn’t deny her for anything. I love her so.

  This is where I falter. What to say next? Nothing could ever replace my not being there for you. Though from afar I was. I saw your pictures as you grew up, could hear your small voice in the background when I called your mother on the phone. I heard and watched you grow up into a lovely, smart, and charming young woman. A man, a father, dare I say, could never be prouder than I am of you, dear Abbigail. Please, please believe that.

  The day your mother told me you punched a girl in the face after she started a fight with your shapeshifter friend, I’d grinned in pride. The day your science project won the highest reward in both high school and college and received a scholarship--brought me to tears. Your mind, darling girl, nothing, and I mean nothing, is more beautiful.

  Now for the bad news. I wish I didn’t have to tell you like this. Just once in my life I wanted to pull you into my arms and feel you there, to sit across from you and hear your voice in person. It breaks my heart to think of it. Maybe I should have done more. God, it’s something I’ve struggled with every single day since the day you were born.

  You need to know, that if you’re reading this letter then I am no longer on this Earth. I have met my Great Death and moved on to the next life. Perhaps it’s my own cowardice waiting until now to send it, but I didn’t know what else to do.

  The point of this letter, the point of my writing you is to tell you that I love you. I love you so much that just writing the words on a piece of paper can’t possibly show you just how much I feel or explain how I can love someone so utterly and dearly without ever meeting them. But I do. How I do, Abbigail. Please, if nothing else in this letter, believe that. Believe me. I love you.

  I want you to know you have three sisters. Chloe, Willow, and the youngest Lily. You have sisters. If you’re as courageous as I think you are then I know you’ll seek them out, and I sincerely hope you do. It’s been my hope from the very beg
inning that we could all be a family together. I can’t be there for it, but maybe you all can, without me.

  With all my love,

  May 15, 2011

  Francis Jeremiah Bellum

  Tears formed at her eyes. She blinked and two tears dropped onto the letter, splattering wetly across the words. She rubbed gently at them as she sucked in a ragged breath. She made sure to be careful, not wanting the wetness to smudge the ink.

  She sat the letter on the cushion next to her and stared off at the wall, her mind turning slowly trying to put the pieces together. After some time, her mind returned to normal speed. Her body slowly relaxed, the weight on her chest gradually released. The tight knot in her gut faded. Everything relaxed as best they could considering.

  She knew what she had to do. She just wasn’t sure she wanted to do it. But she had to do it.

  She went to the kitchen and picked up the phone then dialed the numbers she called many times a week. Her mother answered on the second ring.

  “Hey, baby. How you doin’?”

  She could hear the sounds of people chattering in the background. The soft Celtic music her mother always listened to playing gently. She was at work.

  “I got a strange letter in the mail.”

  Silence. Abby’s gut feeling came roaring back to life. She gripped the counter in her hand, squeezing tight to the surface until her knuckles locked; her eyes fixed on some indescript point on the white stucco wall.

  “Mom?”

  “I think we need to talk,” her mother said gently. She heard her mother’s voice break, the sound crushing her heart like a fist gripped it. She could never stand the sound of her mother crying without feeling the same emotional pull inside her.

  Abby’s fist clenched tighter around the lip of the counter. “About what?” she managed to ask over her own clogged throat.

  “It’s about your father.”

  It was then that Abbigail Krenshaw’s life changed.

  * * *

  By time Abbigail arrived at her mother’s magic shop, aptly named Magic Shoppe, her mother had cleared out all guests, sent the employees home, and closed shop. This left the parking lot completely empty except for her mother’s green Volkswagen Bug parked off to the side. The shop didn’t have many employees. Mom had two coworkers under her, both witches, who practiced magic in the same circle as her.

  Her mom even managed to pull in a decent amount of profit off her shop. Abbigail thought the idea was hilarious when her mom first told her some eleven years ago that she’d be opening a ‘new age’ store. She stopped laughing when her mom sold her fifty-year old home with bad plumbing and worse insolation and upgraded to a brand-new two story house in the suburbs. It was far from a mansion but wasn’t close to being a dump either. She was able to do so well because of the ‘new age’ fad that had come and gone, but wasn’t really gone. Her brand and business had stuck around well enough, even with the local humans.

  Humans knew about magic, though some still didn’t believe in it; and some even knew about the demons, shapeshifters, and vampires of the world. Most ignored it because if they didn’t then they’d have to accept something most weren’t ready to. So most people stayed out of each other’s business, except for the fundamentalists. Whenever they got involved, things always got bloody. A slain vampire here, a dead shapeshifter there. Abbigail knew all about it. ‘Course it went both ways when humans wind up dead, but that wasn’t the area Abbigail worked. It didn’t help that she got to see it more often than other folks.

  She didn’t want to do this, but she needed to. Abbigail stepped inside her mother’s shop and stopped. Her stomach twisted with nerves, her hands couldn’t stop fidgeting no matter how hard she tried to still them. Even her legs felt weak like she could fall down at any moment. The music was off leaving the shop quiet except for the soft whirr of the A/C unit. The A/C was a bit of a strange thing in the North of Colorado. Usually by now the temperature was dropping and people were preparing for the cold wet weather to come with winter, but instead they’d had a surprising amount of heat that still lingered in the air.

  “Abby, is that you?” her mother called from the back of the store.

