by Lexi George
“I will do what I must to protect you.”
Ignoring her sputtering protests, he strode off down the porch. She scurried after him. He rounded the corner and stopped abruptly, blocking her path.
“Lenora.” There was surprise and unease in Brand’s deep voice. “What brings you here?”
“Sol’ Van,” a sultry female voice murmured. “You and Ansgar did not report in as is customary.”
Addy stiffened. Something about that low, sensual voice grated on her nerves. And what the heck was a soul van? Who was this woman, anyway? Addy disliked her, sight unseen. The fact that Brand and the sexpot were acquainted had nothing to do with it.
Okay, maybe it had everything to do with it, but that was beside the point.
“There were signs of an enemy engagement but no word from either of you,” the woman continued. “Conall was otherwise occupied, and I was bored, so I volunteered my services. I found myself delightfully detained by this human.”
Addy had heard enough. She stepped around Brand. A voluptuous woman with long, flowing black hair reclined on the back porch swing against a bank of chintz pillows. She was clad in one of Shep’s white dress shirts . . . and from the looks of it, nothing else. Her left leg was draped along the back of the swing and her right leg was stretched out in front of her. She didn’t strike Addy as the kind of woman who’d bother with a trifling thing like underwear. If Shep’s shirttail had not hung between her legs, Addy suspected the woman’s business would have been out there for God and everybody else to see. Her gaze shifted to the stranger’s face, and she found herself pinned by a pair of cold, blue eyes. Talk about your glacial bitches. This gal was the Ice Queen.
Addy saw Shep and forgot about the woman. He stood in front of a large easel, shirtless and barefoot and covered in paint. There was an expression of utter joy on his face as he moved his brush across the canvas. The only time she’d seen him that happy was when his children were born.
“Shep?”
“One second, Addy.” Shep’s brow furrowed in concentration. “I’m al . . . most finished.” A few more flourishes of his brush, and he stepped back. “There. What do you think, Nora?”
The woman called Lenora stretched like a cat and got to her feet. She was tall, nearly as tall as Shep, and she screamed sex from her red, pouty lips to the curtain of dark hair that swung about her hips. She stared at the canvas for a moment, and turned and wrapped her arms around Shep’s neck.
“It is beautiful, my love.” Her husky voice made Addy want to smack her. “So earthy and sensuous. Teeming with dark, swirling energy like the river that flows past your home.”
“It’s you,” Shep stammered. “You’re the river, full of mystery and promise, a slinky, curving enigma I can lose myself in.”
Eww. Shep Corwin had him a demon, no bones about it. Maybe two or three. Her big brother would never talk that way unless he was possessed.
“You see me as the river?” Lenora’s voice was a smooth whisper of invitation. “That is so sweet.”
She pulled his head down and kissed him. And Shep kissed her back. Right in front of his little sister. Another minute and they’d be hunching like bunnies on the back porch steps. Shep, Mr. Conservative, a two-term member of the vestry at the Trinity Episcopal church, the perfect son, brother, father and husband . . .
“William Shepton Junior, have you lost your mind?” Addy shrieked. “Who is this woman, and where the hell is Marilee?”
Lenora released Shep and stepped back. “I am Lenora,” she said. “Your brother has told me much about you, Adara Corwin. I am thrall. I serve the Dalvahni.”
A red film blurred Addy’s vision. A thrall, a sex slave indentured to the Dalvahni, created to serve them sexually and suck all the feelings out of them so they could return to battle unhampered by emotion.
And Brand knew her by name, which meant she’d serviced him in the past, would do so again once he left Earth.
Addy’s brain felt like it was on fire. She wanted to scratch the other woman’s eyes out. She wanted to tear her apart. So, this was jealousy, this great big snarling beast that consumed her from the inside out.
“Adara?” Brand said.
She took a deep breath. She needed to get a grip, set aside her own feelings and concentrate on the issue at hand. Her married big brother was screwing a sex machine from another dimension. Shep. Mr. Perfect, the good child.
Un-freaking-believable.
Shep seemed to wake from the spell the thrall had woven. “Addy, calm down. It’s not what you think.”
“Shep, where is Marilee?”
