A hex gone wrong, p.38
A Hex Gone Wrong, page 38
“Most of the wolves at the pool hall were gray or brown.”
“Think the black wolf was the one who attacked the woman?”
“I’ll check with the crime scene investigators,” Cal said. “Maybe they recovered black wolf hairs at the scene of the crime.”
“If it was a black wolf shifter, how do we find him?” Deme asked. “We can’t just line up all the seemingly human men in the city and tell them to shift and see what we get.”
“I felt him when he showed up at the hospital. When he smothered Amanda,” Selene said. “And I’ve felt him again since.”
“When?” Gryph demanded.
Selene looked away, refusing to meet Gryph’s gaze. “When you dropped me off at my apartment earlier today.”
Gryph frowned. “When you weren’t feeling well?”
“Which means he knows where you live.” Gryph’s lips pressed together. “Damn.”
“I don’t like it, Selene,” Deme said. “Anywhere else?”
“I felt him again when the truck tried to run us over.” Her brow furrowed. “I tried to read his mind, but it was as if he knew, and pushed back.”
“And almost made roadkill out of you.” Gryph gripped her shoulders. “Promise me you’ll let us know the next time you sense his presence.”
She nodded, the intensity in Gryph’s expression making her very aware of the warmth of his hands on her arms. His jacket swung open, revealing his muscular chest, reminding her of what it felt like to run her hands across his taut skin.
His nostrils flared and his fingers tightened.
“You should stay with one of us tonight,” Brigid said.
“Yeah,” Aurai agreed. “He finished off Amanda to keep her from talking and ran down the Devil’s Disciples dude. If the killer knows you can sense him, he might target you.”
“And he knows where you live,” Gina pointed out.
Selene shook her head. “I’ll be fine in my own place. I have locks on my doors.”
“What about when you open your store?” Gina persisted.
“Close it for the next few days,” Brigid ordered.
Selene laughed. “I can’t close my store for long, or I’ll go out of business. And I can’t hide in my apartment, I have places to go and people depending on me for the charity ball.”
“I’ll hire someone else to take care of things,” Gryph announced.
“No way.” She moved out of Gryph’s hands. “I’ve worked too hard coming up with the costumes for the waitstaff. If you take it away from me, how will I pay the suppliers?”
“I’ll pay them.”
“No, this is a chance for me to get my name and my work seen.” Selene crossed her arms over her chest. “I’m not going into hiding because of what might happen. It might not happen and I will have missed this chance.”
Aurai leaned close to Gryph. “You’re not going to convince her now. When she gets that look, she’s planted her heels in the dirt and she’s not going to let you change her mind.”
Selene rolled her eyes. “I can hear everything you’re saying, Aurai. I’m right here, and I’m not running scared.”
“We don’t want you to end up like Amanda.” Gina slipped an arm around her waist. “You said he pushed back when you tried to read him. What if he attacks you?”
“You can’t throw fireballs.” Brigid spun a ball of fire in her palm.
“And you don’t have the ability to tie him up.” Deme stood with her fists on her hips. “What will you do to defend yourself?”
“I have a brain, you know.” Selene glanced at her feet, wanting the conversation to end so that she could get home to bed. “I’ll think of something.”
“That wolf had to be huge and heavy, Selene,” Cal said. “How is your brain going to fight him off? It could be like throwing a BB at a fence post. You might hit it, but it’s not going to have any effect. You have to go after an animal that large with an elephant gun and blow it out of the water.”
“I can handle it without an elephant gun,” Selene said quietly.
“What aren’t you telling us?” Brigid’s eyes narrowed. “Was that you holding back the wolves attacking Gryph in the pool hall? By the goddess, when did you learn how to do that?”
Selene’s cheeks burned. “It just happened.”
“You did that?” Deme grinned. “I wondered why they couldn’t get to Gryph.”
“How?” Gina asked.
Gryph’s frown deepened. “What are you talking about?”
Selene shrugged, not wanting to make a big deal out of it. Talking about her abilities only made it more apparent that she had some control over others’ minds. How soon would it be before Gryph realized she might have the ability to control his thoughts and feelings? Thus the reason for her to stay out of relationships she really cared about. And for some reason, she felt this one had the potential to be one of those. “I can’t explain it and, if it’s all the same to you, I’d like to go home and get some rest. It’s been a stressful night, as it is.” To Deme, she added, “Let me know what you learn, if anything, from the lieutenant.”
Deme gripped her hand. “Will do.”
“Don’t try being a hero,” Gina added. “We’re your sisters. We’re in this together.”
“Yeah.” Aurai extended her other hand to Gina. Soon all the Chattox sisters stood in a circle and, as one, chanted:
“Feel the power,
Free our hearts,
Find our way
Be the one.
With the strength of the earth,
With the rising of the wind,
With the calm of the water,
With the intensity of fire,
With the freedom of spirit,
The goddess is within us.
She is power.
We are her.
We are one.
Blessed be.”
They broke apart and Selene joined Gryph. “I’m ready.”
