“She thought I would expect to get laid in exchange for a bike ride and a place to sleep,” he told himself. “The lady obviously doesn’t know me. When I do share her bed, it’s not going to be for a quick lay – and by the time I do, she’ll be begging me to fuck her.”
He came back with two plastic room keys and tossed one to Callie.
“We’re in 217 and 219,” he announced. “Why don’t you get settled? The restaurant here has stopped serving but the desk clerk says there’s a place in town where I can get us a couple of sub sandwiches to go. I thought you might like a little time to yourself. You’ve had one hell of a day.”
Callie took the key to 219 and smiled up at him gratefully. “Thank you. That was very thoughtful.”
Her quiet dignity moved Trent. Despite being suddenly jobless and apparently homeless, Callie projected an aura of calm, an inner strength that he admired. Trent realized that there was more to this woman than met the eye.
Callie headed for her room, hauling her meager possessions along. Although Trent was a stranger, she felt safe with him. Over the years, Callie had learned to trust her first instincts about people. So far, Granmere’s gift had never steered her wrong. Although she felt awkward having him pay for her hotel room, she decided to put her pride aside and accept the situation, maybe even confide in Trent a little. Callie knew she was running out of time and needed his help if she wanted to find the little girl before it was too late.
Callie took a quick shower and combed through her long hair, pulling it into a ponytail to dry. Her auburn hair was naturally wavy and if she didn’t confine it, by morning it would become a thick cloak falling over her shoulders and covering her breasts like a modern day Lady Godiva. She pulled on a clean pair of jeans and her favorite t-shirt, a soft blue v-neck stamped with the famous gold fleur-de-lis seen everywhere in the French Quarter. Before she even had time to think about putting on lipstick, there was a knock at the door. She opened it and Trent strode in with both hands full of bags.
“I forgot to ask what you liked,” he announced, “so I bought a little of everything.”
Callie took one of the bags and began unpacking the contents onto a small round table by the window. “Oh my gosh, you weren’t kidding,” she said, smiling broadly. “What in the world did you buy?”
“Well, there’s a meatball sub and in case you don’t like that, there’s a turkey and Swiss on rye. But if you’re a vegetarian, I have a mozzarella and tomato with basil pesto on sourdough. I have potato salad, coleslaw, chips and an apple. I didn’t know what to get to drink either, so I bought iced tea, Diet Coke, water and a couple of these little wine coolers.”
“You have enough food here for a party,” Callie laughed. “We can’t possibly eat all this!”
“Speak for yourself, ma’am. I haven’t had a decent meal since night before last, when Mom cooked my favorite baked ziti as a going-away dinner.”
Callie reached for the mozzarella sub and took a huge bite. “Oh, this sourdough bread is heavenly! How did you guess I’d be a vegetarian?”
“There are lots of vegetarians in California. They all have the same glowing skin that you do.”
His words were casual but the look he gave her was hot. Callie blushed, picturing his hand stroking the glowing skin of her breasts while his lips nuzzled her neck. She quickly switched to a safer topic of conversation. “You said you were visiting your mother yesterday. Where does she live?”
He began his story with the trip to Boca and the new condo, but soon Trent found himself opening up to her, sharing more of his story than he’d told anyone in years.
“It was tough for Mom after Dad walked out on us. She had no family left to help out and he went through every dime they had before he just disappeared one day. No fights, no warnings – a quick trip to the store one evening for a pack of cigarettes and we never saw him again. I was four. You know, it was as though I lost both parents that night. Mom had to work two jobs for a long time. Bank tellers aren’t exactly the highest paid profession and she was determined to keep our small house in the Chicago suburbs so I could grow up in a decent neighborhood instead of some cheap apartment in a bad part of the city.
“I was a geek all through school,” he went on, “spending every free moment learning to program and play computer games. I went to Northwestern on a scholarship and studied computer science, then got a job in San Francisco, creating programs for the home office of the bank where my mother worked. I spent all my free time designing a new concept in gaming – a virtual reality world where geeks like me could be extreme skiers, climb mountains, race cars or catch the ball and run sixty yards to score a winning touchdown while dodging three hundred pound linemen. About six months ago, I won the gamer’s lottery – got an offer to sell my designs to one of the big boys who can spend the millions of dollars it will take to produce my games and get them into the hands of the next generation of computer geeks. We finalized the deal a month ago. I’m under contract with them for the next five years till the first ten games I created are in the stores, but I can do most of my work on-line. Now I can travel, play, ride a Harley. I just need to spend a week in Seattle every couple of months.”
Callie didn’t need psychic powers to know all the unspoken details. She saw a lonely child, turning to his computer to fill the void in his life left by a father’s disappearance. She saw a hard working young man, determined to make up for the sacrifices of his loving mother. She saw an introverted boy bullied by the jocks at school, withdrawing into a fantasy world he created where he could be the adventurous hero. Impulsively, she reached out to comfort him.
Callie was jolted into a vision of a hot, steamy shower. Her hands covered his as he grabbed her breasts, squeezing the nipples while water poured over them. Her body was pressed against the tile wall and Trent’s thick cock slid back and forth between her legs. She felt the tip ease into her, teasing, then pull out again. Callie closed her eyes and heard herself moaning, “Oh, God… don’t stop!”
