The Nymph's Curse: The Collection

by Danica Winters

  “Listen here, you little prick, I know you think you’re top shit, but let me tell you … you will treat my friend here with respect or I will take your pepper spray and stick it up your — ”

  Aura grabbed his arm. “Watch,” she whispered.

  She moved to Officer Grant and touched him softly upon the chest. “Don’t get upset, Officer.” Her voice was so sticky sweet it made his teeth hurt.

  Aura couldn’t think she really had some crazy ability. Grant had just treated her like trash. There was no way that he was going to fall for her luring charms.

  “Aura?”

  She shot him a look and he shut his mouth. This was her game and he could only stand by, watch, and when it didn’t work he could tell her “I told you so.” At least she could no longer lie. This would settle the matter of her thinking she was supernatural — though when the investigation was over, he would need to find her some help. There were meds for her kind of thinking.

  Aura reached up and ran her fingers over the little bit of exposed skin on Grant’s neck. The kid looked shocked at her familiar touch for a moment, but she smiled up at him and something changed. His eyes seemed to glaze over and his face seemed to glisten in spite of the cold.

  A strange surge of jealousy filled Dane. She was sick. She needed help. And yet, in spite of it all, he still cared for her. He tried to shake off the feeling as he watched her trace her fingers along Grant’s jawline.

  “That’s enough.” He touched her shoulder, but she didn’t look back.

  “Grant?” she crooned.

  The boy nodded.

  “Do you want to kiss me?”

  The boy nodded again.

  “Would you be willing to do anything for me?”

  The boy gave another trance-like nod.

  The muscles in Dane’s shoulders and back started to twitch — he really was losing his mind. It was slipping one neuron at a time. Pretty soon they would have to wrap him up and send him to the State Hospital in Warm Springs. It all didn’t make sense.

  “Grant … I want you to take off all of your clothes and take a swim in the lake. Okay?”

  Officer Grant reached down and unzipped his coat. Aura stepped back as the kid stripped down to his underwear. His almost naked body steamed in the freezing air.

  He looked up at Aura with, what Dane assumed to be, a seductive grin. “You want these off too?” He snapped the waistband of his form-fitted boxer briefs.

  Things had gone far enough. “Aura, whatever you’re doing you need to stop it right now.”

  She gave him a devilish smile. “Do you believe me?”

  “Just because you can make a man strip down to his skivvies doesn’t mean you are what you say you are.”

  “Oh really?” She turned back to Grant. “Swim.”

  The kid charged off into the night like he was some kind of Olympic gold medalist.

  “Stop!” Dane called after him, but the kid didn’t even slow down.

  Everyone standing around the investigation turned and watched as Grant dove into the frigid water.

  Dane rushed after him. “Somebody get him a blanket!”

  Chapter Seventeen

  The blanket covered Officer Grant from his pale, fur-covered knees to just under his protruding tiny pink nipples. A little part of Aura felt guilty as she stared at his blue-tinged lips. His skin was raw and red from the cold. It was unethical to use her power like she had, but she had been forced to prove her abilities to Dane.

  When she looked over to him, Dane was still staring at her. His jaw was rigid and tense, almost as if instead of shock and excitement, he was angry. Maybe she should have lied and covered up the truth of her initial intentions, but he pleaded for honesty and she had complied. She should have known better. Few men wanted complete honesty — even when they asked for it.

  “Get in the car and get warmed up,” Dane ordered, as he pushed Grant into one of the waiting cars. “Aura. Come here.”

  She followed behind him as he led her to his patrol unit.

  He spun around and leaned up against the car, like he needed it to hold him upright. “So you’re telling me that you can do that to any man at any time?”

  She nodded.

  “How far can you take it? Can you get them to kill another person? To kill themselves?”

  “Are you interrogating me?” she asked in a voice that dripped with danger.

  He pushed his arms over his chest, as if protecting himself from the blows that she was thinking about landing. She’d told him a secret very few were privy to. Yet, he treated the knowledge with a trivial indifference and, more infuriating, contempt and suspicion.

  She should have never opened up her heart, her mind, or her mouth. The desire to trust was best left to humans.

  “I’m just asking, Aura. You have to understand that this is a new one for me. I just want to understand.”

  He was a cop. Of course he would want to put her in a little box. He needed her to be on the correct side of the line of right and wrong. There was no room in his life for a woman who kept secrets and didn’t always make perfect choices. “I wouldn’t kill anyone. Or have anyone killed. I’m not like that.”

  “What about your sister? Would she have been the kind to kill?”

  Aura’s mind moved to her sister. Had she been the type to kill? To let another kill for her?

  When they had been young and wild, they’d moved from horse to woman and back without a thought. Life was safe, comfortable, and though not easy, it had been understandable. Most things were black and white. When humans had invaded their lives that safety disappeared. Trust quickly followed. Then their freedom. They could only run where they couldn’t be captured.

  “What are you thinking?” Dane asked, but it was almost an order. “Talk to me. Help me to understand.”

