Forbes Carlyle

A former friend of Helen Morgendorffer, Forbes Carlyle is the lifetime companion of Paige Turner in The Winters of Those Gone Before. The only daughter of the uber-wealthy Spaulding Carlyle and Stepford Carlyle (also the granddaughter of Miranda Carlyle and a descendant of Majel Carlyle), Forbes was a double major (Archaeology and Art History) at Middleton College when she met Paige (also known as Serenity) and they fell in love, becoming a couple almost immediately afterwards.

Forbes' friendship with Helen and Jake cooled after their graduation from Middleton (partly because of his slight jealously over Forbes' ability to deal with her family problems in a way he never could, and partly because of the way he refused an offer to work for her family as an entry-level marketing rep in the Carlyle business empire). Currently, Forbes lives with Paige in a supremely affluent surburb of Denver, Colorado, where she also works as an international antiques broker. It is also stated that there has been little said in a negative manner about Forbes and Paige as a couple - mainly because of the family's immense wealth, but also because the Carlyle family has truly accepted Paige as one of them.

(In the story notes for 'Winters', as well as the unreleased 'unrated' version, it is revealed that in the summer after Helen's graduation from Middleton, Forbes and Paige accompanied her on her month-long vacation paid for by Helen's mother (as a ruse to try and break her and Jake up). Over the course of their vacation, the three women engaged in many playfully erotic adventures, including a bet dealing with the fourteen graduating seniors at an exclusive boys' academy in Dijon, France, and an intimate encounter between all three on the night before they returned to America.)

Forbes is tall, with dark scarlet hair and blue eyes. (All Carlyle women have dark scarlet hair.) She is the mother of Cadet Second Class Julia Carlyle, who attends the United States Academy of Extranormal Studies and looks surprisingly like her (except that Julia has green eyes). She birthed Julia with the help of Deforest Carlyle, the adopted son of a fourth cousin who she had dated during her last year of high school and first year of college (before she met Paige), and they have a close relationship as friends and Julia's parents (along with Paige).