Immortally Theirs [Legends & Myths] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (2 page)

He heard the musical cascade of water and followed the sound to one of the courtyard walls. It shouldn’t have surprised him that the old fountain still flowed into the shallow pool he and Christian had dug together. But seeing it again still brought a myriad of emotions and memories to the forefront of his thoughts.

The house and gardens were being well-maintained. But by whom? Stefan knew his brother had made it his mission to protect St. Augustine’s visitors and locals from the things that went bump in the night. There had been enough bloodshed on this little piece of Florida’s coast to last multiple lifetimes, and the bloody history drew tourists and supernatural beings alike.

Even he and his brother had died—and been resurrected—on this very spot. Whether his brother was still here, running interference with those who refused to leave their mortal existence and grievances behind, not to mention the others that used the city’s supernatural history to hide their own nefarious activities, remained to be seen.

Stefan’s gaze roamed over the outlines of the casa, taking note of the changes since he had last seen it. He hardly recognized the place. When he and Christian had been forced to either leave their home or swear allegiance to the fledgling British Empire, they had left a one-story house behind. But the first floor had been greatly expanded and a second story had been added since then. A wide balcony graced the two-story structure and rough-hewn wooden shutters stood sentinel on either side of the upstairs windows. Red clay tiles adorned the sloping roof, providing unmistakable evidence that this was still a Spanish home.

Stefan sighed and shook his head as the hopes he and Christian had shared before they parted ways washed over him. This was meant to be the place where they would have brought wives and raised children. But that had been before they understood that their resurrections had changed them in a profound and irrevocable way. It was before they realized it would be impossible, even selfish, to share a life with any mortal woman.

What woman would want to grow old while her husband stayed forever young? And how could he or Christian offer a mortal woman the thing that would grant her immortality, but rob her of her ability to have children, her body frozen in time? They wouldn’t even have been able to adopt, for then they would have been forced to watch their children grow old and die, unless they offered them the same life-giving curse. No, it had been far better to spend their long lives as bachelors, enjoying the occasional company of women, but never growing attached.

Stefan shook off the centuries-old regrets and approached the massive front door of the casa with more than a little trepidation. He had told himself there was no reason to dread seeing his brother again, but that didn’t stop Stefan’s stomach from churning. Would Christian accept him back? Or would he shun Stefan, just as Stefan had shunned Christian so long ago? Stefan sighed and stepped up onto the porch. Why was it that immortality could cure hunger and prevent him from getting drunk, but it didn’t stop that gut-wrenching feeling whenever he was about to walk into a bad situation?

His arm felt as though it were made of lead as he lifted it to knock on the massive wooden door. Before he could grasp the heavy iron door-knocker, the door swung open and warm light bathed the porch. Stefan blinked and then stared into the face he had thought about so often but hadn’t seen in two hundred and fifty years. He opened his mouth to speak, but no words came to him. Everything he had thought he would say had fled from his mind.

Christian grabbed him by both shoulders and stared at him for long moments, as though he were looking into the eyes of a ghost. Then his older brother pulled Stefan into his arms and clutched him as though Stefan were a life preserver in a storm-tossed sea.

“Welcome home, my brother. Welcome home.”

Claire didn’t have dreams very often, or at least she didn’t remember them. But she remembered the one she’d had last night. It hadn’t even felt like a dream. It had felt so real that Claire had struggled for several minutes as she tried to separate the dream from reality.

At first, she’d thought she’d woken up in the car in the middle of the night, but there was a woman sitting in the passenger seat. Claire’s first instinct had been to scream and get out of the car. She had struggled with the door handle, but the door wouldn’t open. Near panic, she had turned back to the intruder, expecting the woman to pull a gun on her and rob her. But the woman had just stared at Claire with a look of pleading in her eyes. Then she had told Claire she needed to go to St. Augustine. She spoke as though it was the most important thing Claire could ever do. And then she had faded into nothing but mist.

When Claire had woken up that morning, she’d had the strangest urge to follow the woman’s instructions and head straight to St. Augustine. But she shrugged the dream off as the consequences for eating a bad hot dog from the convenience store she had stopped at for dinner. She hadn’t been able to squelch her curiosity, though. So when she saw the exit off the highway toward St. Augustine, she’d made the split decision to check it out. Claire got out of her car and stretched. It felt good to move around after so many hours on the road. The warm sun felt soothing on her shoulders and she rolled them, trying to ease the tension that had built up over the long drive.

She looked around at the impressive stone fort near the parking lot where she had found a space to park the car. Finding a parking space hadn’t been an easy task. She had driven around the Historic District for at least half an hour trying to find an empty space. This was a metered lot, so she would have to feed the machine some quarters and find another place where she could park overnight. But considering the number of people and cars she had seen, she was happy to take what she could get. Because right now, the thing she needed more than anything was lunch.

She fed enough coins into the parking meter to last several hours and then headed across the parking lot. There was a restaurant she had spotted while driving around the Historic District right across the street. A bright-red tour trolley, designed in the shape of a railroad train, stopped at the corner. It was loaded with passengers and some climbed off while others climbed on, their enjoyment of the tour evident in the excitement on their faces and the happy sound of their voices.

This city hadn’t been Claire’s intended destination. She hadn’t even planned on getting off the main highway. But the brochures she had picked up at the visitor center when she had crossed the Florida state line, combined with the unsettling dream, had tempted her to stop here.

Her original goal had been to drive to the farthest point she could reach by car—Key West. She had wanted to be as far away from Denver as she could get, while also finding warm weather to ease the lingering ache in her bones. She was tired of the cold, tired of aching all the time. She was just plain tired.