  This is it. She couldn’t turn back now. All those years of never knowing who her father was, of asking her mother over and over again for answers only to get shut down time and again, this was her chance. She’d never told her mother, but that was the reason she’d shunned her mother’s craft. It was petty, she thought, looking back on it, but no matter; that’s just how it turned out. Her mother was a practicing grey witch, could dabble in magic that could heal or hurt and Abby had the same power in her blood. But it seemed that each year that passed growing up, each new birthday she had, each holiday that came and swept away without knowledge of her father, she pushed her mother further and further away. Until now, she only saw her mother on those holidays and birthdays, only talked to her on the phone a few days a week. Even the phone calls they shared didn’t last long. Abby made sure of that. She just couldn’t stand to be around her.

  And now she knew who her father was. That she knew, but what she didn’t know was how to feel about it, or how to feel towards her mother. She heard her mother’s soft footsteps coming out of the office and closed her eyes. Anger, she certainly felt some anger but that wasn’t the overriding emotion, surprisingly. No, she wasn’t very angry with her mother.

  “Abby, is everything all right?” her mother asked, her voice closer, wary.

  Abby kept her eyes closed and focused on just herself, the emotions scattering and darting around inside her as if they too didn’t want to be figured out yet. As if something terrible might happen if she did figure it out--something awful maybe. But even knowing that, Abby pushed as if swimming through the heavy water of her own emotions, and then her breath caught. She found it. It wasn’t anger or surprise or confusion she was feeling. It was pain. Pure and not very simple, pain.

  The words came to the tip of her tongue, laden with every ounce of emotion riding her. Abby spoke before she lost them. “After all this time, I needed to know. I had to know and you couldn’t tell me. Not once. Not after all the begging and the tears and the pleading.” Her voice cracked, tears slipped out of her eyes that were squeezed so tightly, but still she went on. “And now that he’s found me, I’ve found him, he’s dead. I know who he is and I can still never know him. And I can never talk to him, never hug him, never know him.”

  Abbigail wanted to drop to her knees, wanted to curl up in her bed and let her numb body find itself again. She couldn’t do that. Her pride, herself, wouldn’t let her. She only let one sob escape before she clamped her lips shut, slammed her eyes closed and just rocked on her feet, arms wrapped tight around her waist. He’d wanted her. He’d wanted to be there for her but her mother wouldn’t let him. God, she couldn’t even wrap her mind around it. No way. None of it made any sense. The vision of her mother doing something so cruel contradicted the sweet caring mother who’d always been there for her, setting rules and boundaries, punishing her when it was right and always loving; no matter what.

  “I wish he wouldn’t have even sent the stupid letter,” Abby said, slowing her rocking. Her mother was oddly quiet, all things considered. “You know, mom, it feels like there’s a knife in my heart that hadn’t been there before. It’s like I’m being taunted. ‘Oh by the way, I love you and would have loved to be in your life. Too bad I’m dead now.’”

  Finally her mother spoke. “Let me see the letter, honey.”

  Long engrained to answer her mother’s commands, Abby pulled the letter out of her back pocket and handed it over. She kept her eyes averted. She just couldn’t look at her mother right now, because while anger wasn’t the overriding emotion driving her right now, it was second in line and would be much easier to take on. She didn’t want to be angry at her mother. She just wanted to know her dad.

  A few minutes passed while Abbigail listened to her mother’s breath catch, tears clog her throat as
she tried to control it.

  “I’ll tell you everything,” her mother said.

  Anger started to poke its head up. Now you’ll tell me, Abbigail’s inner conscious yelled. Now, after it’s too late to do anything about it! Isn’t that fucking convenient for you, mother. But she didn’t say any of those things that she was really thinking. Instead she got up, her back muscles feeling stiff like they hadn’t been used in a while and went to her mother’s office to take a seat in front of the desk. Her mother followed and sat behind her beat up wooden desk covered in a disarray of pamphlets advertising the store, eschewed paperwork, pens without the caps on, pencils with broken points, three cups of coffee that were probably days old and God knows what else.

  “H-how do you want me to start?”

  “Just...at the beginning, mom.” Abby temples pounded against her skull. She pressed two fingers to the spot and rubbed circles as her mother began to tell her the very thing she’d been begging for her whole life. Funny, but she wasn’t relieved or excited to hear it now; not like she’d thought she’d be.

  “I met him twenty-six years ago. He was so handsome and charming. There was something about him, old world, you know? Like he came from a different time. I felt something special about him and when he pursued me, I agreed. I realized he was an incubus then. I fell in love with him fast. So fast...”

  Abbigail’s chest felt like it was going to explode. “Mom,” she butted in, “can you skip to only the most needed details please?” She couldn’t handle hearing the falling-in-love story of her mother and father. Not right now anyway, when everything felt so raw.

  “Oh, okay, anything you want honey.”

  The knife in Abbigail’s heart twisted even deeper at her mother’s favorite endearment for her.

  “Well, um, I got pregnant. Pretty quickly actually, and, well, I know you know about it from the letter, but it’s still hard to say. He had three daughters already. They were all so precious to him. I mean, he worshipped them. Their mother was his Protector. You know how they are, they get that one person who is sort of like a mate to them and they stay together forever. He loved her. They don’t have to love their Protector but he did--so much.”