Books by Nora Roberts

by Roberts, Nora

  “Exactly.” Mac beamed as if Sam were a prized student. “In Ripley’s case—”

  “In Ripley’s case,” Ripley repeated, “I had to accept a power I’d rejected, and walk the line when part of me wanted to cross it.”

  “Emotional turmoil,” Sam agreed. “It can affect the tone of power in the same way it can affect the tone of your voice, the tone of your actions. The gift doesn’t protect us from flaws, or mistakes. That kind of turmoil was tailored toward you, and Nell’s was turned toward her as a potent weapon. With—”

  He broke off, glanced at Mac.

  “No, keep going.” Mac waved a hand. “It’s good to hear it from someone else’s point of view.”

  “All right. The force that was unleashed centuries ago used Remington as a conduit and fed itself into the reporter who followed Nell’s cross-country route to the Sisters.”

  “You’ve kept up,” Mia said quietly.

  “Yeah. I’ve kept up. Holding the line, power against power, without crossing that line isn’t a simple matter. It requires conviction, compassion, strength. Even so, in the end Ripley, like Nell, faced a man. Whatever was inside him, he was flesh and blood.”

  “It looks like Sam and I have circled around to the same theory.”

  “Then why the hell don’t you punch through to the point of it and stop circling?” Ripley complained.

  “Okay.” Since Sam gestured the go-ahead, Mac took over. “What came at Mia today wasn’t flesh and blood, not a living thing, but a manifestation. That tells me a couple of things. Maybe, just maybe, because the circle’s intact, because twice now it’s been defeated, its power’s diminished. It can’t possess, but can only deceive.”

  “Or it hordes its strength. Waiting for its time, and its place.”

  “Yes.” Mac nodded at Sam. “Waiting for the right circumstance. There isn’t that much time—when you measure by three centuries—left on either side. It’s going to keep pushing, trying to weaken the circle, and Mia most specifically. Undermining the bedrock of your power. It’ll use your fears, doubts, any weaknesses that trickle through the chinks. Tailored to you,” he added with a nod to Sam. “That’s just exactly right. It’ll try to prey on you as it did on her three centuries ago. Through her loneliness and loss, her despair at the thought of living without the people she loved, and needed most.”

  “I’m aware of that,” Mia acknowledged. “But I’m not lonely, and I’ve lost nothing. My circle holds.”

  “Yes, but . . . I don’t believe the circle can be considered complete, and whole, until your step is taken.” Since this was tricky ground, Mac took his time. “Until then, there’s a vulnerability, and that’s where the pressure will be the greatest. It only needed to break Nell, and it failed. To seduce Ripley, and it failed. With you . . .”

  “It needs to cause my death,” Mia finished calmly. “Yes, I know. I’ve always known.”

  When she started to leave, Nell held on to her.

  “Don’t worry so, little sister.” Mia pressed her cheek to Nell’s hair. “I know how to protect myself.”

  “I know. I just wish you’d stay. I know how stupid that sounds, but I wish you’d stay with one of us until this is really over.”

  “I need my cliffs. I’ll be fine, I promise.” She gave Nell one last squeeze. “Blessed be.”

  She’d lingered longer than the others, hoping to avoid any more conversation. But when she stepped outside, she saw Sam leaning against her car.

  “I walked over. How about a lift back?”

  “It’s a pleasant night for a short walk.”

  “Give me a lift, Mia.” He took her wrist as she started to move past him. “I want to talk to you, for a minute anyway. Alone.”

  “I suppose I owe you a favor.”

  “Do you?”

  She circled the car, slipped in behind the wheel. She waited until she’d started the car. “For cleaning up my mess on the coast road this morning,” she said as she eased into a U-turn. “Ripley told me she ran into you. Thank you.”

  “You’re welcome.”

  “Well, that didn’t hurt too much. Now, what did you want to talk to me about?”

  “I wondered about you and Mac. There’s something there.”

