Bewitching the Beast

by Tamara Hughes

  “Dave?” She nodded. “That’s how he blows off steam.”

  “Must be a young kid.”

  “Actually he’s a middle-aged tax accountant who’s going through a divorce. Kind of sad.” She shrugged off her coat. “He’s a good guy though. We’re doing dinner and drinks once his divorce goes through.”

  “Really.” He shoved the door shut, ignoring the flare of jealousy that streaked through him. “He’s wasting no time getting back into the dating scene.”

  “He’s a friend. That’s all.” Tess headed to the refrigerator. “Hungry? I’ll see if I can find us something to eat.”

  With Tess in plain sight over the peninsula counter in the kitchen, Ethan wandered into the living room. Three framed pictures decorated the walls—two prints he’d seen before and an original oil of a cow in a pasture. He leaned in to read the signature. Tess Edwards. “You paint?”

  Tess popped her head over the open door of the refrigerator. “Yeah. What do you think of my lame attempt at greatness?”

  “It’s not lame. You’re very good.”

  “Something to drink?” she yelled from inside the fridge. “I’ve got a Coke, some orange juice, and cherry Kool-Aid.”

  Really? “Cherry Kool-Aid?”

  She peered over the door and cocked her head to the side. “It’s a weakness.”

  “I’ll have a Coke.”

  “Glass or can?”

  “The can is fine.”

  Coke in hand, she rounded the short wall, kicked off her shoes, and delivered the drink. “You’re a man who obviously does his own dishes.”

  “Yes, I am.” He accepted the can and raised it up. “Thank you.”

  “Well, you did save my life.” She looked into his eyes with the sincerity he’d been hoping for all day. “And I believe you intend to protect me.” Tess lowered her gaze and took a step away, but stopped. Her eyebrows drawn, she gestured to his hand. “You’re hurt.”

  Ethan examined his scraped knuckles. “I’m fine.”

  “Are you sure?”

  A smudge of dirt streaked her cheek. He was tempted to brush it away. “Yeah, don’t worry about it.”

  Tess glanced at his hand one more time before heading to the kitchen, the natural sway of her hips a dance he couldn’t ignore.

  She ducked behind the peninsula, and the clatter of pans filled the room. “Well, I need to go grocery shopping again, but I do have what I need to make my specialty.”

  “Which is?”

  A cabinet door closed with a soft clap, and Tess stood with a round pan. “Pepperoni Tombstone pizza.”

  He chuffed a short laugh. “Pizza it is.” Ethan removed his jacket, dropped it on the sofa, and returned to the painting. Its extraordinary detail drew his eye. He could almost see the individual hairs on the black-and-white cow. “Have you tried to sell your work?”

  “Yes. Fredrick Ellison looked at them. He showed interest, just not enough to display anything. He said that while they were technically perfect, they lacked passion.” Carrying a glass of red Kool-Aid, she joined him in the living room. “If a bowl of fruit can be shown, why can’t a cow? At least it’s original.”

  “A painting of a bowl of fruit is something to put in your dining room because it matches the decor. Not because it touches you in some way.” He turned to the picture. “A fine artist reveals things you never noticed before—opens your eyes to the world, makes you feel something unexpected.”

  “So you don’t like my cow?” she asked, flashing an impish grin.

  Ethan laughed. “You’re obviously talented. This work is outstanding, but does this cow have any significance to you?”

  Tess pointed at the painting. “It just so happens this cow was a good friend of mine. We were in the army together. She became a sergeant. Unfortunately, I was discharged for bad behavior.”

  “Why doesn’t that surprise me?”

  A timer buzzed in the kitchen, and Tess returned to put the pizza in the oven.

  Ethan opened his can of Coke and took a swallow. “I think Ellison sees your talent and knows you’re capable of more. Instead of good, you could be great.” He joined her in the kitchen. “Do you have other work I can see?”

  Tess frowned and grabbed two plates from a cabinet. “I’m not sure about the whole painting thing anymore.”

  “You’re not thinking of giving up?”

  She opened a drawer. “I haven’t painted for a while now.”

  “Why not?”

  Her gaze met his. “I came to New York with Matt. He believed in me, in my painting. Without him . . .” Tess turned her attention to pulling utensils from the drawer. “I needed a break.”

  “How did Matt die?” The words were out of his mouth before he could stop himself. “You don’t have to answer that.”

  She busied herself digging through a drawer of loose cooking gadgets. “The autopsy said a severe asthma attack.”

  “So your muse is gone.”

  She shrugged. “More than that. At least that’s what my psychologist said.”

  “What did he say?”

  Tess flashed him an impudent look. “She said some of my grief is the result of suppressed emotions.” She rolled her eyes. “So Freudian.”

  “Suppressed emotions from what?”

  Flipping on the oven light, she peered at the cooking pizza. “My sister, Faith, ran away from home when I was a kid.” Tess snatched up the plates and silverware and carried them to the table. “She never came back.”

  “Tess, I’m sorry.”

  “No worries. It happened a long time ago.”

  Ethan glanced at her work once more. “The urge to paint will come back. You have the talent.”

