A Time Apart: Book One of The Macauley Series Page 13

  “Let me take you home and I’ll tell you everything,” he said in a hushed voice, seeing the bewilderment cross her face. “I’m sorry. Of course you don’t know it as home.” He paused, cautious to divulge to her the extent to which he had gone in her name.

  “After ... well, afterwards ... many years later, I rebuilt it. I didn’t know what was driving me to do so, only that it had to be done. I was a man possessed. And so, I restored it. Our home. I believe you’ve seen it in magazines.” He smiled at her then, letting her know that he found her determination to see the castle – what she hadn’t then known was also hers – a rather happy turn of events.

  She chuckled over her earlier tenacity, and his heart soared.

  “Tonight, how long do we have?” Olivia asked.

  “We can be there in a little over an hour, and then we’ll have three hours together before I’ll need to ...”

  William paused, not sure how to phrase the realities of his physical needs to her in a way that wouldn’t tax an already delicate situation.

  “... sleep,” he continued.

  “You’ll be safe from me, and you can leave whenever you want. I don’t want you to do anything that you don’t want to do,” he finished, not quite knowing what had made him add that last part.

  He stood up to make his way back to the fire, turning to face the flames. He was afraid to see her face when he next spoke. “I want to be with you, in all ways, but I’ll understand if you can’t.”

  “I can’t leave you,” Olivia admitted, an air of certainty and finality infusing her words. “But you have to understand that this is a rather terrifying turn of events. I’d be lying to you if I said that I’m not afraid. But still, I’m going with you.”

  The words rushed from her lips, and then ten staccato heartbeats passed before she added, “For as long as I can, I’ll be with you.”

  William could tell it had taken her some effort – and a measure of trust in him – for her to make the admission.

  “You know, I dreamed about you before I ever heard of you, and I wanted you well before we even met,” Olivia continued, her voice faint, but her words emphatic. “I didn’t know it then, but I’ve been looking for you my whole life. I had to know the castle. I couldn’t just let it go, even though my obsession made absolutely no sense. Then, when I saw your photo I was pulled to you in a way I’ve never been pulled to anything before. I can no more fight my tie to you than I can deny it.”

  William felt as if time had slowed down, his feet barely managed to carry him to her side. Those words – words he didn’t deserve – would sustain him through anything. Having her love him, despite all the reasons why she shouldn’t, was more gift than he had earned and he was greatly humbled by her faith in him, her faith in them.

  Kneeling down to hold her face in his warmed palms once again, he said the words he had longed to say for so many centuries.

  “My love.”

  The desire was coming off both of them in waves, the tension in the air palpable.

  “I want you too, more than you can possibly know,” he told her. “I’ve waited hundreds of years for you. Please be patient, we have a lifetime ahead of us.”

  And then the falsity of his words hit him. He would live forever while Olivia would not. What would seem like a brief instant in his eternal life would be the span of her entire existence. He could see her reach the same conclusion a moment later, regret mixed with sorrow.

  For only the second time in his preternatural life, he seriously thought about what it would be like to create another vampire, to sire someone that would walk the world with him for an eternity. If ever he were going to do it, Olivia would be that person; however, he didn’t dare broach the subject, not when they were still so new to one another.

  As quickly as the thought of keeping her by his side forever had popped into his head, another altogether opposite thought came to him: in the present, modern day world in which they lived, he didn’t actually know this woman. Yes, he had known a version of her intimately once upon a time, and tonight he had learned a great deal about her, but beyond that, he had more questions than answers about who Olivia was. He would have to treat her with care, and not take for granted that while she had clearly been Ceara at one time, today she was her own woman. William couldn’t expect that she would automatically slip into the relationship that he had had with Ceara. While his darling Olivia was every inch the woman that Ceara had been, she was her own person, in her own right, and he would need to tread lightly.

  Olivia was speaking to him about rooms and costs and coming back to get her stuff, but William was only half paying attention to the words leaving her lips. He was already deep in thought, skipping ahead to how the rest of the evening would play out and wondering what would happen once they reached the castle. Would he take her to bed right away? Would she let him, or would she want to talk more about their shared history? Would she stay?

  “I will never hurt you again,” he murmured aloud, more to himself than as a point of conversation.

  William hadn’t known she’d heard him speak until she responded.

  “I know. I trust you. But let’s go now before I change my mind.”

  * * * *

  William and Olivia didn’t speak much on the ride out of Dublin. The truth of the matter was that Olivia didn’t know what to say; obviously they were beyond small talk at that point. In the last three hours she had learned that she was apparently the reincarnation of a woman from the mid-1600s and, as if that wasn’t enough, that she was somehow eternally bound to a vampire who also happened to be both her former husband and onetime murderer.

  She tried not to think too much about these things because no matter how hard she tried to make sense of her situation, there was no logical explanation. Then again, she told herself, nothing in her life had ever felt neat, ordered, or sane so today’s revelations were just a different type of challenge, on a different type of day.

