by Marie Hall
“Who’s Vi?” Sable asked.
Benjamin tossed another nugget into the center of the table. “Whore that used to work here, right Alice?” he asked.
Alice nodded and mumbled something, but then went back to canoodling Frank.
“And how did he drown her exactly?” She looked at Adam when neither of the other two answered.
“Folks say he was waitin’ down there by the river for her. Drowned her.” He shrugged. “Probably wanted to scalp her.”
“I tell you again, Adam,” Caleb growled, “it’s not a Native.”
And that’s when it dawned on her, she was going to have to put on her detective hat to try and suss out fact from fiction.
“Heard from Joe that he made his pack of mules ill. Feed ‘em moldy grain,” Benjamin interjected, tossing a card on the table and then reached for another from the deck.
Sable shook her head, but not because she believed any of it. Superstitions were going to make this so much harder. “Where is One Eye now?” she asked, noticing again he’d yet to make an appearance.
Benjamin tilted his head and nodded. “Exactly,” he mumbled.
Caleb and Adam groaned.
With one last giggle, Alice grabbed Frank’s hand. “Sorry, boys, been fun...”
“But it’s time for me to have my lady for the evening,” Frank said as he stood up. He snatched his hat from the table and plopped it on his head, tipped it to Sable and with a polite, “Ma’am,” took off up the stairs after a giggling Alice.
Adam shifted. “Now, how ‘bout that poke, darlin’?”
Blessedly, Sable was spared from having to answer when a commotion sprang up from the direction of the bar. Raucous laughter erupted when the man sitting next to Arianna dropped to the ground.
“Old Bob, can’t hold his liquor,” someone shouted and the men nearest started hollering with laughter.
In the short time that Sable had been investigating the bandit the parlor was now bursting to capacity with men.
“Too deep in his cups. What a, boyo,” a strong Irish brogue blasted out. “Snorin’ like an old coon hound he is.”
A couple of men gathered up the limp body of the loudly snoring Bob and dragged him outside the swinging doors, leaving him sprawled out on the sidewalk to come to on his own good time.
But what really caught Sable’s attention hadn’t been Bob at all. It’d been Arianna smirking with an evil glint in her deep brown eyes.
A hand clamped onto Sable’s elbow. She’d thought at first it was Adam and was ready to shrug him off with whatever lame excuse her brain could conjure up, when a soft lilting voice said, “sorry, Adam, but Bunny’s needed.”
For a second she had no idea who Milly was talking about, but then her cheeks flamed as she recalled her ridiculous alias.
Milly was dressed in a pretty cream-colored gown dripping in pearls. She leaned in close and whispered in Sable’s ear. “You’ve been requested, your date awaits your service upstairs.”
If wishes were reality, she’d be swooped up by the boys and taken far, far away from here. But they weren’t here and they probably wouldn’t take her anyway. She had no idea how to get out of this one.
Milly patted her chest. “He paid in full.” Her eyes were flashing and Sable sensed the unspoken dare, Milly was trying to psyche her out. Prove that Sable was not who she claimed to be.
She glanced over at Adam. He was crestfallen and looking at her with a small frown. “Maybe another time, Adam.” Then she nodded sharply at Milly and hiked her skirt up so she could walk unhindered up the stairs. She kept her back straight and her chin up.
She walked like that until she reached the landing and turned toward her room. How hard it would be to jump out a second story window without breaking a leg?
Chapter 4: Haunted and Hunted (Synnergy)
Minutes earlier
He was back. The pock faced man. No longer content to simply haunt her as a ghost. He’d learned a new trick. He was hunting her.
Arianna threw her head back chugging the whiskey, embracing the burn as it slid down her throat. Her eyes watered.
She’d hoped he’d disappear. She snorted. She should be so lucky. Papa warned her not to abuse her powers. She glanced over her shoulder; her world swam in and out of focus—how much had she had to drink? She shook her head, no longer sure. She stared at strange faces looking for him.
