CHAPTER 16
I roared up to the school, picked up a sulky Mina, and zoomed us over to Eastview Mall as big fat drops pelted the windshield. Taking her to the mall was the least I could do to square things between us. I even let her pick out some lip gloss as penance for making her wait. Mina chose Fairy Berry, while I favored the more sophisticated Ravishing Red. Under ordinary conditions, Lance would kill me for buying her make-up, but since he wasn’t around, I decided to live dangerously and take my chances. Mina pranced beside me, delightedly blowing air kisses to all the other shoppers.
She kept trying to tell me about one of the boys in her class, but my thoughts roamed elsewhere. I relived the moment when Madame had summoned her djemon right in front of me. The sight of Oneiri, combined with the old lady’s story drove just about every other thought out of my head.
Oneiri dazzled me. I found his physical presence both awesome and exhilarating. I glanced around for my little entourage and noted both Blix and Larry now walked right beside me. Djinn, she’d called them, until they’re named. And once commanded, they materialize into djemons. The thought of Blix growing up to be something like Oneiri was beyond my wildest imagination. I’d noticed a fine plush fuzz on his skin, and wondered what it felt like. I wished I would have touched him when I had the chance. I hoped Madame Coumlie would let me pet him.
Yeah, but the souls of their victims is what makes them grow so big. How’d you like to have that on your conscience? A sobering thought. I wondered how many people he’d killed.
Did the FBI know she was a demon master? And she could see all my djinn, where Mina couldn’t. Maybe she was my great-grandmother after all. And what had she meant about Sentinel Hill? She couldn’t be serious in thinking I’d be able do anything about capturing all those loose djinn, could she? Would Oneiri be helping me? I had so many unanswered questions.
Focus, Mattie. Finding my great-grandmother was all well and good, but her problems were not mine. All I really cared about was getting rid of my stinking djinn. Why hadn’t I asked her to banish them when I had a chance? Bang-up job there, Mattie. Why didn’t you think of that?
Later that night, after I got Mina tucked in and sound asleep, my mind continued to race. I paced living room instead, waiting impatiently for Lance to call. When someone knocked at the front door, I jumped, thinking it was the guys from House of Cards. But when I peeked out the window, Rhys stood on the doorstep.
I spared myself a quick check in the mirror. Hair and lipstick okay, no stains on my shirt, and the living room picked up; okee doke. I opened the door.
He looked good enough to eat. He’d changed into black jeans and a matching tee shirt.
“Madame asked me to bring you this.” He handed me the green journal. “She thought it might come in handy tomorrow. You made quite an impression.”
“How did you find me?”
“Lance works on my bike. I’ve been here before. When you mentioned Mina, I realized you must be his sister.”
I flipped through the pages of the journal, dismayed at the cramped, tiny writing. Some of the pages looked to be written in French, or for all I knew, Greek. She’d made tiny drawings in the margins as well. This would take me a while to get through. I put the book down, figuring I’d read it later, and trailed Rhys into the kitchen. He helped himself to a bottle of beer from the fridge, and even knew where Lance kept his bottle opener. The mage took a long swallow, draining half the bottle. Nice arms. The room seemed unusually warm, and sweat trickled from the back of my neck into my shirt. I had a fan on in the living room, but the kitchen was stuffy.
“Here, I brought you something.” He pulled a vial out of the pocket of his jeans and unstoppered the brown glass.
I shook my head and frowned. “I don’t do drugs.”
“This is not a drug.” He waved the open vial beneath my nose.
“I’ve got teratosis, remember? All I can smell is demons. What is it?”
“Essence of sweet orange oil. Completely harmless.”
He covered the mouth of the vial with his thumb and gave it a shake. “You trust me?”
I tensed. “What does it do?”
“Maybe nothing. Maybe everything. Close your eyes.”
My first instinct was to just say no to the mumbo-jumbo, but after my encounter with Oneiri today, all my internal compass points were out of whack. Why not?
I took a deep breath and closed my eyes. Rhys tilted my head back and anointed a spot in the middle of my forehead, just above my eyebrows.
“This is your third eye.” His thumb smoothed the oil gently into my skin. “Clear your thoughts.”
I cracked an eye open. “Easy for you to say.”
“Relax.”
Riight. I pretended I was relaxed.
“Now. Take a deep breath.”
I inhaled. The heavy dredge of putrid muck which clogged my sinuses suddenly evaporated, and cool tendrils of silvery relief reached into every cavity within my brain. My eyeballs relaxed into refreshing cool sockets, and even my inner ears tickled with the clarity of sensation.
