The Magical Christmas Cat

Afraid that the day's excitement would keep her up too late, Ruby closed her eyes expecting to fight for sleep. Instead she drifted off almost immediately.



Callida wanted to fight against the bonds that restrained her, but she was too weak to move. He had put something in her wine, something intended to take away the last of her strength. She was helpless, bound and prone on a cold stone floor. She wanted to call for help, but even if she could manage to make a proper sound, who would come? No one.



She had no one to rescue her, no one to miss her when she was gone. The one person she had believed to be her friend had put her in this position. Dezso had pretended to care for her, he had promised to show her the wonders of Rome, but instead he had kept her here, far from the great city, always promising tomorrow and tomorrow and tomorrow. He had clothed her in fine chitons and fed her an abundance of food and given her gifts of jewels and other pretty things. And now he had betrayed her; he had poisoned her and bound her hands and left her here. Why?



The door to her stone cell opened, and Dezso walked inside. He smiled at her, smiled with great warmth even though he had lied to her and made her his prisoner and drugged her so that she could barely move.



"What you are about to do is very important, Callida," he said in his soothing, pleasant voice. "You will make the ultimate sacrifice in the name of a power much greater than any you have ever known."



"Please, let me go," she whispered.



Dezso shook his head. "I cannot. It is time. Do you see the moon?"



Callida turned her head—it was a great effort to do so, as her head felt heavy and her vision swam—and she saw the full moon through the small window high in the stone wall of her cell. It was bright, and large, and it shimmered with power. "I see."



The man she had loved stood over her and began to chant, calling to a demon to rise. Callida tried to scream but could not. Dezso clasped something in his hand, and from that hand black smoke began to rise. No, this was not smoke it was simply blackness, a darkness so deep it looked bottom-less. What began as a formless blackness grew and took shape before her very eyes. The shape was not that of a man but was of a large, black cat with tremendous paws and glowing red eyes. It was solid and yet was not, as if a great nothingness in the shape of a large cat floated on air.



With a mounting horror Callida realized that Dezso offered her to the blackness, he gave her to this monster that grew and took shape before her. Again she tried to scream, but no sound came forth, not even when the dark cat hovered above her, blocking out all other sights, and its red eyes captured and held hers.



She stopped trying to scream. It was too late for that.



Much too late. And she was too terrified to make a sound or fight her fate. The demon—for yes, it was indeed a demon that Dezso had called forth to take her—placed its empty face close to hers. And it inhaled. . .



Ruby was jerked out of the dream with a scream. Her own scream, one that died quickly, caught in her throat. Good heavens, she'd never had a nightmare like that one! She'd been watching and participating at the same time, she'd been terrified as if she'd been the one sprawled on cold stone, sacrificed to a dark monster. Lying in bed, Ruby rubbed a hand up and down her arm. She still felt chills, as if her blood ran icy cold. What had she eaten at the party to bring on such a nightmare?



She glanced at the clock. Not quite 2:00 a.m. She had two more hours before her alarm went off but wasn't sure that she could sleep after that vivid dream.



Great. What a way to start the week!



It was dark in her bedroom, the only illumination coming from the bedside digital clock and a decorative porcelain night-light on the other side of the room.



What little light she had was enough to draw her eyes to the object that sat on her bedside table, an object that should not be there. The cat figurine, the one she had allowed the professor to borrow, stared at her.



Ruby muttered a curse as she sat up slowly, blinking hard, wondering if this was still a dream.



She'd seen Benedict walk away from her house with the figurine in his hand. How had it gotten here? She reached out slowly and touched the pale green cat.



Strangely enough, it felt warm. Alive. She drew her hand back. That nightmare had certainly revved up her imagination.



The damn cat had not been on her bedside table—had not been in the house—when she'd gone to sleep. It was here now, and that was fact, not the product of a bad dream. She shook herself into full awareness, throwing off the last of her dream along with the blanket that covered her andkept her warm. Had Zane Benedict broken into her house and placed the statuette there? What other explanation was there? She threw her legs over the side of the bed. Was this supposed to be some kind of sick joke?



No, this wasn't funny, it was creepy as hell. Studly or not, she did not want men she barely knew—or even men she knew well— creeping into her bedroom at night to leave signs of their visit. Ruby grabbed her bathrobe and stuck -her feet into warm, fuzzy slippers.



