by JoAnn Ross
He wondered why, since Tara was supposed to have inherited the Delaney women's second sight, she hadn't realized that right off the bat. "Absolutely."
She thought about that for a minute. "He told me he'd been in love with Brigid for years and years. Apparently he even proposed. Perhaps he just felt uncomfortable about having admitted that to a total stranger."
"That's probably it." Gavin wasn't certain he bought the explanation, but as he could see McVey leaving the party, it seemed foolish to waste time he could be enjoying having Tara in his arms by worrying.
For a while, they swayed to the music, their thoughts focused on later, when they would return to the house and celebrate the holiday in their own private way.
Tara's eyes were closed, her fingers entwined around Gavin's neck. As her thoughts drifted, the vision of a group of children flashed into the front of her mind. They were dressed in typical Halloween costumes, and they were carrying plastic pumpkins. The fact that the pumpkins were filled with candy suggested and were on their way home from a successful evening of trick-or-treating.
Another vision flashed. A truck was speeding down the treacherous winding road leading from the top of the Mogollon Rim into town.
The picture switched back to the children, giggling at the fox terrier who was dancing around them barking for treats, then cut back to the truck's driver, whose expression was one of icy fear.
The children were standing in the middle of the deserted street.
The driver's foot was slamming against the brake pedal, but the truck was not slowing. He cursed, a savage oath ripe with frustration.
"Oh, no!" Tara gasped without thinking.
"Tara?" In contrast to the warm, soft woman Gavin had been holding only a moment before, she'd stiffened like cold steel in his arms.
"Gavin," she whispered, "the children!" Drawn by an equally intense feeling of dread, she whipped her gaze across the room and saw Noel staring back at her. It was obvious they were both thinking the same thing. It was also obvious from the terror on Noel's face that she was absolutely helpless to intercede.
No! She couldn't do it, Tara told herself. She wasn't Brigid. Her magic skills were basic, at best. Stopping a runaway truck was beyond her.
But she could not stand by and let those innocent children be killed.
She closed her eyes, struggled to shut out the vision of the children and concentrated on the truck instead.
And the road ahead. The grade was steep, guaranteeing that the truck would pick up even more speed.
She considered dropping one of the tall shaggy green ponderosa pines lining the roadway in front of the truck. But even if she could pull off such a feat, she feared it wouldn't be enough to stop the truck. Or it might cause the truck to crash, which could prove fatal to the driver.
"There's a wetlands around the next curve," a calm voice Tara recognized as Noel's spoke inside her mind. "For migrating birds. If you could somehow…"
I'll try, Tara answered, her own gaze skimming across the landscape, until she saw the small bit of marshland Noel was referring to. Conjuring up Gaelic words she didn't even know were in her memory, she implored the help of ancient Celtic gods, goddesses and her grandmother.
"You can do this, Tara, darling," Brigid's familiar voice assured her in loving tones. "You're not alone, darling. I'll help you. We all will."
Tara felt the power flowing through her, warm and golden, then warmer still, like rays of blue heat that got hotter and hotter until every atom in her body was glowing with a white-hot light. She focused all that flaming energy on the truck driver, forcing her inner gaze away from his now-terrified face to his white-knuckled hands gripping the steering wheel.
The truck was approaching the marsh. One more turn. Her nerve endings were crackling like heat lightning on the horizon during a high-country storm.
She bit her lip as she forced the wheel to turn to the right. The air in the cab of the truck was filled with curses as the driver realized he'd lost control. The eighteen wheels sped off the pavement. Mud and water sprayed into the air; ducks took flight with a flurry of flapping wings. The truck sank into the thick, gooey mire with a loud, final, sucking sound.
There was silence.
And then, blessedly, the laughter of children.
Tara felt so drained she would have collapsed to the floor if Gavin hadn't been holding her up. As he lifted her into his arms, the door burst open. "Trace!" an excited male voice called out. "Where's the sheriff?"
