Dangerous Lover

by Maggie Shayne

  “Okay.” Bonnie took the paper.

  Selene didn’t let it go. She held it, gnawing her lower lip. “I didn’t tell her about Tessa.” She looked at him as if for advice.

  And he knew right then that she hadn’t forgotten his presence for a minute. “You can’t tell her something like that in a note, Selene. If she was as close to Tessa as you were—”

  “I know. But she has a right to know.”

  “She’ll call you. You can tell her then. Face to face.”

  “But what if she doesn’t call? What if she doesn’t realize how real the threat is, without knowing what’s already happened?”

  Bonnie covered Selene’s hand with her free one. The other still held one edge of the note. “She’s your coven mate. Perfect love and perfect trust, right?”

  Selene met the other woman’s eyes and nodded. “Perfect love and perfect trust. If I say she’s in danger, she’ll believe me. She’ll call.”

  “She’ll call,” Cory repeated.

  Selene gazed at Cory again and seemed reassured. “She’d better.” She let the other woman take the note.

  “There’s an inn, in town,” the helpful Bonnie said. “A nice one. Should be vacancies, this time of year. Go back to the end of the road and take a right. Three miles down, on the left. the Cactus Rose.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Before you go, Selene…” She stabbed Selene in the eyes with a probing look. “Is there any chance this trouble followed you down here? Any chance it’s liable to show up at this campground?”

  “We weren’t followed,” Cory said. “I’m sure of it.”

  He glanced at Selene, saw the troubled look in her eyes and wondered at it.

  “It wouldn’t hurt to be extra cautious, Bonnie. Just in case.”

  Bonnie looked worried. More than worried, she looked scared. She glanced at the name on the note, and lifted her brows. “Erica Jackson?” Then she shook her head.

  “She might be using her craft name. Starshadow,” Selene said. Then she looked at Cory and nodded. “Let’s go.”

  He waved to Bonnie, put the car into gear, drove around a loop, and headed back the way they had come. But the troubled look on Selene’s pretty face didn’t ease. And it worried him.

  “Tell me. What’s wrong?”

  She sighed, gave her head a shake, almost as if trying to shake something out of it. “Nothing. Probably nothing.”

  “I can see there’s something.”

  She waved a hand at him. “Turn right here, remember?”

  “I remember.” He took the turn, and decided to try changing the subject. He didn’t like seeing her so worried. “So how about those shorts she was wearing huh? Had enough pockets to hold my entire collection.”

  “What collection?”

  He glanced at her, and then realized he was remembering again. In vivid detail. “Birds of prey,” he said. “Miniatures, wood carvings, ceramics, clay, pewter.”

  “No wonder you recognized my feather. You’re into raptors.”

  “Yeah. Accipiters, buteos and allies, eagles and falcons, even the vultures.” He could see his little collection even now. It sat on shelves in his log cabin, shelves he’d made of hand-hewn pine planks, all stained and polished to a rich lustrous shine.

  In fact, he could see more. He could see his living room. Cozy and neat. Hunter-green plaid curtains in rich flannel. A fireplace. And something he’d said aloud just now was ringing a loud bell in his brain. Accipiters, buteos, allies…falcons.

  Nowhere, however, did he see any sign of a wife.

  “Which hawk is your favorite?”

  “Redtail,” he said. “Same as yours.”

  She smiled. “Maybe we have a few things in common after all, huh?”

  “Maybe we do.” The bell was still ringing. And it finally came clear. “Falconer,” he said then. “It’s Falconer.”

  “What is?” She studied him as he drove. “You’re a falconer?”

  “I don’t think so. But that’s my name. Cory Falconer. Cory Michael Falconer.”

  She smiled, and he sent a smile back at her. Their eyes met, and that spark flared between them, but then her smile died slowly. And he knew she wanted to ask if he remembered there being a Mrs. Cory Falconer, and he wasn’t sure how the hell to answer her if she did. He didn’t want to admit there was no hint of that sort of memory in his mind. Would he really recall a bird collection and not a wife? And wouldn’t he then have to admit that he never had felt that was true? And wouldn’t that just set her off again on her tangent about them being soul mates, destined to be bound forever? He didn’t want that.