I shivered with pleasure and grabbed Rhys’ hand; burying my nose into his open palm to gulp the heavenly scent of aged leather, beer and mocha spice cake.
Rhys’s grin stretched from ear to ear. “You should see your face,” he said. He restoppered the vial and handed it to me. “It’s yours. Once a day ought to do it.”
Tears of relief streamed down my cheeks. My hands trembled and I held the vial to my lips. “Oh my god, I can smell again. How does it work?” Even my eyesight seemed sharper.
“It doesn’t always. I’m glad it helped.” His eyes focused on my mouth.
“Thank you so much,” I closed my eyes and took another deep lungful of air. “You’ve saved me.” The muted scent of djemon still remained, but the intoxicating aroma of sexy mage dominated my senses now. This I could live with.
He licked his lips. “Come by the shop after you drop Mina off in the morning. We’ll go check out the cavern.”
Reality slapped my euphoria to smithereens. Not my problem. The idea of crawling around in some creepy old cave rated about the same with me as cleaning hair out of a clogged drain.
“Um, about the cave thing, you’ll have to go without me. I’m more of a fresh air and sunshine kind of girl.”
“You gotta be kidding. Caving is the best fun you can have with your clothes on. You’ll love it. You’re not afraid of the dark, are you?” He leered at me suggestively and took another long swallow of beer.
I pushed him away. “I kill my own spiders.” I tried to remember the mage wasn’t my type, but he smelled too damn good, and I couldn’t keep the idiotic smile off my face. I felt too wonderful. And with my newly improved vision, I noticed for the first time that Rhys had dimples hiding beneath his Fu-Manchu. Not so bad-ass after all.
“If the Sentinel Hill cavern has been compromised, I’ll need to inform the authorities.” He drained the rest of his beer in one long gulp and was looking at me like I was next on the menu.
My body responded with a rousing hand of inner applause. Rhys Warrick fairly oozed sex appeal, I realized. In fact, I was noticing all kinds of pleasant aspects of the mage I hadn’t considered before. Funny how getting one’s sniffer fixed can affect a girl’s libido.
“What’s so special about Sentinel Hill, anyway?”
“Good question. Four hundred years ago, the local tribes wondered the same thing.” He shrugged. “Let’s just say some places in the world hold an attraction for the supernatural, and Shore Haven is one of them.”
The scent of Rhys’ aftershave had me thinking wicked thoughts in spite of myself. I leaned closer. “You mean like New Orleans and Taos?”
He brushed a wisp of hair off my forehead. My hands automatically reached for his stomach, caressing solid muscle through the thin material of his shirt. Oh my. Rock-hard abs jittered beneath my touch, and he moved closer. I closed my eyes and breathe
d him into me.
“Yeah.” He whisper-kissed my neck, and I yearned for more. “Something like that.” He nibbled along the edge of my jaw, and breathed into my ear, sending me the shivers. I slipped my hands beneath his shirt and up his velvety chest; caressing soft hair and the hard buttons of his erect nipples. I sighed and he put his mouth on mine.
I was ready for him this time. That kiss melted me right down to my happy spot, and sent pulsations of pleasure though my body. My back arched and my toes curled in appreciation. Man oh man. It was over way too quick, and I opened my eyes to see him grinning at me. He lifted me back to my feet. Yowza.
He grinned. “Wear sturdy shoes tomorrow,” he said, and left.
I stood, dazed and motionless for a minute, reliving the memory. Hands down, that had to be the best kiss ever. Whew. I touched my fingers to my still-throbbing lips. He even kissed off all my Ravishing Red lip gloss. I wandered into the living room and stood in front of the fan to cool down. No sooner had I come to my senses, when another knock sounded at the door.
I smiled. Back for more, obviously. I wondered if bedroom aerobics would be an appropriate activity tonight. Definitely not. Especially with Mina sleeping in the next room.
I steeled myself and answered the door. I caught a glimpse of chinos before Hector sucker-punched me in the gut. I crashed to the floor, curled into a fetal position, gasping for air. My only thought was Mina. Hector grabbed me by my arm, lifted me clean off my feet, and backhanded me across the face. I saw my own blood spatter across the wall and sofa.
“Where’s your boyfriend?” Hector sounded so calm, he might have been asking after his mother. He hit me again.
