by Jory Strong
Aislinn’s thoughts moved to the last conversation that she’d had with her mother. The Elf-lord, Rennie, had been there, his eyes crystal-clear in their arrogant disdain for anyone not of pure blood. He was her mother’s heartmate now, had been for most of the years that Aislinn had lived in Elven-space.
Sometimes she wondered if perhaps her mother would have warmed up if it had remained just the two of them. If perhaps they would have become friends if not a true mother and daughter. Maybe if her mother hadn’t been a highborn Elf it would have been different. But her mother was a princess among Elves. And while her mother’s friends and family forgave her for exploring the human world and explained away her beguilement with the human because of his music, they never accepted the child she’d created and brought back with her.
Take care in your father’s world, her mother said before pulling a ring from her finger and handing it to Aislinn. It was a heavy ring with small violet stones, masculine though finely crafted. Aislinn had a vague memory of seeing it on her mother’s hand when they’d first come here to live. But she hadn’t seen it in a long time.
This is your father’s ring. He was a true heartmate or you would never have been conceived. But he was not Elven, nor gifted as we are with the ability to touch others with our minds. This ring allowed him to join his mind to mine. I don’t know if you will find a heartmate among the humans. But perhaps you will.
Aislinn had stroked the stones, finding a small measure of comfort in how they warmed under her hand. She’d kept the ring with her, but once in her father’s world, the warmth of the stones had faded.
“I need to go to Inner Magick,” Aislinn said as the picture of the necklace that she wanted to make for Sophie began forming in her mind.
“No way! Trace would make my life a living hell. He’d arrange it so every time I double-parked or went over the speed limit, there’d be some cop waiting to give me a ticket.”
Aislinn laughed. “Only for a few minutes. You said that you didn’t see any reporters there when you drove by.”
“Right. But I didn’t get out and check the bushes either.”
“We’ll be back before Trace even knows we’re gone,” Aislinn said, then defended her request further by adding, “I only promised to stay here yesterday. I didn’t promise not to leave today.”
Sophie snorted. “Somehow I doubt that Trace made that distinction. Just tell me what you need from the shop and I’ll go get it. Better my face in the newspaper than yours.”
Aislinn shook her head. When it came to creating charms for her mother’s people, Aislinn’s gift for working crystal wasn’t as great as even the least of the Elven craftsmen. But when it came to crafting special amulets for humans, Aislinn had a true gift, made more powerful by her feel for creating at just the right point in time, when the magic was willing to be harnessed.
Now that she had decided to make a heartmate necklace for Sophie she couldn’t let it go. She couldn’t put it off, not if she wanted to give Sophie a true charm that would aid her in finding the one meant for her.
“It’s important,” Aislinn said, once again reaching for Sophie’s hand, this time giving it a gentle squeeze.
Sophie’s expression wavered slightly. “Why don’t we call Trace or one of the other guys? I’d say Storm but I think she’s off interviewing some guy who wrote a book about psychic investigations.”
Aislinn shook her head. “This is something that can’t wait. It’s not just going and getting the crystal. I need to do some other things, to prepare. And you need to be there, too.”
“Me?”
Aislinn hesitated. She didn’t want Sophie to be disappointed if the magic couldn’t be harnessed, but there was no time to waste.
“I want to make a necklace for you. A heartmate necklace. Among my mother’s…people, there are certain…clans who use a crystal to find their…husbands and wives.”
Sophie’s brows drew together. “It doesn’t make someone feel something they wouldn’t feel without the necklace does it?”
Aislinn laughed softly. “No.”
Sophie nibbled on a bottom lip before curiosity got the better of her. “How does it work?”
“If you mean how does the magic in the crystal work, then I don’t know the answer. But the crystal will come to life and glow when you’re around your perfect mate.”
Sophie frowned. “And the catch is…I’m the only one of us that’ll know we’re perfect for each other. Right? The guy may have no interest at all.”