It wasn’t until they got into his SUV that he sat back against the seat and stared across at her. “Maybe you can fill me in on everything.”
She looked away. “You heard it all from my sisters.”
“I’d like to hear the part about your controlling a pack of wolves with your mind.”
Selene lowered her eyelids and sent a silent prayer to the goddess to help her let this man go. There was no other way.
Chapter 11
Gryph drove away from Selene’s sisters, the moon shining bright in the sky. So many thoughts churned in his head with one rising to the top. “Let me get this straight. You can read minds?”
Selene sighed. “Sometimes. If the thought is prominent in the person’s mind, sometimes I can hear their thoughts word-for-word. More often, it’s a feeling, emotion or sense.”
“Can you read my thoughts right now?”
“I can sense you’re angry and that you have a lot on your mind. Images are flashing through of the wolves, the truck and the interior of the pool hall.”
“And what do you see about you?”
Her cheeks reddened and she glanced at her hands, twisting in her lap. “I sense confusion.”
“Anything else?”
“Anger...and...lust.” She stared out the window, her chest rising and falling with shorter, ragged breaths. Her reflection was one of a woman torn by honesty and longing.
Gryph almost pulled to the side of the road and took her into his arms. Instead, he shifted his gaze back to the road in front of him. “I’m not sure I like having someone in my head.” His fingers tightened on the wheel. “Granted, if you hadn’t sensed my distress the night I went for a swim in the river, I’d most likely be dead. But this mind reading and maneuvering is another thing entirely. Is that how you manipulated the wolves attacking me?”
“Something like that. I didn’t even know I could stop those wolves. It just...happened.”
“Nothing just happens like that. What were you feeling at the time? Was it like a buildup of emotions that manifests itself in a type of force field?”
“I don’t know.” She pinched the bridge of her nose. “Could we not talk about this?”
He bit back the questions spilling into his head and nodded. For the next few minutes he sat in silence, going over everything that had happened over the past forty-eight hours.
The attack on Amanda, Selene showing up to save him, the intense thought he’d had right before the leader of the wolf pack had transformed from human to animal. In his head, he’d felt the urge to change. As though someone told him to change.
When he pulled up in front of Selene’s building, Gryph shifted into Park and stared at the storefront with the pretty sign and dainty vintage and designer clothing display in the window.
Selene reached for the door handle.
He grabbed her hand before she could get out and held on with a firm grip. “Why didn’t you tell me?”
She twisted her wrist, trying to slip out of his grasp. “It’s not something you announce to strangers.”
“Okay, I get why you didn’t tell me, at first. Same reason I keep my inner beast secret. But later, you might have given me a hint.”
She quit struggling and stared at where his hand held her wrist. After a long pause she said, “I was afraid.”
“That I’d be angry?”
She glanced up. “Well, you are, aren’t you?”
“Only because you didn’t bother to tell me you could be reading my mind and pushing thoughts into my head.” He released her hand.
Selene didn’t get out right away. “I know. I should have told you. But I didn’t expect things to go as fast or as far as they did. I expected to walk away from you before then.”
“Instead, we made love in my office.” His jaw tightened, a muscle twitching in the hardness. “Did we because you wanted to, or because I wanted to?”
She flipped her hair back. “That’s why I didn’t tell you. I wanted to and I was afraid you might not want to as much as I did. For all I know, I could have pushed the thought into your mind. I’m sorry. It’s just that I wanted you, so very badly.” Her head dipped again, her gaze shifting away from his. She turned and scrambled for the door handle, missing several times before she found it and jerked it hard to open.
Gryph was out of the SUV and around the front to her side before she could drop to the ground and run. He reached for her waist and slid her down the front of his body, sure to let her know the effect she was having on him. Slowly, he settled her on her feet, his hands resting on her waist. “Are you pushing thoughts into my head now?”
“I don’t know,” she whispered.
With his thumb, he brushed a stray hair across her cheek. He was so close he could smell her fragrance, a mix of herbal shampoo and shay-butter body lotion. He wanted to taste her, to feel her skin against his. “What are you thinking?”
She chewed her bottom lip before answering. “That I should go inside, and you should go home.”
He bent his head, his lips hovering over hers, so close he could feel her breath. “Is that all?”
Her gaze shifted to his lips. “No,” she whispered.
The brush of air across his mouth was almost his undoing. His fingers tightened on her hips. “I have the sudden urge to kiss you.”
Her brow furrowed. “You see? That’s exactly why you should leave and never come back.” She pressed her hands against his chest in a weak attempt to push him away.
He caught her fingers in his, bent and pressed his lips to her fingertips. “No, I want that kiss.” His mouth slipped across hers, a feathery brush at first, then he was crushing her in his arms, holding her so close, their bodies melded together.
She opened to him, her mouth parting.
His tongue thrust against her, darting and tangling in a warm wet dance, making his blood turn to molten lava, pushing hard through his veins, flowing south to the hard evidence of his lust.