But above all, she had needed to get away from Mark. She had entertained the thought of going to the police to tell them the things she had learned about her husband and about the abuse she had endured at his hands. But as she discovered more about him, she realized the police would be unable to protect her. Mark had managed to get close to people with far more security than the Denver Police Department could ever offer her.

Claire shuddered and pushed the disturbing thoughts aside, determined not to dwell on things she couldn’t change. She crossed the street and entered the restaurant, the smells from the kitchen wrapping her in tempting aromas and causing her stomach to growl. A brochure rack caught her eye and she grabbed a few of the colorful tourist guides before approaching the hostess stand. The hostess led her upstairs and to a seat on an inviting balcony overlooking the fort, a beautiful blue bay, and the expansive ocean beyond. Claire basked in the warmth of the day, amazed that she could sit outside in March and be so comfortable. There had been snow on the ground when she’d left Denver.

Her waiter brought chips and salsa to her table and she ordered a margarita, no longer worried what Mark would say about the unbecoming effects of alcohol on a woman. For a man who killed people for a living and beat his wife on a regular basis, he had a lot of nerve belittling her for the few times she had asked for a drink. Besides, the only times she had ever asked for something alcoholic to drink had been when she needed something to dull the pain from Mark’s beatings. But he had wanted her to feel every painful bruise.

She pushed her sleeves up and reached for a chip, wincing as pain pierced her left arm just below her elbow. That bone still hadn’t healed well since the last time Mark had broken it. He had refused to allow her to get medical treatment for it, knowing the emergency room doctors would get suspicious if she showed up on too many occasions, claiming to have fallen down the stairs or run into a door. He had provided her with basic first aid and wrapped it up. Then he had told her he would re-break it if she ever talked back to him again. She massaged the painful spot and hoped the warm air would help to ease the ache.

The margarita arrived and she sipped it in small amounts, enjoying the salty taste and the slight tingling the alcohol provided. It helped to soothe her frayed nerves. She had spent the last three years on edge and in pain. She was twenty-seven years old, but she felt fifty.

The waiter took her order and she sat back in her chair. The stunning view before her was unlike anything she’d ever seen. Sailboats sat moored in the bay and some skimmed across the blue water. Their sails unfurled and rippled in the ocean breeze. The ocean seemed to meld into the blue sky and flocks of seagulls swooped low over the water.

Claire pulled a sketchpad and pencil out from her tote and drew the expansive scene before her. She had always loved to draw. Mark had destroyed most of her drawings out of spite, claiming she cared more about her art than she did about him. He had been right.

The fort below drew her attention to it. People roamed over the grassy areas surrounding it and walked along its turreted stone walls. Claire had no idea how old the fort was, but she knew it must be older than anything she’d ever seen before. She flipped the page on her sketchpad and focused in on the fort, sketching its outline with bold, sure strokes. Something about it fascinated her. Maybe it was the scars of bygone battles still evident on its aged walls. Maybe it was the idea that this bastion of protection and defense had weathered untold numbers of storms, both natural and manmade. It was a survivor.

The waiter arrived with her lunch and she put her sketchpad aside. Steam billowed up from the cheese-covered enchiladas, and the enticing aroma made her stomach growl. She dug in to the plate of cheesy comfort and sighed. Mark had almost never let her eat food like this. He had wanted to make sure she stayed nice and slim. She took another bite and smiled. Maybe she would eat this kind of food every day and gain twenty pounds, just for the sheer enjoyment of being able to do whatever she wanted to.

As she ate, she flipped through the tourist guides she had grabbed downstairs. There seemed to be a lot to do in this town. There were boat tours, an alligator farm, and a lighthouse that could be explored. There was even a park where the fabled Fountain of Youth was said to be located. She would definitely have to visit that attraction before she left St. Augustine. One brochure offered a dark and mysterious tour and it caught her attention. She didn’t know why she was drawn to the darker side of life. It had gotten her into enough trouble with Mark. But Claire found herself reading the brochure and checking the times the tour was available. She put the brochure down, her mind made up.

Claire had no doubts about how things were going to turn out for her in the end. Mark would find her. It was one of the few things she was certain of. After all, it was what he was paid to do. He was a hunter and he would hunt her down. And then he would kill her.

But if she was going to die, she wasn’t going to spend her last days locked in a nondescript Denver hotel room with a couple of police officers. Before Mark found her, she was going to live a little for a change. And she would start tonight.

Christian took another sip of beer and scowled at the tourists gathering in the dark pub. This would be the third stop of the night on the ghost tour these people had signed up for. They came seeking excitement and mystery. Maybe they would see something spooky they could tell their coworkers about when they got back from their vacations. St. Augustine had a reputation as being one of the most haunted places on the planet and the local pub owners had figured out a way to make a profit on it.

If these people only knew. They were promised plenty of beer, ghost stories, and maybe even an eerie encounter as they shuttled from bar to bar in the old section of the city. And for the vast majority of unsuspecting people who ventured through town, they would depart with nothing more than a hangover from too much beer and a sunburn from too much time on the beach.

Every now and then, though, someone would attract the attention of the more sinister inhabitants of the Historic District. The legendary ghosts were real enough, though most of them were more mischievous than threatening. It was the other creatures, the ones that used the city’s haunted reputation as their own cover, that Christian watched for. They didn’t come out often, but when they did it was never good.

As if on cue, a chill settled across the back of Christian’s neck. He gripped the glass in his hand and turned with deliberate slowness, already knowing who he would find. “Atticus.”