The Madam glared at her. She didn’t care. Sable watched her with a predatory gleam. The bird knew too much. Saw too much.
She banged her cup on the bar, throwing more gold on it. “Mas,” she growled. She didn’t know if the bartender understood Spanish, but he understood her meaning. He refilled her cup. His skin was brown. Just like hers.
She jerked her gaze up to his face. The pock-faced man would return. He’d found her on the sidewalk this morning. He was a poltergeist now. His soul able to slip into another’s body and control it.
The bartender’s eyes were dark. His cheeks smooth. He frowned, but didn’t look away.
She broke eye contact first. He wasn’t the pock-faced man. But he was coming. Coming. She knew it.
Men were grabbing her. She hissed and they left. She drank her cup dry. The bartender hadn’t left. She grabbed his wrist holding onto the half full bottle.
“I paid a large nugget. You owe me more.” Her words were garbled, slurred. But he didn’t stop pouring and she didn’t want him to. She wanted to forget. Needed to.
An electric presence made her flesh tingle as someone sat down on the stool beside her.
Don’t look. Don’t look. She knew. It was him. He’d found her.
“Hola, Angel.”
She looked.
Glaring. Leering at her. A face within a face. A shadowy image buried beneath the visage of another. Her muscles trembled, her fingers curled around the cup.
“Missed me?” His eyes were dark black slits. Skin pale white, but wavering beneath the surface like steam rolling on water was her enemy. His voice, she shuddered as memories flooded her—the machete he’d slit her mother’s throat with, the line he’d drawn in the dirt with the toe of his boot—a sound rolled through her chest. Wild. Animalistic. Raw.
He licked his fat lips. She could not see the other man. Pock-faced had taken over.
“I’ll haunt you until the day you die, healer,” he sneered and her heart threatened to rupture into a million tiny fragments.
He leaned into her, so close his heat invaded hers and he whispered Spanish words that none could hear, save her. His fingers toyed idle with loose strands of her hair and her blood sang with crystal.
Instinct kicked in and she touched him. To an onlooker it was so gentle. Fingers trailing a satin, sensuous curl up the length of his exposed arm. But her fingers were weapons, pumping him full of her killing resonance. The man shuddered and for a moment his skin turned purple. His veins bulged.
Pock-faced wavered, like someone had thrown static over his face. And then his eyes blinked. And they were green now. The true soul of the man fought for dominance against the black demon who’d taken possession of him.
This was wrong, this was wrong...wrongwrongwrong. She closed her eyes and mumbled, “can’t kill. Don’t kill, Ari.”
A wicked laugh that boomed from the bowels of hell. Fine hairs on her arms stood up.
“Is that it?” Pock-faced was back, leering at her. His lips curled, exposing long sharp canines.
The alcohol was burning her belly. Her skin tingled with a rush of adrenaline.
“Weak.” He hurled the insult like a dagger.
She winced. “Cannot kill. It is not him, Ari. This man is innocent.”
His nose sniffed the hair on her head. “Want to know a secret?”
She shook her head. “Lord save me. Save me,” her plea a fervent whisper coming up from the cracked depths of her being.
A hot tongue touched the shell of her ear. “It felt good running my blade through her throat.”
She looked at h
im. His hands roved the length of her thighs. She smiled into his black eyes and reached for his face, then poured crystal shards into his body until he slumped to the floor beside her.
Chapter 5: Caught (Sable)
Strong arms banded around her waist, and a hand clamped over her mouth. “I knew you’d try to bolt.”
The voice, it did weird things to her body. Hot things. Made her tingle. Want to melt into a puddle at his feet.
The panic that had fluttered like a rabbit caught in the sights of an eagle quickly turned to something else, something electric and very exciting. Sable grinned and shoved a chuckling Slayde back.
The candle sconces in the wall cast flickering shadows along the hall. A couple three doors down were kissing and pawing. Sable knew it was one of the twins because of the black frizzy hair that haloed her.
