Every Witch Way but Wicked

by Barbra Annino

  Julene’s nostrils flared and the cords in her neck stood out. The tension in the courtyard spiraled. Caz breathed shallowly. Inside his chest, his heart thudded like a bass drum.

  Bending her head, Julene stared at Emma, as if memorizing every curve of her face, the length of her nose, the width of her eyes, the exact shade of her complexion.

  He drew in his strength, readying himself to step between them.

  “You don’t know who you’re talking to.” Jolene’s eyes seemed to bore into Emma’s.

  “I know you.” Emma’s voice was low and sure. “And I know one more thing. I know you poisoned Caz.”

  Chapter Four

  Hatred flared in Julene’s imperious face. Emma slid her hand into her jacket pocket, ready to whip her cell phone out and speed dial Sep. Next to her, she felt Caz stiffen, and knew he was ready to step in front of her, though he could barely stand.

  Then Julene’s lips pulled back in a snarl, like a wild animal’s. Without a word, she twirled and stormed back into the club, where she would doubtless kick aside any club goer who had the bad luck to be in her path.

  When the door slammed behind Julene, Emma brought her hand out of her jacket pocket and turned to Caz.

  “How did you know?” he asked, and his low voice resonated through her.

  “She reminded me of a woman in a fairy tale.”

  He frowned. “Julene is no Cinderella.”

  “What about the evil queen in Snow White?”

  “Ah.” His smile deepened, though in his eyes a vast sadness pooled. “Did you know her?”

  “The evil queen?”

  A husky laugh came out of his mouth, but his sad eyes still didn’t light up.

  She shook her head. “I did PR for the city of New Orleans for the last four years. I’ve met people like Julene. There’s something wrong with her.”

  “When she wants to be charming, no one can resist her.”

  “You couldn’t?”

  He hunched his shoulders. “I knew what she was from the beginning.” He put his hand on her shoulder, and though she wore her jacket and beneath that a silk-knit top, a zing did a slow sizzle through her.

  “Because you’re like her.” Her voice came out in a whisper. She’d suspected before. Now she knew.

  His other hand came up to grip her other shoulder, and she stared into his strange obsidian eyes, the sadness not there anymore, only hard stone.

  “And you…” He stared intently, as if searching for a glimpse into her soul. “You’re like her, too.”

  She felt a tremor in his hands. She told herself she could draw away. Let him stumble after her. Try to grab her. Never catch her.

  Instead she reached up and covered the hand on her left shoulder with hers. She didn’t say a word. Just stared into his eyes.

  Something was happening to her and him with the moon shining down on them, spotlighting them. Making her feel, think and act strangely. A silent cry started in her mind, and she didn’t know who it came from, him or her.

  Never leave me again. Never, never, never.

  This was insanity. Leaving is what her family did.

  Usually richer than when they’d arrived.

  He closed his eyes, a sigh coming out of his mouth, and leaned his forehead against hers. “I’m so tired.”

  She slid her hands behind his back. “I know.” Something odd was happening to her. She felt his sorrow, his pain, his need.

  “Save me,” he said.

  She closed her eyes and didn’t answer. Just held him. This was supposed to an assignment. Rutledge had sent her here to find out if there was anything non-human inside him.

  But if she told Rutledge and the others about him, she would have to tell the truth about herself.

  That she didn’t know what she was.

  A witch. A goddess. A devil.

  Perhaps an alien after all.

  She lifted her head, not laughing, not smiling.

  “I’ll try.” It was a promise.

  Then his mouth came down. Not swooping, but a leisurely descent. Giving her plenty of time to avoid his lips if that was what she wanted.

  But what she wanted was … him.

  Angling her face, she lowered her eyelids. Their mouths met slowly, softly, resting upon each other. Breathing each other’s breath. Not like any kiss she’d experienced before. Of course, she’d never kissed a dying man before.

  Odd how her body flamed.

  Odd how she wanted to drag him down to the hard tiles.

  Odd how she thought that she could have his baby. Another Lemarchal girl who would grow up to be like the other women in their family.

