Sinful Magic (10 page)

She wasn’t going there with her mother, wasn’t getting into the old stuff. Gwen had made her choices and now Roxy was making hers. “I don’t want sex magic.” She’d tried casual sex, tried to fill the growing emptiness inside of her, but she’d felt worse.

“It’ll be different with your Awakening,” her mom said gently.

“That’s not reassuring. My father was your Awakening, and you two hate each other.”

“I met him before the curse, Roxy,” her mom said heavily. “I had my high magic, the sex drive was manageable. But then I lost my familiar and couldn’t reach my top three chakras. Everything got out of control.” She drew her breath through her teeth. “Mortal men are weak. He said he loved me until it got tough. Until I had needs he couldn’t handle.” She looked away, somewhere offscreen.

She saw vivid pain in her mom’s profile. Her parents had never married, but their love had been real once. Keeping her words soft, she said, “That’s why I want to be mortal.”

Her mom looked at her. “Roxy, it won’t stop. The desire will keep growing until you go insane with it. You have to follow through and gain your magic.”

No. She refused to believe it. “I’ll find a way. Besides, he’s a witch hunter. If my powers suddenly unlock, it could make him insane with bloodlust, and he’ll kill me.”

Her mom didn’t even pause. “It’s a sex and blood-curse; sex often tames the bloodlust.” Her face darkened with bitterness. “Other witches are doing it, and they are gaining power. This hunter could be your soul mirror, Roxy. Then you’ll be as powerful as the others: Darcy, Carla, and Ailish.”

Soul mirror? Kieran? Not just her Awakening, but the other half of her soul? Fear tingled along her spine and made her stomach cramp. Bubbling along with that was old hurt. “You’re willing to risk my life to find out? What if he’s not my soul mirror? What if he kills me?” Or she survived with a sex-based magic that she couldn’t handle? Her dreams dead, her life consumed by the magic she didn’t want? Or what if Kieran was her soul mirror, but he didn’t want that relationship so he rejected her?

“You have the fully formed schema!” Her mom’s voice rose a notch.

On one of her day visits to her mom—her father never allowed Roxy to stay overnight—Gwen offered to teach Roxy to shave her legs and she had seen the schema. Even now, she felt a chill at the memory of the almost wild look in her mother’s eyes.

Gwen went on, “As far as we know, you’re the only fertility witch born with one since the curse. We think that means you might be able to increase all our magic in our ceremonies, creating more fertility in witches, mortals, and crops, without the terrible drain on those of us with half a schema.”

She tried to digest all that. Her mother was infuriatingly secretive about the magic and ceremonies of fertility witches. “You’ve never told me that before. Why would my full schema make a difference?”

After a pause, her mother said, “The schema is an important part of our history. Only Awakened fertility witches can read the spells and legends handed down from the very first fertility witch. Once you Awaken, you’ll—”

“More evasions. Big surprise.” Her mother had held out that carrot for years: Find your Awakening and join the secret club. There was a knock at the door and Roxy felt a wave of exhaustion. “I’m coming home. If you want to quit playing games, we can talk then.” She got up, shoved the phone deep into her purse. Her mother would get the hint and cut the magic she was using to talk to Roxy.

Beyond tired, she took a last look around the room, picked up her purse, left her key card on the dresser, then pulled the handle out of the suitcase and opened the door.

“Ready?” Joel asked.

She stepped out into the hall and looked up at his longish face with the slightly big nose and deep brown eyes. “Were you able to get a car?”

Joel took the suitcase handle from her, pulling it into the hallway so the door could close. “Yes, it should be out front by the time we get down there.”

The sound of the door closing reverberated through her, as if she were slamming a door on an essential part of herself. The witch. She had the deep urge to find Kieran and

but no. She made her decision. “Okay, let’s go.” They headed down the hall, got into the elevator, and were in the lobby in less than a minute. They passed by the occasional elf or wolverine as they headed for the glass exit doors.

Stepping outside into the bright sunlight and warm air was a shock. The sounds of traffic and voices flowed around her. She reached into her purse, pulled out her sunglasses, and slipped them on. Able to see, she glanced around at the velvet-roped line for taxis and valet on her left. On the right, she felt the cool spray from the fountains. Cement seating surrounded the water feature, and she caught sight of a boy in a Dyfyr hat sitting on a bench, pencil in hand, sketching.

