Eden's Charms

by Jaclyn Tracey

  “Serrie, I’m sorry. Oh my God! Some guy just grabbed me from behind, swung me around and kissed me like I haven’t been kissed in a long time. After an awkward minute of swapping spit he licked his lips, then apologized. He said he had the wrong woman. Whew! Sweet!” Raven readjusted all her bags under her arms and blurted out, “Do you remember the guard at the manor that always spied on us just before André almost got crowned king?”

  “It wasn’t us he watched. It was all you, dear.” Amazing how one hundred nine years had flown by in the blink of an eye.

  “Remember Donovan?”

  Serina nodded. “Hard not to. He had the dark hair with mysterious olive eyes and a tight tush. I’ll bet Payton and Jonah remember him as well, although, not as fondly.” Serina nudged Raven’s arm.

  Raven grunted. “Anyway, that guy reminded me of him. My tummy’s rolling. I’m famished, and yes, I mean that. I brought a few spare pouches of type O neg. They’re in the limo, on ice.”

  ****

  As she stared out the window of their limo, Raven frowned. Once she gathered her courage, she confessed, “I bit him you know, Donovan.” The weight of Serina’s gaze crushed her. “Desperation took over one night, and he was there.”

  Serina’s voice cracked. “I’m listening.”

  Raven readjusted herself in the seat to face Serina. She took in a large breath and released it slowly. “It was fantastic, Serrie. I remember it as if it were yesterday.” Raven touched her lips. “We ended up naked so fast.” Raven searched Serina’s face. Not even a twitch. “Well are you going to say anything?”

  “Raven, you’re an adult. You’re not married, although it seems like it even if it is to two men. You explored other avenues of your life. There’s nothing wrong with that, and the fact that it only happened once—”

  “Higher,” Raven cut her off.

  “Two?”

  Raven’s fingers pointed upward. “Keep going.”

  “Twenty?”

  A cacophonous grunt echoed through the car. “It happened four times. God help me, I couldn’t say no to him. I didn’t want to.”

  “You had sex four times or bit Donovan four times?”

  “Both.”

  Serina rubbed her jaw. “I’m not certain I want the answer, but is the man who just had his tongue down your throat Donovan?”

  Raven closed her eyes in hopes to hold back the tears. It never worked. She blindly reached for a box of tissues in the console, her hand grasping at air.

  Serina jammed a wad of tissues between her fingers. “Oh, Raven!” Serina cajoled, “We have to find him. You’re his bloodline. You sired him.”

  “Serrie, I’m pretty sure when he’s ready, he’ll find me.”

  “What do you mean?”

  Raven dabbed at her nose and eyes and then pulled the sweater just below her collarbone. “He nipped me in the store.” Ashamed, she turned abruptly back to the window and watched people along the sidewalk meld into one long stream of legs, heads and torsos as the limo sped up. “What have I done?”

  Serina laid her hand on her sister-in-law’s shoulder. Trying to lighten her mood, she asked, “Tell me he wasn’t the one with the Red cap on sporting little red socks?”

  Raven wiped her eyes and attempted a grin. “You and your Yankees.”

  Chapter Two

  June 6

  The House that Ruth Built, New York, N.Y.

  Lucian St. James hesitated purposely, as he produced his best sexy smirk, which worked like a charm every time. “Who do you think will win today, M’sexy lady? The team that finally broke the curse after seventy-six years or the not-so-evil empire?” He egged her on as he led Serina to her seat behind home plate.

  “You’re not the least bit funny, St. James.”

  “Luce, you can’t say stuff like that to her. She’ll get mad and try to juju ya, and we all know how well that goes—or doesn’t!” Payton whispered as he, Raven and Jonah settled into their seats beside them.

  Lucian’s eyes went wide. He put a silencing finger to Payton then wrapped his arms around his wife and pulled her to him. As he slid his hands over her ripe abdomen, her stomach went rock hard and then relaxed. One minute later the same thing happened, each time his wife’s face reddened. Concern crept in.

  “Serina? What is that?”

  “Braxton-Hicks contractions. Been getting the annoying things on and off for the past few days.”

  “You’re certain that’s all they are? Not the real ones?” Lucian asked.