She turned to look at Slayde. Clothes, that this morning had looked clean were now stained and smudged in spots, there was a dirt spot on his cheek and she didn’t think before she reached up to brush it off with her thumb.
His gaze was searing and she was sure he could hear her heart beating. He grabbed her hand after a second, threading her fingers through his and yanked her into her room. He shut the door behind them. A single flame flickered from the candle standing in the metal holder bedside the nightstand both she and Arianna shared.
Once inside they grew quiet and she dropped his hand, taking a step back and then another. Sable glanced down her skirt and their lack of conversation made the sounds around them all the more loud and intrusive. Groans and grunts and floorboards creaking, heat raced a fiery trail up her neck and settled in her cheeks. Then Slayde started laughing and the tension flowed out of her bones.
He wiggled his brows, hitching his thumbs into his vest pockets. “So how ‘bout that poke?” he drawled, and she stomped her foot, glancing around for something to fling at him.
“You were listening downstairs?” she accused him.
“What did you think I was going to do? Leave you out there alone?” His grin was pure mischief.
She found a feather stuffed pillow and whacked his rib cage with it. Small downy feathers flew out, dancing a lazy curl to the floor. She narrowed her eyes, advancing on him with her weapon. “If you think for a second, Mr—”
He laughed and the roll of his Adam’s apple made her toes curl. Why did he have to be so damn hot? She really hated that about him.
Sometimes.
“I didn’t come here for a poke with you.”
She frowned, her spine went rigid in a heartbeat. “Who did you come upstairs to poke?” she snapped, the word reverberated with loud accusation. “They’re all busy.” She hugged the pillow to her body.
He unfurled the long length of his frame from the door behind him. A searing fluttering of fingers tickled her belly.
“I didn’t come here for anyone but you, Nix,” he said in a voice rich with grit that made her want to purr.
She swallowed hard, digging her fingers into the pillow.
Then he was in front of her, moving in that way of his that blurred her reality and dulled her senses to everything but scent.
He smelled of man and pine, a wild forest of temptation and desire sprang reckless through her. She wanted to shed her skin, become her bird. Fly wild and free through a lightning streaked sky with him. Blood rushed in her ears.
She licked her lips. She’d be lying if she didn’t admit to being a little scared, of him, of this.
“I remember something you told me before I got hurt.”
She frowned. “Huh?”
He gave a wicked smirk, like he knew what he was doing to her and relished it. It was enough to break her from the delirious fog. She rolled her eyes.
He led her to Arianna’s empty bed. On it sat a paper wrapped bundle. He pointed to it and wouldn’t look at her as he shifted back onto his heels. “I saw this today and thought it was kind of perfect.”
She looked at the shoddy wrapping which completely prevented her from making out the shape beneath the bulging package. “What is it?”
“Open it.” He picked it up and thrust it at her.
Her fingers shook a little as she peeled the paper back. Inside laid the most gaudy, ugly creation she’d ever seen. A crudely fashioned gold ring with two bluish hued birds, beaks touching and claws gripping a small chunk of green-blue opal. Heat prickled her eyes as she looked up at him.
He wrinkled his nose and shrugged. “It’s awful, right?”
She found it hard to talk around the lump in her throat. “Why did you buy me this, Slayde?”
No longer was there a teasing glint in his eyes, he looked nervous and even slightly crestfallen. “Hunter and I were scouting through the cribs today and I came across a woman trying to sell it to me.”
He was looking through baby cribs? She was having the hardest time picturing that. “This belonged to a baby?”
“No,” his chuckle was weak, “they call the section of whore houses belonging to the Chinese cribs. Anyway,” he shrugged, “she seemed to need money and when I saw the bird and remembered that you said it was your birthday, I bought it. But it’s lame. You can throw it...”
She placed her finger over his lips to stop him from talking. It was ugly, hideous even, but she loved it. “It’s not my birthday for two more days, Slayde.”
