Written in the Stars Page 17

Morgan didn’t try to stop her.

  Making her way back to the Evening Star as fast as she could row, Cordelia felt crushed under the weight of that armor Morgan spoke of and wondered how to rid herself of it for once and for all.

  …

  For once and for all, Innis had to rid himself of Morgan Murphy.

  The pirate had conquered the gris-gris that Brigitte had admitted to planting on Murphy. Surely she could come up with something more efficient, the reason he’d had Brigitte meet him.

  She took one look at the open altar, at the lit candles and incense and seemed pleased with herself. Innis clenched his jaw. This wasn’t the way he normally did things, but he was desperate. He wasn’t going to let that pirate steal what was his. He would do what he had to, just as he had when he’d wrested the salvage company from his father.

  As if she knew that, Brigitte’s lips curled in satisfaction. “What is it you want me to do this time?”

  “To secure my destiny—both Cordelia and bringing up the mother lode of the Celestine. It was my ancestor who lost it during a hurricane. And it was during another hurricane that I found myself.”

  She seemed puzzled at that. “You are speaking in circles.”

  “Then let me explain. Twelve years ago, Foley Salvage partnered with the Wards to bring up the mother lode of De Oro Del Casco. That’s when I met Cordelia. From that first moment, I felt the connection. Very soon I became aware—”

  “That you loved her.”

  “That was part of it. There was more.” He would tell her all so she would understand what he’d known all these years. “When the winds picked up, announcing the arrival of the hurricane, everything intensified. Every time I touched Cordelia, I got glimpses into another world. The past. I suddenly knew Cordelia on a level I couldn’t explain. I became obsessed with her even as the hurricane struck full force. Unfortunately, the storm destroyed the dive site and her parents gave up. They took her from me, and our paths didn’t cross again until a few years ago. But the connection, the obsession, remained…never to be forgotten throughout the years.”

  “So you knew each other in another lifetime. Souls who know each other never forget.”

  “I want to know Cordelia, to have her, in this lifetime, and Morgan Murphy stands in my way. He needs to be gone.”

  She murmured, “You need something from your past life when you and she were first together…”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “That’s where your power lies,” Brigitte said. “In the past.”

  “In what exactly?”

  “This is for you to learn. You must be willing to give yourself over to the loa Agwe. He will guide your hand.”

  If a Voodoo god could help him, so be it. “Whatever it takes.”

  Brigitte nodded and stepped to the altar, Innis following, his intent to watch her every move. There she mixed several powders and chips in a mortar and used the pestle to grind them together, all the while whispering to the loa in an island patois Innis vainly tried to follow. Then she scrawled the names Innis Foley, Cordelia Ward, and Morgan Murphy on a piece of parchment, which she rolled up before setting the end into the black candle’s flame. The parchment flared for a moment and smoked. The material burned fast, and as it crumbled, the ash fell into the mortar, where she mixed it into the powder.

  When she was done, Brigitte turned to Innis. “You must now close your eyes and open your mind.”

  Nodding, Innis did as demanded as she began her plea to the loa.

  “Oh, Agwe, god of the sea, ruler of all below the water’s surface, lord of the underworld, ferrying dead souls and keeping watch over the oceans. Enter Innis Foley so that you can guide him back into his past where he first met his woman. Allow him to see what he must to rid himself of the obstacle to his desires for both her and the treasure you hold in your watery arms.”

  Innis heard her take a breath and blow…felt fine powder spray over his face and neck… His body jerked, his mind trying to tear away from him. Instinct made him fight to keep control, but it was a losing battle.

  “Submit…” Brigitte insisted “…and let Agwe enter and guide you…”

  He jerked again. And again. No control. Not over his body nor over his mind.

  “Submit if you wish to overcome your obstacle,” came her whisper, which now seemed hollow and very far away.

  Submit…

  Eyes still shut tight, Innis relinquished control and his body rolled and jerked and moved without his knowing how. A deep, guttural sound escaped him. His mind was on fire, hurtling backward through decades and then through centuries.

  Suddenly, he saw her in his mind’s eye…Cordelia and not Cordelia…dark hair…green eyes…but her. She was wearing the celestial girdle. And she was with him.

  “Joined with me I shall release your full dark power,” he says. “Together we shall conquer time and space.”

  “Never!” She pulls a jeweled gold dagger from her girdle and aims it at his heart.

  He laughs. “Good. You like your play rough. As do I.” He lunges toward her.

  Some force like unseen hands flings him back away from her.

  Then she hadn’t loved him, after all!

  Anger made him try to pull away from the force controlling him, but determination made him give back over. Perhaps she hadn’t been his in a previous life, but she would be his in this one.

  “Agwe, show me what I must do,” he growled, and his mind immediately whirled forward in time and then stopped deep beneath the water’s surface.

  He allows Agwe to pull him where the loa will, faster and faster toward the depths of the ocean’s floor. Then suddenly Agwe frees him, and he hangs suspended over what looks like a dark shadow.

  The darkness takes shape—the hulk of the Celestine.

