Immortal Billionaire, page 14
He thought carefully about his words. “I don’t pretend to understand how reincarnation works. If you believe humans are just a bunch of atoms, then we die and that’s the end of us. But if you believe we have a soul, then you may also believe this is not our first life on this earth. It may also not be our last. Most people will never know the details of their previous lives. They may have occasional dreams or feelings of déjà vu, but otherwise, the past will not affect them. It’s only in cases like ours, when fate conspires to cause our paths to cross again, that vivid memories will resurface.”
Connie lifted her head to look at him. “But surely the fact that I was Cariña and you were Máximo only makes what we feel for each other stronger?”
He shook his head. “We can only go as far as our destiny will allow us. You were Cariña in a past life, but I wasn’t Máximo.”
“No. That’s not true.” Determinedly she shook her head. “I saw you in my dreams. When we make love, I know it’s happened before. I’m not wrong about that.”
“No, you’re not wrong.” He cupped her cheek with one hand. “But you don’t understand. I wasn’t Máximo in a past life...I am Máximo.”
She frowned. “You’re right, I don’t understand.”
This was the hard part. He found it difficult enough to understand it himself. “Máximo de León y Soledad did not exist before his thirtieth birthday. There are no records of him prior to that date. It was as if he came from nowhere. In a sense, he did. That happened because we are the same person.” He took a deep breath. “On my thirtieth birthday, I have to fulfill my destiny and go back in time to Spain in the year 1521. I have to pick up the pieces of my life as Máximo.”
She was quiet for so long he thought he must have blown it. The only thing that gave him hope was the fact that she didn’t pull away from him. Eventually, she drew in a shuddering breath. “Have you always known you would have to go back?”
Sylvester swallowed that strange obstruction that still persisted in his throat. “I wasn’t born knowing it, if that’s what you mean. Because I wasn’t born in any conventional sense of the word. My life has existed on this loop, this immortal cycle. As Máximo, I was the first head of the house of de León. I have been the head of this house ever since. Knowing I must go back was more a realization that came to me gradually over the years.”
“What do you suppose would happen if you stayed here?” Connie’s voice was small and sad.
He stared over her head, out the window at the blue sky. The same sky he’d stared at five hundred years ago and every day ever since then. “If I don’t go back, history would look very different. Máximo would not exist. He wouldn’t have been there when Ponce de León landed in Florida. The history of these islands would have looked very different. Even leaving that aside—” he laughed slightly “—if anything as momentous can be dismissed so lightly. Máximo and Cariña would not have met and fallen in love. They would not have founded the house of de León. All that I am now would not have happened.”
“Are you going back because you must go to her...because of your love for Cariña?” Connie bent her head over the coverlet, tracing the embroidered pattern with one fingertip.
Placing a hand under her chin, he lifted her face so she was forced to look at him. Although Connie blinked rapidly, a single tear escaped and slid down her cheek. Sylvester smoothed it away with the pad of his thumb. “Connie, I said I don’t understand any of this. You know how stunned I was when I first saw you. That was because I recognized you. In that instant, I knew who you were. I didn’t fall in love with you there and then. I couldn’t, because I was already in love with you.”
Her lip trembled. “Cariña will come to you in Valladolid. She will share your life from then on. Even though my own life will not have begun, I envy her because she can be with you and I can’t.”
He drew her close, wishing he had some words of comfort to offer her, wishing there was some way he could stop time, change the past, make things turn out differently. He had wished the same thing many times in his life, but never with such a strong reason.
Sylvester didn’t know if the cycle was repeated. If these five hundred years happened over and over. If this was the first or one of many times in the supernatural loop that represented his immortality. He had found that questioning could lead him onto a downward slope of gloom and depression from which it was hard to clamber back. All he knew for sure about his questions was there were no answers.
It would be different if Connie, or Cariña, had shared his immortality. But that wasn’t the case. She had not been alive for five hundred years the way he had. Cariña had been mortal. She had died when she reached old age. It was only now that she had come back again as Connie.
The supernatural world became even stranger here on Corazón. Immortality and reincarnation, although different, had collided with a force so powerful it had rocked their lives off course. Even though Sylvester had lived for five hundred years, the chances of his dead love being reborn had to be nonexistent. Unless Corazón was added into the equation. Here, all things became possible.
Some time later, Connie lifted her head again. “How will you go back? Do you know, or will you just vanish?” Her eyes widened. “Tell me I will be able to say goodbye to you.”
“I will take the same route so many people on this island have taken over the years.” She looked confused. “The Salto de Fe.”
“No, Sylvester. You can’t.” Connie raised a shaking hand to her lips, her eyes wide with panic. “How do you know it will work? You could just die on those rocks for nothing. How can you be sure it will lead you back to Valladolid and to your life as Máximo?”
“I just know. For as long as I have known I must do this, I have known how I must do it. I know that when I step over that edge, it will take me to the exact point in time that I need to go to. It will take me to the precise point at which Máximo joins Ponce de León on his journey. The Salto de Fe is the leap of faith. Trust me, Connie.”