“The crystal wouldn’t lead you to someone who’s wrong for you.”
Mixed emotions flickered across Sophie’s features. “So even if it never glows, at least I’ll know from the start if a guy isn’t Mr. Right?”
Aislinn nodded. “The magic demands that you give up something if you want to gain something.”
Sophie let out a sigh. “I’ll take you to Inner Magick.”
Chapter Seven
Dark, dangerous fantasies washed over Trace as he prowled around his house. Damn her! She’d promised!
He flicked his cell phone open, then closed it. Shit. He’d already left messages on Sophie’s cell and home phones. He’d even tracked down Storm to see if she knew where her cousin and Aislinn were. Goddamn it! He thought it’d be enough to have a couple of patrol cars cruise by, just to make sure no reporters showed up. When he’d gotten the call that Sophie’s car was parked in his driveway, he told them not to worry—she was authorized. That had backfired on him.
He stalked back down the hallway, this time stopping at the alarm panel. He should’ve changed the code.
Uneasiness washed through him as he studied the keys. They all looked the same to him. Even knowing which numbers he touched repeatedly, he couldn’t see more wear on them than on the others.
Fuck. He saw the scene in the interrogation room all over again. She’d gone directly to the Morrison kid’s glove. No hesitation. It was like none of the other gloves even existed for her. How had she done that?
Trace ran his fingers through his hair. He felt like he’d been thrown into a wall made of concrete.
He was too good a cop to start believing in this psychic shit now. But he was too much of a man to want to lose Aislinn over it. Christ, all he had to do was think about her and his cock got rock-hard. When she got home…
The cell phone in his pocket started ringing. Trace reached for it, pressing his already tight jeans even tighter in order to retrieve the phone. “Dilessio,” he growled.
Sophie’s voice answered him. “We’re on our way to your house now.”
“Let me talk to her.”
“What? What? Sorry this connection is bad.” The line went dead.
With a curse, Trace called her back and got voicemail. Son of a bitch. He didn’t believe for a second that the connection was bad.
He stalked back to his bedroom and dug around in one of the drawers for a pair of padded restraints. When Aislinn got here she was going to learn once and for all that she belonged to him and he called the shots.
* * * * *
Aislinn shook her head. “I don’t think hanging up on him was a good idea.”
If Sophie was worried she didn’t show it. “He wanted to talk to you. Yell is probably closer to the truth.”
“I’m not afraid of him.” Aislinn shivered despite the words. Some primitive part of her knew what was coming. She blushed as she remembered his husky warning in the shower, the dark promise it contained. Don’t come on my leg, baby. If you do, I’ll punish you.
Sophie slowed to a stop in front of Trace’s house. The front door opened and Trace stood there, chest and feet bare, face dark and dangerous, hands on his hips—bracketing the huge bulge pressed against his jeans. “Ohmygod,” Sophie breathed.
Anticipation washed over Aislinn in a skin-tingling, electric wave. Her nipples tightened into painful buds. “I’ll call you,” she said as she eased out of Sophie’s car.
Trace’s body tightened with each of Aisli
nn’s steps. He could read the need in her, the acceptance of what was to come. He couldn’t have stopped it if he’d wanted to. It took all of his self-control to keep from pouncing on her as soon as she got close. He stepped back and let her pass, almost groaning when the scent of her arousal enfolded him as she moved into the house.
“You weren’t supposed to leave. Now strip and let’s get your punishment over with.”
His cock tightened when he saw Aislinn’s eyes flash at his demand. “I didn’t promise not to leave today,” she argued, “and besides, no one saw us.”
“That doesn’t matter. You knew I didn’t want you to leave the house.”
Her eyes dropped to the bulge in his pants and Trace had to grit his teeth to keep from groaning as his cock twitched under her gaze. He stalked her down the hall, using his body to maneuver her into the bedroom, forcing her backward until she came up against the bed. “You’re under my protection. That means you do what I say. Now strip, baby, before you make me lose control.”
