“Wolf.” Loti shook him by his hip.
“Hmmm?” He grumped and rolled over. “What is it?” His eyes were still closed.
“That painting,” she pointed at it, “it’s watching me.”
Wolf wrinkled his nose. “What?”
Loti smacked his arm. “Just look at it will you.” She rocked his hip again. “Open your eyes.” She chewed her lip as he opened one eye at a time and rubbed his forehead. His whole demeanor said: annoyed.
“Please.” She grabbed his hand and the bedroom disappeared in a rush of adrenalin and the weightless sensation of falling. With a disconcerting wrench, Loti found herself in one of the sitting rooms she had seen on their way to the Virginia suite.
“They’ve made the decision that you are going to have to die,” a redheaded man said to a beautiful woman in turn-of- the-century attire. Loti recognized her from one of the portraits in their suite as Isabelle, Lars Anderson’s statuesque wife. It suddenly clicked that Isabelle was the ghost haunting her dream.
Isabelle put her book down on the Indian sheesham wood coffee table with a practiced calm. “They’ve made the decision.” She didn’t meet his gaze, but kept her wary eyes on her now clasped hands.
“Yes, they’ve made the decision and I have been appointed to execute you.”
And then he dived on her, his pale hands squeezing her delicate neck. Isabelle punched him in the face, but he barely flinched as he pinned her to the settee with his body. As less and less oxygen reached Isabelle’s brain cells, Loti’s vision convulsed in streamers of colors, like sparkling, spinning rainbows.
“Stop,” Isabelle mouthed, but no sound emerged, her hands fluttering at his shoulders.
A dawning horror filled the man’s brown eyes, but for whatever reason he didn’t stop. A fist shot out, followed by a loud crunch and warm blood spurted across Isabelle’s face. The pressure on her neck sprang lose and she gagged as she clutched at her throat. Stumbling off the settee, she staggered into the fireplace.
The world wavered and Loti found herself in an antique office that was strangely familiar but she wasn’t sure why.
“Why am I here?” Lars yelled from a leather upholstered chair on the other side of a cherry wood desk.
“You attempted to murder your own wife, Lars.” The voice was unnaturally calm, considering the topic. A blond gentleman sat in a tall desk chair on the authoritative side of the desk.
Lars’s eyes bulged and he turned a purple shade of red. “I did no such thing, Gabriel.” He leapt from his chair and fell on his face. The chains strapped to his ankles clanked against the wooden floor.
“Ow,” he howled and cupped his swollen and broken nose.
Gabriel stood up as he tugged at the cuffs of his jacket and walked around the desk. “Wolf broke your nose to stop you from choking Isabelle to death.”
“He wasn’t himself, Gabriel. I told you that.” Wolf knelt down to slip a hand under Lars’ armpit.
“So you believe.” Gabriel glared at the floundering Lars. Wolf narrowed his eyes as he regarded the slender director. Standing, he pulled Lars to his feet. Lars’ mouth opened as if to protest but a warning look from Wolf closed it. Lars shuffled in awkward steps back to his seat. When Lars settled back in his chair, Gabriel rummaged in his pocket. He withdrew a crumpled handkerchief and handed it to Lars.
The room and the people wavered like heat rising off hot asphalt and Loti was suddenly back in bed, Wolf fast asleep beside her.
Chapter Fifteen
Heather stood over the sink rinsing a coffee mug, her mind whirling despite her attempts to calm the storm. She set the mug in the dish rack and wiped her hands on the white dish towel. Hanging it back on its hook, she glanced around the kitchen and nodded. Everything was neat and tidy, the exact opposite of what her life had become. While the life of a dancer and witch-for-hire was not laudable, it had been stable, for the most part—if she was vigilant.
The soothing sounds of Lewiston’s busy, downtown district drifted through the open kitchen window. She leaned on the sink and pulled the sash down. Pausing before locking the sunshield in place, she watched the waitstaff carry café tables and chairs into the roped areas in the middle of the pedestrian mall. The sun cut a golden angle through the fluttering oak leaves and the afternoon crowd was leaving with hands full of the day’s plunder.
