by Anya Bast
“More than the average person.”
She grinned at him. “So you want to be the one to train me, huh? Don’t trust me to Theo?”
“Never.”
She shrugged. “Let me get a cup of coffee and let’s go.”
Twenty minutes later they went to the ballroom of the Coven, a place big enough for them to move. Mirrors lined one wall and an area of hardwood flooring lay like an island in the middle of the plush red carpeting. Thomas and Isabelle stood on the hardwood, each holding a sword and facing each other. They had traded the viciously sharp swords for blunted training blades.
“We’re not going to train like fencers,” said Thomas, “since the demon’s not going to have a sword and, if he did, he wouldn’t be playing by any kind of rules anyway. I just want everyone to get a good feel for the weapon, learn to move with it in the most effective way.”
“Makes sense.”
“So the first thing to remember is to breathe.”
Her eyebrows rose. “Breathe? I’m doing that already. I intend to keep doing it for many more years.”
“I mean breathe in a regulated, focused way.”
“Be one with the sword?”
“Exactly. Breathe like you’re meditating, deep and regular. It will keep you calm and give you enough oxygen to fight.”
She tried it, turning around a circle with the sword in hand and breathing deeply as she moved. Closing her eyes, she rotated on the balls of her bare feet with the natural grace of a dancer or a warrior. Just by looking at her Thomas could tell that he didn’t need to discuss the second basic with her—balance.
Isabelle finally came to a stop and opened her eyes. “That was a lot more relaxing than fighting the demon will be.”
“Undoubtedly. All right, now we spar in order to familiarize ourselves with the other basic concepts, as well as to get a feel for the weapon.”
She swung the blade experimentally. “And the other basic concepts are?”
“Tactics and timing.”
She jumped and pointed the blunted training sword in his general direction. “En guard! But take your shirt off first, champ. Because, you know”—she shot him a salacious grin that made him chuckle—“you’ll get warm dressed like that. Yeah, that’s it. I’m worried about your comfort.”
They sparred into the late afternoon. Isabelle was good with the weapon and he found himself on the defensive many times in the face of her surprising aggression.
The way she looked—her face and neck shining with perspiration, pupils wide and dark, lips pursed in absolute concentration—made it seem like the workout was therapy for her. Her movements were quick and self-possessed, too. What Isabelle lacked in terms of upper body strength, she made up for in speed and flexibility.
In the end, they were evenly matched, despite the fact that he was stronger physically.
Isabelle turned and brought her training blade down against his in a wide arc. He threw down his weapon, intercepted her and pulled her back against him. Thomas needed to touch her, just for a moment.
She thumped against his chest and went still, breathing heavy. Then she tossed her training sword to the floor and turned in his arms, rising onto her tiptoes to devour his mouth in a deep kiss.
He took a step back at the passion pouring through her, but she stepped with him, winding her arms around him and nipping at his lower lip. She tasted like hot magick and urgency, and acted like she might die if he didn’t return her ardor.
Not breaking contact with her mouth, Thomas scooped her into his arms, knelt, and laid her on the floor. Isabelle wrapped her legs around his waist. He balanced over her, covering her body and slanting his mouth over hers to take control of the wild kiss.
Thomas’s body tingled with the awareness of her, as if every molecule had been tuned to the frequency of Isabelle.
That’s how he knew, despite the hardness of his body and his intense desire to strip her clothes off and take her right on the floor, despite the passion with which she tangled both tongue and lips with his…something was wrong.
It had been in her eyes that morning, in the way she’d thrown herself body and soul into the sparring, and the way she threw herself at him now.
Escape. Distraction.
That’s what it seemed like to him. Like she tried to drown herself in stimulus to order to avoid thinking about whatever was bothering her. That’s what she’d wanted him for the first time, too. Make it all go away for a while. That’s what she’d said to him in the library.
“What’s wrong?” he murmured against her lips.