  What he wanted…was to kiss her. To kiss her breath away.

  He was saved from the question she was about to ask by the sight of the inn up ahead. “There it is,” he said. “Vacancy. Score.”

  “Yeah. Cool.”

  They pulled into the parking lot, and Cory went in to register them, proud as hell that he could sign his actual name.

  He was easily pleased, wasn’t he?

  As she signed in beside his name, he glanced at her profile, the way her hair fell down to veil her face, so he could only see the exotic tilt of one blue, blue eye between the fringes of pale blond.

  No, he wasn’t easily pleased. Not easily at all.

  All through the long drive from Oklahoma, she’d felt that something wasn’t right. But her instincts were so off target that she didn’t trust them.

  Goddess, how could she have been so wrong?

  She gave herself a mental shake. She had to get over it, get her focus off Cory, and how sure she’d been, and how wrong she’d been. To seal it she asked herself if any woman in her right mind would be this heartbroken, this devastated at losing a man she’d only known for a few days. Losing a man she’d never really had.

  Well, okay, she’d had him. But she’d never really had him. Not the way she had thought she would. Not to call her own. Not to be his own. Not to be loved by him.

  And that was what she wanted. She wanted him to love her. It was stupid that she wanted it, even now. Wanting something like that was wrong. It would only cause him pain to love one woman while being married to another. Why would she wish that on him? Was she honestly that selfish?

  Maybe. Because she did wish it, deep, deep inside her, she longed to have him turn to her, sweep her into his arms and tell her that he couldn’t help himself. That he loved her. She didn’t want him to be in pain. She didn’t want to cause him trouble. But she craved his love.

  And didn’t every woman want that? Every woman who loved a man, even if she new they had no chance, no future? Didn’t every woman ache, deep down, to have the man she loved tell her that he loved her, too? Wasn’t that kind of hardwired into the female heart?

  Ah, hell, she just wasn’t sure of anything anymore.

  She mulled these things over as they walked from the inn’s office to their room, which was a tiny cabin that was a separate building. All the cabins were. The sidewalk twisted among gardens lush with natural, native plants. Plants that didn’t need watering in this dry climate in southwestern Texas. And it occurred to her that they were not that far away from El Paso, or Quinn, just beyond it.

  “I have relatives not far from here.”

  “You do?” he asked, and he looked at her as if he were interested. “Who?”

  Did he really want to know? she wondered. Did he honestly care about her relatives or her family background? Could he, maybe, care about her? This thing had felt completely one-sided, at the start. But maybe—hell, did it matter? If he had a wife, did it really matter?

  Yeah, it did. To her it did. “Too many to name. The Texas branch of the family is huge. I haven’t seen most of them in a long time. Too long.”

  “So maybe when all this is over, we should pay them a visit.”

  She met his eyes. “When all this is over, Cory, you’ll be going back to Big Falls, collecting your brother and heading home to…to wherever you’re from. To your coll
ection of raptors. And your wife.”

  He flicked his eyes away, just briefly. Guilt again. He must remember her, if he were feeling this guilty about being with Selene. She just knew it. He didn’t want to hurt her by talking about it, but hell, how likely was a man to remember a bird collection and not a wife?

  He probably loved her. He probably missed her, ached for her, now that he remembered her, and he was probably racked with guilt for making love with another woman.

  She had to turn her head away quickly, so he wouldn’t see the tears that sprang into her eyes. Blinking rapidly, she pointed to the cabin at the end of the walk. “That would be it,” she said, noting the number 7 on the door. “I’m really sorry there’s only one available. But…nothing will happen, Cory. I promise.”

  Her tears blinked dry, she glanced up at him when he didn’t answer. And she could have sworn she saw real regret in his eyes.