  “No worries. These have no rhyme or reason. And we’re still a few weeks out. M’lord, the baby wants a hotdog with the works, a pretzel slathered with cheese and some water. Ooh, and some cotton candy. I’ll lick your sticky fingers after we’re done.” Serina lifted her eyebrow in a non-prim, non-proper fashion.

  “Would you stop all ready?” Raven teased. “Dear God, woman, you’re pregnant, act like it!”

  A wave of scorching heat blazed a trail to Lucian’s groin with the mere thought of his wife’s lush lips anywhere on his body. Nine innings suddenly seemed a little too much like eternity and although he had eternity on his side, he didn’t feel like waiting to get steamy and naked with his wife. His very beautiful, very pregnant wife. The same little devil that put a restraining order on their conjugal visits until their wee one made her grand entrance into the world. Serina worried he’d poke her head with his penis. Yes, that comment did wonders for his ego.

  A mere two strikes away from the seventh inning stretch, Serina stood in her chair and screamed at the home-plate ump for a bad call against the newest member of the team, number eighteen. She didn’t have to like him in pinstripes, but if she rooted against him? She couldn’t go there. Superstitions were like bad hair days; you had no idea when they’d pop in to haunt you. “Come on eighteen. You can do it.” Serina yelled trying to sound just like one of the characters in the movie, The Water Boy.

  “Ah, so you do like número eighteen.”

  Serina bit her cheeks before spewing, “That’s blasphemous.” She stuffed her last bit of her pretzel into her mouth and then licked her fingers clean.

  “It is not, M’lady. You like him. Admit it.”

  “No—I do not. He’s a transplant a—a—a spy from another team,” she spewed flustered.

  “I agree,” Jonah added.

  “So what if he looks awesome in pinstripes.” That last part she mumbled as she smacked her lips together.

  “I agree,” Raven tossed in. “Love a man in uniform!”

  “I do believe this is a case where the lady doth protest too much. He’s a great player. He was great when he played for Boston. He’s just better now that we have him on our side. Face it, luv, you’d even like a few of the other players on Boston if they were in stripes, specially the one with dreds.”

  Serina laughed as Lucian jerked back away from her just in case she swung at him with the pink, fluffy ball of fairy floss. Like I’d waste this scrumptious little confection on him…

  “Jail-bird stripes.” Serina never turned to see her husband’s reaction.

  With the next pitch careening backward toward her, Serina waited with the patience of a lizard, his tongue ready to snag the first bug that buzzed him. Net or no net between she and the players that foul ball had her name on it. Out of seven innings this was the closest a ball had come. Nor was she waiting for Skippy, the ball boy, to bring it to her. Seemed his interests were well occupied with all the pretty young things who weren’t bursting at the seams with child. Serina jumped non-to-eloquently as only someone eight and half months pregnant could do, over the sidewall and proceeded to waddle as fast as her puffy little feet could carry her.

  “Doc, stop!” Payton yelled, his amber eyes ready to spark. He turned to Lucian. “She’s your wife, get her off the field before we have to go bail her out.”

  Serina took chase after the ball where she found—she too was being hunted down by security. She stopped, picked up the ball—triumph plastered on her face
in the form of a giant smile as the guard closed in on her, then changed her smile to a frown, dropped the ball, grabbed her stomach, and looked down at her feet to see a flood of water spilling from her body. Her new comfy shoes that expanded to accommodate her swollen tootsies were now soaked in amniotic fluid.

  “Oh my God, Lucian!” Serina yelled, with a protective hold on her abdomen. “It’s not what you think,” she shouted to the guard. Fear swiftly replaced embarrassment. “Lucian!”

  Lucian got on the field before she finished screaming his name a third time. He approached the camera operators and asked them, “Please stop filming my wife. Doesn’t the team have a policy of not filming crazy pregnant ladies jumping on fields?” To no one in particular he mumbled, “One hundred years of keeping our identity a secret—blown in a New York minute and on national television to boot. Fuck!!! I can say that coz they’re only bleeding gonna bleep it anyway.”

  “Lucian.” Serina panted. “We’re about to have our baby.”

