by Jenna Ryan
He turned his head just enough for her to see his expression. She couldn’t read it, of course, but that was nothing new.
“I told you I was a foundling, Amara. What I didn’t tell you is that the people who took me in were part of a smuggling operation.”
“Part of a— Really?” She leaned farther around him. “Are you serious?”
“It was a small business, salvage items and minor artifacts from Central America. No drugs or weapons. My father had an antiques shop. My mother was his bookkeeper. I harangued them into letting me be their go-between. Everything was fine until my mother died. I was seventeen at the time. Two years later my father’s heart gave out. He knew he wasn’t going to make it, so he wrangled a promise from me. He wanted me to give up the life and get out before the business got out of hand. I told him I would, and I kept my word.”
“You became a cop.”
“Yep.”
“And then?”
A smile ghosted over his mouth. “Still wearing a badge here, Red.”
“Yes, but it’s a Raven’s Cove badge.”
“What, you want me to quit and let Jake take over?”
And now they were back to evasion.
“At the risk of sounding repetitive, where does the guy with the knife enter the picture?”
He considered for a moment while lightning flickered and fading peals of thunder echoed through the woods. “His name’s Westor Hall,” he said at length. “After my mother died, my father let himself be talked into expanding the business. Stakes got higher, more people got involved. Westor’s sister, his father and two uncles were part of the expansion. Westor’s sister died a few months ago. He thinks I turned her in. He wants to get even with me.”
“So why was he holding a knife on me?”
“He saw us together. He won’t hurt you, Amara. He likes to threaten, even role-play to some extent, but he’s no killer. All he really wants to do is tell you about my sordid past.”
“Ah. So he thinks...?” She moved a finger between them.
“It’s how his mind works. You’re a beautiful woman, you’re with me, you must care.”
A laugh tickled her throat. “What an intriguing line of reasoning.” Unable to resist, she angled herself toward him. Close up, in a close space, with rain drumming on the metal roof and the windows of the RV steaming up, she suddenly found herself wanting to touch.
Somewhere inside, she knew she’d been struggling with these feelings since he’d tackled her in her grandmother’s kitchen. Now here they were, all alone—well, more or less alone—in the mysterious north woods, and that struggle had become an all-out war.
She skimmed a suggestive finger over his jaw. “Tell me, McVey, just how perceptive is Westor?”
He curled the fingers of both hands lightly around her arms. “You don’t want to start something with me, Amara. I can handle being a cop, but in every other way that matters, I’m a crappy risk.”
The heat inside her cooled a little, but she held on to her smile. “Oh, good. So the wedding’s off. Because right at the top of my to-do list was the task of seducing the new Raven’s Cove police chief. Seduce, have sex, plan a relationship with, then ensnare for a lifelong commitment. After all, McVey, we’ve known each other a whole twenty-four hours now.”
“Amara...”
“I’m not angry.” But she was something, and seduction no longer played into it. She pushed at one of his hands. “I’m not upset either, or not very, which surprises me because I have a temper. Insulted, though. I’m definitely that. And I promise you, in about five seconds, if you don’t let go of me, I’ll work my way up to slapping your face.”
“Look, you’ve been through a lot...”
“Yes, I have.” Now she plucked his hands free one at a time. “So much so that, using typical male logic, you’ve decided I’m scared. Worse, you think I’m on the verge of throwing myself into your arms, and when I do, you’ll feel obliged to protect me, because...well, hey, helpless female.” Her eyes chilled. “I’m not Yolanda, McVey. And, yes, I know that sounds catty. It is catty, which must mean I’m more upset than I realized. So my mistake for starting this, and now is really not a good time to touch me.”
His expression took on a suspicious edge. “Are you hysterical?”
She closed her eyes before giving in to a humorless laugh. “I’d say I have every right to be, but I’m not. I’m—” she spread her fingers “—no idea, actually. Irritated, I suppose. Frustrated.”
“Mentally, emotionally or sexually?”
