by Rachel James
Perching on his desk, Logan began whistling softly. He had to get Dresden out of his office ASAP. He wasn’t ready to talk about Sonny and New Mexico yet. Not with anyone. Quicker than he liked, he heard Dresden’s booming laugh and took a deep breath. Moments later, Dresden’s imposing form dwarfed the doorway, and Logan hopped from the desk.
“I’m on my way out,” he said by way of greeting. “I’ve got my teens cornered in Chinatown. If I delay, I’ll never smoke them out.”
“I won’t hold you up long,” Dresden said, stepping back. He pushed his companion into the room. “Miss King, here, assures me she will take only a moment of your time.”
“Miss King?”
Logan’s throat closed up. Jesus! Sonny? Here? What the hell had happened?
Bowing out the door, Dresden cleared his throat. “I’ll leave you two to your discussion.”
For the first time in his life, Logan was speechless. What the hell could the mouse possibly have to say to him in her present form? It was clear by the tilt of her brow and the uncertainty of her expression that she didn’t recognize him. It was also clear she was having trouble finding the right words to start the conversation between them. Should he push the issue first?
As if pulled by a magnet, she suddenly moved to the other side of the room and began studying the large, framed picture hanging there. Logan’s gaze fell on the image. The Lovers card. He was a glutton for punishment, he mused. Upon his return, he had bought a deck of mythic Tarot cards, made a portrait-sized copy of the image, and hung it up, as a token of his time with Sonny.
“It’s a blow-up of the Lovers Tarot card,” he stated, breaking the silence.
She whirled around at the pronouncement, and he saw a blush stain her cheeks. “It’s quite a unique photo,” she remarked. Her gaze swung back to it again. “I wonder if it’s proper to hang such an erotic picture in your office, though.”
Logan hid a smile. That sounded a lot like the old Sonny. He perched himself on the edge of the desk again, deciding to let her continue the conversation. After all, they were nothing more than strangers now—ships that had passed in the night. He crossed his right ankle over his left, noting she had turned to face him again. He noticed the skin pulled taut over the elegant ridge of her cheekbones. She had lost weight since he had last seen her, and he guessed the mind transfer had taken its toll on her demeanor.
He wished he could bring the confident gleam back to her eye. The mouse standing before him had lost all her polished veneer. Ned Chalmers had wanted to make her a passive, nebbish mouse, dependent on him for everything, and he had certainly achieved it.
Watching her recross the carpet, he saw her glance at the mirror hanging on the wall directly in front of her. She seemed to lose herself in the reflection, and he sensed she was distracted; perhaps she had even gone away from the room itself, lost in some kind of mind fugue he couldn’t begin to fathom. When she continued staring at herself, Logan knew, if the conversation was ever to keep going, he would have to continue it. She was simply not up to the task. That she had been discharged from the hospital before she was fully recovered was evident. What the hell had Ramsay been thinking? He’d place a call to Taos the moment she left the office and demand an answer.
“You’re probably wondering why I’m here, Mr. Reed.”
Startled, Logan glanced up. She had come out of her trance and was now seated in a chair in front of him. “Naturally,” he replied. “A detective thrives on a good mystery.”
She almost smiled at his statement, and for a brief moment, Logan was reminded of the day they had met. She had almost smiled at him that day, too. She opened her purse and retrieved a manila envelope from the interior, and then, straightening, she held the envelope out to him.
“I appreciate your generosity, Agent Reed. However, I can’t accept money from a complete stranger. It’s a matter of pride.”
Logan studied the envelope but made no move to take it. “There seems to be a lot of that going around these days.” He hopped from the desk then, away from her and towards the door. “The money is yours to do with as you wish, Miss King. You can keep it or throw it away; it’s your choice. If you can’t use it, there are a number of charities in the area who would appreciate the donation.”
He reached the door, taking a moment to glance back over his shoulder. She was standing now, holding out the package, but her sad expression had shifted to a scalding fury.
“Do you mean to say that you are refusing to take the money back from me?”
He jiggled the doorknob. “Looks like it.”
She stepped forward, waving the envelope at him. “No one refuses to accept five thousand dollars.”
“You just did.”
She snapped her mouth shut, obviously floored to find her own words thrown back in her face. She let the package fall to her side, and Logan sensed he had won the battle between them. It was a hollow victory, though—and unfair. She didn’t remember their feisty arguments. He did.
When she continued to stand transfixed, he jiggled the door handle to gain her attention. She was back in one of those damn fugues again. How often did they occur? She’d had two since he had been with her, and they had been together less than five minutes. Didn’t Ramsay give her medication to combat the damn trances?
“You won’t take the money back?” she asked again.
Jesus! She was out of the trance and back with him. He could hear tears laced in her voice, and when he scanned her face, he saw her brush away a wet spot. That small movement was his undoing. A sudden flash of an erotic kiss assaulted his mind, and his stomach clenched tightly. The image also sent him moving back to her side where, when he reached her, he cupped the side of her face. His voice was husky and warm as he spoke.
