Always Look Twice

by Sheri WhiteFeather

  A crow cawed in the distance, taunting her with a screeching sound. She glanced up at a second-story window, saw the curtain move.

  The house wasn’t empty. Not completely.

  She tried the doorknob, turned it, heard the hinges squeak. The crow cawed again. Olivia didn’t know what the bird was trying to say. In the old days, the Chiricahua feared the black-winged animals. Yet the appearance of a crow before a hunt was a favorable omen.

  Was this a hunt?

  She looked up at the window again. The curtain had stopped moving.

  Olivia kept turning the doorknob. It spun in a circle, like the little girl’s head in the Exorcist.

  Did Derek Moon worship the devil?

  No, she thought. This was just part of his game, his theatrics. Irritated, she turned the handle one more time.

  The door flew open.

  Olivia entered the house, her shoes echoing on marble tiles. Orange candles flickered from every table, from every corner, flames dancing in jest.

  Derek had prepared his home just for her.

  She glanced around, wondering where the hell he was. She wandered into the dining room and stood in front of the satyr. Refusing to be intimidated, she stared at the jeering beast.

  It stared back at her.

  The candles smelled like caramel. Sweet and syrupy.

  Orgasmic.

  Olivia wanted to go home and make love with West. The real West, the flesh-and-blood man. She wanted to prove that she was more powerful than Derek’s spell.

  But you’re not, a voice whispered in her head.

  “Yes, I am,” she said out loud.

  She closed her eyes, tried to get a reading on Derek, to locate him in her mind.

  But she saw her dead mother instead.

  A quick flash, a familiar image. The red-stained sheet, the heart, the arrowhead. Yvonne’s motionless body, her beautiful face.

  Things aren’t always what they seemed.

  “I didn’t kill her.”

  Olivia spun around. Derek stood behind her, dressed in a long black robe. Around his neck he wore Allie’s charm, the wolf claw, the silver beads.

  “You bastard.” She reached for the necklace and tore it off him. The leather thong broke, spilling the beads. They rolled across the floor like tiny marbles.

  A second later, they disappeared.

  It wasn’t Allie’s charm, she realized. It was another trick. Another illusion.

  Tired of his game, she lunged for his throat and shoved him against the wall, pushing her thumb into his windpipe.

  He gasped, his eyes bulging wide.

  But Olivia couldn’t hold him for long. Something slammed into her, hard and fast and sharp. She fell forward, against Derek, and they both hit the floor.

  Pain exploded in her body, blood trailing down her spine. She cursed and crawled away from Derek. He was still gasping for air.

  Olivia turned and looked at the painting. The satyr had blood on his hooves.

  Her blood.

  She drew her gun and aimed it at the canvas, but the half man, half goat did nothing but dance, shuffle its bewitched feet.

  Her bullets wouldn’t kill it.

  She turned the weapon on Derek instead.

  He stopped gasping.

  Olivia rose, refusing to wince, to give credence to her pain. “I want to learn your magic.”

  “Why?” Derek didn’t move. He remained on the floor, gazing at the pistol aimed at his chest. “So you can bind me? Stop me from casting spells?”

  She didn’t respond. Her back was still bleeding.

  “I won’t teach you.” He blinked and the candles flickered. “I’m not a fool.” Smoke misted around him, rising to the ceiling. “You shouldn’t have talked to my ex-wife about me.”

  “Because she told us the truth?”

  “I didn’t break my marriage vows. Voyeurism isn’t cheating.”

  Olivia narrowed her eyes. “Your little joke last night wasn’t very funny.”

  He took a chance and stood. “Funny, no. Fun, yes.” He smiled at her, even though she was still holding him at gunpoint. “I let you control him. I gave you that much. Your fantasy. Your boy toy. He behaved just the way you wanted him to.”

  “And then he turned into a creep. He started acting like you.”

  “Watching rough sex excites me.” Braver now, he reached into the pocket of his robe.

  Olivia nearly shot off his hand until she saw what he had.

  A small cloth figure. The image doll that represented Agent West.

