Dark Secrets: A Paranormal Romance Anthology

by Colleen Gleason

  “Well,” he said, his voice slowing to a dangerous pace, “I guess I’d like to know if I’m sleeping with a woman who’s going home to her fiancé or not. The idea of sharing doesn’t appeal to me. I’m sure you can understand why.”

  Diana’s heart was pounding like a tom-tom, and she was finding it difficult to read him. His brown eyes had gone cool and remote, just as they’d been the day he realized she’d changed the locks on him. She put on her lawyer hat and removed herself and her emotion from the situation, placing her closing arguments out on the line. “Let me clarify for you, then, Ethan. I have indeed ended things with Jonathan, so you’re off the hook for sleeping with a cheating woman. Although the fact that you thought you were does give me pause—”

  “What was I supposed to think?” he asked, again in that dangerous voice.

  “As you might recall, I was a little distracted and distraught last night. I’m sorry that it wasn’t top of mind. And also, you’re not sleeping with me. We slept together, and it was mind-blowing, I’ll give you that, Ethan. But it’s past tense. Right?”

  “Right,” he said. His eyes raked over her as he at last stepped aside to let her go into the house. They were cold and flat.

  Diana started to walk by him, but as she brushed past, she felt him exhale deeply. Then suddenly, his arms closed around her and with one fluid movement, he flattened her back against the edge of the doorway. His mouth settled over hers with a surprising fierceness, his lips forming to hers in the same way they’d done the night before—but with an edge. The kiss was warm and hot and slick and intense and Diana couldn’t keep from succumbing to the renewed flare of desire that swarmed up and over her body. Ethan’s mouth was firm and soft, coaxing and demanding, and his tongue licked her insides in a way that had her fairly collapsing into the wall.

  Strong arms pinned her against the door, fitting her between muscular thighs and the ridges of the doorjamb. Solidness, strength, heat and wildness covered her, and she allowed herself to feel the range of emotion to her every last nerve ending. She wanted him as much here, now, with this dangerous edge, as she had last night when he first touched her.

  Then, suddenly, he released her and stepped back. He looked down at her with eyes that were flat and emotionless, even as he reached out to touch her cheek in a light caress. “Safe travels, Diana. Good luck back in Boston. I hope you’re happy there.”

  And with one last, long look, he spun and walked away—off the porch, heading home.

  She almost called him back. Even now, as she finally reached Boston, Diana remembered how she’d had to curl her fingers into the edge of the door to keep from going after him. She’d bit on her lip to keep her mouth closed.

  The subject, she reminded herself. You are the subject.

  She’d had enough hurt and pain in the last month and a half. Why expose herself to more?

  Why indeed.

  But more than once during her drive, she’d lifted her fingers to brush over her cheek just as he’d done. And remembered how kind and efficient he’d been during her migraines, how solid and sure he’d acted when all of the vandalism had occurred. And she thought about the way his face eased and his demeanor changed after their first frank conversation, when she apologized to him for thinking he was a shyster and they talked for a long time in her kitchen. And how he’d teased her about her nicknames for Valerie, enjoying her being undignified—even including her bold use of the F-word.

  Ethan Tannock was a good man. He just wasn’t the man for her.

  * * *

  Drawing in a deep breath, Diana went up the sidewalk to their townhouse—Jonathan’s townhouse—and she could hear his voice through the open windows. Her heart lodged in her throat. What if Valerie the Surgery Slut was there with him again?

  But she didn’t hear any other voices and so she slipped in the front door as quietly as possible.

  “I’m working on it.” She could hear his voice coming from the den, where his office was. He sounded stressed, tense, more strung out than she’d ever heard him before, and he was coming closer. “Yes. Yes, I just need more t—” He stopped when he came out of the office and saw her standing there.

  Diana balked at the expression on his face. He looked gray, almost sick, and his skin was damp with perspiration. His hair, already wispy and thin, was flyaway and uncombed. He was wearing an untucked shirt, half-buttoned, and workout pants—an uncharacteristic uniform for the proper physician. “I’ll be in touch,” he said quickly into his cell phone and disconnected. “Diana, what are you doing here?”

