Final Days Read online

  His body was, as she had told him, as perfect as that of a Greek God. His touch had done things to her she had never known could happen. Their connection was beyond just physical, she still had no idea how, but it had been. At one moment she had felt as if they merged and she was, literally, a part of him. It wasn’t possible, she knew that, but what an incredible surreal experience. Was it her pending death that had created a mystical altered state of perception that did not actually exist? Didn’t matter. For her, it was real. Strangely, it seemed as if he felt it, too.

  Alisa put her hand to her forehead and tapped it.

  “Nuts,” she accused herself out loud.

  The thing that stayed with her the most was the way he had brushed her hair back lovingly at one point, and asked what he could do to “fix” things for her. He wanted to be her hero.

  God. Did she ever need a hero.

  She slipped down the alleyways to the main street, walked through a group of people who looked like they were returning from all-night partying, then turned into a café.

  Sitting in a booth, she looked at the menu with a grin. They’d never gotten to dinner. Even so, she wasn’t really hungry this morning, but she knew she needed to keep her strength up. Nutrition was vital at this point.

  Forcing herself to have a little breakfast, some coffee, and a pastry for instant energy, she paid the check and got up too quickly. Her right leg gave out and she stumbled against another table occupied by a young couple in business dress.

  A pale blonde-haired woman put a hand out to help steady her as the young man stood and supported her from the back.

  “Ah, pardonnez-moi,” Alisa said, embarrassed. This was happening more often now. “You are kind to help a clumsy woman. I am all right now, merci.”

  She left as quickly as her betraying muscles would let her. Carefully stepping with one foot then the other to make certain she would not trip again, she kept to the alleyways so that if she had a problem, at least there would be no witnesses.

  Once she arrived at her hotel, and slipped in the back entrance, she took some meds, paid her bill, and climbed into a hired car waiting under the covered pavilion. As it faded in the distance, Paris winked at Alisa. She took a long look at the skyline. For the last time.

  The apartment was empty. He wondered if she’d just stepped out and would be back momentarily. Then he saw it.

  In the center of the bed where they had made love, a square scrap of paper. She hadn’t just stepped out. She was gone. He waited a full sixty seconds before he walked over to the perfectly made bed. Even then, he stared at the fluid handwriting for another minute before he picked it up.

  Koen,

  First, I wanted to tell you that I keep my promises. But I knew you were the kind of man who wouldn’t let me go until I promised I would be here when you returned. And, oh, God, I wish I could be. It is impossible for me to find words great enough to make you understand what this night meant to me. Let me just say that every day for the rest of my life, I will wake with the memory of this night as the most wonderful one I’ve ever known. Even now, thinking of you inside me, your touch, your voice, your eyes, my body warms and my heart smiles. I hope you can think of our romance as fondly, because although it shot through us like a flaming meteor, it was real. And perfect. I cannot stay. You know what we felt, so you know if I could, I would. Please, remember our moments sometimes, don’t forget me. But have a happy life and find someone to love. You were made for love. Always, Alisa.

  The paper slipped from his fingers, slid on the wood floor, and glided under the bedside table. Koen walked to the window and watched the human drama play out on the busy street below.

  Well, he’d tried. He’d made it clear to her that she had to be here tonight. Now he second-guessed himself and wondered if he shouldn’t have just told her what he was and taken her back to the apartment so she could stay with him until daylight left again. When he rose tonight, he’d already decided he wanted her in his life. He’d just been too slow to realize. Never in all his centuries had he connected to someone like that.

  It was okay. A first blood vampire knew how to find people. And nothing would stop him. With CCTV and security cameras, he’d be able to track where she’d gone. She’d told him she had a flight out in the morning. No chance she would escape the cameras at the airport. His team would have her inside of a day.

  A chirp announced an incoming call. When he answered, it was Jacob.

  “She’s in Africa. I need you, Koen. Will you come?”

  “I’ll meet you at Charles de Gaulle. I can be there within the hour.”

  Then he contacted his security team to begin the search for Alisa. He wished he could go himself, but Jacob would need him in Africa to help find the young vampire Starla. Eillia was too pregnant to travel that far to search for her friend, and just the fact that Jacob asked him to come meant he expected trouble. Koen would always be there for family. Hopefully, they would find her quickly, get her back to his villa, settled in, and then he could commit every moment to helping Alisa adjust to who and what he was.

  Her private charter took Alisa over vineyards in the Rhône Valley. While she used commercial jets for transportation, the intimacy and versatility of small planes were the only way to tour a country. Especially now.

  The pilot was an old friend who had flown her and several of her friends on assignments. Palo had flown in the military with Percy decades earlier, so Percy called him and set up this leisurely cross-country flight to let her absorb the landscape that showed off the true magic of France. Palo flew low much of the time so Alisa could see details missed at higher elevations. A true bird’s-eye view.

  Her smile didn’t stop as he flew her past country farms, horses and cows wandering in lush green fields. The shoreline of any country was beautiful and it was especially so here in southern France as they approached the Pyrénées.

