by Maya Banks
offering goddamn apologies left and right.”
“Then what do you want?” she burst out. “What do you want? Because I don’t know and I’m not good at playing mind games or guessing games for that matter.”
He was suddenly right in front of her again, heat radiating from him in waves. His jaw was tightly clenched, his features as hard as stone. And he was pissed.
“You don’t get it, do you?”
“What? What don’t I get?” she yelled at him. “What is it that I’m supposed to be getting? Because I don’t know! All I know is that I’m bringing more pain and suffering to a family who has already experienced way too much.”
She broke off as a sob welled up in her chest, constricting her throat before spilling out, ugly and guttural. Her shoulders heaved and she covered her face with her hands.
Caleb sighed and then suddenly she was in his arms. She buried her face in his chest and wrapped her arms around his waist, holding on as if he were the only anchor in a vicious storm.
“What don’t I get?” she whispered against his shirt. “Because it seems to me I get exactly what the situation is.”
He grasped her shoulders and pulled her away so they were looking each other in the eyes.
“That I want you.”
She stared soundlessly at him as his words penetrated the thick curtain of despair and isolation. She went so still that she realized she was holding her breath and finally let it escape in one long exhale.
“What you don’t get is that I want you,” Caleb repeated. “What you don’t get is that the idea of you in the hands of a monster terrifies me. What you don’t get is that you are important to me. And what you don’t get is that no matter how much my sister hates you being here, I’m not letting you walk out of my life and that has nothing to do with any debt I or my family owes you. Or any obligation I may have felt a year ago. It has absolutely nothing to do with you saving Tori. I won’t let you go because I want you to stay. I realize you’ve never had anyone fight for you, Ramie. But you do now. You have me.”
“No one has ever wanted me,” she whispered. “They’ve wanted what I can do, what my abilities can do, but never me. Do you know what that feels like?”
Caleb’s expression softened and his eyes darkened, not with pity, because that truly would have driven her over the edge. But with understanding.
“We aren’t as different as you think,” he said quietly. “I’m a Devereaux. And people—women—want what that name brings. Money, power, prestige. But they don’t want me. Caleb. They want Caleb Devereaux.”
Sharp understanding hit her and shame burned her cheeks. She was so self-absorbed, so ensconced in her own pity party that she failed to see beyond her own issues. Caleb had considered her selfish, before, when he hadn’t known how her abilities worked. He wasn’t wrong. She was selfish. And it wasn’t a pleasant revelation.
She’d gone through her whole life expecting the worst, settling for the worst. Never fighting for more. Never expecting more. How could she hope to gain more if she didn’t demand it?
She’d spent so much time railing at the injustice of it all and poor little unloved Ramie. She’d allowed herself to be stripped of her soul. No one had done that to her. She’d done it to herself. Because she wasn’t strong. Because it never occurred to her to want more than what she’d been dealt. Or to go after happiness instead of waiting for it to be magically bestowed on her. Instead she’d wallowed in her own misery for a decade.
Right here, right now, right in front of her stood someone who professed to care about her. Not her abilities. He wasn’t asking her for anything. She’d be a fool to walk away even though it meant endangering him—his entire family. Maybe together, they could fight.
“I want you,” she said softly. “Me, Caleb. I want you. No matter what your last name is.”
FOURTEEN
CALEB stared back at Ramie, at the fear and vulnerability in her eyes, and marveled at what it must have taken for her to open herself up to him. There was doubt and her expression was troubled, not exactly the kind of reaction a man wanted to see on the face of the woman he planned to get intimate with, but Ramie wasn’t most women. Most women hadn’t seen the world through Ramie’s eyes.
He reached for the hands that had dropped his just moments before, and he knew why she’d severed the link between them. But he was calmer now, and he wanted her to see—to know—that she had nothing to fear from him.
She shivered when he tugged her back into his arms and her body went soft and pliant against his frame. There was still a hint of dampness in her hair. Hair that smelled like honeysuckle.
He wanted to take her to bed. Right now. He wanted to spend the entire day making love to her. Showing her without inept words the ever-strengthening bond between them.
Instead he smoothed his hand over the top of her curly hair and stroked reassuringly, getting her used to being touched by someone. A man. A man who had no intention of hurting her. It occurred to him that her sole experience with sex might be the degrading crimes that had been committed against so many women Ramie had helped.
