They were part of Wishing Moon Bay, it was their home. It was where they belonged.
“Mr. Lyle will see you now,” Vicky told Helena and she broke out of her dream and smoothed down her hair as she headed down the corridor to her boss’s office.
The decision to come here now had been spontaneous and she hadn’t given much thought to how she looked. Not until she entered Mr. Lyle’s office and her boss looked her up and down.
“Sorry, I just got back to town. I came here before going home.” She smiled apologetically. Mr. Lyle was a lover of crisp white shirts and ties that were perfectly tied. Women were expected to be equally smart, either in skirts or pants. He had no preference as long as they were neat and tidy.
“What can I do for you? Not an emergency with your sister, I hope?” He indicated the chair in front of his desk, and she sat down, while he slumped down in his own chair. He looked tired, his face pale, not in the same way as a vampire, but from lack of time in the fresh air.
Helena put her hand to her face. Was that how she looked? Or was this what she would evolve into if she didn’t make a break and get out of this job?
“My sister is okay, it’s not that kind of an emergency. But I have made up my mind to quit my job here. My sister and I are going to travel a little and then find a business we can run together. She needs me. My nephew needs me.” She smiled apologetically.
“Are you sure about this? You are good at your job here, Helena. I always thought that you would take on a more senior role in the coming years and maybe even sit in this chair.” He patted the arms of his plush leather chair.
“Really?” She leaned forward, a couple of weeks ago she’d have been ecstatic to hear him say that. Helena leaned back and sat up straight. “It’s wonderful to hear such praise, but I have made up my mind and I have to stick to it.”
“I understand. You want to put your family first.” He gave a small smile. “It’s funny, but it was precisely because you don’t have much in the way of family that I thought you would be the one to rise up through the company.”
“It was?” Her fingers curled around the arms of her chair as she tensed.
“Yes, with no husband and no children, you were a prime candidate.” His eyes narrowed. “Have you found yourself a husband?”
“No.” It was none of his business, but that wasn’t the reason she denied his question. Helena wasn’t giving her job up because she planned to be a stay-at-home mom. She wasn’t being forced into this decision because anyone expected her to. If she chose to stay, she could have handled the job and a family. Dario would have happily stayed at home with their children while she worked...
And that was why she loved him so dearly. Dario, the man who would be by her side no matter what. The man who would always have her back. Her man, her perfect mate.
“Well, I wish you happiness, Helena.” Mr. Lyle glanced toward the door, she was being dismissed. He probably had a client waiting, but part of her was a little peeved he hadn’t put up too much of a fight to get her to stay.
But Mr. Lyle had seen enough people come and go. He likely could tell she’d made up her mind and there was no shortage of people to take her place.
Helena stood up. “Thanks, Mr. Lyle.” She slid her hand into her purse and pulled out the written resignation letter. “I’ve enjoyed working here.”
“If you ever do change your mind, I’ll always find a place for you.” He smiled warmly. “Be happy.”
“You, too.” With a lump in her throat, she turned her back on her boss and walked to the elevator, feeling numb. This was the right decision, she was certain, yet it was as if a part of her life was ending.
She pressed the button to call the elevator, not risking a look at Vicky. If she did, she might well cry, and then rumors would fly that she’d been fired or had a mental breakdown.
Pressing the button for the ground floor, she closed her eyes briefly. When she opened them, an old man was hurrying toward the closing doors.
Helena stepped forward and put her hand out to stop the doors from closing, but the man had a walking stick in his hand and lodged it between the doors. She stepped back as he hurried forward. “What floor?”
“Oh, fourth, please.” His voice creaked like an old door.
Helena pressed the button and the elevator doors closed. As they began their descent, she inhaled deeply. A familiar scent tingled in her nose, and her eyes widened as the man turned and grinned at her.
“Surprise.” He was old, so much older than the Barry she’d dated, the Barry who had come to her apartment.
“Barry.”
“That’s not really my name, but it’ll do.” He tilted his head to one side as she put her hand in her pocket and closed her fingers around her phone. “I don’t think we need to make any calls.”
He rapped her hand with his walking stick, and she yelped and pulled back her hand. There was no way she was going to let this old man get the better of her. But as she fended off his stick, he pulled a vial out of his pocket, used his teeth to pull the stopper out, and blew the contents in her face.
Her body went limp, but she didn’t fall to the floor. It was as if she were drunk, the world around her spinning and her voice slurred.
“All I want is for you to take me to Wishing Moon Bay. I know you have been there. Then I’ll let you go.” The old man smiled amiably. “If you do as I say, I won’t hurt you.”
But how could she trust the man who had murdered her father and destroyed her family?
Chapter Twenty-Eight – Dario
“She should be back by now.” Dario strode toward the elevator doors and stared at them, his hands on his hips as he pushed his senses outward. He tilted his head to the left and right as he tried to locate Helena among all the other people in the building.
Relax, his horse told him. If you push too hard, you won’t find her.
If I don’t push hard, I won’t find her. Not when there are so many people in the building.
“I’m taking the elevator up,” he called over to Detective Renshaw.
“Okay, I need to wait here.” He glanced outside the building. “The sun won’t set for another hour. I can’t come with you.”