  “Do you want to hold it? Kiss it? Put its head between your legs?” He waved the dark-haired figure, making it flop back and forth. “Or should I kill it instead?” When he threw the doll, it sailed through the air, then made a deathly descent.

  In one desperate motion, in one gut-clenching instant, Olivia holstered her weapon and lunged for the figure, saving it from the burning candles scattered across the table.

  Once it was in her grasp, Derek shrugged and walked away, disappearing into the cavern of his house, leaving her alone with his magic.

  A short while later Olivia reclined on West’s bed, facedown, with her T-shirt pulled up. While she gazed at the unfamiliar headboard, he dressed the wound on her back. He was no longer staying at the Z-Sleep Inn. He’d moved to another motel on Sunset, leaving her father’s ghost behind.

  “I knew I should have gone to Moon’s house with you,” he said.

  “I handled it.”

  “You call this handling it? That son of a bitch kicked you.”

  “His pet goat kicked me. Derek is too much of a wuss to fight back on his own.”

  “Then maybe he isn’t the killer.”

  “And maybe he is. He’s a powerful witch. He brought that stupid painting to life.”

  “That’s not the same as murdering people.”

  She sighed into West’s pillow. How many whodunit conversations had they had? “I’m exhausted.”

  “I know. I’m sorry.” He bandaged her wound, his ministrations gentle.

  “You’re good at this.” Really good. He even took the sting out of the antiseptic, if that was possible.

  “I earned my emergency-medical-technician certification during high school, and I became a paramedic after I graduated. That’s what I did to put myself through college.”

  “Really?” She rolled over to look at him. She hadn’t figured him for a healer. “You’re a multitalented guy.”

  “Yep.” He pulled her shirt down, adjusting it over her stomach, babying her. “I almost went to medical school, but I changed my mind.”

  Fascinated, she sat up. “Dr. West became Agent West.”

  “Yeah, and considering the amount of trouble you get into, you’re going to need me.” He propped a pillow under her head, making her more comfortable. “As a doctor and an agent.”

  “Don’t get cocky. I saved your ass today.”

  “You saved a doll.” A frown marred his forehead. “Can I see it?”

  “It’s in my purse.”

  He climbed off the bed and retrieved her handbag, then gave it to her so she could open it.

  Olivia looked inside, then removed the doll, cradling it carefully in her hands. It was dressed in denim pants and a tan shirt, identical to the clothes the clone had worn last night. It even had a tiny gun clipped to its belt. She’d already checked its pockets for miniature condoms, but that was a detail Derek had forgotten, something he’d been forced to conjure from thin air.

  “It’s cloth,” West said. “I expected it to be clay.” He studied it curiously. “Should we torture it and see if I start hurting?”

  “That isn’t funny.” She swiped the little guy away from him. “I already rescued him from a fire.”

  “Yeah, but this is what Moon used to cast that sexual spell.” He took the doll’s hand and made it rub her boob. “See? It’s a pervert.”

  “Stop it.” She couldn’t help but laugh. West had a way of making everything seem funny
, no matter how creepy the subject matter was.

  “Can I keep it?” he asked.

  She gave him a suspicious look. “Why?”

  “So I can have my own Mini-Me.”

  She rolled her eyes. “I should have known you were an Austin Powers fan.”

  “Yeah, baby.” He impersonated the movie character, mimicking a British accent, making a silly face. “Aren’t you just dying to shag me?”

  She paraded the doll past him. Goofy, sexy, Agent West. “I already shagged Mini-Me.”

  “Lucky him.” He took the cloth figure and placed it on the nightstand. “When the clone was doing everything right, what exactly was he doing?”

  “I’m not giving you details.”

  “Why not? You thought it was me.”

  “I know, but—”

  “Come on, Olivia. Tell me.”

  “No.” She looked around the room, noticed how tidy it was. West never left anything out of place. When she shifted her gaze back to him, he was staring at her.

  Like a dog begging for a bone.

  Or a boner, she supposed. He wanted to talk about sex. “You’re going to get all horned out about this.”

  “No, I won’t.”

  “Okay. Fine.” She gave in, figuring she owed him that much. He’d been hexed, too. “The clone used his mouth.”

