Haunted: Penance / After the Lightning / Seeing Red

He shook his head, his brow furrowed. “Why are you pushing me away?”

He was the one who’d pulled back physically. But emotionally she was doing as he accused, to protect herself as well as him. He was too good a man to live with her curse.

“If I’m pushing, why are you still here?” she asked, her heart aching as she struggled with her fears. “Just leave.”

“Ariel?” Bewildered and hurt, his voice cracked on her name.

“Just leave me alone!” she shouted, all her anger and desperation raw and exposed in her shaking voice.

He drew in a ragged breath, and his chin lifted with the pride she’d accused him of putting before her. “If that’s what you want, fine.”

She closed her eyes, not opening them until the slam of the front door shook the thin walls of her house. She couldn’t watch him walk away from her, not the way she’d watched Haylee fade into the mist. Once his temper calmed, he’d be back.

By then, she would be gone.

They circled him, these women cloaked in darkness with hooded robes covering their hair and shadowing their faces. Even as flames licked up from the blazing fire, they remained in shadow. The glow lit up the night sky while the smoke hung low, gathering thickly just above the ground, choking him. His lungs fought desperately for breath, and as he gasped and coughed, they laughed, their voices clear and melodious.

And malicious.

The laughter echoed in his ears, in his head, like thunder, splitting his skull. Pain throbbed at his temples, at his neck, radiating throughout his body until he shuddered under the force of it.

They were killing him. His chest ached as the last of his breath escaped him. The fire blurred, then burned on his lids as he closed his eyes on the life he’d known. But even then the pain wouldn’t go away. There was no welcome release from it. No peace.

He jerked awake, throwing back the blankets tangled around him like the ropes with which they’d bound him. As he staggered from the bed, he bumped against the nightstand, knocking the journal to the cold, hard floor. The bang as the book struck the wood ricocheted like a gunshot through his skull.

Careful to move slowly as he bent over, he reached for the journal. His family’s history. His legacy, locked away for years, discounted as the incomprehensible ramblings of a crazy man. No one had understood his ancestor. Until now. Until just the few short weeks ago he’d come into possession of the journal and read it. If only he’d known sooner…about the curse, about the power of the charms and the witches. Now he understood his dreams, the black-and-white visions of his future. It was his curse. His demise.

If they got to him first.

But now that he knew about the witches and knew about their powers, he would be able to find them. To reclaim the charms and stop them.

To kill them before they killed him.

Chapter 2

The door opened at just the barest brush of her knuckles against the wood. A man stood in the shadow of the old oak door. Despite the two weeks that had passed, his face still bore traces of bruises in the yellow stains around his eyes and jaw. The same yellow Haylee had often worn, to match similar bruises.

“Ariel!” Ty said, his voice raspy either from disuse or from the bruises on his throat, visible even in the shadow of his shirt collar. “Where’ve you been?”

“Away.” She’d run away, and she hated herself for the cowardice. She could have blamed her running on grief over Haylee, or despair over the school board suspending her. But she knew what it really was; like blood from a split lip, she could taste the fear.

“David’s been going crazy looking for you. He’s beyond worried.”

No doubt he was furious, with every right. She’d taken off shortly after their fight, fleeing the shelter of her cozy little home for anonymous hotels. For an anonymous life. But she’d not been running from the media or from grief. She’d been running from herself, from who and what she was.

But like the times she’d run before—from the ghosts, from the disgust of foster parents—she’d realized there was no escape. She had to deal with what she was—and so would David once she gave him the chance. Fear over the risk she was taking squeezed her heart.

She hadn’t told anyone about the curse since an old boyfriend back in college who’d dropped her and transferred to a different school after she’d shared her secret with him. After that heartbreak, she’d only casually dated. Until David.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have disappeared like that.” Pushing David away before he could reject her had cheated them both.

Ty waved off her apology with a hand, the knuckles of which were scabbed over, the fingers swollen. Then he stepped back and gestured her inside his apartment, one of three in a converted Tudor on Barrett’s east side. Despite the cracks in the plaster and scratches on the old hardwood floors, the apartment was charming with its dark red paint, high ceilings, thick oak trim and leaded-glass windows. His living room expanded into the turret, bathing it in light, but somehow he remained in shadow.