  “Palo, thank you. What a wonderful thing to be able to fly. To see the world from such a height, distant and yet still part of it all.”

  He looked at her with moist eyes and said, “Bien sûr,” with such sadness, she knew Percy had betrayed her request.

  “Ah, he told you, didn’t he?”

  Palo nodded. And spoke in English. “I am so sorry, Alisa. Such a beautiful person… I cannot think of you gone.”

  “Well, it’ll be much sooner if you crash this plane, so kill the tears. I’m all right. Really. I’ve accepted this. No one lives forever, right? And I’ve got a good year or so heads-up. That’s kind of a gift. It gives me the chance to do things like this. So, I am grateful to have you take me on this part of my Magnificent Journey.”

  “Anytime, ma belle. Anything you need, I am your man.”

  Sweet. Such a kind man. It was clear he was sincere. And sad for her. which is why she wasn’t planning to tell anyone. Which is why Percy owed her big time when she got back next week for her follow up with the doctor.

  She didn’t know why Dr. Patel wanted to see her. It wasn’t as if there was anything he could do for her. He had her on some meds that might help delay its progression. Right now, she was pretty symptom free other than the muscle weakness, but nothing was going to stop that. The only medical intervention she would ultimately need when the time came was palliative care.

  She switched her attention back to the ground rushing quickly below her. No more thoughts of her illness. The scenery was too gorgeous to miss.

  After they landed, Alisa said a heartfelt goodbye to Palo and thanked him for all he’d done for her in the years past. He hugged her and held on a little too long this time because he knew as well as she that he would never see her again. As he drove away, she saw him wipe tears from his eyes with the palm of his hand.

  Sighing, Alisa admitted her mother had been right. People didn’t need other people’s troubles. Everyone had enough of their own. It made her more certain than ever that her decision to keep her condition a secret was the right one.

  Alisa would spend a da
y at her friend Chloe’s little house by the sea. Chloe was a fashion model, but she was out of town, and had left a key for Alisa under a concrete alligator by the back door. Serenity was easiest found in solitude. And right now, Alisa was looking forward to quiet walks on the beach and the pitch dark nights on soft sand with only the sound of waves rushing against the shore and an occasional seabird.

  Percy had a list, and notes, for each of the only five people Alisa was close with. He would make sure they were delivered after her death.

  Alisa’s mother had always told her not to visit her troubles on others. From the first time Alisa had run to her mother with a skinned knee, she had been brushed aside sharply.

  “Don’t be bothering anyone with your problems,” the stoic and unforgiving woman had said to her little girl.

  And Alisa never did. From there forward she took care of everything herself when she had a problem.

  Her mother had taken very good care of her. Proper clothes, nutritional food, good schools. She’d just never been loving. But Alisa knew she had done the best that she could.

  It wasn’t a mystery why her mother was so unemotional and detached. Alisa met her grandmother just once before she died. The old woman was worse than her own mother. Neither woman was mean, just not kind. She knew that through much of her own life, she herself had been too cautious about letting people in. Stoic, like her mother. Implacable at times.

  She was sorry for that. Now more than ever, Alisa realized how important it was to let people in. Which is why she left loving messages for those who had touched her life most. And who she had let in, at least a little bit.

  Sitting on the sand with the warm water pushing at her toes, she thought of the big man in Paris. Koen. Oh, how she had let him in. Blushing at the thought of how she’d practically attacked him, a perfect stranger, she thought about how it would have shocked people who knew her.

  She had meant every word she wrote in the note she’d left. She’d meant it too, when she’d asked him to remember her. Shouldn’t there be something she left behind? Shouldn’t someone miss her like that?

  Morbid thoughts, stop it, she chided. She’d decided she would not do this. No more sadness. Only living every remaining moment to its very fullest.

  Next, Cairo, for a visit with a colleague from an Egyptian newspaper and one last look at Egypt’s treasures before she flew back to Chicago.

  EIGHT

  Holy fuck! Koen had just reminded himself a few days ago that life could take incredible turns in moments. And that’s exactly what happened in Africa. He thought that he and Jacob would go there, find Starla, bring her home, and things would be normal again.

  Did. Not. Happen. Everything got complicated when Koen realized that Jacob was in love with the girl.

  Then they discovered she had been abducted by a first blood vampire who was part of a large community of first bloods. Unheard of to Koen or any of his own clan of first bloods in Europe.

  The leader of the first bloods, who called themselves children of the moon, was a striking man named Ahmose who claimed Starla as his mate because it turned out she was Shoazan, an extraordinarily rare person who could have a child with a first blood vampire. Koen couldn’t fault him, she was too precious, first blood children so rare and prized.

  But Starla admitted she was in love with Jacob, and it all turned into a horrible mess. Jacob attacked Ahmose to free the woman he loved. Ahmose attacked Jacob because he believed she was destined to be his mate and the mother of his children. There was no easy way to resolve it.

  Shocked, Koen had to play peacemaker when he suggested they call in an old friend who was an empath with the ability to divine the future, especially when it came to first bloods. Cherise and her husband David flew to Zambia from their home in Iceland and did a reading for them with everyone present.