Aislinn shivered, wanting to submit, wanting to please him. Her eyes flickered upward and met his. He needed this as much as she did.
“I didn’t do anything wrong, and you don’t have any right to punish me.”
“Wrong answer, baby.” He took her wrists in one hand and sat on the bed, pulling her down across his knees before yanking her dress up and exposing pale peach panties. His cock jerked in anticipation of where this was heading.
She began struggling, but he knew she was aroused by the telltale wetness of her panties. He ripped them down and gave her a sharp smack on one ass cheek. “Who makes the rules here?” he asked.
“Let me up,” she answered and was rewarded by five sharp spanks.
“Wrong answer. Who makes the rules here?”
When she didn’t answer right away, he escalated the spanking, sending fire across the globes of her buttocks and through her clit. Aislinn bit her lip to keep from whimpering.
Trace paused and ran his hand over her ass. “Ready to answer now? Who makes the rules here?”
His touch burned her sensitive skin, but Aislinn couldn’t stop herself from moving into his hand. She was so swollen and wet, so achy with need that she wanted to spread her legs and feel him inside her.
“You do,” she whispered.
He slipped his fingers between her legs and slid them back and forth along her slit before darting down to circle her clit. With the touch to her clit, Aislinn arched upward and sobbed.
“Right answer,” Trace said, releasing her wrists and standing her on her feet. “Now strip like I told you to.”
Aislinn pulled the dress up over her head and dropped it, never taking her eyes off of Trace. His face tightened and his eyelids dropped. She removed the bra and stepped out of her panties and sandals.
“Get on the bed,” Trace ordered, standing and waiting for her to comply as he fought the need to simply push Aislinn down and fuck her.
Aislinn moved to the center of the bed. Her heart rate escalated when he didn’t begin removing his clothes.
Blood roared through Trace at the sight of her naked and submissive in his bed. Christ, he wanted to rip his jeans off and fuck her right now, but he knew it wouldn’t be enough, wouldn’t satisfy him—not after the emotional roller-coaster ride he’d been on since he got home and found her gone.
He walked over to the nightstand, feeling her eyes on him, sensing her increasing anxiety as she wondered what he was doing. Anticipation rippled through him at her sharp intake of breath when he picked up the restraints.
He turned and attached the end of one restraint to the bedpost. “Lie down,” he said, more aroused by this, by her willingly giving him control, than by the mock capture-and-fuck scenarios he’d played out with other women in the past.
Aislinn’s gaze darted back and forth between the restraints and Trace. Her heart pounded in her chest, racing between fear and desire.
“Don’t make me tell you again,” Trace growled, his voice sending shocks of heat through her clit and buttocks at the implied threat of another spanking.
Aislinn shivered and lay down.
Trace fastened the first restraint to her wrist, then moved around the bed and bound her other wrist before removing his clothes and straddling her body.
He couldn’t contain a groan as his balls settled on the smooth hot skin of her belly. His cock strained upward, demanding contact. Trace moved along Aislinn’s body, his balls growing tighter and heavier with each new inch of skin they rubbed against. Her mouth drew him, but he got sidetracked at her breasts.
As soon as he cupped them in his hands, the need to push them together and ram his cock in and out of the valley between them seized him. Her pale pink nipples were tight with arousal and Trace had to give them tribute. He leaned down, sucking first one then the other, pulling the nipples hard and fast into his mouth as Aislinn writhed beneath him.
Each of her movements sent shards of pleasure through his testicles and up his spine, then back to his dick. Groaning, he pressed her breasts together and rammed his cock in and out of the tight hot channel he’d created.
Aislinn whimpered at the loss of his mouth on her nipples. She pulled against the restraints, willing to ease herself with her own hands if she had to. “Please,” she begged.
