THE TEMPTING

by D. M. Pratt

  Reality tapped her gently on her shoulder, summoning her back into the moment.

  “What am I going to do?” Eve said, releasing another sigh.

  “We’re living in the present tonight? The past is done. You can’t change it and the future has yet to be decided. So, tonight you do nothing. Get some rest. Sleep on it. And no dreaming! We’ll discuss options in the light of day. Perhaps the doctor from Egypt will have emailed us back. Let it go, Eve.”

  Eve looked over at the computer.

  “I just checked. Nothing yet,” Mac said as he poured her a fifth shot.

  “Detective, if I didn’t know better, I would say you were trying to get me drunk,” Eve said, her speech slightly slurred.

  “Mission accomplished. Me thinks you are an easy drunk, Miss Dowling,” Mac added laughing.

  “I am. And proud of it,” she said and laughed.

  He grinned and leaned forward, his face close to hers and to her surprise, he kissed her. It was a long, warm kiss filled with the sweetness that swirls inside the innocence of a first kiss. Again, reality tapped her on the shoulder and she pulled back.

  “Please don’t do that,” Eve said.

  Before she could finish Mac stood and swept her into his arms. This time he kissed her and the world seemed to fall away. His lips lay gently against her’s and she felt the wet warmth of his tongue slip inside her mouth. She struggled through the alcohol to protest, but words failed her. Eve felt Mac’s strong hands slip down her arms and encircle her waist. She pulled her face back to tell him they had to stop, but he smothered her neck and shoulders with sweet, gentle kisses. Each slow and deliberate kiss touched her skin as soft, warm and wet as fat, summer rain drops. Mac pushed her hair off her shoulder and left a trail of kisses, tasting his way up her neck, delicately across her cheek and ending on her mouth. He tasted like summer pears mixed with the hint of scotch on his breath.

  Mac’s kisses were unbelievably delicious. He gently pulled her body into his. His other arm found its way under her blouse. He made a move so smooth and fast, releasing the catch on her bra, her breast was in his hand before she realized it. Gently, he cupped and massaged her, intensifying each kiss, brushing his fingers lightly against her nipple and sending quivers of pleasure through her entire body. She felt her nipples go erect and a warm blush of moisture blossomed between her legs. Her body wanted him as much as he wanted her. Eve could hear his breath quicken. She matched his rhythm. The next thing she knew he had lifted her into his arms and bent forward to lay her on the sofa. In a single gesture he pressed his body against hers. She felt how tight and muscular he was beneath his loose cotton shirt. His groin pressed into hers. His hips twisted as he sensually rubbed himself back and forth, building friction through their clothes. She could feel her clitoris swell. Their kiss broke and they looked into each other’s eyes. She had expected desire, lust and passion, but not the tenderness of what she saw. Her expression of shock stopped him along with the rush of tears that welled in her eyes.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “Are you not enjoying this?”

  “I …” she started. “I don’t want to do this,” she said. “… I’m hurt and angry at Beau and Cora and I don’t understand this insanity happening around me. I’m running away from something and I don’t understand what it is or why. Please, Mac, I can’t have you complicate my life any more than it already is.”

  He was silent.

  “I appreciate you Mac and, maybe if things were different I… but they aren’t.” Eve felt embarrassed by what she had allowed to happen. As good as it felt it was just bad timing.

  “I … I’m sorry,” he started.

  Mac pushed back, sitting up. He was fumbling, doing his best to pull himself together. He finished and turned to her, deliberating what to say and how.

  “Eve, I want you. I’ve wanted you from the moment I first talked to you. Maybe even from the first moment I saw you at Thibodaux and I want you to want me. Me. Not some anger driven by revenge for what you aren’t even sure you saw happening between Beau and Cora or, Heaven forbid, because you think I need to be serviced in order to keep helping you. You must know, I’m not that kind of man.”