“Over here.” Joel took her arm, leading her toward the curb where a few town cars, limos, and SUVs idled.

Roxy pulled her arm away. “One minute.” Then she walked over to the kid. “Hi there.”

The boy lifted his head and squinted at her. “You’re the lady that got smacked.”

“That’s me,” she said. “My name is Roxy. You okay? That was pretty scary in there.”

His eyes rounded. “Did you see him? He was fierce! And he signed my book, even though it’s kind of messed up.” The boy shifted his papers and turned his comic book over to show her.

Roxy looked at the message, and she felt something shift in her chest. She’d seen Kieran’s face when he saw the knife at the kid’s throat. The man protected a stray, gangly-looking kid, then wrote a message that any boy would love. She smiled, trying not to wince at the flash of pain in her left cheek and eye. “Cool. And yeah, I saw him. Fierce,” she repeated the boy’s word. “What’s your name?”

“Tyler. Key’s friend is going to teach me self-defense. It’s a girl, but she’s cool. Blind, too. Ever heard of the Blind Kickboxer? She said she’ll work with me for a couple days, until she goes home. She and the big dude with her, they are going to talk to my mom and see if it’s okay.”

“Roxy, the car is waiting,” Joel said, his voice sharp.

She glanced over her shoulder at him. “I have plenty of time to make my plane.” Turning back to Tyler, she said, “They left you here to go talk to your mom?” Why wouldn’t they take Tyler with them to his house?

“She’s on the casino floor. I can’t go there, I’m twelve and you gotta be twenty-one. My mom deals blackjack. She’s real good.”

Roxy began to see the pattern. “You hang out around the hotel while your mom works?”

“I like it here. A lot of the staff know me; they don’t mind as long as I don’t pester the guests.” He looked up. “I probably wasn’t supposed to bother Key, but I wanted to meet him. He’s so awesome.”

The boy had a case of hero worship. And why not? Kieran was tremendously talented, and he’d saved the boy’s life. Maybe hers, too. “What are you drawing?”

He looked up again. “Dyfyr. Key took one of my drawings. He wanted my autograph on it.”

“Roxy,” Joel said, “sitting out here like this isn’t smart.”

He was right. She’d hired him to protect her, and ignoring his advice was stupid. She rose and said, “Nice to meet you, Tyler. Good luck with your self-defense.”

His smiled shyly. “Thanks.”

Joel took hold of her elbow, and they walked to one of the SUVs with blackout windows. He opened the back door, letting out a blast of cool air. Roxy put her hand on the doorframe, stepped up on the running board, and squinted as her eyes tried to adjust to the gloom inside.

A thread of uneasiness tightened her stomach, and she hesitated.

Two hands reached out, grabbed her forearms and yanked her into the car. “Hey!” She screamed as she was dragged across seats and the door slammed behind her.

She twisted and fought, kicking the door with her sandals. A hand grabbed the back of her neck, shoved her face into the leather seat. “Got you now, Roxy.”

It was Mack! She could barely drag in any air with her nose and mouth smashed into the seat. Something cold was pressed against the side of her neck.

Oh God. Where was her bodyguard? Why wasn’t he doing something? She was being kidnapped! She redoubled her efforts to twist and fight.

A sudden buzz, and the pain shot through her. Her body twitched and jerked and then

Nothing.

Key paced in his room. The bloodlust was rising, filling his veins like the burn of acid. He had his laptop opened on his dresser. Darcy MacAlister said, “I’m still waiting to see if anyone in Circle Witches has a way to repress the attraction between a fertility witch and her Awakening. But didn’t you say the schema had color?”

Turning, he met Darcy’s brown gaze on the screen. “Yes, a thin outline of emerald green and faint watery sweeps of blue and green.” He’d wanted so desperately to touch that mark. It was the source of Roxy’s pain and he’d intuitively known he could turn that pain to pleasure.

“It’s starting. Her schema already recognizes you and is coming to life. The power is probably rising in her chakras, filling them. We’d be trying to repress a magic that’s already begun working. Much harder.”

Key’s drawing hand began to twitch, but he ignored it and focused on Darcy. “We—” The ringing of his cell interrupted him. Pulling the BlackBerry out, he looked at the screen and saw it was Phoenix. “What?”

