by Rebecca York
That wasn’t so difficult. In his previous lives, he had always been alone, not really connected to the human race in any meaningful way.
As that eternal truth sank in, he shuddered. He wanted to open his eyes. To leap off the bed, flee the room if that’s what it took to get away from his past.
But he knew he had to make Sophia understand how it had been for him—and all the men of his doomed race.
It had to be bad. The honest unvarnished truth, because Sophia would never believe less.
With grim determination he considered alternatives. He could have gone back a hundred years. Two hundred. Back to the Dark Ages where a short, violent life was the natural order of things.
Or he could have chosen the Crusades. The Hundred Years War. Czarist Russia.
Instead of going back through endless centuries, he chose something from less than a hundred years ago: America, the Roaring Twenties.
He’d wondered if he could drag himself into the scene. Not just as an observer, but back in the moments, reliving them. Even as he thought he couldn’t do it, he was there. And he knew instantly who he was.
A mobster named Jamie Ferguson, high up in an organization making wads of money smuggling liquor into the states. Sometimes across the border from Canada, sometimes by swift boats that could outrun the Coast Guard if they were spotted.
Maybe there had been some good in him once, but he’d been seduced by the prospect of making all the dough he wanted and the adrenaline rush of living on the edge.
The gang he’d joined sold the booze in their own speakeasies in cities along the East Coast, and they didn’t hesitate to wipe out rival gangs who tried to cut in on their territory.
He went deep into that life, thinking that his strength and cunning had helped him get ahead as a thug. He was sitting pretty, in line to take over the business.
Somewhere along the way, he was aware of another presence beside him. Another mind linking into his. A woman, seeing, tasting, touching, hearing, smelling through his senses and at the same time experiencing all of his emotions. It was strange. He didn’t understand it, but he accepted that he had invited the woman to come along with him.
He was caught up in the scene. Why had he ever tried to forget this? He was living big—like a movie star, or a captain of industry.
He had all the money he wanted. An expensive car, apartment in a swanky building, women, booze. Even Mary Jane and coke.
The excitement of living on the edge got him pumped. He loved the choices he had made. Except for one. There was a woman he wanted above all others, yet he sensed that she was out of his reach in the dog-eat-dog existence he was living.
A bunch of rivals tried to muscle in on his boss’s territory. He and a couple of other guys ambushed them at a warehouse and machine-gunned them down with the casual savagery of men who will do anything it takes to maintain their positions.
Somewhere in his mind, he heard the woman with him gasp as the images assaulted her, but he was too busy to pay much attention.
She tried to intrude into his thoughts. Jason.
You want to stick around, you keep your trap shut, he growled.
He was too busy for dames at the moment. He’d gotten wind that the Feds were closing in on him, and he knew he had to lie low. A guy named Sid Lombardi offered to set him up in a hideout in Maine—for a stiff fee. It turned out that was just a down payment on what Lombardi thought he could score.
He and two of his friends slipped Jamie a Mickey Finn at the hideout. Turned out, they wanted to know where he’d hidden his stash of dough.
And when he wouldn’t tell them, they thought they could make him spill. He woke up stripped naked, chained in a chair that was bolted to the floor, with his feet in a tub of water. Then they attached electrical leads to his penis and other tender parts of his body. It worked off a battery and a crank telephone. When they turned the crank, electricity shot through him.
Even with his strength, he couldn’t free himself.
He was stuck. Although he tried to take the pain in silence, eventually he was screaming. And he could hear someone screaming along with him.
The woman. She was there, feeling some of the pain, but she couldn’t do anything to get him out of there.
The torture went on and on. When he’d pass out, they’d wake him up with a bucket of cold water in the face. But he wasn’t going to tell the bastards nothin’.
When they finally realized the electricity wasn’t going to make him crack, they started using him for target practice. Starting with his right kneecap, then his left.
He knew he was going to die, and he also knew he was a tough SOB. He vowed not to tell them what they wanted, no matter what they did to him.
Finally, when they knew they had lost, they shot him in the heart, and he sagged against the bonds holding him in the chair. At the moment of his death, he knew he had lived many lives and died over and over again. And that it would all happen again. He was cursed, and there was no way to stop the endless cycle.
He would be in darkness for a while, then wake again, to a new life. At first, it would seem that he had everything he wanted, until suddenly it would all go horribly wrong.
He didn’t want to go back to that. All he wanted to do was drift for a time.
But two women were with him. He had thought it was only one. Now he realized they were sisters: one very close to him and the other far away.
Sophia and Tessa.
He didn’t understand how he knew those names, but he understood that they were important.
He felt hands on his shoulders shaking him.
“Jason. Jason. Wake up.”
He felt confused. He wasn’t Jason. He was Jamie. Another man who had lived a dissolute life and died a horrible death at the hands of men even more ruthless than himself.
What kind of monster had he been? Not just then, but over and over down through the centuries. He wanted to deny that his past lives had anything to do with him, but he knew that would be a lie.