  Eve said nothing. There was nothing she could say. She knew he was one of the good guys. She didn’t know what she wanted or what she felt other than she liked his arms around her. Yes, she was angry at the insanity of the situation with Beau. Her mind filled with questions. Was she allowing Mac to seduce her because she was jealous of Cora and feeling vengeful because the father of her son and her best friend had betrayed her? Was Mac right? Was she so frightened and desperate because she needed Mac to help her that she would seduce him to ensure he helped them? She knew in her heart that wasn’t true. She could see how good a man he was and she loved how safe he always seemed to make her feel. Right now, at this very moment in time, was it about feeling safe and being loved by someone good who only made her feel better? That feeling was what she needed in her life and Beau, as wonderful as he was as a man, a provider and a lover did not make her feel safe. As a matter of fact, based on what she’d seen and the things that had been leading up to his and Cora’s indiscretion, he could no longer be defined as ‘good’ or safe. Eve needed to know why.

  Eve stood, reached under her blouse and hooked her bra. The zipper on her pants was half down, though she barely remembered him moving so fast to get her undressed because it felt as if he was moving so slowly and sensually to seduce her.

  “Please, don’t be angry with me,” he said with pleading eyes.

  “I couldn’t be angry at you, Mac. I … wanted you too or I would have stopped you. You must have felt that when I kissed you. It’s just … not the right time,” Eve said. “I have too many unanswered questions to add any more. What’s happening to me and Beau, Cora, those children and now you have to be solved and solved quickly. Something is happening and I’m going to find out what it is or die trying. I’m hoping the answers are in Egypt, but if they’re not, I’ll keep searching because I have to. I need you to understand that. Because if I make love to you, I want it to be for the right reasons.”

  “Then I’ll wait and I’ll do whatever I can to help you,” Mac said.

  He took her hand and she pressed his to her cheek in a gesture of thankful gratitude. Eve turned and headed upstairs when a soft ding chimed from the computer. Mac crossed to the computer. He ran his hands though his hair and stood for a moment in front of the screen looking at the alert as it faded.

  “Eve,” he said. “It’s from the doctor in Egypt.”

  Eve hurried back down as Mac opened the email. They read it together.

  EVE DOWLING,

  YOU ARE IN GREAT DANGER. SPEAK TO NO ONE ELSE ABOUT THIS. I AM ON THE FIRST PLANE OUT OF CAIRO. I WILL FIND MY WAY TO THIBODAUX HOSPITAL BY EIGHT. I NEED YOU TO GET THERE. TAKE THE CHIDREN AND DO AS I SAY: MAKE A NECKLACE WITH A SMALL LEATHER POUCH AT THE END FOR THEM AND FOR YOU. PUT ANAMU GUINEA HEN WEED INSIDE THE POUCH AND ALL OF YOU MUST WEAR IT. IT WILL PROTECT YOU. STAY IN A SMALL ROOM AND SEAL THE WINDOWS AND DOORS WITH THE REST OF THE POWDER AND DON’T COME OUT UNTIL YOU ARE COMING TO ME. PLEASE BE CAREFUL. EVERYTHING YOU THINK AND DO HAS POWERFUL CONSEQUENCES. MOST IMPORTANT, BECAUSE OF WHO YOU ARE, YOU CANNOT HAVE SEX. THE TIMING OF THE OCHIFURUS MOON HAS ASCENDED AND WILL BE FULL TOMORROW NIGHT. ANYONE HAVING SEX WITH YOU WILL CREATE A SERIES OF PORTALS. DON’T OPEN THEM WITHOUT ME THERE TO GUIDE YOU. WE WILL HAVE ONE CHANCE TO STOP THEM. I WILL BRING EVERYTHING ELSE WE NEED. BRING THE GRIMOIRES BOOK. IT WILL BE OUR GUIDE. REMEMBER ALL I HAVE SAID HERE THEN DESTROY THIS COMMUNICATION. I WILL FIND YOU, EVE. I WILL GUIDE YOU. THE OTHERS ARE GATHERING TO HELP YOU FIND YOUR WAY.

  WALK IN LIGHT,

  AFRINE KASATAH

  Eve and Mac looked at each other.

  “What the hell is Anamu?” Mac asked.

  “She wants us to make and wear a grigri,” Eve said.

  “That’s Voodoo,” Mac said.

  “Call it whatever you want. It’s spiri
tual and it’s powerful and it is tied into what is happening to both of us,” Eve said correcting him.

  “How do you know that?” Mac asked.

  Eve stared at the letter on the screen. The act of reading Afrine’s letter stirred memories of the shattered dreams and nightmares that had been haunting her and driving her mad; memories of the other place and time.

