Chapter Two
Shannon moaned and tried to rub her forehead, which throbbed like the morning after a late night tequila binge. Her hands were locked behind her.
Handcuffs? What the hell?
She seesawed her wrists. They’d bruise from the abuse, but she needed her hands free. The handcuffs didn’t loosen. Courage abandoned her. Her throat worked, closing tight. She felt herself flying apart, felt her control shredding.
Deep breaths. Don’t freak. Look around.
This wasn’t the bar. Bookshelves lined the walls, filled with assorted items. Three tables littered with antiques sat to her right. The smell of musty air mixed with cleanser reminded her of an old public building.
“If your wrists are bound, you can’t dimension hop to escape, but you can still use magic to protect yourself.” Her mother’s instruction from long ago blasted through her brain. The concept of jumping from this reality to another, where the people and time was similar and yet not, was mind-blowing and not something she’d attempted.
The only exit from the windowless room was a closed door fifteen feet away, perhaps locked.
Get up. Test the door. Leave before whoever brought you here comes back.
Her neck tingled as if someone watched her.
More Mom words drifted through her mind. “If captured, don’t show the enemy your fear, honey, and don’t come unglued.”
She schooled her expression to reflect blankness. Her best option to defend herself was magic. She wasn’t sure how to use the mysterious ability to manipulate elements, which she’d inherited mere weeks ago. Yesterday’s experimental attempt to control wind whipped up a tornado that almost killed her. She wished she’d paid a bit more attention when her mother discussed how to control the powers. Too bad the magic couldn’t break the handcuffs.
A man stood with his back against the wall in the dark corner nearest the exit. He was taller and broader than Harnish.
She pushed her witchy senses to read his aura, but it didn’t work.
No, no, no. Come on. Work!
Pain throbbed behind her eyes as she swung her legs over the edge of the slatted wooden bench. She struggled upright.
“Good nap, Miss Shannon?” her watcher drawled in a rich Southern accent. His leg dropped off the wall to the floor.
Energy buzzed through her head and resonated deep in her chest. Uh-oh. Even if she couldn’t see the colors of his aura and gauge his intent, the energy coming off him signified some sort of magical power. He might be another warlock or sorcerer after that which she didn’t have.
“Who’re you?” Her heart thump-thumped piercingly between her ears.
“Does your head hurt?” His deep, rugged voice resonated with concern. His arrogant stance seemed familiar.
“Do we know each other?” She blinked past her head pain to see details. The set of his lips communicated a clear my-way-or-else attitude, but she couldn’t make out his face above his mouth. She needed to see his eyes.
“Everyone knows you’ve come down from New York. The big-city girl visiting the family estate.” His tone wasn’t taunting or threatening. Only factual.
“Why’d you bring me here?” She jiggled the cuffs, waiting for him to remove them.
He didn’t.
This might come down to her need to use magic. Crap.
An HVAC system kicked on. Cold air blew from an overhead vent. She asked the air to pin her captor to the wall. She would exchange his freedom for hers.
Nothing happened. She tried again. Not even so much as a gust stirred the air. Since she got the power, she’d been able to whip up at least a modest breeze.
Whatever drug knocked her out had also stolen her abilities. Do not panic. She needed some kind of weapon, anything, no matter how primitive, with which she could protect herself. A piece of broken glass sat on one of the tables. It didn’t get much more primitive than that. Next, she had to get him to take off the handcuffs.
“I thought you recognized me in the bar, darlin’?” With a push away from the wall he moved closer. Light filled in all the previously hidden details. She sucked in a startled breath. His face, so familiar, had been created with great care to sharp detail, but injury had wreaked havoc. Linear scars marred his right cheek, the one she hadn’t seen in the bar.
“Jason?” Her breath stuck in her chest. “Jason Merck?”
“It’s Merck.” He didn’t smile. Didn’t look even remotely pleased. His clothes were simple, a long-sleeved dark T-shirt, bunched up on his strong forearms and jeans. Odd dress for the summer when iced tea and air conditioning were essentials to surviving the sweltering heat. The shirt pressed tight to the ripped muscles she’d ogled in the bar. Colorful tattoos stretched down to the tops of his hands in skeletonlike stylized lines, broken by foreign lettering.