“Are you all right?”
Trent’s very real voice across the table shattered her vision. Callie’s eyes flew open. She could feel the wetness between her legs. Trent’s gaze left her face, moving lower, and Callie could see that her nipples were sticking out of the thin t-shirt, as hard as they had been in her vision. Embarrassed, she grabbed her sandwich and took another huge bite, covering her chest with both arms.
“The guy back at the diner said something about spells. You’re sweating and you zoned out for a minute. Are you feeling faint?”
“No, I’m fine. This happens to me sometimes. It’s been going on ever since I was a little girl. It’s a long story….” Callie trailed off, unable to meet his eyes.
“Well, I downloaded my entire life story tonight. It’s only fair that you tell me yours. Besides, I’ve still got dessert here – two pieces of cheesecake, covered with fresh strawberries. Might as well keep me company while I polish off both of them.”
Callie laughed in spite of herself and grabbed one of the plastic containers he pulled from the other bag with a flourish. “There’s nothing in the vegetarian code that says I can’t eat cheesecake.”
She reached for one of the plastic forks, careful not to touch his hand this time. “This is even better than the sandwich,” she sighed happily, taking a tiny bite off the tip, then scooping up a sweet, ripe berry.
Trent watched her lick the last bit of cheesecake off the fork. “I’d like to smear that cheesecake all over my hard-on,” he thought, “and feel that hot tongue licking me. Most women would make a big show of eating it that way just to watch my reaction, but I don’t think she’s even aware of what she’s doing to my dick.”
Callie took another small bite, determined to savor every bit. It had been a long time since her budget allowed for such treats. Snapping the plastic lid back on, she set the cheesecake aside and pondered how much to tell Trent. Over the years, she had confided the depth of her gift to very few people. Other than her fa
mily, only Lydia had known the full range of Callie’s abilities. Now all of them were dead and there was no one with whom she could share the awful burden.
“I’m from New Orleans,” she began, “where everyone grows up hearing legends of black magic, love potions and spells. Granmere was known as a Voodoo woman. She had the gift of sight. People would come to her, bringing a chicken or a bushel of yams in exchange for a session – women wanting to know if their man was cheating on them, men asking for her advice in business. I’m not just talking about stereotypical backwoods folk. We had chauffer-driven limos from the French Quarter pull up to our cabin on the bayou along with the pickup trucks.
“Granmere saw other things too, visions of strangers in trouble. As far back as we know, women in my family have inherited her gift, although sometimes it skips a generation or two. I was born with it. Ever since I was a little girl, I could touch someone and peer through a window into their life and their future.”
Callie looked up at Trent to see his reaction. There was no shock or disbelief in his expression, only intense concentration on her words. Callie continued. “Like Granmere, I see other things too – visions of…”
Her voice trailed off and Callie slumped forward, as though she carried a burden too heavy to bear. Trent saw the look of pain in her eyes. She took a deep breath, squared her shoulders and went on.
“I see visions of evil.”
Chapter 3
Trent sat in silence for a moment. Callie was obviously in distress, and he wanted to let her proceed at her own pace.
“It must be very hard for you to see bad things and know that you’re powerless to change them.”
Callie jumped up and began pacing back and forth in the small room. “That’s just it. I CAN change things. I’ve done it three times now. When I see someone in danger, I found out if I concentrate hard enough, I can sometimes pick up clues to tell me where the person is. I went to Mobile last fall. There was a young woman, a dealer on one of the riverboat casinos. I saw her walking out of the Delta Queen late at night after her evening shift. I watched her in my dreams night after night, being followed home by one of her regular customers. I could see into his mind, see the room he was preparing where he planned to keep her. He had chains bolted to the floor and a padlock on the outside of the door.”
“I went to Mobile and found her in the casino. She didn’t believe me, thought I was some kind of whacko. But I watched out for her and when he grabbed her off the street a few days later, I followed him and made an anonymous call to the cops – said I was a neighbor and saw someone breaking into his house. When they arrived, they heard her screaming inside. Thank God they got there in time.
“And then there was the guy a couple of months ago in Atlanta,” she went on.
“Atlanta?” Trent broke in. “I remember something on the news a few months ago. There was a serial rapist caught in Atlanta. He was targeting real estate saleswomen, having them show him vacant homes, then he’d beat and rape them.”
Callie nodded. “Yeah, that’s the guy.”
“You caught a serial rapist?”
“No, I didn’t catch him. I just got there in time to visit the office of the last woman he was going to attack, pretending to be one of his past victims. I spoke to all the women there, warning them about a man I described. He called one of the agents a few days later. When he insisted on meeting her at a house instead of the office, Sheila was suspicious. She was already at the house when he arrived. Fortunately she recognized him from my description, ran out of the house and locked herself in her car. When the police arrived, they found enough evidence in the trunk of his car to charge him with eleven rapes. He was one of those guys who kept souvenirs to help him relive each episode.
