His phone rang, interrupting him as he was finishing the last few paragraphs of his report, and he glanced at the screen, seeing that the phone call was from his mother. For a moment, he almost didn’t take it, but then he felt bad for even considering ignoring her and picked up. “Good morning, Mom. How’d everything go last night?”
“Well, it was just fine,” his mother said. “I just can’t remember, dear. Did you tell me that Dhara could or could not leave the house?”
Kean bit back a groan, dropping his head in his hand. Some days, like the day before, his mother was as sharp as anything. Other days, she couldn’t remember what he’d said from one minute to the next. “She’s definitely not supposed to leave the house, Mom. Remember? Is she gone?”
“She could be,” his mother said pensively, as though she wasn’t sure how to figure out where exactly Dhara was. “I don’t see her anywhere. But my friend is coming over. You know, your little friend’s mother.”
“Bridgette,” Kean said, supplying his mother with the name of her dearest friend whom she had fought and worked alongside when they were younger. “Eamon’s mother, Mom. What about her?”
“Well, I just don’t have time to look for Dhara.”
“So she is gone,” Kean said, standing up and grabbing his wallet and keys. “She’s not there?”
“She doesn’t seem to be,” Colleen said, sounding as though she was looking around herself to be sure.
Kean bit his tongue, not wanting to take his frustration out on his mother, who, bless her heart, was getting older and couldn’t help what was happening to her. Colleen had been a warrior in her youth, and her jet-black dragon form had been simultaneously stunning and powerful. He remembered, as a young boy, watching her in awe as she soared through the sky, faster and stronger than almost anyone around her. Now that she was older and her memory was starting to go, he could hardly hold it against her. Even if it did mean that Dhara could be anywhere.
“Okay, Mom,” he said. “I’m coming over right now.”
“But your little friend’s mother will be here.”
“Bridgette,” he told her again, hurrying out of the office, lifting a hand to Moira as she poked her head out of her own door. “Bridgette is coming over.”
“Yes, Bridgette. She’s my friend.”
“That’s right. She is. I’ll see you in a minute, Mom.”
He hung up the phone and jumped in his car, gunning it out onto the main road that would lead him toward his mother’s house, just outside of the downtown area. Immediately, Kean regretted deciding to drive. It would have been faster to run, given the early morning Boston traffic, even if it might have drawn a strange glance or two as a man in jeans and loafers raced down the sidewalk at a two-minute-mile pace.
It would have been worth the risk though. He had told Dhara not to leave the house, and she knew that he’d been serious. That it was important. She wouldn’t have just wandered off on her own for no good reason, particularly without letting either himself or Colleen know where she was going. That meant that something was wrong. He didn’t think she had been taken—that wasn’t how this kind of spirit worked.
But he was very afraid that her possession was growing stronger and that she was being lured back to the house. If she went inside, he didn’t know what might happen to her, and the thought alone had him changing directions sharply.
There wasn’t enough time to start the search at his mother’s house. He needed to go straight to Dhara’s house and keep her from going inside—if there was still time.
He needed there to still be time.
Chapter Twenty
Dhara
She was standing in front of her house again. Dhara didn’t know exactly why she was there, only that she’d had to come. It had been such a natural thought that her mind hadn’t even questioned it that morning when she’d awoken. She’d simply gotten out of bed, showered, answered a few work emails, then slipped on her shoes and headed out the front door. Her feet had done the rest of the work for her, guiding her toward the place that she had meant to call home for the next ten or twenty years.
Now, as she stood outside the fence, looking up at it, she sighed. Something wasn’t right. She knew that much. She’d been told to stay away from the house by someone whom she knew she should listen to. But that didn’t seem terribly important, and now she couldn’t remember why she shouldn’t go inside. She wanted to go inside. So she did.
Pushing the gate open, Dhara walked up the winding sidewalk, stopping briefly to look at the little patch of weed-like flowers that was cropping up by the porch steps. Then she walked onto the porch, reached inside of her pocket for the keys, and came up empty.
She had forgotten her keys back at the house she had slept in the previous night, and now she was standing on her porch, unable to go into the house, where she was confident she would find all the answers she needed—like why going into the house was so important.
For a moment, she was befuddled. She turned, as though to go, but stopped, still standing on the porch. She wanted so badly to go inside that she didn’t want to leave, even long enough to go and retrieve her key from—where had she stayed last night?
The seconds slid by slowly as she tried to figure out her predicament, and then a creak drew her attention away from her muddled thoughts. She turned, smiling to herself. The front door was open. And to think that she had been worried about needing her key when all she had to do was simply walk inside and close the door behind her.
She approached the door, any warning bells a dim chime under layers of certainty that she was doing exactly the right thing. Reaching out her hand, she pushed the front door the rest of the way open and a lovely spring floral scent drifted out to meet her, drawing her in. It had been so cold for so long, and she suddenly imagined that the house was filled with bright, cheerful, sweet-smelling flowers, waiting to greet her.