  Then the cool moonlight shone directly down on her, gleaming through her thin eyelids. He moved his lips down her jaw, to her neck. Warm, melting kisses. She opened her eyes and took in the brilliance and beauty of the round orb. The light chilled her, and at the same time it strengthened her. Touching the magic inside her.

  As she stared at the moon, a figure appeared on its surface. A woman, tall and slender, with a bow and arrow. Diana, the goddess. Diana, the huntress. Diana, who her grand-mere said bore the first of their line, leaving the half-human girl baby with her Roman lover.

  Emma shivered and drew back from Caz.

  “I’ll heal you,” she said. “I promise.”

  But not alone. She needed help. Because the man she was kissing wasn’t far from death, and none of her talents included bringing back the dead to life.

  The thought was still in her mind when Caz slid to the tiles and his body started to twitch.

  Chapter Five

  “You’re violating rule number one,” Sep said.

  Realizing she was biting her knuckles like a dog in a trap, Emma whipped her hand behind her back and glanced at the waiting room doors, as if she could see through the oblong windows and down the corridor where the best doctors in the Midwest—according to Rutledge—were fighting to save Cazidor Diaz’s life.

  Though she willed the doors to open and a doctor in a white coat with a stethoscope hanging around his neck to stride in and tell her that Caz was in recovery, that didn’t happen. Nothing happened. No doors opened. No doctor came in looking strong and compassionate and relieved.

  They’d been in the waiting room of the private clinic for more than four hours. The restrained grays and burgundy of the room made it look more like a waiting room of a top law firm. A firm only the very stinking rich could afford.

  Lucky for Caz, Emma thought, that Baron Rutledge was so rich that skunks stayed far away, hoping he wouldn’t spray them. Lucky for Caz, Rutledge could pay enough money to jerk the best doctors in the Midwest out of their beauty sleep then rush over to find out what was killing him.

  She turned her attention to Sep. Talking beat worrying. “The pren-head rule?”

  “That’s my number one rule. Rutledge has his own. Don’t fraternize with aliens.”

  “We don’t know if he’s an alien. He looks human. He smells human.” She clamped her mouth shut to keep from saying, He kisses human.

  “Something’s wrong with his blood. The doctors found anomalies.” He pronounced the last word carefully, as if he’d just learned it.

  “Poison,” she said.

  “No poison that they know.”

  “You said you’re an alien.” She thrust her chin up. “What does your blood look like?”

  “It’s got extra testosterone.”

  Two words separated by a hyphen popped into Emma’s mind. Pren-head.

  The door swung open. She jumped to her feet, only to see Nina striding toward them like a racehorse, not looking back because she knew she was ahead of the pack.

  “How is he?”

  “I don’t know.” Nina’s expression was blank. Except for Sep, everyone’s expression had been blank since they’d burst into the clinic and three men and four women wearing blue scrubs had whisked Caz away on a gurney, taking him into the bowels of the white brick building. “Are you okay?”

&
nbsp; “I’m keeping her entertained,” Sep said.

  “Telling me the Foundation rules.” Emma smiled but her lips quivered, and she sucked them in.

  “Rule number one,” Sep said. “But don’t worry, my sweet Snickers bar. If you sprout tentacles, that won’t keep me from our marriage bed.”

  Her eyebrows arched. “Keep it up, and your bed will be the floor.”

  “True love in action,” Emma said.

  Sep’s grin softened. His whole face softened. “It’s gratitude. She saved my life.”

  “And now he’s my slave.”

  “True.” Sep’s grin widened to a proud beam. “You should see what she makes me do when we’re alone at night.”

  “Quiet, slave.” Nina reached out and brushed her hand over his shoulder. He lifted his hand and placed it over hers. The intimate look they shared made Emma turn her head.

  She closed her eyes, picturing Caz falling, his body seizing, twitching, eyes rolling back. And what had she done? The coolheaded witch and possible descendant of a goddess?

  With a cry, she’d fallen to her knees by his side and yelled, “Call an ambulance. Save him!”

