Did he know he was being followed or was he just in a hurry?
Or is it a trap?
Katrina quickened her own pace. Trap or no, she wasn’t letting him get away. Not until she ascertained if he was The Mouse or not.
She increased her speed, taking the stair three at a time, her palm hot under the cool rail from friction. Or was it excitement? Nerves?
Hurry up. You should at least be getting a glimpse of him by now. His heel, an elbow… something.
The stairs curved to the left. The footfalls grew fainter. Fainter.
Shit.
Throwing caution to the wind, Katrina broke into a sprint up the remaining stairs, bursting onto a carpeted landing painted in warm muted light. The mezzanine.
The empty mezzanine.
She scanned the thoroughfare. A row of closed doors stretched out before her on the right, obviously guest rooms, statues of big cats—tigers, panthers, cheetahs—occasionally resting between them. On the left, the foyer sprawled below, guests moving across the lushly carpeted floor, checking in, checking out, perusing the lines of slot machines, staring up at the enormous statue of a proud lynx rising from the centre of the space, a wicked glint of devilishness in its large emerald eyes…
Fuck. She’d lost him. He’d either entered one of the rooms unfurling before her, or jumped over the balcony down to the foyer, and something about the relaxed way the people moved down there told her a tall, broad man in denim jeans hadn’t just come vaulting into their presence.
She swung her stare back to the doors, doing a quick count. Damn it, there had to be at least sixty before her, and that didn’t include the ones she couldn’t see on the other side of the mezzanine behind the lynx statue. He could be anywhere.
“Ms O’Lauchlan?”
Katrina jumped, her hand snapping immediately to where her gun would normally be. She spun about, fixing the woman standing behind her with a steady look.
“I’m sorry to startle you, Ms O’Lauchlan,” the woman apologised, her clear eyes the most unusual shade of gold. “But I have a message for you.”
Katrina noticed a slim silver nametag pinned to the lapel of the woman’s immaculately tailored black suit. She was slipping. She should have noticed that before now. Focus. Focus. She bit back a scowl. Fair Dinkum, she was getting sick of that word.
“Ms O’Lauchlan?” the woman—Tiamat—gave her a small, quizzical smile.
“I’m sorry. A message?”
From nowhere a small folded piece of paper appeared in Tiamat’s slim hands and she held it out to Katrina. “From a friend,” she said, and for a moment her eyes seemed to shimmer with a deep golden glow.
Katrina’s already pounding heart leapt into her throat, obviously not content with staying in her chest. A friend…She took the offered note from Tiamet, mouth dry. I can’t believe it. He’s done it to me again…
Hands steady, she unfolded the paper.
Got to be quicker than that, Kat.
Nothing else.
But there didn’t need to be. She recognised the handwriting.
Bastard.
Lifting her stare from the note, she looked back to Tiamat…and discovered the space where the woman had just stood seconds earlier, empty.
Katrina frowned. What the hell was going on? Just what kind of place was Los Magia?
“The most amazing kind.”
Abaddon’s deep voice tickled her ear and she spun about, crumpling the note in her fist.
Nothing.
She was still alone.
Katrina rubbed at her face. Okay. This was getting ridiculous.
Go back to your suite. Have another bath, study the map and maybe get something to eat. Clear your head, O’Lauchlan. You’re starting to hear things.
She stood for a moment, feeling The Mouse’s taunting note crunch in her fist. The bath could wait, but her stomach couldn’t. She needed coffee, lots of coffee, and toast. Preferably lathered with Vegemite. She’d park herself in a booth in one of The Wicked Lynx’s many bistros and caffeinate herself as she studied the map. Then she’d hit the pavement.
Four slices of Vegemite-smeared toast at The Feline Bistro later, Katrina felt better. More focussed. Taking a tentative sip of very hot coffee, she studied the unfolded map of Los Magia spread out on the table before her, admiring the city’s design.