And if that was the case, then he had to handle her with extreme caution. No rushing her into physical and emotional intimacy before she was ready. Yes, he wanted her to be able to depend on him. Willing to depend on him and trust him. But he didn’t want to be her crutch. For him to merely be a coping mechanism when he wanted so much more.
He dropped a kiss on top of her head as he continued to caress her back and nape, tangling his fingers periodically in the unruly strands of hair. And he simply enjoyed the feeling of her in his arms. Of her standing in his home and him knowing that she was safe. Not out there alone and vulnerable. Afraid that each breath would be her last. It was no way to live. And certainly no way to die.
Thank God she’d called him. Else he’d still be searching for her. Or worse, she could be in her stalker’s hands suffering indescribable torture.
He closed his eyes against that image and inhaled through his nose so he wouldn’t flood her with rage all over again.
There was too much anger and animosity in this house as it was. Caleb had never given thought to whether Tori would object so strenuously to Ramie’s presence. It wasn’t until Ramie’s explanation that he understood.
He hated feeling so goddamn helpless. If he gave in to his sister then Ramie suffered. She could die. She would die. If he dug in his heels, as he’d already done, he’d cause a rift between him and Tori that might never be mended.
“I want you to fight for your right to be here,” he murmured.
She stiffened and pulled away, glancing up at him with those troubled gray eyes that seemed too enormous for her face. Eyes that had several lifetimes of violence and pain behind them.
“I know what I’m asking isn’t easy,” he continued. “You don’t deserve Tori’s hostility and you don’t deserve for my brothers to look at you without welcome in their eyes. But I’m asking you to stay. For me. And you owe me nothing. God only knows how much I owe you. I’m still asking, though.”
“What exactly are you asking me to be?” she asked hoarsely. “Friend? Lover?”
“Yes and yes,” he responded quietly. “More. A lot more. But we’ll get to that in time. For now, yes. Friends. Eventually lovers. After that? It’s whatever you want. What you need. I hope to God I’m able to give you what you need.”
“And what about what you need?”
He stared back at her, momentarily off balance by her question. Need? He needed a lot of things. Things he had no control over. For a man used to being in control of every aspect of his life, suddenly not being in control was daunting. It made him feel weak at a time when his family needed his strength more than ever.
“I need . . . you,” he finally said. “I need for Tori to be able to sleep at night. For my brothers to quit blaming themselves for what happened to her. I need for the animals who have terrorized both you and Tori to be captured and punished. I need a lo
t of things, but the only thing I have any control over whatsoever is you and your presence in my life. So give me that, at least. If nothing else, give me that.”
“Okay,” she said in a near whisper. “I’ll stay. I’ll try. I’ve been running for so long that I don’t know any other way, Caleb. I don’t know how to be normal. Don’t let me run this time. I need you to believe in me even if I don’t believe in myself.”
He squeezed her hand and then slid his other hand up her arm to clasp her shoulder, balancing her, infusing her with his will and determination. Then he leaned down and pressed his lips to her forehead, inhaling her scent.
“I won’t let you run, Ramie. Never again. I want you here with me and if you try to run, I’ll just come after you. Always.”
He watched the slow realization of his words sink in and the shocked look in her eyes but also unfettered hope. Maybe he was finally getting to her. God, he hoped so.
“Now, let’s get you something to eat,” he said. “After you’ve had a decent meal, we’ll sit down with my team of investigators so we can get an idea of what we’re dealing with here.”
FIFTEEN
IT was a frightening concept for the hunted to become the hunter. Ramie had spent all her time running, trying to avoid being captured, and yet now she was suddenly on offense. Going after the man who wanted nothing more than her death. Was she insane for agreeing to stay in one place for any length of time? Shouldn’t she be constantly on the move, remaining one step ahead of her stalker?
She rubbed her hands repeatedly over the tops of her thighs, the denim of her jeans worn and faded. Holes had formed, a look people paid good money for on perfectly new pants. For Ramie it was just the result of having no way to buy new clothing.
“Ramie?”
Caleb’s voice drifted through her consciousness and she guiltily turned her head in his direction. She could feel the tightening pressure of an impending panic attack, but she was determined not to give in and not to freak out in front of the people Caleb had hired to bring down the man hunting her.
“I’m sorry. Can you repeat the question?”
Caleb sighed but at least he didn’t look angry. He wore a look of understanding. And then, as if realizing how perilously close to the edge she was, he sat down beside her on the couch and slid his fingers through hers. Perhaps it was so she could share in his resolve and determination. She could certainly use a transfusion of those qualities.
