"Marguerite," Kate corrected. "I—"
"I came to help you," Luc's mother interrupted again. "Not to badger or berate you, but to help you make what is probably the hardest decision of your life."
Kate hesitated, then asked, "Can you? Can you really help me? Lucern is your son."
"Yes, he is. But I also had to make this decision myself several hundred years ago. I know how hard it is."
Surprise flickered in Kate. "You mean, you weren't—"
"I was human like you when I met Luc's father, Claude. He was dark and sexy and seemed all-powerful to me at the time. I thought I loved him. I thought he loved me. He didn't. His heart had been given to another long before he chose me to mate."
Kate sat back, feeling as if she had been punched. She had questioned whether she could give up her family for Lucern, but had never questioned her love for him. Not since admitting it to herself in that hotel bathroom at the conference. But what if she didn't really love him, but was merely dazzled by his charm and powers and… Her thoughts died when Marguerite burst out laughing.
"I'm sorry, my dear," the woman apologized, covering her mouth for a moment. She explained. "It's just that your thoughts are quite the silliest I have heard in a long time. Dazzled by his charm and powers? You are half repulsed by those powers—they frighten you silly. As for his charm, Luc is my son and I love him, but even I must admit he is sadly lacking in charm. The man was as surly and grouchy as a bear with a burr up his butt until you came into his life."
Kate was shocked to hear the woman use such modern terms, but she was more concerned with: "You can read my mind?"
Marguerite nodded.
"But, Lucern said my mind was too strong for him to read. He said—"
"He couldn't read your mind," Marguerite assured her. "You guarded it from him because you were already half in love. You don't bother to guard it from me, however, and I have read your mind and recognized your reluctant respect and love all along. Never doubt your love for him, Kate. You recognized his true character from his books, and that his off-putting behavior hides a sensitive soul. You have learned much more since meeting him and you do love him… despite those special abilities you find so abhorrent."
Kate was silent for a moment. "But you didn't love your Claude."
"No. Not with the kind of love you and Lucern share. Claude wasn't as strong as our children have grown to be. He was an essentially weak man, though I loved him as such. By the end, he was like a fifth child rather than the partner and helpmate a husband should be. He didn't seem to have hope—I think that's why he turned to drinking from alcoholics and drug addicts and died the way he did." She sighed. Then, shrugging, she said, "But that does not matter. What matters is that, despite that, I have never regretted my decision to cleave to him. I have four wonderful children and two children-in-law from it. I have seen the world change and reshape in ways I never imagined. I have done almost everything I ever wanted, yet every day I come up with more things I want to do."
"But what if I'm not strong enough? What if I turn out to be like Claude?"
"You are strong enough," Marguerite assured her. "I have seen your mind. You, Lucern and all my children—you have hope. No matter how bad the situation gets, or how low you feel, there is still one little grain of hope left in your heart, and that makes you strong. It forces you eventually to wipe away the tears, slap a bandage on your wounds, and reenter the fray. You would do well as Lucern's lifemate."
Kate agreed. But that still left one concern. "My family?"
Marguerite's expression turned sad. "Yes. Your family. It must seem like we are asking you to give up everything to be with one special man."
Kate suddenly held her breath as Marguerite's words made her recall the psychic: "He is special, your man. But to be with him you will have to make a choice. You will have to give up all. If you have the courage, everything you ever wanted will be yours. If not…"
"We would be your family, Kate," Marguerite said softly. "And so long as they lived, you could always have contact with your other family."
"Lucern said that after ten years—"
"Yes." Marguerite interrupted. "After ten or twenty years, Kate C. Leever must not be seen by those who know and love her—at least not those who are not of our kind. But you could still write to them. They must simply never see that you are not aging. You will have to avoid them and travel, make excuses not to visit or not to attend funerals. It would be easier for Kate to have an accident and be thought of as dead, but there are other more intricate ways to work things out. Surely Lucern is worth that effort?"
"Thanks," Lucern muttered as Bastien closed the van door on the coffin he and Lucern had just moved out of the basement.