Spellbinder: A Love Story With Magical Interruptions

by Melanie Rawn

  “Sam, you and Nurse Ratchett get over here beside Mr. Phippen.” He got out his cell phone and punched the speed-dial. “If you choose to give up this right, anything you say—”

  “Please bring me another glass. Per favore, mi porti un — ”

  “And turn that damned thing off!”

  “I got nothin’to do with this, honest,” Sam babbled, inching toward the second door. “You gotta believe me, Marshal, I’m innocent —”

  “Yeah, yeah, heard it all before.” When the nurse drew in a long breath, he added, “If she screams again, you’re gonna get deputized to stuff her support hose down her throat.”

  “Are there any local specialties? Avete — ”

  Lachlan drew the Glock. “Shut that fucking tape off before I shoot it!”

  In the abrupt silence, Pete Wasserman’s voice came through loud and clear. “Evan? What the hell’s going on?”

  “I need the NYPD and an ambulance at Felicia Holton’s place—”

  “Somebody wounded? Besides the tape player, I mean.”

  “Funny. No, Grandpa Phippen bought himself a new face, and he’s not done healing yet. You might want to call the prison ward at the hospital, too —”

  The foyer guard and his musculature surged through the door; Lachlan had been wondering when he’d show up. As Holly might say, the guy was not exactly the sharpest tool in the shed.

  “Shoot him!” Phippen demanded.

  “Don’t tempt me,” Lachlan retorted.

  The man hesitated, then became statuary again. Wise choice—though probably not the best career move.

  “Just get here, huh, Pete?” When acknowledgment came back, he snapped the phone shut. “Where was I? Oh, yeah — anything you say may be taken down and used as evidence against you in a court of law. You have the right to an attorney. If you cannot afford one — that’s a laugh—counsel will be appointed to you at no charge. Do you understand your rights?”

  “Stewart!” Phippen yelled at the guard. “Do something!”

  “Yeah, Stewart,” Lachlan agreed. “Get on the phone and call the lawyers.”

  “Marshal,” Sam whined, “let me outta here, this is nothin’to do with me—”

  “I knew it,” said Felicia Holton’s voice. “It was just too easy.”

  Evidently Lachlan had made a mistake in calculating how much time it would take her to get to the post office and discover the key didn’t fit.

  “Mr. Wyatt, or whatever your name Is —”

  “Deputy Marshal Evan Lachlan,” he introduced himself pleasantly. “Mrs. Holton, you’re about to interfere with a Federal arrest. Please don’t.”

  “Who are you trying to arrest?”

  “Your grandfather.”

  “You’re mistaken,” she replied, cool as a cloud. “This is my uncle George, who as you can see is recovering from surgery. I don’t know where my grandfather is.” She crossed the room to stand beside the old man. “How are you, Uncle George? I hope this hasn’t upset you too much.”

  “Lady, you just pissed me off,” Lachlan said.

  The sweet song of sirens wafted up from far below, proving once again that however much you paid for a place to live in New York, you never escaped the noise. Lachlan figured a couple of minutes to get past the doorman, another couple for the elevator, and then he’d have backup.

  Which didn’t come soon enough to prevent Felicia Holton from heaving a free-form lump of marble knickknack at him. Or the nurse from charging with a loaded hypodermic. Or Stewart from drawing his pistol. Or Sam from bolting through a side door.

  Lachlan shot Stewart in the shoulder. At the same time he dodged the marble chunk and rammed a knee into the nurse. She and Stewart both collapsed. The marble crashed to the hardwood floor, landing at just the right angle to shatter it. Lachlan gritted his teeth and hoped the bones of his left forearm hadn’t shattered as well; he hadn’t been quite fast enough in dodging.

  A minute late, four NYPD patrolmen stormed in, weapons drawn, followed closely by am EMT crew with a stretcher. By the time everyone had been sorted out and arrested (including Sam, who was discovered cowering in the master bedroom closet), they’d run out of handcuffs.

  Lachlan spent the night with an icepack and a six-pack.

  MIDNIGHT OF A WANING MOON.

  Denise’s cauldron was that rarest of antiques, a nganga. Her grandmother’s grandmother had made it long ago in Cuba according to an age-old rite involving, among other things, rum, ashes, cinnamon, garlic, lizards, ants, bats, termites, worms, a tarantula, a scorpion, and certain bones from the corpse of a criminal. Denise used the nganga rarely, but when she did, she charged it the same way her ancestors had done: with rum, pepper, dry wine, and her own fresh blood.