“Can you describe the man who attacked you?” Caleb asked.
She drew a complete blank. Her forehead wrinkled and her skin tightened around her eyes as she focused her absolute attention on trying to grab an image of her stalker from the fragments of her mind.
“It will be helpful if we can get a sketch of him,” the woman who’d introduced herself as Eliza said gently. “If we plaster his face in enough places, sooner or later we’ll ferret him out.”
Ramie swallowed, her mouth going dry. Was he out there even now looking into her mind, seeing what she was seeing, hearing what she was hearing? Did it do any good for them to plan traps for him if he knew about them because he was a constant presence in her mind?
Which was why she didn’t need to know.
She bolted off the couch as the realization hit her. She spun to explain to Caleb just as he grabbed her arm, a confused look on his face.
“I can’t know,” she babbled out. “Because if I know, he knows. So you have to leave me out of it. I can’t see or know any of it.”
“Whoa, slow down,” Dane Elliot, one of Caleb’s security specialists, said, holding his hands up in a placating manner.
He wanted her to calm down. He thought she was being hysterical. A nitwit. No, she was finally being smart.
“He’s there,” she said, including each of the people in the room in her sweeping gaze. “He has a psychic link to me. It’s like having someone sit on your shoulder all the time. He has an unobscured line of vision, a pathway into everything I see or do. So you see, it does us little good to plot and plan because he’ll know exactly what we’re doing.”
Caleb swore and murmurs arose from the occupants of the room. They likely all thought she’d lost her mind. She had no idea what if anything Caleb had told them about her. If they even knew psychic abilities were involved.
“I can’t be in here. Sorry,” she whispered.
She turned and fled from the room. There was an invisible hand clutching at her neck, choking her, preventing her from getting oxygen into her lungs. The oppressive weight of evil was so heavy on her chest that it felt like she was being crushed.
She stumbled into the downstairs bathroom and hastily turned on the cold water in the sink. She splashed water on her cheeks and then leaned on the countertop with her elbows, hands covering her face as the water still ran full blast.
Her hand clutched her neck in an effort to remove the invisible grip. But it was as bruising as if she were really being choked.
“Ramie? Are you all right? What the hell is going on?” Caleb demanded.
He reached around her and turned off the water and then he grasped her by the shoulders and gave her a gentle shake. She held up her hand to halt him, straining to find the words around the strangling sensation in her neck.
“I have to learn to beat him,” she bit out. “I have to close myself off to him. I have to be better about knowing when he’s there and I have to be able to shut him out. Or maybe he’s simply there all the time. I don’t know. Why don’t I know?”
“Is he . . . there . . . right now?” Caleb asked as he stared holes through her.
It was as if he were looking for her stalker in her. Her eyes, or expression or like she’d developed a split personality and one half of her thought she was a sick monster who preyed on women. Or maybe he thought she was demonically possessed. It wasn’t as though she’d given him any other explanation.
She couldn’t bear the disgust—or the worry—in his eyes.
“You do think I’m crazy,” she whispered. “Maybe I am crazy.”
“Goddamn it, no, I don’t think you’re crazy,” Caleb said in a frustrated voice. “I just want to know who the hell I’m talking to and if it’s you or the asshole who’s trying to kill you.”
“He’s just a passive observer,” Ramie explained. Or rather she tried to explain. Because how did one explain the inexplicable? “It’s like he has a porthole into my brain. He can see what I see, hear what I hear. Be aware of what I’m aware of. It’s why he told me last night that I wasn’t safe here. That all your security wouldn’t keep him from me. He knows everything.”
“How does this happen?” Caleb asked. “Has it ever happened before? Can you block him?”
“Oh God, don’t you think I’ve tried? That I don’t want him in my mind all the time? That I’m vulnerable every hour of every day because he sees everything that I see?”
“Of course,” Caleb soothed. “But there has to be a way of blocking him. We need to work on you schooling your thoughts. Of making your mind go completely blank. It’s a therapy that Tori used when she was younger. One of the many things we tried in an effort to make the visions go away. But somehow I think it’s more applicable to your situation than it ever was to Tori’s.”
Her pulse beat painfully at her temples. It felt as though her head would explode at any minute. Her blood pressure had to be sky-high.
She rubbed absently at her forehead as she tried to collect her scattered thoughts. His explanation was logical. But how to put it into practice? She wasn’t prepared to fight off a mental invasion. She’d never thought herself susceptible to such a thing. She was always the one intruding, thrown into others’ minds. But she still had no control over how long the connection stayed intact.