They filtered between the early evening diners arriving to eat elegant meals in the warm spring atmosphere. Christian was still sleeping, but the sun would go down in the next couple hours and she needed to prepare the apartment. With a heaviness in her stomach, she locked the sunshields in place, one by one.
Heather padded on bare feet into her day bedroom, the extra room that had been turned into her dressing room, more or less. Since her sleep pattern wasn’t closely tied to Christian’s yet, she needed a space where she didn’t have to fumble around in the dark. Or worse, make noise and disturb Christian’s sleep. It was hard to wake a vampire depending on the time of day, but possible.
Heather rummaged through her closet, but couldn’t make the simple decision about what to wear. Her mind wasn’t on the task at all. For some reason, her mother had been on her mind since this morning at the AWA meeting. Specifically, the day she called to tell her that the doctors said she had a few weeks to live. They hadn’t spoken since Heather’s high school graduation party.
She took a deep breath and blew it out, grabbing a blue top from the closet and a pair of tan trousers from a drawer. Why was she torturing herself? She and her mother had a falling out the night of Heather’s graduation party. It seemed so stupid, in retrospect. Her mom found her birth control pills that day when she “accidentally” knocked Heather’s purse off the kitchen counter.
Lena flew into a rage yelling about consequences and whores, while Heather screamed about not wanting to end up like her mother. Heather shivered with the memory as she peeled off the sheath dress she had worn to the AWA meeting. She considered burning it for a moment, then hung it up with a shake of her head.
Mentally, she shifted to find the new sensation in her awareness, that of the coven. In such a short time, she had developed the troubling habit of turning to it—to them—for comfort. She wrinkled her nose as she pulled the long sleeve top on. They were always there, in the background, a subtle presence that she could ignore if she chose.
Right now it was impossible because it buzzed just below the pain threshold. Heather hid her eyes and grimaced. It would take a concerted effort to relegate the bond back to a distant hum. Another subtle energy link shifted. Christian. He wasn’t awake but something Heather had felt before disturbed his sleep. A ghostly shiver rippled through her energetic and physical bodies.
Quickly, she stripped off her silk stockings and tugged on a pair of khakis. Peeking out the bedroom window, she noted the sun was well behind the brick buildings and slipped on a pair of red flip flops. She pulled her red mane back into a bun at the nape of her neck, tying her hair in a big knot, just like her mother used to do. She paused, wondering what her mother would think of her present situation and waited.
When her mother remained silent, she shook off the disquieting notion, rooting in her purse for a pink lip gloss and dabbed it on. She snuck across the living room and slipped out of the condo. Jogging down the three flights of stairs, she burst out the side door and into the May sunshine. She paused to lift her face to the sun, closing her eyes. For that moment, she could almost believe everything would be okay. Almost.
“Heather!” Rachel called. Heather’s eyes popped open and a surge of hope threatened to put her off her guard completely. Rachel waved as she trotted across the street, glancing back and forth for cars.
Heather’s face lit up as she surrendered to uncharacteristic optimism, grabbing Rachel’s hand and pulling her into a hug. “What a day, right?” Rachel mumbled.
Heather pulled back and examined Rachel’s face. “You okay?”
Rachel squinted at her new friend. “I’m okay. It�
��s you I’m worried about.” She shifted her purse on her shoulder as the two women strode towards the pedestrian mall in the middle of Lewiston proper. “And Nan.” Rachel sighed, looking straight ahead as they turned right and slowed their pace. “But we have to hope for the best, I guess. I mean, Nan did nothing wrong.”
“Don’t waste your energy worrying about me. I can take care of myself.” Heather curled her lips under, but had to ask. “What about Theresa? This is a big no-no, right? Coven members do not accuse their coven mates in public.”
Rachel stopped dead in her tracks, her face blank. Without looking at Heather she said, “No, they don’t. She should have brought her concerns to the coven as a whole. She could have talked to anyone of us, not just Nan.” Her face came alive one feature at a time as she rushed through her words. “The thing is—” but she cut herself off, shaking her head and fixating on the pavement. “Never mind. It is what it is.”
