ENTANGLED
Page 5
She wondered why. A way of taking control of his life? Given his childhood, that made sense. Right now she grabbed onto anything that made sense.
“You’re prescient?” she asked.
“I felt your energy.” The purr in his voice deepened. The lion in him pleased. “It’s very…powerful. In a feminine way.”
The hair on her nape lifted. She swallowed to get saliva into her mouth. Her self-confidence and her witch magic had disappeared along with the moon.
The moon would be full tonight…
“I’m calling about Nikki Nyland,” she said.
“Nicole is with me. Voluntarily, I assure you.”
“May I speak to her, please?” The words came out stilted. She didn’t like pleading with any man. Especially creeps. She wondered if the paper he’d written for his doctorate was on deviant behavior.
Her studies had been theater and the arts. Anything to do with acting. Right now she needed to act brave.
“Don’t you want to see her in person?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“I’ll call you back, Victoria Brannigan.”
She held onto the phone until she was sure he’d cut the connection. Putting the phone in its cradle, she knew he was going to Google her. He’d find photos all over the place, mostly from the plays she was in during high school and a few commercials from her time in New York.
He’d hear her voice. Not the constricted one from the phone, but her voice in all her moods. Happy, sad, excited, depressed.
And he’d know her face. Her body.
She’d never been paranoid. While auditioning for roles in New York, she’d been told she was too happy and quirky. But a weird feeling crept inside her now, as if someone was pawing through her underwear drawer, picking up her panties, lifting them to his face and sniffing.
A loud, scolding meow jerked her from the dark thoughts. She gazed down into Samson’s eyes.
I’m here. His green gaze was steady and for an instant he reminded her of a small mountain. I will protect you.
She laughed, got out of the chair and scooted down, sitting cross-legged on the wooden floor. He stepped into the cradle of her legs where the sunbeam found a few gray hairs among his black fur. Purring, he rubbed his jaw on her knee, putting his scent on her while she stroked his back.
Peace settled over her, a Zen-like feeling. They remained like that long enough for the rays of sunlight to change their angle, moving so that her foot and his butt were no longer in the light stream. Then the rude ring of the phone shattered her Zen-ness.
She tensed. “Up, sweetie.”
Samson stared at her. Lift me.
She narrowed her gaze at him, and he stared back, unwinking, unmovable.
The phone rang a second time. She let out her breath in a huff and slid her arms beneath his warm belly that hung over her arms.
She didn’t have time to argue with him. Especially since she’d lose. He was more stubborn than her two brothers combined.
Draping him over her shoulder, she got up, his extra weight making her stagger as the phone rang a third time.
“You really need to lose weight.”
You really need to exercise.
She grabbed the phone. Just what she needed, a smartass cat.
“Yes.”
“You can come.” It was the creep, his purring voice making her think he really was channeling the devil.
Screw him. “I’d like to speak to Nikki now.”
“You can speak to her tonight at my place.”
“It’s All Hallow’s Eve,” she said.
“My favorite night of the year. A true Hallow’s Eve tonight, with a full moon. Do you know what the moon this October is called?” he asked, his voice so smooth she imagined it sliding beneath doors and through keyholes.
She shook off the eerie notion. Her mother used to complain about her active imagination. “Harvest moon.”
“Hunter’s moon.”
Her hands clenched on Samson’s sides and he yeowed. She loosened her hold. “Sorry,” she murmured.
“Also known as blood moon.”
Staring into Samson’s eyes, she inhaled sharply. “You’re a font of information. Where and when?”
She had to look away from Samson as she jotted down the address and time. 9pm. The moon would be shining brightly.
“Come alone,” he said, “or the gate will be locked against you.”
Samson twisted out of her hold, put his mouth against the speaker and screeched.
A laugh came from the other end. “You can bring your cat.”
“I will,” she said. “And I want to see Nikki.”
“Naturally. By the way, Nikki told me you practice the black arts.”
She pressed her lips together.
“It will be my delight to test my powers against yours,” he continued. “A warlock and a witch. It will be a pleasure to see you, my dear.”
“I’m not your dear. I’ll see you tonight.”
She hung up on his shout of laughter.
“Bringing a gun would be a good idea,” she said to Samson. Only she didn’t own a gun. A knife, perhaps?
I’ll protect you.
She petted Samson’s head. With his arthritic legs and his bulk, he had a tough time jumping onto the couch.
“Maybe my spell will kick in before tonight,” she said. “And you’ll be young and virile.”
