Grey Eyes: Book One of the Forever Trilogy

Chapter Fifteen

I don’t know how long I stood there on my balcony.  It could have been hours or even days for all I knew.  I was lost in my thoughts, trapped in that same trance-like state I’d experienced while listening to Tristan explain the story of how he’d met me.  The night kept replaying in my head.  First, there were London’s odd revelations.  She could hear the thoughts of others, which apparently I could do as well; she said as much when she communicated with me telepathically.  Tristan confirmed it when he asked if I read his mind.  I had.  I heard him speak without him opening his mouth.  It was almost as shocking to learn that London wasn’t the “mean girl” I’d made her out to be.  She helped me to meet him, Helena too, though I couldn’t imagine how they were all connected.  Well, Helena could have found out about him during the time that he and my aunt were sneaking around—when he and I were sneaking around.   My aunt, those girls, I was supposedly all of them... reincarnated?  That’s what he’d told me, but it was so utterly insane!  I was willing to admit that my long held parameters for what was or wasn’t possible had taken a beating since learning that witches were real, but this was just too far out there—far too much of a leap to take on good faith.  Yet, how else could I explain what I felt?  The familiarity I felt before tonight, or the emotions that gripped me so strongly that I could barely sit still as I sat across from him on that boat—the separation anxiety that made me feel less than whole now that he was gone. 

“Ana?  Ana, what’s wrong?  What are you staring at outside?”

The voice registered as static until I felt the hand land on my shoulder.  The contact jarred me back into the real world.  I turned to find my grandmother—the woman who had lied to my face and stolen my memories—standing directly behind me.  It was hurt that came first, but it didn’t last long; a new hatred was growing within me, devouring all other emotion, so intense that my hands shook…

Tears began down my face and I balled up my fists to release some of the tension.  I was so sick of being “protected.”

She stared at me for a moment, puzzled.  “Someone’s already told you?”

“Told me what?” I answered loudly.  I didn’t bother trying to conceal the resentment in my voice.

This seemed to confuse her more.  She tilted her head and studied my face.  I tried my best to radiate as much anger as possible from my “royal” eyes.  When she finally spoke, it was in an uncertain tone.  “They’ve found her, Ana.  They’ve found your mother.”

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My grandmother, who’d assumed that my anger was the result of receiving some exaggerated, gossiped version of what transpired, went about getting me straight on the facts as we waited on Duncan to arrive with the truck.  Apparently, they found my mother in a hospital, eighty miles away from our home in South Carolina—a “Jane Doe.” That was the subject of the phone call she received this morning, when she’d excused herself from Darren and my company. Remarkably, the hospital was the only health care facility in the state with a specialized “bite” center.  The treatments she received there had done much to stall the effects of the vampire’s venom, but her condition was still very serious. Because of this, the doctors refused to allow Duncan’s local team (Jake and Eddy) to bring her here, especially when they couldn’t identify what kind of “animal” had been responsible for the injury.  In an offer of full disclosure (I flinched at her use of the phrase), she admitted that they had to draw up some phony legal papers which stated that my mother was against all forms of medical treatment, for religious reasons.  She explained that it was necessary to get her to our doctors. It was her only chance for survival, however slim that might be.