  “I’m here to get my things,” she said. “Are you all right? You don’t look very good.”

  “I’ve been sick,” he said a little sharply. “Food poisoning. This is the first time I’ve gotten out of bed in two days, and it was to deal with this,” he added, gesturing with his phone. “Antoni is at it again.”

  “Oh,” she said. And realized that not only did she not care about the latest problem with the partners in his practice, but that she didn’t have to listen to him talk about it and pretend to be interested. Ever. Again.

  “I didn’t expect you until tomorrow,” he said. “Is everything all right? Did you change your mind?” he added, hope lighting his face as he stepped toward her. “Please tell me you changed your mind.”

  “No,” she said, putting her suitcase down. “I haven’t changed my mind, Jonathan. I’m going to pack up a few things and get out of your way.”

  “There’s no need to do that, Diana. It’s late and there’s an extra bed. Why don’t you just stay here tonight? I promise, I won’t impose my presence on you,” he added. “You can take a few days to get your things packed and ready to go.”

  That sounded reasonable. Very reasonable, and Diana nodded gratefully. “Thank you. I appreciate that. I’ll just go out and get the rest of my things.” Maybe this wasn’t going to be as difficult as she’d imagined.

  Once outside, she walked around to the back of her car to retrieve her shopping bags from the trunk, and then remembered her all-important laptop, her lifeline to her work, her world...the one she hadn’t touched in days. Not until I went to Portland and put it in the car, she remembered with a sudden burst of clarity.

  Diana stopped, there in the middle of the street, shopping bags dangling from both arms, and realized she’d put the laptop case in her car before heading for Portland the night of the vandalism and second break-in. That was odd—odd that she’d bring the computer on an evening out. And odder still, she reflected, that she’d felt compelled to put the Tarot cards in the computer case before doing so...along with Belinda’s journal. Possibly saving them from being stolen or vandalized in the break-in?

  She broke out in a cold sweat as she stood on the quiet Saturday evening street. Diana remembered feeling a strange, strong need to bring the computer with her. It was almost as if she’d known...or that someone was telling her what to do.

  She shivered and carried the laptop case into the house, setting it on the kitchen table where she usually worked.

  Diana took her time arranging her things in the guestroom, unwilling to have to interact with Jonathan more than necessary. She’d find a place as soon as possible, and in the mean time, she’d spend as much time at the office as she could.

  It was almost dark by the time she left her room in search of something for a late dinner. Diana walked into the kitchen, but the sight that greeted her made her stop short.

  Jonathan had the countertop television on, but he wasn’t paying any attention to it. Instead, he had opened a familiar mahogany box and spread the black silk to pull Aunt Belinda’s Tarot cards from its depths. He was flipping through them, tossing them into careless piles onto the table in front of him.

  Irrational rage swept through Diana at the sight, tinting her vision with red.

  “What are you doing?” she demanded. She pulled the cards out of his hands, scooping up the ones off the table in a second hasty motion.

  “I was just loo
king at these cards.” Jonathan stared up at her. He appeared to be feeling better, for the odd cast to his skin had faded.

  “Those are Aunt Belinda’s—they’re mine now—and they shouldn’t be touched by anyone but the user. Unless you’re having a reading done.” Her breath was coming in quick shallow gasps, and even as she berated him, Diana realized she was overreacting. But the sight of his hands on the cards made her so angry.

  Jonathan’s expression didn’t change, but his voice became sharp. “What’s the matter with you? They’re just cards.”

  “I know that,” she snapped, carefully straightening them into a neat pile. She picked up the box. “What were you doing, digging through my computer bag anyway?”

  “I was looking for a pen and I found them in the case.” He stood and brushed past her, his bewildered expression giving way to irritation. “I’m going to bed. Good night.”

  Diana stared after him for a moment, then she walked into the living and sank onto the sofa, still holding the mahogany box in one hand and the oversized deck of cards in the other. The sudden force of anger had blinded her to reason, and now, as it faded, she was shaken. What was that all about?

