In This Life

by Terri Herman-Poncé

  I clutched my stomach, moaning over pain that tore through my abdomen, and fell to the floor.

  “I need … help.”

  “Doctor Morgan?” Logan raced to my side and tried helping me sit up but my arms and legs started convulsing, and I couldn’t make the convulsions stop.

  Casey shoved him away.

  I peered up at her, rolled over, and threw up.

  Logan turned on his mother. “What the hell did you do to her?”

  “I gave her what she deserved.” Casey squatted down next to me, smiling now. “How was the tea, Shemei? Does it meet with your pleasure?”

  I remembered the voice — the woman — and all the years she had asked me that very question. How she soothed me when I was sick, and encouraged me when I was sad. How she sounded pleased when my makeup was exceptionally applied and my sheer linen sheaths were perfectly styled. I remembered her teaching me the ways of satisfying a man, and her excitement when she discovered I had given myself to Bakari — and used what she’d taught me to please him.

  I remembered her anger when she thought I’d told Pharaoh about her affair with Haji, and her disdain the day she discovered my infidelity to Bakari. And I remembered her smile of triumph when Pharaoh, embarrassed by my transgression before his people, allies and enemies, ordered my execution by Bakari’s sword.

  I rolled over and faced Casey again. Pain tore through my belly once more.

  “Yes, Shemei, it is me,” she said, brushing my hair from my cheek. “And I must say, I’m so disappointed in you. You have betrayed so many men in your lifetimes.” Casey’s eyes softened and I sensed the love she once felt for me so long ago. “I understand you’ve been experiencing your own regression very recently. Paul helped me through mine when we met two months ago. Isn’t it amazing how our lives have come full circle?”

  My body convulsed again and a tingling sensation swept through my legs and arms. Then my limbs fell limp and numb. I looked up at Logan. “Call … for help.”

  Casey stroked my cheek. “You look so much like Shemei, it’s truly amazing.”

  Behind Casey, Logan started moving away from us.

  “Please,” I rasped over a ragged breath. “Call. Help.”

  “I miss those days, don’t you?” Casey asked.

  I wanted to shake my head and tell her no. I wanted what I had now. What was so precious to me and that I might never get back, for a second time.

  “But I don’t miss all of them,” she said. “You found out about my relationship with Haji and told Pharaoh.”

  I didn’t tell him.

  “You betrayed me in a past life, and you have betrayed Paul in this one.”

  No.

  Logan stood at the doorway to the foyer now, shifting on his feet.

  Tears filled Casey’s eyes. “I love Paul, as much now as I did when he tutored you.” She kept stroking my cheek. My hair. “But he loved you instead. You never knew that Haji loved you, did you?”

  No.

  “Or that Paul still loves you now?”

  I searched for Logan. He wasn’t there.

  “You betrayed me, and then slept with Kemnebi even when you weren’t sure what had really happened to Bakari.”

  It was a mistake.

  “Then you told Pharaoh about Haji and had him taken from me.” Casey’s tears fell to my face. “It was because of you that I lost him. And so I told Pharaoh about you and Kemnebi. I had to make sure that you felt the same pain and loss that I did.”

  I felt it. More than you realize.

  “That is why I’m going to get you out of the way now. Only then can Paul truly be mine.”

  Logan. Please. Where are you?

  “You won’t take him from me again, Shemei.”

  Casey grabbed a poker from the fireplace and raised it overhead, and I saw it all. Swimming in the river. Drinking stolen wine. Time spent alone with Bakari, learning of love near the Nile beneath a brilliant starry sky. The heat and passion in Kemnebi’s body and how it perfectly molded to mine. The pain I’d caused Bakari when he found out what I’d done once Kesi told Pharaoh. The tears that ran down his cheeks when Pharaoh ordered my death, and the glint of his sword angling down toward me.

  Kemnebi, pleading for my life and demanding that Bakari should take his instead of mine.

  And Bakari’s last words to me.

