On the desk was a single blank square of wood. No dust to speak of, as if something had been there only a few minutes prior. As if something had just left, and whatever had been sitting there, it was gone now. Ash shivered at the thought. There had been something here.
If Cora had been led here by something, tricked into coming, like a trap—either they were already dead, or this was just another part of the trap. He took his gloved hand and wiped the table clean. No clue, no trap.
He looked up and found what he'd been looking for. A little window in the ceiling of the master bedroom. No wards. Still, it didn't mean anything if the window wasn't broken in. That would have been where a Devil could come through. They didn't much like wards, and they didn't much like folks who put them up. But that didn't mean they could pass through solid glass.
Ashton took hold of a dresser, still heavy with clothes, and climbed up onto it. If he reached from here, he could about feel the sun-roof window. His fingers came away cold, and more worryingly, wet.
He took his gun and poked at the glass. It gave too easy. This wasn't glass—it was ice. He took a breath. Devils' work, and no doubt. He got the hammer back out of his briefcase, pulled a charm loose.
He wasn't going to make the same mistake that the previous owner had. No chance.
They wouldn't stay out in this house longer than they had to, and then they'd leave this devil-infested territory, and Ashton would go back to living in Cincinnati, hoping he never caught wind of the devil that had taken King Peters.
He knew what he would do, if it came to that, and he sure as hell didn't want to go down that path. Was he afraid? Hell, yes he was.
But it wasn't going to change anything, once he caught wind, and that scared him that much more.
Eleven
Cora let herself sit by the fire a moment longer. It was starting to be quite big, and Ashton seemed to have taken the entire search onto himself. If there was something to find, surely he would call her. But if not, well, she would look around.
She hadn't expected how cold it was. Hadn't expected her fingers to get stiff from the icy coldness. The warmth returning to her body stung badly, but she welcomed it. Just another five minutes, and she would feel human again. Then she could look around.
Ashton came up behind her and settled down beside. Cora blushed at the memory of what had happened between them, the ideas that she had in that cave. What had she been thinking? There was no future for them. None at all.
But that wasn't what had put the thoughts in her head. Nothing about the future. What she'd wanted was to feel him, moving inside her, driving her crazier and crazier until the future didn't matter any more. She closed her eyes. And now she was doing it to herself again. She should have better control of herself.
Cora finally forced herself to stand up. "I'm going to have a look around."
"Go ahead, the place is safe," Ashton assured her without looking away from the fire.
"Can I have that candlestick?"
He took it out and relit it for her. As he passed it, their fingers brushed each other. He was frozen solid, but it didn't stop her from feeling exhilarated. She wanted to sit and comfort him, worry over his chill. But she knew that wasn't even close to all she wanted to do.
Instead she started looking around, left the object of her interests behind. She didn't need to be thinking those kinds of thoughts, not about Ashton Lowe. Regardless of whether he was a good man, they were in completely different social circles. The job the man did would get him killed one day, and from what she could tell they both knew it.
So why was she the one having so much trouble remembering that when she was sitting beside him?
The kitchen was empty. No silver in the drawers, no dishes left in the cupboards. Whoever had lived here, whether it was her mother or someone else entirely, she had cleared the entire place out when she went. She wasn't expecting to find a dead body, or anything so dire. After all—the place had been emptied with care.
Even things of sentimental value weren't left behind, so this was no mere robbery. She would have to check with Ashton, but there was nothing to suggest that anything bad had happened here.
The place seemed to ooze memories, but none of them were here any more. The floors were worn with use, the house cluttered with furniture, but nothing had been left to suggest who had been here or why they had left.
The upstairs was the same. Too many things to be an unused house, but too few to get any idea of what had happened. If this had been her mother's house, she had know way of knowing. And worse than that, she had no way of finding the one that she had left for.
She finished her search around the house with the master bedroom. She could see from the dust that Ashton had taken the most time here, but she found as little as he obviously had. A whole lot of nothing, except for an empty jewelry box.
It was nice, but too large to carry all the way down the mountain on the back of a horse. It wouldn't fit into a saddlebag and her arms would get tired holding it. Besides that, Cora reminded herself, she had no evidence that it was her mothers', and she had plenty of much nicer jewelry boxes. It was only the connection to her mother that had put the thought into her head in the first place.
She opened the top anyways. A tune softly began playing, one that Cora remembered vaguely. Perhaps an Irish folk tune? Her father had never been able to abide them, before he passed on. The constant reminder of where his wife had come from…
Perhaps that was why she had left. Perhaps it was the constant implication that because she was Irish, she wasn't good enough for the man who she'd married. Cora looked closer, holding the candle up to illuminate the inside of the top.
It was lined with a pretty paper printed with a rose-vine pattern, but Cora wasn't looking at that. She was hoping to find—she opened the drawers, one-by-one—some sign of a monogram. A way to prove ownership. She closed the top and picked it up. Turned it over. Checked the back.