“I’m not the one you need to apologize to,” he said as he shoved his hands into the pockets of his faded jeans. “I’m not going crazy.”

But his blue eyes were a bit wild, his manner more edgy than she’d ever seen him. She’d met Ty before she’d met David when the police officer had spoken at safety assemblies at the school. He’d definitely gotten through to the children about danger, intimidating more than befriending them. Like David, he was more intense than easygoing, his navy-blue eyes ever watchful. He always stared at her, making her wonder if she passed his scrutiny. Did he approve?

But this visit wasn’t about her or David. “I’m apologizing to you,” she insisted. “I never should have called you that day.”

He shrugged. “What—you were going to dial 911 and explain that you wanted them to go out because a little kid missed school? Her dad called in the absence, saying she was sick. They wouldn’t have sent anyone out.”

“But you went.” And for the first time she wondered why.

He jerked his chin down in a rough nod. “And if I hadn’t, that bastard would have finished packing and skipped town. You did the right thing, Ariel, no matter what David said to you.”

“You know?”

“That he was upset you called me?” He nodded again. “I’ve known David a long time.” He chuckled, the sound rustier than his voice. “He’s not too proud to admit to me when he’s been an ass.” His crooked grin faded. “He’s really going crazy worrying about you.”

“So he told you about the fight?” About what a bitch she’d been? If Ty had any sense, he would have told David to forget about her.

“Yeah, I agreed that he’d been an ass,” he said with another rough laugh.

The muscles in Ariel’s face twitched as she smiled for the first time in two weeks. “You’re a good friend.”

Ty’s breath audibly caught. “Yeah, and that’s too damned bad….”

Before she could ask what he meant, his door rattled, shaking under the pounding of a fist. “Ty, you all right? I heard about the suspension…” David’s last word trailed off as his friend opened the door. “Ariel!”

His dark eyes were shadowed, lines of fatigue rimming them. He’d apparently suffered as many sleepless nights as she had. He turned his gaze on Ty, his tone accusatory as he said, “You found her.”

“Nobody found me,” Ariel maintained. She was still lost, in so many ways.

David’s gaze, full of heat and passion, swung back to her. The air between them crackled. “Ariel…”

“I was heading to the Towers,” she insisted, resisting the urge to throw herself in his arms. She had run away when she’d needed him most and spent the past two weeks convincing herself she had to get used to being without him, that if he knew the truth he’d reject her. Assuming the worst hadn’t been fair to either of them. “But I wanted to check on Ty first.”

“You’ve checked. I’m fine,” he said, his raspy voice dismissive. “You two can leave me alone.”

Is that what he really wanted? She’d told David the same thing, but she hadn’t been alone. She’d had Haylee, who’d stayed close to her, perhaps feeling Ariel’s pain and knowing her teacher needed her. Mist funneled into the room; light warmed it, and Haylee appeared, hovering at Ty’s side. Did she think he needed her now, even more than Ariel did?

Ariel had David, if he still wanted her. From the way he stared at her, his eyes full of hunger and yearning, she suspected he did. But then, he didn’t know yet what she had to tell him.

Ty cleared his throat, drawing David’s attention to him. “Are you fine?” David asked him. “You’ve been suspended.”

“Why?” Ariel gasped the question.

Ty’s mouth twisted into a bitter grimace as he explained, “Man dies at the hands of an off-duty police officer. Internal Affairs has to investigate.”

“You’ll be cleared,” David insisted, “and reinstated to active duty soon.”

Ty shrugged as if he didn’t care. Ariel didn’t know him well, but she knew enough about Ty to realize that his job was his life. Losing it would kill him.

She could identify. Her heart ached for her second graders. Not only had they lost a classmate—someone they’d all loved—but their teacher had been taken away from them, too. Tears threatened; she missed them so much.

At least she could still see Haylee, faintly, as her image began to fade into the mist. Both men, intuitive, insightful men, were blind to what she saw, the light and the child.

“I’m sorry,” she said to Ty again.