“Christ, no!” he groaned, the pain flashing back to him.
The woman groaned, too.
Was she the one named Sophia? Or Tessa? He was too confused to figure it out.
“Jason. Stop it. You’ve got to stop. I can’t take any more. You’re going to kill me if you don’t pull yourself back to me.”
Perhaps that was the one thing she could have said that would get through to him. Making a tremendous effort, he managed to open his eyes.
For a long moment, he lay there, trying to figure out where he was and why.
“What are you doing here?” he asked the woman who stared down at him.
Panic warred with determination on her face.
“Jason, we’re in a cabin. You brought me here. We’re hiding out from Cynthia and the other Ionians. Don’t you remember?”
“I’m dead,” he whispered. He remembered dying. That was the clearest thing in his mind.
“No. You’re alive. You’re Jason Tyron.”
When he stared at her, struggling to focus on her words, she repeated the name.
“Jason Tyron. What do I have to do to bring you back to me?”
As she spoke, she threw herself on top of him, pressing her mouth to his for a frantic kiss while her arms gathered him close, her hands stroking over his back and shoulders.
The kiss broke, and he realized his face was wet—with her tears. While she’d been kissing him, she’d been crying.
“Jason. Please. I’m so sorry I put you through that.”
“Sophia?” he murmured.
“Yes! Oh yes.”
She sobbed again, and as she kissed him more frantically, he remembered what had happened.
“Tessa made you doubt me,” he said against her lips.
“You wanted proof.”
“I’m so sorry.”
“It’s okay.”
“No. That was horrible. But it made me understand that everything you’ve told me was true.”
&n
bsp; “It’s hard to swallow.”
“Worse than anything I could imagine,” she gulped. “And I know something else, too. You never would have risked letting me into Jamie Ferguson’s life if you didn’t love me.”
She had said what he’d been afraid to tell her.
“Yes, I love you,” he said.
“And I love you.”
The shock wave of those words left him gasping. “How could you? Now that you know what I’ve been. That guy Jamie Ferguson was . . . awful.”
“Back then, you couldn’t help yourself. It was your Minot traits and the curse.”
“I’m still a Minot.”
“I saw what you were and what you are. You’ve transformed yourself.”
“I couldn’t have done it without my mother. She made all the difference for me.”
“Jason, she was important, but you had to want to change. And you’ve proved a Minot can do it.”
When he started to speak, she went on. “And I’ve been fighting what I felt for you because I’m an Ionian. And I’m not supposed to feel anything but hate and fear for a Minot. But I don’t. Not for you. I love you,” she repeated.
He gathered her close, hanging on to her, rocking her in his arms, wanting to make love to her. So much.
But they couldn’t. Not now.
“We have to go to Santa Barbara,” he said.
“What?”
“Tessa is in Santa Barbara.”
“How do you know?”
He shrugged. “She was here. Sort of.”
“I didn’t sense her.”
“Because you were focused on the horror of Jamie Ferguson’s final hours.”
Her hands clamped on to his arms. “You’re sure it’s Santa Barbara?”
“Well, not right in town. He’s got a big estate up in the hills.”
“Okay.”
“You didn’t see her?”
“No.”
“The two of you were hovering around me when I was in the . . .” He fumbled for a way to describe it and came up with, “The space between lives. She was just staring at me—probably in horror. You were telling me I had to come back here. And I understand why. We have to rescue her. And then we have to build a life together.”
“Can we?”
“Yes,” he answered, not even sure if it was true. She might be like his mother—too bound to the Ionians to give up her relationship with them. But what if they could accept him?
He couldn’t count on that. But he couldn’t simply abandon the idea either.
“We’d better go,” he said, pushing himself up, feeling his head spin. He’d dreamed of his past lives. Dark, disturbing dreams. But he’d never tried to get back into any of his previous personalities before. He hoped he didn’t have to do it again. Because it had almost killed him, and next time it might.
“I need a drink of water,” he said, feeling the dryness in his throat.
“I’ll get you some from the pack.”
Sophia started across the room, looked toward the window, and gasped.
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINE
JASON MOVED TO the side of the window and peered out.
He could see the high priestess staring in at him, a look of triumph on her beautiful face.
As their eyes met, he felt a terrible pressure constricting his head, making him feel like it was going to explode and send parts of his skull flying about the room.
“Damn you,” he cursed.
“It’s my fault. I made you prove yourself to me,” Sophia whispered. “And while you were back there with Jamie Ferguson, she honed in on us.”
“Not your fault,” he managed to say.
The Ionians had silently gotten into position around the cabin. Maybe they’d gradually started exerting the pressure he was feeling now, and he hadn’t even realized it because he was deep into the horror of his past life. Now it was almost too much to ask to stand up, let alone walk.
Yet he knew he had to. For himself. For Sophia and for Tessa.
“We’re getting out of here.”
“How?” she asked in a shaky voice, glancing from him to the window and back again. Her face was so pale that she looked like she’d been attacked by a vampire.
“You feel it, too?” he asked, struggling to get the words out.