His eyes were so blue they reminded her of Mediterranean Sea pictures.
She’d never forgotten those eyes or those lips. Stop thinking about his fricking eyes and mouth. He kidnapped you. “Why am I in handcuffs?”
A few more dramatic wrist tugs didn’t inspire him to unlock them.
“You were hallucinating. I worried you’d hurt yourself.”
If that were true, then he would’ve bound her ankles too. He must know what she was and didn’t want her escaping via dimension hop.
No, he couldn’t know. She wanted to believe him about the hallucinations. Good Lord. Staring at his eyes, she had a hard time reconciling her memory of the rebellious, yet considerate, teenager she’d crushed on for years and the man before her who’d evolved into something dangerous and dark.
He continued to stare at her as if she were an out-of-control flame he wasn’t quite sure he wanted to extinguish but found fascinating.
“Take the handcuffs off. Please.”
“How do I know you’re in your right mind now?”
She granted him her best squinty-eyed glare.
“There’s the Shannon I remember.” He twisted the Oakleys hanging on a black neck cord from his front to rest against his back. He’d done the sunglasses rotation hundreds of times while they’d waited for the bus together in high school. He may not be that guy anymore.
“The Jason I remember wouldn’t have put me in handcuffs.”
He smiled. “It’s Merck. I’ve been waiting for you to wake up so I can drive you home. We’re going in the same direction, neighbor.”
His smile lit up her body like she was still sixteen all over again and at the mercy of a crush on the out-of-her-league, hottest guy in school. No amount of air could steady her heart or nerves, but she sucked in a lungful.
You’re twenty-eight, not sixteen and getting kissed by him. He might be your enemy. “Why am I here if you planned to take me home?”
“I didn’t know if you wanted whoever was home to see you this way or if anybody would be home at all. Couldn’t leave you by yourself like this.”
“Right,” she said sarcastically.
“Are you visiting down here alone?”
None of his business who may or may not be down here with her. If he’d been acting out of altruism, he would’ve taken her home. The fact he didn’t meant he had an agenda.
“What do you remember about last night?” His smile faded. Furrows creased his forehead. Her gut believed his concern was legitimate. Yet, she was here and restrained. Even if not evil, Merck may be after the same item she sought.
“Did you slip me something last night?”
“I didn’t give you anything. I swear. Tell me what you remember.”
She jiggled the cuffs.
This time he moved forward and unlocked them, stepping away the moment he freed her.
With a jump, she grabbed the piece of glass off the table and held it toward him.
He didn’t look impressed by her threat. “I’m not going to hurt you.”
“Tell me how I got here.”
“You’ve been passed out for about,”—he rolled his wrist to view his watch—“fifteen hours.”
“What happened?” She glanced around again, her gaze snagging on a gun safe in the corner.
“Are you going to put that down?”
“No.”
He shrugged. “I wouldn’t want you to hurt yourself. Chad and I were at the bar last night. Remember him from high school?”
She nodded, recollecting Chad’s obsession for surfing with his bleached blond hair and signature fragrance of sunscreen.
Merck said, “We were playing pool with some out-of-towners—”
“You two are still hustling?” They’d been notorious in high school. Their post-hustle fights landed them in jail once or twice.
“I wouldn’t say we were hustling per se. When we do, we simply take advantage of people who equate our accents with stupidity.” He flashed a wolfish leer. “It wasn’t hard to miss you singing at the top of your lungs. I guess the tone deafness didn’t improve.”
“I’m not tone-deaf. And I don’t sing in public.”
“You sing when you’re drunk, apparently. I’ve got it videoed on my phone. Wanna see?” He pulled his phone out of his pocket.
“Show me.”
In silence, she watched the minute and a half of her hip-swaying and singing into her cell phone like it was a mike, accompanied by a tinny rendition of a familiar country song on the jukebox. Her face scorched as the terrible off-key performance ran to completion. Who was this woman singing? She didn’t do karaoke or anything that involved performance. Ever. He pulled the phone away when it ended.
“I wasn’t drunk. I don’t remember…that.” She pointed at where he’d put away his phone.
