Psychic for Hire Series Box Set

by Hermione Stark

  Feeling cheered, I pick up my heavy skirts and do a twirl, enjoying the tapping of my heels on the stone underfoot. Perhaps it is the romance of this dimly lit castle, but I feel truly alive. I feel like I am finally doing something useful with my life. I don’t know what will come after this week is over, but I am no longer afraid of ending up penniless on the street. I do not have to be helpless and at the whim of fate’s desires. I can shape my own future.

  I’ll ask Lila to help me find a job. Storm lives in London. If only I could find a way to stay in England and be near him. There is nothing for me back in America.

  Suddenly my future seems wonderful and so full of possibility. I can’t wait to tell Lila my plans. She might disapprove of Storm, but I feel such a connection with him. I want to prove her wrong. He isn’t just some playboy intent on using me. And he saved me from Freddie.

  The thought of Freddie sends a chill down my spine. I had not seen him at the ball.

  I pause to try to get my bearings. I had thought that I knew the way to the rose garden, but now I find myself in an unfamiliar part of the castle. The further I got from the ballroom, the fewer people I saw in the corridors, and now there is no one to ask for directions.

  Damn this castle’s many confusing corridors and courtyards and levels, and its unexpected private corridors that require detours and turnings. And double-damn the odd staircases that sometimes skip levels entirely. I had been on what I thought was the ground floor, but a glance out of a window reveals that I am up on the first floor.

  I have either gone up the wrong staircase, or I have taken one of the wrong corridors. I am probably very near to where I want to be, but with no idea how to get there.

  “Hello?” I call along my dimly lit corridor, hoping that there might be a member of staff nearby to point me in the right direction.

  Nobody answers. I hurry on, hoping that when I get through the double doors at the end of this corridor that I will get a better sense of where I am. But when I get there, I find that I am in another long hallway, just a continuation of this corridor. I mutter to myself in frustration, and then shut up, worried that someone might be within earshot and have heard me being rude.

  I begin to worry that not only will I be late to meet Lila and that she might leave before I get there, but also that I won’t get back in time to meet Storm. That he will think I have stood him up.

  The corridor that I am in has many windows. I go over to one, to see if I can make sense of where I am within the castle. It is dark outside, but lanterns give sufficient light for me to see a courtyard outside. It is a narrow strip of manicured lawn. Opposite it is another section of the castle which is where I think I need to be. Lila is probably already there, waiting by the fountain. Oh, why could she have not chosen somewhere nearer to meet!

  I gaze at the opposite section of the building, trying to see inside. It looks like a mirror of the part of the castle I am in. There are many tall windows and when I peer through one, I see another long dark hallway like the one I am in. I suspect the ground floor might be the Rose Garden Terrace. If only I could see inside it to be sure, but the window opposite is frustratingly dark.

  And then a light comes on within, making me blink in surprise. I press my face up against my window, trying to make out the inside of the room opposite. There is movement by that window and then a man comes into view. He is tall and lean, with greying hair pulled back in a short ponytail and distinguished features. And he is looking right at me.

  Dr Carrington!

  I stumble back from my window, my heart drumming in my chest. Dr Carrington stays where he is, glaring right at me.

  I throw myself against the wall beside the window. How can Dr Carrington be here? Did he see me? It is dim in my corridor. Surely all that he will have seen is an outline of a female figure? And yet the way he was looking right at me… A chill runs through me.

  I start running back the way that I came. I stumble over the hem of my long skirt, tearing it with my heel. I gather it up in my arms, and keep running, my only thought to get back to Storm. But when I hear the sound of the ball get louder in the distance, I skid to a stop.

  What if Storm isn’t back yet? What if Dr Carrington is heading towards the ball too? What if he hides himself among the people there, and suddenly grabs me?

  I change direction, heading towards a wooden door that leads off this corridor. I don’t know where it goes, but I need to find a place to hide. I need to lose myself within the vastness of this castle.

  As I wrench open the door, someone grabs my dress from behind. Screaming, I whirl around to hit them. My bodice tears open as whoever grabbed me tries to hold on. My flying hand whacks Lila on the head.

  She looks alarmed, and she lets go of me abruptly. “Hey!”

  “Oh, gosh! Lila!” I gape at her, my mouth open for a moment. And then I throw my arms around her. I realize I am shaking.

  “Easy there, Miss Grabby!” she says, sounding irked.

  I let go of her, feeling ashamed for wimping out so horribly. “Sorry.”

  She rubs her temple. “What was that for?”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “The dark isn’t that scary,” she jokes.

  “Someone was there,” I say, pointing back towards the direction I saw Dr Carrington.

  Her eyes go wide in scandalized delight. “Was it the murderer?”

