Heroes Among Us: A Paranormal Romance Collection

by Ditter Kellen

  Unable to move, Charlie stared up into the old woman’s onyx-black eyes.

  The priestess closed the distance, until her face rested inches above Charlie’s. Words spilled from her lips, though they never moved. “The blood of a legend, you must bring to me. In return, your life, I give unto thee.”

  A dozen questions ran through Charlie’s mind at once; such as, what legend Celia referred to, and how did she expect her to get blood? But the old woman backed away, disappearing in the fog as mysteriously as she appeared.

  Chapter Four

  Kash docked his boat several yards up the bayou from the Bickford place. The old house he’d stopped in front of, or what was left of it, could barely be seen through the cluster of vines and moss choking the remains.

  He trekked his way up the embankment, his spine tingling with the rise of the silver moon.

  Though his instincts screamed for him to shift, Kash resisted. The last thing he needed was for his beast to rip the woman to shreds, forcing an investigation from local law enforcement. No, he would ease over there, drag her into the swamp and disappear without a trace.

  The Bickford house came into view a few minutes later. Kash noticed a light burning inside, yet no movement could be detected.

  He bypassed the back of the house in case she was on the porch watching the water. Hell, that’s where he’d been before Mauve arrived to tell him of her vision.

  Kash stopped near the shrubs, noticing the front door stood open. Odd, he thought, his gaze scanning the yard before coming to rest on her car. Perhaps she had been to the grocery store and was now unloading her bags.

  Easing his way toward the SUV, he laid his palm on the hood to find it cool to the touch. She hadn’t left recently.

  He moved silently toward the porch, eased the screen door open and stepped inside. No sounds could be heard coming from the house as he inched his way into the kitchen.

  And then her scent hit him full in the face; a sweet, feminine essence that roused his beast to the surface and sent blood rushing straight to his shaft.

  Kash gritted his teeth against the intoxicating smell. It took considerable effort to force his beast to heel.

  He crept into the living room, his gaze touching on a soft display of light reflecting from the bathroom.

  The bathroom door stood ajar, and the flickering flames of candles could be seen dancing along the walls. Kash had little doubt he’d find her in the bath.

  He stepped in closer, mentally preparing himself for what needed to be done, and his breath froze in his lungs. There, beneath the soft glow of the candles, lay the nude body of the blue-eyed woman, fully submersed in the water.

  The woman had obviously offed herself, taking the dreaded job of killing her right out of his hands. And yet, he felt no satisfaction in that knowledge.

  Her dark, blonde hair fanned out around her face, gently swaying in the otherwise still water.

  Kash stepped in closer, his gaze traveling down her nude form. The woman was perfection; from her small rounded breasts to her slightly flared hips and shapely thighs.

  A small bubble suddenly slipped from her nose to drift to the surface in silent finality. She obviously hadn’t been under the water more than a couple of minutes.

  If he lived to be a thousand, Kash would never understand what made him do what he did next. He only knew that he couldn’t let her die, not on this day, and not like this.

  He reached into the tub, wrapped his arms around her torso and pulled her free of the water.

  Rushing out of the bathroom, Kash hurried to the bedroom, laid her body in the center of her bed and straddled her. He tilted her head back, pinched her nose closed, and covered her mouth with his.

  His heart began to race as he started CPR. He forced air into her lungs again and again while performing chest compressions. “Come on!”

  He pinched her nose closed and covered her mouth with his once more, only to pull back as her body jerked and water expelled from her parted lips.

  “There you go,” he praised her, jumping off her and turning her on her side. “Get it all out.”

  She continued to cough for long moments, her breath coming in wheezing gasps.

  Kash grabbed a cover from the foot of the bed and covered her naked body.

  She finally calmed, her unfocused gaze seeking him out. “What’s going on, and why are you in my house?” She clutched the blanket in a white-knuckled grip.

  “You don’t remember?”

  When she only shook her head, Kash continued. “You tried to off yourself. I found you unresponsive in your tub.”