Merck’s eyebrows drooped low. “You were hanging out with this out-of-towner who got you outside after you serenaded the bar, and then you passed out. I can’t say you had a graceful lights-out moment, but I figured you weren’t on board with whatever the guy planned next.”
“Was he Asian?”
“He stuck out like a turd in a punchbowl. You think he slipped you something?” Merck’s gaze darkened. He ran a hand through his short, lightly gelled, blond hair, now so much shorter than he ever used to wear it.
“I didn’t drink anything.”
“He might’ve used a poison. Did you touch anything he gave you?”
The handshake. “Must’ve been something because that woman singing…that’s not me.”
“It could’ve happened to anyone.” His tone was gentle, as if he realized how mortified she was.
“I guess I’m lucky you and Chad were there.” Both of them there might not be coincidence. Perhaps, this was an elaborate hoax to get her to trust him.
“Everyone’s there on Friday night.”
“Did the guy say anything to you?” Such as why the hell he drugged her after she paid him for the scrying glass?
“He said you were drunk and needed a ride home, but I didn’t buy it. So I relieved him of you.” Something about his tone suggested the relieving part hadn’t been as simple as a verbal exchange.
“What happened exactly?”
He shrugged, dismissive. She’d have to get details from Chad, if she could find him. She could call his dad, who still worked at the tire store in town. She had to find the Asian to get the scrying glass back from him. She’d purchased the thing free and clear. However, this time when she confronted him, she’d take help with her.
“Most drugs would’ve knocked you out for maybe six or seven hours. Not fifteen.” His tone ended it as a question, not a statement. She wasn’t about to get into a discussion of the drug possibly being something magical, a spell or potion. Even though she’d always detected Merck had some sort of preternatural abilities, it wasn’t a topic either of them had discussed. Rule one in being a person with abilities was never be the first to reveal.
“Why were you at the bar?” he asked.
“It’s none of your business.” She finger-combed through a few tangles.
“It’s my business when you almost get yourself kidnapped and...” His voice dropped off.
She refused to answer. Alpha males didn’t scare her.
He cocked his head. “You’ve changed. You’re different. Tougher.”
“A lot’s happened in ten years.”
“I heard you went into journalism.”
“I’m not a journalist. I do camera work on a contract basis. Mostly TV stuff.”
“Isn’t the camera heavy to haul around?”
“Sometimes. The newer ones are lighter. You don’t think I can haul the old ones because I’m a girl?” She encountered this mentality all the time.
“I didn’t say that. I was just wondering. Are you visiting down here alone?”
“No.” She didn’t want to admit yes. Well, other than the well-armed, ex-MI6, druid bodyguard assigned to protect her. Eli was probably having a coronary at her house right now over her missing. She’d be lucky if he didn’t call in every druid in the U.S. and Canada to put her on guarded lockdown until her death.
“You have a husband…maybe a posse of kids waiting for you at home?”
She shook her head. “You?” Her gaze darted to his left hand, but she couldn’t see his ring finger.
“Nah. Your mother, how is she?”
“Dead.” Her mother’s parting words had sent her to this hot, humid, mosquito-infested coastal town where she’d supposedly find “help.” She needed help for the pile of cow shit she’d landed in.
“Sorry to hear that.” His words weighed heavily, as if he knew everything her mother’s death meant—the instant promo to head witch in her line and a destiny to lead the other six Pleiades witches. All of it unwanted. He couldn’t know all that, though. The information was a guarded secret amongst the Pleiades and their druid protectors, a secret all of them would die—many had died—to protect.
“Your brothers? I heard Tom got married.”
“Both of my brothers were killed last year.” They’d been defending her mom from witch hunters. God, she missed all of them.
“Damn.” He rubbed his forehead. “I’m sorry. They were good people.”
“Dad is still with us, but since Mom and my brothers are gone, he’s not the same.” She cleared her throat against the sudden tightness. “Last I heard you’d moved away. What’re you doing here?”
“I moved back not too long ago.”
“Is this where you live?” She gazed at the relics on the tables representing a mishmash of eras. Magical energy came from the items. They weren’t random artifacts but a hodgepodge of mystical items. None of them invited touching.