Doesn’t matter. I’ll protect you anyway.
She smiled at him. We make a good pair.
He smiled, Cheshire-like. We’ll beat his warlock ass.
Chapter Four
It was an hour’s drive to Lamont’s house in the country, and Tory arrived late on purpose. Let him stew. Let him bake in his anger like a cracked egg on a sidewalk in August. He was a man who loved control. She’d start this off by showing him he wasn’t pulling her strings, even if he’d forced her to come tonight.
The long, private road that curved up a hill added to her tardiness. She’d looked up the place on Google map, and had seen a big hill with trees, but with the back of the hill chopped off. More like a cliff worn down by an ocean than a hill in rural Wisconsin.
The house came in sight. On Google map, all she’d seen was a red-gabled roof and a gray stone tower. Now she saw it was a castle, not a fortress as Jan had said. On the small size, but a castle all the same. Under the full moon it felt as if she was transferred to another century. All it needed was a moat and a hunky prince.
When she was a girl, she’d gone through a Disney princess phase. Then she’d realized none of the princesses played soccer or had sleepovers with friends, and she decided she’d rather join a circus and be a trapeze lady.
She pulled up in front of the castle. One of the two oversized double doors opened.
A man marched out, head high, back straight. She was unimpressed. As a former actress, Tory immediately knew what he was doing. Making an entrance. The lights from the iron lampposts outside the entrance, along with the moonlight shining down on him, were his theater lights. She was his audience.
She opened the car door and got out. Keeping the car between them, she peered over the roof at him.
Her breath sucked in. She hadn’t expected him to look like a prince out of a fairy tale. Golden brown hair, pale gold complexion. Black jeans covered long legs and lean hips. A black turtleneck clung to broad shoulders, a great chest, a flat belly. And his face…every angle sculpted, every feature yummy.
She didn’t have to look at his lower parts to know they were in pretty good shape, too.
“Mreeooow.”
She turned her gaze from him and opened the door wider to let Samson jump out.
Bad, Samson scolded her. Bad.
“You’re late.” Damon’s voice wasn’t warm and happy, either.
“Where’s Nikki?” She shut the door but stayed on her side of the car.
He stared at her, and she felt the power of his gaze on her face.
“Come closer,” he
said. “Where I can see you.”
She braced her feet. “Where’s Nikki?”
“Inside.”
“Bring her outside.”
“Are you afraid?”
“Distrustful.”
“Paranoid,” he said.
She shrugged. “I must be. I emailed my brothers, telling them where I was.”
“Would they come after me?”
“If I went missing, count on it.”
His teeth flashed and he laughed, exultation coming off of him in waves. Instead of making him angry or concerned, her words amused him. Gave him power.
He wouldn’t laugh after he saw them. But Sorcha was the one he really needed to worry about. Sorcha was…unusual. She didn’t have the same respect for laws as her brothers. She said men created them, and she wasn’t a man. She did what she felt was right, and the hell with anyone who got in her way.
Right now, Tory wanted to be more like Sorcha than her brothers.
“Either you bring Nikki outside, or I’m outta here.”
His laughter shut off. The air changed. Becoming denser, heavier, darker.
She forced herself to hold her spine straight, her chin up. Breathe, she reminded herself. Breathe.
“Nicole.” He raised his voice slightly. Still staring at Tory. “Come outside. I order you.”
She glared at him. If she had hackles, they were raised. What a creep.
I want to scratch him.
Good boy.
Yes, I am.
The door opened. A woman stepped out slowly. The moonlight hit her face, her blue eyes looking blankly at Tory, blond hair falling listlessly to her shoulders.
If Tory hadn’t known it was Nikki, she wouldn’t have recognized her. Her eyes were lifeless. Her face showed no recognition. No emotion.
Just like the women in Tory’s vision last night.
Soulless.
Damon snapped his fingers, and Nikki walked like toward him like a zombie. The living dead. A beautiful shell.
Tory put her hand over her mouth to stop a cry.
“Face forward,” he said, not looking at Nikki. “Toward the car.”
She turned, following his orders as if she were a Stepford wife.
“You want her?” Damon asked Tory, giving her a smile that at a night club would’ve had a dozen women within eye range whimpering over him.
It made her want to puke.
I want to puke, too.
She glanced down at Samson. You always want to puke.
No, I always want to eat. Now I just want to puke.
Tory flicked her gaze back to Damon. “You’re a vampire.”
He smiled, as if she’d given him a compliment. “There are no vampires.”
