In the mid-ninth century— near 850 AD.— the thing had gone on a rampage, meddling with mortals for the seemingly sole purpose of inciting fury and causing battles to break out all over Scotland.
Thousands had died by the time it was done amusing itself.
Numerous sightings had been made of the thing watching, smiling, as blood ran on countless battlefields. For a time it hadn't been just O'Callaghan women who'd seen it; it had made no effort whatsoever to hide itself, and her ancestors had gathered the tales of those myriad sightings, recording than in great detail.
By far the most dangerous and unpredictable of his race...
No other fairy had ever dared such blatant, cold-blooded interference with humankind.
The clock on the mantel chimed the hour, jailing her. She rubbed her eyes, startled to realize that the night had sped by and it was already morning. The first rays of sunlight were pressing at the edges of the drapes that, late last night, she'd pulled tightly across the windows. She'd been up for well over twenty-four hours straight; it was no wonder her eyes felt so gritty and tired.
His favored glamour is that of an intensely sexual Highland blacksmith....
Her gaze drifted back to the book in her lap, opened to a sketch of the dark fairy.
Uncanny. It was the very image that had occurred to her when she'd first spotted it. Was it possible, she wondered, that there really was such a thing as genetic memory?
Knowledge passed from one generation to the next, imprinted in one's very DNA? It would go a long way toward explaining why the moment she'd laid eyes on it all kinds of alarms had gone off inside her. Why she'd thought instinctively of a blacksmith, as if in the deepest, darkest reaches of her soul she'd instantly recognized her primordial enemy. Enemy to countless O'Callaghan women before her.
The sketch didn't begin to do it justice, though it captured the unmistakable essence of it. Sighted in medieval times and sketched at a place in the Highlands called Dalkeith-Upon-the-Sea (where it had allegedly killed a young Gypsy woman), it was all muscle and arrogant sexuality, clad in a kilt, standing at a forge near a copse of Rowan trees, before a magnificent, medieval castle that loomed in the background. Strong hand wielding a smith's hammer, its arm was flexed in midswing. Its hair was flying about its face in a dark tangle that fell to its waist. Its lips were curved in a mocking smile.
She'd seen that smile tonight. And a worse one still. One far more... predatory. If possible.
Her gaze fixed on the heavily inked and underscored admonition beneath the sketch:
AVOID CONTACT AT ALL COST
"Oh, Gram," she whispered, a sudden, hot burn of tears stinging her eyes, "you were right"
She had to leave. Now.
* * *
Twenty-two frenetic minutes later, Gabby had changed into jeans and a tank top and was ready to go, running on pure adrenaline, in lieu of much-needed sleep. She couldn't leave the precious books behind— she didn't know if or when she'd be able to return, and they simply had to be preserved, by God, she would have children to pass them down to one day— so she'd packed them.
While she'd been at it, she'd been unable to resist tossing in a few other items she simply couldn't bear to leave: a soft cashmere afghan Gram had completed shortly before she died; a photo album; a much-loved locket; jeans, a few shirts, panties, bras, and shoes.
She'd firmly turned off her tears, a leaky faucet for which she simply couldn't afford a plumbing bill right now. Later, in some other city, in some other house, she would grieve the loss of her childhood home and virtually all her possessions. Later she would try to figure out if she dared resume her own name and finish law school at another college. Later she would take stock of all she'd so foolishly thrown away in one night with a single look. Later she might admit that her mother had been right about her all along: She was a fairy-abduction waiting to happen.
Now she stood at the back door with two suitcases and a backpack crammed full.
Though the banks would open soon, she didn't dare waste any more time. She would stop somewhere in the late afternoon, in whatever state she'd managed to get to by that point, liquidate the special account, and find a safe place where she could lose herself and become someone else.
She took one last look around the kitchen she'd learned to bake cookies in, the kitchen in which she'd cried over her first boyfriend (and her latest— the bastard), the cozy room in which she and Grain had shared so many long talks, so many hopes and dreams.
Damn you, Adam Black, she thought bitterly. Damn you for making me leave.
The sharp clarity of anger helped blast away some of the fear fogging her mind. Squaring her shoulders, she slung the backpack over her shoulder and picked up her suitcases.
She was smart. She was strong. She was determined. She would outrun it. She would have her chance at a normal life: a career, a husband, and babies. So what if it meant changing her name and stalling all over? She would succeed.