  She looked down at the cards. She held them face down in her hand, and for a moment, she was tempted to turn the whole deck over and see what the bottom card was. Diana set the box carefully on the table in front of her, still holding the cards. Clutching them.

  She felt a trembling begin in the base of her spine, shivering up to her tense shoulders and down her arms. She saw the hand that held the cards begin to shake as queasiness roiled in her stomach.

  Drawing in a deep breath, she forced herself to relax.

  Then, in a sort of daze, Diana opened her mind to the swirl of images and thoughts from Damariscotta, and Boston, and everyone she’d seen and spoken to in the last month. And then she cleared her thoughts, closed her eyes, took a deep breath, and looked down.

  She rested the deck on the table, cut it, and stared at the card she was to turn over.

  She swallowed heavily, the nausea becoming more intense, the tom-toms of a migraine starting in the base of her skull.

  She turned the card over.

  The High Priestess.

  Her steadiness wavered. Again. Yes, again. She drew in a deep breath, reminding herself what it meant.

  Accessing the unconsciousness...opening the doors to the unknown...seeking what is concealed.

  She nodded, swallowing back the lump in her throat. Okay. Now what? The pounding became harder, sharper, more violent.

  She cut the deck again, closed her eyes, and selected a card. Opened her eyes.

  Death.

  A sudden rush of terror surprised her at the sight of the black-armored Death on his horse. Irrational, deep, and cold, the fear swept over her, leaving her shaking and ill. All at once, darkness tried to suffocate her, and she struggled to breathe, to shake off the powerful emotion.

  “No,” she said, and shoved the cards roughly into their black silk covering. “No.”

  Half-blind with pain and smothered by shadows, she slammed the top back onto the box and shoved it back into her computer bag next to the journal, hands shaking, stomach roiling, head pounding.

  She staggered to the bathroom, making it just in time to be violently ill into the toilet. Her head throbbed and felt as if it were being squeezed in a vise as darkness cloaked her vision. Tears came as she held onto the cold porcelain, then at last she collapsed on the floor in misery and pain.

  * * *

  Diana wasn’t certain how many hours later she dragged herself off the bathroom floor, but it was very dark and quiet in the house. Her skin was clammy and her muscles trembled, and the remnants of the migraine—or whatever it had been—still throbbed in the back of her skull.

  Either Jonathan hadn’t heard her getting sick, or he didn’t care—and either way, she was grateful for the fact that he hadn’t come around trying to be solicitous. The only person she wanted comfort from was Ethan.

  And that thought had her gritty eyes popping open wide with shock and fear. That was not a good thing to be thinking at all.

  Trying to banish the frightening thought, she climbed between the sheets of the guest bed, weak and shaky, and tried to fall asleep. But whenever she closed her eyes, those horrible dark images pressed down, smothering and stifling her, hot and heavy. She tossed and turned, trying to stay awake and then giving in, succumbing to sleep. But each time, the nightmares grew darker and more insistent, wrapping her in what seemed to be long, snakelike tendrils of evil, thick heavy ropes of horror, and she clawed her way back to wakefulness.

  Through it all the black-armored Death rode slowly and steadily through her nocturnal images. His flag snapped dully in a nonexistent wind, ominous in its incessant rhythm. Like the sound of an army approaching, or that of a death knell. Thwack, snap, thud...thud...Di-an-a...Di-an-a….

  “Diana?”

  Her eyes peeled open and she saw that the world was light once again. Someone was pounding on her door. Jonathan.

  She couldn’t answer; her brain was still fogged, smothered by the dreams. She looked at the clock. Two. In the afternoon?

  “Diana,” Jonathan said again, and this time he cracked the door.

  “What?” she croaked.

  “I’m—leaving for awhile. Thought you might want to know.” His gaze traveled the room lighting on her suitcases. “I hope you’re still here when I get back,” he added, looking at her hopefully.