She surprised him by starting to laugh. There was no trace of hysteria or disbelief, only genuine amusement in her expression. “I am lying in bed in the middle of the day with a man who tells me his island is cursed, that we knew each other in a past life, and he must jump into a ravine next week so he can resume his life as a sixteenth-century conquistador. I have no reason to trust you, Sylvester de León, but, for some strange reason, I do.”
He lay back, smiling into her eyes and pulling her down on top of him. “In that case, perhaps you might consider trusting me one more time?”
* * *
In her dreaming state, Connie shivers and tries to cry out. The sense of menace is strong but she can’t pinpoint its source. The Calusa braves stand proud and tall. Nearby, the voices of the maidens chant their sweet songs. Overhead, the sky is clear and the lightest of breezes ruffles the surface of the water. Her eyes seek out Máximo and find him among the ranks of the braves. His blue eyes hold hers briefly, warming and reassuring her.
Her father, the chief, steps forward, taking her hand. Beside him, her grandmother’s face glows with pride. The Calusa king is coming to claim his bride. If she pleases him, one of their own will be the new queen of Shell Indians. Through her, their family will become all powerful.
I cannot do this. I love Máximo.
Her knees tremble as she walks with her father to the water’s edge to meet the ceremonial canoe. Slowly she raises her eyes to the face of the man who holds her destiny in his hands...
* * *
“No!” Connie jerked bolt upright in the darkness, sweat cooling on her limbs while her heart raced wildly.
Strong arms were around her instantly and, with relief, she remembered Sylvester’s presence. Leaning against him, she allowed reality to wash away the horror of the nightmare.
“What scared you so much?”
“It was another of those vivid dreams. I can’t explain how real they are. It’s as if my senses are more heightened than they are in reality. This time, King Yargua was arriving on this island—before it was known as Corazón, of course—to decide if he wished to take me—take Cariña—to be his bride.” She shuddered. “My father, the chief, led me down to the water’s edge to greet the royal canoe. I didn’t want to go. By then Cariña was already in love with Máximo.”
Sylvester’s arms tightened around her. “I know. I was there.”
Connie gave a shaky laugh. “Of course you were. When we reached the water, the king stood up and I forced myself to look up at him.” She felt the words freeze in her throat, remembering the sheer terror she had felt, and forced herself onward. “I knew him, Sylvester. He is my stalker.”
“What?” Sylvester sounded stunned. His hand fumbled for the lamp next to the bed so he could look at her. “Are you sure? You said you’ve never seen your stalker’s face.”
“I just knew. The same way you recognized me when you first saw me.” She lifted a hand to touch her scars. “Even though I never saw the face of the man who slashed my throat, I know with absolute certainty he was the Calusa king in the past life we shared.”
“My God.” Sylvester was silent for several minutes, allowing the meaning of what she had just said to sink in. “Do you realize what this means? He never targeted you because of anything that happened in this life.”
She nodded. “He came after me to get his revenge on Cariña. Because she left him for Máximo.”
“But how did he know who you were?”
“The same way you did. He recognized me. I was a model, remember? I was becoming successful, so my pictures were in magazines that were widely distributed.”
Sylvester nodded. “If he saw your picture and identified who you are, he could easily have tracked you down. Or perhaps he was always looking for you?”
Connie plunged on. “When I first came to Corazón, I sensed he might be here, but I told myself I was being overimaginative. Everything on this island felt strange. There was the story of the curse, the things that were happening to the guests...how I felt about you.”
“That wasn’t strange.” He kissed the top of her head. “That was wonderful.”
She managed a smile. “Strangely wonderful. Nevertheless, I blamed all of those things for my perception of danger being thrown off balance. I’m so used to being scared, I decided I didn’t know how not to be scared. Does that make sense?”
She raised her eyes to his face and the flame of love and sympathy she saw in their blue depths almost made her cry out. “I wish it wasn’t true for you, but, yes, it makes sense.”
“Now, after that dream I had just now, I know I was right. He is here on Corazón.”
“Do you know who he is?”
“I wish I did, but I don’t. I feel his malignancy, his evil intent, his hatred toward me. All of those things. I just don’t get any feel for him as an individual. But this doesn’t make sense. I know how Yargua looked back then. So do you. We’d both know him in an instant if he was here on Corazón today.” She frowned fretfully. “Why doesn’t he look the way he did back then? You are Máximo. You haven’t changed over time. I am Cariña born again. I look like her. I get that. But this man looks nothing like the Calusa king. There is no one on the island who even remotely resembles him.”
“As I’ve said, my credentials as a reincarnation expert aren’t proven, Connie, but I don’t think it works that way. It’s the soul that survives to the next incarnation. The body dies. What body the soul inhabits when a person is born again is immaterial. The chances of you looking exactly like Cariña are, I think, remote and rare. Your looks seem to be one catalyst for why ours has become such a dramatic situation.” Sylvester seemed to be following a particular train of thought. “Whoever this man is, I wonder if he even knows why he has these feelings of hatred and revenge toward you. Does he know who he was and who you were, or did he see your picture one day and just feel compelled to hurt you?”