“This is work.” He crossed his arms.
His work involved mystical items. Damn it, he was after her for the same reason as all the other magical weirdoes she’d encountered in the past few weeks. She palmed the glass shard, still ready should he attack. “What exactly do you do?”
“I find people.”
“Like a private investigator? Or are you a bounty hunter?”
“Something like that.” He watched her while moving slowly forward. Six-foot-something of unpredictable, supernatural power, who might be a bounty hunter, intimidated her. Her head carried a pretty high price these days.
She stepped backward. Her legs caught on the edge of the bench and she ended in an awkward sit. The glass piece flew out of her hand.
“You’ve been here four days, Shannon. Is this a vacation for you, or are you down here for another reason?” His tone encouraged her to talk. Maybe it was a well-practiced skill, or he had persuasive powers.
“Have you been spying on me across the property line?” He was so close now that she picked up his subtle scent. Something clean, like aftershave or deodorant mixed with male.
“I noticed activity next door and figured you were back in town.”
“Why would it matter to you why I’m down here? It’s our family property. We visit a few times a year.”
For an instant, his face scrunched up as if he was irritated. Then his expression smoothed over. He extended his hand to her. “Let’s get you home.”
She regarded his offer of help, reluctant. He wanted something. Everything about her here at his work after she’d been poisoned was suspicious. Even if he hadn’t hurt her so far, he had just tried to grill her, and he had ill-defined magical powers. Right now, she trusted no one who wasn’t family.
Before she could decide one way or another on accepting his assistance, his hand closed around hers. The calluses at the base of his fingers rubbed against her palm. She liked his large hand around hers, warm and secure.
No, you can’t like it. Snap out of it. As soon as she was on her feet, she pulled free of his grasp. She skirted a few steps out of his reach. “I can take myself home, thank you. I’ll get my car from the bar parking lot.”
“I had a friend drop the car off at your place. I’ll drive you home. Come on.” He led her down the hallway of what turned out to be a generic small office building. The rest of the place was better lit and less cluttered, but didn’t look to house any other businesses. There was a room full of books and another with a bevy of security monitors flashing images of all angles of the building.
She wanted to trust him, but the desire lay in memories of the kid she always felt got a bad rap from adults, a guy whose mother hated him and who always seemed alone. As an adult, like her, he’d become a different person.
She retrieved her cell phone from her bra while he wasn’t looking, the only personal item still on her. Why had he left her cell phone?
It had charge and signal. Notification she had twenty-six voicemail messages flashed on the screen. She thrust it back into her bra moments before Merck glanced over his shoulder at her.
As they passed by an office with an open door, a man yelled in a thick Hispanic accent, “Did Sleeping Beauty wake up yet?”
“I thought you went out, Danny,” Merck replied.
“Already back. Just grabbed the mail. You wouldn’t believe my last phone call. You’ve been gazing at Sleeping Beauty so long…” Danny’s hazel eyes widened when she stepped into the doorway. His mouth closed against finishing the sentence. “You’d be Shannon Randolph?”
She nodded. The roomy office with two wooden desks reminded her of an off-exhibit storage room at a museum. Countless busts, partial sculptures, pots, and ancient vases had been shoved haphazardly onto crowded shelves. Perhaps, Merck sold artifacts in addition to finding people. If he wasn’t after the relic, maybe she could hire him to find it.
Three gigantic, gold-gilded, framed paintings of deities dominated the walls. They weren’t prints and she was pretty sure they featured Greek or Roman gods. A chill slithered down her spine. Too much Greek stuff in here. With her of Greek goddess ancestry and in need of finding a Greek God’s Trident, Merck was definitely in the don’t-trust category.
“Shannon, this is Danny Velez,” Merck introduced.
Danny stood, coming to an inch or two taller than her five-eight. His muscles bulged, suggesting gym rat, but his carriage and confidence hinted at a history with advanced combat training, only too familiar to her from years of druid bodyguards with such skills. He’d be handsome if it wasn’t for his aura of broody isolation. Something tortured this man. A prickle slid between her shoulders. Danny had some magical ability. Not strong like Merck’s power, but it was there. Maybe Danny was a dormant druid.