“She’s gone, Addy.” He picked up a clean cloth and wiped his hands. “Ran off three weeks ago with that tennis instructor from the club. She’s filed for divorce. I got served with the papers last week.”
“What?”
Brand cleared his throat. “Lenora, why don’t you and I walk down to the river?”
Lenora lifted her shoulders in a gesture of cool indifference. “Very well, Sol’ Van, if you insist.”
Brand and the sexy thrall left the porch and walked down the sloping lawn to the shallow bluff that overlooked the river. Addy watched them leave with mixed feelings. Desperate as she was to talk to her brother in private, she didn’t want Vampira anywhere near Brand.
Shep chuckled. “Relax, Addy, she’s not going to eat him.”
Addy scowled. “Damn straight she’s not.” With an effort, she dragged her attention back to Shep. “Now, what’s this about Marilee leaving? I thought she was at the beach with her mother and the kids.”
“Marilee’s gone. She dropped the kids off at the beach house with Janice and took off. No one’s heard from her since.” He grimaced. “Unless you count the divorce papers.”
Her brain scrambled to process the stunning news. “Lily and William?”
Shep shook his head. “They think their mama’s here. They keep calling to talk to her and I keep making excuses. It’s been a bad couple of weeks.”
Addy sank into one of the rocking chairs that were scattered around the porch. “I had no idea you and Marilee were having problems.”
“That makes two of us. I never saw it coming. Apparently, she’s been carrying on with this guy for months.” He laughed harshly. “When I think about all the money I spent on her stupid tennis lessons . . . I was paying the guy to screw my wife.” He wadded up the cloth and threw it aside. “I tell you what, I get my hands on him, I’m gonna pound some sand up his ass.”
“Are we talking about the new guy, the one the club brought over from Namath Springs? Curly hair and a tattoo on his arm?”
“Yep, that’s the one.”
“But Shep, he’s younger than I am,” Addy said. “He’s—”
“Twenty-four. Ten years younger that Marilee.” His expression was bitter. “But who’s counting.”
Addy couldn’t think, couldn’t focus. Shep and Marilee had been happily married for more than ten years. Marilee adored Shep. She was like a sister to Addy. It was hard to believe she had left Shep and the children to run off with another man. Was nothing what it seemed to be? The past few days, she’d been hammered by one shock after another, but this last one . . . She couldn’t take this one in. Shep and Marilee divorced.
She jumped to her feet and paced up and down the porch, thinking. “Does Janice know? Did Marilee tell her mother where she was going, or did she dump Lily and William with her mom and leave?”
“She told Janice we needed some alone time and took off. Janice thought Marilee was here with me. I had to work late the night they left. I came in and went straight to bed. Didn’t find the note until the next morning. I called Janice and told her what was up. She didn’t believe me, not until Marilee called and told her mama she wasn’t coming home. Janice and I talked about it and decided to keep quiet about it, not let the children know, in case . . .”
“In case she changed her mind?”
Shep blew out a breath. “Yeah, just in case. She didn’t. Th
ings were really bad for a while there, but then Nora showed up.” His gaze drifted to Lenora and Brand down by the water. “Things are much better now. Clearer. I know what I want to do with my life.”
“What do you mean ‘do with your life’? You’ve got Corwin’s.”
“Corwin’s has me, Addy. I didn’t want it, but Daddy died and I didn’t seem to have a choice. Then I got married and Lily and William were born, and it was easier to go with the flow. What I wanted didn’t seem to matter, seemed . . . irresponsible, a pipe dream.”
Addy stared at him in bewilderment. “What on earth are you talking about, Shep?”
His eyes lit up. “I want to paint, Addy.”
“Paint?” She couldn’t have been more surprised if he’d said he wanted to join the circus.
He rushed on. “Oh, I know I can’t walk away from Corwin’s right now, but maybe someday, when I’ve established myself as an artist, I can sell the funeral home and open up a little studio.”
“Sell Corwin’s? Are you crazy?”
His jaw hardened. “You got to do what you wanted, Addy. It’s my turn. You’re not the only one who hates dead people, only I couldn’t run down the street to Aunt Muddy. I had to stay. Somebody had to stay. I’ve given fifteen years of my life and my marriage to the business. Do I have to give it the rest of my life, too?”
