Eternal Island (Book 1 in the Eternal Series) (12 page)

Becky quickly grabbed the bag and opened the velvet box. Tears spilled out of her eyes and she ran to Ariana and threw her arms around her neck.

“I love it and yes you can have two best friends.” She smiled and wiped at her eyes. “Come on, let’s find you something to wear tonight in all this mess. We need to get ready; it’s almost eight o’clock.”

Becky walked into the bathroom and turned on the light. “OMG! Ariana, you might wanna come and take a look at this.”

“What’s wrong?” Ariana was taking things out of the store bags, but she quickly dropped what she was holding and joined Becky in the bathroom.

There were at least a dozen vases, with flowers of all kinds, all over the bathroom. There wasn’t any more room on the vanity, so some were on the floor. There were two clothes bags hanging, one on each closet door, with a shoe box on the floor below them. One bag had Becky’s name on it and the other one Ariana’s. In the center of the vanity stood at least three dozen red roses in a vase with a card sticking out of the top. Becky grabbed the card and squealed when she opened it.

Dear Ariana and Becky,

I would like to give my sincere apologies for my rude behavior last night. I realize that you are both respectable ladies and in no way did I mean to offend you. I do hope I’ve got your sizes right and I hope to see you both at Code Red tonight. I promise to try and keep my thoughts clean. Please forgive me and all of my faults. I will try to make a better impression.

Jonah

Becky was so excited, she couldn’t stand still. “Let’s see what he bought us!”

“You go ahead, I’m just gonna find something we picked out today,” Ariana said as she turned and walked out of the bathroom.

Becky grabbed both their bags off the closet doors and followed Ariana into the bedroom.

“Come on, Ariana, he feels really bad about what he was thinking and I’m sure now that you can read minds you’re gonna find out that all guys think the same. They were born with dirty minds. It’s true; I swear it.”

Ariana started taking things out of the bags again. “Well, then maybe I don’t want any guy if they’re all like Jonah. I had a good one, and now he’s gone.”

Tears poured out of her eyes, stinging hot tears that hurt almost as much as the torrent she’d shed on the flight over. Becky put her arms around Ariana and they sat on the bed while Ariana grieved for her lost husband.

§ § §

Abe went through his closet three times looking for his favorite shirt. It was just a plain black t-shirt with a pair of white fangs tipped with red blood on the back. Underneath the fangs it read, ‘I Bite Back’. It fit him perfectly. It showed his chest muscles and closed tightly around his biceps. He couldn’t find the damn thing anywhere.

“Son of a bitch!” Abe swore to no one. “I bet Kelli wore it to her room when she left the other night.” Abe looked in the hamper and that confirmed it. Unless Kelli had walked out of there naked, she had his shirt, because right there on top of his dirties were Kelli’s clothes.

“Damn!” Abe went back to his closet and pulled a random shirt off the hanger. It wasn’t a bad shirt, none of them were, but it wasn’t his favorite one, either. He wanted it because he thought Ariana would like it and now that tramp Kelli had it. He was definitely going through his list of whores and sending them all packing to the mainland, after him and Ariana got together. He damn sure didn’t need any of them filling her head with bullshit and trying to pick fights with her just because it was Ariana he picked, and not them.

“Holy shit, that’s it! I gotta find Rainey!”

C
HAPTER 18

Rainey fidgeted with her bright blue fitted shirt that was dangerously low cut; her favorite black mini skirt and her new high heeled black boots that zipped up to her knee completed the ensemble. With her long coal black hair and shocking blue eyes, her outfit matched in every way. As she applied the last of her make-up, her bell rang.

“Oh, for the love of Pete,” she said as she walked to the monitor that let her know who was visiting. “Shit!” Rainey cleared her mind and tried to think of something simple as she buzzed Julia in. By the time she walked in, Rainey was getting a coke from the fridge, on the other side of the room. Silly and useless, she knew that. Her mind would be just as accessible to Julia from there as it would have been if they’d embraced.

“Where’ve you been lately, Rainey? I’ve been trying for days to reach you,” Julia’s scratchy voice brought goose bumps to the back of Rainey’s neck.

“I had some family business to tend to. Want a coke? Oh, that’s right, you can’t drink coke. It must suck to be a vampire.”

“No, it really doesn’t,” Julia said as she walked around the room, smiling. “I just thought I would come and visit you before I go out. It’s been such a long time since we talked.”