“Nothing.” She renewed the assault on his lips and grazed his bare back with her fingernails. He shuddered against her, desire flaring in his groin and swamping his mind.
“Isabelle,” he whispered between kisses, “I know something’s bothering you.”
“You’re wrong.” She ground up against him. The delicious heat of her sex rubbed the length of his cock through the fabric of their clothing.
Thomas lost his train of thought.
It took a monumental act of strength to catch her wrists and pin them to the floor on either side of her. She stilled instantly, staring up into his eyes. It wasn’t lust that colored them dark now, but the edge of panic.
Why panic?
“Isabelle, don’t lie.”
The glimmer of panic receded and her expression relaxed. “You worry way too much, Thomas.”
“I can tell there’s something bothering you.”
She sighed. “Maybe. So what if there is?”
He released her wrists and collapsed on his back, breathing heavily. His rapid heart rate had nothing to do with their sparring. Neither did his rock hard cock. The absolute male of him wanted to just take her, curse the reason she was willing to throw herself into gritty, urgent sex here on the floor.
He wanted her, wanted her so much his cock had gone rigid at the first touch of her body against his. The thought of yanking off her clothes and rolling her beneath him now, spreading her thighs and sinking his cock into all that soft, warm, and willing heat was hard to resist.
But his yearning for Isabelle went past the physical.
Isabelle rolled away and sat up, pulling her knees to her chest in one lithe movement. “Maybe something is bothering me, but I’d prefer to keep it to myself if you don’t mind.”
He sat up, his hair trailing over his shoulder. “You want to use sex with me as a way to escape. Fine. But you have to level with me about it first.” His voice came out harsh and cold.
“Thomas, I—”
The ballroom doors burst open and Mira rushed into the room, her face pale and drawn. Jack and Micah followed her.
Thomas leapt to his feet. Coldness curled through his stomach at the expression on their faces and at the psychic hit he got off Mira. It was something really bad. The demon had killed again.
Mira didn’t bother with the preliminaries, probably reading in Thomas’s expression that he already knew. “It’s worse than you’re imagining. I know because I heard it all.”
Jack stepped up behind her and encircled her in his arms, his hands coming to rest on the small bulge of her belly.
Isabelle got to her feet, her gaze fixed on Mira’s face. She hugged herself. “Boyle murdered another witch, didn’t he?”
Mira shook her head and licked her lips. “He murdered two.”
For a long moment the room was completely silent. Mira’s mouth opened and closed. Perhaps she was stalling before she expressed her thought, hoping it would somehow disappear.
Thomas tried to make his voice as gentle and warm as possible. “Please just say it, Mira.”
Silence dominated for another moment before Isabelle pushed out the words, “Who were they?”
The sentence exploded from Mira in a rush, “A twenty-one-year-old water witch named Brandon Michaels and an elderly fire witch named Mary Hatt.”
Mira turned in Jack’s arms for comfort and showed them her back while she continued, her
words muffled against Jack’s chest. “I was so tuned in to anything having to do with Boyle that I heard the entire murder. I became locked in it, mired down in a kind of psychic quicksand. It was…” Her voice broke and she trailed off.
Mira didn’t have to explain. He understood what she’d just vicariously lived through. Her words punched him in the solar plexus. He closed his eyes and bowed his head. Beside him, Isabelle took a shuddering breath.
Focus. He had to focus on what they could do.
“What else do we know?” Thomas’s voice sounded forced to his own ears.
For the first time, Jack spoke. “Since Mira was able to glean their full names, I took the liberty of having Ingrid organize the witches in the area of the killing to go to the scene immediately. I understand Adam and Theo are on their way there now. She’s going to start the process of notifying next of kin, too.”
“How long ago did you learn of this?”
“Minutes ago.”
He glanced at Isabelle, who stared at a fixed spot on the floor. She’d tightened her arms around herself and her face had gone white. Was she fighting memories of finding her sister? Thomas wanted to go to her, to slip his arms around her, but his intuition told him that was the last thing she wanted right now.
