Ascension (30 page)

"You're crazy."

I shake my head, tears springing to my eyes.

"I thought I was dreaming last night, but I wasn't. I'm not crazy."

He stops in his tracks and stands still for a moment. I see the tension drain out of him, his shoulders sagging.

"No you're not," he says, coming to where I stand. "I'm sorry," he whispers. "I didn't mean that." Then he lays his hand on my cheek. "You shouldn't be able to see that. I'm supposed to be able to make you forget when you dream, but it must
n
o
t have worked." He shakes his head. “This is the second time I screwed up.”

"Tell me how you know me," I say softly, looking in his eyes. "Tell me what you are. You can do things. You healed that bird. You healed me. When you touch me, you enter my mind."

He glances away, staring off across the sea. After a moment, he turns back and looks in my eyes. He touches my cheek again.

“Am I in danger from you?" I ask.

He closes his eyes.

"I’d never hurt you.”

I touch the bite mark.

"But you bit me.”

“I’m weak," he says, his voice filled with pain. Then he takes my face in his hands, his fingers tangling in my hair and he leans down and kisses me
. H
is lips press mine apart, and the brief wetness as his tongue touches mine makes something surge inside of me. Without knowing I've done so, I slip my arms around his neck, pressing my body against him, and for a moment, the kiss intensifies and a jolt of desire spreads through me from my chest to my belly
.
I'm feeling his desire as well and it's so intense, I can barely breathe. Then he breaks the kiss and presses his forehead against mine.

"I never wanted you to ever
have to
know," he whispers. "I thought this time I could let you go for good, but I can't. I just
can't
."

Finally, he lets go of me and turns, walking to the pathway, scrambling up through the rocks to the field that leads back to the cottage.

I follow him but stop at the top of the path.

"Who am I to you?"

He stops as if considering. Finally, he steps closer still and touches my cheek with the backs of his fingers.

"We were lovers."

Disbelief floods through me, my knees feeling suddenly weak.

"Lovers?" I say, shaking my head. "I'd know if we were lovers…"

"No, you lost everything
.
"

My mind's numb. I shake my head and step away from him, then I turn and start back towards the pathway to the cottage.

He follows me.

"Eve," he says when he reaches my side. "You don't have to fear me. I'd never hurt you."

"This is too much," I say and shake my head, holding my hand up to stop him.

He grabs my arm and when he touches me, my anxiety and fear dissipates. I just stand there, waiting, not feeling anything.

"Eve," he says. "I know you don't remember me, but we were lovers. I have photographs to prove it." He reaches into a pocket and removes a wallet. Inside are two small photographs. One is of me as a young girl, waiting in the wings before a recital, my hair up in a bun, my eyes unfocused. The other is a picture of me standing with his arms around me, my forehead pressed against his. It looks real enough, but I'm no fool.

"That's a manipulation for all I know."

"It's real," he says, sighing. "It was taken by a security camera in the warehouse where we lived for a while. Before the bombing."

"Look," I say. "I don't remember you. You could be anyone with a picture of me that's been manipulated telling me you and I were lovers. How can I know it's true if I have no memory? Even if you prove to me it's true, I don't remember!"

"Your foster parents will tell you. And when they do, and when you know the truth, you can come to me. My cottage is up on the cliff about a mile down towards
Rockport
Bay
.
21 Oceanside Drive
." He's silent for a moment. "You loved me, Eve. It was the last thing you said to me before the bomb."

Then he turns and walks away, leaving me standing there like a zombie, not knowing what to believe.

CHAPTER 28

“The greatest happiness of life is our conviction that we are loved; loved for ourselves, or rather, loved in spite of ourselves.”

Victor Hugo

The cottage is fantastic, with huge windows
on three sides and a large wrap-around cedar deck. I
peer inside the window and
the space is rustic, with comfortable couches and a large flagstone fireplace. The door is open and so I knock and step inside.