  Elated, he skims along the rotting bones of the once-powerful British galleon, now scattered along the seafloor. Centuries have spread the remains…and another diver has beaten him to it.

  Even as the other diver reaches for treasure, he shoots forward, his hand driving into the sand-covered mother lode and finding the handle of a dagger.

  Pulling it free of the sand, he strikes out…

  Sucking in a huge breath, Innis opened his eyes and met Brigitte’s gaze. A slow, knowing smile curled her lips.

  “Now you know what you must do to get what you want.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Dunham Castle, 1605

  Last night in my dream flight I hovered above the vortex of wind in which Carlyle’s ship floundered. The monstrous waves crashed into the wooden hull as the screaming wind ripped the sails to shreds.

  Carlyle gave no thought for the woman and child but only sought to keep safe his treasure. The wooden chests filled with silver, gold, and jewels. The five hundred heavy bars of gold. Ingots of silver, rubies, emerald, diamonds, and pearls by the hundreds. The heavy pieces of jewelry set with precious stones. All sinking to the bottom of the sea.

  He saw that I was there as I promised and he gave a silent scream as he drowned, entangled within my celestial girdle beneath the warm waters, which wash the shores of the New World.

  I saw the woman and the boy she calls his son reach land safely. They will bother Serena and Stephen no more from that far off place.

  Yet their role in the play is not finished.

  At last the curtain of time has parted to show me a glimpse of the final act.

  The part of me which never dies will find Will at last. Know that if I combed the earth and searched through the galaxies for eternity there is no being I would want but this one. And so it shall be when once again passion beats between us like a living force.

  I long for this with every breath I draw. Yet I have foreseen that once again Carlyle’s evil shall rip us asunder.

&
nbsp; Do not be so bewitched by enchantment that you believe all danger is past.

  For you and I are one.

  Feeling as if she’d just seen the Celestine sink through Elizabeth’s eyes—a supernatural feat on her ancestress’s part that took away her breath—Cordelia set down the journal in the middle of her bunk. Her own abilities of having precognitive dreams and a brush with telekinesis were dwarfed by comparison.

  Elizabeth had written: That future is for you to write for it is set firm in your stars. And: For you and I are one.

  Had Elizabeth meant her specifically? Was she the “you” in the journal? Was she meant to fulfill Elizabeth’s destiny and find her Will?

  Or was it the Will, as in Will reincarnated?

  Was she Elizabeth reborn?

  All along, the journal had drawn her closer and closer to the past. The dreams had taken her to another level, had shown her what she now believed to be true.

  At first she’d been afraid to believe.

  Never having known that kind of love, she hadn’t been open to it.

  But that last dream had convinced her, had seduced her in new ways. She wanted its promise. Needed it. And only one man could give it to her.

  Which man? she wondered, hoping it would be the one who had her heart.

  Open your mind and you will know what is true…

  Had she really heard a woman’s voice? “Elizabeth?”

  No answer.

  So, closing her eyes, Cordelia went through every moment of the past days.

  Innis saving her from the shark. Morgan giving her his spare air hose.

  Innis romancing her. Morgan trying to seduce her.

  Innis doing all in his power to make her dreams real. Morgan trying to take them from her.

  She concentrated on finding the truth. She needed to know for certain who to trust. Her hand went to the chain still around her neck. She fingered its length, and the moment the ring and crescent met, a charge of power shot through her entire body.

  Her wrist burned.

  The ring tightened.

  Her mind opened.

  Though she was awake this time, a dream-vision threw her back to the underwater realm.

  The diver hurtles through the water, racing toward the wreck.

  Which man? she thinks frantically, needing to uncover his identity now, before it is too late.

  He plunges inside the maw, and without hesitation, continues straight into the bowls, his headlamp the only light…

  Horrified, she realizes he is making a deep penetration.

  Her wrist and her ring set off like a fire alarm…

  A deep penetration without his first setting a line puts him in serious danger.

  What is he thinking? What if he can’t find his way back out?

  Another danger follows. She senses more than sees a school of tiger sharks.

  Her breath catches in her throat and the flesh along her spine raises. No way to warn him as the danger multiplies.

  Another diver follows the sharks. The man who would kill him.

  Which man?

  She thinks she knows but she has to be certain.

  The events of the past days race through her mind. Every word, every action, every look…

  Jerked out of the vision, Cordelia shook with dread.

  One man would be a victim, the other a killer, unless she stopped it from happening.

  “No, Morgan, don’t do it!” she cried, rushing from her cabin straight through the galley and across the deck past her mother reading in a lounge chair.

  “Cordelia?”

  “Later, Mom.”

  She jumped to the salvage ship.

  Two of the divers leaned against the rail of Foley’s Treasure. Chatting, they stopped when she stepped down from the rail.

  “Innis—where is he?” she asked, rubbing at her birthmark. It wouldn’t quiet.

  One of the men said, “He’s already below.”

  That’s what she’d been afraid of. She looked to the Sea Rover on the other side of the Evening Star. The man with the oxygen tank had his feet propped on the ledge. To her horror, he was smoking.

  “Where’s Morgan?” she yelled.