Five main streets intersected to form a pentagram, with five major casinos located in each pointed sector. The Wicked Lynx sat in the south-west sector, surrounded by various strip-clubs, night-clubs and a comedy club called Laughter Bites. Tartarus, the BDSM parlour the concierge recommended to her (a little thrill, both dark and disturbing, shot through Katrina at the memory) was located in the North-East sector, a part of the Olympus casino. In the centre of the pentagram stood a museum dedicated to the city. Outside the star, the rest of the city sprawled in which Katrina noticed the airport, schools, hospitals and other less touristy buildings. In amongst all that, there were residential areas. A normal city. Yet something didn’t seem normal about Los Magia. Not at all.
Katrina lifted her head from the map, sipping on her coffee again. At first glance, normal people surrounded her. Normal tourists enjoying their vacation; laughing, eating, skimming tourist guides and talking amongst themselves. But a closer look, a “cop’s” look revealed something else.
Some of the people seemed different. Some reminded her of her collage performance of A Mid-Summer Night’s Dream, almost dream-like and ethereal. She kept getting the impression of delicate wings on some of them, of fangs on others. In one both an slim woman sat between two men, one nuzzling her neck, the other whispering in her ear, an expression of absolute rapture and—underneath that—stunned amazement on her face. A private moment Katrina wanted to turn from, but something about the two men kept her attention. Something about the way they looked. Handsome and dangerous, but somehow not human.
Not human? O’Lauchlan, you’re going out of your mind. You need more toast. Or coffee.
No, that wasn’t it. There was something about Los Magia, an undercurrent, a…a…a vibe, that felt unnatural. That made her nerves twitch and her skin tingle.
And your nipples pinch and your sex flutter? Is it the place that has you thinking about sex constantly? Dominated, forceful sex? The kind of sex Flynn Marsters knew you—
She dropped her coffee cup, the hot liquid splashing on her hand with a scalding kiss. But she didn’t notice. A tight, agitated beat thumped in her temples.
Flynn Marsters? Damn it. She’d refused to even think his name for the last ten years, and now here she was, not only thinking his name but, since touching down in Los Magia, remembering every immoral moment she’d spent in his arms. Reliving every aberrant, sinful second.
Her pussy constricted and she suppressed a scowl. What the bloody hell was going on here?
Snatching at her napkin, Katrina wiped the cooling coffee from her hand, mindless of the sting in her flesh. The city seemed to call to that dark, forbidden part of her, as if it knew what she wanted on a deep, base level.
How is that possible, O’Lauchlan?
“Everything is possible in Los Magia, Ms O’Lauchlan,” Abaddon murmured, sliding effortlessly onto the bench opposite her, blue eyes sparkling. “Surely you have realised that by now. Your deepest fantasies, your darkest urges. The city knows them all. What you hunger for the most will be delivered to you.”
Katrina stared at her unexpected companion. “Forgive me, Mr Abaddon, but do you always sound like a tourist brochure?”
Abaddon chuckled, and a wave of warm fingers seemed to feather up Katrina’s arms, along her ribs. Her nipples puckered and a squirming sensation unfurled between her thighs. She tried not to fidget in her seat, a goal made trickier by the burning intensity in the man’s blue eyes.
“Shall I tell you what you want, Ms O’Lauchlan?” he continued, as if she hadn’t said anything. “Shall I tell you what dark desire burns in that delectable body of yours? Shall I tell you about
the desire to be dominated? Controlled? Thrown against the wall, onto a bed, over the back of a lounge and taken by a man who can easily overpower you? A man who can draw one forceful orgasm after another from you no matter how much you fight? A man who refuses to listen to your ‘nos’ because he knows what you are really saying is ‘harder, harder, harder’?”
Katrina stared at him, her face flooding with red heat, her fists tight balls of incredulous rage, her pussy a spasm of raw want. “How…” She stopped the question before it fell from her lips.
“Los Magia knows, Ms O’Lauchlan.” Abaddon smiled, the action both utterly charming and completely disturbing. “And I am more than willing to deliver.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Yes. You do.
Whose voice was that in her head? Hers? Abaddon’s? Or someone else’s?
“I’m here on a holiday… a vacation. Nothing else.”
