A Life Earthbound (16 page)

She was sixteen when she first heard the sound that would ultimately save her soul.

She had been ready to go out into the garden behind the castle, having just gotten permission to pick some wild red roses for the dining table, when she stopped dead in her tracks just before the exit.

Beyond the wood doors that were cracked open, she could hear someone strumming a guitar, rather inexpertly, but they were trying nonetheless. She chanced a peek through the opening, and spotted Liam, sitting with his back to her on the steps leading out to the garden, an acoustic guitar in his hands.

Backing away, intending to come back later for the flowers, she stopped when she heard him begin to sing.

It was a song about a tiny dancer, counting headlights on a highway…

Incredibly moved, she stepped forward and crouched down just inside the doorway, leaning her head back against the cool stone of the wall so she could listen to him.

In that moment, her cold, hardened heart ached and in private she briefly gave herself a moment to grieve over what could have been.

July 3rd, 2010

Euphora

She walked, as
she always did, with resolute purpose. Her heels clicked along the stone floor of the corridor, echoing hollowly off the walls as she headed to the Greenhouse.

Her mind was sharp as a tack and meticulous, her body tall and slender with delicate feminine curves, dressed in elegant gray slacks and a soft, plum colored blouse. Her dark brown hair that she had always worn long draped down her back and swayed as she walked.

Eyes the color of rich sage flanked by generous lashes focused straight ahead, never wavering from her destination. It was symbolic of her disposition to never dwell on the past, at least not anymore. No, she learned from it, but never did she dwell.

Like her father before her, she wore practical reading glasses when she worked, perched on her straight and narrow nose like a badge of honor.

In her arms she carried her journals and log books, filled with pages upon pages of detailed projections and tracking of plant cycles, animal population density, and earthquake sequences. In the sensible black bag on her shoulder, she had her scientific calculator, three mechanical pencils, an extra eraser, aloe hand lotion, aspirin, a slim tube of clear lip gloss, a nail file, and a tin container filled with sugar free mints.

She was twenty years old.

It was still early and most of those on Euphora would just be settling in for breakfast. But not Rhiannon. She was up and ready to go long before the rest of them even got out of bed.

Her routine steadied her and she took immense pride in it. Rising at dawn, doing basic stretches to wake her muscles, taking a refreshing shower…she’d get ready, carefully put on makeup and classy designer clothes, dry and style her hair. Then she’d head down for a quick breakfast of hot green tea, fresh fruit, and whole wheat toast before heading to the Greenhouse for the day.

In the afternoon, she’d break for a quick yoga session to center her mind and strengthen her conscientiously toned body, then return to work until dinner. After dinner, she would play chess with Brogan or head into the library to read, or perhaps, if she was feeling a bit more social, engage in a discussion of literature with Capri or of human politics with Lucian and her father.

Day in and day out, her life was the same. And she knew without a doubt that it suited her to live this way, thriving on consistency and routine like a dying man in the desert sun yearns for water.

What was the point of living if one did not have structure? She had been taught from a young age that carelessness and frivolity led to nothing but stress and disappointment. And who wanted that?

Yet even with all of her carefully crafted structure and meticulous planning, life still managed to throw curve balls at her once in awhile, the most recent one being Brogan’s departure to Richmond to look for Dante.

It worried her to see him go, despite how insistent he was that he could handle himself and that he wasn’t in danger. That didn’t stop her from trying to convince him to have Rian go in his place, and in fact that suggestion had only upset him. He needed to do this for himself, to prove that he could handle his duty as a Fury. And because she understood that, understood him, she had dropped the subject and let him go without a fuss.

But that certainly did not prevent her from worrying for him. He had been gone for a few days already, and she had heard little about what was happening or when he would return. And everyone else’s lack of worrying about him was starting to get on her nerves.

Especially Nyxa. The woman had been attached, quite literally, to Brock for days now, the two of them fixated on each other, not even noticing anyone else around them. It was really quite disturbing, given the circumstances of the whole situation, but that didn’t stop them. And it appeared that Nyxa couldn’t be bothered to worry about her stepson, who had done nothing but stand by her side and defend her on everything. It was, in Rhiannon’s eyes, unforgivable.

It grated on her that Thea had let Nyxa stay on Euphora after the horrific crimes she had committed. The woman had endangered all of their lives, and for what? A chance to get revenge on the one person she despised above all else?

While Rhiannon knew her mother was not perfect, especially now that Serendipity’s affair with Brock had been exposed, she still knew her mother didn’t deserve Nyxa’s retaliation. She felt Nyxa should have known what kind of man Brock was, and she shouldn’t have been surprised to find him cheating on her. Rhiannon certainly hadn’t been surprised.

She had also correctly predicted that Nyxa would want revenge, and as such had kept a close eye on her. And look at how it turned out–the woman was stark raving mad and deserved to be banished. Of course, part of her knew that such a decision by Thea would destroy Brogan. He looked to Nyxa as the only parent he had left, even though she wasn’t even his blood. Rhiannon never wanted Brogan to get hurt, no matter how justifiable the reason.