  “So it appears, my wild rose. So, Doc…Braxton Hicks or the real thing?” Lucian shook his head. Once beside her, he lifted her into his arms.

  “Ouch! Oh, Lucian, put me back down,” Serina whaled. “I think the baby’s got other plans on where she wants to be born. Ah-hoo-ah-hoo…” She practiced her Lamaze breathing.

  “Oh not here, Serina. I knew you wanted to meet your number two, but this?” Lucian gave himself the hand-to-the-forehead slap.

  Just then, as if hearing his name, the team’s illustrious captain and a few other team-mates came out of the dugout to see what the hold-up on the field was about. Serina shrugged her shoulders and gave a little waggle of her hand to them. It was all she had.

  “Ah, just a pregnant lady behind home plate delivering a baby,” One of the players yelled into the dugout.

  Her knees buckled. Lucian caught her before she hit the ground. Was it seeing her all-time favorite baseball player this close up or the ensuing baby? That little devil Mr. “J” probably had women swooning at his feet on a daily basis.

  Out of every scenario Serina had ever played in her head on how to meet the man…this so wasn’t it—breathing heavily, sweaty, and soaked from the waist down. That was supposed to happen after she’d met him! With her dignity barely intact, she managed to squeak out a tight-lipped grin in his general direction. That grin flew out of the ballpark with the next contraction.

  “The baby’s head is coming—now!” Serina panted. She heard people in the stands chanting, “You can do it,” and if she weren’t so scared or embarrassed she’d have laughed, but right now…laughing wasn’t an option. Pain medication… Now that would have been a beautiful thing, she thought, if only it worked on vampiric witches.

  On the ground, surrounded by news cameras fighting for every angle of the lens they could get, Serina pushed, regardless of the stadium filled to capacity of people watching her deliver her child, as others watched from the comfort of their own homes. Lights, camera, action! The first thing to come out of her was a brown torpedo.

  Her dignity was no more.

  She did not just go pooh.

  She’d always laughed when she heard of other women telling of their delivery stories. Funny thing, she wasn’t laughing now. Lucian was though! Until her fingers tangled in his hair and she jerked his face to within inches of hers.

  “I didn’t see a thing,” he said, hidden behind a smirk.

  When she doubled over with the next contraction and the baby’s head came out, he lost the smirk. Lucian sat with his wife between his legs and stroked her face. At the first sight of his daughter, tears flooded him while the team’s sports doctor delivered the wee one. Lucian gazed into Serina’s eyes and in that moment in time, he saw the most beautiful, ethereal vision—his wife and daughter laying there both smiling up at him. He bent over, his lips on his wife’s forehead, the happiest man alive.

  Sex!

  The thought slammed him over the head just as his wife would soon enough for even daring to think such thoughts. He couldn’t help it. He looked around in search of someone wielding a baseball bat. The entire team. Shit. Alibis for them all. The smirk resurfaced.

  He was about to get his sex life back. This day couldn’t get any better from his point of view. Suddenly Lucian understood a shopaholic’s euphoria wandering into a dollar store loaded with singles.

  Typical male. Serina sent her husband that thought.

  Lucian wiped a few stray strands of hair from his wife’s face. “Pretty lady, there is nothing typical about me. She’s perfect. Thank you for such a gift.” Lucian kissed Serina’s lips with every ounce of love he could pour into it. He made love to her with that one kiss in front of the world, with no one the wiser, except for every bleeding heart, romantic out there. Passion burned in his eyes. He pulled away from Serina and kissed the tip of her nose. “M’lady, je t` aime tant.”

  Serina mouthed the words, “I love you too,” back to him as she wiped the tears from his cheeks.

  ****

  “Oh Maestro, I’ll give you one guess what just came across the telly.” Xanti Sinclair skipped across the penthouse from the television to the window, to glance at the statue of Eros in Piccadilly Circus. Finally, he’d found them again. And where Lucian St. James could be found his twin sister, Raven, was sure to follow.

  “The supreme court finally got the wording, IN GOD WE TRUST, out of our lives forever?” The older man with a neatly trimmed salt-n-pepper beard asked as he slurped at some fluid stuck to his lips.

  “Not yet, but think back to a time before cars, before cell phones, computers… Hell before most of the fodder about us had electricity. Remember any one family disappearing into the night?”