There was nothing. This far up the mountain, though, how big a concern was theft? How often would someone dispute ownership? Cora guessed that the answer was just north of "never." She let out a long breath. This wasn't the right way to go about any of this, she thought. She should have been smarter. Should have tried to hunt down more clues.
Maybe if she'd been a better daughter. Maybe she would be able to see her mother now. Maybe the woman would have stayed for her. Or maybe she would at least have left some clue. Some way to find her.
Cora wanted to sit down. She fought the urge to lay down on the bed and relax out her worries. There was nothing there for her. Nothing in the entire house, except for a warm fire and a man who was too much challenge for her to get out of her head. The exact sort of man that she didn't want to be thinking about, in fact.
She didn't like it one bit, but it was what it was, and nothing was going to change that. She forced herself to keep moving. Nothing in the whole house, that meant it was time to go back to the fire and warm herself for the road.
She settled in next to Ashton and it was a moment before he said anything.
"You find what you were looking for?"
She didn't answer him. She knew he already knew what she was going to find, and he was only asking as a formality. Well, she wasn't feeling very formal right now.
"Five minutes by the fire, then we head back down." She held her hands out to get the last bit of stiffness out of them.
"Yes, ma'am."
"Did you find anything when you looked?"
He hesitated a moment, like he was tabulating, or thinking about what to tell her.
"The place was safe as can be. Someone didn't want any Devil trouble in here."
She nodded. "I suppose that makes sense. You think my mother coulda did it?"
"I've met woman hunters, if that's what you're asking. They're as capable as anyone, I suppose. Depends on how good they are at their jobs."
"How good are you?"
Ashton snorted. "My teacher was one of the best.
I guess that should make me pretty good. But then again…"
He let out a breath and she could see that the question had taken more out of him than she had intended for it to.
"Hey. You've been doing great."
He looked at her out of the corner of his eye, cocked an eyebrow.
"Sure."
Twelve
Ashton kept his eyes on the fire. It was easier that way. If he looked at her, even now that the fertility Devil's effects had long-since worn off, then he would be filled with all sorts of ideas that he couldn't even consider going along with.
As long as he could pass the time, get her back to Detroit in one piece, then everything would be fine. Ash had never wanted to be tied down to a woman. Part of what made his job so nice was that he could live in the city and travel around as much as he wanted.
But Cora wasn't the sort of woman you passed a few lonely evenings with and then left behind, and the fact that he didn't mind the idea very much had him worried.
He tried to shake the thoughts out of his head. There was nothing good going to come from introspection but worries. There was no time for that, not in this business. He had never felt better after he thought a lot about himself. Only ever worse.
It wasn't that he was afraid of settling down, he knew. It was the Devil. The one who had killed King Peters. It might be twenty years until they found it. Maybe thirty. He wouldn't know until the word came, but when it did, he would know.
When he knew, he'd go with the boys to go and they would try to kill it. And when that happened, he was a dead man. It was as simple and as unpleasant as that. No woman deserved to bear that cross. Ash knew he couldn't put it on her. More than that, he wouldn't. It didn't matter what he wanted. It only mattered that he had to leave her be.
He stood up fifteen seconds before five minutes was up by the timer in his head. Pulled his coat and gloves back on, set his hat back on his head.
"I'll fetch the horses."
The way back to the stable was about as clear as it had been. For that, at least, he was thankful that the wind had faded. The implication that it left, though, was still as sour in his mouth as it had ever been.
The horses didn't argue with him, which was a bonus. He fished a few carrots out of his saddlebag and gave them over before he put the saddles back on.
They didn't argue, they weren't bossy, and they didn't want things that were bad for them. They would listen and trust their rider, if the rider knew what they wanted. For all intents and purposes, they were nothing like him, and they were nothing at all like Cora Little.
He could do with as few Cora Littles around him as possible. It was no good for him to be spending all his time distracted, thinking about her the way he had been. Trying to figure out how she was going to get herself into trouble. He should have turned down the job. It would have been better that way.
Ashton knew that if he had a second chance to make the decision, he would make it the same either way. But he could pretend that he would do the right thing. Like how he could keep pretending that he might die of old age. Or how he could keep pretending that one day, he would believe it himself when he told people that he'd been trained by the legend himself.
After all those years, he was still the unreliable one. The youngest and the worst. What right did he have to call himself a hunter with that kind of training? When he compared himself to the old man—there was no comparison. Even when it came to the other boys he was riding their coattails. They were all out there, doing whatever impressive work they could.
But he was just hiding in an office in Cincinnati.
Ash helped Cora up onto her horse, and he started tracing the line back the way they'd come. She was quiet, even now that the wind had died down, and Ashton was glad for it. He wasn't in any mood to talk right now. If he were back in the city, back on the job, then maybe he would have crawled onto the couch with a bottle.
He wasn't. He had a job to do, and if they were going to make the cave by nightfall he had to concentrate on that.
