Octavia's Choice [The Klawinken 2] (Siren Publishing Classic)

The Klawinken 2

Natalie Rosewood

EROTIC ROMANCE

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IMPRINT: Erotic Romance

OCTAVIA’S CHOICE

Copyright © 2012 by Natalie Rosewood

E-book ISBN:
1-61926-546-X

First E-book Publication: June 2012

Cover design by Jinger Heaston

All cover art and logo copyright © 2012 by Siren Publishing, Inc.

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Octavia’s Choice
 
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The Klawinken 2

NATALIE ROSEWOOD

Copyright © 2012

Octavia sat down at her parents’ kitchen table with a cup of coffee she had poured from the pot her mother made before she went to work. She sighed, enjoying the hot liquid that tasted of hazelnut and cinnamon. Her mother always made the best coffee. As a child, she had taken comfort from the aroma of coffee perking. It meant her parents were lingering to chat after dinner or sharing a weekend breakfast together. If only she felt that sense of well-being now. Instead, the coffee only seemed to add to her anxiety over the events of the last few weeks. She looked around the room at the familiar surroundings in the cozy kitchen before she looked out the kitchen window to the Jansen’s house across the street with the same shutters in need of repair. Their drainpipe was still hanging haphazardly from the last storm. Everything looked the same, but for her it would never be the same again.

When Mathieu Lacroix walked into her life a few weeks before, announcing her Klawinken heritage, she had not wanted to believe him. However, when her estranged sister, Evenela, came back into her life to confirm his story, she had no choice but to believe the life she had been living was not the life she had been born into. Her parents had been adamant that her grandmother’s stories of the Klawinken were nothing more than the ramblings of an old woman suffering from dementia. She knew they thought they were protecting her from a world that Marta and James Andreas, her biological parents, had wanted their children removed from, or they would have never given their non-Klawinken friends custody of their two daughters in the event of their death.

The revelation, although shocking, wasn’t as difficult for her to comprehend now that she believed she was Klawinken. It explained why neither her mother nor the father she had known all her life had the half-moon birthmark on the back of their neck that identified a Klawinken. At some point, she would have to confront them with the fact that she knew the truth, especially if she and Mathieu were to be married. It didn’t matter to her that they weren’t her real parents or that they had not been truthful with her. They were the only family she had ever known, and nothing could change the love she felt for them. She knew how much it hurt them when her sister, Evenela, had left, but she wasn’t her sister. She would not abandon them for the Klawinken.

“Don’t delay telling them what you know,” Evenela had warned when she had made a second visit to see her. “The longer you wait, the harder it will be. I would have confronted them myself, except you were still at home and as a Klawinken I was bound by a promise made by our family to keep our secret until you were twenty-one.”

“I’ll know when the time is right. Besides, they only did what our real mother and father asked of them. I still don’t understand why our grandmother or our aunts didn’t fight for us.”

“They wanted us! They couldn’t just go against our mother’s and father’s wishes. They felt they had to abide by them regardless of how misguided they were. However, they vowed that when we each turned twenty-one, they would bring us back.” Taking a moment to calm herself, Evenela continued, “Believe me when I tell you they want you with them and they are waiting for you, just like they were waiting for me.”

Octavia didn’t want to upset her sister. She remembered her temper only too well. However, she couldn’t stop herself from saying, “None of this makes any sense to me. I feel like there’s something we’re not being told.”

“Aunt June thinks that mother was suffering from a nervous breakdown and that she and our father were not happy together…which leads me to something else I need to tell you.”

“There’s more.” Octavia sighed. “And by your tone it doesn’t sound good.”

“It’s about our father’s family, the Andreas. They don’t believe we are his children.”

“What?”

“I know. It’s hard to imagine on top of everything else I’ve told you. I’m not sure Aunt June or Aunt Sable would have said anything to me about it unless I asked. You see, not one Andreas came to my welcoming party or attempted to get in touch with me once I returned to Boston. I kept thinking with each new introduction I would be meeting aunts, uncles, cousins, or even a grandparent from the Andreas side of the family, but that never happened.”

“I’m almost afraid to ask, but why don’t they think James Andreas is our father?”

“Evidently our mother was a bit wild before she mated with our father. Maybe, according to Aunt Sable, a bit wilder than most of the Klawinken women. Even when she turned twenty-one, she didn’t just settle into dreaming about her one true mate. It took a little time for her to find our father and for him to find her. Evenela looked down at her hands. “Our aunts both say that when she married our father, all the wildness left her, regardless what the Andreas choose to think.”

“According to Mathieu, the Klawinken hold family in very high esteem. The Andreas may not have liked our mother, but to turn their backs on you and me, it just seems to go against everything Klawinken. I’m surprised they didn’t want a paternity test. Wouldn’t that have convinced them?”

“I brought that up myself, but Aunt Sable practically had a stroke. She said paternity tests were for the humans and that you and I don’t need to prove anything to anyone. We were the product of a Klawinken mating and that to take a test would only serve to sully our mother’s reputation. She said we should stand our ground and that in time they will come around.”

Octavia shook her head. “In my opinion, if they haven’t come around in over twenty years, they’re not going to now. A simple paternity test would do nothing to hurt our mother. It would only repair her reputation in the eyes of those who believe she slept with someone else, and the Andreas would know once and for all that we’re family.”

“I agree with you, but I’m not going up against our aunts and I have enough family, especially now that you’re back in my life. I don’t need the Andreas. They obviously don’t want anything to do with us.”

Their conversation was not an easy one, but Evenela seemed relieved that Octavia now knew the truth. It was probably why she had insisted on another visit when Octavia had not visited her in Boston. They met at the Half Moon Gallery as they had before.

They sat in the garden outside the gallery, admiring the flowers that surrounded them. Octavia rested her head on her sister’s shoulder. “I love you, Evenela. You know our Klawinken family a lot better than I do, so whatever you think is best is fine with me.”

Evenela hugged her sister. “Thanks. I just wish you were taking my advice when it came to Mathieu.”

Octavia knew her sister blamed their parents for why she was still not embracing being Mathieu’s mate with the exuberance Evenela had displayed when she met Carl. What she couldn’t bring herself to tell either Evenela or Mathieu about were her dreams. Initially she had not seen the face of the man who came to her in sleep to take her body on one erotic journey of discovery night after night. It wasn’t until after Mathieu had taken her virginity that the face of the man in her dreams had been revealed to her.

She had immediately recognized him as the lead singer for the band Naked Dreamer. Although she enjoyed his music, she had thought she had outgrown her childish obsession with the tall, dark, and sexy rock star. Why she had subconsciously chosen to dream of him and not Mathieu only served to add to her confusion concerning her mating. The worst part was that her body still craved the man of her dreams. Just thinking about him made her tremble. Those dark eyes of his were burned into her memory, to say nothing of how his body had taken hers to a place that she had never imagined possible.