“I understand.” Anyway, he could travel faster on his own. Even without shifting into his horse.
With one last look around, he pressed the button to call the elevator. The doors opened and he stepped inside, turning to take one last look at the car with the vampire hidden in the trunk. Life sure had taken a turn for the weird.
Our life has always been strange, his horse told him. Compared to normal humans at least. Compared to some supernaturals, our lives are fairly normal. Boring you could say.
I don’t say. Dario pressed the button for the eighth floor and looked up as the elevator began to move. That smell.
He inhaled deeply. He could scent their mate, her subtle perfume hung in the air but there was another scent not as familiar, and he’d smelled it before. Recently.
Barry has been here. His horse reared up in Dario’s mind, pawing the air, wanting to tear the world apart to find his mate and ensure she was safe.
Dario gripped the handrail running along the side of the elevator, his expression set firm. If Barry had hurt their mate in any way, he was going to find out a shifter didn’t need to be a predator to tear someone’s throat out.
Calm down, his horse advised. We need to think carefully, we need to use our shifter senses to find her.
Dario closed his eyes and centered his mind as the elevator rose toward the eighth floor. He pushed his senses outward, searching for Helena as if he were searching for a needle in a haystack. He went systematically, floor to floor, pushing further, trying to get a fix on where she was.
Here! His horse stamped his foot, getting Dario’s attention as they passed the fourth floor. She’s on this level. His horse was incredibly confident, and Dario had learned to trust his other side’s hunches.
Dario pressed the button for the
fourth floor and the elevator slid to a halt. The doors opened but Helena was not in sight. He stepped out of the elevator, ignoring the strange looks cast his way. He didn’t fit in here, his clothes were all wrong.
Ignoring the appraising looks thrown at him from several women, he sniffed the air. He might not be able to pinpoint Helena’s whereabouts among all the other people here, but he could follow Barry’s scent. His cologne hung on the air, leaving a trail.
Down the corridor and to the right, he hurried after his mate, hoping she was okay.
She must be okay, his horse assured him. They passed this way recently and if there was anything too suspicious about Barry and Helena, then the people in these offices would be talking about it. What else do they have to talk about?
His horse was right, and Dario clung to this thought as he rounded another corner. Stairs. Barry had taken Helena into the stairwell. He paused, sniffing once more before going down the stairs, his heart sinking as he got close to the ground floor. Once they were outside in the open air, the trail would get cold fast. Even the slightest breeze would soon cause Barry’s scent to dissipate.
I feel her! His horse neighed as he sensed their mate. She was close, they were closing the distance between them. He wasn’t going to lose them.
Dario reached the ground floor and burst out into the daylight, which was fading fast. If he could catch up with them soon and subdue Barry, the vampire could do his magic on him and they could all go home.
What a tempting thought, his horse murmured as they looked right then left.
Which way? Dario closed his eyes and focused on his love for Helena as if that would guide him to her side. Left.
He set off at a run, sensing her up ahead. They were moving slowly, very slowly, giving Dario time to catch up with them.
There. He spotted Helena on the sidewalk, she was waiting to cross the street, but he couldn’t see Barry.
There’s an old man with her. His horse sniffed the air. It’s Barry.
Barry in his true form. So that’s how he got close to Helena without raising the alarm. He came in the guise of a wolf in sheep’s clothing. Dario’s hands curled into balls as he slowed his pace and followed behind. He didn’t want to cause a scene in the middle of the street if he could help it. They didn’t need the police added into the mix, there was no telling what Barry might have up his sleeve.
If Dario attacked an old man, there was a good chance he was the one who would be locked up. Perhaps that was Barry’s plan.
Half an hour until it’s dark and the vampire can help us, his horse announced.
Let’s follow behind. As long as he doesn’t hurt Helena, we’ll keep our distance.
Why isn’t she putting up a fight? His horse studied their mate. She’s walking strangely, as if she’s drunk.
He must have drugged her. Dario’s anger grew as he crossed the street, slowing his pace even more. If Barry looked over his shoulder and saw the shifter then he might hurt Helena.
Where is he taking her, and what does he want? Dario’s horse longed to gallop up to them, throw Helena over his back and then gallop off into the sunset.
They turned off the busy street and went down an alleyway. Dario ran on light feet, stopping alongside the alleyway and using his senses to figure out what was happening. Had Barry seen him? Was he lying in wait around the corner?
No, Barry was hurrying down the alleyway with Helena. They slipped around the side of the alleyway and hugged the wall. In the distance, he could see another street. If Barry had a car waiting, then Dario would lose them.
He took a chance, he gambled that no one would see and shifted into his horse.
He ran fast and true, his hooves clattering on the hard ground drew Barry’s attention. But he was too slow to turn around and hampered by Helena as she swayed on her feet. He wasn’t fast enough to block the horse’s attack.
He tore at Barry with his teeth until he let go of Helena. She placed her hands on the wall and stood with her head down as the horse darted around her, putting himself between Barry and his mate.
“I’m not going to hurt her. I just want to find my way back to Wishing Moon Bay. I want to go back home. You can understand that, can’t you?” The old man looked pitiful as he stood there in the gathering darkness.