Her next laugh was genuine. “Okay, we are not having this conversation, right? Because, honest to God, it’s way too zigzaggy for me. You say we can’t start anything, yet you want to know if I’m sexually frustrated. If I say yes or even maybe—square one. So I guess no would be the appropriate— What are you doing?”
“Something I don’t often do, Red.” He slid the fingers of his right hand from the side around to the back of her neck. Keeping his eyes on hers, he pulled her slowly forward. “I’m changing my mind.”
She refused to be tempted. Or amused. But she did meet his eyes and fist the front of his shirt. “What you said before was valid, McVey. This shouldn’t happen. I have stuff, too. A past. Baggage. An ex who expected me to fall in line with his plans.”
“I don’t expect.” As he eased in closer, anticipation pulsed through her. “All I want is for you to do the same.”
“I never expect.” Because his mouth was almost on hers and, hello, this was what she’d wanted all along, Amara relaxed. It was only a kiss after all.
His thumb stroked the sensitive skin below her ear. Then suddenly his hand was in her hair, his mouth was covering hers and everything inside her flipped upside down.
A single word flashed in her head. Trouble. It repeated, over and over again, the same word.
And it had nothing to do with Jimmy Sparks’s hit man.
* * *
MCVEY HADN’T MEANT to start anything, but now that he had, he couldn’t stop. Couldn’t think beyond the raging force of his needs.
One taste of her and he was hungry for more. Hell, he was ravenous. One touch and his brain shut down. He hadn’t given up this much control since he was sixteen—more than half a lifetime ago. He’d grown jaded with time, cynical with experience—and rock hard in every possible way.
Her lips and hands yanked him right to the edge of his restraint. All he could think about was more. Of her. Of everything.
His tongue ravaged her mouth while his fingers teased the curve of her breasts.
“McVey...” She said his name as his lips slid over her jaw.
“Busy here, Red.”
“I hear—music, I think.”
He heard blood pounding in his head. And rain. Maybe thunder.
The pounding grew more insistent. From within it came a voice. And finally he heard the music, too.
Grasping her arms, he dragged his mouth free, swore and held them both still. “That’s your phone, isn’t it?”
“I can’t tell. Maybe. Yes.” She breathed deeply, in and out. “Yes.” And turned to locate her jacket. “Someone’s at the door.”
He swore again, focused and heard the banging fist.
“McVey! Amara! Answer something! Phone, door, whatever!”
Amara dug out her phone and frowned. “Brigham?”
“Open the damn door!”
The latch jammed. In no mood to finesse the thing, McVey kicked the stuck metal panel until it flew outward. “What?” he demanded.
Brigham stuck a hand in, grabbed McVey’s shirt and pointed with his cell. “One of the trailers fell off its blocks. The owner, Rune, went out to level it, and the whole edge of the ravine gave out. It took half the trailer down and trapped Rune underneath. I can’t get to him. I’m too big and too heavy to shimmy down with a rope. But someone has to do something fast or he’s a dead man.”
McVey didn’t think. He just took the jacket Amara shoved into his hands, said, “S
how me” and went out to do his job.
* * *
THAT JOB HAD drawbacks and benefits, and McVey experienced both over the next two hours. It turned out that only Amara had been able to slide between the precariously balanced trailer and the rock wall that formed the outer edge of the ravine.
A chain of men and women had held the rope that had held him while he’d lowered her inch by inch toward the stuck man. She’d managed, after three failed attempts, to loop the end around his chest and pull it snug.
Braced just over the edge, McVey had seen her thumbs-up and pulled. Behind him, Brigham had provided a solid anchor, with everyone else holding him.
Rain had come down in sheets and caused them to slip more than once. But finally, after a grueling tug-of-war, the nightmare had ended. Several backslaps later—and after a stony once-over by a woman who looked like Mother Time—he and Amara found themselves in the well-camouflaged raven tamer barn.
Fires roared in a trio of woodstoves, tarps closed off the entire rear section and the Grateful Dead pumped from an old boom box at ear-splitting volume.