  I shake my head. “Someone I thought I knew.”

  She laughs. “You didn’t imagine your uncle or aunt, did you? It’s just your mind playing tricks. No way could they be here.”

  She links her arm with mine. “I saw you leave and was trying to catch up. You’re going in completely the wrong direction. The rose garden is that way.” She waves generally in the direction of where I had seen Dr Carrington.

  “I’m not going back there.”

  “But it’s so pretty,” she protests. “Did you know they have a maze? I wanted to explore it that first night but I never got a chance. We can do it now?”

  I shake my head firmly.

  “Come on,” she urges. “There nothing to be scared of. I’m with you now, and anything that goes bump in the night better be scared of me.”

  “I can’t. Not tonight.”

  She eyes the torn bodice of my dress, which I am holding in place with my hand. “We can fix that. I’ve got pins.”

  “It’s not that.”

  She looks disappointed. “But Diana, how do you even know what you saw was real? No one you know could possibly be here.” She squeezes my hand sympathetically. “I think what happened with Freddie freaked you out and now you’re seeing monsters everywhere. You’re totally safe here of all places. We’re in a freaking castle!”

  “It was him,” I insist. “Dr Carrington. My psychiatrist. I have to find Storm. I’m going to tell him.”

  Even if it means telling Storm about why I was seeing a psychiatrist, and why Dr Carrington wanted to lock me up. Storm has to believe me. He has to.

  “Don’t be silly, Diana. You can’t. It’s bad form to tell a guy stuff like that when you’ve only just met him. You’ll put him off.”

  “He’s not like that,” I ask her, feeling hurt by her attitude.

  “Even if he did believe you, you’re not sure who you saw. What if you saw the wrong person? The Hollywood rumors about Storm aren’t just rumors. He’s done some bad things. And now you’re going to make him hunt down this poor guy, and what do you think will happen? He’ll probably beat the living daylights out of him.”

  “You don’t even know Storm. He wouldn’t do that.” And yet the memory of Storm hitting Freddie makes me uncertain. “I’ll tell him not to,” I finish weakly.

  “And you think he’s going to obey like a meek puppy? You’re making trouble. It’ll be all over the press. It’s not fair. We’ve got a bad enough reputation as it is. This is the first time that succubae had been invited to an event this important. They’ll never invite us again. Some of us need this to earn a living, you
know!”

  I stare at her, startled. She looks hurt, as if I am being completely unreasonable. I had never thought of it her way.

  “But… But…” I don’t know what to say.

  She narrows her eyes. “Are you sure this guy was Dr Carrington? Did you see him clearly? What was he wearing?”

  “Erm, I think… A cream and red waistcoat, and a white shirt underneath.”

  She raises a perfectly arched brow. “Like what the waiters were wearing tonight?”

  “Oh.” Now I feel stupid. I wrack my brain, trying to remember more details but there is nothing concrete. She is right. It couldn’t have been him. How would he even know I was here? My shoulders slump.

  She links her arm with mine. “Good. Now you’re seeing sense. Let’s not run away from shadows. I want to see that rose garden, and I told someone I would meet him there after I met you.” She gives me a meaningful glance.

  I shake my head. “Why don’t you just go meet your, er, friend? I just want to go back to my room.”

  She looks disappointed, as if I am being boring and sulky, like a child. I don’t want to spoil her romantic rendezvous, and yet I want to plead with her to help me find the way back to our rooms. I don’t want to go alone.

  And then, to my relief I see a member of staff heading our way. One of the security people who I’ve seen before. I wave vigorously until he comes towards us and enquires if he can help. I ask him to show me the way back to my room.

  “I’m sorry,” I tell Lila. I can tell she is annoyed. “Maybe we can talk tomorrow night?”

  She shrugs, looking disappointed with me. “Suit yourself.”

  “Wait. Did you hear anything about my rumor?” I ask.

  “God, you and your stupid rumor,” she snaps. She stalks off.

  I watch her, feeling sad, and guilty for having upset her. The last thing I want is to lose a friend.

  Chapter 32

  DIANA

  I get to my room just as Storm is arriving. He approaches from the opposite direction, strolling almost lazily, and he smiles when he sees me. His smile is brilliant. It makes me feel light as air.

  When he gets close, I forget my fears about Dr Carrington and I forget that Lila is mad at me. I even forget to thank the staff member who brought me here. By the time I realize my rudeness, the man has already discreetly slipped away.

  Storm is holding a single long-stemmed rose in his hand, its velvety petals the color of blood.

  “For me?” I murmur.

  He snaps off the long thorny part of the stem and carefully places the bloom behind my ear. It is deliciously fragrant.

  “Beautiful,” he says.

