Kissed by Darkness(32)

My cell rang. I knew it was Cordelia before I picked it up. She was starting to show a knack for knowing when weirdness was happening in my life.

I waited to answer until I’d pulled off the road. “Hi, Cordelia.”

“Morgan, be straight with me. Are you all right?”

I sighed. I wasn’t all right. Not really. But I wasn’t ready to talk about it just yet. “I’ll be fine for now, Cordelia. I just want to get home, get some sleep. Can I come by your house tomorrow?”

“Of course you can. Are you sure you’re OK to wait until then?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. Thanks.” Apparently she was bound and determined to become my Mother Confessor. I wasn’t even Catholic.

I could picture her smile quirking at the corners of her mouth. “Any time, Morgan. Bastet says hello.” And with that, she hung up.

“Weirder and weirder,” I muttered to myself before I pulled back out into the street and headed for home.







I could feel the tension drain from my body as I locked my front door behind me. Like the girl said, there’s no place like home. Sometimes I wished home still meant London, but this was good, too. The closets were certainly bigger. Plus, I was born in Portland, and had spent most of my life here. It got in your blood, this city. And let’s face it, Portland, while rainy, had nothing on London.

I propped myself against the wall and yanked off my boots, letting them drop right there in the middle of the hall. The socks followed before I let out a sigh of blissful relief. I may have been a boots kind of girl, but there was nothing in this world quite as delicious as bare feet.

I padded quietly down the hall toward the kitchen, not bothering with the lights. Like I said, the dark was a friend of mine. I shoved that thought aside. The dark was getting just a little too friendly lately.

I headed straight for the sink and a glass of icy water. Moonlight filtered softly through the window, filling the kitchen with oddly shifting shadows. Halfway through the glass it finally registered: I wasn’t alone. I slid my stiletto quietly out of my cleavage, keeping my hand hidden from view of whoever was behind me while cussing myself out mentally. I must have been more tired than I thought. How could I have been so bloody stupid?

I whirled, stiletto at the ready, only to be confronted by a familiar figure lounging at my kitchen table. “Dammit, Inigo,” I sputtered. “You nearly gave me a heart attack.”

I couldn’t see his expression in the darkness, but I sensed his amusement, nonetheless. “I take it your hunt was successful?”

I snorted. “Of course it was.” I hesitated. I wasn’t sure I wanted to discuss my current weirdness with Inigo, either.

He didn’t say anything. He just waited.

I let out a groan and collapsed into the kitchen chair opposite him. “I just don’t know. Something weird is going on with me.”

“Weird? Weird how?”

I shrugged. I liked Inigo. More importantly, I trusted him. That was saying something for me. When it came to men, I didn’t trust easily. I’d worked with him for a long time, though. He was my best friend’s cousin, for crying out loud. Still, I wasn’t sure I was ready to tell him I was losing my grip on reality. I wasn’t sure I was ready to admit it to myself because if I wasn’t going crazy, then something much scarier was happening.

He got up slowly from the table, unfolding his long, lithe body from where he’d been lounging. I watched him walk over to me, desperately trying to hide the fact that my pulse was pounding hard enough I was half-afraid I’d crack a rib. Not good. Not good. So very not good.

I couldn’t really see in the dark, but I was pretty sure I saw his lips quirk into something very like a smirk. Bastard.

He stepped behind me and I tensed up before I realized what he was planning. Then I felt his hands on my shoulders, sending a little electric thrill straight to my nether regions. Dear gods, this was not good. “Uh, Inigo … “

“Shh. Just relax. You need to relax. You’re too tense.” His hands began kneading the muscles of my shoulders which, until that moment, I’d had no idea were so beyond tense they closely resembled a rock.

I was pretty sure I let out a moan, but things were starting to go a little fuzzy around the edges. I could feel that odd tingling again, that pulling of the dark. It was rushing around me, swirling and pulling and surging into me, through me. In the dark there were sparkles, like tiny stars, dancing and dancing on the edge of my vision. The night began to wrap itself around me, its energy driving deeper. I was seriously beginning to lose my grip on reality.

“Morgan?” His voice was rough, full of desire and need. He pulled me out of the chair and turned me to face him.