Trials (The Forever Series, Book 6)
Read Trials (The Forever Series, Book 6) Online
Authors: Eve Newton
Trials
The Forever Series Book Six
By Eve Newton
Edited, Produced, and Published by Writer’s Edge
Publishing 2013
All rights reserved.
© 2013 by Eve Newton.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be
reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system in any form or by any means without
the prior written permission of the publisher.
All characters in this book are fictitious, and any
resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental.
Other Books by Eve Newton
Forever
(The Forever Series Book One)
The Power
of One (The Forever Series Book Two)
Revelation
(The Forever Series Book Three)
Choices
(The Forever Series Book Four)
The Ties
That Bind (The Forever Series Book Five)
Trials (The
Forever Series Book Six)
Switch (The Forever Series Book Seven…Coming soon)
Table of Contents
Acknowledgements:
To my #POISisters
Los Angeles, USA, June 2012 – Liv
“So, are you ever going to tell me?” I asked Lincoln as
we sat on the beach, just the two of us. He loved it here on the sand in the
warm June sun. It was the complete opposite to the cold, dark, magickal forest
that housed Lance’s Castle.
“Tell you what?” he asked innocently.
“You know what. Don’t be coy.”
“Is it important?”
“Well, it was a huge part of your life, don’t you want to
talk about it?” I pressed.
“No, not really,” he replied, looking away from me.
“Linc. Come on. I have told you things. You owe me one. Besides,
we are supposed to be getting to know each other.”
“I know that. I love our chats. I feel like I can tell
you anything, but I just don’t want to talk about the curse,” he sat forward,
shielding his face from my interested stare.
“Just give me the basics then. You don’t have to go into
details. Like for example, the other wolves, were they Shifters?”
“No, just the regular kind,” he said carefully.
“Oh. How did that work?” I asked curiously.
“In the same way a regular Pack works,” he snapped at me
and I chewed my lip.
“Okay, fine. Be that way. You know everything that he did
to me. Not even C…Constantine or Devon or Cole knows half of what I have told
you.”
“Don’t make me feel bad about not sharing. That isn’t
fair,” he sat back again and took my hand. It was a friendly gesture, nothing
sexual in it. Not that my stubborn fool-of-a-sire would have believed it.
“I’m not. I’m sorry. You tell me whenever you are ready.”
I was prepared to drop it as he looked pretty pissed off and, after having
witnessed his aggressive side not even a week ago, I was not particularly ready
to see it again.
“I had heard from a Feline Shifter in Chicago that there
was a pack of Wolf Shifters in Romania. After what happened to my family, I
wanted to find others. I was alone and an alone Alpha is not a good thing to
have around,” he started, staring firmly at the ocean.
Hm, I thought with a slight gulp. Probably why the chosen
profession of hitman for the mob.
“I got there and searched for weeks but got nowhere until
one day, out of the blue, I picked up a trail. It, however, led straight to the
forest around Castle Black. I was warned to stay away from there. Everyone in
the paranormal community I came across warned me but I didn’t listen.”
He stopped speaking and I guessed that was all I was
going to get from him, but it was more than I knew before. To my surprise he continued
after a few moments.
“I was so desperate to find others that I went anyway. As
it turned out they weren’t Wolf Shifters, just regular wolves, but folklore and
probably Lance had turned them into a myth. He lured me in and trapped me. He
wanted the wolves for protection, to keep unwanted visitors out. Not that
anyone dared to set foot there anyway. He could only get them under his control
with an Alpha Shifter. And there was me, dumb enough to give him what he
wanted,” he said with a sad laugh.
“Oh, sweetie. None of this is your fault. Lance
is--was--such an evil creature.”
“I am glad you let me stay to watch him die,” he said
forcefully. “Best day of my life.”
And with that I knew I was not going to get any more out
of him, like how exactly Lance managed to get him to do what he wanted.
Although, having been rather familiar with Lance’s techniques myself, I was
pretty sure I could imagine.
“Thank you,” I whispered to him as I gave him a quick
hug. He shrugged and hugged me back.