  “Really?” Deliberately she took her attention away from the road long enough to bat her lashes. “Do you think I’m trying to tempt my sister’s husband into a wild, illicit affair?”

  “If you were, he’d already be there.”

  She laughed. “What a lovely compliment, even if you’re wrong. He’s sweetly, madly in love with his wife. But you’re right about one thing, there is something between us. You’ve always been good at picking up atmosphere and emotion.”

  “What is it?”

  “We’re cousins.”

  “Cousins?”

  “It happens that the granddaughter of the first sister married a MacAllister—Mac’s mother’s side of the family.”

  “Ah.” Sam did his best to stretch out his legs in the little car. “So he’s of the blood. That explains a number of things. I felt a connection the minute I met him, but couldn’t pin him down. Just as I felt one for Nell, even when she wanted to drop me into a dark pit and leave me there to rot. I like your friends.”

  “Well, I’m so relieved.”

  “Don’t snipe at me, Mia. I meant it.”

  Because she knew it was true, she sighed. “I’m tired. It always make me cross.”

  “They’re worried about you. How you’ll handle things.”

  “I know. I’m sorry about it.”

  “I’m not worried.” He paused when she pulled up in front of the cottage. “I’ve never known anyone, witch or woman, more vital than you. You won’t give in.”

  “No, I won’t. But I won’t say I don’t appreciate the confidence, particularly after a long, difficult day. Good night, Sam.”

  “Come inside.”

  “No.”

  “Come inside, Mia.” He slipped a hand through her hair to rub the back of her neck. “And be with me.”

  “I’d like to be with someone tonight,” she continued, “to be comforted and soothed. To be touched and taken. So I won’t.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it wouldn’t make me happy. Good night, Sam.”

  He could have pressed, they both knew it. But some of her glamour had slipped, and he saw fatigue breaking through to haunt her face. “Good night.”

  He climbed out, watched her drive away. And kept her in his mind until he knew she was safely inside the house on the cliffs.

  Eight

  It was all a matter of strategy. In business, Sam thought. In relationships. And sometimes in just surviving the day. He checked the progress on the rehab and was pleased that the work was proceeding on schedule.

  He knew something about building and design. There had been a time, years before, when he’d considered breaking with Logan Enterprises and building his own hotel. He’d taken some extra college courses in architecture and design and had even spent a summer working as a laborer on a construction crew.

  That had given him some practical knowledge, an elementary skill, and a healthy respect for manual labor.

  But his plans to build his own had faded as every design he attempted or imagined turned into a mirror image of the Magick Inn.

  Why replicate what already was?

  Once he’d realized he wanted the hotel, the rest was a matter of patience, canniness, and careful strategy. It had been important not to let his father know that the Magick Inn was the single family asset he coveted.

  It would have come to Sam through inheritance in any case, but had Thaddeus Logan realized it had become a kind of Holy Grail to his son, he would have felt obliged to nudge it out of reach, thereby pressuring his son and heir to take more personal interest in other areas of the family empire.

  The carrot would have dangled at the end of a very long, very thorny stick during his father’s lifetime. It was, Sam knew, how his father o
perated. He was not a man who rewarded; he was one who withheld. A philosophy that garnered results and never concerned itself with affection.

  Despite that, Sam hadn’t been willing to perch like a vulture on a tree branch, waiting for his own father to die before he claimed what he wanted.

  For nearly six years, he had held his desire for the hotel close to the vest. He’d worked, he’d learned, and whenever he’d managed to carve out room, he had implemented some of his own ideas, establishing a few profitable offshoots to Logan Enterprises.

  In the end it had come down to deflecting his father’s attention, waiting him out, then broaching the deal at the right moment and meeting the cost.

  Historically, the Logans were staunch believers in the adage that nothing comes free—unless, Sam thought, it was their own trust funds. So he had paid fair market value for his father’s share of the hotel.

  Sam didn’t count the cost, not when he had what he wanted.