"I'm here," a deep voice answered. "What's the matter?"
"I was headed up the hill when I saw a truck veer off the road and into the wetlands."
"Is the driver hurt?" Trace asked, instantly alert.
"Nah, he's okay. But the lucky thing is, if he hadn't gone into that bog when he did, he would have taken out a bunch of kids who were in the middle of the street around that last corner."
There was a collective intake of breath. Then a buzz of excited conversation. A startling idea reverberated in Gavin's head, but there was no time to think about it. Not when Tara's pale complexion and wide, unseeing eyes reminded him of a wraith.
"I'm taking you home."
Tara didn't answer, couldn't answer. But she held on tight as he led her across the dance floor and out into the crisp Halloween night.
15
At Gavin's insistence to Tara's embarrassment, Laurel McGraw followed them to the house to examine Tara. After declaring she couldn't find anything wrong, she recommended that Tara come into her office the following day for tests.
"How are you feeling?" Gavin asked when they were alone again.
"Fine," she insisted for the umpteenth time.
"Now that the doctor's gone, want to try telling the truth?" he asked mildly.
She sighed, knowing that she'd been foolish to think she could put anything over on a man who knew all her secrets. Well, almost all of them.
"Other than a crushing headache, I'm fine. I think."
"I didn't say anything earlier, but since you mentioned the children, I figured you must have seen the accident."
"Yes." The pictures ran with horrifying clarity through her mind. "I did."
"Sounds like it was a case of psychic overload." He sat on the side of the bed and stroked her hair. "No wonder you have a headache. I think you ought to take Laurel up on that suggestion of having some tests done."
"I don't need any tests. I just need an aspirin."
"Coming right up." He left the room. Tara heard him curse. "The bottle in the bathroom is empty," he said when he returned. "If you're sure you'll be all right, I'll run to the store and get more."
"I told you, there's nothing to worry about. And in case you haven't noticed, the nearest store is ten miles away."
"No problem." He bent his head and gave her a brief kiss. "Want me to make you some tea before I go?"
"No, thank you. Except for the little sadist pounding away with a sledgehammer inside my head, I'm fine."
He smiled at that. "Oh, you're a helluva sight better than fine, Tara Delaney." He gave her a longer, deeper kiss, one filled with sensual promise. "You know," he suggested with a friendly leer, "there's more than one cure for a headache."
Despite the pain behind her eyes, Tara smiled. "Why do I think I have an idea what that might be?"
"Because you can read my mind," he said easily. "When I get back, we'll try out a few headache cures. See what works."
One more kiss and then he was gone, leaving her lips tingling in a way that almost took her mind off her blinding headache.
Tara closed her eyes and had drifted off again when the sound of footsteps on the stairs roused her. "Are you back so soon?"
"Actually, I've been waiting for some time."
Her eyes flew open. Reginald McVey was standing in the doorway. "What are you doing here?"
"I've come for the Cortes mirror, Tara."
"What?" She sat up and clutched the sheet to her chin as he entered her bedroom. "What m
irror? I don't know what you're talking about."
"This." He reached down and took hold of her necklace. "You've no idea how long I've been searching for it. Rumors have circulated for years that Brigid had the mirror in her possession, but, crafty old witch that she was, she'd never admit a thing."
There was a nasty edge to his voice that chilled Tara's blood. "You don't sound much like a rebuffed suitor now."
"Actually, that little tale was a lie. But it had a nice ring, didn't it?"
"You lied? Why? And how?" She could read minds, for heaven's sake! Why hadn't she been able to read his?
"To throw you off the track, of course. To make you feel comfortable with me so I could continue looking for the mirror. As for why you didn't know, your powers don't begin to equal mine, Tara Delaney. It was a simple matter to hypnotize you into believing anything I said."
Tara thought about Gavin's unflattering comments regarding the man at the party. "But this isn't a mirror," she observed. "It's only a piece of obsidian."