Selene moaned into his mouth, her fingers digging into his shirt, dragging him impossibly closer, her leg circling behind his, her crotch riding his thigh.
Gryph broke off the kiss long enough to say, “Your key.”
Selene fumbled in her jeans pocket, and then handed him the key to her apartment. He scooped her into his arms and carried her down the short flight of stairs to her basement home, dropping her to her feet in order to unlock the door.
As Gryph reached for the doorknob, Selene grabbed his wrist. “Wait.” Her tone was soft, but intense.
That concentrated nudge of danger rippled through him. He recognized it as the same feeling he’d had just before the wolf leader transformed. He stared down at Selene.
Her brow furrowed and her eyes narrowed as she nudged the door with her fingertips, jerking them back as if they’d been burned. The door swung open without resistance, the doorjamb splintered, the lock broken. “He was here.”
Gryph shoved her behind him. “Stay here.”
Her hand touched his back. “He’s not inside. I can’t sense him.”
“Fair enough.” He turned to face her. “Humor me, and let me check things out before you go inside.”
She nodded, shrinking against the walls of the alcove, hidden in the shadows from the streetlights above.
Gryph allowed his inner beast to rise to the surface, just enough to give him good night vision and increase his auditory and olfactory senses. If Selene was wrong, and the intruder was still there, he needed to be ready to defend himself.
Once inside the apartment, he slipped from one room to the next, checking beneath the bed, in the closets and behind the shower curtain. As small as the apartment was, it didn’t take long. When he returned to the living room, Selene stood in the doorway and flicked on the light switch.
A soft glow filled the room, chasing away the shadows, revealing a room that appeared to be untouched, other than the shattered doorjamb.
“Is anything missing or out of place?” Gryph asked.
Selene walked silently around the room, touching picture frames, lifting items from tabletops. She entered her bedroom, her frown deepening. “He was in here the longest.” Opening the closet, she ran her hands across the clothes, pausing as her fingers touched a gown she’d designed and sewn herself for the upcoming charity ball.
“Are you sure it was Amanda’s killer?”
She nodded, a shiver shaking her from her shoulders all the way down her spine.
Gryph sensed her unease, the fear and anger over having had her personal space violated. His heart aching for her, he hooked her arm and turned her to face him, brushing a strand of hair from her face. “Your sisters were right. You’re not staying here tonight.”
“It’s my home.” Her gaze skimmed across the furnishings, the artwork on the wall, the candles lining the tabletops.
“Yeah, but it’s just a place. And if he’s been here once, he knows where you live, and there’s a chance he’ll return. You can’t stay here.”
Her body stiffened. “I won’t be frightened away.”
“Think through this. Your doorjamb is busted, you don’t have a way to lock him out, or anyone else for that matter. Not that locks stopped him this time. If you stay here, you’re setting yourself up for attack.”
She stared at the door, another shiver rattling across her body, vibrating against his grip on her arm. “I can stay with Deme.”
“You’ll stay with me.”
“No!” She jerked free of his hand. “I’ll be fine at Deme’s place.”
“She might not be there yet.”
She glanced around as if in a daze. “I’ll call. And if she’s not home, I’ll go to Brigid’s.”
Gryph’s jaw tightened. “Are you afraid to stay with me?”
“Yes.” She gazed into his eyes. “Aren’t you afraid I’ll manipulate your mind—make you do things you had no intention of doing?”
His lips twitched upward. “Like making love to you? I can see where that would be a hardship. Look, if it bothers you that much, I’ll sleep on the couch, you can have my bed and I’ll resist any urges, yours or mine, to make love to you.”
“What if I can’t?”
“I guess that’s the chance we’ll have to take.” He spun her around and gave her a gentle shove toward the bedroom. “Get whatever you need for tonight and tomorrow. And hurry, I want to make a stop before we settle in for the night.”
“All the more reason for me to stay with my sisters. I don’t want to be a burden.”
“Says the woman who rescued me. Seems to me, I owe you one for saving my life.”
She shrugged. “I’d have done it for anyone hurt.”
“You’re stalling. I want to get there before everyone is asleep.”
“Where are you taking me?”
“My place first, and then to where I grew up.”
* * *
Selene hurried through her bedroom and bathroom, throwing clothing, panties and toiletries into a small duffel bag, her heart skipping beats every time she thought about where they were going. Gryph wanted to take her where he grew up. Curiosity pushed her to move faster.
“Do you happen to have a hammer and nails?” he called out.
“In the kitchen pantry.” Within five minutes, she had everything she needed for a night in Gryph’s apartment, including a condom. She dug in her stash for another, and another. Her body flushed with warmth. Not that she intended to use them. But a woman never knew when desire would outweigh caution.
Her lower abdomen clenched and lust washed over her like butter melting over a hot potato, sliding into every crevice.
Finally, she emerged from the bedroom, her cheeks flushed, her insides trembling in anticipation of the night to come. She sensed that Gryph didn’t share his life easily, and that he was going to show her where he’d grown up was something big.