  “Mac, that old woman at the graveyard saved me before. That’s what she said. Remember? I think she was from the time we keep experiencing in the dreams. That letter’s making me remember more of the missing pieces I was seeing in the visions and dreams. Mac, look at the letter. Don’t you see it?” She told Mac, pointing at the screen.

  Mac sat before the screen carefully reading the words, searching for the hidden knowledge.

  “That’s what she was trying to tell me,” Eve said. “She had given me a grigri to protect me. You and I saw something happen and we are remembering,” Eve explained.

  “Why us? Why no one else?” Mac asked, his eyes still focused on the screen.

  “I don’t know. All I know is we have done this before. Please tell me you see what I saw?” Eve asked.

  “I don’t know. I’m not seeing anything but the letter.”

  “We have to get the anumu,” Eve told him.

  “I may not understand this, but I do know buying guinea hen weed to make a grigri is some kind of dark magic Voodoo,” Mac added. “I’ve lived in Louisiana and have enough Creole blood in me to know that messing with this stuff is not a good thing.”

  “We have to fight fire with fire,” Eve said as she typed the substance mentioned into Google to ask what it is. The information came flooding back.

  “Look. Anamu is from the rain forests,” Eve said as she kept reading. “Powerful herb from Jamaica, South and Central America, Africa and tropical areas around the Caribbean.”

  “But what does it do?” Mac asked.

  She searched deeper and read.

  “Increase the immune system, destroy cancer cells, arthritis, aid as a digestive for intestinal ailments and pain relief. I want some for good measure,” Eve said.

  “Shit, it says it can induce abortions,” Mac said reading along.

  “We’re not ingesting it we’re only going to wear it.”

  “But what does it do against these … things?”

  “She said to protect us. It keeps them from harming us is all we need to know,” Eve told him.

  “Where the hell do you get it here and how much does it cost?” Mac asked.

  Eve’s fingers flew across the keyboard. She found an herb store just on the outskirts of New Orleans that carried it. “Here and it’s not expensive,” Eve said.

  Her mind started spinning as to how to get everything they’d need together to prepare for meeting Afrine Kasatah.

  “I need to get into my bank accounts,” Eve said.

  “You left your purse at the guest house,” Mac reminded her. “Look, I’ll go to my bank as soon as it opens. Then I can go to this herb store and get as much as I can,” Mac told her.

  “Thank you. I’ll call Dr. Honoré in the morning. We’ll need to go to her office and get the book of Grimoires she tried to give me. Why didn’t I take it?”

  “Okay. We’ll get everything tomorrow. Get some rest,” Mac said, looking one last time at Afrin’s letter. “Sex portal, huh? To what?”

  “I don’t know,” Eve said.

  “That’s got to be the best mental chastity belt on the planet,” Mac said.

  “You have to delete the letter,” Eve told him.

  Mac hit delete and the letter vanished into the trash.

  “Thank you for believing me,” Eve said.

  “At this point I’m afraid not to. Get some rest. Take my bed and I’ll hunker down here on the couch. Tomorrow maybe we get to find out why this is all happening,” Mac said.

  “I hope so,” Eve told him.

  They lingered a moment, the attraction still present between them.

  “Thank you again. Good night,” Eve said.

  As she reached the stairs she turned, glancing back at Mac one more time, grateful that he was there.

  Chapter Twenty Nine

  Beau, Aria and A.V. drove to St. Anne’s Cemetery near the heart of Old Algiers. It was four thirty in the morning by the time Aria and A.V. stopped by her apartment so she could gather all the things she would need to conduct a séance. The pouring rain ceased, allowing a fine, cool mist to seep up from the wet ground and crawl along the road in front of them. Caught in the headlights, it drifted lazily between the cemetery crypts like ghosts rising up to peer at them through the iron fences, an eerie warning as they drove up to the chained and padlocked cemetery gate.

  “How the hell are we supposed to get in there?” Beau asked.

  “We’re not. Turn down the alley,” Aria said.

  A.V. turned right and drove along the twelve-foot white wall that encased the larger crypts inside the cemetery on a narrow street overhung with moss-covered trees whose branches draped so low they scraped the roof of their car. The scratching of the branches sounded like fingernails on a chalk board and made the tension in the car worse. The street narrowed into a one-lane, muddy path without streetlights. Darkness enveloped them. Only the Tesla’s headlights pierced into the dark night. Directly ahead of them was the edge of the bayou.

