by C. M. Owens
“Actually, I think it was an astronaut who killed me when I was on the space station,” she says, as I shake out of the trance and hop out of the driver’s side. “Again, are you sure you’re safe here?”
“Despite the creepy feel of it, I trust my mother. This is probably the safest place I can be.”
“How long did she work here before she died?” she asks me like she doesn’t already know the answer.
I answer, even as I rein in my own doubts. “Three months.”
“And you still think you’re safe?” she asks incredulously.
“That’s actually a fair point, but I still trust her, Anna. The will stated I received it all—and this is all she had. She wouldn’t have led me here if she thought I’d be in danger.”
“Risky assessment, considering she wouldn’t even let you visit her after she moved here,” she immediately fires back.
Refusing to allow her to chip away at my resolve, I ignore her. I’m certain Mom wanted me to come here. Considering she was killed here, it’s also the best place to start finding answers.
Then I’ll have wine with my mother’s ghost, wherever she is. That’s the only reason I can think of that her spirit is in hiding. She’d come to me otherwise.
They can likely still harm her even from beyond the grave, possibly even track her the way she used to track spirits, and she won’t lead them to me. Which means there’s a high probability that I’m dealing with gypsies.
“Where do you think your mother is right now?” Anna asks as I start picking through the boxes, finding the correct one.
“If I’m right, she’s as far away from me as possible,” I mutter as I lift the box and start carrying it toward the front door.
Anna waves her hand and the back doors of the van fly shut.
“I told you to stop using your powers. It speeds up the disease,” I groan.
Yeah, that’s the other bad thing about Anna. My only friend is a pathological liar who is hurdling herself toward the final stages of her last decay—In short, she’s a dying ghost.
The fun lying will stop when the crazed dementia kicks in. Sometime, after she’s lost all sense of who, where, what, and when she is, she’ll suffer in agony for a final three days before vanishing into the air, leaving nothing behind but a pile of salt.
I keep trying to detach myself from the situation, preparing myself for what happens next if I don’t find a cure that no other more qualified gypsy before me has found.
“Let it. I can’t even tell half the time when I’m lying anymore,” she says a little too soberly, enough to trigger that pang of dread.
Her constant distraction has been one of my many coping mechanisms to keep me focused instead of falling apart like I did the first two months after my mother’s death.
“Give me time,” I tell her from the side of my mouth. “I’m working on a fix.”
“And so far you’ve blown the house up and created zombies,” she says, causing me to huff out a groan.
“No, I haven’t,” I grumble just as the door swings open.
Did I knock?
I forget how to speak when I see the guy in front of me, who leisurely props against the frame, his lips tilted in a barely-there grin.
“Ohhhhh, he’s a yes-please with a side of fuck-me-now and a tall drink of orgasms-galore,” Anna says in an awed whisper.
I take in the man’s open shirt that leads down to the semi-dressy slacks that have the top button undone, along with the loose tie that hangs on both sides of said unbuttoned shirt, dangling in a way that’s oddly mesmerizing. It’s like he’s trying to pose for me, and it’s really distracting, because this is my new favorite pose on a man.
In my entire life, I’ve never met a man quite this…entrancing.
“Are you counting his abs too? Because at least he can’t see me drooling,” Anna says from beside me, causing me to snap my eyes up.
I feel my cheeks burning when he grins knowingly. It’s not like it’s the first time I’ve seen a nice body, so I have no idea why I’m acting like a blushing virgin when his grin turns into a smug, self-satisfied smirk.
“So it’s true. A Portocale is hand-delivering her goods to the families. I’ve seen it all now,” the man with almost blindingly blond hair says in a voice that’s borderline hypnotic.
That hair on anyone else would look ridiculous. But on him? It’s like he wouldn’t be nearly as sexy if it were any other color.
“You remember how to talk, right?” Anna asks when my mouth opens and closes a few times.
Clearing my throat and giving myself a mental shake, I tell him, “Sorry. I’m a Carmine, not a Portocale. I’m not sure why it’s so shocking I’m delivering things. I’m trying to get everything caught up before hiring help.”
With what they’re paying, it won’t take long. But I find it weird my mother barely had enough money in her account to cover the back payments. I had to come before I drained the last of it.
His eyebrows hit his hairline.
“What?” I ask, growing annoyed with the ominous, cryptic responses and mysterious facial tics everyone keeps giving me.
“I’m trying to decide if Marta was brilliant or stupid.” Before I can respond to that, he adds, “Or if you’re faking all this.”
“Faking all what?” I ask incredulously.
His lips do that twitching thing the others have been doing. “Let’s not play coy. You know you’re a Portocale, and Portocale gypsies are notorious for their enemies. I understand why you’d try to hide your name, but…surely you know that’s not always possible or plausible.”
I bristle, wondering how we went from cryptic to just digging right into the meat of things; although some of what he’s saying still sounds a little murky.
“Man, they are really not believing this estranged aunt thing, because you’re a terrible liar,” Anna says from beside me. “But I’m brilliant at it. Tell them you’re a dominatrix with your own dark room under the house...”
Damn you, Anna. Not now.