His lips were warm pressed against her finger, but she didn’t move and neither did he when he said, “I know.”
She hugged him. He wrapped his big arms around her and she thought, if she could, she might have melted right then. Her body warmed and curls of heat gathered beneath the large billows of her skirt. He sighed and stepped in closer and she loved that he didn’t mind her fire. For the first time she thought maybe someone might actually like her the way she came.
“I’ll treasure it forever, Slayde. Thank you.” Though she knew he wouldn’t feel it, she pressed a soft kiss against his vest, right above the spot of his heart.
She could have stayed that way all night, but he dropped a peck on her forehead and then grunting, stepped back. “So I paid for the night.”
“I know.” She fought the grin and slipped the ring on her index finger. It was too large. She wore it on her thumb instead. He watched her do it and she could swear his chest puffed out. “Why’d you do it?”
He seemed more at ease now and scooted back until he could sit on the edge of her bed. He yawned. “I heard a rumor that these were the best beds in town. You don’t actually think I came here to spend time with you, do you?”
She licked her lips, trying and failing miserably not to wear a large Cheshire grin. “The thought crossed my mind.”
He snorted and started kicking his boots off. Her heart skipped a beat. Then he undid his vest and unbuttoned his top button and was it hot in here? She walked over to the window and shoved it up. Hard.
The salt tinged breeze rolled in, cooling her body instantly.
He shook his head. “I’m tired, Sable. I was traipsing all over God’s green earth today with the boy scout and I’m ready for bed.” He patted the mattress. “Promise I won’t bite.”
His blue eyes twinkled and she crossed her arms. “You know I only slept with you before, Slayde, because you were dying and needed me to stay warm.”
He brushed his fingers through his hair, forcing a few strands to poke up in different directions. “Yeah, I also heard that pissed Arianna off. Something about causing infection to spread quicker.” His eyes narrowed to twin slits.
She shook her head. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He got up off the bed, there was a large dip where he’d been sitting. He walked to her. “Turn around. I’ll help you take this thing off.”
The warmth of his body invaded hers and her breasts felt suddenly heavy and they tingled. She didn’t know where to look or how to act. He turned her around and she didn’t have the strength to resist him.
“Slayde, please.” Her voice cracked. She had no idea what
she was pleading for, all she knew was she was both elated and terrified. Her skin was awash with goose bumps and the large muscle of her thighs started to twitch.
“I swear,” the warmth of his breath caressed the nape of her neck like a tender stroke of fingers, “I won’t do anything.” His hands rubbed her arms and she hung her head, exposed, but trusting him not to hurt her. “I just want to keep you safe, Sable. I just don’t...I don’t like this.”
She craned her neck to look at him over her shoulder. He was as serious as she’d ever seen him, and her heart almost broke at the fierce protective gleam in his eyes. No one had ever looked at her like that before.
“Why do you care? I wouldn’t have let anyone touch me. I can protect myself.”
He closed his eyes, shaking his head slowly. “I don’t know why, I just do.” His stare was penetrating. He wasn’t simply looking at her, Sable Ray, crazy girl from the insane asylum, he saw her. The real her. The monster, the budding woman, and he liked it. And she loved that he liked it. She shivered.
She tipped her head and turned back around, holding her breath as his strong fingers undid all thirty buttons along the seam of her back.
Cool air splashed over her sensitive skin and his hands were pushing the dress off her arms. Once the sleeves slipped off her wrists it dropped in a scarlet puff at her feet. He kept hold of her hand, helping her out of the pile, and she stood there unsure what to do next. All she had on was a cream-colored frock thing, which she guessed was what passed as bra and underwear in this time. It was totally unattractive.
His gaze traveled from the crown of her head to the tips of her still booted feet. He closed his eyes a quick second and his hands flexed, then with a deep breath, he opened them. “You’ll have to take off your boots yourself,” his voice was throaty.
Slayde fell back on her mattress and flung a hand over his face with a soft groan.