While Amara sat cross-legged on the slatted floor and put twenty stitches into the rescued man’s leg, Brigham came over with two jugs of raven’s blood and an assortment of mugs. He plunked his makeshift tray on a tree stump, uncorked the jugs with his teeth and poured double handed.
“Marta says you’re ‘common.’ Means you’re welcome in.”
Chuckling, McVey took the mug Brigham thrust at him. “The logic being, if I’m welcome in, I’m less likely to bust anyone for whatever’s behind those tarps. My guess is five or six stills and an illegal winery. Marta’s a smart woman.”
Brigham sampled the wine. “You don’t live as long as she has by being dumb.” He raised his voice, “You’re common, too, Amara.”
“I bet that’s a first for a Bellam.”
“It’s a never-gonna-happen-again-Blume-blood-be-damned, so finish the patch job on Rune’s leg and prepare to drink yourself stupid.”
She cast an amused look in McVey’s direction. “The logic being that on the off chance someone did follow us here, I’ll be so ratted I won’t care if my head gets blown off.”
McVey sampled the bloodred wine—and found it surprisingly good. “Willy Sparks doesn’t blow heads off, Amara. He’ll toss you into the ravine, or try to. But he’ll have to get past me and fifty raven tamers to do it.” Raising his mug, and hoping like hell his system was up to the challenge, he grinned. “To being common.”
* * *
THE BRIDGE WAS a nightmare. Willy made it back over, but shuddered in spasms until the lights of Raven’s Hollow came into view.
The bitch was going to die in agony for this. The cop, too, for involving himself and making everything ten times harder than it should have been. Who played white knight in today’s world? What kind of person put his or her own life on the line for a complete stranger? Yes, Amara was lovely, but they were talking life and death here. Cops didn’t really want to die, did they?
Whether he did or not, McVey would be toast, right behind Amara Bellam. Unfortunately neither death would be taking place tonight. For the moment, they were on opposite sides of the bridge to hell.
So...what to do in Raven’s Hollow that might be fun and end with a little consensual sex? When in doubt, the locals said, head to the Red Eye.
Gonna get me some tonight, Willy decided. And if the drink caused anything to slip out that shouldn’t, well, more than cops and witnesses could be eliminated. What was it Uncle Jimmy liked to say? Practice made perfect.
Once again, Willy reflected, what better place to start than the Red Eye?
Chapter Eleven
“This isn’t your fight, Annalee....”
The words wound through Amara’s head like bright silver threads that tangled into a ball and eventually turned black. She saw a pot—a cauldron?—and smelled coffee, but no way did she plan to drink it.
The scene shifted. Where was she now?
A raven with a pink beak sat in a duct-taped chair, filing its talons.
“You’re so naive, Amara,” it rasped. “I told you McVey was mine. Why didn’t you listen? You never listen. You’re headstrong. Just like Uncle Lazarus said.” One of the talons snaked out to snare her wrist. “How hard did you make him laugh...?”
Another shift, and in the swirl of thoughts flooding her mind Amara saw a woman covered in black feathers. She had Hannah’s waxen features—and her lifeless green eyes. Only her mouth, thin-lipped, chalky and trembling, moved.
“Why am I in this part of the manor? Why didn’t I die in my own bed?”
Like a scenery screen yanked sideways on a stage, everything changed again. The black pot that had nothing to do with Hannah popped back in. Thick red liquid bubbled up, spilled over. A woman’s hand reached inside, pulled something out, held it up to look.
Amara’s breath stalled. Her heart gave a single hard thump.
The hand was hers. So was the face that stared in fascination at the...whatever it was. Some kind of dripping black root.
Lips that were hers, yet not hers, moved. A voice that was definitely not hers emerged.
“Evil spirit, good spirit—no and no. Man becomes raven, yes, but the spirits that bring this transformation about are human, in action and in form. You will remember nothing of this night, Annalee...”