Shannon threw Danny her best smile, the one that could charm any man. Well, except Merck. She’d tried it on him and failed so many times years ago that she’d given up.
She shook Danny’s hand.
“You truly are Sleeping Beauty.” A flush settled high on Danny’s cheeks as his eyes darted down to her chest.
“Thanks. Good to meet you, Danny. This is quite an office you have here.”
Danny still stared at her shirt, which was designed to draw attention to her breasts. She didn’t think of herself as a flirt, but she enjoyed appreciation from a handsome man.
Merck cleared his throat. He’d crossed his arms and looked pissed. Over harmless flirting with Danny? Maybe it’d been her office comment?
Danny glanced around. “Yeah, we’ve picked up a few things over the years.” He faced Merck. His cheeks flushed a darker red. “Shit’s getting real on the water, Merck. Two more bodies washed up down in Savannah this morning. It’s all over the news. That makes six. The girls were about…” He cleared his throat. His eyes darted to her and then back to Merck. “Her age.”
“A serial killer?” Chills tickled her arms. She might’ve been the next dead body if not for Merck. Did that mean she trusted him now? No.
“I’m not sure if it’s a serial thing.” Merck scratched his chin. His gaze was guarded. He addressed Danny, “I’m going to run her home. Call me if you get any new leads on the unusual happenings.”
He wrapped his hand around her upper arm and propelled her out the front door.
“What’s Danny’s job?” she asked.
“He’s my assistant.”
“What unusual happenings is he to be on the lookout for? Serial killers?”
“There’ve been a some murders in the past few days. ’Round here people don’t die unless it’s an accident or domestic dispute. Those deaths were strange. They occurred since you’ve been back, actually.”
Was he accusing her of killing? She yanked her arm out of his grasp. “I can get home on my own.”
“Get in the damned car so I can take you home.” He hooked her arm before she took more than a step away.
She didn’t move. Her gut trusted him. Why it did made no sense. One too many red flags had gone up since she’d woken up.
“What can I say to convince you I’m not the bad guy here? That Asian fellow had been hired to kidnap you. I want to know why you were meeting someone like that at the bar.”
She should call Eli to pick her up. “I can get another ride.”
“Jesus, Shannon. I don’t know what’ve you gotten yourself into.” He let go of her and stepped away. “Fine. Call for a ride. But I’m not leaving you alone until your ride arrives.”
“I just woke up after being poisoned by a guy who deals in mystical items to find myself in a building filled with similar things. Then there’s you with whatever kind of magical skills you’ve got. I need to know what you’re up to.”
“You’re the one with the special skills. You arrived in the area and now weird stuff’s started happening...”
She crossed her arms. “You’ve got skills too.”
His eyes narrowed. “No, I don’t.”
“Oh, please. Let’s have honesty between us on this. I’ve known about you since the first time we met. Something spooked my parents enough to pull me out junior year and move north. I think it was you and your skills.”
“You’re reading into their decision to move. I think it was you who was spooked after we made out that night.”
She stared at him, getting conflicting aura readings off him. Hallelujah. Her reading skills were back.
“A little kiss isn’t enough to scare me. If I remember correctly, it was you who rushed me off your property and then stayed scarce ever since. Seems to me it was you who ran scared.” She pointed at him. “Your aura screams all kinds of complex magical mojo. It always has.”
“Okay.”
She couldn’t tell if he said it sarcastically or out of agreement. “Okay? You admit to having some sort of magical ability.”
“Why’re you down here, Shannon? Do you have something to do with these murders?”
“Do you really think I’m capable of killing someone?”
“Yes.”
She tried to keep her face blank when his aura swirled viciously with part anger, part determination, and part arousal. “All right. I admit I could kill someone if I really wanted to. I don’t have any desire to attack at random, but you are pushing me...”
Both his eyebrows shot up in challenge.
“What kind of people do you hunt, Merck?”
He dangled a round, black glass attached to a golden chain from his index finger. Its foul energy made her back up a step. “I hunt people who use black magic. Like witches with scrying glasses.”