I had no breath to answer. I couldn’t have told him anyway, I didn’t have a clue. He hit me again. And again. And at some point, Mina ran into the living room and started screaming. It was a high, shrill panicked, keening sound. Her eyes stretched wide with terror. I tried to tell her not to worry, but I couldn’t catch my breath. I had never felt so helpless. Dimly, I hoped Mina’s screaming would bring help. I told her to run, but couldn’t get the words out.
Hector leaned over me and I tried to brace myself, but my lungs were too busy fighting for air. Black spots closed in on my vision, and Hector’s voice came far away.
“Listen bitch. You better tell your boyfriend he’s got twenty-four hours to pay up, or the next time we’ll be having this conversation with the kid. Understand?”
I nodded wordlessly. Hector let go of me and I flopped to the floor like a dead doll. Out of nowhere, the idea dawned on me that as obviously lethal as Oneiri had been, the real monster was Hector. So much for normal. In spite of myself, I started to laugh. I squirmed and rolled; coughing, gasping for air, and laughing, unable to stop myself. Hector seemed offended by this, and after delivering a few more vicious kicks to my ribs, everything went black.
I came to, lying on Lance’s sofa. Mina leaned over me, holding my hand and sobbing, her sweet face all red and puffy. I pulled her to me.
“S’okay baby, s’all right. I’m fine.” My words came out on little puffs of breath. I attempted to sit up and immediately decided I was much more comfortable where I was. I wondered how I got to the couch.
“Hey there.” I recognized the concerned face of Lance’s neighbor, Hal Winslow, peering at me over his thick glasses. “You want to tell me what happened here?”
Oh boy. This would be all over the entire Shore about thirty seconds after the bakery opened tomorrow morning. I couldn’t tell Hal about Hector or House of Cards. One whisper of Lance’s troubles would give Violet all the ammunition she needed to regain full custody of Mina. I needed to think up a story real fast. I sat up slowly, stalling for time.
“Everything’s fine,” I lied. “Show’s over. Nothing to get excited about.” Mina clung to me as I got up. My ribs and back hurt, my left eye had swelled shut.
Hal’s wife Marie came out of the kitchen wearing her bathrobe over her nightgown, and powder blue slippers.
“Here you go, Mattie.” She handed me a wet compress. “You’re still bleeding.”
I nodded, and held the cool cloth to my bloody nose, my mind racing to come up with a plausible explanation.
“Let me just get Mina tucked in, and I’ll be right back.”
Marie and Hal exchanged looks, but I retreated with Mina into her bedroom and closed the door behind us. Mina had stopped crying, but her eyes told me of her fear, and she kept a death grip on my arm. I sat her on the bed, and put my arm around her.
“I thought you were dead,” she said, and started to cry again.
“Shhh,” I whispered. “I’m okay, but we’re not going to stay here tonight. Let me go talk to the Winslows, and then we’ll go over to my house to sleep.”
“Who was that man?”
“Nobody. He doesn’t matter. We’re safe now. I’m going to go out and talk to the Winslows and then we’ll pack you a bag and we’ll go over to my house. You can sleep with me tonight. Will that be okay?”
“He hurt you. I want my dad.”
“He’ll be home on Sunday.” It was as good a guess as any, if I didn’t kill him first. “You sit here for a minute.” I hugged her as well as I could and went out to face the Winslows.
They both looked pale as they huddled together on the sofa, Marie holding Hal’s hand, like a couple of wrinkled teenagers.
“I am sorry for all the bother, really,” I said. “Someone slashed my ex-boyfriend’s tires, and he thought it was me. He backhanded me and I fell. I guess it just knocked the wind out of me, that’s all. I’m sure it looks worse than it is.”
“That’s the worst lie I ever heard,” Hal said, and Marie nodded.
I sighed, knowing that nothing I said would make any difference. “Thank you for not calling the police.”
“The guy was already gone when we got here, or I would have. I know Lance is having problems with the ex-wife. Maybe this guy?”
“This had nothing to do with Lance. I’m sorry if my friend alarmed you.” I wiped my face and this time the cloth came away blood-free. “I don’t want to make a big deal out of this. I’m okay, and I’m sure my friend feels terrible.” I tried to smile like it was true.
“Some friend. You ought to think about a restraining order.”
“Well, thanks again; I’m fine, and Mina is settling down. I’m grateful for all your help. I appreciate it.” I eased them towards the door, and they took the hint. I waited until I saw their lights go out, then got Mina and I packed up and into the car. Five minutes later we were safe at my apartment. I called Lance again, but he still wasn’t answering. By the time we got to bed, I didn’t think I’d be able to sleep a wink, but Mina and I curled up like kittens and I was gone.