  She held the black cauldron between her hands for a few moments, calling on the spirits of those long-dead women who had been feared and respected throughout the bayous. Then she began her ritual of banishing and cursing.

  A tall black candle was affixed to the bottom of the cauldron, extending a few inches over the rim. A pint of salt, a pint of cornmeal, and a pint of her own urine went into the cauldron, nearly filling it. With the candle lit and a fire kindled under the nganga, she sat in silent contemplation of what she wanted to do to Elias Bradshaw and Holly McClure.

  Such lovely things. Impotence for him and frigidity for her, to begin with — Ms. Goddess Almighty didn’t deserve that big hazel-eyed hunk, and Denise had her own plans for him. Add a little anxiety, a touch of unease, an abrasion or two for the temper, a nightmare or three for the hell of it—subtle, luscious annoyances.

  That she was able to Work at all was proof of the Magistrate’s deficiencies. By pitting her will against his, Denise had overcome the contemptible little geas he’d placed on her. The forgetfulness would end tonight—and be directed back at him and at Holly. During the next waning Moon, and the next, and the next, until she was satisfied, she would target more and stronger banes using the nganga. And include lures meant just for Holly’s lover.

  Eight

  PETE WASSERMAN, WATCHING LACHLAN WAVE off the kid with the snack cart, heaved a long, long sigh. “Look, Evan, have a bagel. A doughnut. Anything—just do something with your mouth besides talk, okay?”

  “You’re just jealous,” Lachlan replied haughtily, rubbing a hand over his stomach.

  “Anybody ever tell you what a pain in the ass you are when you’re being healthy? Christ, am I gonna be glad when Holly gets home. Maybe she’ll give you something else to think about besides lettuce and the gym.”

  “‘Maybe’? I’m countin’on it.”

  Over the last fifteen days there’d been postcards and letters, funny and informative and gossipy, and on occasion so steamy that he understood why there were laws about sending salacious material through the mail. At least she’d put the postcard of a certain statue’s vital parts in an envelope — with a note reading, If Michelangelo had seen you, this would’ve been just the rough draft.

  But Monday she’d phoned, lonely and homesick and abruptly tearful as exhaustion caught up with her. He’d ordered her to take the next day off from research and schmoozing, bullied her into agreeing, and yesterday had received a FedEx package at work: a box containing a silver medal from the Vatican. The small oval featured St. Michael the Archangel, patron of law enforcement officers. The note read: So you turned out to be my White Knight after all. In token thereof: the enclosed, with my love. (Don’t scold — just shut up and wear the thing!) Yours, and you know it, Holly.

  He’d put the medal around his neck, and the note with the letters and cards in a compartment of Granddad Lachlan’s mahogany cigar box. And had taken them out time after time, trying to be with her in some way, any way, when the grim stuff went down, that thing that had sent him to the gym to punish his body with muscle strain and blank out his mind with fatigue. He shied away from thinking about it and returned to the topic upon which he’d been rhapsodizing for a good ten minutes now, a topic that had finally made the
redoubtable Pete Wasserman crack.

  “It’s the perfume that does it to me every time,” he mourned. “It’s the same all over her, but everywhere it’s different, you know?”

  Pete sighed deeply and glanced up from paperwork, gray eyes suddenly dancing in his likably homely face. “Would you define ‘all over’ and ‘everywhere’?”

  Evan grinned. “In your dreams.”

  Pete eyed him, pulled a face, and said, “The sooner she’s not just in your dreams, the happier I’m gonna be.” Then his gaze shifted, and a smile broke across his face—the smile reserved for seriously lovely ladies arriving unannounced in Judge Bradshaw’s chambers.

  All at once Lachlan was breathing that perfume. The next instant he was enwrapped by long arms around his shoulders, and heard a throaty voice whisper in his ear, “I’ve been wanting to kiss this exact place on your neck for weeks.” The place was duly kissed: warm, lingering, with a delicate flicker of her tongue.

  His immediate reaction was to damned-near fall out of his chair.

  She steadied him, hands on his chest, laughing softly. “Careful, big guy. Don’t injure anything important. I have plans for it tonight. Hi, Pete. Miss me?”