She snatched up the green cat and headed for the front door.



She stopped in the hallway between her bedroom and the living room, her step stuttering. What was she thinking? Her first instinct was to run across the street and confront Benedict with the evidence, but maybe that was just what he wanted. Maybe he was waiting for her by his front door—or in the darkness somewhere between her door and his. Two in the morning. Holland Court slept. There would be no one to see her, and no one to hear, if anything went wrong.



Ruby fell into the wall for support, and when her knees went weak she gave in and sank to the floor.



Until this moment she hadn't thought to be afraid of the professor. Why should she? He was a known factor, a quiet neighbor who ran every evening and kept odd hours and mowed his yard when it needed to be done. She'd always suspected he was one of the very smart people who lived in his own little world, which was odd, perhaps, but odd in a normal way. He was a well-respected member of the academic community. A couple of her employees had mentioned him a time or two, not only bringing up the fact that he was cute but that they loved his classes. A while back she had heard one student mention that he taught some kind of psychology.



She remained on the floor for a few long moments.



Her luck with men had never been the best. They turned out to be unfaithful or dishonest or else they lost interest in her and her workaholic schedule. Not that she'd had a slew of serious relationships in her twenty-eight years, but there had been a few. None of them had panned out, and in the past couple of years she'd been content enough just to drift alone. It was easier that way.



But now, sitting in the dark with a nightmare still on her mind and the proof that a man she barely knew had been in her bedroom, she didn't know whom to call. A year ago she would've called Aunt Mildred, but Mildred was gone.



She could call Todd, she supposed. He'd love that, wouldn't he?



No, she should call the police. With that in mind, Ruby pushed herself to her feet and walked toward the living room and the phone there. Of course, by the time she reached the couch and grabbed for the receiver, she realized that she couldn't call the police.



She could swear up and down that the cat figurine had been in Zane's possession when she'd gone to bed, but she had no proof. She wasn't hurt.



A quick check of the doors and windows showed that everything was locked tight. The dead bolts were engaged on the front door and the back. To all appearances, it looked as if it would be impossible for Zane or anyone else to have broken into her house to leave the cat.



That statement alone was enough to keep her from dialing 911. Someone broke into my house to leave this cat figurine, then sneak out, leaving no other sign that he was ever here, and somehow locking the dead bolts behind him.



Deflated and wondering if she was losing her mind, Ruby collapsed on the couch, the figurine still clutched in her hand. She carefully placed the green cat on the end table, grabbed the phone book out of the table drawer, and snatched up the phone.



Zane hadn't been asleep very long when the phone rang, jerking him out of a deep sleep. Shit. Phone calls that came in the wee hours of the morning were never good. Never. He lifted the receiver and glanced at the caller ID. Shit, again. He barked hoarsely, "What's wrong?"



The voice he expected to hear responded, "What makes you think anything is wrong?"



He breathed a sigh of relief. Ruby sounded okay, at least. "It's almost three in the morning," he said. "No one calls at three in the morning unless something is wrong."



She breathed steadily, perhaps more deeply than was normal, but did not immediately respond. After a couple of minutes that dragged on too long, she said,



"I have to know. How did you get this blasted cat into my house?"



Zane threw off the covers and leapt from the bed, cordless phone in hand as he ran into his office, which was set up in the spare room across the hall from his bedroom. Sure enough, the figurine he'd left sitting on his desk was gone. He had studied it for quite some time before retiring, but he was positive he'd left it right there.



Obviously, the cursed thing had found its way to Ruby's house. He couldn't tell her the truth. Not yet.



She would never believe him, and he wouldn't be able to do what had to be done.



"Well?" she prompted sharply.



"I don't know what you're talking about," he said, forcing a yawn she was sure to hear.



"The little cat knickknack that was left under the tree by my secret admirer," she said testily. "I let you have it to study, but when I woke up after having a bad dream, the thing was sitting on the table by my bed. Don't play dumb with me. You put it there, and I want to know how and why."



"You changed your mind, don't you remember?"



Zane said, trying to sound sympathetic. "I was going to study it. It's quite an interesting piece, and I think it might be jade, and there are small markings that I'd like to magnify and study."



"I didn't change my mind," she said softly. "You took it home with you."



"No, you kept it. If you've changed your mind I can pick it up tomorrow . . ."