Heather grabbed Rachel’s shoulders giving her one, solid shake. “Say it. I need you to say what’s on your mind. I don’t know how to negotiate this. It’s all dark, unknown territory.”
Rachel struggled to raise her eyes to Heather. “Okay.” Her pixie-like nose wrinkled. “The thing is, Nan would have accepted Theresa’s concerns and probably taken it to the AWA herself. So maybe it’s a moot point. I don’t know. The more I try to sort it all out the more I get this nagging feeling like there was no avoiding this, other than Theresa should have talked to us first. She should have confided in one of us, for Goddess’ sake.” She blinked and her mouth thinned into a slash. “Or she should have kept her thoughts to herself.
“What kind of mess have you gotten yourself into now?”
“A little too late for that, don’t you think, Mom? Heather closed her eyes and took a breath.
“Heather?” Rachel tugged on Heather’s arm. “I’m sorry for going on like that. Forget it, okay?” Rachel meandered towards the Thai restaurant, leading Heather by the hand. Heather stumbled as a cold shiver coursed through her. Rachel paused as Heather regained her footing.
“You okay?”
She merely nodded, avoiding Rachel’s gaze. Christian’s sleep was being disturbed, again. What the heck was it? He never explained it to her, and she never asked again after the second time. Rubbing her cheekbone, she glanced at Rachel who was studying her now with scrunched eyebrows.
“Rachel,” someone called.
Rachel put on a happy face. “Oh, hey, Professor Canon. How are you?”
A pudgy, well-groomed man trotted towards her and Heather. “Hold on, would you please.” He was winded as he reached her. “I wanted to know how the AWA meeting went today.”
Rachel snuck a peek at Heather, whose brows were drawn down and her arms were crossed over her chest. “How’d you know about that?”
He shrugged elegantly. “Word travels, my dear.”
Rachel folded her hands in front of her and sighed. “Well, that’s really a matter for the members, Professor Canon.”
He arched his eyebrows, considering her for a moment before speaking. “Do you really think this is going to stay out of the press?”
Rachel paled and her face fell. With everything she was trying to juggle and sort through, that particular thought had not crossed her mind. “You don’t think this is going to go that way, do you?”
Heather never spoke as she stood half ignoring the conversation, her jaw set. While Rachel seemed to know and genuinely like the gentleman, Heather’s busy-body bullshit meter was ringing full-tilt.
Professor Canon glanced around and tilted his head. “It’s going to get out, one way or another.” He tucked his hands in his sport coat pockets. “What happened?”
Rachel shook her head and raised her hands in surrender. “An investigation is underway, but nothing has been decided.”
Canon nodded and patted her arm with a half-smile that offended Heather. “Katie will do fine. She is the heart and soul of this university. She is above reproach and will weather this.”
Rachel nodded back and a breeze blew through the mall, tossing oak and maple leaves on their branches.
* * *
Just as twilight claimed the sky, Heather unlocked their condo door and walked into the foyer.
“Where have you been?” Christian sat in his brown leather chair by the window overlooking the pedestrian mall. He set aside his cell phone and smiled up at her.
Heather paused, assessing his body language with cautious eyes. He leaned back in his chair, his bangs strewn across his forehead like he just climbed out of bed. His gaze was heavy in a way that stirred her, not scared her.
“I met Rachel for dinner on the walking mall.”
She tossed her keys in the wooden bowl on the table by the door. Turning to the mirror over the table to fluff her hair, she wiped a smudge of makeup from the corner of her eye. She scrutinized his reflection, and his eyes met hers. Warmth crept up her neck as he sat in his black robe and crossed a bare foot over his knee. Heather spun around with a stage-like flare, her eyes glittering.
“Did you just wake up?” she purred.
Christian broke out in a wide grin as he rose from his chair in a blur to sweep her up in his arms. “I was hoping you were feeling playful.”
“You couldn’t tell?” She ran a finger through the dusting of blond hair on his chest. He kissed her slow and soft, and her eyes closed, a euphoric thrill threading through her body. This is what it felt like to yield oneself, to give yourself over to the moment. He pulled back, his eyes at half-mast.