  “It is a lot to take in, but small talk probably would make the drive go faster,” William said, interrupting Olivia’s internal monologue.

  So he has been listening in on my thoughts!

  “Normally I try not to listen, to tune in,” he acknowledged. “But I admit to feeling out of my depth here, and every second you don’t say anything is another second that I’m left agonizing over what you’re thinking, what you’re feeling … why you’re still here.”

  When he put it like that, Olivia could somewhat understand the inclination to “tune in,” as he put it. In fact, when faced with the option to hear what people were really thinking – no way for them to lie – she would probably do the same. Still, they would need to set some boundaries if they were to continue on. Her mind was the only completely private place she had and she needed to know that he wouldn’t intrude on her solitude or go looking for information that she wasn’t ready, or willing, to share. Her mind had to remain a safe haven because otherwise she’d be left with nowhere else to go when things got dark and bleak, as they were wont to do.

  “Since we’re going with small talk, tell me about yourself,” Olivia began, as much to divert the conversation away from herself as a need to learn more about the enigmatic man sitting across from her. “From the magazine articles I saw, I know you’re some sort of tech investor and that you’re very successful at it. You run in very important circles and you’re considered something of a catch.” She paused to see if he’d acknowledge that tidbit, but he failed to take the bait. “And you’ve clearly cultivated a very convincing persona for the outside world, so tell me about yourself, William Macauley.”

  Olivia could discern from the narrowing of his eyes – a subtle physical reaction – paired with the pause he took just before he spoke that he had spent a long time dodging questions and when pressed was used to giving only cryptic, yet believable, answers. Regardless of William’s overwhelming need for privacy, Olivia felt that she had a right to know everything she could about him and as quickly as possible. Me
mories from a bygone era from a person she didn’t actually remember being simply wouldn’t suffice.

  “I don’t know what else there is to tell,” he hedged. “As you’ve already figured out, I have spent the last fifteen years investing in up-and-coming technology companies, which has been both incredibly lucrative and a bit of financial folly depending on the idea and the year.” He paused, and looked at her ever so briefly, barely taking his eyes off the road when doing so. “I’ve used a lot of the wealth I’ve accumulated over the years – hundreds of years, in fact – to finance both my professional and personal endeavors, including the restoration of the castle, which you’ll see in about twenty minutes.”

  He shyly glanced Olivia’s way again.

  Why is he being so shy, so humble, with me?

  Wait, Olivia thought, what had he said?

  Twenty minutes?!

  There was no way they had been on the road nearly long enough, and yet looking out the window she could see that all traces of civilization had receded and now it was just them, the car, and the stars overhead. She put down the window to let the crisp night air swirl around the cabin, bringing goose bumps in its wake.

  “Since we’re talking about you, tell me something I haven’t already found on the Internet. Tell me something new, something that isn’t widely known,” she challenged. “In fact, you should tell me about the woman in the photograph from that gala earlier this year.”

  Olivia heard an intake of breath from his side of the car.

  Undaunted, she continued, “Not to sound like a jealous lover or anything, but she’s obviously very beautiful and I want to know if my being in your life is going to cause either one of us any difficulties.”

  Pondering how to continue, William looked over at Olivia for a few more seconds before speaking. “Elizabeth is ...” he trailed off, searching for the right words before proceeding with the train of thought he had been about to voice seconds earlier. “... our relationship is unusual, but certainly not difficult. It works for both of us.”

  Intrigued, Olivia turned toward him in the plush leather seat, her back placed firmly up against the door. Waiting for him to look back at her, she raised her left eyebrow, inviting him to continue. When he didn’t, she made him.

  “Go on.”

  Running his right hand through his head of thick black hair – a gesture she was beginning to recognize as one he did when stressed or thinking – William took a deep breath and launched into a version of the story he was willing to share with her.

  “Elizabeth is a woman with a loneliness that rivals my own.” Another glance in Olivia’s direction confirmed that she was hearing what he wasn’t actually saying. “She’s human but she knows who and what I am, and she accepts me anyway. We care for one another and we give each other a respite from some of the more unpleasant realities of our situations.” His voice hitched on the word “realities.”

  Breathing deeply once, he continued.

  “She doesn’t know any specifics about Ceara – or obviously about you – but I suspect that she knows the source of my turmoil stems from what I am, how I came to be, and the memories that have been haunting me since those first early days.”

  Olivia could hear in his voice what he wasn’t saying out loud. William was a deeply unhappy man. Despite everything he had at his disposal – his success, his wealth, and his position in society – none of it meant anything to him because none of it truly mattered. But what then did he value? What would bring him the bit of peace he clearly sought but could not find? Could she make him happy? Her questions were put on hold when he continued speaking.

  “Currently I don’t know where Elizabeth is. She was incredibly angry about the photograph you saw. She left.”