And how remarkable that Blythe, practically Rhiannon’s arch enemy for years, had personally thanked her for uncovering Nyxa’s vile plot against Serendipity. It had humbled her more than she cared to admit to see Blythe overcome her pride and simply say thank you. Nothing more, nothing less. But it made her feel incredibly childish to know that she couldn’t have done the same if the situation was reversed. Her own grudges were too deeply rooted to allow for such behavior.

Maybe it was the bounty hunter’s influence over Blythe that had drastically matured her. Certainly before her month long rendezvous with Jackson Murphy, she had been much more juvenile.

And then she had come home with him, injured and beaten by Dante, and she had proven to be a capable woman and a relentless fighter. Rhiannon had been, despite everything, impressed.

And now the bounty hunter was practically living with them. Oh, her mother had choice words with Thea over
that
decision, but she had been brushed aside with Thea calling her not only prudish, but a hypocrite as well. But even Rhiannon thought it quite unseemly for Blythe to be sharing her room with a man who wasn’t even her husband, no matter how much in love they claimed to be. It just wasn’t proper.

Not to mention how much the bounty hunter bothered her. Especially with that fresh scar on his face, his strange, drawling accent and those cowboy boots he wore all the time. He didn’t pay her much attention, for which she was undoubtedly grateful. Yet when he did look at her, she felt like she was being scrutinized and examined like a fly on a pin. And from the distance he kept and the disapproval in the air she felt whenever he was near, she knew Blythe had divulged all the dirt on why Rhiannon was not a friend, but an enemy.

Well, she didn’t want to be his friend anyway, and had no desire to get to know him. He was Blythe’s business and not her own.

The person she was responsible for was her father. And the last several weeks had not been kind to him. She watched his gradual decline with unease and a jarring helplessness. Her mother’s betrayal had broken his heart, despite how desperately he tried not to show it. But Rhiannon knew…she’d always known when something was wrong with him, even when others didn’t have a clue.

Thinking of him, she pushed open the door to the Greenhouse and stepped inside. Morning rays of sunlight drifted through the glass ceiling, dappled and tinted green from the vines of ivy that spread over the glass. For a moment, she marveled at the beauty of it, reminding herself not to take it all for granted.

When she heard the irritated shouting, her eyes flew from the ceiling and focused on her father and her younger sister, Sierra, who were standing by the pond, arguing loudly. Sierra had her hands on her hips and her long waves of honey blonde hair shivered as she whirled around, hearing Rhiannon enter. Her cool blue eyes, the same color as their mother’s, narrowed and then rolled in annoyance before she turned back to Rohan.

“I need a new dress, dad! How can you expect me to go to this party wearing something I’ve already worn? That’s just disgusting, no one does that,” Sierra said, waving her arms in frustration.

Rhiannon watched her father’s right eye twitch as he took a deep breath, clearly upset.

“I don’t have time to take you, Sierra, and your mother apparently has a migraine. You’re just going to have to wear something you already have.”

“
This is stupid!
” Sierra shouted, indignation coloring her pretty face. Looking for leverage, she spun around and eyed her older sister again. Glaring back at her father, she pointed a finger at Rhiannon. “I bet you always let Rhiannon get new dresses when she wanted them!”

Rohan’s eyes flicked to his older daughter. Hating himself, but knowing it was the only way to get Sierra out of his hair, he motioned to Rhiannon. “Come here, Rhiannon.”

She set her work items down and went over to him.

“I want you to take Sierra to Los Angeles so she can get a new dress for the party tonight.”

Dumbfounded, Rhiannon shook her head, staring at him and ignoring her sister’s cheer of triumph. “But there’s so much to do…I have to finalize the reforestation plans, and collect data on that new species of deer we introduced last year. Not to mention the plate shifts we have planned for today, or the–”

“Stop it. Just stop it,” Rohan grunted between clenched teeth, taking a deep breath and rubbing his eyes in aggravation. “Do what I tell you, Rhiannon. I don’t have the energy for your excuses right now. Both of you, get out of my sight.”

When Rhiannon just stood there, warring between obeying her father and her obligations as an Earth Dryad, he glared at her in a way she had never before seen. “
Now!
”

Startled, she grabbed her notebooks and glasses and fled the room, her little sister in her wake, grinning ear-to-ear. Clearly, Sierra could care less about what was happening to their father, now that she got what she wanted.

“So we’re gonna go right now, right? Because I think it’s like 9 a.m. in L.A. and that’s when the stores open, and I want to get there early in case they have new stock. Plus, we’ll need time to go to several places, ‘cause I need new shoes, a purse, and jewelry and everything,” Sierra rambled on as they walked down the corridor.

Sierra was much shorter than Rhiannon. She had their mother’s build, with curves already beginning to show that would make most grown women jealous and have any man with a pulse drooling on his shoes.