Katie pushed her arm forward. It felt like it was made of lead. It felt like her muscles were carved from ice. She couldn’t move fast enough. The card was telling her what to do, and she ached to make it happen in time because if she didn’t then she knew in her heart that there wouldn’t be a second chance.
NOOOOOOOOO she heard Laveau scream.
Her hand reached the mirror. The joker card slapped against the glass.
Flames burst into being around the edge of the card, searing into the glass, sending radiant cracks along the surface that cut through Katie’s image and splintered here into distorted fragments. In some of those pieces, Katie could see herself.
In others, she saw the loa of Madame Laveau wearing her skin, her clothes, her face. One eye was Katie’s, one eye was Laveau’s. The one that belonged to the voodoo queen glared menacingly.
“You can not get rid of me,” Laveau spoke to her. “I am forever. The power of voodoo preserve me--”
Whatever else Laveau was going to say was lost forever when the mirror finished shattering into tiny bits and fragments that fell in harsh, discordant chimes to the floor.
The only thing remaining in the frame of the mirror was the joker card, the edges of it melted to the wood baking.
Chapter 38
The fires didn’t stop with the card.
Katie was covering her face with her arms to protect her eyes from the flying glass. She was desperate to know that Laveau was gone. There was no time to check for sure before the entire room erupted in flames.
A muffled boom was followed by a bright flash of dark flames. Then another. And another. Katie peered through her fingers in horror as the dried up bodies of Madame Laveau’s followers all spontaneously combusted. Their link to their mistress had been the only thing keeping them around. With Laveau gone the magic was burning them up.
Their skin melted, and smoked, and turned to charred ash. The fire ate through to their bones, and scarred the basement floor. Katie could smell them dying. She could see the fire doing things to their bodies that she would never be able to unsee.
The flames were hot, and they screamed with a life of their own. Katie dropped to her knees and now she covered her ears to shut that sound out.
Her overworked brain finally clued in that this house was on fire. She needed to leave. She needed to get out.
Before the fires of the dead consumed her.
She crouched, and crawled a few steps in what seemed like the right direction to find the door out but then she wasn’t sure. There was smoke in the air now, greasy and putrid smoke. She couldn’t see two feet in front of her face.
She was crying, and babbling fragments of words that didn’t go together and didn’t make sense even to her. Death was all around her. It wanted her. She wanted to get away.
Something grabbed ahold of her by the back of her hair.
Pain shot across her scalp and she yelped in surprise, throwing her hands back to grab hold of whatever had her in its grip. The flames of the dead behind her spread to the stacks of odds and ends in the basement around them. Old boxes. Newspapers. Wooden furniture. Everywhere around her became an inferno as she was roughly lifted up off the floor.
Her hands caught hold of the muscular arms of her attacker.
Carlson.
She barely got her feet under her when she was spun around to face him. He held her there like that, pulling her closer with his fist in her hair. His eyes radiated the same sort of heat burning around them in the basement.
“You,” he growled. “I thought you would be happy to give Queen Laveau a body again. I thought you would understand how much of a gift this is!”
Katie saw the fires getting closer through the smoke. She knew Xavier’s zombie was still out there. Or maybe he was part of the flames like the empty followers around the pentagram. She didn’t know. She just wanted out of this horror show.
“You’ve ruined everything!” Carlson yelled in her face. “Everything!”
Katie’s focus narrowed down to this man keeping her from escaping. This man who had lied to her, seduced her, brought her into his bed--all to trap her into being a host for an evil voodoo queen. This man had given her body to Laveau and damned her soul to oblivion.
She wasn’t going to let him do this to her. She wasn’t going to die because of a man like this. Her life was her own.
Her heart was her own. This guy didn’t get to mess with it like this.
He yanked on her hair again.
It brought her feet up until just her toes touched the floor.
Gritting her teeth, she swung her knee up into his groin.
He dropped her immediately, holding his hands to his wounded junk, and Katie felt the sweet relief as he let go of her hair.
It wasn’t good enough. She wanted him to pay for what he’d done.
With a cry of absolute frustration she brought her knee up again. This time, right in his face.
She felt the crunch of his nose as it broke against her kneecap. He tumbled backward, falling into the flames. They caught hold of his clothes immediately, and his hair...and his flesh.
Katie didn’t wait to see if he died. She didn’t want to see any of that. She closed her eyes, and crawled down the hallway to where she knew the door waited.
Try as she might, she couldn’t block out Carlson’s screams. They followed her to the door, and they followed her when she was through and on the other side.
She doubted she would ever get the sound of it out of her head.
Chapter 39
Plane rides weren’t cheap, but thank God they were quick.
After escaping the madhouse of Xavier’s family residence Katie had gone right back to her hotel room. The plan had been to collect her things and leave New Orleans immediately. She didn’t want to spend another minute in that city.
Her plans changed when she found out the next flight home wasn’t leaving for four hours.