“Same thing happened to you.” Ty revealed his knowledge of her.

“I talked to the principal,” David admitted. “I’ll talk to the board next.”

“Don’t,” Ariel said, knowing that he wanted to fix things for her. But there were things that even his money and influence couldn’t fix.

“You’re not ready to go back to work,” he surmised as his dark eyes asked another question. Was she ready to go back to him?

“Would you two like me to take off?” Ty asked, either with generosity or bitter irony. His raspy voice distorted his tone and his blue eyes guarded his emotions.

“No,” Ariel was quick to reply.

“We’ll leave?” David worded his response as a question, asked of Ariel, not Ty.

She stepped closer to him and nodded. “I’ll meet you at your penthouse.” Then she added in a whisper, “Give me a minute alone with Ty?”

Some dark emotion passed through his eyes, making her shiver as if a cold wind had blown into the apartment. But he nodded, then glanced at Ty over her head. “We’ll talk later.” His deep voice vibrated with a warning. About Ty’s suspension or about her?

The door shut hard, just short of a slam, behind him as David left them alone. Ty blew out a heavy breath. “Sometimes he forgets that I’m not one of his employees.”

David didn’t treat Ty like an employee, though. He treated him more like a brother. Underneath the bossiness there was affection. After she’d been separated from her family, Ariel had known little affection in her life.

“Why are you friends?” she wondered aloud, then felt heat rush to her face. “I don’t mean that in a derogatory way. It’s just that you have nothing in common.”

Except their intensity.

Half of Ty’s bruised mouth lifted into a crooked grin. “Oh, you’d be surprised.”

“Seriously.” She wanted to know. In the six months she’d been with David, their friendship had fascinated her. She’d never experienced anything like the bond between them. Not even her family had been that close, not as close as she’d like to remember. If they had, someone would have found her by now. Despite the times she’d run away, she’d always come back to Barrett. She hadn’t changed her name; she’d waited for them to come find her. But no one had looked. No one had cared.

“Seriously?” Ty repeated, lifting an eyebrow creased with a thin scar. He sighed before sharing his succinct answer, “History.”

“History?” She smiled at his odd response. “You mean because you were friends for such a long time?”

Ty sighed. “It’s more complicated than that. David’s never told you?”

Her lips turned back down; she didn’t feel like smiling anymore. “Told me what?”

Ty’s blue gaze was ever watchful, his tone curious as he asked, “How much do you know about him?”

Not nearly enough, apparently, but she’d always thought she knew more than he did about her. “Of course you’re going to know more than I do about David. It’s not like we’ve been dating for years,” she defended her ignorance.

And it wasn’t as if they spent all their time talking when they were together. So much of their communication required no words. Only kisses, caresses…moans of pleasure. If there was something about him she needed to know, she was certain David would have told her. She was the one keeping secrets.

“No, it’s not,” Ty agreed, rubbing a hand along his jaw darkened with stubble as well as the shadow of the bruises from Haylee’s father’s fists.

Ty had said that Haylee’s father had died resisting arrest. Based on media accounts, during the ensuing fight, Mr. Reynolds had sustained a blow to the head that had killed him. She knew what had happened, but there was something else she had to know.

“Why did you go that day?” she asked.

He shrugged his broad shoulders as if it were no big deal. “You asked me to.”

“But I didn’t give you a reason.” Because she couldn’t. She couldn’t tell him how she’d known that something horrible had happened to Haylee. She’d have to tell David first. “Did you trust my…instincts?”

His blue eyes unblinking, he stared intently at her. “I trusted you.”

She drew in a quick little breath. “I need to go.”

He nodded. “To David.” This time she caught the bitterness in his voice and eyes as he held open the door for her to leave. What was the history between these two supposedly best friends? And why was she suddenly afraid to learn it?

She walked over the threshold, then stopped and turned back as she said again, “I’m sorry.”

“Me, too,” he said before closing the door in her face and shutting her out.

Had David shut her out of some part of his life, of his past? If so, she needed to learn it from him, not his friend. But now she wondered…why had he, a powerful man used to getting what he wanted, let her push him away two weeks ago? Maybe he didn’t want her. Or maybe she wasn’t the only one keeping secrets.

