Choosing Eternity Read online

  And, thank any deity willing to listen, there was Bran, in her suit, looking completely anachronistic on the vintage staircase in her vintage threads while talking into a very modern smart phone, the sleek silver case pressed to her ear.

  “Yes, I’ve got her in my sights now,” said Bran warmly into the phone. And then she hung up and surveyed me, brows raising. “Rose? Are you all right?”

  “No,” I answered, and I darted forward, meeting her at the top of the next set of steps, and I gripped her forearm tightly.

  “Rose, what’s wrong?” she asked, searching my face, but I shook my head, finally risked a glance over my shoulder.

  The stranger hadn’t followed me.

  It seemed that Bran and I were alone on the staircase.

  But that didn’t necessarily mean much.

  “We’re not safe here,” I whispered to her.

  Several emotions crossed Bran’s face in that moment, but resolution was clearly on display as she shook her head, her lips pursed into a thin line. “This is the Sullivan Hotel, Rose,” she told me quietly. “You are safe here, and you will be safe here—”

  I shook my head again. It was so sweet and noble of Bran, but I was worried for her safety, too, at the moment. There were two vampires in that room I’d been spying on (that I knew of—there could have been more people in there), and it looked as if that older vampire, the creepy woman who gave me the pin, had been angling for their room, as well. Could three overpower one?

  The odds didn’t seem to be in Bran’s favor.

  “Can we go somewhere private? I need to tell you something,” I whispered to her.

  Bran searched my face and nodded, turning on her heel.

  And we made our way down to a familiar floor. We passed doorway after doorway, passed the little silver plaques next to them that read “T. Sullivan” and “K. Sullivan.” And then, several doors down, there was a tall, imposing door twined with filigree around its border, a plaque marked “B. Sullivan” beside it. Branna paused in front of this one, bowing a little to me and gesturing toward it.

  “My rooms,” she said with a small smile. “I promise you’ll be safe here, Rose. I know you had a horrible time of it last night, but I want you to know I meant what I said. You are safe here.”

  I nodded distractedly, and I moved to open the door.

  And I paused.

  The flat of my hand, my palm, was pressed to the wooden door, my other hand gripping the doorknob. The knob was old, made of leaded crystal, and I stared down at it in my hand.

  It wasn’t like the other knobs in the doors on this floor, all metal ones. Even Kane’s rooms, a little further down the corridor, were entered through an antique door with a metal knob.

  It was a silly little detail, but it stood out in my head as my palm gripped it. The glass felt smooth against my skin, and I stared down at it, glittering in my fingers.

  It reminded me of something.

  “What’s wrong?” Bran intoned again, her warm voice tight, on alert. I shook my head, opened the door.

  “It’s nothing—” I began.

  And I fell silent.

  Bran’s door opened up into a parlor. It was very sparse. There was a round mahogany table in the center of the room, no chairs. There were no shelves along the bare walls and nothing else besides. A music rack stood in the far right corner, with a stack of sheet music beside it, and a battered, old violin case leaning along the wall. The walls had been painted a soft blush color, and across the way from us was a pair of French doors leading out onto a narrow balcony.

  The room was wholly unremarkable and even a little drab. It might once have been very pretty, but Bran didn’t have much use for finery, it seemed, and she only really cared about her music—the corner with the sheet music, the music stand and the violin case appeared to be the only “lived in” part of the room. I cast about, took in the emptiness of the room, and a feeling came over me, unfurling slowly, like a rose…

  I’d been here before.

  I stepped through the doorway gradually. Bran came through, too, and then shut the door behind her, her head to the side as she regarded me.

  “Are you quite all right, Rose?” she asked me, her voice urgent.

  I didn’t answer.

  There was a painting on the far wall near the music stand. The painting was of a simple seaside landscape. The French doors looked out onto the cliff face beside the Sullivan Hotel and the ocean, and the painting reflected that view, reflected it magnificently. I walked slowly toward it, my head to the side as I considered it.

  I’d seen the painting before.