  No. That was probably just her own wishful thinking. She stopped at the door, waited while he unlocked the cabin, and then walked through the door while he held it open for her. She eyed the tiny sofa, more like a loveseat, just big enough for two, and the single bedroom, with the big fluffy bed. Just one.

  And she heard him mutter something that sounded like, “I must be out of my freakin’ mind.”

  She thought she must be out of hers, as well. Or would be, by morning, if she had to spend the entire night in this cozy place with him and not touch him. Not even kiss him. Goddess, this was clearly set up as a love nest. A romantic getaway. A place designed for intimacy, privacy and comfort.

  Maybe she should just sleep in the back of Kara’s station wagon and call it good.

  At least they’d brought some sleeping bags.

  Cory had tried every position in his sack on the floor, but none made sleep any easier. He wasn’t uncomfortable, oddly enough. In fact, he had the feeling he’d spent a lot of nights in a lot of sleeping bags. No, it wasn’t his bed on the floor keeping him awake. It was her.

  He wanted her. No matter how hard he tried to sleep, all he could see when he closed his eyes was her face, the way it had looked the night before, when she’d been on top of him screwing him senseless. It had been good. More than good. It had been phenomenal. And he wanted more. It was killing him how badly he wanted her.

  But he was doing the right thing. She didn’t just want sex, she wanted hearts and flowers, and that just wasn’t his thing. He might not have his memory back, but he knew that much. There was no doubt. It made him want to cut and run for his life when she started talking about destiny and soul mates and fate.

  He’d stopped tossing and turning a while ago.

  She hadn’t. She wanted it, too, but for all the wrong reasons. And all her reassurances about just taking it one day at a time and seeing what developed, didn’t ring true. She wanted forever.

  He wanted no part of forever.

  He estimated he’d been lying there, aching for her and fighting off fantasies about what would happen if he got up and went over to the bed, for about two hours, when she got up.

  His heart sped up, because his first thought was that she was coming to him, instead. She was going to shimmy into this sleeping bag with him and—

  But no. She wasn’t coming toward him. Even in the room’s pitch darkness, he could see that. She tiptoed across the room to where her backpack rested, picked it up, and then headed for the door. It took her several seconds to open it, and he knew she was trying to be quiet, trying not to wake him. She was sneaking out.

  What the hell was she up to?

  It crossed his mind that he didn’t suspect her of being up to anything underhanded. His notion that she’d had anything to do with knifing him or with the man who had, had evaporated a while ago. But he was worried about her. He got out of his sleeping bag, pulled on his jeans, and walked quietly to the door, then peered through it. She didn’t go toward the car. Instead she walked around behind their cabin. What the hell?

  He opened the door, and as silently as he could, he followed her. Five steps later, he wished to God he’d thought to put on his shoes, as he stepped on one pebble after another. Walking as if over hot coals, he kept going behind the cabin. It was easier to see her outside than it had been in the cabin. The moon was lopsided, but big, and bright in a clear, starry sky. It was warm. Even the breeze, what little there was, was warm.

  He crept where she led—down a small hill, over a path that wound through trees. She couldn’t possibly know where she was going, could she? She hadn’t told him she’d ever been here before.

  No, he didn’t think she did know. She stopped a couple of times, looked around, then moved on as if not finding what she was looking for. Whatever the hell that was.

  Finally, the third time she stopped, she nodded, and veered off the path into a small clearing. It was only a few yards in diameter, sprouting stiff, dry grasses and weeds. But it seemed to be what she wanted. She moved into it, and he found a stump, concealed by the trees around her, and sat down to watch.

  Was she meeting someone here? Her friend had never phoned. He’d half expected to find that she was sneaking into that campground to find the elusive Erica—Starshadow, he thought with a shake of his head—herself.