“Trust me, mouse, the money won’t break me. I want you to have it.”
She froze at his words, but her hand didn’t. It came up and settled over his caressing fingers. A second later, the pair was pitched into a vortex and out the other side. When the vision settled, they were side by side, watching themselves have sex in the middle of a big, round bed lined with white satin sheets. To say the sex was mind-blowing was an understatement. Their thighs were soaked, and their breaths were caught in long, surrendering moans. The turbulence of their passion seemed to burn away the room around them.
As quickly as they entered the vision, they were flung back out. The woman touching his fingers collapsed, and thinking fast, Logan snatched her up. A full-blown seizure seized her body, and he lowered her to the floor. He slipped his arms beneath her back, attempting to soothe her contorted body. Where was her tongue? He needed to keep her from choking on it.
He reached up, startled when the seizure left as quickly as it had come. When she didn’t move or rally, an icy tremor of fear swept through Logan. They had been down this road before, and it had ended badly. He grabbed hold of her chin and shook it.
“Don’t you die on me, mouse, you hear? Do anything, but don’t die on me!”
Her eyes flew open, scaring the hell out of him. A sob tore from her lips, and she flung her arms around his neck, clinging to him as if all the demons of hell were chasing her. He pressed his hands against her spine, listening to the deep sobs wracking her frame. Christ! That had been close. He felt a cool wetness on his neck.
“What hap-happened to me?” came a stuttered hiccup.
“You blacked out momentarily, but you’re coming round again.”
She wound her arms tighter around his neck, her lashes fluttering against his cheek. “Thank you ... for not abandoning me.”
“All in a day’s work, Miss King.”
Her body stiffened, and she pulled back to glance at his face. “Who the hell is Miss King?”
A myriad of emotions swept her face, and then, as if a light switch had suddenly popped on, she scrambled from his arms, kicked at his legs, and scooted along the carpet away from him. She was on her feet in a flash.
“You arrogant clod! If this is
how you protect your female clients, it’s no wonder they shoot you. I’ve a good mind to buy a gun and shoot you myself.”
Surprise siphoned the blood from Logan’s face. He’d recognize that shrewish tone anywhere. “Sonny?”
She made a face at him. “I don’t know. Maybe, maybe not. Let me think on it.”
“With what?”
A stunned silence greeted his ears, and then she exploded in icy fury again. “What a filthy, rotten thing to say! I’d like to see you stay sane after having a trillion gigabytes of electricity jolted through your brain.” She glanced down at her hands suddenly. “Good God, where are my gloves? I need my gloves.”
Logan sprang to his feet. “Simmer down, mouse! You’re breaking my eardrums!”
“I need my gloves.”
Hearing her panicked tone, Logan rounded his desk and flung open his top drawer. He hauled out a sealed package of gloves and tossed them to Sonny, who took one look at the gloves inside and glanced his way.
“Don’t ask,” he warned, slamming the drawer shut. “You already own every inch of my heart. If you think I’m giving you any more power over me, think again.” He winked at her broadly, and stunned, she snapped her mouth shut, tore open the package, and donned the gloves. Finding them a perfect fit, she glanced at him again. He shrugged at her. “Just a safety precaution,” he said, “in case your memory returned and you came looking for a broken-down detective who loves you more than words can ever say.”
A fresh set of tears glistened on her eyelashes. “You can’t imagine how horrendous it was,” she told him. “The pain was so great, I prayed for the mind transfer to work.”
He shot to her side and took her in his arms. “But your mind found a way to come back to me. You beat Ned at his own game.”
She stilled his mouth with her fingers, her glance narrowing. “What happened to him? Where is he?”
“Spending an eternity in Hades, I hope.” Her fingers dropped away, and she shifted in his arms. She was running away from him again. He brought her back into the circle of his arms. “Nothing matters now but that you’re with me again.” His tone hardened, like steel. “I’m not letting you go again. The last time damn near killed me.”
He heard a sob tear from her throat. “We barely know each other, Logan.”
“That's not true,” he said. “Thanks to your empathic skills, I've seen all of you, and I'm pretty sure that you’ve seen all of me.”
Her lips tilted for a half second but then turned down again. “It’ll never work. You’re needed here; I’m needed in New Mexico. I have to go back and put things right.”
“You needn’t worry. The Pandora Project will never see the light of day again.”
She pulled from his arms. “It’s not that.”
“What then?”
“Ned used The Sanctuary to sexually abuse our guests. By now, the media will have crucified the retreat and our staff.”
Logan’s hands spanned her waist, drawing her back to him. “The media has been dealt with by Meta Corps. There’ll be no slander, and your aunt has taken the reins of The Sanctuary. She and Brad have things well in hand, so stop all this stubborn mouse nonsense and say you’ll marry me.”
