Awakenings (Intertwined Souls Series Book 4)

by Mary D. Brooks

  “Did Grandmother know what was going on in Aiden?” Eva asked the one question that had haunted her for the past twelve years.

  Wilbur remained quiet for so long that Eva thought he would refuse to answer the question.

  He finally nodded. “My mother was in charge of the Research Facility and the hospital, and knew exactly what Dieter and Hans were up to. She thought that their treatment would help you.”

  “You didn’t think so?” Zoe asked.

  “I took an interest in your medical care after I came to visit you. You did not look like you were being healed, so I got your medical records and read them.”

  “Did you understand them?”

  Wilbur shook his head. “Unfortunately I did not.”

  “Did you tell Grandmother about your concerns?”

  “No, I would rather she didn’t know what I was doing. The last thing I needed was for her to pay attention to my activities.”

  “Is anyone still working at the Research Facility?”

  “No. The hospital wants to turn it into a hospice so we—?”

  Eva looked at Wilbur. “I want to raze it to the ground. I don’t even want the foundations to remain. Bulldoze everything on that property.”

  “It’s a vast property. Do you want the entire thing bulldozed?”

  “Every last bit of it. Do you have the records from it?”

  “Yes.”

  “No. I mean do you personally have the records?”

  “Yes, I do. I supervised the removal of all the offices and put them in storage for when the renovation would be completed.”

  “Does anyone know the location of this storage facility?”

  Wilbur glanced down with a puzzled expression. “Does that matter?”

  “Uncle Wilbur, does anyone know the location?”

  “My secretary does.”

  “Can you go to the office and remove the name of the storage facility?” Eva asked, glancing at Zoe.

  “Of course I can, but why?”

  “It wasn’t just me that was at this research facility, and I plan on bringing Beatriz Muller to justice,” Eva said as she gazed at Wilbur. They shared a smile.

  “Whatever you want, I will do.”

  “Now.” Eva put her arm through the crook of Wilbur’s elbow and leaned in. “Tell me about you clandestine courting of Aunty Marlene?

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  Eva sat outside on a long wooden seat which had been a fallen down tree. The seat was carved out of the bark and had a bed of multi-colored flowers on one side. The tree behind her acted as her backrest. Tessa’s and Marlene’s excited voices made her smile, as her aunt and her adopted aunt had met for the first time. More than a few tears had been shed when Marlene embraced Tessa.

  Eva closed her eyes and leaned back as she felt the sun’s rays warm her face. She took a drag of her cigarette, exhaled, and watched the smoke rise into a cloudless sky. The French doors leading from the living room were open. She turned to see Zoe walking towards her. Eva sighed contentedly at the sight. Zoe spotted Eva and made her way to where she sat.

  “I have a surprise for you.”

  “Oh?”

  “Open your hand,” Zoe asked while holding both of her hands behind her back.

  Eva did as she was asked and held out her hand. Zoe opened her right hand and placed a pebble on Eva’s palm.

  The pebble wasn’t very big, but big enough for two eyes and a smiling mouth to be painted on. Eva brought it up to see it up close and laughed on seeing the eyes were colored green. “Is that you?”

  “Yes, and now turn it over.” Zoe leaned in and rested against Eva’s shoulder.

  Eva flipped the pebble in her hand and stared down at a drawn heart with E and Z in the middle. She laughed. “I think you’re supposed to carve this on a tree, love, not on rocks.”

  “This is a special rock.”

  “Oh? What’s so special about it? It looks like an ordinary rock to me.”

  “It’s from Larissa.”

  “You picked up a rock from Larissa?” Eva asked incredulously. “We have rocks back home.”

  “Larissa rocks are very special, Evy. It’s how I got your attention,” Zoe said and grinned. “I collected a lot of pebbles and we are taking them home with us.”

  “You collected a lot of rocks to take home with us?”

  “Yes.”

  Eva leaned back and laughed at Zoe’s eccentric behavior. She put her arm around Zoe’s shoulders and gave her a kiss. “I love you Zoe Lambros! Do you want to know what I was just thinking before you came out?”