Having been through once before took the half-knowledge of the mountain that Ash had gained from the map and turned it into full-fledged confidence. He skipped tracing their route. He could see a straighter path through the trees, from this angle, and he took it. No problem.
Ashton kept his focus raised. That thing could be back any time, and the wind wasn't any proof of anything. If they were anywhere near as tough as the Devil that had taken Peters, then it would be able to show whatever sign it liked. The clearest sign of that thing was that nobody could be able to figure out what the hell to do about it.
Ash had a cold feeling already that he had gotten in over his head with this job, but abandoning it meant leaving Cora to her fate. As much as he didn't want to talk to her, because looking her in the eye meant knowing how close he had come to fucking her, and thinking about that meant thinking about how much he had wanted it.
Thankfully the night passed without a problem. It was all routine. Wards up, check the area, fire, sleep. Easy. Nothing to worry about, nothing to think about, and certainly no reason to be as worried as he was.
The third day on the mountain, the last day on the mountain, they finally passed back by the campsite again. Time to see how good Martin Littlefeather had been, he supposed. Ash took a jog over to follow the route he guessed that Cora had taken up the mountain. To pass through the place where they'd slept.
The tent was still there, still closed up tight. There was still firewood, though it was long-since out. Ashton stepped off his horse to get a closer look at the body.
No visible injuries, no bruising, no cuts. Beside the body was a big fighting knife. Carvings in the handle that looked a little like the sort of things a hunter could do. There were differences. Inefficiencies, by Ashton's eye.
Perhaps the natives had their own way of doing things. Maybe they thought that hunters like Ash left something out. Maybe they were right, but it wasn't Ash's place to make that declaration. If it was good enough for King Peters, it was good enough for him.
He checked the body for internal injuries. Just one he found. A broken arm. Practically pulled clean of the shoulder joint, far as he could tell. Just hanging on by skin.
He frowned. This wasn't good. Not good at all. Not much had this kind of precision, and the things that did… why would it have left Cora be? Anything big enough and mean enough to cause this kind of trouble, it wasn't the kind of thing that would leave someone—anyone—be. On the other hand, it was exactly the kind of thing that could cause the kind of winds that he had been experiencing since he set foot in Salt Lake City train station.
He frowned. And yet, it hadn't caused a lick of trouble for them. That was another piece of the puzzle he didn't like. Things were just getting more and more unclear.
Thirteen
Cora let herself take a long look at Ash. He had made good time into town. At least as good as Martin's time on the way out, she thought. He had known what to do with that… Devil.
The thought that there were things more powerful than that was more than worrying. It was terrifying. But she was just going to have to live with it. Another two days, and they would be back in Detroit. She would be able to forget about all of this.
The cabin had been a complete bust. No hints in the place, and the letter had nothing more to offer her than talk about a family that her mother had thought was important enough to care about.
More important than her daughter, that much was clear. Well, if her mother didn't think that she was important, Cora wasn't going to let herself get hurt by that. Someone who had no time for her was someone she had no time for herself.
They pulled up into the station, and Ash bought tickets. They only had a few minutes before the train would pull up, and then it would only be there long enough to change luggage over.
Ashton paid a boy to take the horses back, paid another to have her luggage brought to the station from the Royal hotel where she'd left it in their store-room.
In every way, it was easy and quiet. No blow-you-down wind to contend with like she'd had had to contend with when she got off the train. Nothing much to worry about at all.
What if there was no trouble the whole way? What if Ashton had nothing to do the whole way? Would he leave her behind the way her own mother had? If he did, he was a fool. So why was she so upset over it?
Cora let herself settle into the seats of the train. The ride would be two long days, separated by one much longer night. A night where she would be only a little ways away from the only man who had ever made her feel like a woman.
She tried to remind herself that one day she wouldn't be bothered by it. After all, it wasn't as if there was anything special about it. Love was something that you worked for. A sort of comfort and shared responsibility that formed between two people. It was exciting, but it wasn't anything mind-blowing.
She had known that for years. It was why it hadn't bothered her one bit when her father, and then her brother, had laid down her future in front of her. She'd marry someone important, someone who would help her brother's career. Someone who she could help with his career, in turn.
An easy life, and one where she played an important role. Her feelings didn't play a part in that future. They never had and they never would. There was no problem with that. No problem whatsoever. She knew that. So why was it chafing now?
Ashton went into his room, just beside hers. If she needed something, he said, she could just knock. He'd be checking every half-hour. Just as he said, every half-hour a knock would come at the door, and Ashton Lowe the professional was at the door to make sure that she was alright.
She didn't know that she liked this version of Ashton. The version that wasn't passionate, had no strong feelings it seemed about much of anything. Nothing like the man that she had seen in that cave. Nothing like the man that she had seen ever since.
Whatever was inside him, whatever had made him into the man that so fascinated her, it was gone now and she was going to have to get used to that. It was for the best.
Sadistic Master Bundle (BDSM Billionaire Erotic Romance) Page 12