Read Online A.K.A. Goddess by Evelyn Vaughn - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Evelyn Vaughn
Tags: Fiction, General, Romance, Contemporary, Man-Woman Relationships, Love Stories, Romantic Suspense Fiction, Women college teachers, goddesses, Chalices
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a lot.”
I’ve never been asked out before. “But that’s not for another month.”
“I wanted to beat anybody else asking,” he says.
I’m in braces, and I’m by no means slim. I’m not ugly; even I know that. But…he thinks there could be competition for me?
Lex Stuart, I decide, is wonderful.
“It will be years before we know how I’ll turn out,” he says, as if warning me. “Even if the cancer doesn’t reoccur, I could end up not growing or getting cataracts or getting really fat. Or…other stuff.”
If I think about it too hard, the warning won’t make sense. I deliberately don’t think about it, and it feels exactly right.
“I would love to go with you.” It is an understatement.
When I get home, I can’t stop talking about Lex and the Stuart mansion and the food and the fresh flowers.
“It’s like fairyland there!” I tell my parents.
They exchange worried glances.
Mom says, “Just remember your fairy tales, Maggi. Fairyland always has a catch.”
I was expecting Lex to call—heck, I’d half expected it the day before. This was probably his version of giving me space.
I just hadn’t planned to be marinating in the destruction that powerful men so often wreak when he did.
After we checked out of the Holiday Inn, I rented a little silver Renault Clio. The train didn’t stop at the small town of Lusignan, where Rhys and I were now walking. What had once been a center of power was now a rural town. And the glorious castle—one of many—which the fairy Melusine had supposedly built for her bridegroom in one night…
Long gone. Nothing left but a sunny, public walking path where once the castle had stood, and trees, and an uninterrupted view down to the River Vonne. The castle had been razed for harboring Huguenots, adding to my frustration about finding anything. Whatever the goddess worshippers might have hidden at Château Lusignan was history, thanks to devastation and religious intolerance. Thanks to dark power.
My phone trilled out “Ride of the Valkyries” at the exact wrong time. When I glanced at the caller ID and saw it was Lex, I rolled the call over to voice mail.
Trust me, Lex. You do not want to talk to me right now.
Rhys glanced at me and my phone, then said, “Any goddess cult that worshipped Melusine would have gone under ground by the thirteenth century—fourteenth, at the latest. Would they not?”
I fingered a little purple flower beside the path. “Mmm-hmm.”
“And Lusignan was torn down, stone by stone, in 1574?”
Over religion. “A tower was torn down later.”
“So what did you expect to find?” asked Rhys.
“Not the chalice,” I admitted, though it would feel right to uncover it here at Melusine Central. “Just…a clue. Something. We have to start somewhere, don’t we?”
He looked around us and murmured, “Three fair figures…”
That was the first line of the nursery rhyme that my family has passed down for generations, seeming nonsense with a hidden meaning—like “Ring around the Rosie” being about the bubonic plague, or “Mary Quite Contrary” being the Queen of Scots. Nursery rhymes rarely attracted the attention of people in power, so they made a great treasure map.
Ours started, “Three fair figures, side by side…” As a child, I’d pictured people; kids are that literal. As a scholar, I knew the “figures” could be anything, standing stones or towers or trees or buildings.
Nothing stood in threes at Lusignan. Not that we could see.
My phone rang again. Lex. This time I just turned it off. My inner good-girl protested that it could be important, it could be an emergency, how could I be so selfish….
AKA the Eve Syndrome, holding ourselves responsible for everything. Ten years ago, before I had a cell phone, I couldn’t have stressed about it. I chose not to this time, either.
Instead, I raised my face to the blue sky, breathing in the fresh air. “This isn’t where we
I’ve never been asked out before. “But that’s not for another month.”
“I wanted to beat anybody else asking,” he says.
I’m in braces, and I’m by no means slim. I’m not ugly; even I know that. But…he thinks there could be competition for me?
Lex Stuart, I decide, is wonderful.
“It will be years before we know how I’ll turn out,” he says, as if warning me. “Even if the cancer doesn’t reoccur, I could end up not growing or getting cataracts or getting really fat. Or…other stuff.”
If I think about it too hard, the warning won’t make sense. I deliberately don’t think about it, and it feels exactly right.
“I would love to go with you.” It is an understatement.
When I get home, I can’t stop talking about Lex and the Stuart mansion and the food and the fresh flowers.
“It’s like fairyland there!” I tell my parents.
They exchange worried glances.
Mom says, “Just remember your fairy tales, Maggi. Fairyland always has a catch.”
I was expecting Lex to call—heck, I’d half expected it the day before. This was probably his version of giving me space.
I just hadn’t planned to be marinating in the destruction that powerful men so often wreak when he did.
After we checked out of the Holiday Inn, I rented a little silver Renault Clio. The train didn’t stop at the small town of Lusignan, where Rhys and I were now walking. What had once been a center of power was now a rural town. And the glorious castle—one of many—which the fairy Melusine had supposedly built for her bridegroom in one night…
Long gone. Nothing left but a sunny, public walking path where once the castle had stood, and trees, and an uninterrupted view down to the River Vonne. The castle had been razed for harboring Huguenots, adding to my frustration about finding anything. Whatever the goddess worshippers might have hidden at Château Lusignan was history, thanks to devastation and religious intolerance. Thanks to dark power.
My phone trilled out “Ride of the Valkyries” at the exact wrong time. When I glanced at the caller ID and saw it was Lex, I rolled the call over to voice mail.
Trust me, Lex. You do not want to talk to me right now.
Rhys glanced at me and my phone, then said, “Any goddess cult that worshipped Melusine would have gone under ground by the thirteenth century—fourteenth, at the latest. Would they not?”
I fingered a little purple flower beside the path. “Mmm-hmm.”
“And Lusignan was torn down, stone by stone, in 1574?”
Over religion. “A tower was torn down later.”
“So what did you expect to find?” asked Rhys.
“Not the chalice,” I admitted, though it would feel right to uncover it here at Melusine Central. “Just…a clue. Something. We have to start somewhere, don’t we?”
He looked around us and murmured, “Three fair figures…”
That was the first line of the nursery rhyme that my family has passed down for generations, seeming nonsense with a hidden meaning—like “Ring around the Rosie” being about the bubonic plague, or “Mary Quite Contrary” being the Queen of Scots. Nursery rhymes rarely attracted the attention of people in power, so they made a great treasure map.
Ours started, “Three fair figures, side by side…” As a child, I’d pictured people; kids are that literal. As a scholar, I knew the “figures” could be anything, standing stones or towers or trees or buildings.
Nothing stood in threes at Lusignan. Not that we could see.
My phone rang again. Lex. This time I just turned it off. My inner good-girl protested that it could be important, it could be an emergency, how could I be so selfish….
AKA the Eve Syndrome, holding ourselves responsible for everything. Ten years ago, before I had a cell phone, I couldn’t have stressed about it. I chose not to this time, either.
Instead, I raised my face to the blue sky, breathing in the fresh air. “This isn’t where we
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