“No, of course not.” Addy felt sick with guilt and remorse. Shep was not quite twenty-one when Daddy died, she not quite twelve. She’d been so hell-bent on getting away from Corwin’s she didn’t stop to consider what Shep wanted. “I don’t know what to say. I had no idea you were so miserable.”
She flung herself in Shep’s arms and burst into tears.
“There, there, sis, don’t cry.” He patted her awkwardly on the back. “You’re getting my shirt all wet.”
She gave a watery chuckle. “You’re not wearing a shirt, smartass.” Wiping her eyes, she straightened with a sniff. “So about this painting of yours. Are you any good?”
“Hell, sis, I don’t know. You tell me.”
He turned her around.
The canvas was a swirl of color, browns and greens and blue, the river in high summer set against a cloudless sky. Addy stared at the painting in shock. She was no expert, knew nothing about color, composition, technique, or brush strokes, but Shep’s painting called to her, stirred her. The river on the canvas was a living thing, a gleaming, sinuous snake that coiled through the trees, a siren that lured men from their homes with the promise of wonders around the next bend.
“Wow,” Addy said. “I am so embarrassed.”
Shep’s eyes twinkled. “That bad, huh? Gee, thanks, brat.”
Addy shook her head. “I’m embarrassed because I didn’t know you could draw stick people, much less paint something so wonderful. My own brother, and I’m clueless.” She glared at Shep. “About a lot of things, apparently. How did you get mixed up with that—that woman?”
“Lenora?” Shep grinned like a jackass eating briars. “She showed up at Corwin’s Saturday night. She’s something else, isn’t she?”
“She’s a barracuda with legs, that’s what she is. You be careful.”
Lenora and Brand came back up the porch steps.
“What is this barracuda?” Lenora asked.
The thrall’s silky voice crawled all over Addy. “It’s a voracious fish with lots of sharp pointy teeth,” she snapped, not bothering to be polite.
Lenora slithered up to Shep. “Your sister does not trust me. She thinks I mean you harm.”
“I know what you are, what you do,” Addy said. “You’ve turned him into some kind of zombie.”
“Nonsense.” Lenora pointed to the canvas. “Could a zombie paint something so passionate, so fierce and full of life? Your brother is quite good, is he not?”
It stuck in Addy’s craw to admit it, but the thrall was right. “Yes, he is,” she said gruffly. “So good, I mean to hang that painting in the shop, if he’ll let me.”
Shep’s expression grew alarmed. “Slow down, sis. That’s a big step. I don’t know if I’m ready for that.”
“Get ready.” She hurried on, excited by the idea and eager to do something, anything to make up for her selfishness. “You haven’t signed it. No one will know who did it. You said you wanted to open a studio some day. Lots of people come into the flower shop, people with money. I do business with folks from out in the county, and from Paulsberg and Namath Springs, and I go to market in Atlanta. Here’s your chance to see if anyone will buy your work.” She frowned impatiently when Shep remained silent. “Well, don’t stand there like a knot on a log. You’re the one who wants to be a painter. Put your money where your mouth is, Big Shot.”
“Adara,” Brand said.
Shep laughed. “Don’t worry about it. It’s just her way.”
“Well?” Addy put her hands on her hips. “Are you a man or a mouse, bro? Come on, I dare you. I double-dog-dare you.”
Shep rubbed his jaw thinking. “Nothing’s dry yet, but in a week or two you can have your pick.” He looked down and scuffed his bare foot against the porch floor. “That is, if you like any of them.”
“There are more?” Addy said. “I want to see them now.”
Lenora sank down on the swing, reclining once more against the cushions, all languid grace and sensuality. “I will wait here for you, Shep, my love. I find the river so peaceful.”
Yeah, right. More like the succubus was lounging in the swing planning her next meal.
Addy followed Shep and Brand through the back door and into the den. Canvases in assorted shapes and sizes lined the wall and leaned up against the furniture.
Addy looked around the room in astonishment. “Shep, there must be ten or fifteen paintings here.”
“I’ve been busy.”
“Busy? You did all of this in the past few days?”