  “If it was anything like what I was thinking, we would scandalize the relatives.” Zoe giggled.

  “No, it wasn’t that, although that would be nice out here, under the tree.”

  “We could neck behind the tree and no one would notice except the squirrels, but I don’t think they care.”

  “No, no necking.”

  “What were you thinking, Mrs. Lambros?”

  “How much I love you,” Eva replied as played with Zoe’s hair. She pushed a long strand behind Zoe’s ear. “You are so beautiful. If we didn’t have so many eyes upon us I would make love to you right here.”

  “Hmm, that would be nice. Just you, me, and the squirrels.” Zoe grinned. She took Eva’s hand and kissed it. “Can I have a drag of your cigarette?”

  Eva offered her the cigarette, and Zoe took a drag and gave it back. “This isn’t your favorite brand.”

  “I ran out and Marlene gave me one of hers.” Eva glanced towards the open French doors in the living room, where Marlene was talking to Tessa. She laughed lightly. “Marlene and my mother were sisters. Not by blood but just as good.”

  “What are you doing out here?”

  “I wanted to talk to Uncle Johan. There are so many questions swirling around my head, Zo. I need to know from Johan about my mother.”

  “Aunty Stella said he was in the garage.”

  “Hm... Do you want to come with me?” Eva asked. Zoe shook her head. “Are you sure?”

  “I think you and Johan need to have this chat alone. You can tell me about it when you come back. I want you to have some rest before the banshee comes tonight.”

  Eva gazed at Zoe for a moment. “I want you to promise me something.”

  “What’s that? I bent the good poker on Dieter’s ugly face and I don’t have a gun.”

  “I’m hoping you are joking.” Eva grinned. She brought up Zoe’s hand and kissed it. “Don’t get angry tonight. She feeds off that.”

  “She sounds like the type of woman whose personality might be improved by a poker to the head,” Zoe quipped.

  Eva stifled the giggles, and doubled over laughing. “You are priceless.” She put her arms around Zoe and kissed her. “Don’t ever change. Thank you, my love. I needed that laugh.”

  “I know,” Zoe quietly said. “I missed sleeping next to you last night.”

  “I was nearly tempted to come into your room. We were in Marlene’s home and I didn’t—”

  “I know. I heard you pacing. Did you know your old room has a floorboard that creaks when you walk towards Willie’s room?”

  Eva nodded. “It’s a false floorboard. I used to hide my diary under there.”

  “You were very secretive even back when nothing was going on.”

  “I’ve always been like this. They didn’t change me. You read some of the diary?” Eva asked.

  “I did. I just wanted to come into your room and hug you, but I didn’t. Marlene is family and I felt it wouldn't be the right thing to do since we were guests in her home. It’s never bothered me before, but she’s different.”

  “Marlene’s opinion means a lot to me.” Eva watched Zoe take a drag of her cigarette. “You never used to smoke, and look at you now.”

  “Yes, it’s your fault. How are you feeling?” Zoe asked. “This will be over soon.”

  “I’m going to go crazy by tonight. I need to just walk around or maybe Uncle Johan
’s dead car might need a hammer or two at it.”

  “You have waited twelve years for this meeting, and you have rehearsed it enough in your head. Let it go now and wait for tonight,” Zoe said.

  Eva gazed down at her, bemused.

  “I know, I’m the last person to tell you to have patience, but you’re rubbing off on me. Beatriz is going to expect a reaction from you.”

  “I know. She expects me to be upset, to be unsure, because that's what her spies have been telling her that I am.”

  Zoe snorted in derision. “They don't know you.”

  Eva turned her head and smiled. “You are just biased. I love you, but you are biased. It's exactly what I was.”

  “You were, not you are. This trip has changed you in a good way.”

  “Has it?” Eva asked. She could feel the change in the way she thought about Aiden and her stepfather, but she wasn't sure how much Zoe knew of that change or whether anyone else had seen it or cared.

