Embrace the Night

Embrace the Night by Amanda Ashley
(Madeline Baker)



PART ONE

ONE LOVE, ONE LIFETIME Prologue

Salamanca , 1995

The single headstone stood on a small rise, the luminous white marble glowing like a beacon in the gathering darkness. A thick gray mist rose up from the ground to meet the lowering clouds, but he needed no light to find his way to the grave site, or to read the inscription on the stone.

SARA JAYNE DUNCAN OGNIBENE

1865 to 1940

Beloved Wife

Gone From This Earth Yet She Abides Forever In My Heart

Sara. They had shared more than fifty years together. Had there been fifty more, a hundred more, it would not have been enough. She had filled the emptiness in his life, brightened the darkness that dwelled in the abyss of his accursed soul.

He groaned softly, experiencing the pain of her death anew. "Why, Sara?"

The question, torn from the depths of his heart, echoed in the stillness. Why, why, why…

He cursed himself for letting her go, and yet, loving her as he did, he'd had no other choice.
"Sara, beloved, come back to me."

The pain of their separation pierced him anew, as sharp as it had been the night she died in his arms.

His hand caressed the cold marble headstone, then came to rest on the earth that covered her remains. But the woman he had loved more than his own life was gone. Her soul, her essence, had departed the earth, bound for that heaven that was forever denied him.