“Sorry. Again, just a Carmine. I barely knew my aunt. Portocales have enemies because they have a lot of power in their bloodlines. And I’m sure my aunt wouldn’t have left me things in a town where I wouldn’t be safe. Don’t you think, Mr. Morpheous?” I ask.
I’m not sure if I’m pronouncing his odd last name correctly.
“The name Morpheous is derived from Greek mythology, meaning God of Illusion,” Anna tells me matter-of-factly, but it could be utter bullshit.
“Indeed, she would not,” he states as he runs his hand over his smooth, strong jaw in a thoughtful sort of manner. “I can assure you this town is possibly the only safe place for a Portocale…or their estranged kin.”
He adds that last part like he’s mocking my lie.
“Yeah, except for the fact your mother survived for plenty of decades before meeting her demise here after just three months,” Anna points out, causing me to regret all the things I’ve shared with her.
Still refusing to let her ebb away that steely resolve that brought me to this unnatural town, my jaw grinds.
“A little sensitivity would be nice,” I say to her…and then remember I shouldn’t talk to ghosts in front of people who can’t see them.
It makes me look like the crazy one.
“I apologize. I’m sure losing your aunt you barely knew was hard,” he tells me, apparently believing me to be speaking to him.
I roll with it, since it’s out there. “It is hard, regardless of closeness. Especially since I still don’t know how she died, and the sheriff here refuses to discuss an open case that has no suspects, no cause of death, and no murder weapon. Her file is already collecting dust, and I’ve seen how quickly dust can accumulate on things that aren’t being touched. To them, she’s just another dusty, slim folder already.”
We both just stare at each other for a second, though I can’t read anything on his expression or in his eyes. I’ve never seen anyone so well guarded.
“I heard she was stabbed in the heart,” Anna tells me, forcing me to fight off a flinch, because sometimes her blurted lies sting too deep.
Mom wasn’t stabbed. There were no visible marks on her. According to the autopsy I had overseen by my own hired professional, nothing indicated a cause of death.
“You truly have no idea what’s going on around you, do you?” he muses.
Never show how curious you are, Violet. People will use it against you. Be careful who you trust, because their knife may just find your back. Betrayal is the normal in our world. Trust me. Trust your father. Trust yourself.
My mother’s words flit through my head as if to remind me. Dad wants me far away from here and not following the breadcrumbs Mom left for me, so it’s hard to trust one without denying the other.
“I’m not really concerned about finding out what’s going on around me, Mr. Morpheous—”
“I’d rather you call me Damien,” he interrupts, mouth twisting at one corner in a grin.
Starting again, I say, “I’m not really concerned about finding out what’s going on around me. I’m simply here to start the life my aunt afforded me.”
“Liar,” the pathologically lying ghost scoffs.
Salt. Why don’t I ever remember the salt?
His hand comes up so fast I don’t see it at first, and he cups my chin, causing my breath to freeze in my lungs as something dark and exciting stirs within me.
His eyes are so pretty when his pupils dilate like that; I just want to be closer.
I lean forward, mesmerized by the way his eyes seem to turn into changing windows I feel desperate to see inside. The bit of blue in his complicated, beautiful irises seems so much brighter than a second ago. So perfect. So—
“Intriguing little thing you are. Maybe Marta was more brilliant than stupid,” he murmurs. “You’re very different, Violet Portocale.”
It’s like a light comes on behind those dark windows. Images roll through them and into my mind…images of us on a bed as he fucks me like he never plans to love me, shoving my hands into the mattress, as he takes all he wants from my body.
It’s like I can feel him inside me, touching me, caressing me…
A little shudder rolls through me.
Another image pops into my head of me kissing my way up his stomach…maybe even licking…
It’s like my hands move on their own, touching the skin his undone shirt reveals. He hisses out a breath as I run my hand over him, feeling the firm skin as my veins begin to burn in a really good way.
With a groan, he releases my chin and takes a quick step back, causing me to blink rapidly, as a metaphorical bucket of cold water drops over my head, dousing the flames of mortifying stupidity, and allows humiliating smoke to start drifting up.
I think my teeth actually chatter when the unnatural cold settles into my bones.
What the hell?
“Very intriguing,” he says again as he takes the box I don’t remember putting down…and simply turns and walks inside like nothing ever happened.
“You totally just ran your hands all over those sexy abs. In real life! You’re my hero,” Anna states with wide, disbelieving, doe eyes.
My hands feel like ice when I start trying to blow heat into them, quickly walking back to my van. The loss of the warmth generating from his body has left me bereft and too cold from the inside out.
Which is insane.
In less than twenty minutes, another one of my richer clients has turned me into a bumbling idiot. Only this time, I touched him. Without even asking for freaking permission, which I doubt he would have just agreed to.
Mom’s death is seriously fucking with my head, and I can’t seem to figure out how to make it stop and just get better. A stone settles on my stomach when I think back to the powerless feeling I just suffered through.
It wasn’t my grief making me vulnerable. That man wasn’t just a man…
“He did something to me just then,” I warily and quietly tell Anna when we get into my van.
Idly, I think back to Emit Morrigan as well. Maybe it wasn’t Anna; maybe it was him. What the hell is going on right now?