  A small indention appeared between her eyes. “I what?”

  Kash pinched the bridge of his nose. “I’m assuming it was a suicide attempt.”

  Another round of coughing resumed before she sat up in bed, lifting the blanket to her chin. “I would never try to kill myself. I don’t know what happened, but I can assure you, it wasn’t intentional.”

  Kash could only stand there, wondering why in the hell he’d saved her life. He was sent there to kill her, but she’d beat him to it. Yet, he’d dragged her from that tub and performed CPR. He must be losing his mind.

  Suspicion flashed in her eyes. “How is it that you are in my house?”

  “Your door was standing open.” Why was he explaining himself to her? She lay before him, completely at his mercy. Yet instead of doing what he came to do, he found himself attempting to calm her fears. “I called out to you, but you didn’t answer.”

  Something was off about her, something besides the obvious. No, this had nothing to do with her nearly drowning. Kash couldn’t quite put his finger on it, but he sensed it there, lurking just beneath the surface.

  “Thank God you showed up when you did.” She reached up with trembling fingers and rubbed at her eyes. “I don’t know what could have happened. I remember preparing my bath. I had a headache…”

  Kash didn’t move. He stood there next to her bed, watching her in suspicion. “What are you doing in Louisiana?”

  That got her attention. “Who did you say you were again?”

  “I didn’t.” Damn, but she had beautiful eyes. The color of the sky on a warm summer day.

  Kash didn’t see a lot of women in the bayou. And the ones did see lived in town. Yet none of them could compare to the soaking wet female before him now. Not even close.

  “Well, I appreciate your help, Mr…?”

  “Name’s Kash. And you are?”

  “Charlene, but my friends call me Charlie. Did you come here for a reason?”

  Ignoring her question, Kash repeated his original one. He could tell by her accent that she wasn’t from the area. “What are you doing here?”

  Another round of racking coughs seized her. “I’m here on vacation. If you’ll give me a minute, I’d like to get dressed.”

  Dipping his head, Kash backed from the room and trailed off into the kitchen. He noticed a purse sitting on the table, the top gaping open. He listened for sounds of movement before leaning over to take a peek inside.

  A tan wallet rested within, along with some receipts, car keys, and a bottle of pills. He plucked the bottle up and read the label. As needed for pain. He wondered if the pills had anything to do with what he’d sensed in her.

  He replaced the bottle and tugged her wallet free. Inside, he found a driver’s license along with a registered nurse license. “Charlene Howard from Los Angeles California,” he whispered aloud.

  Quickly closing the wallet, he set it back inside her purse and strode toward the door. He needed to return home and speak to Mauve. Her visions had been wrong before; only once or twice over the years, but enough to create doubt about killing the woman with the incredible blue eyes.

  Chapter Five

  Charlie climbed from the bed weak as a kitten. She’d nearly drowned. If not for the stranger’s intervention, she shuddered to think of what would have happened.

  The irony of the situation finally registered. If Ka
sh had been just a few minutes later in arriving, she wouldn’t have died of cancer after all.

  A nervous laugh threatened, but she swallowed it back, pulled a pair of jean cut-off shorts from her bag along with a red tank top and underclothes.

  Dressing proved a challenge with the dizziness that continuously assailed her. She fought it back, blinking to clear her vision, and pulled on a pair of running shoes.

  “I’m sorry I…” she began, entering the kitchen, only to find the door standing open and no sign of her savior.

  She trailed to the front porch and stepped outside in time to see him moving toward the darkened trees. “Wait!”

  He stopped, keeping his back to her for a moment before turning to face her. His eyes glittered in the moonlight.

  Charlie nervously ran a hand through her damp hair, unsure of what to say now that she had his attention. “I…” She cleared her throat and tried again. “Please allow me to thank you properly.”

  He slowly sauntered back in her direction, his muscular thighs bunching in his jeans as he moved. Charlie nearly swallowed her tongue. He had to be the sexiest man she’d ever encountered. And she’d encountered a lot in California; the land of plucked eyebrows and fake tans.