Ariel shivered under the cold stare of the security guard standing inside the opulent marble and brass lobby of the Towers. The glass-and-chrome high-rise was actually named Koster Towers, after the man who’d built it. The man she wanted to see, if security would let her. Like David, the guard was a big man, but he had graying hair and pale eyes. Although he studied her as if he’d never seen her before, he knew who she was. Why make the play of requesting her driver’s license, then phoning the penthouse to see if she were allowed up?

David took a long time to respond to the guard, but after the way he’d acted at Ty’s, she doubted he’d changed his mind about wanting to see her. At least she hoped he hadn’t.

Ariel’s heart thumped slow and hard as it lay heavy in her chest. In the two weeks she’d been gone, she’d come to some important realizations. The first, of course, had been that she couldn’t run from who she was anymore. The second had been that she needed David in her life. She couldn’t say that without him it wouldn’t be worth living; she’d never had any problem going on alone.

But she didn’t want to anymore. She wanted David at her side and she wanted to be at his…if she were ever allowed to see him. Her palm itched, tempting her to slam it against the marble counter over which the guard loomed. But then the man jerked his chin toward the private elevator. His voice gruff, he conceded, “You can go up now.”

She followed the Oriental runner to the elevator, stepping inside the small car of mirror and brass. Before she could press any buttons, the doors swished closed and the car jerked, beginning its ascent. She stared at the image reflected at her. Red hair, long and tangled, falling around a face devoid of makeup. A loose-knit brown sweater hung on her, like the long denim skirt, the tattered hem dangling threads against her brown leather boots.

No wonder the guard had questioned her admittance to the penthouse. She undoubtedly didn’t appear suitable for a man of David’s wealth and power. But David never cared how she dressed; he always called her beautiful. The guard probably watched her from cameras hidden somewhere inside the elevator. She considered sticking out her tongue but resisted the urge. Obviously she’d been spending too much time around second graders. Or she once had. After she settled things with David, she’d see about getting her job back or getting another. She missed teaching almost as much as she’d missed him.

The car shuddered to a halt, and her stomach lifted, not from the height but with nerves. Would he forgive her running away? She hadn’t even taken her cell phone when she’d left, so he’d had no way to contact her.

The doors slid open to the two-story foyer of the penthouse. A wide mahogany staircase wound up one corner of it while plaster columns separated the sitting area from the hall leading to the rest of the apartment.

“David?” she called out as she stepped out of the elevator. “David?”

Her heels clinked against the marble floor like wineglasses in a toast as she walked across the foyer. Light glowed from the living room, so she followed it through the rows of plaster columns, down a couple marble steps until she neared what David called the conversation pit, where black leather couches angled around an octagonal table in front of a massive marble fireplace. Despite the warmth of the spring day, a fire burned in the hearth, mirroring the flames of the profusion of candles arranged on the glass-top table.

“David?” she said as she neared the couches. Along with the candles, a bouquet of red roses adorned the table, the flames reflecting in its crystal vase making it look as if the stems were on fire.

“You’re here,” he said as he joined her in the living room. He carried a silver tray laden with flutes of sparkling champagne and plates of canapés.

“As if you didn’t know,” she said. “I couldn’t get past the lobby until you authorized it. Did you take me off the list?”

“List?” His mouth kicked into a secretive grin. “You think I have a list.”

She nodded, refusing to be distracted by his handsome face. She loved that wicked grin, loved the creases it left in his cheeks, the way it warmed his dark eyes. “And I’m not on it anymore.”

He gestured at the table, the candles, then the fire burning in the hearth. “I might have asked the guard to stall you.”

“So you could set this scene?”

For what? Seduction? It never took him much for that. Just that grin. The touch of his hand. The brush of his lips. Her stomach quivered as heat spread throughout her body. Since she stood before the hearth, she would blame the warmth of the fire, but she knew better. David got her hot. Her body craved his almost to the point of obsession.