  What was extremely odd was that it felt… Well, it felt like I had painted it.

  I took several art lessons in college alongside all of the art history courses I plowed through. I wasn’t what you might call “good,” but I learned how to paint whimsical landscapes and pretty florals well enough. I didn’t need to be “good.” I simply enjoyed painting, and that was what truly mattered.

  I’d painted several seascape paintings, and though they were not executed as expertly as this…my paintings had looked almost identical to this one. No alarming fact, that. There are so many ocean paintings in the world, and many of them look similar. You can only do so much with water and sand, after all.

  But the brushstrokes on the waves—they reminded me, so much, of my brushstrokes. And the view of the ocean outside was a mirror of this painting. I’d never been to the Sullivan Hotel, had never seen this view from this window…

  “Rose?” asked Bran, clearing her throat.

  I turned, shaking my head, clearing my throat, too. “Sorry, sorry,” I muttered, shaking the cobwebs from my head. It hardly mattered that a painting looked familiar to me. There were more important things to consider at the moment.

  Like the fact that, this evening, I was supposed to die.

  I sighed, leaned back against the table in the center of the room heavily. I lifted my chin. “Bran, something happened upstairs. Melody…isn’t who she says she is.”

  Bran’s eyes narrowed, and she listened, carefully, as I told her about what I’d just witnessed. I related everything in detail, but when it came to the part regarding the older vampire on the stairs…I didn’t tell her. It didn’t seem relevant to the larger, more important story, no matter how spooked the encounter had made me feel.

  In hindsight?

  I probably should have mentioned it.

  When I was finished, Bran nodded sharply, took a step backward toward the door. “I’ll go get Kane,” she murmured, her voice low. “Please wait here while I do, all right? If there is anyone looking for you, even before this evening, I don’t think they’d consider looking in my rooms.”

  I blanched a little, straightening. I’d almost forgotten. “But, Bran, I can’t stay here. I promised Gwen I’d bring her breakfast.”

  Bran blinked at me. I think she thought I was making a joke, but I was quite serious. “I’m sure she’d forgive you this,” she told me then, her mouth turning up at the corners mirthlessly. “This is not—”

  “Listen…” I swallowed. “I mean, I don’t know what today’s going to bring, right? I promised my best friend breakfast, and she almost died yesterday because of me…because I put her in danger.” My voice was thick, and I let out a sigh. “The very least I can do is keep a promise to her.”

  Bran raised one brow, then sighed, too.

  “All right. But I’ll bring her the breakfast. Is that all right? I think it’s imperative that you remain here, Rose. That’s the only way I can be assured of keeping you safe. I’ll lock the door behind me. Only Kane and I have the keys to this room. No one can enter except through me. Please,” said Bran, her voice sounding a bit pained as she winced, “stay here. Can you do that, Rose?”

  My mouth turned up a little at the corners, too, and I nodded. “I promise. Just get Gwen…everything. Pancakes, waffles, sunny-side-up eggs, lots of syrup.”

  Bran chuckled a little, I think at the
ridiculousness of the situation, but then her face became serious once more. “All right, yes. But you must stay here. Are we agreed?”

  “Yes,” I replied, and then she was out in the hallway, shutting and locking the door behind her. I heard the key turn in the lock, heard her footsteps fading away.

  And then it was just me and my thoughts and this great empty room.

  It seemed that each of the Sullivans had their own complete living quarters, because there wasn’t just the parlor that I stood in. There was a small powder room off of the parlor, and then through the open doorway, I could see Bran’s bedroom and what appeared to be a powder room off of that, as well.

  The bedroom, also, had few furnishings. There was an almost modern-styled bed, with a low, black headboard and no footboard, the white linens on the bed meticulously made up. There was a small, low dresser, with a vintage hairbrush and a pot of gel on it, and apart from that, the bedroom was bare, apart from one black armchair. The curtains in the bedroom—blackout curtains, considering how little light filtered in—were drawn tight, but the curtains in the parlor were open. There was that small balcony out beyond the French doors, and it was to it that was I was drawn.