  But no, that wasn’t it. And she wasn’t meeting anyone, either. He realized that as she began tugging items from her backpack. A tiny vial. A paper packet. An incense stick. Four candles. She set them in the four corners of the little clearing, lit them one by one. Then she lit the incense from one of them, let it burn for a moment, and shook it out. She closed her eyes, and leaned close to the spiral of smoke that rose from its end, sniffing it as if she loved its scent. Then she wafted the smoke over herself, using her free hand, moving it from her head to her feet and back again. She moved, then, waving the stick around, as she moved in a circle from candle to candle, spreading the smoke.

  Soon, though, her movements became more than just that. They became a dance. She stepped, and spread her arms and turned slowly. She bowed and dipped and spun and whirled. She arched her back, raising her arms to the skies, then moving them snakelike, lower again. She was the most incredible thing he’d ever seen. There was music, there must be, but it was music only she could hear.

  Or maybe she was the music.

  She was something, that was for sure. Outside in her T-shirt and panties, dancing by candlelight. The way she moved, the sense of freedom in it, hell it got to him.

  She set the incense down, sticking its stem into the sandy soil, and picked up a candle, dancing it around the circle. Then she replaced the candle, took the vial, and danced with that, spreading droplets of whatever was inside it in her wake. Finally, she picked up the tiny paper packet. It looked like sugar or salt from a restaurant. She tore it open, poured its contents into her palm, and danced the circle once more, scattering it all around her.

  When she finished, she moved toward each of the candles, pausing a moment at each one, facing outward, skyward, opening her arms, whispering words he couldn’t hear. And when that was done, she moved to the center of the spot she’d chosen, and sat down, her legs crossed, her forearms resting on her knees.

  “My kingdom for a drum,” she muttered. Then she smiled as if she’d made a joke, as if there were others there to share it with her. “I know. It’s just a tool. I don’t need it to journey. Hell, I have the best drum anyway, right here.” Lifting one hand, she pressed her palm to her chest. “I’m just not sure how well it’s working right now. Help me out, here, guys.”

  Huh? Guys? What guys? He looked around the clearing, but no one came out of the trees. No one showed up.

  She took a few deep breaths. Really deep, and after each one she paused a moment, then exhaled fully and kind of loudly. And then she lay back, right there on the ground, and she crossed her arms so both palms were resting on her chest, over her heart. She closed her eyes.

  And that was it. She didn’t move. She just lay there. And he was damned if he knew what to do. He thought maybe she�
�d fallen asleep after awhile, and considered going over there and waking her. But he decided not to interrupt, because it wasn’t as though it had been accidental. Maybe she just couldn’t sleep in the room. Maybe she made a habit of walking out into the middle of nowhere in her underwear and sleeping on the ground without a blanket. She was nutty enough that he could buy that theory.

  But hell, it wasn’t too wise a move, not while they were targeted by killers. In the end he decided to wait it out a while, see what happened. It wasn’t an unpleasant excursion, after all. He hadn’t been sleeping anyway. And it was a nice night, and hell, looking at her lying there with her legs exposed clear to her hips wasn’t exactly a chore. She had great legs. Short, sexy legs.

  Hmm. And no bra under that T-shirt, either. Nice.

  He shifted his position, and told himself to stop wanting her so much.

  It didn’t work. He wanted her anyway.

  A half hour passed, more or less. He wasn’t sure, because he wasn’t wearing a watch. But finally, she opened her eyes and lay there a minute, staring up at the sky. She frowned, took another deep breath, and sat up. She took her time, as if she had to get her bearings before getting to her feet, and then she swirled around the circle again, waving her arms and whispering words and snuffing her candles, all but one. She left the incense burning—it was nearly gone anyway. She dug a notebook from her backpack. It had a pen in a pocket inside the cover, and she took it out, sat down by the remaining candle, leaned over it and began writing.

  He managed to let her go on for another ten minutes, before he finally decided to let her know he was there. But before he could get to his feet, she lifted her head, looked in his general direction and said, “You can come over now, if you want to.”

  He lowered his head, closed his eyes. He should have known, he thought. “How did you know I was here?”

  “Just did. And that’s odd, isn’t it? I mean, isn’t that just totally out of whack?”