Eagerly, she walked into the foyer, and the door snapped shut behind her of its own accord. She thought nothing of it, sliding her shoes off and kicking them to the side, her sockedtoes scrunching against the wooden floors. The sight of her living room was welcome, though she did note that the flowers she’d hoped to see where nowhere to be found. But her antique-looking décor called out to her, and she longed to lie down on the ivory couch, sink into the cushions, and remember what it was like to feel safe and comfortable.
Dhara did exactly that, padding across the plushness of the rug and perching herself on the cushion of the scrolling couch. Her eyes landed upon the fireplace, and she suddenly longed for the warm, comforting crackle of a blaze. It was cool outside, so it made perfect sense to light one. At least, she thought it did. Somewhere in the back of her mind, she knew that she shouldn’t, but it didn’t seem important in comparison to the appeal of flames dancing in front of her, warming her skin.
She got up, looking for wood. Surely she must have some stored somewhere. After all, she loved her fireplace, so she would definitely have wood nearby, ready to go whenever she wanted a fire. It upset her when she couldn’t find any, and she glanced over at the table that was beneath the living room window, noting how the finely-sculpted legs would make perfect stand-ins for wooden logs.
The pictures that were on top of the table displayed her parents’ faces looking back at her, as well as pictures of her own graduation and a trip that she had treated herself to afterward—the Azores, the perfect hiking getaway in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean. The pictures only briefly registered in her mind as Dhara took them off and set them aside, tossing the last few on the floor in her impatience to get to the table legs.
Though she pulled as hard as she could, the wood wouldn’t budge, a clear indicator that the table was worth the high-quality price she’d paid for it. Rather than satisfaction that she hadn’t been ripped off though, all she felt was anger. It was a slow-growing, seething anger that seemed to be focused on her inability to start a fire, though some part of her still knew that was utterly irrational.
>
When she pulled again and the table leg still refused to give way, Dhara let out a frustrated scream. “Aaaarggggghhh!” she shouted, stepping back and kicking the table as hard as she could with her foot. The sock she was wearing offered her toes no protection from the blunt impact of the table, but the pain was just a footnote in her thoughts, briefly acknowledged, then bypassed without further attention.
“Just work!” she shouted at the table, grabbing the leg again, her other hand bracing the table top itself. This time when she pulled, the leg gave way, splintering at the joint. Her joy was almost maniacal, and she cackled, yanking harder, again and again, until the jagged leg broke off in her hand. Accomplishment shone in her eyes, and she backed away from the broken table, breathing hard, the table leg in her hand.
Turning, she threw it into the fireplace. Adrenaline was rushing through her. Her heart was pounding, her breath was coming fast, and her hands were shaking as she yanked open drawers and tore open pillows and cushions, searching for anything that she could use to light the fire. The task at hand had gone from a casual impulse to an aching, burning need, and she didn’t even stop to question why. She simply had to fulfill the urge.
“Come on, come on, come on,” she said under her breath, her voice harsh and rasping as she hunted for anything that would cause a blaze. The room around her began to fade, and yet that felt normal too. Suddenly her reality was zooming in and out. One moment she was in her living room, tearing it apart, and the next she was in a room she didn’t recognize, with people she didn’t know. They were crying. Screaming. Tearing at their hair and scrubbing at their skin as though the confines of their own bodies were too much to bear.
Dhara stared at them, not questioning why she was amongst them, but wondering if she, too, should be tearing at her skin in an effort to break free of it. As soon as the thought entered her mind, she felt an unbearable itch just beneath the skin on her forearm. She stared at it, watching something move beneath the skin, and a panic overtook her. Clawing at her forearm, she tried to break the skin so that whatever was beneath it could get loose. She could just imagine it writhing around in the sinews of her arm, traveling along her veins, perhaps seeping into her bloodstream.
There were parasites inside of her, devouring her from the inside out, filling her lungs, working their way into the valves of her heart.
She couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t see. Couldn’t feel. Couldn’t think. Everything was going black, and all she could hear was the sound of her own screaming. All she could perceive was the pressure against her chest, strangling her. Suffocating her. An unbearable heat surrounded her. She was falling, and no one was ever going to be able to find her. She was lost…drifting…drowning…dying…
“Dhara!”
Her name, spoken by a voice she knew, barely broke through her mental prison, and it did nothing to ease her suffering.
“Dhara!”
No! Her thoughts fought against it. He can’t help you! No one can help you!
“Dhara, honey, look at me. Look at me! Open your eyes!”
He can’t save you now. You’re mine. You’re mine!
“Dhara, please…please, baby. Please.”
Push him away. Come with me. You’re safe with me.
Lips on hers, warm and soft. Arms around her, holding her close, keeping her safe, easing her pain.
No…don’t leave. Stay. Stay.
“Dhara, please. Open your eyes, honey. Please look at me.”
Light flickered through her eyelashes as they fluttered open. The light was so bright that it hurt her, and she winced away from it, pulling from the arms that were holding her and reaching out to steady herself. Her fingers grazed over grass, and she frowned, not understanding where she was.
She had been sitting on her couch…
“Dhara!” The relief in his voice was potent, and it grounded her. “That’s right, sweetheart. Open your eyes. Look at me, Dhara.”