  I am yours and you are mine. For always. Forgive me, as I have forgiven you.

  Casey aimed the poker and swung down.

  I closed my eyes and left this life.

  Forgiven.

  Chapter Thirty

  Someone was whispering my name.

  I felt fingertips brush the hair from my face, coaxing me back. My eyes fluttered open and I discovered David sitting beside me. His green eyes were filled with concern but his smile was relieved and tender.

  “How are you feeling?” he asked.

  “Okay, I think.” I took the time to ground myself and figure out where I was. “Emergency room?” I asked over a raspy throat.

  David nodded and handed over a small cup of water that I downed in three gulps.

  “How long?” I asked.

  “You’ve been in and out of sleep since you got here fourteen hours ago.” David took the empty cup and set it off to the side. Then he swept a gentle hand over my hair again. “Do you remember anything?”

  I nodded, remembering too much, and shot up in bed, realizing what I didn’t. “Where is Logan’s mother? And Logan? And how did I get here?”

  David hushed me and coaxed me back into the pillows. A monitor beside the bed beeped in time with my heart and an intravenous line was hooked up to my left arm. “Take a few minutes first, okay? Moving too fast isn’t a good idea right now.”

  “David,” I persisted, “please tell me what happened.”

  He frowned but gave in. “After I got your call, I raced back home. Nat told me what had happened between you and Paul and that you went to Logan’s house after he phoned you. I followed you there.”

  “Why?”

  “After I packed and left the house, I started poking around the PROs database for information on Paul and Mrs. Reynolds. She popped up in the system with a long history of drug-related charges, mostly abuse related to antidepressants. And guess who the prescriber was.”

  “Paul?”

  David nodded. “I had a gut feeling about her and when Nat said that Logan was having an issue with her, I started doing the math. That’s why I followed.”

  “And that’s where you found me?”

  He nodded again. “I called an ambulance when I found you unconscious and followed you to the emergency room. The doctor said you had elevated levels of bupropion in your blood.”

  “Bupropion? That’s an antidepressant.”

  “Yeah, that’s what they told me. They said you were lucky because you could have overdosed, but the hospital staff monitored you through the night and said you’ll be fine. They’re going to discharge you sometime today.”

  I looked at the wall clock. It was almost six in the morning.

  “Casey Reynolds tried to kill me,” I said.

  “Yes. And she almost succeeded.”

  “Where is she now?”

  David stared at me for several drawn out seconds. “Dead.”

  I didn’t have to ask how she died. The resolute look in his eyes gave me the answer.

  “You saved my life,” I whispered.

  David caressed my cheek, his warm fingertips lingering there as if he still needed to be reminded that I had survived.

  “What happened to Logan?” I asked. “And Paul?”

  “Logan disappeared. There was no sign of him when I got to his house, but if the authorities find him he’ll be dealt with.”

  I remembered the note he left for his mother, about wanting to leave home and not wanting to be found. Sadly, it looked like Logan had gotten his wish.

  “Paul was taken in by the cops. He’ll be brought up on charges. I’m sure of it.”
r />   “I’ve failed again,” I said. “First with Deborah, now with Logan and his mother.”

  “You can’t save everyone, Lottie.”

  But how I wished I could.

  David took my hand and I thought about the things I’d learned recently. That past lives really did exist. That, for some reason, certain people returned to a new life so that they could continue learning. To keep going on a specific journey until they were ready to move on.

  I wondered what journey was intended for me.

  “I think Paul wanted retribution for my choosing you over him,” I said. “At first, I thought he was only trying to get back at me for Deborah’s death, but Casey said he was still in love with me even though he was in a relationship with her. I think Paul used her on many levels, David, to try to ruin me. She loved him and he took advantage.”

  David stroked a thumb over my fingers. “Love is a powerful motivator, Lottie. It’ll drive people to do some really crazy things.”

  “Like stalking.”

  David gave me a questioning look.

  “Casey had been stalking me. I’m sure of it now.”