“You don’t suck blood. You eat energy.” She felt his excess power, reaching out to slam into her. But it wasn’t all his. There was something feminine in it. Something stolen from Nikki.
Tory had heard of energy eaters but thought JK Rowling invented them. Never thought they were real. Never thought she’d be staring at one.
Never thought she might be his next energy drink.
Sudden fear engulfed her. Her mind scrabbled for a way out. She could hop in the car and leave Nikki to him so he could squeeze out a few more drops.
As the thought formed, her body and mind repudiated it. A loud NO welling up inside her.
She raised her chin. Resolve pierced her fear, forming a wide, windless and dry spot in the middle of a storm.
This was why she was a witch instead of an actress. Not to cast love spells. Not to dance naked beneath the full moon. Not to wear the sexy witch costume her brother Ted had given her as a joke two years ago, after she’d come out to her family (though it had been a favorite of Phil’s, despite his objections to her calling).
She’d thought she was here to save Nikki, but that wasn’t true. She was here to stop this energy eater from stealing the soul of another woman.
Could she do it? The doubts lingered. With his energy pulsing at her, she felt his Goliath-sized strength.
She was more like David with breasts.
“You didn’t answer my question,” he said. “You want her?”
She nodded. Maybe she wasn’t calm and confident, but she was an actress. And a woman. She’d faked orgasms, she could fake confidence. “Of course.”
“I’ll trade her. You come inside my house, and I’ll let her go free.”
A sob came from Nikki. He turned toward her. “Stop.”
As if he’d hit her Off switch, Nikki stopped.
He faced Tory again, gesturing toward the gray castle.
Nausea rose in Tory’s throat. Once she stepped inside those stone walls, she would never leave. Not until she was a shell of herself, her energy drained, and he had no use for her anymore.
She knew this the way she knew she was in the presence of evil.
She swallowed. “No.”
“I didn’t think you’d be so easy.” His smile widened and he seemed to glow brightly. “It makes it more fun.”
Anger spurted up in her. What an asshole. “You are such a cliché. But I suppose most psychos are.” She shrugged, as if she didn’t feel the air heating around her. As if she weren’t wondering how he did that. As if it weren’t her intention to make him lose control. Like David had done with Goliath.
Phil would say she was an expert at making men lose control.
“After all,” she added, “how many kinds of crazy can there be?”
A blast of air thrust her backward. A small shriek involuntarily emitted from her mouth.
“All kinds of ways. Are you ready to find out?”
“Fuck you.”
“You will,” he said. “As often as I allow you. And you will be happy to do so. Until I no longer want you.”
I want to scratch and bite him.
She snorted a laugh. Across from her, on the other side of the car, Damon’s eyebrows contracted and the energy pulsing at her lessened.
Because she’d laughed.
That’s when it came to her that he was already feeding from her. Already eating her fear.
It made her wonder how much fear Nikki had suffered before she’d become this shell of herself.
And the other women in her vision? How much had they suffered?
“Do you know what this place is?” His forehead smoothed, as if the blip in his power never happened.
“A fake castle,” she said.
“An energy epicenter.” He stepped forward. So did Nikki, and he peered sideways at her. “Stay.”
She stopped on the front sidewalk, as if planted there. Not bothering to look back at her, he strolled around the car.
Tory’s hatred and disgust pushed back her fear. Enabled her to stand straight as he neared her. It even allowed her to admire his appearance, though she deplored the man.
His lips curved. “Like what you see?”
“If you were an Easter egg, you’d be the prettiest. But no one would want to eat you, because you’re rotten inside.”
His laugh held no humor. “I’m not an egg, I’m a magic man.”
“A monster. A psychopath.” She didn’t take her gaze off him, the air eddying around her, the moonlight on her face. “I bet you were the cutest and smartest boy. You should have been a wonderful man, leading a wonderful life. I read about your parents’ problems. Is that why you came out this way?”
His eyes flashed. “Don’t you dare pity me.”
“Anyone would pity you. Mental problems run in your family. You should be locked up. Kept away from sane people. I wonder if the other Lamonts know what you’re up to. I’ll email them. Hell, I’ll email the tabloids.” She reached for the car door handle. “One of them might even pay me for the information.”
“Stop!” His voice thundered. The ground shook beneath her shoes. “You’re on my territory. I have control.”
In the middle of a string of mental ‘Oh shits’ for pushing him too far, she glommed on to one word. Control.
She’d been right about its importance to him. This monster that he’d turned into was all about control.