  I pulled the French doors open and kept them open, stepping outside. It was frigid out, the kind of cold that slices through you, and I wasn’t wearing enough to stand up to that cold autumn breeze. I shivered, wrapping my arms tightly around myself as I stared out at the ocean.

  The rolling waves surged over and over, driven on by the winds of the day, white-capping until they hit the sand with grim resolve, pounding the shoreline with such power that I could hear the waves crashing, even this far distant from them.

  There was power in the sea today.

  I stared out at the ocean, and the wind cut through me, and I was struck by how familiar this felt. I’d never stood on this balcony, looking out at this piece of ocean, but, by God…it felt as if I’d done it a thousand times before.

  Again, the hair stood up on the back of my neck, and I turned, looking toward the right of the balcony.

  There was a small gap in the red stone above the balcony railing.

  I’d known it was there.

  I’d seen it in my mind’s eye before I turned. I knew it would be there.

  Startled, I stepped over to the gap, ran my palm over it. I was flustered now, and I went back inside, shutting the French doors tightly behind me.

  I felt…strange. Tingly.

  But while I was in the middle of that strange feeling, my curiosity was getting the better of me. It felt like I was unraveling a mystery, and it honestly felt like I’d been unraveling that mystery since the very first moment I stepped foot in the Sullivan Hotel.

  I went to investigate the painting a little closer.

  It was hung at eye level, and—considering the ceilings in the parlor rose about ten feet above me—this was a good thing: otherwise, I never would have been able to get a really good look at it. I reached up, intent on taking the painting off of the wall and setting it on the floor in front of the French doors so I could use the light to my advantage and study it in detail.

  But when my hands clasped the painting’s frame, when I lifted the painting up and off of its hanger…

  I held it in front of me, my brows furrowed as I stared at the wall under the painting.

  There was a hole in the wall.

  Not a hole by accident, ragged and broken, but a hole that someone had deliberately fashioned into the plaster. It was a neat square, with a little wooden door, painted the same color of blush that the rest of the walls were painted.

  I set the painting down on the floor, leaning against the wall, and I stared at that little door, swallowing. It seemed like a safe, the kind that people have hiding behind paintings in order to store their most precious possessions. And it also seemed, as I stared at this safe, that I was very much trespassing on Bran’s trust. I was in her room. This was her painting, this was her wall, and this was her hidden compartment. What the hell was I doing, discovering it, staring at it, considering opening it?

  But just as I’d been pulled to the balcony, just as I’d felt the sweet familiarity of it seep into my bones, this was all familiar, too. This, all of this, felt like reuniting with a comfortable, old friend: the painting leaning against the wall, the softness of the blush-colored walls, the safe’s little door tantalizing me.

  I reached up slowly, tentatively, and I pressed my hand to the door.

  It clicked open.

  I hadn't touched the wooden handle. It had simply made a click and gave way beneath my palm. I drew my hand back as the door popped open, and my brow furrowed as I stared into the recessed space.

  For half a heartbeat, I thought there was nothing inside this little hidden compartment. But then I put my hand into it, and my fingers brushed against metal.

  I scooped up what I found there, and I brought it into the light.

  In my palm shone two gold rings.

  They were covered in dust, had obviously not seen the light of day in years, but it was very clear to my eye that they were finely wrought. They were lovely. Both of them were shaped from thin bands of gold into Celtic knots that spun and twined together, looping and swirling like dolphins dancing in the tide. Both the rings were the same width, but one was a little larger than the other.

  They made me think of…

  I stared at them, turned them in the light, perplexed.

  They made me think of wedding rings.

  There was the sound of voices out in the corridor, and a key was fitted to the lock of the parlor door. My heart beat in my throat, but there was no use trying to put the rings back into the compartment, no use hanging the painting back up again upon the wall, scrabbling to right things before I was found out…and I wouldn’t have wanted to, even if I had time. If I was snooping around in Bran’s room, the right thing to do would be to tell her, as uncomfortable as that felt.