  Zoe rocked back a little, rested her head against the tree, and looked up into the sky. “Yes, it has. I started to notice it with Mrs. Muldoon. You sensed something was wrong and you didn't accept her word at face value. We both sensed it, but you felt it more. You had some rough days in Larissa, we both did, but we managed to get through that.”

  “Rough?” Eva took Zoe's hand and held it tight. “That wasn't rough. That was brutal.”

  “It could have been worse if Stella and Tessa hadn’t been there.”

  “That's true.” Eva nodded. “I think Tommy's surprise gave me some time to think as well. It wasn't ‘let's do this and get out of here.’”

  “I did like his rabbit story.” Zoe glanced at Eva, who was smiling. “Noticed that he deliberately left out why you were restrained.”

  “The restraints were there to stop me from killing the rabbits,” Eva quipped. They giggled. “Whatever they gave me, they didn't give it to me again because I never saw those rabbits again.”

  “Experimental drugs?”

  “From what Tommy said, they were,” Eva replied, leaning back against the tree and crossing her ankles. “Drugs, torture, and intimidation. That’s my grandmother’s style.”

  “So what's your plan for tonight?”

  “I keep telling people that they should never underestimate you, Zoe. People do that a great deal with you.”

  “Huh? It's not about me.”

  “No, it's about me, but I'm going to do what you do.”

  “Whack people with a poker and shoot them? I like that idea,” Zoe joked as Eva put her arm around her and leaned down for a chaste kiss on the cheek. “I think that deserved more than a kiss on the cheek.”

  “We have critical eyes on us,” Eva quietly said.

  Zoe turned to Eva with a puzzled expression. “Marlene knows we are lovers, Tessa and Stella definitely know, and our husbands know…”

  “Our husbands know we are lovers.” Eva giggled. “Mrs. Lambros?”

  “Yes, Mrs. Lambros?”

  “Don’t react at all to what I’m about to tell you, but there are two men spying on us,” Eva said and smiled. She plucked a few leaves from the tree branch above her. With her other hand she touched Zoe's hand, which was clutching the seat. “Don't react.”

  “They were there before Muller decided to trespass and they are still here?”

  “Yes. My uncle didn’t do that. It was my grandmother. I can feel them.”

  “Taking a poker to this conniving bitch is—”

  “Don't react. Smile.”

  “Taking a poker to this conniving bitch is going to be one of my wishes tonight,” Zoe said with a big grin. “Are they still looking?”

  “Yes.”

  “Doesn't she ever give up?”

  “Would you?” Eva looked at Zoe.

  “I’m getting tired of this game and you must be exhausted by it.”

  “I want it to end,” Eva said. “Psst.”

  Zoe turned towards Eva and grinned. “Yes, Mrs. Lambros?”

  “Run away with me?”

  “Where are we going to go?”

  “Back home.” Eva shook her head and closed the distance between herself and Zoe. She took Zoe’s hand. “I want to go home and leave all of this behind. I want us to go home and have our children. I really hope we have a daughter who looks exactly like you and has your personality.”

  “We are in big trouble.” Zoe laughed. “My mama used to say that she wished when I finally became a mother that I would have to deal with a child just like me. I would eventually see that Mama was a saint.”

  Eva chortled at the idea of a miniature Zoe.

  “Oh, shudder.” Zoe giggled. “I don’t think I can survive that.”

  “It’s going to be fantastic.” Eva put her arm around Zoe and kissed her on the cheek. We could practice tonight with that syringe after I deal with Beatriz,” she whispered in her ear.

  “We will have to be very quiet.”

  Eva giggled. “As long as you don’t bolt when you see that syringe again, we will be very quiet.”

  “I can’t believe a woman would let that kind of thing anywhere down there,” Zoe exclaimed as Eva gazed at her for a moment and burst out laughing.

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Eva left Zoe in the garden and made her way further down the property to where she could hear a great deal of noise emanating from the garage. The noise would stop for a while and then start up again.