  “I better not get stuck here, or worse, sucked into the damn bayou,” A.V. said.

  “Shut up A.V. If your damn car sinks, I’ll buy you another one,” Beau told him.

  “You won’t do shit if you’re dead. What the hell are we doing out here trying to communicate with aliens?” A.V. said as he stopped the car.

  Aria opened her door, gathered her backpack, and got out.

  “First we’re raising my mother from the dead. Then she’s going to open a vortex and summon Gathian from his world. And if you have a sliver of doubt in your head or your heart, stay in the car. The last thing we need is the wrong demon to show up because you’re a skeptic or worse - standing in fear,” Aria said and slammed the door.

  “She’s right. I saw the thing that tried to possess me. I don’t ever want to see it again and trust me, neither do you,” Beau told him. “What I don’t understand is, why now? How did I not know before?”

  “Your parents gave their lives to protect you, but he did not need you until Eve came. Until now,” Aria explained.

  Beau opened his door and leaned out, looking at the remains of an old house.

  For a long moment A.V. sat in the car wishing he had a drink. He got out and stepped into the deep mud ruining his six-hundred-dollar alligator shoes.

  “Shit,” he said as he stepped next to Beau. “I sure the hell hope whatever this is works.”

  “Yeah,” Beau said. “Me too.”

  Beau stopped him.

  “A.V.? I want to ask a favor,” Beau said.

  “Yeah?”

  “If that thing comes for me, I need you to make sure it doesn’t take me. Please,” Beau asked. “I won’t go there.” A.V. looked in Beau’s eyes. He knew what he was asking and he didn’t like it.

  “How about we make sure that doesn’t happen?” A.V. said.

  “But if you can’t stop it… promise me.”

  “Hush up. We’ll stop it. Now shut up and let’s go raise the damn dead.”

  Together they walked to the porch.

  The stone fireplace and a skeleton of burnt wood encircled what must have been the main room of the house. What remained of the door hung open but oddly enough they didn’t see Aria.

  “Aria?” Beau called out. “Where are you?”

  “In the main room,” she called back. “Ignore what you see. It’s only an illusion.”

  “Looks pretty damn real to me,” A.V. said.

  The two men stepped up onto the moss-and algae-covered porch. Beau stepped inside first but abruptly stopped so fast A.V. bumped into him.

  “Hey, Beau—” A.V. said, his eyes on Beau.

&
nbsp; Beau grabbed his face and turned it toward the room. A.V. fell silent as he looked around at the room, whole and perfect. Aria stood by the fireplace that presently held a small fire she had started. She was putting the finishing touches on a large circle around a pentagram she’d drawn in white and red powder at the center of the floor.

  “Bring that table and those chairs and set them in the middle. And whatever you do, don’t break the lines,” Aria said.

  The two men carried and carefully placed the table at the center of the circle before going back for the four chairs. Aria then set out a cluster of nine candles in the center of the table – all different sizes and colors. Carefully, she lit them, then meticulously placed several crystals also of various sizes and colors in between them. Finally, Aria removed a solid gold tuning fork from a velvet pouch and set it inside a golden stand directly in the middle of the candles.

  “I don’t suppose you’re going to explain what this does?” Beau asked.

  Aria looked at the two men. She needed them to help her. She took a long, deep breath and nodded, hoping that even if they didn’t understand, they would at least trust her.

  “The candles are to create light and warmth to ward off the cold of evil. The tuning fork resonates to a specific harmonic field and is calibrated to match the electromagnetic energy that flows in this area of the bayou. That resonance is amplified by the precise alignment of crystals and the Ophiuchus moon. We will direct our thoughts to connect to an energy vortex that has existed since the beginning of this planet from deep underneath this house. My mother can be summoned through that vortex and hopefully she can help us save Eve and the children,” Aria explained.

  “I thought you said your mother was dead,” A.V. said.

  “In this world, dead is what you consider her,” Aria told them.

  “So, she’s not from this world?” Beau asked.

  “Neither are you, especially if you think in terms of eternity. We are energetic forces that can never cease existing. When we are done with these physical bodies, unless some force holds us, we move on to another realm and another existence,” Aria said. “However, this realm was created and at the moment we are trapped living in it. Eve is the one person who might be able to get us out and back where we belong in space and time.”