  So I turned, holding the rings in my palm, my fingers closing over them, as I prepared to face the music. The door opened, and Kane and Bran came into the room, Bran turning and shutting and locking the door immediately behind her when they were both inside.

  Kane strode across the room to me, gathered me into her arms, her eyes burning fiercely as she gazed down at me.

  “I promise I will keep you safe,” she murmured to me, her voice burning just as brightly as her eyes.

  I stared up into those beautiful blue eyes, the blue so dazzling, the blue that captivated me from the very first hour I knew Kane Sullivan…

  And I breathed out, for the rings were burning in my palm. There was a genuine heat against my skin as Kane held me close, and when she turned my chin up for a kiss, when our mouths met…

  That’s when it began.

  The rings were as heavy as the world in my hand as I fell, unconscious, in Kane’s arms.

  It seemed that everything had merged together, finally, that all of the puzzle pieces were in place.

  The rings.

  Me.

  Kane.

  For my memories…came back.

  ---

  I gasped, inhaling breath, glancing about.

  I was no longer in Kane’s arms, no longer in the parlor.

  No longer in the Sullivan Hotel.

  Instead, I was standing on the side of a road, but…it wasn’t a road like I understood it, with pavement and white stripes.

  Instead, the road that stretched before me was a dusty path cutting through a riotously green meadow.

  I glanced down at my shoes, my brows furrowed.

  They were pinching my feet, the toes narrowed and tapered. But, honestly, it was difficult to make out my shoes from beneath the edges of my too-wide skirts. They billowed out over them, restricting my view.

  I pressed a hand to my belly. It was tight, constricted.

  I was wearing a corset.

  My hand was encased in a thin crocheted glove.

  My heart beat rapidly as I gazed up at t
he sun, shielding the glare of it with an arm that was enclosed in a mutton sleeve. I knew it was called a mutton sleeve, but I didn’t know how I knew that. The mutton sleeve was created with a big, poofy bit of fabric that billowed out into puffed sleeves.

  Where…was I?

  There came the softest nicker, and then I heard the tumult of horses’ hooves trotting down the dusty path, carriage wheels squeaking, as the coach came into view around the bend in the trees.

  “Whoa, there! Sorry, marm. Got held up. Were you waiting long?” As the coach pulled up in front of me, a young man wasted no time to leap off the top of the coach. He didn’t wait for my answer, instead grabbing up my luggage and scurrying back up onto the coach, tossing the luggage onto the top of it, over a thin metal railing.

  I blinked.

  The coach was tall and dusty and must have, at one time, been black, but the sun had bleached it to a sad, drab gray. It looked like it was being held together by wood glue and several passionate prayers. The horses looked no better, old nags with their sides heaving and their withers all in a sweat beneath the reins.

  “No…not long,” I heard myself saying, then cleared my throat. “But how long will it be to the inn?”

  The coachman was staring straight ahead, a grizzled old fellow with a thick mustache, his cloak wrapped tightly about him, even though it was warm enough to do without. It was up to the boy to glance nervously down at me, swinging his legs on the seat.

  “I’m sorry, marm… We can’t go all the way to the inn. We’ll have to drop you off at the nearest crossroads?”

  I was annoyed by this, crossing my arms in front of me, eyes narrowed.

  “Heavens, why? It’ll be nightfall by the time we arrive, and I’m exhausted now—”

  “Sorry, marm. But we’re the only coach that’ll take you even that close. No one drives to the Sullivan Inn,” said the child, shaking his head. And then he gave a deliberate shiver, his eyes wide.

  The man beside him glanced sidelong at me now, shaking his head. “Will you be riding with us, marm, or not?” he asked, his voice a study in testiness.

  I knew I’d been waiting for this coach for the better part of an hour, and to wait for another coach would take me until the morrow. So I grimaced, but nodded, and then I was climbing up and into the coach, shutting the door tightly behind me.