“That’s why I’m here in North Carolina. There’s a little blonde girl in Waynesville who is going to be abducted. This time I haven’t seen the man. It’s like I’m looking at everything through his eyes. He travels from place to place so no one has connected the crimes yet. He’s killed all the others he took – and when he’s finished with her, he’ll kill her too. That’s why I have to get to Waynesville. I can see the old farmhouse he’s renting in my mind but I have to find it. There’s not much time. I can feel his hunger building.
“My truck broke down on the way here and I didn’t have enough money left to rent a car to get there. That’s why I took the job in the diner.” She stopped pacing and met his eyes. “I need your help.”
None of his virtual adventures prepared Trent for Callie’s tale. But he didn’t doubt a word. Ever since meeting her, he’d been having daydreams… vivid images… hot, steamy, erotic scenes of the two of them in every imaginable sexual position – and some he’d never even imagined before.
“I’ve been living in a virtual world for years,” he told himself, “but never a world as real as the one that appeared in my mind when I met her. I could swear I felt her tongue on my cock when we were on the Harley and she had her arms around my waist. This woman has some kind of power - and it’s way beyond anything I’ve ever experienced.
“Okay, buddy, here’s your chance,” he told himself. “You’ve created worlds of adventure and excitement in your head all your life. Now you can have a real adventure – maybe even save someone’s life. Or you can play it safe, figure she’s a little crazy and drop her off in town in the morning.”
Trent looked her squarely in the eyes. “I’m in,” he said boldly. “What do we do next?”
Callie breathed a sigh of relief. He believed her! What’s more, he wasn’t running for the door like every other guy she’d met that found out about her abilities. Maybe she still had a chance to change this premonition. Callie bore the burden of sleepless nights reliving her visions, listening again and again to the screams and pleading of innocent victims she was unable to help over the years. She was determined that this fair-haired toddler would not suffer the same fate.
“I don’t know what to do, other than drive to Waynesville and hope that I see something I recognize once I get there.”
Trent nodded. “You’ve had a tough day – and I’ve covered a lot of miles. Let’s sleep on it and get an early start in the morning. Maybe one of us will come up with an idea.”
He headed for the door, then turned to say goodnight. Trent’s heart skipped as he saw Callie sag onto the bed. She looked so utterly exhausted, pale and trembling, that he longed to take her in his arms and tell her that she wasn’t alone any more. But he knew instinctively that this woman needed to feel safe and comfortable with him emotionally before he ever dared to approach her physically, even for something as demure as a warm hug. Trent vowed that, difficult as it might be, he would wait for Callie to make the first move. He only hoped that the erotic scenes filling his thoughts would prove as real in the future to her as the never-ending nightmares she envisioned.
Chapter 4
Callie fell into bed the moment the door closed behind him and her eyes closed wearily. What a hell of a day! She lost her job, let herself get picked up by a stranger, went to a motel with him – Granmere would tan her hide for acting so recklessly!
That thought led to her earlier image of them together, where she was held firmly over his lap as he delivered a stern lecture and an even sterner hand spanking to her bare behind. Rather than being put off by the idea, Callie felt strangely comforted. She had been alone for so long now, with no one to care about her and her safety. Hearing him say in her vision that she must not put herself into danger ever again made her feel cherished and protected, even if only in her imagination.
In the bayou it was common for parents to spank disobedient children and for men to threaten in public to take a switch to a willful wife when she got home. As a child, Callie had been spanked a few times by Granmere, mostly to get her attention when her mind wandered too much into other worlds while doing chores.
Callie vividly recalled her last spanking. She was almost thirteen. Granmere had come home from town and found her at the
kitchen table giving a reading to one of the mechanics from the auto body shop down the road. She was staring intently into the scrimming mirror and he was staring intently at her budding breasts outlined under the thin cotton shirt. Granmere booted him out the door and grabbed Callie by the arm.
“What were you thinking? Letting a strange man in here while you were home alone? I thought I raised you to have more sense than that!”
“But Granmere, he needed my help. He was so worried about Marie Claire, he was nearly in tears when he knocked on the door.”
Granmere pulled out a kitchen chair and sat down.
“Well, it wasn’t a tear I saw in his eye when I walked in. I reckon I need to pound some common sense into you. Pull down those jeans and get over my lap.”
Callie had never seen her so furious. Granmere hadn’t spanked her in several years. She knew there was no point in arguing, so she slowly unzipped her jeans and lowered them to her knees.
“Underpants too,” Granmere demanded.
Callie had never gotten a bare bottom spanking before. Nervously she bowed her head and slid her white cotton underpants down to her knees. Granmere pulled her forward and Callie reluctantly lowered herself into position.
From the first intense smack, Callie’s bottom was on fire. Granmere spanked first one cheek, then the other, all the while lecturing her on what might have happened.
“Don’t you know how dangerous that was? He could have attacked you right here on the kitchen table. There’s no one within miles to hear you call for help… and you’re certainly not strong enough to fight off a grown man.
“You will NEVER, EVER, allow a strange man into the house when you’re here alone.”
Granmere emphasized each word with another harsh blow of her hand. Callie bucked and squirmed, but Granmere trapped Callie’s legs between her own, holding her in place while continuing to punish her quivering ass.
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