  “You’ve already thanked me,” he rumbled, his deep voice doing funny things to her insides.

  Charlie couldn’t look away from his golden-colored eyes. “You saved my life. At least let me do something to repay you.”

  “You can tell me why you’re really here, Miss Howard.”

  “I told you, I’m here on vacation.”

  He only stared down at her from his great height, watching her in suspicion.

  And then it dawned on her. She backed up a step. “I never told you my last name.”

  “I went through your wallet.”

  Surprised by his boldness, Charlie whispered, “You-you went through my shit?”

  He stepped in closer, forcing her to crane her neck to hold his gaze. “No, I went through your wallet. Now, what’s a big city girl such as yourself doing in the mosquito-infested swamps of Louisiana?”

  “I told you. I’m on vacation.” Charlie wasn’t sure whether to run or stand her ground. She decided to stand her ground. If this man were going to kill her, he wouldn’t have saved her life first.

  His beautiful eyes narrowed. “A little piece of advice that might just keep you alive around here. Lock your doors. You’re in the swamps now, where mosquitoes never sleep, Voodoo is the only religion, and Rougarous roam the night, seeking whom they may devour.”

  Charlie swallowed around her fear. “Rougarous?”

  “Werewolves,” he answered, so softly, she thought surely she’d heard him wrong.

  “Did you say, werewolves?”

  Headlights suddenly shone across Kash’s face, forcing him to break the penetrating stare he had trained on Charlie. “You have company.”

  Charlie turned in time to watch a small car wind its way up the drive. It came to a stop behind her SUV. “It’s Mrs. Bickford…” Her voice trailed off as she realized that Kash had disappeared.

  Scanning the woods beyond, Charlie could find no sign of her mysterious guest.

  “I hope I’m not disturbing you,” Mrs. Bickford called out, making her way toward the house carrying a paper bag.

  Charlie took one last look in the direction of the woods before moving to greet her landlord. “Not at all. I just thought I heard something.”

  The elder woman clucked her tongue. “You have to be careful out here at night. There are all sorts of wild animals in these woods. Not to mention snakes and alligators.”

  “What sort of animals?”

  Mrs. Bickford blinked as if Charlie were daft. “Well, there’s coyotes, bobcats—”

  “Werewolves?” Charlie blurted, catching the other woman off guard.

  “You’ve been talking to some of the locals, I see.”

  Charlie motioned for Mrs. Bickford to follow her inside. “Just one. A man named Kash. Do you know him?”

  The older woman hesitated and then hurried up the steps onto the porch. “He’s a strange one. He and his grandmother both. Though, I don’t know much about them other than the rumors I’ve heard.”

  Entering the kitchen, Charlie pulled out a chair for Mrs. Bickford and took a seat opposite her. “Rumors?”

  “I’ve never actually seen the grandmother, but I heard she’s into witchcraft or something.” She set the bag she carried on the table. “They say she’s over a hundred years old, and at night, you can hear her wailing for her lost husband. Of course, you know how rumors are. Only a small portion of them hold any truth.”

  Charlie laughed. “Don’t I know it. So, what are the rumors on Kash?”

  Mrs. Bickford’s eyes twinkled. “He’s a handsome one, isn’t he?”

  At Charlies nod, she continued, “I hear he used to frequent a strip club in the French Quarter. I don’t recall the name. I once rented to one of the waitresses who worked there. According to her, he was quite the um…scoundrel. She said the girls would fight over him when he walked in the place. But he stopped going a few years back.”

  “What for?”

  The elder woman shrugged. “From what I hear, one of the girls he’d been seeing regularly had come up missing. A Darcey something-or-other. I don’t recall her last name. Anyway, they found her body a few days later, ripped to shreds in the woods not far from here.”

  Charlie gasped. “She was murdered?”

  “The coroner claimed it was an animal attack, but we don’t have animals around here big enough to cause that kind of damage. And if we did, an animal wouldn’t have left the corpse behind to rot.”