“Our bond is getting stronger, but I still have to concentrate to know what you’re feeling.”
Her lips parted in the slightest smile as her eyes drifted open. “I think you know exactly how I feel.”
He lifted her up in his arms and she laughed. “Why does being with you always feel like I’m in an epic film? All we need is a soundtrack of a string orchestra.”
Christian didn’t bother to answer, although the dark light in his eyes said everything she needed to know. He laid her out on the bed, hovering over her.
“We have only a little time. I’m meeting Calisto tonight.”
Heather brushed the long bangs from his striking blue eyes and pressed her generous lips to his ear. “Good,” she whispered. “Do you want me to come along?”
This time his kiss was hungry as he sank into her. Her legs trembled. “No. I need to work on this on my own.” He ran the back of his hand along her pale cheek, “For us.”
* * *
Loti brushed her teeth staring at her reflection in the mirror. They had met with the rest of the team for the briefing. And other than they suspected Modore was back in the country and possibly in Virginia, nothing earth-shattering had been discussed. Wolf had been his belligerent self, but managed to contain the worst of it.
He boiled under a cool exterior, but over what exactly Loti wasn’t sure. Maybe he was still ruffled over the director’s initial threat: “Join us or she dies.” Loti couldn’t focus on that, though. Maybe she should have been paying more attention to it, but what was bothering her was the dream of Isabelle and Lars, Wolf and Gabriel.
“Wolf,” she called around her toothbrush.
He appeared in the bathroom doorway as she bent over the sink and spit. He watched her every movement like a predator watching his prey, which he was. She rinsed and spit again.
“The dream I had yesterday.” She wiped her hands on the embroidered hand towel hung by the sink on a silver ring. “Did I access your memories somehow?” She fussed with the towel, getting it to hang just right.
Wolf reached for her hand as she turned toward him. Dragging her to him, he kissed her nose and then her lips. She wrapped her arms around his neck and he picked her up and carried her to the bedroom. Plopping her down on the bed, he crawled over her.
“Hey, you didn’t answer my question.” She leaned back on her elbows as he hovered over her, nuzzling her neck.
“You smell like . . .” but he n
ipped her ear and she didn’t hear the rest.
“Stop,” she said, her voice breathy.
Wolf’s jaw flexed as he sat back. He sighed. “I think we shared a dream, and yes, it was a memory of mine.” His low voice vibrated in her ear and throat. A chill ran down her spine and the inside of her thighs. She closed her eyes, willing herself to focus.
“But what was it all about? Why did Lars try to kill his wife?” She sucked in her breath as Wolf leaned in to kiss his way down her neck to her collarbone. He stopped and sat up abruptly.
“He was possessed. I believe by a dybbuk.” His eyes were black holes and Loti knew she had ventured into dangerous territory. He had been shielding enough to leave her puzzled and worried, but now he felt a million miles away and her throat tightened, as if she were tasting something sour.
“What is it, Wolf?” She pressed herself up and reached for him. He turned away and stood up. Loti retracted her hand and curled it to her throat, tightening her chin against it as she leaned on one arm, her legs curled up. Her heart thudded without a sound in her chest as Wolf glided away from her. With his back to her, he contemplated his reflection in the mirror above the dresser.
He tilted his chin down so his thick, black hair slid over half his face. From Loti’s angle, she couldn’t see his face at all. She didn’t need their bond to know he was hurting somewhere deep inside. She wanted to go to him, hold him, but she was learning to give him space and time. But that didn’t stop the flutter of anxiety when he retreated into some remote place inside himself.
“A dybbuk is a spirit, most likely a lost soul who’s been wandering our world. Some people think they are demons, but I don’t.” His jaw flexed. “I think they’re cursed or confused, maybe re-enacting some violent tragedy.”
Loti untangled her legs and draped them over the side of the bed. She leaned on her hands and bit her lip. Not wanting to push him deeper inside himself, she debated on whether to explain herself. “No, I know what a dybbuk is. I mean, what is it that’s made you pull away from me?”
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