  “You think Paul put her up to it?”

  I shrugged. “I have no idea. Logan made it sound like Casey was unstable, and she probably was, which means she was capable of doing a lot more than I gave her credit for. The fact that she abused antidepressants certainly didn’t help.”

  “I’m sorry you had to go through all of this,” David said.

  I thought about the final moments I experienced as Shemei, and wondered why Kemnebi offered his life in exchange for mine. I remembered Bakari’s forgiveness in the end and, in that moment, understood David in a way I’d never understood him before.

  With a sigh, I understood exactly who Galen was, too.

  “So, you want to tell me what happened to you?” David asked. “The version you’re not going to tell the cops?”

  It was a question I was expecting that I knew I couldn’t answer. I looked at David and my heart sank as all the years we’d shared together slipped away. All the trust, all the joy, all the heartache and love, all the effort we made to keep our relationship alive and honest, disintegrated like the fragile pages of a centuries-old book.

  I shook my head, feeling disappointment and sadness settle inside my heavy heart.

  “I can’t, David. I just don’t think you’ll understand.”

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Officer Jim McKarren took my statement while David and Officer Llewellyn listened. I kept my answers simple and to the point, and shortly after one o’clock, when they left the hospital to continue their investigation, I was discharged.

  David drove me home in his SUV but we didn’t speak along the way. Despite his outer appearance of calm, I knew he felt restless on the inside. And I did, too. It felt as if a huge chasm had surfaced between us, distant and gaping and that would never close unless one of us made the first move to heal it.

  Neither of us tried.

  I closed my eyes and thought about how much had changed in the past week. My life felt surreal now, and nothing like it used to be. I thought about how much David didn’t, or couldn’t, understand about my past, and I wanted to believe that his inability to accept that part of me was the reason for the rift between us. But I couldn’t lie to myself any longer. I’d learned something important about Kemnebi and me before I’d almost died at Casey’s house, and it needed to be addressed. If it wasn’t, I didn’t think I’d ever fully understand or appreciate who I was right now.

  We pulled into the garage and David killed the engine. I noticed that someone had already brought my Jeep back home.

  “David,” I said, stopping him before he got out of the SUV. “There’s something I need to take care of.”

  He pulled back into his seat and appraised me. “And that means what, exactly?” he asked, though I had a strong suspicion he already knew the answer.

  “It’s something I need to do alone.”

  His jaw clenched and he nodded, but with little enthusiasm. “We have to talk, Lottie.”

  “I know.” But that wasn’t going to happen now.

  I went inside and found my handbag and the Jeep’s keys next to it. David tugged my cell phone from his back jeans pocket and handed it over without a word. I took it and returned to the garage, admitting that I’d spent too many years keeping him at emotional arm’s length, realizing that I’d never really let him completely into my heart and asking for far too much from him without giving the same in return. David had put up a good fight for us, even after Galen entered the picture. Now it seemed the fight in him had died. If it hadn’t, maybe he wouldn’t have been so willing to let me go.

  For the second time in days, I ended up on Galen’s doorstep. I rang the bell with as much reservation as I felt the first time though for very different reasons. This time, I understood exactly what we were to each other.

  Galen answered the door and our gazes locked and held. “You have seen what you needed to see,” he said.

  I nodded. “Can I talk to you?”

  He motioned that I should step inside.

  We both entered the living area and I stood near the sofa, not because I needed physical distance from Galen but because I now saw his condo’s décor with new appreciation. The framed Egyptian artwork and faience pottery. The beveled mirrors edged with coral and lapis and ebony.

  The vase filled with fresh blue lotus flowers.

  Those furnishings were no longer a visual link to my past but to an emotional one instead.

  I turned to him and asked the one question that burned inside my brain. The one I didn’t ask thousands of years ago when Kemnebi, kneeling before Bakari, offered his life for mine.

  “Why?”

  For a moment, Galen looked confused, then he smiled and regarded me with equally new appreciation. “That has been the question that has concerned you throughout most of your regression, wouldn’t you say?”