  Just seconds after she’d promised to save him.

  Her heart felt heavy, as if an evil queen had turned the fist-sized muscle into lead.

  After the first hour at the clinic, she’d gone into the ladies’ room and chanted every healing spell she’d learned, over and over, until her voice cracked.

  An hour after that, she made her way into the parking lot, empty except for ten cars—all there because of Caz. Glancing at the round moon above her, she begged Diana to help.

  Nothing happened. No silhouettes appeared. Instead it turned whiter by the minute, as if Diana was sending her a Gone Hunting message.

  She opened her eyes. Regrets wouldn’t heal Caz. Nothing she’d done had healed him. “Did you hear anything from the doctors?”

  Nina shook her head, her hand sliding slowly away from Sep. “Just the blood abnormalities.”

  “I told her,” Sep said. “Alien.”

  “Poison,” Emma said.

  “Could be either.” Nina took the seat across from Emma, sitting on the edge of the cushion and leaning toward her. “One of the bartenders told me the bitch’s full name.” She spoke conversationally, as if ‘bitch’ was a word she used often, though she looked like someone who, if the queen of England stopped by, would be invited to tea. “I Googled and found out she’s an intern at the Medical College, going for her PhD in research. Guess what she’s working on?”

  Emma’s skin grew cold. “Blood,” she whispered.

  “A study on blood cells.” Nina frowned. “Not healthy ones. Sick ones.”

  “Somehow she put the sick ones in his blood.” Emma shivered, the jagged puzzle pieces fitting together.

  Nina shrugged. “That would be hard to prove.”

  “Did you see her?” Sep gestured, his eyes bright. “A woman like that would do anything.”

  “Are you admiring her?” The look Nina gave him promised retribution.

  “You know I never look at any woman but you.”

  “You’re such a liar.”

  He grinned at her, and Emma stood. Their obvious love for each other made her think of Caz. A man that maybe she could love.

  If he weren’t an alien.

  If he lived.

  If he didn’t turn out to be a pren-head.

  If, if, if… She wanted to scream at all the ifs in her mind.

  “I want to see him. To talk to the doctors.”

  Nina’s mouth twisted into an apology and she shook her head slowly. “The last time you spoke to them, you were a bit too emotional.”

  “One of them said, ‘Keep that emo bitch away from me.’” Sep’s eyes glinted. “I can make him listen to you.”

  “Sep.” Nina looked at him reproachfully. “You know you can’t do that.”

  “I have a better idea.” Emma’s stomach fluttered. Hope, she thought. Butterfly wings of hope. “I’ll give him my blood. That will save him.”

  “The doctors gave him a transfusion.” Nina sent her a look that quietly screamed, Aw, honey, you may as well give up, nothing’s going to work.

  The butterfly wings fluttered faster. “They didn’t give him my blood.” The certainty that her blood would be compatible, that it would heal him, was so vivid and so real, she could see him standing strong and tall and full of energy.

  Nina shook her head. “You don’t know if your blood will be compatible.”

  “I know here.” Emma thumped her chest over her heart. She’d met him a little less than five hours ago, yet it felt as if she’d known him forever.

  “Why would your blood make a difference?”

  “Because…” She stopped. Swallowed. Whispered. “Because Caz and I… We’re alike.”

  Nina frowned. “Emma, you—”

  Sep surged to his feet, his face serious for once. “I’ll tell Rutledge.”

  Relief made Emma weak, and she sagged back onto the sofa. Rutledge would fix it. Rutledge would fix everything.

  *

  Nina stood when Rutledge entered the clinic exam room where Emma was waiting for the doctor’s okay. The expression on Rutledge’s face was impossible to read, but Emma wasn’t getting a warm and fuzzy feeling in her churning gut.

  “The doctors can’t do it,” he said.

  “They can.” She kept her gaze on him, and she turned on her charm, pulsing it out of her, as easy as turning on a switch. The same Lemarchal charm that made Grand-mere the toast of the retirement community and kept her mother in dancing shoes, as well as her jewel-like home in the French Quarter. “You can make them do it.”