“Cut the shit, Julia. Why are you really here? We don’t talk for a reason. I know you don’t like me, you know I don’t like you, so why are you in my lair?” It was all Rainey could do to keep from thinking about Abe, or meeting Ariana and Becky later.

“You look nice. Going somewhere… interesting?” Julia asked, a smile playing across her face.

“Yeah, I’m meeting one of my guy friends and we’re gonna have a few drinks. What’s it to you?” It wasn’t a total lie. Rainey fully intended on a whole bunch of guys buying her drinks tonight.

Rainey’s doorbell rang again. ‘Saved by the bell’, Rainey thought, but when she got to the monitor she realized she was nowhere near safe. She pushed the button to talk through the speaker system. “I’m visiting with Julia right now. I’ll call you later.” Rainey crossed her fingers hoping he would take the hint and keep quiet. Julia didn’t need two minds to probe, especially since he wasn’t that good at keeping this whole Ariana thing under wraps.

“Yeah, call me. And hurry, Rainey.” Abe’s voice sounded urgent and a little frantic.

Ah, hell. Way to go, Abe. Rainey so wasn’t in the mood to cover his ass right now.

“I will.” Rainey let go of the button and went to her purse, vampire murder on her mind. She fished around until she found her keys, then jiggled them trying to give Julia a hint.

Julia walked over to Rainey and looked her in the eye with a big smile on her face.

“I know something is going on with you and Abe. I don’t, however, think that you two are together. But you are definitely hiding something, from me in particular.” Julia stepped closer and Rainey stood her ground, staring right back into Julia’s eyes. “I will find out. I always do.” Julia smiled as she turned and walked to the door.

Rainey didn’t know what to say, but she didn’t want Julia to think she was that easily intimidated. She also needed to know what to expect when Julia figured out Abe was in love with Ariana. So she threw herself to the wolves, so to speak. “So what if we
are
together? He’s unattached. He’s not interested in you, and he never will be.”

Before Julia walked out the door, she turned around and smiled at Rainey. “You’re not after Abe, but someone is, or will be. Have fun at Code Red with Becky, Abe and… Ariana, is it? Interesting, I haven’t met her yet. I wonder what’s keeping us apart. I may have to make an appearance at Code Red myself. To say hello – it’s sheer courtesy.” Julia slipped through the door leaving Rainey standing there with her mouth open.

§ § §

Becky and Ariana were ready to go. Becky wore the little red dress and heels that Jonah had bought for her; the dress hugged her curves well. The heels were half a size too big, but she didn’t care; no one would notice. Ariana had put on a backless burgundy halter dress; shiny gold straps criss-crossed her back and tied at the back of her neck. It was tight fitting to the waist; the skirt flared down to right above her knees. She wore shiny gold high-heeled sandals.

She hadn’t even looked at what Jonah bought her. She figured it would be a see-through towel, with the way his mind worked. When Becky offered to unzip the bag, Ariana stopped her and said she was returning it to him unopened. Becky rolled her eyes, but didn’t press her further.

“Come on, Ariana. Let’s go before all the hot guys are taken. It’s a long way to the club and I’m ready to dance my ass off and drink till I pass out.”

The girls headed for the elevator. “That sounds really fun, for some reason. I haven’t had a drink since me and Michael…”

“Oh, no, Ariana. You’re gonna make your mascara run. What did we agree to earlier?”

Ariana sniffed. “That we won’t worry about anything and that we’ll have a good time tonight.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.” Ariana cleared her mind of the past and wiped at the single tear that had threatened to fall.

“Good, let’s go,” Becky said as they stepped out of the elevator into the garage and walked to her yellow 2008 Pontiac G8.

“Cool car.”

“It’s not as cool as Rainey’s, but I like it.” Becky started the engine and plugged her mp3 player in. She pushed ‘play’ and The Beach Boys’ ‘Kokomo’ blared out of the car’s speaker system. Both girls started singing. “Aruba, Jamaica, ooohh I wanna take ya…”

Becky pulled out of the garage and turned the volume down. “I’ll take you by the church. I forgot to point it out when we were in town today. It’s almost a hundred miles to the club, so we need to hurry.”

“A hundred miles! This is an island. How can it be a hundred miles to anywhere?”