"Michel?"

There's no answer so I enter and go up the stairs to the living room. In the corner of the room sits a huge Steinway piano - a monster. Concert grand. I walk over and touch a few keys. Sheets of music litter the stand - some of it old and curling - Some works by Chopin.

He walks in and stands in the doorway, watching me.

“You play?” I say.

“Yes.”

“Play something for me. I played for you.”

He sighs and sits at the piano.

“Play the piece that breaks your heart,” I say.

He smiles, wistfully, and I sit beside him on the bench and admire his hands as he holds them above the keyboard. He starts to play and it’s familiar but I can’t remember the name.

“I know that,” I say. “I can’t remember the title.”

“Nocturne in E Minor,” he says. “Chopin wrote it when he was seventeen.”

I listen to him play and he plays so well, with such feeling. It brings tears to my eyes for some reason and I have to bite my lip to fight them, covering my mouth with a hand.

When he finishes, he turns to me and I can’t hide
my
tears
.
I don’t know why I’m so sad. He inhales and runs his finger through my tears, and then slips his finger into his mouth, closing his eyes.

"I'm sorry," I say, shaking my head, wiping my cheeks. "I don't know why I'm crying. It happens sometimes, when I see certain things, pictures, hear certain songs. Must be from the brain damage."

"It's OK." He pulls me into an embrace. I let him hug me. We were lovers. My foster parents told me.

He breaks the embrace and wipes my cheeks with his fingers.
 

"Another bad memory?"

I shake my head, unable to speak for a moment.

"No memory at all. Just sadness."

Just then, the door opens to reveal an older man with a salt-and-pepper brush cut and a pale blue button-down shirt and jeans. His face is weathered, with deep lines above his eyes, beside his nose. He has piercing blue eyes.

The man just stares at me for a moment.

"Sorry," he says to Michel. "I have bad timing."

"No," Michel says and motions to the man. "Come in and say hello to Eve."

The man hobbles over, using a cane.

"I am Vasily," he says, extending his hand. “Nice to meet you, Ballerina Girl.”

"Ballerina Girl?”

“Was my name for you.”

“I knew you before, too?”

He nods.

“Nice to meet you." I take his hand and shake it, a smile on my face.

Vasily covers his eyes with a hand. He turns away and goes back to the kitchen and stands with his back to the room. I look at Michel.

"Did I say something?" I ask, keeping my voice down.

"Vasily's an old softie," Michel says and shakes his head, his voice quiet. "He was so worried about you because of the bombing. Play something for him. Play something Russian."

I sit at the piano and play a piece, but I don't remember how I know it.

“Rachmaninoff,” Michel says. When I look up at the kitchen, Vasily stands with a tissue at his eyes.

I stop playing. "It's upsetting you."

He looks at me over the tissue, and waves a hand. "No, I am just silly old Russian who loves music. Please don't stop."

I keep playing.

"It's so strange," I say. "I don't even know what I'm playing. I have no memory of it, but my brain knows how to play it."

"Memories aren't made up of one sense,” Michel says and clears his throat. “They have layers. Sight. Sound. Smell. Taste. Feel. Emotions. They get cross-referenced to other memories, other senses. You might lose one part of a memory, but not others."

Vasily leaves us alone and I get up from the piano walk around the room, inspecting his books, the art.

Michel sits on a couch. Finally, I sit on the chair across from him.

After a pause, I take in a deep breath.

"Why me?"

He frowns. "What do you mean, why you?"

"Why did you want me? Why were we lovers?"

"Why?" He shakes his head as if the question's ridiculous and stares at his hands. "Why does a man ever want a woman?" He looks at me. "Because her smile makes his heart hurt." He looks away. "Because being with her, in her arms, inside her body, is about the only time he feels truly happy, like existenc
e is bearable, and all the pain,
sadness and disappointment
is
gone, even if only for a while."

His words make me so sad. “How did we meet?”