  He was going to try not to count the cost with Mia.

  He intended to be patient—within reason. He would, of course, be canny. But he had yet, he was forced to admit, to outline a clear-cut strategy.

  His direct approach—Honey, I’m home!—hadn’t worked. And why he’d been brainless enough to think it would was currently beyond him. Let’s kiss and make up hadn’t done much better. She wasn’t freezing him out at every opportunity, but neither was she softening.

  He wanted her safe. He wanted his island secure. And he wanted her back.

  The idea that he might not be able to have all three didn’t sit well with him. But the fact was that the responsibility of cleaning up a disaster three hundred years in the making was in their laps. And it couldn’t be ignored.

  Mac hadn’t mentioned his theory in the meeting at the Todds’ the other night. But Sam imagined he had discussed it—or would—with Mia in private. In the end, rejecting him might be her answer. Might be the answer.

  But going down without a fight went against nature.

  So . . . strategy, he thought, and scanned the parlor area of the currently empty suite where the walls had been newly papered in pale green moiré silk and the woodwork sanded down to its natural oak and varnished golden.

  Thinking, he wandered through the bedroom and to a doorway where a second bedroom had been sacrificed to expand the bath and the master closet space. The fixtures had yet to be installed, but he’d selected the generous jet tub himself, the ripple glass on the multi-head shower unit, the curving ribbon of counters.

  He’d used warm colors, a lot of polished granite and copper. Luxurious amenities in old-fashioned apothecary jars.

  A blend of tradition, comfort, and efficiency.

  Just the sort of thing, he mused, that appealed to Mia. Business, steady profit, and exquisite service.

  He smiled to himself as he took his cell phone out of his pocket. Then just as quickly replaced it. A personal call wasn’t the way to conduct some business discussions.

  He headed down to his office to tell his assistant to get Ms. Devlin on the phone.

  He puzzled her. The boy she’d thought she knew so well had become a man full of unexpected turns and missing pieces. A business dinner? Mia mused when she hung up the phone. At her convenience. She frowned at the receiver she’d just replaced. And he’d sounded as if he meant it. Very cool, very professional.

  A business meeting, over dinner at the hotel, to discuss a proposal he hoped would be of benefit to both of their establishments.

  Just what did the man have up his sleeve?

  Sheer curiosity had pushed her to agree to the meeting, though she was wily enough not to be available the same night. She graciously agreed to rearrange her schedule to fit him in the following evening.

  It wouldn’t hurt to see if there was anything she should be ready for. She took a ball of crystal from her shelf and set it at the center of her desk.

  With her hands cupped around it, she focused her mind, gathered her power. The glass began to warm. Mists swam inside it, shimmering with a light that seemed to come from deep within the globe.

  Visions swirled into the mists, and into her eyes.

  She saw herself as she had been, young—so young—lying naked in the cave, wrapped only in Sam’s arms.

  “Not yesterday,” she whispered. “But tomorrow. Clear the future from the past so I can see what may be.”

  Her garden, lush with summer, under a bright white moon. As she looked, the air in her office was perfumed with the vanilla scent of heliotrope, the spice of dianthus. She wore white, a long flow of it, to echo the moon.

  He stood with her in that ocean of flowers and held out a hand. In his palm he held a star, a slice of colored light that beat like a pulse.

  He was smiling when he tossed it high, when a shower of light and color exploded over their heads. As it streamed down, she felt the thrill, the utter joy that the woman inside that ball of glass felt.

  It swelled inside her own heart, like a song.

  And in a flash, she was alone on the cliffs while a storm screamed. Lightning struck around her, burning arrows of it. Her island was enveloped by a fetid fog. The chill of it reached out to where she stood in her quiet office and iced her bones.

  Out of the dark, the black wolf leaped. His jaws were still snapping at her throat as they fell toward the raging sea.

  “Enough.” She passed a hand over the globe, and it was only a pretty glass ball.