“Now, Queen Liv, I think you owe me a story about how you
found out you were a Dragon,” he said with a chuckle and I proceeded to tell
him my story, much to his relief that I dropped the subject of his capture.
The G6, 2013 – Liv/Constantine
“Come again?” I blink at Devon as he continues to glare at
me. “My husband?”
“Yes,” he snaps. “Remember? Five hundred and seven years
ago, you turned me on Holy ground and we got married?”
“What?” I shake my head, very confused now, and look to CK
for assistance. He is glaring at Devon like he wants to kill him, so no help
there then.
I look at everyone else on board the jet as it makes a swift
landing--I am going to assume at Pearson in Toronto, but we could be anywhere
right now--and as we are all still standing we all tumble to the floor in a big
heap.
“CK,” I say, grabbing his arm as he pulls me upright. “What
the fuck?”
“This isn’t what I had in mind, Aefre!” he yells at me.
“What do I have to do to get you where I want you?”
“Don’t fucking yell at me,” I yell back at him, almost in
tears. “This is your fucking fault. You should never have said anything to
him.” I start to cry now and Devon is the first to give me comfort.
“Lizzie, what is happening? What are you talking about and
where did you go? Why have you Shifted and why are speaking with a British
accent?” he asks quizzically.
“Am I still Queen?” I snuffle into his chest, ignoring all
his questions, as he strokes my hair.
“Of course! You have been Queen for over five hundred
years,” he says.
“What?” I squeak at him, now completely sober. Again I look
back at CK and he is thunderous.
“Him? Him?” he yells, pointing at a startled Devon. “It was
him this time? Fuck’s sake, Aefre.”
“What do you mean ‘this time?’ Both of you have some serious
explaining to do,” Lincoln says.
I look at Lincoln, “Wait, Linc. How long have we known each
other?”
“Coming up on a couple hundred years,” he says. “Don’t you
remember?”
I shake my head. “No…Lance?” I question him.
“Who’s Lance?” he asks.
I look back at Cole who is looking concerned and I ask, “And
us?”
“Nearly nine months.”
Right, well that seems to fit, so I ask, “And I turned you?”
“Yes.”
“But we didn’t get married?”
“Noooo, you are married to Devon,” he says and looks at me
as if I have lost my marbles.
“Then why did I turn you?”
“We are in love,” he says.
“But not married?”
“Livvie, did you bump your head or something? You and Devon
are married. You have been since 1506,” Cole says.
Livvie? Cole has never called me that. What is going on
here?
“But I am in love with you?” I ask. I am getting a serious
headache now.
“I hope so,” he says. “Have you changed your mind?” he asks,
suddenly worried.
“No.” I look at Devon, “Are we in love?” I have to ask because
this set-up seems even weirder than the one I came from.
“I should fucking well hope so,” he says. “I want you to
tell me right now what is going on, why you are talking and acting so weird.”
I look again at CK and sigh, “Where do we start?”
“How about with you travelling us back in time to the day we
met?” he snaps at me, still irate he didn’t get his own way…again.
“Excuse me?” Sebastian says. “You time travelled?”
“It appears so,” CK says. Everyone starts shouting questions
at me and CK and we both glare at them all to shut up.
“I want to ask ‘why,’ but the bigger question seems ‘how?’”
Xane asks me.
“How long have we known each other?” I ask him instead.
“Five hundred and six years,” he says. “We met after you
formed an alliance with my father.”
Holy crap. I turn to Jess, who isn’t looking very pleased
about all of this. “Constantine,” she barks at him, “What is the meaning of all
of this? Explain yourself.”
We both stare at her audacity in speaking to him in such a
fashion. “Watch your tone, young lady,” he says to her with a menacing step
forward. “I don’t take orders from you.”
She lowers her eyes seductively and sidles closer to him,
placing her hands on his chest. He pushes her away as I continue to stare at
her with my mouth open. “I’m sorry, my love,” she says, taking his hands. “You
just disappeared with her. I was frightened I would never see you again.”
My love? She called him “my love”?
He can’t quite believe his ears either and shakes her hands
off of him, much to her disappointment. “Why are you pushing me away?” she
asks.
“Why are you acting this way?” he asks, glaring at her.