  William paused again before continuing with his story, searching for words that wouldn’t betray his friendship with Elizabeth, and what she had meant to him, but wanting Olivia to understand the intricacies of his relationship with her and the role she had played in his life.

  “She tends to do that when things become too much. I think it’s how she’s learned to cope with the unpleasant encumbrances of life. She claims it’s because she likes to keep her life extremely private, and for reasons she won’t really discuss in depth, she doesn’t want anyone knowing about our connection to one another. I don’t question it, but I think on some level she must find our association distasteful, so she sometimes feels the need to distance herself.”

  William continued speaking candidly, which only served to underscore how stilted his words had flowed before. Olivia thought he felt a bit of catharsis in the act of telling her about his complicated relationship with what sounded like an even more complicated woman.

  “We go months at a time without seeing one another, and then one evening she’ll show up unannounced. From there we’ll spend weeks in each other’s company. It’s a rather odd relationship, I know, but I don’t question her too deeply, nor she me, and so we’re able to go about our lives in a fairly comfortable – if unconventional – manner.”

  Olivia briefly wondered when Elizabeth would next pop up unannounced and how he would explain her.

  Would he tell her about me? Will there be anything to tell?

  Ceara had been the love of William’s life centuries before but there was no guarantee that the two of them would be able to establish the same sort connection here in the present. While they had a shared history – one he remembered and apparently relived every day – they would need more than that to base any current relationship on. They would need a stronghold between the two of them today, not just the people they had been hundreds of years before.

  Can we even establish that sort of connection with the specter of another woman looming over us?

  They made a left turn onto yet another twisty country road and William slowed the car down. As they turned a bend in the road, the lights from his Audi rested on a set of wrought-iron gates twenty feet up ahead. In the distance Olivia could see the moon glinting off the calm, rippling water of the river. They had arrived.

  William rolled down his window and spoke into an intercom before the gates swung open to let them in. As Olivia heard them clang shut behind them, her heart gave a flutter in nervous anticipation of what would come.

  As the car slowly made its way up the long, tree lined drive, William broke the silence that had hung expectant between them since he had stopped talking about his relationship with Elizabeth.

  “If you decide to leave before I can take you back to Dublin, feel free to use any of the vehicles in the garage. Seamus, my majordomo, will provide you with the keys.”

  Even though Olivia had resolved to see the situation through to the end, come what may, William still held the belief that she would sneak away like a thief in the night. Or in their particular case, the day.

  “When I go back to Dublin, you’ll be with me,” she said, reassuringly. “I know you think I’m going to run away screaming any minute, but I promise you that I am in this for the long haul. No matter what happens later, I’m with you.”

  She made sure to emphasize those last three words.

  William reached over and rested his right hand on the leg that was closest to him and Olivia felt that electric current again, hot and tingly, ride up her thigh and into her belly. She knew he felt it too when he closed his eyes ever so briefly on a soft sigh.

  “Thank you,” he said before finally stopping the car and turning off the engine. When the lights of the Audi went out, Olivia could see the castle in front of her for the very first time, a few windows lit from within.

  “Welcome home, Olivia.”

  CHAPTER 16

  Stepping out of the car, William walked around to the other side to take Olivia’s hand, directing her to the crushed stone path that lead straight to the front door of the castle. She halted, not yet ready to take the steps that would propel her into the next phase of her life. As long as she stayed outside, she rationalized that she could always go back to Dublin a
nd forget that any of this had ever happened. If she didn’t go through those doors, she told herself, she could still back out.

  And do what? Go back to the life I’d been living before? Because that had been working out so well for me.

  No. Olivia couldn’t do that. If nothing else, she’d never been a coward and she didn’t intend to start being one now. Besides, just minutes before she had told William that she was committed to him and this endeavor, seeing it through come what may. She wouldn’t – couldn’t – back out now. She had to know what was waiting for her beyond the castle’s doors and how it would alter her future.

  William sensed Olivia’s hesitancy, but he wouldn’t force her.

  “It’s okay, take your time.”

  “No, I’m good.” Olivia squeezed his hand quickly to show him that she had meant what she had said. “Show me your home, William.”

  Walking up to the castle’s imposing entrance, the door opened before William could reach for the handle.

  “Hello, Seamus. You didn’t have to wait up,” William said to the man who was standing in the doorway to greet them. Putting his left hand on the small of Olivia’s back, William nudged her forward. “And this, Seamus, is Olivia.”

  “Ah, yes,” Seamus said almost snidely, and Olivia was overcome with the sense that Seamus had heard about her previously and wasn’t happy to be meeting her now. His next words, however, belied that first impression. “Hello Olivia. I’m glad to see William was able to convince you to join him. Welcome to the castle.”

  Olivia stepped away from William and extended her right hand in invitation. “Good to meet you. I hope my presence here doesn’t cause you any problems.”

  She looked back at William to see gauge his reaction to her words. “With William having ... somewhat abnormal hours ... I’ll try not to be in your way during the day.”