  Aura glanced around at the roaming police officers who were still going over the scene and talking to the fisherman.

  “Just believe me. Neither of us is capable of killing.” Their past had proven such a thing. Her eyes strayed to the black van where her sister’s body lay. “I need to see her.”

  He moved to stand up, but then slumped back against the car. “I have more questions.”

  “I thought that you would. But please, before they take her away … I need to say goodbye.”

  Some of his hard edge seemed to crumble away as he looked at her. “Are you sure you want to see her?” He stood up and moved toward Aura, taking her hand in his. His hand was warm despite the bitter cold and she let his warmth soak into her as she stared at their joined hands. “Let them clean Natalie up first. Then I will take you to the crime lab and you can identify her.”

  There was no perfect time that she could think of that she would want to go and see her dead sister. “I need this, Dane. I need to see her. I need to see her to know that this is all real. That it isn’t some strange, awful dream.”

  He got a strangled look on his face. “I understand that more than you know.”

  The way he said the words piqued her interest, but it could wait. “Let’s go.”

  Dane pulled up the yellow tape and led her underneath. The pudgy curly-haired coroner gave her an out-of-place smile as he opened the back door to his van. “So you’re her sister?”

  Aura nodded and looked away from his upturned mouth.

  “It’s a real shame. I bet she was one hell of a looker.”

  There was an undertone of nastiness that made her skin crawl.

  Dane moved protectively between her and the foul little man. “Bill, isn’t there something else you should be doing?”

  “Well, actually I was just about to call the lab and let them know I was about to be on my way to bring her in.” Bill jingled his keys.

  “Why don’t you go do that
somewhere else?” Dane pointed toward the wooden dock that bobbed a little further down the shoreline.

  “You sure you got this?” Bill asked. “I mean, I can help if you need.”

  “No. That’s fine. Go.”

  Aura was relieved as he walked away.

  “I’m sorry about him,” Dane said, squeezing her hand. “He’s a bit off. I think it happens when someone is around death all the time. People tend to get a little strange.”

  She’d been called strange on a number of occasions, but she still couldn’t empathize with the little penguin-shaped man that waddled down the beach. “Thanks for sending him away.”

  “You’re welcome, but I sent him away for both of us. If he said one more stupid thing I was going to have to find some reason to arrest him.” He turned to the van, stepped up, and lifted her hand, indicating for her to follow. “I know you said you were ready for this. To see Natalie, but I have to warn you, she’s — ”

  “She is dead,” Aura said. The words seemed to cement the wall that she had formed to protect herself from the reality that attacked from all fronts.

  He squeezed her fingers as a miserable look centered on his face. “That’s not what I was going to say.”

  “It doesn’t change the fact that she’s dead. She’s not going to come back.” Her voice cracked and she tried to swallow away the sadness that threatened to spill over. She had to keep control of herself. She needed to get through this, steel herself until she could get away from the prying eyes of the police that walked around the site.

  Dane moved toward her like he wanted to take her into his arms, but she stepped back and dropped his hand. If she allowed him to comfort her, there would be no holding back. The sadness and anger that twisted just below the surface would break through and take her down and everyone around them. There would be no way she could open the bag that lay on the gurney in front of her and search for things that perhaps she could use to make sense of the tragedy. Perhaps she could find the answers, but only if she could stay in control of herself.

  The bag was cold in her shaking fingers as she unzipped the little silver interlocking teeth. The scent of death wafted up from the bag, making a wave of nausea rise within her. The stench was unmistakable, decay, the deterioration of what was once vibrant and alive, but underneath the horrific scent was the fading scent of the woman — rich, earthy, mixed with the strange scent … of bird.

  She jerked the zipper down past the woman’s face and slung open the bag. A familiar face looked back up at her. Aura’s heart pounded with excitement as she slapped her hands over her mouth. “Dane,” she exclaimed from between her fingers. “It’s not Natalie.”

  “What?” He stepped closer. “Are you sure?”

  Did he really think that she didn’t know her own sister?

  “It’s not her. It’s Jenna Cygnini.” She dropped her hands from her smiling lips. As hard as she tried, she couldn’t make the smile lessen or her heart slow. She felt sorry for the woman she once knew, but was filled with overwhelming relief. Natalie could still be alive. She could still be waiting to be found. There was hope.

  “Who is Jenna Cygnini?” He pulled out a pad of paper from his jacket and then stuffed it back in his pocket, as if he realized that she was going nowhere — that she wasn’t just another person to be questioned. “Is she one of … ” He glanced around, then leaned close. “You? You know a nymph?” He said the word in a barely audible whisper.

  Relief that he believed her swept through her, making her feel the lightest she had since she’d arrived in Montana. There was no one around within hearing distance. “Yes. She’s a swan-shifter from Idaho.”

  “What? She’s a what?”

  She reached down and rolled the woman slightly. The wet sweater gripped to the woman’s flesh, but Aura forced the cloth down , exposing a patch of black ink at the base of her neck. “Look.” She pointed at the black swan that was tattooed on her flesh. “It’s their mark.”