Shep nodded
“Impossible,” Addy said.
“I was inspired.”
Addy moved about the room, examining the paintings. They were all nudes of Lenora. There was Lenora Reclining, Lenora at the Window, Lenora Looking Over Her Shoulder, Lenora— yikes! Holy cow, that one must be called Lenora the Explorer.
“I can see that. They all seem to have a—er—recurring theme.”
Shep blushed. “I was a little hyperfocused on Lenora at first, but she’s encouraging me to move on. I told you she is my muse.” He looked anxious. “You can take what you like when they’re dry. That is, if you like any of them.”
Addy heard the uncertainty in his voice and was touched. Her got-it-all-together big brother didn’t have it all together any more than she did, and he was insecure about his painting. She considered the nudes, trying to set aside her natural dislike of the subject matter. Lenora might be a siren from hell, but she had to admit Shep was good. He’d captured Lenora’s bewitching beauty and allure. And something else as well, the essence of the thrall. The pouting red lips and curvaceous body promised untold carnal delights, but the world-weary blue eyes held the shadow of loneliness.
“I’ll take the landscape and these to start.” She pointed to three of the nudes. “You better come up with a pseudonym, bro. Mama finds out you been painting dirty pictures, she’ll scob your knob.”
“Thanks, sis.” Shep grinned. “I owe you one. Say, you going to the Grand Goober tomorrow night?”
Addy groaned. “Oh, Lord. I completely forgot about it. Yes, I’m going.”
“What is this Grand Goober?” Brand demanded.
“It’s a formal ball, the social event of the year. Kicks off the Hannah Peanut Festival,” Shep said. “The Grand Goober is our biggest fund-raiser. Everybody will be there. Who you going with, sis?”
Addy mumbled something under her breath.
Shep put his hand to his ear. “I’m sorry. Could you say that a little louder?”
“You heard me, Shepton Corwin. I’m going to the ball with Bruce Jones.”
Shep crowed. “Pootie Jones? You’ve go
t a date with Pootie Jones?”
“Poo—er—I mean Bruce is lactose intolerant, a problem he fortunately now has under control,” Addy said loftily.
Brand scowled. “Is not ‘date’ a term used by humans to signify a social engagement with another person, often one for whom you feel romantic interest?”
“Yep.” Shep was still laughing. It made Addy want to slug him. “I wasn’t planning on going to the ball,” he said, “but now I might. Addy has a date with Pootie Jones. Hoo boy, that’s rich.”
“No,” Brand said.
The air grew heavy and thick and hard to breathe. A wall of swift-moving dark clouds rolled over the river from the east.
Thunder boomed and lightning crashed over their heads.
Shep ran to the window. “Jesus, I never saw a storm come up so fast.”
Addy laid her hand on Brand’s arm. “Relax. It’s sweet that you’re jealous, but this is something I have to do. Poo—dammit!—I mean Bruce is my friend. I promised him months ago I’d go with him. I can’t back out on him now. He’s counting on me. It would be rude.”
“I am not jealous,” Brand said. “The Dalvahni do not experience jealousy. It is a purely human emotion.”
“Uh huh.”
Shep jumped as another loud rumble of thunder shook the house. “Sounds like the damn storm’s right over the house. ’Scuse me a sec. I’d better tell Nora to get off the porch.”
He hurried out of the room, leaving Addy and Brand alone.
Addy sauntered over to Brand and poked him in the chest. “Your little atmospheric disturbance gives you away. Admit it. You’re jealous.”
“I am not jealous. I have to protect you. This Pootie human could be the djegrali.”
“Oh.” Addy pretended to think this over. “I’ll admit it then. I’m jealous as hell of Elvira out there, soul man. What does that mean anyway? Is it thrall for boy toy or something?”
“No one toys with the Dalvahni. Sol’ Van is a term of respect. It means ‘most noble Lord.’ ”
“Aw, that’s so cute in a submissive totally vomitous kind of way.” Addy stroked Brand’s hard-muscled chest through the shirt. “Well, Sol baby, since you’re not the jealous type, I guess you won’t mind if Bruce drives me home tomorrow night and kisses me at the door and—”