"Cortes brought back a piece of black obsidian from Mexico that John Dee used as a magic glass. It's currently on display in the British Museum. But there was another mirror, a smaller, more powerful one. Dee's wife, Jane, reportedly wore it around her neck on a silver chain. After she died, it disappeared. People have been searching for it for more than four centuries."
He reached out and his fingers closed around the gleaming piece of jet. "And now I'm the one who found it."
The touch of his fingertips brushing against her flesh sent a surge of lightning through her, scorching her blood while illuminating her mind. She jerked away.
"You killed my grandmother." A vision flooded into her mind, of Brigid standing on the top of the stairs and a man behind her, his arms outstretched. He was furious, his face was scarlet, his eyes bulged; he was shouting obscenities at her.
When Brigid turned her back on him, intending to walk away, he lunged. Tara watched in horror at the sight of her grandmother falling head over heels down the stairs. "My mother was right," she said. "My grandmother was murdered. You pushed her."
"It was an accident." His eyes were hard blue stones, without a glimmer of warmth. "If only she'd just turned the mirror over to me. But no, she was so high and mighty, spouting that old garbage about the right-hand and left-hand paths."
"Brigid only believed in white magic." Tara suddenly understood everything. "You want to use the stone for evil." She leapt out of bed, trying to judge how quickly she could get out the door and down the stairs. He was an old man and he had to be at least thirty pounds overweight. Surely she could outrun him.
"For power," he corrected. "But I never intended for her to be injured. And you won't be, either, if you just hand it over. Now."
He no longer resembled Santa. He was, without question, the most malevolent individual she'd ever met. She also knew that there was no way she was going to willingly hand over something Brigid had died trying to prevent him from getting.
She pushed past him and dashed from the room. Amazingly, given his age and physical condition, he was right behind her as she reached the top of the stairs. His hands reached out, and he managed to grab her shoulders and yank her back toward him.
And then Tara felt a gust of icy wind and suddenly Brigid was back, pulling him away, and the next thing Tara knew he was tumbling headfirst down the stairs, in much the same way her grandmother had done.
He landed sprawled at the bottom of the stairs, grabbed hold of his legs and began screaming curses at her.
Tara was terrified, but the way his legs were bent at ugly, unnatural angles suggested they'd both been fractured. Since it was unlikely he could make his way up the stairs again, she ran back into the bedroom where she picked up the phone and dialed 911.
Then, after locking the door, she sat down on the bed and waited for Trace to arrive.
Gavin arrived at the house right behind Trace. He found Tara, trembling and looking heartwrenchingly vulnerable, and decided that it was a good thing Trace was there to stop him from killing the bastard for trying to hurt Tara. The woman he loved.
Love. It was a word he'd always avoided. Until now. Until Tara.
After the ambulance had taken McVey away, en route to the Payson hospital, Trace took Tara's statement. She told him everything she knew, except the part about her grandmother saving her life. The official story would be that McVey fell while lunging to grab her. Since Trace was obviously a man of reason, a man who insisted on facts, Tara knew he'd never believe that the horrid man had been pushed down the stairs by her grandmother's spirit. She'd been there—she'd seen Brigid with her own eyes—and she hardly believed it herself.
Gavin wanted to call Laurel McGraw, to have her prescribe a tranquilizer. He was frustrated, but not all that surprised when Tara refused.
And finally they were alone once again, sitting in the parlor, in front of the fire.
"Do you have any idea," he murmured, "how much I love you?"
"You don't have to say this, Gavin—"
"Yes, I do." He ran his hand down her face, capturing her chin between his fingers. "I've never said that word to any other woman, Tara. I've used all the euphemisms, but until this moment, I've never told anyone that I loved her. You're the woman I've been dreaming about for years, You're why I invented Morganna—"
"I thought Brianna was supposed to be like me."
"That's what I thought, too—in the beginning, when I first met you. Then I realized that you're both of them all wrapped up in one glorious, sweet, sexy package."