  “Welcome home, Holly,” Pete said warmly. “Lookin’ good. You better believe I missed you—he’s been impossible.”

  “Then he was a good boy! Bless your philandering little heart, Lachtan — hey!”

  Evan grabbed her by the waist and pulled her onto his lap for a long, thorough kiss. “So,” he said when he finally let her up for air, “you missed me so much you flew home three days early?”

  She didn’t wriggle to get comfortable; she always fit him whatever position they were in. Thinking about some of those positions made his heart lurch. She wrapped her arms around his shoulders and laughed at him—she was sitting on his response to her, after all — and tossed the mane of russet hair from her face.

  “Pete, tell me truthfully—has he really been behaving himself? Don’t bother to lie, you don’t have the eyes for it.”

  “He’s been so good it’s nauseating. Go on, take him outta here before he embarrasses us.”

  If she got off his lap anytime soon, he’d definitely be embarrassed. Evan held her tighter and looked into her eyes. “And have you been a good girl?”

  Her brows arched wickedly. “Would I tell you if I hadn’t?” Then, leaning close to his ear and whispering in a lilting brogue, “Mar to t‘point, me boyo, would I be wantin’ t‘strip ye bare-ass naked, t’rowye acrosstyer very desk here, and proceed t’foock ye senseless?”

  With Herculean effort he managed to dismiss the image of being consensually raped on his own desk. Touching her nose with a finger, he said, “You’ve been in the sun — you’ve got new freckles.”

  “And you’ve been working out — you’ve got new muscles.” Her fingers stroked over his shoulder and arm. “I figured you’d gain another ten pounds guzzling beer.”

  In his own thickest brogue, with a plaintive sigh that would do credit to a martyred saint, he replied, “Ah, I drowned me sorrows every night in uisquebaugh, darlin’, so I did.”

  Again her whisper was just for him, warm breath caressing his ear. “Liar. And your stomach isn’t the only thing that’s hard, in case you hadn’t noticed.”

  The only thing that saved him—but not from a blush — were the clipped New England tones of Mrs. Sophia (with a long i — literally and figuratively speaking) Osbourne, Judge Bradshaw’s secretary and undisputed empress of suite 710. “Ms. McClure, would you kindly unhand my deputy?”

  Holly leaped from Evan’s lap, smoothed her skirt, and apologized.

  “Nice trip?” Mrs. Osbourne went on, settling her five-foot-five and two hundred pounds against the credenza. “Thanks for the postcards, by the way. I loved the one of Michelangelo’s David.”

  Lachlan choked.

  “Wonderful trip, thanks,” Holly said, rummaging in the flight bag she’d left on the floor. “I brought back a whole slew of guidebooks and stuff for your grandsons—I thought they might get some use of them in school, and I never met a kid yet who didn’t love castles — damn it, I know I put them in here somewhere —”

  “That was very thoughtful,” Sophia said. “Don’t go looking for them now—I can tell you’d like to take Evan home early.” And, incredibly, she winked.

  Holly grinned back. “If it’s all right, yes.”

  “You’ll be doing us all a favor by getting him out of here,” Mrs. Osbourne added. “He’s been hell in cowboy boots ever since you left.”

  “And,” Pete added, “he made up a new story about where he got the stupid things—”

  “—just as bogus as all the rest,” Mrs. Osbourne finished. Stabbing a finger in his direction, she warned, “Someday, Marshal, I’ll get the truth out of you.”

  He made his eyes wide and innocent. She snorted.

  “Don’t you already have plans for the evening, Evan?” Wasserman asked with an eager helpfulness belied by the glint in his eyes.

  “Such as?” Holly inquired.

  Lachlan gestured to the newspapers on his desk. “Apartment hunting. My building’s going co-op and I gotta find another place.”

  “Oh, the heartbreak,” Holly mourned. “No more listening to the neighbors fight. Can you put off the shopping until tomorrow? I want to go home. I’ve got a ride waiting and presents to unpack —”

  “What did you bring me?” Pete demanded.

  “As a matter of fact, I have a little something right here.” Again she hunted through the bag, and came up with two small gold boxes. “I had some extra lira to get rid of, so I got these in the Rome duty-free. But there’s more in my luggage.”