“Is it working?” he asked her as he set the tray on the table next to the candles. Then he pushed aside her hair to brush his lips against the nape of her neck. Her pulse quickened. He didn’t miss her reaction, as he chuckled and asked, “Should I stoke the fire?”

With another kiss, another touch?

“You must be cold,” he said.

She had been cold and alone, even with Haylee’s sweetness haunting her. “I missed you,” she admitted.

“Good,” he said, his voice hard.

She glanced up in surprise at his harsh tone and turned toward him. “David?”

“I was going out of my mind worrying about you, wondering where you were—” his hands settled onto her shoulders, tangling in her hair “—wanting you at my side.”

Instead of feeling guilt, satisfaction lifted her spirits. He cared as much as she did. She smiled. “So I heard.”

“From Ty?” His brown eyes darkened with emotion. Bitterness or resentment? Or something else?

“Is it a problem that I stopped there first?” She probably wouldn’t have if she hadn’t been stalling on carrying out the decision she’d made to tell David everything.

He shook his head, tousling his golden hair. “Not at all. I’m worried about Ty, too.”

“Why?” she asked. “The suspension?”

David sighed. “It’s more than that.”

“He’s healing all right?”

“Physically, yes,” he replied. “I’ve checked with his doctors.” To whom patient-doctor confidentiality obviously meant nothing. But when David Koster asked a question, people answered him. Except her. She’d done a good job avoiding telling him anything about her past. She hadn’t realized he’d done the same to her.

“So what are you worried about?” she asked. “His emotional well-being?”

“All Ty has to do for reinstatement is talk to a psychiatrist. Then he’d be cleared to return to duty.”

“But he won’t do it.” She couldn’t blame him. After she’d been taken away from her mother, she’d been forced to talk to a barrage of psychologists. The minute any foster family had learned about her ability, she’d been sent to one. A couple of times she’d even been locked away in a psychiatric ward, with other kids screaming and yelling or laughing maniacally.

David’s hands slid from her shoulders, and he walked a few paces away. “No, he won’t.”

“Maybe he’s not ready to talk about that day.” Sometimes it was better if a person didn’t share everything. Maybe she shouldn’t tell David. Just talking about psychologists reminded her how anyone who’d learned the truth had looked at her as if she were crazy.

“It’s not just that day he’s avoided talking about,” David remarked with another ragged sigh as he stared moodily into the fire.

“History,” she said, admitting to the knowledge of their bond.

He turned to her and blinked as if clearing something from his mind. “What?”

“History,” she repeated, wondering why he’d been distracted. “You and Ty share quite a past.”

His eyes darkened and his jaw clenched. “What did he tell you?”

“Nothing.” And she had an eerie suspicion that neither would David. “I just know that you two have been friends a long time.”

“Yes,” David admitted. “We grew up together.” The hard edge to his tone suggested that he wasn’t talking about just chronological years but something else, something that had caused them to grow up faster. “He even lived with us…after his dad died.”

Fathers meant little to her. She’d never known hers. Undoubtedly Daddy Dearest had been rich; her mother had liked the security of rich men. Even at nine Ariel had realized that. Now, looking back from a woman’s perspective, she also realized her father had probably been married. He’d certainly never been any part of their lives. Neither had Elena’s father or Irina’s. Since their mother had lied for money, she’d undoubtedly cheated, too. But that was long ago and should matter nothing to Ariel anymore.

All that mattered now was David.

But she found herself asking about Ty. “His mom was already gone?” Dead or just lost to him, as Ariel’s was lost to her? Perhaps that was why Ty had come when she’d called; they had the unspoken bond of abandoned children. Maybe she should have told Ty about her past first; his acceptance might have come more easily than David’s.

David nodded. “She died when he was about five.”

At least his mother had an excuse for being gone. “Then he lost his dad, too?”

A muscle twitched in David’s jaw, he clenched it so hard. “That was more a blessing than a curse.”

She winced at first the word, then the sentiment. “David!”

“His dad was a monster,” he explained. “Used to beat the hell out of Ty.”

“Like Haylee’s father did her.” That was why Ty had gone when she’d called him.

“God, Ariel, I’m sorry about bringing that up,” David said. “I shouldn’t have….”