“It’s too soon. We just met.”
“And the sky is falling, blah, blah, blah. What’s your point?”
“I’m sure I have one, if you’d just let me—”
“Kiss me,” he said, cutting her off mid-sentence. “What?” She looked so adorably flustered, he repeated himself.
“Kiss me.”
He waited for her lips to lift, and when they didn’t, he took the initiative. The way to have the last word with a stubborn wench was to put her mouth to better use. He smothered her warm lips, letting his hands trace the soft lines of her hips to the hollow of her back. A small moan came from her throat, and she molded herself against him. Her touch was his undoing. In minutes, his fingers were fumbling with the buttons of her blouse, and all thoughts of chasing two lovesick teens through Chinatown frittered away.
“If you’re going to make love to me, you should lock the door,” Sonny whispered breathlessly, a moment later.
His finger halted, and he studied the upward tilt of her mouth. “Later.”
“Now.”
“Later.”
His mouth nuzzled hers, and then a whisper fanned his lips. “The door, Logan ... ”
“Later," he said, slipping his fingers into her bra.
“I said now ... ”
His fingers halted, and he sighed dramatically. “You are the most aggravating mouse.” He left her side, locked the door, and then headed back her way. “However, there is no way in hell you’re going to talk me out of making love to you,” he said, sweeping her into his arms. “Don’t even try.”
He dropped her onto the office sofa and then followed her down. In just under a minute, his naked body claimed hers, and, just like their shared visions, he brought her to the brink of climax and then pushed her over the edge.
THE END
Crimson Sneak Peek
Cursed
by Charmaine Ross:
Blistering flames. Acrid smoke. Heat stung my skin. Fumes clogged my throat. I was on hands and knees, dragging in each breath, knowing my body would give out at any moment.
And there was nowhere else I’d rather be.
I don’t know how or why it was here, but it was a godsend. I whispered a prayer of appreciation to whatever deity had thought to start the bushfire. Even it was just a flippant, toss-away thing for an almighty, I was thankful.
The flames sent plumes of writhing brown smoke into the sky. My father’s buildings were just beyond the line of flames. So damn close I could taste their desecration, but then the fire headed away from them, turned by a strong wind. I’d waited my life for an opportunity like this, and I wasn’t going to let it slide.
This was my chance to end the hell I’d been living in for years. It was kill or be killed. Both sounded good.
I clutched the trunk of a gum tree, using it to get to my feet. A wave of giddiness overpowered me. I waited it out. I leaned against the trunk, breathing deeply, the bark prickling into my back. Sweat beaded my face and trickled down my spine.
I willed the thought-energy into myself and drew it into my core. I don’t know what to call the energy. It might be my life force. It might be universal energy. I’d had it for as long as I could remember. A gift from my father. My curse and now my savior.
This was what my father—Victor—wanted from me. This was why I’d been left in the middle of the bush for weeks, starving, slowly dying. So he could see how strong I was. How long I could keep on living in these conditions. It was his right, he told me. Years ago, he’d taken me in when there was no one else. A sick child. Too much work for prospective parents when other, healthier children could be adopted. At least he’d named me: Katia.
He’d spent years searching for me after I ran away, and I had to pay for that, too. He said it was the least I could do. That was eight years and several lifetimes ago, before they’d found me and brought me back. It had slowly destroyed me, but I’d resisted him. The nightmares of what he’d made me do when I was a child still woke me at night, sweating and screaming and believing I was still that helpless fourteen-year-old again.
Well, I’d show him just what I could do now. Now it was on my terms, and the only people who were going to die this time were the ones who deserved it.
The energy pulsed through my body. It was living, throbbing, vying for life. It screeched through my limbs, spiked my veins. I gritted my teeth, fighting unconsciousness, letting the pain of a thousand needles prick me from the inside. I invited the pain, let the energy feed on it. This was the buildup of eight years of depriving myself. Eight years of letting my energy lie dormant. Letting it rest and build and grow strong. I wasn’t a naive, weak teenager anymore. I was twenty-four and stronger.
I pried open my eyes, concentrated on the acrid flames. I called the energy fr
om my blood, balled it into my core until it was all I could feel. All I knew. All I was. Then, when it was almost too much for me to restrain, I pushed it from my body, out toward the flames. They exploded, soaring upward until they blocked out the blue of the sky.
For a moment, I thought it hadn’t worked, that I had depleted myself for nothing. Then there was a shift in direction of the flames. They danced and flickered, letting off black smoke at the moving tips, as though they were thinking for themselves. And despite the direction of the wind, the flames moved, charging toward the buildings—that hell on earth. Flames descended, obliterating and destroying. There was a lot to destroy in this area of the Toolangi State Forest.
I laughed. My legs gave out. I sank into the dirt, so dry it spiraled around me and clogged my throat. I closed my eyes, felt a smile on my mouth as I welcomed death. At last, I had ended the nightmare.