Her eyes focused on his face, and the darkness began to recede. She was outside. In her backyard. Something had happened to her, but she didn’t understand what. All she knew was that Kean’s face was above hers, his chocolate-brown eyes swimming with emotion as he stared down at her.
There was soot on his face, and she reached up to touch it, confused. “What happened to you?”
Chapter Twenty-One
Kean
No matter how long he lived, he would never forget the sight of Dhara lying on the floor of her living room, thrashing around as flames leaped out of the fireplace, starting to consume the upholstery around it. Moments later and he might have been too late to drag her out of the path of the creeping fire. Too late to run to the backyard, haul her spiraled hose inside, and blast water against the flames until there was only a jagged pattern of soot across the flooring and the walls of her living room. Too late to drag her out of the smoke-filled house into the fresh air where she could catch her breath, filling her lungs with pure air.
He didn’t want to think about what it would have been like if he had been just a few moments later, and he reminded himself to make sure that he bought his mother ten potted orchid plants—her favorites—as a thank you for calling him when she had. If she had waited another five minutes …
“What happened to you?” Dhara repeated, confused when he didn’t answer her question the first time.
How did he explain to her what he’d seen? Would he tell her how she’d been writhing on the ground, moments away from burning away into nothing?
“There was a fire,” he said, brushing her hair back from her own sooty face. “An accident somehow. You’re okay now. Right? Are you okay?”
She seemed to take a moment to take stock of herself, her fingers moving against the grass as her eyes scanned down her prone body. “Yes?”
Kean heaved a sigh of relief, letting his body sag against hers, his face pressed against her shoulder. “Thank God.”
Her hand lifted up, resting lightly on his hair, stroking. “Is your mother okay?”
It was a strange question to ask—unless being with his mother was the last clear memory she had. He looked up at her, studying her gaze. “Yes, she’s fine. Dhara, why did you come back here? To your house? Why, sweetheart?”
“I don’t know.”
She seemed as bemused as he was, and that confirmed his worst fears. The spirit tormenting her was going to continue drawing her back to this place, and everytime it did, it grew stronger. This time it had almost killed her, and at any time it could jump back into her body to wreak the kind of havoc Kean didn’t even want to imagine.
Instead, he kissed her again, not caring, in that moment, about all of his very reasonable reasons why he couldn’t get involved with her. “You scared me,” he whispered, lacing his fingers through hers. “Dhara, I told you to stay away. You could have …”
“There was a room.”
He looked down at her, frowning. “What sort of room?”
“A room of people in torment,” she whispered, her eyes wide. “I just remembered it. I saw it in my head. I thought I was there. I was …”
She looked down at her right arm, and they both saw the scratch marks that were there, red welts where she had failed to break the skin.
“It’s lucky that you’re a practical woman,” Kean said, holding up her hand to show her tidily-trimmed short nails. “It looks like you were scratching yourself. If you had claws, you could have really done some damage.”
“I remember more now,” she whispered, her voice suddenly haunted. “There was so much darkness. People in so much pain. I was in pain. I was determined to start a fire, and I don’t know why. I broke a table. I was…” she shuddered. “I was out of my mind, Kean.”
He gathered her into his arms, rubbing her back gently. “You were possessed, Dhara. You weren’t in control of yourself.”
“I’m so afraid.”
“I know,” he whispered, kissing her hair. “I’m going to help you. I promise. Before my mother called me to
say you were missing, I was doing research. I know where we need to start, and I won’t let you out of my sight until we get this fixed. None of the rest of it matters. Not the attraction, not the tension—nothing. I’m going to be right here, every second, making sure that you’re safe.”
She looked up at him, and he had never seen her so vulnerable. “Thank you for coming for me.”
“I always will.” He touched her cheek, stroking her soft skin.
“Why are we like this, you and I?”
It was a question he couldn’t answer. Part of him didn’t even want to answer it because to answer it would mean having to acknowledge that there was something between Dhara and him that was more powerful than anything he’d ever come across. When she was with him, her presence dominated his mind, and when they were apart, she was in his every thought. He had willingly risked his life, his family, and his spot in his clan for her, and he barely knew her. If he had to order a drink for her at a restaurant, he’d have no idea what she’d want—or if she even drank at all. And yet he would also die for her. The dichotomy was almost too much for him to handle.
“I don’t know,” he said, knowing she needed some sort of response, even if he didn’t have one. “But I feel it too.”
“We can’t be together.”
He shook his head, his throat tight. “No, honey. We can’t.”
“Not even for a little while?”
His heart broke a little bit, and he cradled her closer, kissing her forehead. “If I had you for even a day, I would have to have you forever.”
Dhara drew in a shaky breath, but she didn’t argue with him or push the subject any further. She simply lay in his arms as he held her on the cool grass in her backyard, both of them recovering from a morning of intense emotions.
The spirit that haunted Dhara seemed to have had its fun for the moment. It had receded, the power that Kean had felt in the house when he’d first burst in to save Dhara dissipated. There was still the crackle of paranormal in the air, but it was distant rather than dominating, and Kean could only hope that meant they would have at least a few moments’ respite to just hold on to each other.
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