"Gavin, please don't do this…"
"I once said in an interview that if I ever met a woman who intrigued and excited me half as much as Morganna did, I'd marry her. The reporter thought I was joking. I wasn't."
He lowered his head until his lips were a breath away from hers. "I want you, Tara. I want to marry you and have babies with you. I want us to spend the rest of our lives here in Whiskey River making magic together."
The idea was so wonderfully appealing. "It sounds wonderful," she admitted. "But what if we aren't the ones making the magic?"
She was so damn stubborn. So sweet. Lured by her slightly parted lips, he covered her mouth with his, giving her a kiss that revealed all the secrets of his heart.
"Tell me that wasn't us," he said when the long kiss finally ended. "Tell me we don't make magic together."
"It's Brigid," she insisted, even as her heart continued to pound wildly in her chest from the aftereffects of the deep kiss.
"Dammit!" Gavin's patience, which had been hanging by a slender thread, snapped. He released her, dragged both his hands through his hair and began to pace. "We've been through this before. Brigid may have brought us together, but it's not like she put some sort of spell on us, Tara. We're adults. With free wills. Capable of making our own choices."
"So if you can't love me, if you don't want to marry me, just say so. But don't you dare try to blame any of this on your grandmother. Because I'm not going to buy it. You need to trust me, Tara, trust what we have together."
"I want to."
"But?"
"But there's something I want you to see, first."
It was important that she get this over and done with now. Once burned, twice shy. And now, before she handed her heart over to Gavin, Tara wanted him to know who—and what—he'd be marrying.
"I'd rather watch you."
The line might not be original, but it made her smile, despite her jangling nerves. "And miss the show?"
Deciding to humor her—she had, after all, had an amazingly stressful night—Gavin followed her outside to the porch.
Tara turned toward a nearby grove of oak trees. The limbs, appearing black in the night light, were bare, the leaves having already fallen to the ground in the age-old circle of nature's death and rebirth.
Breathing deeply, she closed her eyes and cleared her mind. That done, she summoned up the wind, causing the scattered leaves to swirl into a single pile. Encoura
ged by that small success, she tightened the muscles on her body and began rubbing her palms together, creating a tingling warmth.
As the energy she was raising began to flow through her, she held her hands a few inches apart and visualized it passing from one hand to the other.
Using only the power of her mind and the magic that was her natural birthright, Tara sent that energy swirling in a clockwise direction, faster and faster, in a glowing pulsating ball of red, blue and purple lights. Then she cupped the flashing hot ball in her hands, and when her hands were warm and the energy was at its peak, she pressed it against her body, absorbing it into her system, sending it rushing through her blood.
Opening her eyes, she held out her hand, sending the energy through her arm and out her fingertips. A streak of blue lightning shot across the front yard. An instant later, there was a loud rushing sound and the pile of leaves burst into flames.
"What the hell?" Gavin stared in disbelief at the crackling flames that were shooting upward into the clear black sky. And although he admired her theatrical flare, he wondered how she'd managed the special effects. The quilted robe she'd put on was the key, he decided. She must have rigged it.
"Not hell," she corrected mildly. She untied the robe and held it open, revealing that she had no hidden devices. "Magic."
"It's spontaneous combustion," Gavin insisted. "It happens all the time. In fact, I read not long ago that there was this guy in Winslow who kept a bunch of old newspapers in his garage, and one day they just exploded. Bang." He clapped his hands together. "The place went up like dry tinder. Ended up burning down his house before the fire department could get there."
"For such a highly creative person, you are showing a decided lack of imagination." Tara shook her head. "But you're right about the danger of the fire spreading," she decided as she watched the orange sparks fly upward. She lifted her palm to the clear sky.
Gavin swore ripely as a soft rain began falling directly over the leaves. He was obviously hallucinating.
"Go touch it," Tara suggested. "Feel the cooling moisture on your hand. And tell me it's not real."