  She didn’t respond with more than a little wave. Her hand trembled noticeably and her head still thudded. Mercifully, the door closed and moments later, she heard Jonathan leave the house.

  Only then did she feel able to pull herself from the bed on shaky legs and make her way to the kitchen. Coffee didn’t appeal, but she had juice and then went to retrieve her cell phone from its pocket in her purse.

  No missed calls. No texts.

  Not that she’d expected any from anyone. Ethan didn’t even have her cell phone number...did he? Not that he’d call her.

  Why would he call her? She was nothing more than a summer fling who also happened to be a subject. The nausea returned in full force and she directed herself back into the kitchen to find something on which to nibble, realizing she hadn’t eaten since yesterday on the road.

  With a few crackers in hand, Diana sat herself firmly down at the kitchen table with her laptop and the intention of working. Tomorrow was Monday, and she’d be back in the office bright and early, ready to get back to her normal life.

  No more thoughts about Tarot cards, no more worries about someone breaking into her house, and certainly no more daydreaming about a handsome, dog-loving parapsychologist.

  * * *

  Two weeks after her return from Damariscotta, Diana was in her office trying to concentrate on a brief when her assistant poked her head around the door. “Got a minute? It’s the Merkovitz case,” Mickey said.

  A twinge of unease shivered over her. She’d been avoiding spending any time on the case, justifying it by the fact that she had months before the hearing. But she couldn’t ignore it and its difficult client forever. “Of course. Come in.”

  Mickey, who was, as always, dressed at the height of trend, clomped in on her chunky-heeled shoes and proffered her boss a stack of manila folders as she took a seat.

  She was as close to a best friend as Diana had had in a long while—next to Jonathan. They were the same age but their lives leading up to their current positions were completely different.

  Raised in the North End among the Italian Catholics, Mickey had married at age seventeen immediately out of high school, bore her first child at eighteen, her second at twenty, her third at twenty-one, and got her tubes tied shortly thereafter over the vehement protests of her mother Salem. Now, her children were in school—the youngest was eleven—and she’d decided to pursue the career she’d never had a chance to start before. Her husband, Dominic, had been surprisingly supportive. Mickey main
tained it was because she was such an awful cook, and that with her at work, his mother could cook for them.

  Regardless of how or why she’d come into this position, the fact was she was the best assistant, confidant, and friend Diana had ever had working for her...even though Mickey tended to be a bit too outspoken.

  “What’s the update?” Diana said from her seat on the other side of the mahogany desk.

  “Don’t think I haven’t noticed how you’ve been avoiding this case. And Merkovitz’s calls,” Mickey said, tossing a cloud of frizzy blond hair behind her shoulder.

  Diana bit her lip. She couldn’t hide much from Mickey. “That obvious, huh?”

  “Not that I blame you—the guy’s still the biggest dickwad I’ve ever met, and that’s saying a lot, coming from the North End. And having five brothers.”

  “Your brothers aren’t that big of jerks,” Diana protested, remembering many a dinner overrun by the big, loud, Italian-Catholic family. Except maybe Leo, who’d once stuck his hand up her shirt after too many glasses of Chianti.

  “No, but they have a lot of friends who are.”

  Both of them chuckled and then Diana returned her attention to the matter at hand. “So tell me the latest. You met with the CNA and the nurse?”

  “Right. They were in the surgery that Merkovitz allegedly screwed up—Jenkson is the patient’s name. They were only willing to talk off the record, but I’m sure they’ll be subpoenaed. They both stated, independently, that they were certain he was intoxicated during the surgery. Slurred words, a bit of a stumble, shaking hands—the whole nine yards. But they didn’t smell anything on him, so ….”

  “Damn,” Diana breathed, placing her hand softly, firmly on the desk. What had always been a prickling annoyance about the previous case, one that she’d forced herself to ignore, expanded into full-blown comprehension. “I knew it.” Anger and disbelief warred inside. He’d lied to her. She’d even asked him point-blank if he’d been under the influence of any drugs or intoxicants, and he’d lied.