A Tale of Two Centuries

closer to our unexpected visitor. “That doesn’t matter. Reyna, you said in your letter that you were leaving her in capable hands, and you trusted that I’d know what to do. And I do. Give her forty-eight more hours. Let her do her dress rehearsal tomorrow, and experience opening night, and then take her back.”

My eyes widen at my cousin’s bold request. Reyna purses her lips, and Cat, perhaps sensing her tentative acquiescence, moves even closer. “She’s got this.”

I just stand there, a passive observer in my own fate as they discuss my future. Where is the brave girl I claimed to be, the girl I’ve become the last week? The girl who stood up for Austin with his father and defied Kendal by auditioning? Apparently the thought of returning home has scared her away, for all I can do now is watch silently and pray that Reyna will say yes to Cat’s request. I doubt I’ll ever have enough time with Austin or in this world, but right now two more days feel as though they are a lifetime.

Lucas shuffles his feet behind me, reminding me of his presence. I can’t even begin to wonder what he must be thinking. But I do not turn around and ask because Reyna suddenly bows her head. My breath catches, and Cat clutches my hand.

“As you wish,” she tells Cat, her eyes trained on me. “She may remain until after the performance. I shall be waiting for her at the portal at midnight.”

She doesn’t need to explain. A flash of the chaotic theater of etched handprints and stars leaps to mind. TCL Chinese Theatre, the location where I first arrived.

Relief fills me to bursting as her words and their meaning sink in…and maybe a touch of something else, too, for as Reyna turns and walks away, I finally find my voice.

“Can I stay…forever?”

The words are out before I can even think about what I’m proposing, what it’ll mean. Cat stares at me as if I have lost my mind, and perhaps I have, but I can’t take back the request. Nothing in my entire life has ever felt as right as staying here.

My heart aches with the admission. It feels like a betrayal to my parents—to Mama— to wish to stay where they aren’t. But what is truly waiting for me at home? A family whom I love with every piece of my breaking heart and whom I miss more than anything in the world, yes, but also a brother who lives in another city and parents who are growing older with each passing day, currently on the marriage hunt for me. Once I return, it will not be long until they make me a match, a suitor who at best will not be Austin, and at worse will be cold and indifferent. And after leaving the shelter of my familial home, I will be thrust into a life filled with propriety and rules, expectations and limitations.

I have become too comfortable with the ways of this world. The freedom I am granted, the choices that I have. Here is where I’ve come to be the woman I always wanted to be, and can have the life I always dreamed of. Here is where I can create my own destiny.

I don’t know where I’ll stay. I can’t expect Cat’s father will just take me into his home and accept that I no longer have one of my own. But those are details for later. If Reyna agrees.

A very important if.

She takes her time turning back. I stand frozen in place, waiting to gauge her reaction, conjuring up a thousand possibilities. But when she does turn, I am unable to read her expression.

Seconds tick by in anticipation. Not knowing whether I pushed too far is worse than any outburst.

A car drives down the street. The engine rumbles; its headlights illuminate the porch where we stand, lighting our alcove like the noonday sun, then driving away, shrouding us again in darkness. My cousin shifts on her feet. Lucas coughs.

Finally, just when I think I cannot take the silence any longer, Reyna asks me, “Is your request in earnest?” just as Cat leans close to my ear and whispers under her breath, “What are you doing?”

My gaze darts between them, but I do not answer. I can’t. It took everything I had in me even to make such a proposition in the first place. But as I remain silent, I can’t help but feel as though I failed somehow when a flash of emotion crosses Reyna’s face. It takes me a moment to decipher it, but when I do, any shred of hope I held for my future is dashed.

Disappointment.

The smooth skin around Reyna’s eyes tightens. “Alessandra, staying here would affect much more than just you.” Her stare drills into me. “Such an act would change history.”

As she emphasizes the final word, the amber color of her eyes seems to glow and swirl in the darkness, lit this time not from a passing car but from a mystical source within. The girl inside me who still believes in things like signs and hidden meanings wants to believe it is for a reason, that she is sending me a silent message of some kind. But when she speaks again, I realize that is simply the childish, wishful stirring of my imagination. And perhaps a touch of slanted moonlight.

“I am truly sorry,” she says, “but a decision like that is not within my power.”

Her emphasis, this time on the word my, catches my attention. I furrow my brow, marveling over what she could mean, what force could be at work in this situation that is greater than she is.

Signore?

The fates?

As I consider the possibilities, my eyes leave hers, closing for just a moment. And in the second it takes for my lashes to lift, Reyna disappears. No windswept storm to ride on. No whispered chants. Simply gone.

And I burst into tears.

Chapter Twenty-five

The crunch of boots on gravel causes me to lift my weary head. I’d recognize that unmistakable tread anywhere.

I’m still standing in the open doorway to Cat’s house, the cold night air settling around me like a torn, tattered blanket that suffocates all the same. Until now, the only sound to pierce the thick silence has been my sobs, my cousin’s sharply whispered “not now” to Lucas’s obvious bafflement, and the lonely drone of a car engine fading into the distance. All have formed a depressing yet completely fitting accompaniment to my misery. But as the thud of Austin’s confident, purposeful footsteps joins the nighttime symphony, my agony reaches a new low.

The automatic porch light switches on, bathing his raven head in soft light, making him appear every bit the fallen angel I once proclaimed him to be, and I realize this may be—no, it will be—one of the last times I’ll ever see his handsome face. Ever hear the deep notes of his voice. Every fiber in my being wants to prolong this moment, to savor it and commit it to memory so I can take it out and relive it in the years to come, but for some reason I’m finding it difficult even to look him in the eye.

“What’s going on, Princess?”

Those deep notes I’ve grown to love so much hold a touch of concern and confusion, and that’s what finally prompts me to meet Austin’s gaze. And when I do, my breath catches at the pure joy—rather than his characteristic cool indifference—shining in his eyes.

Well, that is, until he sees my face.

Then fury, swift and ferocious, replaces it, and the ease with which he took his first steps up the driveway shifts to edgy, tense strides as his long legs devour the distance between us.

“What happened?” he barks at Cat, simultaneously sweeping me into his arms. He glides his thumbs under my eyes, wiping away the tracks of my tears, and then places a feather-light kiss on my forehead. Before I can relax into the tender caress, he raises his head and swings around to Lucas. “Someone better start talking. Now.”

Lucas holds his hands palms up. “Hey, man, don’t look at me. I’m as lost as you are.”

Austin narrows his eyes but nods, then turns and targets Cat with his wrathful stare. I latch onto his arm. “Austin, neither of them is the reason for my tears.”

“Then what is?” he asks. A confused, hopeless look crosses his face. “Tell me, please, so I can fix it. I can’t stand seeing you like this.”