If something has happened to your father, you are now an extremely wealthy young woman. Be careful, Christine. Be very, very careful. Reid St. Pierre has a way of getting whatever he wants, and if your father is dead—and I pray he is not—you now have something Reid wants very badly.
My fingers trembled as I refolded the letter and slipped it back into the envelope. Dear God in heaven, what had my father done? He had set me up to become the next victim. His legacy insured that I would never leave Columbé alive…or, at least, with my sanity intact. Whoever had taken my father would make certain of that. I was a minor detail that would have to be taken care of.
But how? By driving me insane? By making me doubt my own mind? Would that be grounds enough to contest a new will? Perhaps that was why someone had been tormenting my father before he disappeared. Perhaps his sanity would also be challenged.
I stared down at the will in my shaking hands. The words blurred before my eyes. Names ran together: Christopher Greggory, Claudine St. Pierre Greggory, Angelique, Mrs. DuPrae, Rachel, Reid and myself. Lives all tangled together in a hopeless mire of passion and greed…and now murder.
“Please no,” I whispered into the deadly silence. “Please don’t let my fears be true.”
The only answer to my prayer was my grandmother’s raspy voice whispering to me, making me listen to her even though I wanted to clap my hands over my ears and close her out. But the voice was coming from inside my head, and there was nothing I could do to stop it. Over and over again she whispered to me, tortured me with her prophecy.
“When a man pursues a plain girl like you, Christine, he always has an ulterior motive.”
* * *
Later that afternoon, I walked into the police station with the copy of my father’s will, hidden inside its manila envelope, tucked beneath my arm. Somehow, I knew the contents of that will were of vital importance to finding my father. Somehow, I had to make Captain Baptiste see it, too.
But the moment I came face-to-face with the policeman, his dark, serpentine gaze indolently scanning my imperfect features, my resolve wilted. How could I trust him? How could I give him one more reason to doubt my sanity?
“I appreciate your promptness, Miss Greggory. I only have a few questions for you.”
Our gazes met, and he smiled. I felt my skin start to crawl.
“May I ask what your activities have been today?”
“You mean my comings and goings?”
The black eyes gleamed. “Precisely.”
“I’ve been home all day, trying to get some rest. Mrs. DuPrae can vouch for me. Why? Has something else happened?”
He got up from his chair and came around the desk, then leaned against the edge as he folded his arms and stared down at me. “Lawrence Crawford’s office was broken into sometime last night or early this morning. The place was completely ransacked, as was his home. Someone was obviously looking for something.”
The envelope beneath my arm began to burn, and I could almost feel the words on my father’s will writhing and twisting against my skin. “Wh-what were they looking for, do you think?”
“Good question.” His eyes dropped to the envelope, then lifted. “I was hoping you could suggest something. He was your father’s attorney, after all. I know you’ve had contact with him since you arrived in Columbé. Does anything at all come to mind, Miss Greggory?”
Tell him, my mind commanded. Tell him and make him help you.
The only people who had known about my father’s new will had been my father and Lawrence Crawford. My father was missing. Lawrence Crawford was dead.
And now I knew.
I knew, and I could be next in line.
“You now have something Reid wants very badly.”
Tell him! my mind screamed.
But as I opened my mouth to speak, a shaft of sunlight from the dirty window behind the desk fell across Captain Baptiste, backlighting him with a sort of perverted halo. Light sparked on the gold snake ring he wore on his left hand, making it glow with subtle inference.
Jean Marc, the driver who had abandoned me my first night in Columbé, had worn a ring like that.
Lawrence Crawford’s murderer had worn a ring like that suspended from a gold chain.
And once, long, long ago, Reid St. Pierre had worn a ring like that, too.
“Did you happen to notice anything unusual about Lawrence Crawford’s body, Miss Greggory? About his…wounds?”
My lips were dry, my throat parched. I said harshly, “I didn’t examine it closely, if that’s what you mean. But it was obvious his throat had been cut.”