I waste no time getting the hell away from this house, already in the van and gassing it the second it cranks.
“Yeah, he did. He worked his abs. I’d have licked them, but that’s just me. You’re more subtle than I am,” she tells me before she does her feminine roar again.
“No,” I tell her, trying not to second-guess my mom right now, knowing she’d never put me in harm’s way. “It was something else. It was some form of magic.”
“You should have seen the claws on that puppy outside. I bet when a full moon comes—”
“Anna, stay focused. This is serious. Those guys—”
“Was he a werewolf too? Like that one guy with the big penis?” she asks, devolving next to me and leaving me to think to myself.
She’s fully ranting about the werewolves and vampires again in this town, doing her lying thing at a manic level, lost to her own crazy mind.
I glance in my rearview mirror, wondering if maybe I’m not the only true gypsy in this town. Though, he never seemed to notice Anna…
So, again, what the hell is going on? Or am I just going crazier than I already am?
Chapter 6
DAMIEN
My hands are steepled in front of my face as Emit walks around mostly naked, nothing covering him but an open robe on as he shakes more water from his hair.
Vance makes a disgusted face as he moves away from Emit and closer to me. I sneer, and he snarls at me, before he moves back toward another window that puts him farther away from both of us.
“It’s almost a shame that she’s a Portocale,” I decide to say to break the silence.
Emit finally closes his damn robe and ties it, as Vance takes a seat and props his feet up. I keep playing out those little images she put in my head, though there’s no doubt she thinks I put them there.
“What happened when you touched her? Did you sense anything?” Vance finally asks me, even though I know he hates to ask me anything.
I relish the fact that they both want me out of here, so I take my time, drawing it all out to better torture them.
Vance’s eyes narrow on me. “Just because I’ve learned to control my urges, that doesn’t mean I’ve grown into a patient man,” he bites out.
“See? Sucks when it’s not you,” Emit says with a smirk in Vance’s direction.
Vance cuts his eyes toward Emit and snarls. The head Van Helsing is probably the wrong man to rile up in a roomful of monsters, but I do enjoy a challenge. It’s been entirely too long since I’ve had one.
But alas, I’m more intrigued by this little Portocale, who is the reason for us all even being in the same room.
“It was a visual of me fucking her, rather roughly at that, if you must know. Slightly personal, but since you’re relentlessly prying…”
I let the words trail off and grin as they both swing their incredulous gazes back to me. My hands stay steepled together as I continue to comfortably relax in my chair.
“Obviously, you made her see that,” Vance immediately accuses.
“Or he’s just lying,” the alpha wolf volleys.
“I left her sober. However, I stripped all her inhibitions, smashing any false pretenses in her path. Instead of visualizing a way to remove my head or genitals, the way all Portocales do, she was visualizing having me over and under her. It’s abundantly clear that she is truly and utterly ignorant of her current situation.”
I grin, simply because neither of them seem to believe me about what she projected in her mind. However, the wolf clears his throat and looks away, and my smile slips.
“Something you want to add, Wolf?” I ask as he smirks and glances out the window.
“I visited before the full moon, when my pheromones are at their strongest, and there was a spark,” he says with a shrug.
“Have you two seriously lost y
our damn minds? This is a Portocale,” Vance points out as he stands and scrubs a hand over his jaw. He moves to peer out the window. “Even you two can’t be so fucked in the head that you’d consider that.”
Emit grows serious, and I heave out a heavy breath.
“Unwind your coattails from your asshole,” I say dismissively to Vance’s rigid back, as he shoves his hands into the pockets of his slacks.
“What the hell does that even mean?” Emit asks me, looking at me like I’m an idiot. “I don’t think that’s the right saying,” he adds.
“That’s because you don’t know what coattails are, you nude barbarian,” Vance says, unable to pass up any chance to take a jab at Emit.
Emit reaches a hand down between his robe folds and grabs his bare prick, a twisted smile on his lips. “At least I know what the important parts are, unlike some mostly impotent blacksmiths I know,” he quips.
“Silversmith,” I interrupt. “He only works with silver and not irons,” I go on.
“One impotent by curse. One impotent by choice. It’s obvious you two would have an issue with the only true male in the room,” the mongrel says, causing my fists to form.
“I’m hardly impotent,” I say tightly.
“I’d say you’re close enough,” he drawls.
“This is about as productive as I’d imagined when I included the two of you,” Vance resumes as he grabs his suit jacket and pulls it back on, smoothing out the pristine fabric.
“What about Arion?” I muse. “That Portocale has no idea who he is, and he might sweet talk her out of her blood when he smells it.”
A growl rumbles out of Emit at just the mention of Arion returning. I’m surprised it’s the first growl. However, the volatile bloodsucker is the number one enemy on Emit’s list right now.
They like to build up that growing cliché.
“She does smell very powerful for a half-blood,” Vance states quietly.
“Marta’s plan clearly backfired. If Portocale blood could be forced dormant, it would have died out long ago. We know she’s not the first to attempt this,” I say in agreement, glancing around at some of the changes that have been made to this room over the past…