“Got Tyler here with me. The kid saw Roxy get yanked into a black SUV, her suitcase left behind.” Fury quieted Phoenix’s voice to soft death. “I’m on my way to the car. Meet me out front.” He hung up.

Key’s anger went hot, and the dragon shifted on his chest, the spiked tail scraping his skin. Liam was behind this, he was sure of it. Kieran had drawn it.

His head filled with images of all those years ago when he’d come home to find Vivian cut and screaming at the hands of his brother. Now Roxy. His chest burned with rage. She was his! He’d drawn her, he’d touched her, kissed her.

He looked at Darcy on the screen. “Tell Axel—”

“He’s on the phone with Phoenix. Go, find her!”

Key shut the laptop and ran to the door. Urgency pounded through him as he bypassed the elevator, ran for the stairs, and raced down the eight floors. Going at the inhuman hunter speed, he hit the ground floor and made it out the door in seconds. Phoenix’s powerful Mustang GT rumbled at the curb. Ailish stood next to the car, holding the door open. Tyler was next to her and turned to look at Key with big eyes and a pale face. Holding out a sheet of paper, he said, “Sketched this and I saw the three-one-seven and the letter J from the license plate.”

He grabbed it and saw the side and back of a Cadillac Escalade, black with chrome wheels, and the partial license plate. As desperate as he was to get moving, he put his hand on Tyler’s shoulder. “Thanks.”

Tyler said, “You’ll save her, I know you will.”

The boy’s earnestness redoubled his determination. He nodded once and slid into the backseat, and Ailish got into the front and closed the door. Phoenix floored it and shot the car out onto Las Vegas Boulevard, heading north.

Phoenix drove like he did everything else, hard and fast. His profile was rigid, his dark eyes hidden behind his shades. “Sutton’s hacking into the news cameras on light poles or on traffic signals to see if he can spot the SUV and partial license.” He wove around traffic and pedestrians. It was early afternoon; people milled around in slow motion in the glaring sunlight. The strip came alive after dark.

Sutton’s voice came through the speakers. “Found them heading left on Bedazzled.”

Phoenix raced past Desert Inn, then past Sahara, swung a left on the street named for the old hotel.

“Anything more?” Key asked Sutton.

“They passed one camera but I don’t see them at the next.” They could hear his fingers flying over the keys. “The SUV didn’t turn at the next intersection. They must have stopped between these two cameras.” He put the coordinates on the GPS screen.

“What’s there?” Phoenix asked.

More clicking, then he said, “Some strip joints, a nightclub, and the old Bedazzled hotel and casino. It’s scheduled for destruction in just over a week.”

“There’s the hotel.” Key pointed to the blocky, sprawling five-story building that had several steeples. In the heyday of the hotel, each steeple was covered in colored lights representing sapphires, diamonds, and rubies. It was surrounded by a seven-foot fence, and posted with plenty of No Trespassing signs. “Let me out. You go check out the other places while Sutton watches the cameras.”

Phoenix swerved to a stop. Ailish let Key out and got back in, and the car peeled off. Key shielded his presence so no security cameras could see him, and then he rushed up to the fence, grabbed the top, and leaped over it. He landed on the other side and took stock.

The building’s huge marquee was covered in graffiti, and the large sign, Bedazzled, that once blinked different jewel colors, had some letters missing; others were cracked or broken. There were boards over the front doors and windows, and the asphalt had deep fissures.

Moving silently toward the building, he heard the traffic whizzing by behind him. Was Roxy here? Was Liam?

Then he heard noise coming from the underground garage—a pain-filled cry that stabbed at his memories and tore at his old guilt. He shoved it aside and homed in on his target.

Roxy fought to breathe, terror pounding in her veins as the monster looming over her cut off her clothes, leaving her in her bra and panties.

Then he cut her.

Pain, it was a blazing agony that rang in her ears. “No, stop!” Why? Oh Ancestors, why? The gloom was cut by the headlights from the SUV, revealing her tormentor. Stripped to the waist, he knelt over her, smelling like oily copper. He was huge, ripped with muscles, and hairless.

He looked wrong, too-delicate eyebrows, no beard shadow.

There was no help; her bodyguard lay dead in a pool of blood. Her wrists and ankles were handcuffed to something in the cement. She was helpless to escape.

“Stop? But I’ve only started.” He wiped the blood coating the knife on his chest.

Her blood. Bile burned her throat and she twisted, fighting the restraints.