  Koen was thrilled to see the petite Frenchwoman so happy now with her first blood husband. Her life had not been easy.

  Gathered in Ahmose’s yurt, Cherise, Starla, and Ahmose, connected by touch, traveled into the spiritual realm to seek the truth. When it was finished, and the three of them returned from the inward journey, Cherise sat back to advise the angst-ridden group.

  “These souls reached for each other on the spiritual plane. They needed to be together,” Cherise told them. “I could not keep them apart. These two were meant to be together. But as parents. Not as lovers.”

  Nothing was resolved. Starla and Jacob were in love and needed to be together. And although Ahmose clearly knew he was destined to have children with Starla, he saw no way it could happen now. No vampire male would ever allow his mate to be with another man. So, it all went to shit in a shit-storm.

  Eventually, Ahmose had to accept…Starla loved Jacob and nothing he said or did would keep her with him.

  Ahmose was a good man. Koen respected him and his desire to fulfill his destiny for his people. This situation had no way to end well.

  When Starla told Ahmose she would be leaving with Jacob, and how sorry she was that she could not have their promised first blood children, there was enough pain to go around for everyone. Koen hurt for the lost children, but he knew Starla did, too. There was no way to fix this.

  Before they left the hidden community of first bloods, Koen and Ahmose promised to keep in touch and bring their clans together.

  When the next night, Koen, Cherise, David, and a friend of Starla’s left the village near the waterfalls, Starla and Jacob left too. Ahmose was nowhere to be seen and Koen understood completely.

  He had lost his own daughter before she was born, and, against all odds, found her last year. The pain had nearly wrecked him.

  Flying from Zambia to Cairo, they stopped in a luxury hotel to sleep away the daylight and travel on to France the next night.

  While checking in, Cherise sent Jacob and Starla to their room so they could have their first night alone together. Koen was completely exhausted, so Cherise sent him up, too, telling him she and David would take care of the arrangements.

  He glanced across the big lobby, for some reason he hesitated. What was he looking for? His sharp eyes perused the area, and when he saw nothing of interest, he shook his head, and followed the others up the elevator. All he really wanted now was to get home and see if his team had found his blue-eyed angel.

  God. Alisa. What the hell was he going to do about her? He didn’t really want to be in love right now. Too much happening in his life. But when he considered telling his men to cease the search and come on home, he couldn’t do it. He wanted her, more now than before, and when he fell asleep, his dream of their lovemaking was so vivid he woke with a painful, impressive hard-on.

  If there was a place on this planet you could touch eternity, it would be Egypt. Ghosts of the past walked in every corner of the country, but especially in monuments left behind by people who believed they would live forever.

  She loved the Sphinx. It appealed to her on several levels, so on this final night in Egypt, beneath clear skies, she touched the ancient rock and slid down near it to look up at the regal head reaching toward the stars. It was one of Alisa’s favorite places on earth.

  Did she feel a special connection this time because of her lost years? Maybe. At midnight, she sat in the shadow created by a spotlight and just breathed the air above the warm sandy earth. A beautiful couple walked by, arm in arm. Alisa could tell they felt the same connection to the people of the past who walked here beside them. She watched the beautiful brunette lay her hand on the warm stone, closing her eyes. Alisa smiled, because she had done that same thing the first time she’d come here a dozen years ago. It was hard to believe her life was nearly over now.

  She sat there for what might have been hours, but during that time, she committed her moments to the universe. And asked it to be kind and keep her from lingering too long in a body that no longer let her be a part of all this…of life.

  At some point, her thoughts were only of Koen.

  “Thank you, univ
erse,” she whispered, “Thank you for him.”

  This part of her Magnificent Journey was over. It was just the first part, but she needed to go home, rest, check in with her doctor, let Percy know she was okay, and prepare part two of her final visits tour.

  She was leaving tomorrow morning for home, so she stood up, stretched and headed back to her hotel.

  Only the finest would do, according to Percy, who had booked her into one of the best hotels in Cairo. Sentimental man. She loved him for it.

  She’d spent the night under the stars, and although it was nearly morning, she needed to sleep.

  On her way back to her rental car, an overwhelming tiredness struck her. Like someone sapped every remaining bit of her energy.

  Luckily, she didn’t have far to go to get to her room and just let herself drop. A valet took her car and she headed up to get her key at the elaborate desk where guests came and went.

  Alisa waited anxiously behind a couple finishing registration for their rooms in the luxury hotel. Her eyes wandered to a big man beside a gorgeous petite woman who was speaking to the desk clerk with a French accent. He reminded her of Koen, something about his height and carriage, and extremely handsome as well. Were all these amazing men she was suddenly seeing a little gift for her messed-up fate? Or had they been around all along and she just hadn’t been open enough to notice them? Now, she couldn’t get Koen off her mind. Well, Koen’s body. Koen’s naked body.

  Suddenly the beautiful French woman turned around and stared at her. She smiled softly at Alisa, but kept staring. Then she stepped forward.

  “I am sorry, but would you mind if I touched your arm? Just briefly?”