“Acting what way? I was worried about you. I love you.”
“What?” I snap at her, now spinning her around. “What did
you just say?”
“Oh, Liv. Don’t be jealous now,” she says to me, patting my
hand on her arm. “He is my sire too, you know.”
“Oh fuck no!” I yell at her as CK looks like he wants to
fling himself off the Empire State Building. “Devon is your sire. Get your
slutty hands off mine,” I say.
“Devon?” she says to me with a tilt to her head. “No,
Constantine is my sire. Your husband left me to die,” she says with a glare at
my, I gulp, husband.
“No, no, no, no, no! This is all wrong, this is all fucked
up. CK?” I ask him desperately.
“Oh, you don’t need me to agree with you on that,” he says
stiffly. “We need to go back and fix this.”
“NOW!” he yells at me, as I don’t make a move to go
anywhere.
“Wait. Fix what? You still haven’t explained,” Devon says,
not-so-patiently now.
“Aren’t any of you getting off?” Captain Jim asks us,
followed closely by Cade.
“Not yet,” we all say in unison.
He raises his brow. “Fine, I will take us into the hangar.”
Hangar?
“What is going on?” Cade asks me as he comes over and gives
me a kiss. On the mouth!
I push him away, “What the fuck, Cade?”
“Livvie?” he peers at me. “What’s wrong, baby?”
Livvie? Baby? Oh shit. What the hell does this timeline Liv
think she is playing at? I want to throw up and I am pretty sure that CK does
too as he pales and sits. Jess rushes to his aid with a glass of Scotch and I
am pretty sure then I throw up just a little in my mouth.
I take a giant step back from everybody and say, “This is
all wrong. Let us explain, without interruption, and you will see. You will see
this is, just, wrong.”
“Wrong!” CK yells again, pulling away from Jess who has
wrapped her arms around him, resting her head on his shoulder.
“Okay, Liv. Explain, sweetie, but we do need to hurry this
up. The kids are waiting for us,” Lincoln says, coming to stand next to me with
a curious look.
Kids? I think in horror as I hit the deck of the G6 as I
pass out.
“Liz, baby. Are you okay?” Devon asks, cradling my head in
his lap.
I put my hand to my forehead and see everyone peering at me.
I glance at CK and his face tells me everything I need to know. Yes, we are
still in the alternate universe where everything is fucked up.
“No. I am not okay. None of this is okay. How can you be
okay?” I sit up suddenly and gesture around. “I know I am not being true to one
where I come from but Christ, Dev. You stand there and put up with me turning
Cole because we are ‘in love’ and an affair with Cade and… and kids with
Lincoln and…”
“And kids with me,” Cade says, holding up his hand
“What?” I yell. “Are you insane?” I look back at Devon.
He looks shocked by my words and upset. “Well, when you put
it like that it sounds bad, but I love you, Lizzie. I know you love me. You are
Queen, it doesn’t matter to me who you want or what you do as long as you
always stay married to me. That’s what we agreed on,” he says.
More agreements, oh geez. “What is my relationship with CK?”
I ask, not even wanting to know.
“Well if you don’t know, how am I supposed to?” Devon asks.
“I don’t know. We aren’t from here. We landed here from a
different time. No, not a different time, we changed things when we went back.
We fucked up, badly,” I say, standing. I check my hands and I have the exact
same rings on and a look at CK’s hands tells me the same, but then that doesn’t
mean much as we landed here as we were.
Devon sees me look at my hands. “Those aren’t the rings I
gave you,” he says. “And where did you get that from?” he asks as he points to
the blue diamond.
“I told you, we are not the people you know.”
CK stands then. “Aefre and I had an argument, then she
time-travelled us back to London in the year 1012. We saw ourselves meet for
the first time in the marketplace. I wanted to set things right, set the course
that should have been. She was my destiny and I wanted to ensure that we got
what we had been denied,” he states as everyone stares at him, speechless. “I
told my past self to take her and run. Clearly, though, something went awry,”
he says dryly. He takes my hand. “Come, Aefre, you need to try and get us back
where we belong. This place is…” he shudders, “unpleasant.”