  She stopped at the threshold of the garage and looked inside. The garage light flooded the workshop, and in the center was the old car. Johan sat on an old tire, a hammer in his hand and a piece of the fender perched on the ground.

  “I'm going to assume that the house resembles a get together of the sewing circle,” Johan said as he inspected the fender.

  “I wouldn't let Aunt Stella hear you say that.”

  “No, I wouldn't want to get on her bad side.” Johan chuckled. He pushed up his glasses and glanced up at Eva. “I was wondering when you would come down here.”

  “You were?”

  “Aye, it seems you enjoy the quiet times yourself and getting away from the chatter.”

  Eva grabbed the nearest thing she could find to sit on, which was an old footstool. She brought it over to where Johan was and sat down. Her dress scraped the oily floor but she didn't give it too much notice. “Do you like the quiet?”

  “I do. I come out here and I hammer away. I find it comforting that the only voice I can hear is my own.” Johan looked at Eva with a slight smile. “You didn't come out here to talk about why I enjoy hammering and trying to fix a dead car, did you?”

  “No, although I do understand the notion of getting away and just being by yourself. I like doing that in the darkroom.”

  “So, what is on your mind, great niece?” Johan put his hammer and the fender aside. He leaned back against the car and waited.

  “Well, Great Uncle, I've got so many questions that every time I get one answered, ten more take its place.”

  “Hmm. Let's see if we can answer some of them before they sprout new ones.”

  Eva dropped her eyes to the oil-stained floor for a moment, not quite knowing how to broach the subject that had been nagging at her since she found out about her mother’s letter. She looked up and met Johan’s gentle blue eyes. “When did find out that my mother was gifted?”

  Johan shook his head. “I think a little bit of Zoe’s personality has taken hold.” He chuckled but quickly sobered up. “I didn’t know. We believed that only one daughter inherited those gifts. That’s how it’s always been.”

  “That you knew about.”

  “Yes, of course. We are not always told what God has in store for us, Eva.” Johan closed his eyes and bowed his head. Eva watched him and wondered if he was praying.

  After a moment he opened his eyes and looked at her. “When our Lord walked the earth, he selected the men who would one day be with him in heaven. Did He tell them everything when He first met them?”

&
nbsp; “I don't think that's the same thing.”

  “Did He?”

  “No.” Eva sighed. She was resigned that Johan was going to take the long route in answering her questions.

  “That's right. He gave them information by piece meal. Slowly slowly, until they fully understood the ramifications of following Him. Some left, and others stayed. It is the way of our God that He chooses to slowly reveal His plans for us all. Slowly slowly.”

  “I think that’s a bad plan. Why not tell us the plan and then we can all know it?”

  “It doesn’t work that way.”

  “It should be. Aunt Tessa should have told me the night she met me that she believed I was gifted.”

  “You were not in the right frame of mind to be able to handle the whole truth. You had just discovered that you had an aunt who was believed to be deceased. In addition to not being dead, she was gifted. You then found out that you had a cousin. So we had those two surprises,” Johan explained as he gazed at Eva. “Once you digested that information, you found out that you were gifted yourself. We don’t know the extent of your gifts because it’s not the same as Tessa or Irene. It may have something to do with both sisters being gifted and the gifts being diluted for you. We don’t know. Having all of that revealed to you while you were dealing with your memories is enough to make someone run screaming the other way.”

  Eva tugged on her ear as Johan rattled off the big revelations for her. “A lot has happened.”

  “A lot has happened and it’s not over yet. You then found out your mother was also gifted, but she didn't tell anyone other than her friend Marlene.”

  “Marlene knew and kept silent. My mother befriended someone who she knew she could trust.”

  “Yes, your mother kept that a secret even from us. That’s how much she feared being found out. It must have been a terrible burden for her. They both knew and feared what would happen.”

  “All these damned secrets.”

  “I know you are angry, but don't swear, not in my presence.”

  “I'm sorry,” Eva replied. “This whole story within a story, secret within a secret is making me doubt my own existence.”

  Johan chuckled. “Now let’s not get into too much hyperbole.”