“You mean the sensation that my head is going to explode? If something doesn’t happen soon, I’m going to faint.”
He was hanging on to consciousness by his fingernails. Anger surged through him. Anger that Cynthia was so determined to stop him and Sophia from doing the right thing.
Perhaps the anger gave him the will to keep fighting the bitch outside.
Putting his hands on the bed, he tried to move it. But he couldn’t muster the strength. “Help me get this thing out of the way.”
Sophia couldn’t know what he had in mind, but she did as he asked immediately, and together they shoved the bed far enough to the right to reveal a trapdoor in the floor.
When he tried to lift the rectangle of plywood, it slammed back into position, but Sophia yanked on the handle with him, revealing a ladder leading down into a dark space below.
Weaving across the floor, he picked up the pack and thrust it toward her. “There’s a flashlight inside. Go down.”
“They’ll find us.”
“No, there’s a tunnel. You go open the exit door. I’ll be with you in a minute.”
“You’re coming?” she asked in a shaky voice.
“Yes. But I’ve got to make sure they can’t follow us.”
Reluctantly she began to climb down, and he wove across the room to the kitchen area.
Feeling like his head was going to explode like a pumpkin hit with a sledgehammer, he fumbled in a cabinet and pulled out a pack of old-fashioned kitchen matches along with the can of kerosene he used in the oil lamps.
With gritted teeth, he sloshed the fuel over the floor and onto the mattress, choking as the fumes rose toward him.
When he figured the cabin was sufficiently doused, he struck a match and tossed it into a pool of kerosene. It immediately flared up.
Knowing he had to get away, he staggered toward the trapdoor. But before he got there, a blast of psychic energy hit him and he doubled over, going down on his knees.
From below him, Sophia screamed.
What the hell was she still doing there? He’d told her to go down the tunnel and open the door. But she was right under the burning cabin, where the floor could fall on her head.
That thought sent panic shooting through him. He tried to push himself up and crawl toward the trapdoor, but he could barely move. Barely even see through the smoke that swirled around him.
“Get out of here,” he tried to shout, but the words were little more than a whisper.
Sophia’s head and shoulders appeared at floor level, and she gasped as she saw the flames and smoke.
“Get out of here,” he tried again.
Instead, she scrambled up and grasped his shoulders, coughing as she dragged him toward the trapdoor. He tried to push himself along, but he knew he wasn’t much help.
Flames rose all around them now, licking at the floor and the walls, coming closer. And smoke billowed from the surface of the mattress.
They were both choking as Sophia pulled him to the ladder; holding on to him, she began to climb down. Somewhere along the line, she lost her grip on his shirt, and he tumbled past her. He made a frantic grab for the rungs, but couldn’t hold on and ended up hitting the dirt floor with a jarring thud.
Although he didn’t lose consciousness, he felt time and space swirling around him.
Who was he?
Where was he?
Sophia scrambled down and knelt over him. “Jason, are you all right? Jason.”
He lay breathing hard, trying to pull himself together. His head still felt like it was going to explode, and above him the fire roared. He couldn’t stay here, but he needed to rest for a moment before he dragged himself up.
An
d go where?
He’d planned something, but he couldn’t remember what it was.
OUTSIDE, the Ionians had kept their positions, until flames began to shoot up behind the windows and lick at the cabin walls.
Huddling in a group, they watched as fire enveloped the cabin. Window glass shattered, and they jumped back as smoke poured out.
Some of the women screamed. Cynthia struggled to hold herself together.
They’d picked up the mental vibrations Sophia and Jason were putting out, and they’d followed the fugitives here. Silently, while the two people inside the cabin were absorbed with each other, they’d gotten into position. Then they’d struck.
Cynthia had thought it was only a matter of time until the women could rush the cabin.
And now this.
The fire didn’t look like an accident. Why had Jason started it? Because he wouldn’t allow them to capture him? Or because he thought he could somehow get away?
She kept her eyes trained on the cabin, looking from the door to the window.
“Sophia,” she whispered. “Sophia, get out of there.”
Would Jason kill her? Was she already dead? She shuddered, angry with herself for not anticipating the desperation of a cornered Minot.
“They’re going to die in there,” Ophelia shouted. “We have to call the fire department.”
“We have to get them out,” Rhoda gasped.
“We can’t!” In dismay, Cynthia watched the flames consuming the little building, knowing nobody could live through that conflagration.
Or could they?
“JASON!” Was that Sophia calling his name? He didn’t even know.
He tried to open his eyes and look at her, but it was too much effort.
She leaned down. “Are you all right? Did you break anything when you fell?”
Again, it was too hard to answer. All he wanted to do was lie with his eyes closed while smoke drifted down from above. When Sophia shook his shoulder, he managed to mutter, “Leave me alone.”
Were they back at the spa? He remembered the fire there.
Above the roaring sound from above, he whispered, “Did everyone get out okay?”
Sophia’s hand tightened on his arm. “Jason, what are you talking about?”