  “Maybe. Who knows what will happen next. Even with a rent-controlled apartment, without Matt, I can barely make ends meet. Maybe I’ll leave New York altogether. Move back to good old Stratford, Wisconsin.”

  “Have you tried living with anyone else?”

  Tess stiffened. “No one can replace Matt.” She cleared her throat and returned to the kitchen. “So what did your fortune cookie say?”

  “My what?”

  “Your fortune cookie from lunch. What did it say?”

  He didn’t want to think about it right now. The damn thing had cut a little too close. “I don’t remember. What about yours? Did you glean great wisdom?”

  “Actually it was quite good, very practical. It said something like, ‘When life throws tomatoes, don’t wear a white shirt.’”

  “You’re kidding.” He enjoyed the glow in her eyes.

  “No, not kidding. Although Confucius needs to get with the times. I mean really, doesn’t everyone carry a stain stick these days?”

  The oven timer buzzed again. Tess turned off the oven and opened the door. The aroma of hot cheese and pepperoni filled the room. She grabbed a hot pad and removed the pan from the oven. “Ouch.” Dropping the pan on the stovetop, she flapped her hand.

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah.” She ran the faucet and stuck her finger under the water. “You can turn on the TV if you’d like. I could use a funny sitcom about now.”

  “Is there such a thing?” He found the remote and powered up the television.

  The news flashed to the screen. “Three killed and nine injured in a construction collapse tonight . . .”

  Ethan’s attention riveted to the images as the camera turned to a reporter at the scene. Yellow caution tape roped off a pile of metal rods and wood. Police secured the area while crews cleared the street of debris.

  An uneasiness settled in his chest. Tess could’ve died there. Would something worse happen next?

  She’d stopped cutting the pizza. Her gaze was trained on the television, a frightened look
in her eyes.

  “Would you like me to change the channel?”

  “No, it’s okay.” She carried the pizza to the table and sat down. “Dig in.”

  Ethan walked over and took a seat.

  She put a piece of pizza on her plate and stared at it a long moment.

  “Something wrong?”

  “The accident tonight was my fault, wasn’t it?”

  “No.”

  Tess shrank into herself. “You said I’m prone to bad luck, that I attract it to me. Now people are dead and injured, because of me. If I hadn’t been there—”

  “No. I won’t believe that. Accidents happen. The people killed tonight were in the wrong place at the wrong time, that’s all.”

  She poked at her pizza with a fork. “Why didn’t their auras save them?”

  “Auras don’t work that way.” He slid a slice onto his plate. Although the pizza didn’t look as appetizing as it used to, his stomach grumbled. “A strong energy field can improve your health, your attitude, and your life in general, but it can’t prevent death when your time comes. Don’t blame yourself. There’s nothing you could have done.”

  Tess picked at her pizza toppings, separating the cheese from the crust, her expression bleak.

  “Just to be safe, we should try another cleansing to get rid of the negative energy you’ve accumulated.”

  She hugged herself. “Let’s do that. I don’t want something else to happen, knowing I didn’t do everything I could to prevent it.”

  “Agreed. Would you feel better if we tried it now?”

  She nodded.

  “All right.” He stood and pointed toward the sofa. “I’ll need you to lie down and relax.”

  Tess rose and did as he asked. She took a big breath and wiggled her shoulders, before lying still. “I’m ready.”

  Stepping close, he focused on what he’d read, the importance of imagery. He squatted next to her and lifted his hands, holding them inches from her body. “I’m going to sweep away the negative energy.”

  She peered at his hands, and then at his face. “Okay.”

  As he’d done back at his apartment, he ran his hands along her body, not touching her, but close enough he could feel the pull of the positive energy she possessed. He envisioned dragging the negative energy down her body, from her thin white blouse to her narrow black skirt, and past the gentle slope of her exquisite bare legs. When he reached the tips of her toes, he drew the bad energy from her and cast it far away, never to return.

  Preparing to repeat the process, he moved back up the sofa and raised his hands over her chest.

  Tess shivered. Was the cleansing working? If only he could feel negative energy, he could tell for sure, but The Beast only fed on the positive.

  She moistened her lower lip with a flick of her tongue, and all thought of energy disappeared as he focused on her mouth, so perfectly formed, and soft to the touch. He remembered well.

  Exhaling a slow breath, he drove the memory away. He had a job to do here, an important one. Think, dammit. Energy. Negative energy.

  His hands hovered over her chest, over the filmy button-down shirt she wore. The silky material molded itself to the curve of her breasts, which rose and fell more quickly than they had before. Ethan glanced at Tess’s face. Her eyes met his, with a mixture of heat and fear.

  She grasped his hands and pushed them away. “I think . . . I think that’s enough.” She sat up. “Let’s do something else now.”

  “What would you like to do?” He took a chair across from her, a safe distance away.

  Tess’s eyes searched the room with her hands knotting in her lap. “Maybe we could talk.”

  “About what?”

  Her wandering gaze stopped on him. “You. I want to know more about you.”

  “What about me?”

  “Your eyes during the accident tonight.” Her forehead wrinkled. “They changed color. How did you do that?”

  “Yeah, about that . . .” Should he tell her about The Beast? Or would that just scare her off.