“Dear Lord, that’s a scary thought.” Connie shivered. “How many stalkers and killers have a motive that has nothing to do with this life? How many people are committing horrible crimes to avenge a wrong that happened centuries ago without even knowing it?” The trembling intensified. “Did my mother die because you and I fell in love all those years ago?”
Sylvester held her, warming her with his body, running his hands up and down her arms and shoulders until the tremors ceased. “At least we now know why we are stranded on this island.”
“He means to kill me this time.” Connie knew it with a fierce certainty. “Will he also try and kill you?”
“He can try.” Sylvester’s mouth was grim. “Immortality doesn’t have many compensations, but defeating this bastard is the one I plan on enjoying the most.”
* * *
The atmosphere on the island, already tense, was now like a rubber band pulled so taut it was ready to snap. It was evident in the sidelong glances they sent each other. Every comment, no matter how minor, was analyzed and assessed for a double meaning. If one person wandered off alone, the others immediately became suspicious. If two people had a private conversation, everyone else in the group suspected a plot. Connie could feel the hostility toward her mounting because of her closeness to Sylvester. It was the reason she suggested they should try to keep their relationship low-key.
“Why?” Since Sylvester had responded by pulling her into his arms and kissing her, she sensed he might not be in favor of this proposal.
“Because if people are noticing, it will infuriate him even more.”
“Connie, he is going to come after you, anyway. He knows you love me.” His face had softened as he looked down at her. “Pretending you don’t isn’t going to fool him.”
“Well, it might at least lighten Lucinda’s mood,” she suggested.
“Nothing is going to lighten Lucinda’s mood.”
It was true. Doubt and mistrust were like a silent alarm ringing constantly in the air and Lucinda seemed more in tune with its resonance than anyone else. This was evident just after Connie’s conversation with Sylvester when, bursting in on her as Connie sat in her favorite chair in the den, Lucinda looked around wildly. “How can you sit there reading as though nothing has happened?”
Connie placed her book aside. She thought back to the first time she had seen Lucinda. To the glamorous, groomed, petulant woman on the quayside at Charlotte Harbor. This wild-eyed, distraught figure with the unkempt hair bore no resemblance to the person Lucinda had been back then.
“It takes my mind off things.”
“How can it?” Lucinda’s eyes seemed incapable of settling on one thing. It was as if, even in this quiet refuge, she was seeking the source of their troubles, trying to discover the hiding place of the person who had trapped them all here. “How can you think of anything else? We are stuck here and we have no idea what this maniac will do to us.”
Connie felt sorry for her. She might be spoiled and demanding, but she didn’t deserve this. None of them did. “Why don’t we do something together? How about a walk? We could follow the shoreline. Who knows, we might see a boat or even a helicopter. Maybe we could attract its attention.”
For a moment she thought Lucinda was going to refuse. Or perhaps, as the other woman stared off into space, she just hadn’t heard. Then, gathering her thoughts, Lucinda nodded. “Yes. A walk. Give me a minute while I change my shoes.”
Connie rose and wandered out into the hall to wait for her. The house was quiet. Vega was doing a stock take of the food supplies, although she was fairly sure there was enough to last until the electrical contractor’s visit, which would happen on Sylvester’s birthday next week. Roberto was working on the repairs to the launch while Juan was attempting to restore his beloved canoe. Sylvester, Matt, Jonathan and Guthrie were trying to track down the phone-jamming equipment, although Roberto had warned them looking for a small box on an island this size was like looking for a needle in a haystack. At the same time, they were also seeking any signs a stranger might be hiding out on the island.
The first scream made Connie freeze. It was the high-pitched, agonized sound of an animal in fear of its life, and it was coming from upstairs. It was quickly followed by a series of other screams and she recognized Lucinda’s voice. Connie ran for the stairs at the same time Vega emerged from the kitchen.
“Find Sylvester,” she called over her shoulder to Vega as she took the stairs two at a time.
Her heart was hammering wildly as she reached the top of the stairs. What would she find when she reached Lucinda’s room? Would it be something as awful as those bloodcurdling screams promised or had Lucinda’s frayed nerves been tipped over the edge of hysteria by something minor?
The door was open and Connie hurried inside. Lucinda was huddled in a corner, pointing at the bed.
With a feeling of dread, Connie turned to follow the direction of the other woman’s shaking finger. The reason for the screams was immediately all too horribly clear.
Fully-clothed and facedown, Ellie’s dead body was lying spread-eagled on the bed.
* * *
The guests gathered in the dining room and, for once, everyone was in agreement with Guthrie’s suggestion they needed a drink. Vega brought cognac and Guthrie handed around glasses of the fine spirit. These were accepted with real gratitude. Connie was seriously concerned about Lucinda, whose hand was shaking so violently that Connie had to help her lift the glass to her lips so she could take a sip of the amber-colored liquor.
“How did she die?” Connie asked, looking up from her kneeling position in front of Lucinda’s chair.
“Obviously there will need to be an autopsy, but it appears she was strangled,” Sylvester said.