Perhaps that’s what her stalker was merely doing. It wasn’t that he could slip in and out of her mind at will. He’d found a way to prevent the link from being severed. Whereas before, after a period of hours or sometimes days, her connection to victim and a
ttacker was broken and mental silence ensued, this one hadn’t been cut. It had remained. It was like the story of Hansel and Gretel and their trail of breadcrumbs. She’d left a proverbial trail behind her everywhere she’d gone since first establishing the link a year and a half ago.
“Ramie?”
Startled, Ramie’s head came up to see Eliza standing in the door.
Eliza glanced up at Caleb. “Can I have a moment with Ramie?”
Caleb frowned and sent a questioning stare in Ramie’s direction. Ramie nodded and Caleb backed from the room.
“I’ll be right outside,” Caleb said quietly.
Ramie swallowed hard when Caleb disappeared from view. She hated how dependent she already was on him. And the fact that she felt safe only when he was in her sight.
“You have to help us bring this guy down,” Eliza said firmly.
Ramie shook her head. “You don’t understand. I’m endangering you. All of you. Caleb, his family. Tori.”
Eliza pinned her with her steady gaze. “What I understand is that there is a monster out there preying on women and you are the only person who can take him down.”
Ramie closed her eyes, shutting Eliza out. Shutting everything out while she tried to blanket her mind to nothing. A big yawning black hole. That was what she had to become.
“He’s taken another woman,” Eliza said quietly.
Ramie’s eyes flew open. “What?”
“We think he has,” Eliza amended. “Evidence points to that. Either that or an eerily good copycat.”
Ramie’s pulse pounded, a deafening roar in her ears. No. God, no.
She hadn’t realized she’d spoken aloud until the sound of her tortured voice filled her ears. She lifted her gaze to Eliza’s, knowing she had only one choice.
Resolve edged out the fear and despair. She wouldn’t let him win. Wouldn’t let him control every aspect of her life.
Eliza was right. Ramie was the only one who could bring him down. The only one who could end the pain and suffering of too many women to count. It was time to stop being that victim and fight back.
There was nothing she could do to remove the memories, the pain that she and the other women had suffered. But she could make certain that no more women had to endure what others had.
Calm descended. Peace, sweet and aching, filled her. Her jaw firm, she stared Eliza in the eyes, watching as Eliza’s own eyes widened in realization of what Ramie was about to do.
“Can you get me something the victim owned?” Ramie asked.
SIXTEEN
RAMIE’S words reached Caleb where he stood in the hallway and fear slammed into him, rocking him back on his heels.
“No!”
His reaction was explosive. He pushed his way back into the bathroom where Ramie and Eliza stood, shaking his head fiercely as he pinned Ramie with the full force of his stare.
“No way in hell,” Caleb bit out. “Don’t even think about it. Eliza. If you even try it, you’re fired. Your job is to protect Ramie, not expose her to more hurt.”
Eliza’s lips thinned but she remained silent. Instead she turned her head to Ramie, looking pointedly at her as if she expected Ramie to make Caleb stand down.
Ramie’s eyes were haunted. Her lips quivered and her nostrils flared. She had the look of prey being stalked by a predator. As though she knew she was about to be attacked.
“I have to, Caleb,” Ramie said tonelessly, resignation clear in her weary gaze.
“No,” Caleb said emphatically. “You don’t have to. Why would you put yourself through that kind of torture again?”
A tear slipped soundlessly down her cheek. Her eyes were dull as she stared back at him.
“I have to do this,” Ramie repeated. “You know I do, Caleb. There’s no other way. Eliza is right. I’m the only one who can take this guy down.”
Caleb exploded in fury, his anger directed at Eliza. “You weren’t supposed to say any such thing to her! That is not the job you were hired for. You’re off this case. You and Dane both. Get out of my house.”
Ramie saw Eliza’s lips thin even more and her cheek twitched in irritation. She bit her lips as though she desperately wanted to say something but held it in check. But there was something about Eliza that made Ramie pause. She didn’t come across as a brassy, uncaring, ball-busting woman only wanting to do her job. That wasn’t what Ramie had seen in Eliza at all.
“You may as well say it, Eliza,” Ramie encouraged. “If he’s firing you anyway, what have you got to lose by speaking your mind? And by all means, let