“Yes, that was obvious. What might not have been so obvious to you, however, was that his tongue had been cut out. Before he died.”
I gasped. I was shaking all over. I felt sick, drained. “Why?”
Captain Baptiste smiled thinly. “That, too, is obvious. He knew something, and he talked. The act was his punishment. Or perhaps it was meant as a warning to anyone else who might know…something….” He tapped his ring against the edge of the desk—low, measured beats that were hypnotic.
I lifted my gaze and met his. You know, the dark eyes seemed to be saying. You know, and your turn is next….
“I don’t know anything.” I stood, clutching the package as though it might fly from my arms of its own accord. No one could know that I had it. No one. “I have to go now.”
Captain Baptiste merely nodded, an odd sort of glint in his dark eyes. But he didn’t try to detain me. I almost ran through the lobby, bursting through the doors into the sunlight. I paused on the sidewalk, catching my breath and wondering which way to go. Every direction seemed to hold danger for me. Danger and betrayal. There was no one on this godforsaken island I could trust. No one who could help me now.
“I’ll help you, child.”
The soft, lyrical voice spoke behind me. I turned and saw Mama Vinnia standing beneath the limbs of a huge banyan tree. She wore a faded, long-sleeved black dress that dropped to her ankles and a wide-brimmed straw hat that covered her graying hair. A gris-gris, along with a silver cross, hung around her neck on a red cord. She touched them both as she stared at me, chanting softly in the dappled sunlight beneath the tree.
I took a step toward her. “How? How can you help me?”
“Your father has been missing for six days. Tomorrow night, on the Seventh Night, the Dessounin must be performed. If you do not find him before then, it will be too late.”
“But how do you know he’s not already dead?” I moved into the shade, shivering under the canopy of leaves blocking the sunlight. “How do you know it’s not already too late? How do I know I can trust you?”
The black, knowing eyes held my gaze so steady and so direct, I began to think I could see actual words forming in the darkness. A message. But not from her eyes. From her mind. From her soul.
“I’m the only one you can trust, child. I’ve no reason to harm you.”
“And no reason to help me,” I said softly.
“The evil must be stopped. The bokor grows more powerful every day. More and more true believers are falling under the malevolent influence. The society is growing. The old beliefs are being blasphemed for the evil one’s selfish greed and lust for revenge. With your help we can stop the sacrilege.”
“What can I do? I don’t even believe in voodoo.”
“You are stronger than you think, child. The bokor fears you, else you would already have gone to join your father. You have something the evil one wants, something that cannot be tampered with until the time is right. Find out who wishes you harm. Search for the amulets and charms with which the bokor works the powerful magic. Search for something personal of yours that is now in the bokor’s possession. Find the evidence and bring it to me. Only with those items can we reverse the spell. That is your father’s only hope, my child. I fear it is yours, as well. Whose evil has been cast upon you, then shall it be cast back.”
“You know, don’t you?” I whispered, g
azing into her weathered face. “You know who wishes me harm.”
“Find the evidence,” she said, her fingers slipping back to the cross.
Her dark gaze clouded as it drifted over my shoulder. Somewhere behind me, a car door slammed, and I turned to see Reid striding across the street toward the police station. He saw us then, and slowed his steps as he changed directions and came toward us.
“Here, child!” Mama Vinnia slipped something into my hand, and I looked down at the cloth bag. “I’ve prepared you another gris-gris. Keep it with you night and day. Never leave it from your person.”
My fingers tingled as they closed around the gris-gris. Was it my imagination, or was there a strange warmth emanating from the bag?
“Christine? What are you doing here?”
“The same as you, I imagine. I came to see Captain Baptiste.” Was the glint in his eyes curiosity? Or suspicion? My fingers tightened convulsively around the gris-gris. I looked around to see Mama Vinnia’s reaction to Reid, but she had disappeared. Vanished into thin air, it seemed, leaving me alone to face my fears.