Since she couldn’t leave for a while, she decided to take a shower. A long, long shower. The water washed away the smoke, and the ash, and the blood. She smiled, to remember the way the desk clerk at the hotel had stared at her coming back. She made quite the spectacle, and no doubt about that.
Now, she stood in the shower with her fists pressed against the wall as the hot water beat down over her head and shoulders. It felt like the first clean touch she’d had since coming to this Godforsaken city. Gentler than a man’s hands, the water coursed over the curves of her body, touching every intimate spot, teasing her like a lover.
She let the emotions of the past few days slide away with the dirt and the filth, down the drain. It wasn’t easy. It dredged up all the memories of what she had done, and what had been done to her, and it left her wondering once again what was real and what wasn’t.
There was a taste in her mouth she couldn’t quite identify. Lifting her face to the spray she filled her mouth with water and swished it around and spit it out, again and again.
After a while she began to feel like a prune. The water had left her fingers wrinkled and her body feeling scrubbed and refreshed. She was more than a little aroused, too, which surprised her. It brought back a few tattered memories of Carlson, which she sent flying away as she shook her head and let water fly everywhere from the ends of her damp hair.
It also brought back memories of Riley.
She was heading back home, and she wasn’t sure how she was going to confront him. Not that she needed to confront him, really. Riley had made it obvious to her that they were over, even if she hadn’t wanted to accept that when she came rushing down here to this damned city of wonder and magic--neither of which had been what she expected.
But she was going back to her hometown, and Riley would be there. Could she talk to him? Could she tell him everything that had happened to her and make him understand that she needed him in her life, even if it was just to be her anchor when things went totally insane?
If he’d been here with her, none of this would h
ave happened.
Or would it?
Feeling less refreshed by the shower than she had just a minute ago, Katie threw the cheap plastic shower curtain aside and stepped out onto the linoleum of the floor.
In the mirror, the face of Marie Laveau smiled back at her.
Katie startled and slipped and nearly fell on her ass in the tub. She managed to catch the edge of the curtain, ripping it off the first two rings, and that saved her from a nasty bruise on her behind.
It was only her face. This was her body, and no one else’s.
She was fine, and she was safe now.
That was the last fright that New Orleans was going to give her. Toweling off, she got dressed and packed her things and called a cab to take her to the airport. So what if she was early. She could wait right there in the airport until the plane boarded and took off and got her away from this place.
Which was exactly what she did.
It wasn’t until she was landing again in New Hampshire at Manchester-Boston International that it really hit her that she was home. The nightmare was over. She could go back to just being Katie Pearson again. When the wheels bounced on the pavement and the plane started to slow down on the runway, she let out the breath that she’d been holding.
She was home.
Well. She was just a short car ride away from home, anyway. Hour and a half, tops.
She could rent a cab to take her all that way, and use up the rest of the cash she had in her wallet, or she could just rent a car and put it on her Visa. Not like she couldn’t afford either, but she hadn’t really thought this through when she took off after her big fight with Riley. All she’d wanted to do was just get out of Twilight Ridge, where she lived, and worked, and had her whole life.
That had been her mistake. Not leaving Riley, but leaving home without a plan. It was exactly like her to do that, to just live in the moment, and come what may. It was how she’d lived since she was a teenager and it had served her well up to this point.
Then again, she’d always been running toward something before. This time, she’d been running away from something. That one change made for a world of difference.
The long drive home gave her time to zone out and just let her mind wander. The world blurred by outside the windows. Past the city limits it was all green trees and sporadic houses out here. One of the things that Katie had fallen in love with about the area was the remoteness. The connection to nature. The easy life.
It had been a new beginning for her and Riley, together. It hadn’t been all quiet. Not with the ghosts that seemed to be hiding behind every single house and tree in Twilight Ridge, but it had been home to her. Now...she wasn’t sure if she could stay here any longer.
Maybe it was time to move on again. She could always go back west again, back to where she still had her best friend Mel and a few other friends and lots of contacts in the real estate business. She could move to someplace where nobody knew her, on the other hand. Like Wisconsin. Nobody she had ever known in her life lived in that state. She wasn’t sure anyone actually lived there.
Katie laughed at her lame joke, and it felt good to laugh. It felt like forever since she’d been able to laugh.
When she saw the lights of her hometown coming into view, her laughter stopped. Now she was going to have to face Riley. Maybe she’d be lucky, and he wouldn’t even be at the Inn they owned and operated together.
Katie winced. That was another thing she hadn’t given a single thought to when she up and left for New Orleans. They had reservations booked at their Inn for the next few weeks. Without her here to help him, Riley would have had to take care of everything his own self. Not that she minded making him pull his own weight. He deserved that and a whole lot more.
What she cared about was losing a business that she had worked so hard to build up.
Through the streets of Twilight Ridge, past the local restaurant, she came in sight of her Inn. She actually stopped in the middle of the street, her hands gripping the wheel, while she stared at the beautiful redone lines of the building. A lot of work and a lot of dreams were standing in front of her.