  “Whose mark?”

  “The swan-shifters. There are many groups of nymphs. Nat and I are part of the Mustang group.”

  He shook his head like he was trying to rattle the thought of what she was telling him around in his brain. “When you say shifter what exactly do you mean?”

  She had forgotten. She hadn’t told him about their other abilities. “I’m sorry. I don’t want to freak you out.”

  “I’m way past freaked out. Just tell me what I need to know, okay?”

  Should she tell him that she could never love? That if she gave her heart to a man that he was fated to die?

  “I can’t … ” She couldn’t say it. He was in no danger of loving her — not after she told him the entire truth. He hadn’t seemed to want to take things that far, he cared and he was helpful, but it was all part of his job — except for the sex, but that had been her doing. She’d initiated their lovemaking. She’d seduced him.

  Besides, once she told him the complete truth of who and what they are, he’d want no part of them. There were things that were forgivable, understandable, and acceptable to a man like Dane — but being a drifting, law-breaking, demi-god wasn’t amongst those things. Love was an impossibility on all fronts.

  Her fingers trembled on the edge of the bag. “I don’t shift anymore.”

  “What does that mean? Why not?”

  “A long time ago, Natalie and I use to be in our horse form most of the time. We were safe and could run free. When the settlers started moving into the Southwest, all of a sudden there were so many things to worry about. So many dangers.”

  “What happened to you?” There was an edge of sympathy in his gaze.

  “To understand, you need to know that there are only a few ways that women of our kind can be killed.”

  “Wait. Now you’re saying you can’t be killed?”

  “No, Dane. We can. That’s the thing. It’s simple if we are trapped. If someone pulls just a fistful of our hair, we die.” She took a deep breath letting her thrashing heart slow.

  “A long time ago, Natalie and I were running with the remnants of a once great herd when we were corralled. We were surrounded on all sides by the herd.” For a moment all she could hear was the thundering of hooves and the fear-filled screams as the memory of the moment filled her thoughts. “I’ve never been more scared in my life. We had to shift back to our human form in order to escape before they culled the herd. We tried to save them, but before we could, it was too late. We saw every one of our friends, the wild horses, die.”

  She tried to hold back the tears, but chills rippled over her body. “They all died so some cows could have better grazing … It’s all so wrong.”

  He stared at her in stunned silence for a moment and then dropped his gaze to the dead woman. “Do you think that Angela was killed by someone pulling her hair?”

  Aura nodded.

  “What about her hand?”

  “I’m not sure how she lost it, but I think it was the reason she died. Everyone’s body is covered with fine hairs. When we shift those fine hairs shift and become our fur. If she was in her horse form when she lost her hand, the loss would have been fatal. Too much hair was lost for her to survive.”

  Dane leaned his body against the gurney as if it could carry some of the burden of the shock from her revelation. “And your sister still shifts? I don’t understand it.”

  “Natalie loves to shift. She’s a beautiful brown bay. She’s the most beautiful horse you’ve ever seen, strong in the shoulders, glistening mane, and perfect white socks on her feet — she was the horse in the video.”

  He blinked as he must have tried to make sense of her admission. Dane reached down and pushed her fingers from the bag. He reverently moved the sweater back over Jenna’s arm, then zipped the bag closed. “So your sister is a horse. This lady is a swan. And you’re a �
� ”

  “Mustang as well. It’s been a long time since my last shift, but when I do, I’m a palomino. Natalie always used to say she was jealous of my canter, but I never believed her.”

  “Canter … ” he mumbled, shaking his head. “Okay.” He sighed as he must have resigned himself to the fact she had told the truth. “So you can seduce and shift. Can you do anything else? Can you do magic?”

  “If you mean like a sorcerer or a witch — no. Sometimes we have a gift. Not every nymph has one, but I do.”

  “And what is this gift?”

  She wanted to escape from the cage of his questions, but she couldn’t. Somewhere along the way she had come to respect him and part of that respect was the ability to be honest — whether or not he would believe her or understand was another matter entirely. But she cared for him enough to be honest — to submit.

  “I can talk to animals. In our world we call it empathic.”

  He stood silently, staring at her over the dead body of the swan-shifter. The corners of his lips quivered and then pulled into an awkward smile as laughter filled the mobile tin casket. “You’re a seducing Doctor Doolittle!” His laughter echoed off the inside of the van and bounced out into the night like a child’s lost ball. “That’s amazing!”

  It confused her that he would have a problem with her right up until the point that she could talk to animals, and then he thought it was amazing. Being an empathic was amazing, but it surprised her that this would be the ability that he would accept. Perhaps it was the animal psychics on late night television infomercials or the whack-jobs on the animal shows that proclaimed they could communicate with animals, but something about this ability must have been something he could finally understand. Something he could put inside the box. This was something he could grasp and cling to like a fumbling rock climber on the ledge of understanding when the reality around him had dramatically given way.

  She smiled and took his hand and led him out of the van. His laughter and the lapping of the water upon the shore was the only noise. Everyone stared at him.