  He glanced at her zipper. “Down there?”

  “Yes, down there.” She grabbed the sheet, toyed with a corner of it. “In all sorts of positions.”

  “Damn.” He wet his lips. “Did you do it to him, too?”

  “No.”

  “Why not?”

  “Because I didn’t think of it.”

  “You better think of it next time.”

  She covered herself with the sheet. “Next time?”

  He moved a little closer. “When you’re with me. We can do it to each other.”

  Olivia went warm. Woozy and warm. “We’ve never even kissed.”

  He leaned over, lowered his head and brushed his mouth across hers, rewarding her with the sweetest, most gentle kiss any man had ever given her.

  “Now we have,” he said.

  She smiled at him. He really was a healer. “I like you, Agent West.”

  “I like you, too.” He smoothed her hair. “But I’m not going to sleep with a wounded woman. You need to get better first.”

  Her injury wasn’t as serious as he was making it out to be, but she didn’t protest. Because the next time he played doctor with her, she would be naked.

  And loving every minute of it.

  Chapter 11

  Olivia couldn’t sleep. Thoughts somersaulted in her brain, leaping and jumping, making her head hurt.

  Sometimes life was too damn complicated.

  She was home in her own bed, and she missed Agent West. Which made her feel stupid. She’d never behaved like a moonstruck female before.

  Moonstruck.

  Bad word choice, she decided.

  Derek Moon. Moon Dust Entertainment.

  She was sick of the moon.

  To prove her point, she turned her back on the window, snubbing the lunar ball in the sky.

  And then a scratching sound caught her attention. A faint noise coming from another room.

  Samantha sharpening her claws on the furniture?

  No, that didn’t seem right. The cat’s paws weren’t that big. She wasn’t a mountain lion.

  Olivia reached for the lamp and turned the switch, but nothing happened. None of the lights worked.

  She sat up and listened.

  A rustling motion. Gloved hands. Soft-soled shoes. A person moving with timed precision, invading the loft.

  Someone who didn’t expect to get caught.

  A witch? The killer?

  She grabbed her 9 mm from the nightstand, the familiar shape molding to her hand, becoming part of her. Her pistol. Her lifeline.

  Trying to get a reading on the intruder, she closed her eyes and concentrated. Male energy, she thought. Dark clothes. A ski mask. She couldn’t see him, but she could feel him.

  She opened her eyes, preparing to—

  A struggle. A muffled scream.

  He was in Allie’s room.

  Olivia took off, running down the hall, her heart pounding in her throat, her bare feet slapping the floor. Samantha raced after her, hissing in the dark. The cat knew something was wrong, too. She stepped on the hem of Olivia’s nightgown, panicked and dug her claws into the ebony fabric, tearing it.

  Allie’s door wouldn’t open.

  She could hear her sister fighting off her attacker, rolling over the bed, banging into the dresser.

  Glass shattered. A figurine of some kind. One of Allie’s collectibles.

  Samantha hissed again.

  Olivia kicked in the door, breaking the lock.

  The cat lost her courage, skittering in the other direction.

  Mist filled Allie room, making it seem vast, a cavern of endless fog, a dank dungeon.

  A magic spell?

  Olivia couldn’t see Allie, but the younger woman still battled for control, making muffled noises, trying to remove the gag from her mouth, trying to stop the intruder from pinning her arms to the bed.

  “Get out!” he shouted, his voice echoing in the blackened chamber, warning Olivia to stay away.

  In the next instant Allie broke free. She could feel her sister pulling away from the attacker. But Olivia wasn’t going to let him go. She wasn’t going to let him escape, disappear like a magician on a smoke-screened stage.

  Lifting her weapon, she used her sixth sense, the power she’d been honing. She tracked the male energy, back and forth, through the haze.

  She took aim, fired, hit her mark.

  He went down, his knees buckling beneath him.

  Then the room turned silent.

  No movement, no voices. Nothing.

  “Allie?” Olivia called in the dark.

  “I’m here,” came the shell-shocked reply. “But I think you just killed Kyle.”