  She replaced it, and sat. Her hands were steady, her breathing even. She had always known that looking into what might come could mean seeing her own death. Or worse, the death of a loved one.

  It was the price that power demanded. The Craft didn’t ask for blood, but still it squeezed the heart to a throbbing bruise at times.

  So, she thought, which would it be for her? Love or death? Or, by taking the first, would she ensure the second?

  She would see. She’d learned much in thirty years as a witch, Mia thought as she turned back to her computer, back to the work of the day. And one thing she knew. You did what you could to protect, to respect, taking the joys and the sorrows. Then, in the end, you accepted your destiny.

  “I thought you said it wasn’t a date.”

  Mia secured the back of her earring. “It’s not a date. It’s a business dinner.”

  Lulu sniffed. Loudly. “If it’s a business dinner what’re you doing wearing that dress?”

  Mia picked up her second earring, let it dangle in her fingers a moment. “Because I like this dress.”

  She’d known it was a mistake to bring the change of clothes to work rather than going home. But this saved time, and energy. Besides there was nothing wrong with the little, very little, black dress.

  “Woman puts on a dress like that because she wants a man to think about what’s under it.”

  Mia merely fluttered her lashes. “Do tell.”

  “And don’t you get smart with me. I can still give you a good whap when you need one.”

  “Lu, I’m not ten anymore.”

  “If you ask me, you’re showing less sense than you had when you were.”

  A long-suffering sigh wouldn’t work. Pointing out that she hadn’t asked would only lead to an argument. Since it was impossible to ignore the scowling woman jammed in the bathroom with her, Mia tried another angle.

  She turned. “I’ve finished my homework and cleaned my room. Please can I go out and play?”

  Lulu’s lips twitched, but she managed to get them back into a thin, flat line quickly enough. “Never had to nag you to clean your room. I used to worry because you were too damn neat for a kid.”

  “You don’t have to nag me about this either, because I know how to handle Sam Logan.”

  “You figure squeezing yourself into that dress and showing half your boobs is handling him?”

  Mia glanced down. Her boobs, in her opinion, were nicely, even elegantly, displayed. As were her legs, clear up to mid-thigh. “Oh, yes, indeed.”

  “Ar
e you wearing underwear?”

  “Oh, for God’s sake.” Mia yanked the black jacket off the padded hanger.

  “I asked you a question.”

  Searching for patience, Mia put on the jacket. Its hem grazed an inch above the bottom of the skirt, turning the sexy little dress into a sexy little suit. “I find that an odd question coming from a former flower child. You probably didn’t even own any underwear from 1963 to 1972.”

  “Did so. I had a very pretty pair of tie-dyed panties for special occasions.”

  Undone, Mia leaned back on the seat and chuckled. “Oh, Lu. What an image that creates in my feverish little brain. Just what sort of special occasion called for tie-dyed panties?”

  “Don’t change the subject, and answer the question.”

  “Well, I don’t own anything quite that festive, but I’m wearing underwear—after a fashion. So if I’m in an accident, I’m safe.”

  “I’m not worried about an accident. I’m worried about on purpose.”

  Straightening, Mia leaned down, cupped Lulu’s homely face in her hands. She hadn’t had to search for patience after all, she realized. She’d only had to remember love.

  “You don’t have to worry at all. I promise.”

  “My job is to worry,” Lulu muttered.

  “Then take a break. I’m going to have a lovely dinner, find out just what business it is Sam’s cooking up, and enjoy the side benefit of driving him crazy.”

  “You’ve still got a thing for him.”

  “I never had a thing for him. I loved him.”

  Lulu’s shoulders drooped. “Oh, honey.” She lifted a hand, fussed with Mia’s hair. “I wish he’d stayed in goddamn New York City.”

  “Well, he didn’t. I don’t know if what I’m feeling now is just left over from what I felt then, or if it’s because of now, or all the years between. Shouldn’t I find out?”