He chuckled again, and another wave of those unseen fingers caressed Katrina’s body, this time brushing over her taut, aching nipples, the column of her neck. “Ms O’Lauchlan. Katrina… A vacation to a paranormal city? A city you knew nothing about until you landed here?” His deep laugh made her throat tighten. “You think you’re here to find a man, but the moment I saw you, the moment I smelt you, tasted you, I knew there was so much more you wanted. You think you’ve destroyed that want deep inside you, but you haven’t. Los Magia felt it and I felt it.” He leant toward her, his eyes blazing. He closed his hand over hers, his thumb tracing lazy circles in the centre of her palm. “And you feel it too.”
In a blur, Katrina flicked her wrist and grabbed his, smashing her other hand against his elbow as she twisted his arm until locked straight, ramming it backward, driving his shoulder up until it would go any further. “You’re right,” she said, calmly, folding his hand back to his wrist and pushing his arm further backward even as she ignored the warm throb between her thighs at his words. “I do feel something. Your shoulder-joint just about to pop.”
Sharp teeth glinted in a grin. “Oh, I like your style, Ms O’Lauchlan. But before you break my shoulder, answer me one question. How did you know The Mouse was coming here? To Los Magia?”
At the words ‘The Mouse’ Katrina’s mouth went dry. Heart hammering, she shoved harder on Abaddon’s wrist. “How do you—”
He smiled, his eyes refusing to move from hers. “I told you, Ms O’Lauchlan. Los Magia knows…”
And before she could blink, before she could tighten her grip on his wrist, he was somehow free of her hold and standing by the table, staring down at her. “Forgive me, but I must leave you. Until next time…” He smiled and took a step backward, making room for a waiter carrying a tray laden with large plates of bacon and eggs to pass between he and Katrina’s booth. The waiter obscured her view of Abaddon for a split second, barely a heartbeat, but when he’d passed completely, Abaddon was gone. Nowhere to be seen.
Katrina clenched her jaw and her fists. “I really wish people would stop doing that,” she muttered.
Collecting her suite access card, she left the bistro, in just as much turmoil as she was when she’d entered. Abaddon had pressed buttons she’d thought long since removed. She’d spent the last ten years of her life telling herself cops didn’t want to be dominated in the bedroom, controlled by someone stronger than them, but with every syllable that feel from the man’s lips, she’d felt that fire blaze deep within her being again. That fire she’d only let one man feed.
Damn it, she hadn’t been prepared for this, and it was her own damn fault. She never never pursued a suspect to a place unfamiliar to her. She should have suspected Los Magia wasn’t just a more expensive Vegas. She definitely should have realised it the second she’d stepped foot outside the airport. The winged people, the surreal atmosphere… Yes, she was just a cop from Australia, but seriously, how naïve could she be?
This is what you get for skipping those workshop the Commissioner held on paranormal beings and the law.
Biting back a curse, she crossed the foyer, searching for Abaddon, The Mouse, hell, anyone who looked remotely familiar would do at this time. No one.
Heading toward to front entrance, she shoved the map of the city into her back-pocket. Back to the original plan.
Los Magia knew her so well? Well, now she was going to get to know it. In all its paranormal glory.
***
He watched her exit The Wicked Lynx. Saw the determination in each step she took. Australian Federal Police Office Katrina O’Lauchlan. Trouble. She looked angry. And gorgeous. International travel agreed with her. Her deep, deep auburn hair tumbled about her face and shoulders in a tousled, worried mess, so different from the tightly coiled bun she always wore back in Australia.
A fitted black tank-top covered her torso, leaving her arms and shoulders bare. He admired their finely-formed but steely muscles, knowing they were the result of hours of sweat and dedication. Katrina O’Lauchlan was fit. Very fit. A fact he knew first hand. A fact further highlighted by the faded blue jeans hugging her legs, emphasising their toned perfection and the toned perfection of her butt.
His cock twitched and he clenched his jaw.
He had to get his mind out of his pants. Or should that be her pants?
A frown pulled at his forehead. How did she know he was here? He couldn’t believe her appearance in Los Magia was sheer coincidence. She hadn’t taken a holiday since high school. What were the odds she’d turn up in the very US city he was meeting a client by coincidence? Or that she’d be staying in the same resort he himself was booked into?