  Oh, dear God. “What?”

  “I’m not dead,” he snarled, his pain-clenched voice sending her heart into a tailspin. “But what the hell did you shoot me for? I told you I was going to do this.”

  What was he talking about? Suddenly her brain was as cloudy as the room.

  A beam of light illuminated the insanity, and Olivia realized Allie had retrieved a flashlight, scanning the darkness, looking for Kyle.

  She located him in the corner, an ominous figure shrouded in mist, a ski mask concealing his face, his long hair secured in a ponytail.

  Olivia blew out the breath she’d been holding. She’d nailed him in the leg. “I’ll call for an ambulance.”

  “No!” He leaped up and removed the mask, waving it like a flag, clearing the smoke that clung to him. “I’m fine.”

  Fine? The glaring white orb reflected his injury, the blood that had dampened his pants and dripped onto the area rug beneath him.

  “Somebody needs to hit the main breaker,” he said. “I turned it off.”

  “I’ll do it.” Allie’s breath rushed out, her voice quavering with overly spent adrenaline. She left the room, taking the flashlight with her.

  Olivia and Kyle waited in the dark, but she managed to open the windows, allowing fresh air to circulate.

  “You better turn off the fog machine,” he said. “Or it’ll start up again. It’s on a timer.”

  Trust him to plant a Halloween device, to trick her into thinking the mist was real. “Where is it?”

  “Next to the hamper.”

  Olivia used her psychic sight, as West called it, to find her way around in the dark. Within seconds she located the machine and deactivated it.

  When Allie returned, she flipped on the light. For a moment no one spoke. Beneath the dresser, shards of colored glass littered the floor like rocks in the bottom of an aquarium.

  Olivia glanced at her sister. She wore a bandana, the gag Kyle had used on her, looped around
her neck.

  What a disaster.

  “Why can’t I call for an ambulance?” Olivia asked.

  “Because it’s a gunshot wound.” Kyle stumbled over to the bed and sat on the edge of it. “And the doctor on duty at the hospital will have to report it to the police.” He tossed the ski mask down, made a pained face. “I don’t want the cops involved.”

  She sat next to him, smoothed a stray hair that had come loose from his ponytail. “You’d rather bleed to death?”

  He jerked away from her, refusing to let her mother him. “The bullet just grazed me. It hurts like hell, but it’s not as bad as it looks.”

  What if he ended up with an infection? Or what if it was worse than he thought? “At least let me call a friend of mine. He used to be a paramedic.”

  “Fine. Whatever. Just no hospital. No cops.”

  Olivia wouldn’t dare admit who her friend was. Kyle hated the FBI even more than the police. She used Allie’s cell phone and dialed the special agent’s motel. He answered on the second ring, and she explained the situation as briefly as she could, asking him what to do.

  He gave her a list of instructions, telling her to elevate Kyle’s leg and put pressure on the wound to stop the bleeding. Then he promised he would be right over.

  Allie helped Olivia with the emergency care, and Kyle scowled at both of them, making Olivia’s guilt fester even more.

  “You didn’t tell me you were going to break in and jump my sister,” she said.

  “Yes, I did,” he argued. “I left a message on your cell-phone voice mail earlier. I told you it was part of Allie’s training. I mentioned everything, all the details. And I told you to stay the hell out of her room. That I was locking the door.”

  “There weren’t any messages from you today.” She pressed a clean pillowcase to his leg, trying to maintain the pressure, while Allie searched for proper medical supplies, getting things ready for West. “You must have called someone else’s voice mail.”

  “No way.” He rattled off the number, transposing the last two digits.

  Olivia heaved a weary sigh. How brainless could he be? “It’s four-five, not five-four.”

  “Really?” He laughed at his own stupid mistake, and Allie exploded and punched his good leg, shutting him up. Apparently she wasn’t amused by the attack he’d staged, even if she’d figured out at some point who he was. But her true anger, Olivia suspected, came from the fear that she’d thought he was dead. Allie had begun to care for Kyle. Not in a romantic way. But she thought of him as a big brother, someone she could count on, even if he drove her nuts.