  Kash’s words floated through her mind. Werewolf…

  Mrs. Bickford leaned forward, speaking in a conspirator’s voice. “If you ask me, I think that Voodoo priestess had something to do with it.”

  Charlie’s heart stuttered. “Voodoo priestess?”

  “Celia Battiste. She’s said to be one of the most powerful priestesses in the South.”

  Feigning indifference, Charlie picked at a fingernail. “What’s this Celia’s story?”

  “I don’t know a lot about her, other than what I’ve heard, of course. I mean, I’ve never met the woman. I hear she has eyes as black at night and a heart just as dark. Legend has it that she’s over two hundred years old, but we both know that’s impossible.”

  Charlie glanced up, a twinkle in her eye. “Of course. Go on, I’m listening.”

  “Well, Celia’s family settled not far from here a couple hundred years ago. Her land borders Saint Malo, which is owned by Kash LeRoux.”

  Charlie held up a hand. “Saint Malo? I don’t recall seeing that on the map.”

  “That’s because it doesn’t exist anymore.”

  “It…doesn’t exist?” Charlie lifted an eyebrow.

  Mrs. Bickford nodded. “Saint Malo was a small fishing village that sat in southeast Louisiana on the shore of Lake Borgne, from the mid-eighteenth century Colonial Period into the early twentieth century. It was established in 1763 by deserters from Spanish ships during the Manila Galleon trade, in what became St. Bernard Parish—then part of Spanish Louisiana.”

  The elderly woman continued speaking, a faraway look in her eyes. “Saint Malo persisted into the early twentieth century until it was destroyed by the New Orleans Hurricane of 1915. Mauve and her husband Jasper were supposedly the only survivors. Jasper LeRoux had somehow been deeded the entire two thousand acres.”

  Charlie filed that bit of information away for a later time. “If Mauve and her husband were alive during that hurricane, she’d be well over a hundred years old today. I doubt she’s still living.”

  “Oh, I don’t know.” Mrs. Bickford pushed to her feet and laid a key down onto the table. “There have been many folks who would disagree.” She nodded toward the key. “That’s for the post office box in town. It’s right next to Maxine’s Café. Your box number is 102.”

  The old
er woman turned to go, but stopped at the door with her hand on the knob. “I meant what I said earlier. Keep your doors locked. Though legends most times are known to be malarkey, you just never know. Have a good night, dear. It was a pleasure talking with you.”

  “You, too, Mrs. Bickford.” Charlie got up and followed her to the porch.

  Opening the screen door and stepping out onto the porch, Mrs. Bickford smiled over her shoulder. “Call me Mavis.”

  “Have a good night, Mavis.”

  Charlie waited for Mavis to reach her car and climb behind the wheel before, shutting and locking the kitchen door.

  She moved to the table to check the contents of the bag Mavis had left her. A bottle of white wine rested within. Charlie smiled, plucked the wine free, and tucked it into the refrigerator to chill.

  A distant howl suddenly split the night, sending Charlie’s nerves scattering throughout her stomach. “What the hell was that?”

  The sound came again…closer this time.

  Charlie hurried through the living room and onto the back porch where she flipped on the outside light and studied the bank beyond. Nothing moved, save for the swirling dark waters of the bayou and a million buzzing mosquitos.

  Chapter Six

  Kash prowled the swamps of Saint Malo, his vision sharp and his senses heightened to the point he could hear his own heart thumping in his chest.

  He couldn’t get the California beauty out of his head. His stomach tightened with the memory of her staring up at him with those sky-blue eyes.

  A growl rose up on his throat, signaling the shift he’d expected to come. Pain shot through his fingers, followed by a hot sensation in the back of his skull. His body became paralyzed, and the all too familiar buzzing began to echo in his ears. The sound grew in strength until nothing else mattered but escaping its vibrating madness.

  Kash threw back his head, releasing the howl that happened with every shift. Gone were the last remnants of humanity he so desperately clung to. In its place stood a massive beast with razor-sharp claws and hunger swimming in his eyes.