  She handed one box of chocolates to Mrs. Osbourne and the other to Pete, who caressed it tenderly and announced, “I worship this woman. Dump Lachlan and become the third Mrs. Wasserman, Holly. We’ll honeymoon in Hershey, Pennsylvania.”

  “Third time’s the charm?” Mrs. Osbourne asked, dark eyes dancing.

  “Who needs charm when you’ve got chocolate?”

  “So true,” she agreed. “Thanks, Holly. Now get him out of here.”

  After a show of reluctance that nobody believed for an instant, Evan stood up and shrugged into his suit jacket. “Aw, geez,” he moaned, “what’re you gonna do when they got eyes like that?”

  “‘Eyes’?” Pete asked incredulously. “What’re you gonna do when they got legs like that?”

  “Say yes, Lachlan,” Mrs. Osbourne advised, pointing to the door. “I’ll make it an order.”

  “I hear you, ma’am.” He flipped her a casual salute.

  As the pair left, Wasserman observed, “He’ll be lucky if she doesn’t rip his clothes off in the taxi.”

  Mrs. Osbourne’s brows arched. “I’d say he’ll be luckier if she does.”

  IT WASN’T A TAXI. It was a limousine—a long white Caddy, fully equipped with blackout windows. Evan whistled as the chauffeur opened the door for Holly.

  “Thanks, Jacob,” she said, and the young man smiled and tipped his hat to Lachlan. “My publisher sent it,” Holly went on as Evan got in. “So shut up.”

  “Yes, ma’am.”

  “My oh my, ain’t we just the sweetest, most obedient li‘l ol’thang today?”

  Lachlan batted his eyelashes. “You promised me a present.” He’d asked for a couple of art books; he figured she’d come up with a whole library. Relaxing into the leather seat, he unbuttoned his suit jacket and turned to look at her. Just look at her. Inventorying freckles, blue eyes, windblown red hair, and linen suit the exact color of lime sherbet. “Missed you.”

  Her eyes softened, and her fingertips brushed his mouth. Then she leaned forward and said to the chauffeur, “Put something good on the stereo, please, Jacob? Thanks.” A toggle raised the blackout window between the driver’s seat and the passenger compartment, sealing them in privacy. Then Holly rubbed a hand over Lachlan’s stomach. “When did this happen?”

  “Like you
said—I been workin’ out.”

  “But I liked your belly,” she complained as she loosened his tie and began on his shirt buttons. “And nothing should ever be perfect.”

  “Wait a minute — what’re you — ?”

  “Why waste a perfectly good limo ride? Didn’t you ever see No Way Out?”

  “Huh?” He wasn’t tracking too well—not with her fingers busy at his zipper.

  “Kevin Costner and Sean Young in the backseat of—”

  “Holly Elizabeth McClure — !”

  “Can I get a little cooperation here, Lachlan?”

  “You’re crazy! There’s eight million people out there —”

  “—half of ’em women who’d purely love to get their hands on you, and not one of ’em can see us or hear us.” She gave him a cheerfully lascivious smile. “Oh, come on. You wouldn’t care if the windows were wide open. You’re an exhibitionist and you know it. The way you walk, the way you grin, the way you flaunt it—”

  “I do not —”

  “Evan, me darlin’ man, ye’re such a liar! But I love you anyway, a chuisle.”

  Holly undressed him as quickly as possible considering the confined space, the length of his legs, and her own eagerness. When she had him sprawled sideways across the seat, stunned by kisses and hazy-eyed with desire, she drew back to look at him. Just look at him.

  “Are you gonna get on with it, or just sit there starin’ at me?” he growled.

  An unknown amount of time later, when he finally got his breath back, he chided, “Naughty, naughty. You’re not wearing any underwear.” He pushed her back far enough so he could unbutton her jacket. “No blouse or bra, either. And you on a plane with two hundred people all the way from Rome!”

  “I missed you,” she defended.

  He laughed at her. “Nothin’ better to do with three extra days, so you come home to fuck me senseless. What’m I gonna do with you?”

  Laughing, unrepentant, she teased, “Do it again before we get home!”

  “With the windows down this time?”

  THEY ARRIVED AT HER APARTMENT to find dinner in the oven and the kitchen table already set; all they had to do was light candles and open wine. Lachlan cheerfully stuffed himself with Isabella’s enchiladas.