I turned back to Reid. He was staring down at me, his eyes glittering in the sunlight. And suddenly the night we had shared was there between us, like a shimmering illusion—so fragile one only had to touch it to shatter the beauty. And yet, like an illusion, it tempted and taunted, made me want to believe in its reality.
“Christine.” His voice softened, soothed my tortured nerves like a dark and heady wine. He only had to say my name—one word—and I wanted to melt into his arms.
And yet only this morning I had accused him of a crime so violent, so abhorrent, I couldn’t imagine that memory ever being wiped from either of our minds. It would always be there between us, reminding him of my betrayal, and reminding me of my distrust. Even now, with his gaze warming me like hot satin, I felt myself pulling back from him.
He sensed it, too. His eyes darkened, and the sensuous mouth hardened. He looked at me angrily, almost savagely, as he reached for my hand, then pulled me into his arms, right there on the street.
The heat of the sun beat down upon us. The noises from the street faded away as my heart pounded like a captured creature against my chest. His mouth was only inches from mine, but our eyes were open and we were staring at one another. His features were dark with emotion. I wondered what he was thinking, what he meant to do….
“Reid…”
The whispery plea was cut short as his mouth came down on mine, hot and hard and devastatingly hungry. I parted my lips, and his tongue shot inside, so bold and glorious a possession, my senses spun with excitement.
An alarm sounded somewhere inside me, but I ignored it. Colors burst behind my closed lids, and a shower of fire ignited my blood, setting aflame the wild, wanton side of me that had been unleashed last night.
I wanted him. God help me, I wanted him again and again and again. I would never be free now. I would never again have a will of my own.
Reid’s hands tangled in my hair, releasing the pins that held it in place. It tumbled down my back, unbound and disheveled, a brazen symbol of the new me.
He lifted his mouth from mine, and, dazed and shaken to my core, I tried to back away from his embrace. His arms tightened around me.
“Don’t you dare,” he said. “Don’t you dare try to deny it.”
“This is hardly the time or place,” I said weakly. Now that his mouth no longer devoured mine, the world had stopped spinning, and I was all too aware of the curious stares and the laughing dark faces.
“Just so you know, Christine. There’s no place you can run to. No place you can hide from me.”
“You’re deliberately trying to scare me,” I said, lifting my chin. “You’re getting even with me because of what I said this morning.”
“Don’t you think you owe me? You called me a murderer.” His gaze flickered briefly as he traced my lips with the tip of his finger.
“I was frightened, hysterical. You were the first person I saw when I opened my eyes.”
His hand had slipped to my throat, and his thumb caressed the deep hollow. My pulse flailed against his touch. His gaze held me in thrall.
“And now? What is it you believe about me now, Christine?”
“I believe you’re a man who always gets what he wants.”
He looked startled for a moment; then he laughed. “How perceptive you are,” he said softly, his finger running up and down my throat. “And as we both know, you have something I want very badly.”
My heart bounced against my chest. “Wh-what do you mean?”
“Have dinner with me tonight.” His eyes deepened, his voice lowered. “Have dinner with me tonight, and I’ll show you.”
His very presence was intoxicating, like a forbidden drug. I knew he was dangerous, perhaps deadly, but my body needed him, craved him with a dark, hedonistic addiction I had no will to resist.
“Where?”
“In my suite at the St. Pierre.”
Where it had all begun. Where he had made love to me so passionately and so possessively that I would never be able to be with anyone else. I was his now. No matter what, I was his. I would always be his….
The blue eyes impaled me, draining my soul of the last remnants of my will. “Will you come?” he asked, so urgently and so seductively that my stomach fluttered with anticipation. I knew exactly what he was asking.
I slipped the gris-gris into the pocket of my dress, no longer wanting its protection. “Yes,” I said on a whisper. “I’ll come….”
What choice did I have? I was already…so close….