  The Maestro dipped his head between the thighs of a woman spread out on a table and dragged his tongue down the inside of her smooth, curvy leg. The closer he moved toward her more delicate parts, his two inch ivory posts descended. He’d worked up an insatiable appetite and wanted dessert. He’d given her, her treat, now it was time for his. Completely engrossed in what lay before him, it took a minute to register what Xanti said. Xier looked up. “You’ve my complete attention, son.”

  “A birth marking of nobility has appeared on the big screen,” Xanti chirped.

  “Lucian St. James and Serina are still of this world? Or is it André and Jovan? And in the name of all unholy things, how did those two men end up marrying two of the most powerful bloodlines of witches? That’s beside the point, what do you know?”

  “You knew they’re half-sisters, didn’t you? They share the same father. Anyway, Serina just birthed a daughter for the world to see bearing the royal mark along with her royal fluff.”

  “Are you positive?”

  “I’m not stupid, Father. I know fluff when I see it.” Xanti pointed to the woman on the table and watched his father’s black eyes glisten. “I would stake my heart on it, Sir.”

  “Trust me, if you had one, I’d have done it long ago,” The Maestro remarked coldly as he fondled the woman’s private lips, and she squirmed with delirium.

  “I’ve more news. Father, can you feel the vibrations in the air this eve? A ripple of powers to be?”

  “Explain yourself, Xanti. Do not tell me the St. James clan will regain power after this long abstinence.”

  “He is born today. Xavier’s and my son has been born today as well.”

  “Oh this is delicious.” The Maestro shook his head back and forth with his face buried in the woman’s minge. When the words registered he asked, “What the hell are you speaking about, Xanti? Who else was born?”

  “What is the date? Three sixes hold this day. I personally saw to it Xavier’s and my son would be born to Raven St. James today. The birth date of our lord and master.”

  “How, Xanti? Your brother has been gone over a century.”

  “Xavier and I shared a woman, the day before his untimely execution. We bed her then I cleaned her insides out afterwards. I stuck all contents in the icebox includin
g our semen and the rest is history.”

  “Xanti,” Xier skeptically asked again, “how do you know Raven St. James bares your child?”

  “I found her in Boston shopping, drugged her so she’d have no memory of me and implanted Xavier’s seed into her, along with mine.”

  “So, let me get this straight, Xanti. First you evacuated the seed from a woman you and your brother fucked eons past, froze the contents, and then you drugged the illusive Raven St. James, and you of all people, had sex with her and implanted Xavier’s sperm inside her too? You—a son? I’ll be damned. Well, actually, I suppose I already am, but I always considered you a poofer. Humph! And you’re positive beyond a doubt that it was the St. James wench? Did she wear the royal birthmark as well?”

  “For the record, I said I implanted the seed. I wasn’t able to see her clearly, due to the dark hour. She had some celestial splat of ink. But it had to have been her.”

  “So chances are good that you bed a woman with a tattoo, impregnated her with rotten seed, yours, and now my grandchild is out there somewhere in the world alone.”

  A silver cleaver whizzed past Xanti’s head.

  “I will be on a flight as soon as possible to end this. I will bring respect to you.”

  “Or I’ll stake you, Xanti. You’ll beg me to really kill you. Take Ethan with you.”

  “Not the wolf, Maestro. He treats me like a child.”

  “If the shoe fits Xanti…” Hearing the door open, Xier turned. “Speak of my devil in disguise.

  Ethan Kitt sauntered into the spacious fifteen-room flat, picked up one leg, yanked off one foul, worn-out sneaker, chucked it across the room into a basket and then did the same with his other and headed straight for the fridge. Hungry? He lost hungry about ten miles back. He’d hit stage four. Not good. Stage three was bad enough if he hadn’t eaten but anything beyond this and he got ugly. A fifteen-mile trek, being chased by the cops didn’t seem fair, especially when he traveled the heel-toe-express route and the cops followed in a car, but he lost them. Passing his boss, he gave him a high-five. “Nice catch, Boss,” he said without thinking twice as he passed the buffet on the table. The woman was an appetizer, dinner and dessert all wrapped up in one.