Amara woke with a suppressed hiss and every muscle in her body clenched like a fist. Who the hell was Annalee, and why did the name sound so familiar?
Falling back on Brigham’s lumpy mattress, she regarded the dented ceiling and tried to decide if she was feeling the aftereffects of the raven’s blood wine she’d consumed last night or reacting to the dream it must have spawned.
“Did you scream?”
The unexpected question had her wincing before she levered up onto her elbow.
Well, hell, her bleary mind sighed. McVey, wearing jeans and nothing else, filled the doorway of what could only be called a bedroom by virtue of the fact that there was a bed in it. One bed, four thin walls and now an überhot cop on the threshold.
“I’m, um...”
She’d seen a half-dressed man before, right? Maybe not one who was quite so sleek and sexy, who wore his hair too long and whose sleepy eyes didn’t look entirely awake, but still...
“Did you see something?” he asked. “Someone? A pink elephant?”
Amara wondered vaguely if she was wearing anything. “I think I’m good.” She glanced down. Nope, not a stitch. “I had a dream. A very bizarre dream.”
“Doesn’t everyone who drinks devil’s blood?”
“Raven’s blood.”
“Devil’s whiskey, then.”
Holding the sheet to her breasts, she regarded him with a blend of surprise and amusement. “You drank their whiskey, too—and you can walk?”
“Not especially well right now, but it’ll come back to me.” He’d set his hands on the door frame above his head. Whatever his condition, his dark eyes gleamed when he spied the arm banded across her chest. “This is the strangest hangover I’ve ever lived through, Red. I keep seeing ravens in my head. Beautiful talking ravens.”
“That’s because we saw talking ravens last night. Preview of coming attractions. Pretty sure they weren’t real. I remember them having red eyes.” She released a slow breath, rolled her head. “That wine has a wicked kick.”
“You could say.” McVey’s pressed briefly on his eyelids. “If my brain goes south—very likely at this point—remind me when we’re back on our side of the bridge to contact Lieutenant Michaels’s captain as well as the county lab. If there was poison in Michaels or the coffee, I want to know about it.”
“Happy thought. On a brighter note, Brigham says the raven tamers are going to do their Main Street Kickoff-to-the-Night parade on Friday.”
“Yeah, I got the memo. Now that I’m ‘common,’ Marta informs me I’m honor bound not to notice what they’ll be selling at the end-of-parade market.
Or at what she’s calling the preparade teaser on Thursday”
“The tamers will sell what they sell, McVey, with or without your approval. They’ve never had any trouble getting around Ty. And yes, I know, you’re not Ty. Making you ‘common’ doesn’t mean they’ll be overt, only that they won’t feel the need to post sentries. Anyway, I feel better knowing they’re on our side. Now, having said that, can I please get up?”
He dropped his hands, grinned. “If you can’t, I’ll be more than happy to help you.”
A rush of heat, Amara reflected, should not consume her because of a single suggestive remark. In fact, sex should be the furthest thing from her mind. She twirled a finger for him to turn, then stopped and nodded forward. “I believe your jeans are beeping, Chief. One, two, three, pause. One, two, three, pause...”
“You can stop the count, Red.” He pulled his phone out and tapped the screen. “It’s Westor.”
Curious, Amara bundled the sheet around her body and scooted off the bed. “Why’s he contacting you?”
“He wants to meet me tonight at the Red Eye.”
“Are you sure he’s not a killer?”
“He never was.” McVey shrugged. “Doesn’t mean he can’t be bought.”
She glanced through the bedroom window at the dissipating morning mist. “Why does this side of Bellam Bridge suddenly seem a lot safer to me than it did last night?”
Capturing her chin with his thumb and forefinger, McVey dropped a light kiss on her lips. “Don’t get too comfortable here, Red. My observations at the manor told me that although a blow to the head was in fact responsible for Hannah Blume’s death, that blow wasn’t inflicted by a fall. Someone hit her.”
* * *
IT GOT CRAZIER by the minute. Who would want to kill a harmless hermit of a woman?