“Excuse my French, but it’s a big fuckin’ island. It’s about ten miles to 85 Mile Highway and that is exactly how long it is – eighty five miles. It goes straight through the middle of the island and it has roads that lead off in different directions, but no twists and turns, so you can haul ass down it. No speed limit. The club is about five miles from the highway, so it is almost a hundred miles, like I said.” Becky pointed to the huge building with a few different symbols on its front, one of which was a big wooden cross. “There it is. You’ll see the inside of it Thursday night.” Becky stopped at a four-way and turned right. “Hang on tight, roomie. Here we go.” She pushed the accelerator to the floor and the car took off.

C
HAPTER 19

Rainey pulled out her cell phone and dialed Abe’s number with shaky fingers. He picked up on the first ring. “I’m waiting in my Hummer. Hurry up.” The call ended. Rainey ran out the door and concentrated on taking the shortest route to the garages.

Abe had already left finger impressions in the steering wheel while waiting for Rainey to call. He knew it had only been about ten minutes since he’d left her lair, but it felt like he’d been sitting in his black Hummer, starring at his cell and waiting for it to ring, for hours. Rainey opened the passenger door.

“You sure you don’t wanna take my car? It’s faster.”

“Evidently, you don’t know what I’ve got under the hood. Get in. What the hell did Julia want?”

“What do you think she wanted? She wanted to pick at my brain, and as hard as I tried not to think about it, she still got enough to put two and two together. Hearing your voice only helped the process, I’m sure. You should have kept quiet. She knows about Ariana and she’s coming to Code Red tonight, ‘to say hello’, apparently.” Rainey looked at Abe as he shoved the stick shift into first gear and peeled out of the garage.

“Damn! Shit! Son of a Bitch! That bitch deserves to be in Hell. I just don’t know how to send her there. Even if I planned to tie her up and throw her out in the sun, she would see it coming.” Abe whipped through the tight roads around the Palace and didn’t even slow down as he turned the right angle onto 85 Mile Highway and floored it. “Do you still have Jonah’s cell number?”

“Yeah, why? He isn’t on the island, is he? Oh my God, he is! That’s who Becky was talking about when she was telling me about this guy busting in on her and Ariana last night. That is Jonah’s old room, and he featured in my vision, too.”

“Yeah, he’s back, and I’m not too happy about Jonah seeing my woman in a towel.
I
haven’t seen her in a towel yet. The only way he can stay is if he gets rid of Julia for me. I’ve already told him. Call and tell him to meet us at Code Red and not to dick around about it. I’m sure he’s tracking me tonight anyway, to see where I’m going. Tell him what’s happening.”

“Ariana isn’t your woman, you know? She has no clue that you like her. In fact, I had a hard time convincing her you don’t hate her, after that little outburst of yours earlier today.
‘I didn’t say it, I thought it,’
” Rainey imitated his morose tone of voice to perfection. Abe closed his eyes in frustration. Could he get anything right anymore? “Anyway,” Rainey continued. “I guess the cat is out of the bag now, so you may as well let her know how you feel about her. But that doesn’t mean she will like you back. This is one relationship you’ll have to work at, if you really love her.”

Rainey knew Ariana liked Abe, but she just wanted to make him sweat a little, and at the same time ensure she would be treated right, with the adoration and reverence she deserved; she felt very fond of Ariana already, and she didn’t want to see her hurt, on purpose or through some misguided, clumsy attempt at courtship. It wasn’t like Abe’d had a lot of experience at respecting the women in his life.

“Yeah, I know she isn’t mine, yet. I really don’t know how to go about getting her to be, either. I’m not good at this kind of stuff. I have all these new feelings inside of me and I don’t know what any of them are or what they mean. I just know that if I can’t have her, there is no reason for me to go on living. She is my reason for existence. I don’t know why we were born over nine hundred years apart though; that confuses me.”

Rainey smiled. “That was beautifully said, Abe. Maybe you could start with just saying that to her.” Rainey chewed on her lower lip as she contemplated how to tell him of the discovery they’d made at the restaurant. “There is more to Ariana than we expected, by the way. A lot more. Do you know what a Pure Natural Witch is?”

“No, but I guess you’re gonna tell me.” Abe had to slow down because there was a grandma-driven car in front of him; it was irritatingly slow. “Move bloody over!” he yelled at the car.