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
The Sixth Night
Just after dark I guided Rachel’s car into a parking space at the St. Pierre Hotel, killed the engine and sat for a moment, contemplating my dilemma.
It’s not too late to change your mind.
But wasn’t it?
It had been too late from the moment I set foot on Columbé, when the wheels of sanity had begun spinning wildly out of control. It had been too late ten years ago when I had seen him for the first time. My destiny and Reid’s destiny had been intertwined even before we’d met. One could not be separated from the other, and in truth, I wouldn’t have wanted it otherwise.
Because I was in love with him.
I could see it so clearly now, this fascination, this…obsession. I was truly, madly, deeply in love with him, and that fact alone was why I had never been able to forget him, why I would go to him now, in spite of my fears. I gazed down at the package from Lawrence Crawford on the seat beside me. Then I lifted it and tucked it beneath the front seat, out of sight. Out of mind.
I loved Reid, and I always had, always would…no matter what happened.
So tightly strung were my nerves that I scarcely remembered getting out of the car, walking into the hotel and stepping into an elevator, then finding Reid’s suite. I stood outside his door and knocked softly.
The door swung inward and I stepped through, gazing around in amazement.
The room was lit with dozens and dozens of white candles, and incense perfumed the air with the scent of violets. Beyond the double doors to the bedroom, more candles flickered and danced in the mild breeze that blew in from the balcony doors. I stepped gingerly into the bedroom.
“Reid?”
No answer, but the candle flames stirred. I turned around, but no one was there. My heart began to pound. The scent of violets thickened, lingering on the air like an unspoken promise. Like the candles, my senses stirred in awareness. I could feel his presence, knew that he was somewhere near me, waiting, waiting for me to come to him.
Slowly, my fingers trembling, I unbuttoned my dress and the silky fabric slid to the floor. I stepped out of my shoes, slipped out of my underthings, then lay on the bed with only candlelight covering me.
Shadows moved on the ceiling. A breeze from the open windows glided over me. The flames danced and bowed, waiting for the magic.
Then the air whispered
with movement.
I looked up, and he was standing over me, his bronzed skin glowing in the candlelight.
Desire blazed like a torch in my stomach. There was something primitive about the way he was looking at me. Something wild…and fiercely possessive. His blue gaze beckoned, seduced, compelled me to yield to his silent command.
You’re mine now, Christine. I want to hear you say it.
“I’m yours,” I whispered, and he smiled, his eyes gleaming.
He moved around the bed toward me, and I watched, fascinated, as candlelight danced over his features, creating alternate images of light and dark. He sat down on the edge of the bed and reached for me. But instead of pulling me into his arms, he turned me, so that I was lying facedown on the mattress.
His lips touched the back of my neck as he whispered to me dark, heated promises of what the night would bring. His hands—so large and powerful, and warmed now with some fragrant oil—glided down my back, smoothed over my thighs, then dipped between my legs.
Fire ripped through me. I had never felt so deliciously hot, so out of control. His slick fingers caressed me deeply, made me cry out for more, but his hand moved away, and I rolled over to face him, to draw him to me for a long, intimate kiss.
He pulled back, and we gazed at each other in the subtle light. The look in his eyes, so darkly erotic, made me want him desperately, even as I shivered in fear of the unknown.
He reached for the crystal flacon of oil on the night-stand. The glass sparkled like diamonds in the candlelight as he held it over me, tantalizing me with the look in his eyes. The warm oil dropped slowly, oh, so slowly, into the deep hollow between my breasts, then downward, drop by drop, onto my stomach, and lower still…
A storm of passion raged through me, sweeping me into a blaze so fierce, so powerful, I could do nothing but close my eyes and let the sensations take me. His hands were gliding over me, massaging the oil into every inch of my skin until I thought I would scream from the exquisite torture. The scent of violets hung over the air like a fragrant cloud. The flames of the candles danced wildly in the breeze.
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