  The man’s wrinkled face pulled into a grin. He pointed to the water. “Waiting for you to join him.”

  Certain Morgan had said no such thing, Cordelia ignored the wet suit, and the protection it offered. Getting below quickly was critical, so she pulled a harness over her swimsuit and secured it in record time. Her wrist was on fire and growing hotter and more insistent, and her ring threatened to cut off her finger.

  Birthmark and ring had acted up every time Morgan was around Innis, not because he was dangerous, but because he was the one in danger. Considering both were activated without his presence, she knew her dream vision was about to be realized if she didn’t stop it.

  “Help me!” she ordered the divers.

  They jumped up. One grabbed a fresh tank, while the other gathered the peripherals.

  “The gauge is new,” the first said, attaching the tank to her back. “I checked it out myself.”

  The other one said, “Hey, you want to leave that here?” He was pointing to the chain around her neck.

  “No.”

  Sticking the crescent back into the top of her swimsuit, Cordelia hoped it could somehow help her save Morgan. She jumped down to the dive platform, pulled on her fins and mask, then checked her regulator and clamped down on the mouthpiece even as she rolled herself into the sea. Praying she wasn’t too late to save the man she should have recognized as her soul mate, the one meant to share her life as Will should have shared his with Elizabeth.

  She wouldn’t let it happen.

  Not again.

  Elizabeth hadn’t been able to save Will.

  Cordelia wouldn’t let Morgan die.

  Chapter Nineteen

  Below her, a diver skimmed the hulk of the wreck, his light catching the opening to penetrate it. Cordelia did a three-sixty twirl to scan the area, but she didn’t see a second diver.

  Was one of them already exploring inside?

  Turning back to the wreck, she realized she was alone. The diver she’d seen had disappeared. She forgot to breathe for a second, and her heart began to pound. Her wrist was burning off the charts and the Posey ring had tightened until her forefinger had gone numb.

  Elizabeth, help me be as fearless as you…

  She shot toward the dark maw of the wreck, her bare flesh raising when a cold current caught her. The discomfort wouldn’t stop her. Nothing could.

  She noted no line as she entered. She’d been so panicked to stop a murder that she hadn’t brought one herself. Hesitating a second, trying to figure out what to do, she started when a woman’s voice whispered through her mind…

  Save him, and I will guide you both back to safety.

  Elizabeth?

  Had she really heard that, or was her imagination working overtime?

  Whichever, Cordelia had to believe that she could save Morgan and get them back out of the wreck. What would happen after that wasn’t clear.

  First things first.

  Lights ahead guided her. There was some distance between the two headlamp beams and both stayed focused straight ahead. Was Innis following Morgan and Morgan didn’t know it? Although she’d had feelings for Innis, in her heart, she believed in Morgan. She trusted the connection between them that had become so evident to her. Something fast and sleek cut within the fading beam of Innis’s light, and Cordelia knew it to be a shark. Swallowing hard, she had to put it out of mind to go on.

  Instead she thought about Innis, who’d won her young heart for a season, who had played the good friend for years.

  How could she
have been so mistaken about him?

  My greatest enemy, Carlyle, wielded the deadly dagger, yet I must marry him.

  Elizabeth’s journal haunted her.

  I will act well my role in this play.

  Then when the moment is right, I shall step to the edge of the stage between the light and the darkness beyond. From this place, hidden yet exposed, I will claim what is right and just for those I love.

  As she would do, Cordelia vowed.

  If her role was Elizabeth and Morgan was her Will, then Innis had to be Carlyle.

  Cordelia knew Innis hated Morgan, but enough to kill him? There had to be more to this horror. Surely not her. Surely this couldn’t be jealousy that drove him.

  Even as she thought it, she knew it was part of the truth. Innis wanted her. Plus he wanted the glory that went with finding the mother lode, not to mention his portion of the treasure’s worth.

  They were all guilty of wanting the glory. All three of them.

  She’d wanted the glory of the find enough to close her heart against Morgan when he’d tried to win her over. All the things she’d thought about him were true of herself. Though she might have wanted to pump the will to live back into her mother, she’d also wanted the fame of the find to assure her own reputation as a marine archaeologist. So she’d viewed Morgan with distrust and had let that stop her from really knowing him, really seeing through the veil of suspicion Innis had created.

  She’d fought her feelings for Morgan until that moment he’d given her his spare airline and had brought her up to safety. She’d softened to him then, only to allow Innis to twist her mind against Morgan yet again when he hadn’t deserved it. And then for those few seconds before he’d escaped back to the sea, she’d seen the truth in Morgan’s eyes.

  Pulling out of her thoughts, Cordelia realized the first headlamp had stopped moving and the second had gone out. Her pulse roared, and for a moment she couldn’t catch her breath.

  Innis…where was he?

  Undoubtedly, he’d turned off his lamp to make a stealth approach.

  Hoping Innis hadn’t already seen her, Cordelia clicked off her own headlamp and arrowed straight for Morgan’s light. A hard, sleek body slithered against her arm, jerking her to the side, and her heart nearly jumped from her chest.