So how did she know he was here?
Or more to the point, how much did she know, full stop?
He narrowed his eyes, watching her be devoured by the hustling crowd on the sidewalk outside The Wicked Lynx.
He needed to know. Which meant he needed to talk to her.
He dragged a hand through his hair, refusing to acknowledge the stirring excitement in his groin. Well, trying to.
God, was he in trouble.
Chapter Four
Feet sore, limbs sun-kissed, Katrina approached The Wicked Lynx.
She’d walked the main strip of Los Magia during the course of the day, following its pentagram formation and was now heading for a shower before going out again. She’d taken in the five main casinos, she scouted out the museums and main retail section, paying particular attention to the jewellery stores and porn-brokers. She asked the managers of each store she entered if they’d seen a tall male who spoke with an Australian accent in the last few days. None had.
It didn’t surprise her. The Mouse had never sold on any of the diamonds he’d stolen before and nothing in her gut told her he would do so here, but she wanted to suss out the stores and put some ‘feelers’ out, just in case.
So, no further hint of The Mouse.
So how are you going to catch him?
Katrina gnawed on her bottom lip, raking her fingers through her hair as she passed through the Lynx’s wide sliding doors. The cool air-conditioned interior wrapped around her with delicious ease, making her nipple pinch tight. She needed to set a trap. But what would she use as bait?
Yourself. He knows you’re here. He wants to play, then let him play. But by your rules. At the ball.
A wicked throb came to life between her thighs at the thought, troubling and seductive at once. Since when had The Mouse turned her on?
Since touching down in Los Magia?
No. Earlier than that. Much earlier. She just never let herself admit it until now.
“Ms O’Lauchlan?”
Katrina jumped, spinning about. A woman approached her, oozing sensual poise. Tiamat. Again. Twelve hours later and still looking fresh and stunning and pleasant. Maybe she’s not human?
The woman smiled, handing her another folded piece of paper. “Another message for you, Ms O’Lauchlan.”
Taking the note, she ran her gaze over the familiar scrawl, a distant part of her mind
noting the confident structure. Blackjack tomorrow. 6am. Or has the Kat become a chicken?
Pulse pounding, Katrina folded the note and looked at the hovering Tiamat. “Can you describe the person who left this for me, please?”
Tiamat’s smile widened. “Tall. Brooding. Black eyes and dark hair. Very handsome.”
Handsome? Katrina cocked an eyebrow at the word and the throb in her sex grew stronger. Scowling, she fixed the woman with a level gaze. “Did he leave a name? Someway I can contact him?”
“No, Ms O’Lauchlan. Just the note and a request I deliver it to you the moment you returned.”
Damn it. “Was he Australian? Did he have an accent? Like mine?”
Tiamat shook her head. “I did not notice, Ms O’Lauchlan, I’m sorry.”
The glint in her unusual amber eyes told Katrina what had occupied Taimat’s attention while she’d been speaking to the note-writer. The woman looked positively hungry. “Handsome?” she asked. “Really?”
Taimat’s smile turned into a grin. “Really.”
Katrina scowled. Again. Handsome. An image of a man with hazel eyes filled her head, the only man she’d ever associated with that word. He fixed her with a knowing look before merging into a mysterious jewel thief she couldn’t see clearly but knew all the same, a jewel thief who made her want to scream, who in-turn dissolved into an even more mysterious man with blue eyes and an annoying habit of knowing exactly what was in her head.
Damn, she wished she had her gun.
But who do you want to shoot, O’Lauchlan? Which one?
“All of them,” she muttered.
“Excuse me, Ms O’Lauchlan?”
Katrina started. Tiamat still stood before her, studying her with eyes no longer amber but now a deep, deep bronze. “Sorry,” she said, giving the woman a slight smile.
Tiamat returned it, her strange eyes back to amber. “There is no need to apologise, Ms O’Lauchlan. It is late. Would you like me to arrange for dinner to be sent to your suite? The Lobster Thermidor is exquisite.”
Kat and Mouse Page 3