“Is that what you told my father before you killed him?” Helena asked.
“I thought you had no memory of that day!” Barry’s shock registered on his face and in the tone of his voice.
“I didn’t. But then we went back to Wishing Moon Bay. That’s right, we went back there.” She took a deep breath as she turned to face Barry. “We found our memories and now I know who killed my father. Perhaps if you hadn’t been so vain and had looked your age when we met before, I might not have recognized you. But I saw your face, I heard your voice.”
“I lost my temper, I didn’t mean to kill your father. I just wanted him to give me one of his candies to unlock my power.” He held out his hands. “I have power. I can feel it, I just can’t use it.”
“You are a wicked man, and you don’t deserve power, you don’t deserve magic.” Helena’s temper flared and her back straightened.
Sensing the danger he was in, Barry reached in his pocket, but Helena lunged forward and blew the contents of the small vial into Barry’s face. Shock registered there as he called out, “No!” Like a wounded animal he cowered down with his hands over his head. “What have you done?”
“It’s time you got a taste of what you have done to others. You killed my father. My mother was so scared, she had a vampire take our memories and shut them away. Just so we would never go looking for Wishing Moon Bay. So we would never be in danger from you. You see, she believed you were still in town and that we were safer out of it. But she was wrong.”
“I left. I was sure they would know it was me. I heard a child had seen my face.” He cried and covered his head as if expecting to be beaten.
“I was that child. I saw what you did.” Tears streamed down Helena’s face and Dario shifted into his human form, holding her close as she faced down the man who had killed her father.
“I just wanted magic,” Barry complained. “I wanted to prove my father wrong. He always said I would never amount to anything. He said I was nothing.”
“Did you kill him for what he said?” Helena asked. “Is that what you meant when you said the same man killed both our fathers? That man was you.”
“He didn’t believe in magic. He didn’t believe me when I told him. He wanted me to be a bank manager. I wanted to be a warlock and learn to control nature itself.” He thrust out his hands as if expecting flames to shoot from his fingers.
“You don’t even come from Wishing Moon Bay, do you?” Dario asked.
“I belong there. I saw a car driving down a road I never knew existed and I followed it right through the tunnel and into town. What I saw changed my life forever. I knew that was what I wanted to be. Why should some people be born with gifts and others not?” He held out his hands. “Then I realized I did have the power, I just needed to unlock it. And your father’s candies, they were the talk of the town.”
“They were make-believe. They had no power to unlock magic inside you.” Helena shook her head at the man before her. “You robbed me of my magic. You robbed me of my family. They were the ones who made the magic in my life.”
“Helena.” Dario put his arm on her shoulders and looked up. “It’s time.”
He shuddered as Silas appeared out of the darkness, dropping from the sky like a harbinger of doom. With his arms around Helena, Dario tried to turn her away, but she stood firm.
“What is your name?” Silas asked Barry, who stared into his eyes, powerless to fight the pull of inevitability.
“Rufus Mumford.”
“Are you the man who killed Oscar Olsen?” Silas’s voice was alluring, impossible to block out as he focused on Rufus.
“I wanted magic, he said he couldn’t give it to me. I thought if I
took his life, I would get his magic.” Rufus shook his head. “I just wanted my father to be proud of me.”
“He could never be proud of a murderer, could he?”
“No. So I shut him out. I shut him down so he couldn’t look at me anymore.” Rufus stared at Silas.
“You killed them both.”
“I did,” Rufus confirmed.
“And you’ve been trying to get back to Wishing Moon Bay ever since?”
“Yes, it’s a magical place. It’s where I want to die.”
“That’s not going to happen.”
“Oh, I am going to die. I only have a short time to live. Too many spells and potions, my insides are rotten. Just like the rest of me.” He cackled as if he’d told a funny joke.
“You’re not going to die in Wishing Moon Bay. From this moment on, you will forget it exists.”
“No!” Rufus cried out and grabbed at Silas’s lapels. “I will return there. I’m so close.”
“No, Rufus. The road is blocked and there is no way for you to return. Even if you saw the road to town, you wouldn’t be able to travel it. Each step you take will make you burn as if there is an inferno raging inside you.”
Rufus shook his head but no longer protested, as if he’d forgotten what he was protesting about.
“Hear me, Rufus. From this moment on, you will live with your sins and know that you killed. You will feel the guilt you deserve. You will spend your life helping others. That is your sentence for the murders you committed. Do you understand?”
Rufus used Silas to stand on his two feet. “I understand.”
Silas let him go and then stood in the shadows as Rufus brushed his coat down and then walked past Helena and Dario as if they weren’t even there.
“Will that work?” Helena asked.
“We won’t have any trouble from Rufus again. I looked inside of his heart and he’s right, he is dying. He’s used the spells of others his whole life, drunk potions without caring what was in them all to reach his goal of getting back to Wishing Moon Bay. But the town is lost to him now.” He rolled his shoulders back. “And you are free of him, Helena. And now you should be free of what you saw.”
The Horse Shifter's Mate: A Wishing Moon Bay Shifter Romance (The Bond of Brothers Book 2) Page 21