Trace’s fingers moved to her areolas and squeezed hard on the upstroke. Aislinn gasped and when the head of his penis emerged from between her breasts, she took it in her mouth and sucked. His body jerked in reaction, pressing his heavy sac tight against the underside of her breast.
She laved and sucked him at the end of each upward stroke until he was panting and nearly shaking with the need to come. She cried out and fought the restraints when he pulled away from her and rose to his hands and knees above her.
His hips gave an involuntary pump at the sight of her beneath him, at the way her eyes were dilated, her breathing labored, her legs spread, thighs and sheet wet from her arousal. Being outside her body was rapidly becoming more than he could stand. A fever raged through him that he didn’t think would ever have a cure. He pressed his mouth to her cunt and thrust his tongue into her, drinking in her sweet woman’s taste along with her cries of pleasure. When she tried to use her thighs to hold him to her, he pressed them to the bed and punished her by raising his head so that only his breath contacted her engorged clit and passion-swollen labia.
She whimpered and begged, tears streaming down her face as her need for him became unbearable.
He rose above her, a male animal in its prime, cock straining, testicles tight and full as the urge to rut became undeniable.
Trace paused long enough to release the restraints, and then he was on her, in her, demanding with every hard thrust that she yield everything to him.
Chapter Eight
Nobody doubted that they were dealing with the same killer.
“Shit!” Miguel said.
“Yeah,” Conner grunted, stretching and snapping a pair of latex gloves before pulling them onto his hands.
“Trace and Dylan on this one?” Miguel asked, snagging gloves from the box one of the crime scene guys had left next the door.
“On their way.”
Miguel shook his head. “Oh man, Trace is going to lose it if Aislinn knows this one, too.”
They stepped into the psychic’s parlor. She was stretched out on a cloth-lined table with a spread of tarot cards on her chest.
“Tell me about it,” Conner said.
Miguel stopped next to him. “Oh shit. I saw this one on the news. Madame Ava. She wasn’t a fan of the department.”
“Yeah. I caught the interview. The Captain is hunting down Bruner right now to see if Sandra Kirby was using Ava to find her missing kid.”
A movement at the doorway had them turning. “Welcome to the party,” Conner said as Trace and Dylan walked in.
“A hundred reporters out there—any of them here when the murder took place?” Dylan asked.
Conner grunted.
“Already got a couple of uniforms out there taking names and asking that same question. You recognize this one? She’s been all over the news. Made a big point of not trusting the cops. Made it sound like we were harassing psychics and probably murdered Dean ourselves.”
“Fuck,” Trace muttered.
Dylan caught Miguel’s worried expression before shooting Trace a look and asking the question that was on all of their minds. “Think there’s a connection to Aislinn?”
Trace’s entire body tightened. “I don’t know.”
“She’s still at your place, right?” Miguel asked.
“Yeah.” A flicker of uneasiness moved through Trace and he reached for his cell phone. Shit, would Aislinn even answer if he called his house? He could try and catch Sophie, tell her to forget about the beach, at least until he could be there to make sure it was safe.
Trace’s gut twisted. He was a fucking coward. Sophie and Aislinn making a run to the beach had nothing to do with watching the sunset, but he hadn’t asked why it was so important. Christ, he’d still been reeling from the sex. He hadn’t wanted to open the box of psychic shit and have it all dump on him.
His eyes scanned the scene in front of him and he relaxed a little bit. It should be okay. As long as Aislinn stayed away from Inner Magick, she should be safe. This killer liked a stage for his crime.
He pulled up Sophie’s number and called, half-expecting her to try and pull the static-bad-connection-bullshit as soon as she knew it was him. Instead she said, “We just heard the news. Here’s Aislinn. She said she didn’t know Madame Ava.”
Trace’s heart did a little dance as soon as he heard Aislinn’s butterfly-soft greeting. “You didn’t know her?” he asked.
“No. I saw her on TV this morning. If she ever came to the shop, it was when I wasn’t there.”
“Good. You’re on your way to the beach?”
“Yes.”