  He shook his head, unfazed, her charm bouncing right off his thick skin. But his eyes sent sympathy. No, not sympathy. Worse than that. Pity.

  “A good agent can’t get involved with the subjects she’s investigating. I don’t think you’ll make a very good agent.”

  “You’re firing me.” She didn’t care. The new job that had mattered so much this morning was nothing. The thought of getting fired was nothing.

  Saving Caz… That was everything.

  “I’m not sure. But that’s nothing to do with Mr. Diaz. The reason the doctors can’t give him your blood is that you have different blood types.”

  Chapter Six

  Still shaken by denial and shock, Emma dredged up a smile for the nurse who let her into Caz’s room. Aware of his still figure hooked up to tubes like a character in a soap opera, she couldn’t look at him fully. She’d always been the steady one in her family. But now … now she could see why the doctors distrusted her. Right now she didn’t trust herself.

  Something was happening to her. She’d started out yesterday full of hope and energy, determined to do a good job. To be nothing like the rest of her family. Parasites who lived off their witch/goddess/voodoo who-do charm. Who drew men into their web-like spell as easily as spiders captured flies.

  Today she proved she was nothing like the other Lemarchal women. None of them had ever cared about the men they left strewn behind them. But with this man…

  She cared so much it was a pulsing ache in her heart.

  “Can I sit with him for a while?” she asked.

  The nurse hesitated. She was in her thirties and looked tired. Dark rings under her eyes, too much tension in her shoulders and her face, as if she worried about money, about her family. She wore a ring with a tiny diamond, and she looked like a mom. Overworked, underpaid, never enough time, never enough sleep.

  Emma’s compassion rayed out from her to the nurse. She gave it a push, amplifying it.

  The nurse visibly melted, her spine and shoulders relaxing, the muscles in her face softening. “I guess it wouldn’t hurt anything. I’ll leave the door open.”

  “Thank you.” Emma watched her leave, listened to her rubber-soled footsteps. Watched her close the door but not all the way, giving Emma a semblance of privacy, though Emma knew she was
still near. Knew she and the other nurses were keeping track of the machines hooked up to Caz.

  Emma hurried to his side. He looked … dead. His face pale and beautiful, as if Michelangelo had carved it out of marble. Her heart constricted, and she clenched her teeth so hard her jaw hurt.

  The doctors were right. Falling apart wouldn’t help Caz. Maybe nothing she did would help him.

  She put her hand on his arm, and his skin was cool. She bit back a cry, pushing down the stupid, useless emotion. This was about Caz, not about her.

  If Julene was the evil queen, he was the sleeping beauty in this real-life story.

  And she was the prince.

  The nurses and doctors were the Seven Dwarves.

  She bent down, the ache still pulsing strongly. If he were Sleeping Beauty and she were the prince…

  Closing her eyes, she pressed her lips on his.

  It was like kissing lukewarm marble.

  And then … she felt a twitch.

  Her lids popped open and she jerked her head back. He still lay with his eyes closed.

  But was there more color in his face?

  Did his lips curve up a tiny bit?

  As if he were sleeping naturally, having a good dream.

  Or was she seeing what she wanted so badly to see?

  The butterfly wings fluttered again as hope bloomed inside her, another kind of ache. A good ache.

  She slipped off her shoes, and carefully, oh so carefully, making sure she didn’t yank any needles out, she crawled into bed with him. On her side, she put her arm over his shoulders and kissed his cheek. Drawing her head back a fraction of an inch, she whispered, “Heal, Caz. I beg you to heal.”

  Then she laid her head down on the pillow. A wave of tiredness swamped her, tugging her under. She fought it, but it was like fighting an undertow in the Pacific Ocean. She yawned and closed her eyes.

  What would it hurt if she rested? Just for a moment.

  Chapter Seven

  Lips brushed Emma’s forehead and she made a moaning sound. So tired. Sleep was so sweet.

  “Wake up, darling.” Caz’s low voice reverberated through her, and she made a satisfied mewling sound, her nerve ends unfurling, saying more, more, more.