He moved to her anyway. There was a difference between what she wanted and what she needed. Thomas wasn’t sure if Isabelle had any comprehension at all about what was best for her.
He slid his arms around her. She stiffened against him and Thomas thought for a moment she might push him away, but she relaxed, melting against him and resting her head against his shoulder.
“I tried so hard to save that little girl and he just chose other witches to take her place.” Her whisper sounded like silk and sand at the same time. “Lady, two instead of one.”
Thomas closed his eyes and kissed the top of her head. “I know.” Then louder, “Where’s the scene?”
Micah answered. “A warehouse on the corner of Thurston and Maple.”
“Jack, take Mira to see Doctor Oliver.” He worried about her experiencing something so stressful while she was pregnant.
“Already on my immediate to do list,” answered Jack.
Isabelle instantly stepped from Thomas’s embrace. “Let’s go.”
Thomas took a moment to reply. “I don’t think that’s a good idea…not for you, anyway.”
She shot a look at him that froze his balls. “Oh, no, you don’t. See? This is where macho and protective stops being sexy and gets irritating. Anyway, I’m the only one who can access the moisture memory. That’s one of the reasons you hired me, right?” Without waiting for his response, she turned on her heel and walked out the door.
THIRTEEN
BY THE TIME THEY REACHED THE WAREHOUSE, IT WAS past twilight and stars twinkled in the clear black sky. A few hours prior it had showered, leaving the air a little damp. Now Isabelle pulled that soothing dampness around her body like a cloak.
It was far too pretty a night for the job they were on.
Adam was the first to meet them when Isabelle and Thomas entered the large, brightly lit warehouse. Inside two witches had been killed in tandem, the magick sucked from the center of their souls and their bones picked clean.
Isabelle had a flash of a memory—blood, unnaturally tangled limbs—but she stopped short, squeezed her eyes shut, and willed it away.
Thomas’s warm hand touched her arm. “Are you all right?”
She opened her eyes and glanced at him. He parted his lips but before he could utter the words—undoubtedly about her sister—she stepped past him. “I’m fine.”
“Welcome,” Adam greeted them in a flat voice.
She nodded. “Adam.”
Adam leaned against the doorway of the warehouse, watching them approach. His handsome face was drawn in grim lines, his customary grin absent and shadows present in his dark blue eyes. “Isabelle, a beautiful woman on a beautiful night.” He paused and glanced back toward the center of the building. “On not such a beautiful errand.”
“How clean is the scene?” Thomas asked, coming up next to her.
Isabelle glared at him and did a quick translation in her head. Have you removed the bodies so Isabelle doesn’t have a meltdown?
Damn it, Thomas. She could take care of herself.
Adam rubbed his chin and looked for a moment about twenty years older than his thirty-five years. “It’s clean.”
Even though Isabelle was annoyed by Thomas’s high-handed protectiveness of her, she couldn’t help but feel a little relieved. Adam moved out of their way and allowed them to enter the building.
A handful of witches who had reached the warehouse before them labored within the cleared interior, some working earth magick. That power rubbed against Isabelle’s skin like rich planting soil—deep magicks meant to bury and conceal. They worked to cover up the scene of the crime from non-witches, just as they’d done at the scene of her sister’s murder.
At the far end of the building, she noted two large open doors big enough to drive a truck through. She wondered if they’d been open when Boyle had killed the witches. It would make it easier for her to work if the water from the brief rain shower had been lingering in the air during the killings. Since Boyle didn’t seem all that concerned with his murders being discovered and because this part of town was devoid of humanity at this time of night, it was possible he’d left the doors open.
A flash of white caught her eye and she glimpsed two sheets covering a section of the cracked concrete floor. The bodies had been removed, but those sheets marked the location of where they had lain. They’d done that with her sister, too.