She didn’t want to go in.
It didn’t matter what she wanted. She either had to close out her life here and move, or make peace with what she had here and stay.
Her stomach was in knots as she put the car back in drive and rolled right up to the front steps of the Inn. One way or another, she needed to end this.
Chapter 40
The sign on the door said “Closed for Season.”
Katie stared at it for a moment. It must have been the only thing Riley could find to hang on the door. Probably the only one in stock at the local hardware store.
With a heavy sigh, she plucked it off the window and tossed it aside to the floor. If there was a closed sign on the door, that meant Riley had already cancelled the reservations for any incoming guests. Apparently, her Inn was closed for business. Well, that was an answer to one of her questions, anyway.
It was time to go inside.
To her surprise, Riley was there waiting for her. He was standing at the check-in counter. The expression on his face was carefully neutral. No smile. No frown. Just him.
Bright green eyes, unruly brown hair, strong jaw and a great body under that broken in work shirt and favorite pair of jeans. He was a dream in brown Carhart boots. Any woman would be lucky to have this man in their bed.
Katie never knew how literally true that was going to be. Any woman turned out to be not just her, but a casual acquaintance who Katie never would have expected to find under the sheets with her boyfriend. Until she did.
“You’re back early,” he said.
“Well. Hello to you, too.” Katie didn’t know what she had been hoping for in the way of a greeting from him, but it certainly wasn’t that. “I don’t want to fight, Riley. I’m tired and I’m worn out from a trip--you just wouldn’t believe it.”
“Coming from you, that’s saying a lot.”
His smile was exactly like she remembered it. Quirky, and beautiful. Somehow, she had expected him to change in just a few days.
“Don’t try to sweet talk me now,” she told him. “You and I have way too much to talk about and I’m not doing it now. Right now, I’m going in the kitchen to make myself something to eat--”
“Katie, I’m sorry,” he said over her.
She ignored him. “--and then I’m going to bed. Alone. If you don’t want to give me the bed, then I’ll just sleep in one of the other rooms. I see you’ve closed the Inn so I’ll have plenty of them to choose from.”
“I had to,” he tried to explain. “I couldn’t keep this place running by myself and you didn’t exactly give me warning that you were going anywhere.”
“I don’t have to tell you anything!” she nearly screamed at him. “You’re the one who cheated on me. I don’t owe you a damned thing.”
“Katie...”
“Don’t ‘Katie’ me! Riley, I have never in my life given my heart to a guy who betrayed me like you did.”
She stopped talking after she said it, because she most certainly had. She’d given her heart to Carlson down in New Orleans, at least a little bit, and he had betrayed her harder than she would have thought possible. Compared to what Carlson did, Riley was still a saint.
That didn’t mean she was going to forgive him. Her stomach was in knots again, queasy and sick.
“Just stay away from me,” she told him, and headed for the kitchen with long, stiff strides.
Of course he didn’t stay away from her. He followed her, just like she knew he would. Well, she knew she wouldn’t be able to avoid him when she came back here. This was his home too, at least for now. They were going to have to make some decisions come tomorrow, but for now she was going to do exactly what she told him. Food. Bed.
Without him.
She took out the cutting board and a loaf of bread that didn’t smell too stale. The turkey and cheese from the refrigerator, and a tom
ato. She didn’t realize how hungry she was. Maybe some chips to go with it later.
A few long seconds of silence was all that Riley could stand before he started babbling at her. “Katie, please just let me explain. She didn’t mean anything to me.”
Katie ignored him. She ignored the growing icky feeling in the pit of her belly, too. Damn him. She set her jaw so she wouldn’t be tempted to tell him exactly where he could go as she selected a tomato from the bag and brought it over to the cutting board.
Only, he wasn’t done.
“Katie? Katie, please listen to me. I thought it would be exciting and fun and it wasn’t either and now that you’ve been gone this long I just wanted to let you know that it’s you I’m in love with.”
Katie sliced the knife through the tomato, a little harder than she needed to.
“It’s always been you. There’s never been--no, there never will be anyone else but you.”
Slice.
“It doesn’t matter what me and that girl did.”
Sli-i-ice.
“I mean, it matters, sure, but what I mean is it doesn’t matter for what I feel about you.”
Sl-i-i-i-ice.
Katie waited for the next meaningless string of words. They didn’t come. Mildly surprised, she looked up at him for the first time. His gaze wasn’t on her, it was on her hands.
He pointed, and she looked down at the cutting board again.
Without realizing it, she had driven the knife right through the side of her palm. She was bleeding.
The blood wasn’t red.
It was black.
Chapter 41
Katie pulled back from the countertop, grabbing up a towel as she rushed to the sink. The towel pressed against her hand helped stopped the bleeding, and elbowing the lever to turn on the faucet let cold water run over her hand and wash away the off-colored blood.
Her stomach was really doing flip flops now.
Sight Unseen Complete Series Box Set Page 96