  “Can you do it now?”

  “I’d rather not.”

  “And your muscles. I felt them pulse when you had your arm stretched out, as if you were releasing some sort of power.”

  Ethan sat up straight, and guilt tightened his throat. Tess had a right to know what she was dealing with here. “That energy is from the auras I took from you and others.” He swallowed. “I have the ability to use the energy to affect things.”

  “Affect things like blowing a truck tire.”

  “Yes.”

  “So, it’s sort of like telekinesis.”

  “Among other things,” he muttered. Like controlling minds, although technically, he didn’t use that power. The Beast did.

  She tilted her head. “What other things?”

  Why hadn’t he kept his mouth shut? Then again, what if The Beast wanted to take over her mind again? For her own protection, shouldn’t he at least warn her of the possibility? If needed, she could zap The Beast into submission again. Maybe. She didn’t seem to realize she had that power. Still, the right thing to do was to tell her about The Beast, whether he wanted to or not.

  Ethan slumped down in his chair. “Mind control.”

  She smirked. “You can control minds?”

  “I’ve never tried to mess with someone’s head.”

  “Then how do you know it’s possible?”

  Here we go. “Because The Beast does it. In fact, he did it to you. That’s why you followed me into the closet at the club.”

  Her gaze became incredulous. “No way. No one was in my head when I joined you in the closet.” She scrunched her face. “At least not that I remember.” A smile flickered across her lips a second before she burst out with a laugh. “Did you just refer to yourself as The Beast?”

  “No, I’m saying . . .” Swiping a hand through his hair, he sat forward, then rested his elbows on his knees. “This is going to sound nuts, but there’s a monster inside of me I can’t control. I hear it in my head sometimes. I feel it in my body.” Tess’s mouth dropped open, and she got up from the sofa. Shit. But, she might as well hear the rest. “It forces me to steal energy from people. There’s nothing I can do to stop it from getting what it wants. I’ve tried everything I can think of.”

  Tess stood motionless, her face blank.

  “The Beast is the reason I don’t get cold anymore. I can’t. Not when it heats me from the inside out.” Ethan stared down at his hands. He could prove The Beast existed by showing her what he hid beneath the glove. Scrubbing his hands over his face, he sat up. No, he couldn’t. She wasn’t ready, and neither was he. “Are you going to whip out another business card for me? Maybe you have one for a cozy mental hospital.”

  “So what are you saying? You’re possessed?” A hard edge tainted her voice, even as fear crept into her eyes.

  “Exactly.”

  She moved to the other side of the room. “Like the Devil kind of possessed?”

  “Something like that.”

  “No.” Tess shook her head. “First you tell me about this whole aura thing, energies affecting what happens to a person, and now . . .”—she backed away slowly—“now you want me to believe some evil spirit controls what you do.”

  “Yes.”

  “An evil spirit that makes you hurt people.”

  When he nodded, her face paled to an ashen color.

  “At the club, this spirit took over my mind, and that’s the reason I had sex with you?”

  “No . . . Well, yes, initially.” Somehow her skin became even paler. Damn. “It’s what lured you into the closet, but then you zapped it into submission, and it lost control of you.”

  “I zapped the spirit into submission,�
�� she murmured as she hurried to a small table near the closet and yanked open a drawer. Her hands shook as she rummaged inside.

  “Tess?”

  She slammed the drawer shut. “Stay over there.” In two steps, she stood before the closet and grabbed a long, winter scarf from the shelf. She tied a knot in it, then another.

  Ethan rose from his seat. “What are you doing? Are you okay?”

  She secured another knot, concentration tensing her face. “I’m trying to calm myself.”

  “By tying a scarf into knots?” Great, she’d lost it. Not that he could blame her. He’d given her a lot to deal with.

  “It’s all I could find.” The tangled chain grew as her hands worked the yarn.

  He walked forward, his arms spread wide, his voice soothing. “Tess. Take it easy. It’s going to be all right.”

  She glanced up. “Don’t give me that weirded-out look. This is something my grandmother taught me to relieve stress.” She yanked the yarn tighter. “You tie knots, and for each one, you imagine all your anxiety and tension flowing from you into the cord, or scarf in this case.”

  “Is it working?”

  “I think so.” She took a long breath, but her hands continued twisting the piece. “This spirit obviously doesn’t control you all the time.”

  “You’re right.”

  “And you’re the same guy who saved me,” she muttered as if reassuring herself.

  “Yes, I am.”

  “Right. Good,” she said, her fingers still working. “Gram had lots of remedies like these.” A slight smile curved her lips. “She had a different way about her. Sometimes she made so much sense, and other times . . .” Tess gave a soft laugh. “Sometimes she was a little nutty. A few of the things she left me . . .” Her hands stilled. “A few of the things she left me . . . like the letter.” Tess’s gray eyes fixed on him. “You called the thing inside you The Beast?”

  “Yeah. So?”

  Dropping the scarf, she turned away, before disappearing into the back. Ethan followed, his body aching, more tired than he’d been all day. When he reached the bedroom, Tess was standing on tiptoe on the top of a stepping stool, digging through a shelf in her closet.