The world lurched a little and Thomas took her by the upper arm to steady her. She straightened, calmly pulling from his grasp.
Adam walked over to them. The man always had a five o’clock shadow, but Isabelle didn’t think it was so much a fashion statement as it was simple forgetfulness to shave. Right now it made him look weary. “The warehouse is owned by Erasmus Boyle.”
Isabelle let out a small laugh. “Color me surprised.”
Thomas glanced around. “I wonder what a demon wants with a warehouse?”
“Maybe he’s planning to start a shipping business, specializing in sending packages to hell,” she commented.
She knelt and put her palm flat to the cold concrete floor, sending out tendrils of her magick to search for any moisture that might have a story to tell. Water held emotion like none of the other elements. When something violent happened in a place, the moisture picked up and retained a record of it, burned there by the intense feelings of the participants. Accessing that emotional echo was not a skill all water witches possessed, but Isabelle had been lucky enough to inherit it.
Or unlucky, as the case may be. Reliving all that emotion was rarely pleasant.
She drew a breath. Damn it. No moisture to note along the floor. Maybe in the air. There was always a little bit of moisture in the air, and her magick was usually strong enough to pull it.
She stood. “But I might wager a guess he needs a large open area that is also concealed in order to…work.”
Thomas pushed a hand through his hair, freeing it partially from the queue at his nape. “Toward what goal?”
“And,” Adam added, “if he needs a place like this, why kill a witch here and blow his cover? He killed the first two witches in their own”—he hesitated and winced, probably realizing he spoke of her sister—“environment. Sorry, Isabelle.”
“It’s okay.” Isabelle shrugged. “It was just a theory.”
“And not a bad one.”
“Well, at least we can rule out that he’s targeting young female witches now that he’s taken a man and an elderly lady,” Thomas put in.
“He’s selecting them on other criteria,” Theo jumped in, striding to the three of them. He wore rubber gloves over his broad hands. Isabelle didn’t want to think about why.
“Well, I’m leaving you three to hash that o
ut,” Isabelle put in. “I need to search for water molecules.”
Isabelle left them talking and circled the sheets, examining the floors. Reaching out with her magick, she explored the area for any residual moisture that might have retained memories of the murder. She halted in the center of the warehouse and drew the water droplets to her, petting them and purring at them with her magick until they coalesced and began to give up their recollections of what had happened that night. Warm magick rippled from the center of her chest to complete the task.
“Come on. What secrets are you keeping?” she murmured.
Isabelle grimaced as the hazy, watered down images began to flicker through her mind’s eye. She put herself through this torture for one reason and one reason only—to discover something new and different, some puzzle piece that would fit to make the picture clearer.
Now that she had her magick on the moisture, she doubted the doors had been open during the killings. Sifting through, it was difficult to find much memory.
As she gathered more moisture from the air, she felt the strain on her body from the expenditure of her magick. At the same time, the images grew more frequent and came to her a little less hazy, although fragmented, like a horror movie being played, fast forwarded, and then played again.
And then it slammed into her in one short blast of hell.
She tasted the fear of the victims on the back of her tongue—sharp and metallic. She heard their screams echoing in the cavernous building…until they didn’t echo any longer.
Isabelle didn’t know how long Thomas had had his arms around her, or how long she’d been crouching on the floor of the warehouse, both hands flat on the gritty concrete floor. Her vision had gone black and she’d lost her hearing, though she hadn’t passed out. Her body shuddered as if she were outside naked in the middle of January.
Her mouth opened and a puff of air came out as she tried to answer Thomas’s frantic questions of Are you all right? He held her close, rubbing her arms, trying to warm her up.
No.
No, she’d never be all right again. Not ever totally all right for having subjected herself to that. Worse, she’d gained nothing. There’d been no new puzzle piece. Nothing but a nightmare. Lady, and she’d just had flashes of moisture memory. How had Mira endured hearing the whole thing in real time?