He doesn’t answer at first, just sits there, shaking his head, looking at me with those way-too-intense eyes.

“We met. That’s all that matters. Fate brought us together. We fell in love.”

“I don’t believe in Fate,” I say. “There’s just random and non-random events. You made decisions and I made decisions, events happened that led us to meet. That’s all.”

He smiles, but it’s one of tolerance rather than acceptance.

“Fate parted us. Now it’s put us back together and I don’t ever want us to be parted again.”

The sound of his voice makes my throat constrict.

“But you’re a vampire… How can we be together? Don’t you kill humans?”

“Eve,” he says. “You loved me. That’s all that matters. Forget what happened before. It’s the past. It’s gone. You’re safe now. I’ve done things. I’ve arranged things so that you’re safe. No one knows you’re here but me. You can start a new life. We can start a new life.”

“What was wrong with my old life?”

“You were in danger. It almost killed you.”

Finally overwhelmed by it all, I hold my head in my hands. My emotions overcome me and all I know is that I want him to hold me. I want to feel his arms around me, despite the fact I barely know him. I wipe my eyes, and try to get under control. I get up and stand in front of him.

"Can I sit with you?"

He looks up at me.

"Yes." He motions to the couch beside him, but I shake my head and instead, straddle him, one knee on either side of his hips. I don't know why, but I feel such an incredible need to sit with him this way. I put my arms on his shoulders and lean my forehead against his. He exhales heavily, his breath shaky.

"I don't remember your face," I say, looking at him, at his beautiful blue eyes rimmed with thick black lashes, at his strong jaw, the black hair tucked behind his ears. "I don't remember your name." I lean in, my face beside his, my cheek touching his. "But I remember this." I squeeze my arms around his neck and he reciprocates. "My body remembers you."

I kiss him and it feels so right, it feels so familiar, as if finally, I'm where I should be.

I wake and glance around the dim bedroom. Dawn - the faint light from the open sliding glass doors to the deck slowly brightens the room. The king-size bed is covered in white cotton. I'm naked under the covers, and my body feels well-used as I remember the evening and night of tears and pleasure as we made love like first-time lovers, except our bodies felt like they fit perfectly together.

He comes back in through the open patio doors and goes to a closet. He's wearing a pair of boxer briefs and nothing else. My gaze moves over his body greedily as I remember our lovemaking, me sitting on him, riding him, his arms wrapped around me, him kissing my face, my neck, biting me as we fuck and the pleasure was so intense, I can't imagine ever giving it up.

He retrieves a men's dress shirt and comes to the side of the bed.

"Here," he says and holds it out. "Put this on and come out to the deck. You have to see something."

I comply, pulling the shirt on, buttoning it up hastily, following him out the doors and onto the deck. We're pretty high up on the side of a cliff. A new weather system is moving into the region, storm clouds approaching off the ocean. I'll get some respite from the vivid sunlight.

He stands on the deck and looks out at the ocean. I go to the railing in front of him and take in the view. "It's beautiful."

He comes up behind me and wraps his arms around me, one hand slipping between the buttons and inside the shirt to touch my bare skin, cupping my breast.

"Watch," he says and points to the ocean with the other hand.

I glance in the direction of his hand and see a bank of clouds along the coast, moving towards us.

"When I bought this place," he says, his lips near my cheek, "the broker told me that sometimes, when the weather is just right, the clouds actually touch the house."

I sigh and lean back against him, my head fitting beneath his chin. I watch as the trees beside us are enveloped in thick white mist. As the cloud bank approaches the house, I hold out my arms. When it surrounds us, I close my eyes.

"I always wanted to feel the clouds," I say, a feeling of such happiness filling me, tears stinging at the corners of my eyes. He buries his face in my neck, kissing the skin beneath my ear.

"How does it feel?"

I sigh and breathe in as the mist falls on my upturned face.

"Perfect."