  “Yes,” I said, “but this time I ask it because, right now, there’s only one answer I’m looking for.”

  “Is it important for you to know that answer?”

  I moved in closer so that we stood only inches apart. I felt his warmth. Sensed his tranquility and calm. Smelled the rich, spiced scent that I recognized as the two of us. I inhaled and let the scent settle deep inside me, where it felt like it belonged.

  “Yes, it’s important,” I finally said, unable to hide the huskiness in my voice. “I need to know because this is important to me, Galen. Did Bakari kill me like he had been ordered to do? Or did something else happen that I can’t see?”

  Galen’s gaze traced my face, moved lower, and then returned to hold mine. His mouth softened with a wistfulness I hadn’t seen in him before. “I wish I could tell you but I can’t.”

  “But I need to know, Galen. I remember Bakari forgiving me in the end but I still remember his sword sweeping down to strike me. Not you, even when you bartered for my life. Me.”

  He cupped my face in his hands. “What Bakari did that night, because of what you and I had done together, changed our lives forever. That is all I can and will say. You must find your own truth on this, Shemei. You must let the memory play out for you on its own, when the time is right.”

  “But when will that be? Tomorrow? Next week? In five years?”

  “If it is to happen, it will take however long it needs to take.”

  “But you know.”

  “Yes.”

  In my heart I knew that whatever Bakari had done that night, and the days and nights leading up to it since he discovered my infidelity, explained a lot of who David was now. On a subconscious level, David must have known that he’d done something to me so long ago. Something he never recovered from, that he refused to see, and that made him overly protective of me now. Maybe it was his inability to forgive me until it was too late. Maybe it was my believing Kemnebi’s lie too easily that Bakari had died, just so I could sleep with him. Maybe it was something e
lse that I still didn’t know. Whatever it was, it had affected him. Just as it had affected me.

  “You know,” Galen said, “I think that Bakari’s actions that night may be the very reason that Bellotti cannot come to terms with what you have learned about yourself. I believe he, on a subconscious level, still carries guilt even after thousands of years have passed and he simply cannot face it.”

  “I also believe that’s why David won’t consent to your joining his team,” I added. “I think he’s transferred that guilt onto you as suspicion and mistrust.”

  I took the time to more deeply consider the implications of what that meant. And there were many. So much of what we’d done as Shemei, Bakari, and Kemnebi affected our decisions now. Even our relationships and thoughts and emotions. It was as if unfinished business still lingered, waiting and needing to be resolved.

  “But this all leads me back to the one question you refuse to answer, Galen. I heard your appeal in those moments before I was supposed to die. Why did you trade your soul for mine?”

  “I did not trade my soul, Shemei.”

  “But I heard what you said. You bargained for my life.”

  “No.” Galen shook his head and his mouth eased up into a knowing smile. “I bargained for your afterlife. Your second life.”

  I stopped breathing, not completely understanding.

  “You are important to me, Shemei. You always have been. It is as simple as that.”

  “But our relationship was physical, Galen,” I said. “Nothing more.”

  “Was it? Can you look back and truly believe that?”

  I couldn’t. I wanted to, as much for my sake as David’s, but couldn’t. Galen and I were as bound as Kemnebi and Shemei had been, and in a way I might never fully appreciate.

  “Who knows why any of us received a second chance, Shemei. Yet we all managed to get it, didn’t we?”

  Galen’s voice, so deep and rich and lilting, moved through me like honeyed wine, warming my blood and soothing my soul. I felt drawn to him, as I had always been drawn to him, and the long dormant fire from a lifetime past, the one I’d worked so hard to control, flickered and ignited.

  I slipped out from under his hold and distanced myself from his consuming touch. It was too much too fast, and the harder I tried ignoring the emotional grasp Galen had on me, the stronger it intensified. Eventually, something was going to give and any decision I made, either way, was going to have considerable consequences.