  And yet in the center of his deep dark eyes I sense a distance, as if someone else is in there, watching me. That asymmetrical slice of brilliant green in his left eye must be disorientating me. I shiver, feeling that something is not right.

  “Storm,” I ask, putting my hand on his chest. “Did something happen?”

  “Nothing.”

  “You seem… different.”

  “Do I?” Again there is that momentary flash of something in his gaze. I cannot tell if I imagined it or not.

  “What did Caroline want?” I ask, overcome by my suspicions.

  “To talk about business.”

  “Oh. Do you and she work together?”

  “No. I had no interest in what she had to say.”

  “Ok.” I feel immensely relieved, and a little embarrassed for being jealous. “I thought you might go back to the ballroom. How did you know to find me here?”

  “I just knew,” he says.

  I start to turn in order to open the door to my room, but he shakes his head. “We can talk tomorrow. I should go now.”

  “I don’t want you to go yet.”

  “I came to see if you got back to your room. To make sure you were safe.”

  “I am now that you’re here.”

  But he is frowning. He has noticed my torn dress and how I am having to hold it in place. “What happened?”

  “It was an accident. Nothing to worry about.”

  “Was it Caroline?”

  My eyebrows rise in surprise. “No,” I say.

  Just then the doors at the end of the corridor burst open and a couple comes through. It is Maxima, her raven-hair in wild disarray as, laughing, she drags her partner by the hand. They run past us, in a hurry for privacy. She smirks when she sees me with Storm. They disappear into her room.

  Her smirk irritates me. As if she has caught me hesitating. I open my door and pull Storm in after me. “Stay. Just a little while.”

  I don’t want him to leave. If he stays here where I can see him, then he won’t be out there where somebody can strangle him tonight. He will be safe while my rumor flushes out the killer. Once inside, Storm hangs reluctantly by the door, a thoughtful frown on his face like something is on his mind. Something too deep for my current mood.

  I tug him gently towards the rug in the center of the room. “Come dance with me.”

  He sighs. “Really?”

  “One last birthday dance,” I insist. It is an excuse to be close to him, to be held in his embrace.

  He acquiesces, letting me pull him close and wrapping his arms around me. He rests his cheek gently on top of my head. I wrap my arms tightly around his waist. We step perfectly in tune, as if we can both hear a sweet silent music playing.

  After some time he says, “Are you going to tell me what you meant about having a psychic vision?”

  I lean my head up to look into his face. I intend to tell him everything, about my life back home, about my fears of being locked away, about seeing Xander and him being killed in my visions, about Caroline’s threats to me. But I really don’t want him to get mad like Lila warned me about.

  “Do we need to talk about that now?” I say softly. “Can we just enjoy this moment. Please?”

  “I’m worried about you,” he says.

  “I’m not the one in danger.”

  He lets out a short laugh that is more frustration than humor. “I can take care of myself. It’s you who is attracting trouble. That rumor you spread is getting uglier with every re-telling. Caroline is not happy about it.”

  “Did she talk to you about it?”

  “She mentioned it, yes. She’s fiercely protective of her reputation. She took the rumor personally.”

  My heart starts beating faster. So my rumor has upset Caroline, has it? What does Caroline have to be afraid of? But then another thought makes me bite my lip. I hadn’t considered how she might react if she found out it was me who spread it. Especially after she threatened me. She might think I was personally attacking her reputation.

  “Does she know it was me who started it?”

  “I think she suspects it.”

  “Did she say anything else about me?”

  “Like what?”

  I shake my head. If she never told Storm that she thinks I was chasing after Xander, then I don’t want to mention it either. Xander has no place in this moment.

  “Did you two reminisce about old times?” I ask sadly.

  “No,” he says. “I prefer to live in the now.”

  He puts his thumb just below the full curve of my bottom lip, almost touching it. We stand there, looking at each other, and swaying slightly to the music that only we two can hear. Suddenly the night feels magical. It is like we two are alone in the world with each other, and that is all that we need.

  “Storm,” I murmur.

  His head lowers ever so slowly towards mine, and I tilt my face up. The tips of our noses nudge gently. If either of us moved our heads just a little bit our lips would brush. The moment teeters on a fine edge, full of infinite possibility.

  “I should go,” he whispers.

  “Stay.”

  He shakes his head wearily. “I’m not feeling like myself.”

  “I don’t care.”

  His thumb traces my cheek. “You would care if—”

 
My bedroom door flies open, banging loudly against the wall it hits. I throw my arms around Storm as if to protect him. Xander is standing in the doorway. His fists are clenched. He sees me standing there clutching Storm and he sneers. Realizing the torn bodice of my dress has fallen away, I hastily pull it back into place.

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Storm snarls at Xander. He pulls me behind him protectively.