Blood of the White Witch (24 page)

I watched him as he continued on his track,
back and forth.

“We just don’t have enough information
still,” he said throwing his hands up into the air and then letting
them fall helplessly to his side in defeat. “I just feel completely
overwhelmed at times. I don’t know what to do!”

“Let’s talk to Crispin tomorrow,” I
suggested to him, standing. “He’s been following your grandparents’
actions for a long while. Maybe he can tell us where they store
important things or where they go and the company they’ve been
keeping lately. Let’s use the resources we do have.”

He stopped pacing then and came back over to
hug me, wrapping his finely toned arms around me.

“Have I told you just how smart I think you
are?” he asked, and a whisper of a kiss was placed against my
forehead.

“Not today,” I smiled, and I reached my arms
around his waist, laying my head against his sculpted chest. “But
this is why you shouldn’t shut me out. We need to talk to each
other so we know what we’re dealing with.”

I could feel his chin on the top of my head
as he nodded slightly.

“Message received, Portia,” he replied
softly. “Can you ever forgive me for treating you so wrongly?”

“You haven’t been doing it on purpose, and I
understand that,” I said. “It’s hard for you to break several
years’ worth of habit for my benefit. I’m doing my best to try and
look at where you’re coming from, which was why I didn’t want to
say anything to you about it in the first place. I didn’t want to
upset you.”

“So instead, you’ll walk on eggshells around
me trying to keep the peace?” he asked. “I won’t have things that
way either, baby. Never fear saying what you have to say to me. I
want it. I need it.”

I looked up at him.

“I love you,” I said softly.

“I know,” he replied. “And I’m the luckiest
person on this earth because of it.”

He tipped his head down, kissing me softly
on the lips while he hugged me even tighter to him. He pulled back
after a moment, resting his forehead against mine, and he slowly
rubbed the tip of his nose back and forth against mine.

“Gosh, I love you, Portia,” he said softly
with a sigh. “I don’t know if you’ll ever really understand how I
feel about you, and I don’t know if I’ll ever be able to properly
show you, but you make me feel things in a way that I never dreamed
possible.”

I didn’t say anything in reply, not wanting
to break the tender moment of his declaration while he kissed my
cheek with slow deliberate movements before he moved down my neck
to rest his face gently there. I could feel his hot breath
feathering against my throat while he nuzzled up against me.

“I love you,” he whispered softly again, and
he placed a kiss against my skin.

Dad called Crispin the next day, and he
agreed to come meet us at the keep early in the afternoon. When we
were all settled into the sitting room, he started to speak.

“So, Sean asked me for some more information
on the Cummingses’ activities. Our coven has kept tabs on them for
a long time, searching for some way to trip them up and expose
them.

“I can assure you that Douglas and Fiona are
very careful individuals. Members of their coven extend from their
household staff to corporate contacts from the community. They’re
very high-powered individuals even without their magical
influences.

“They have complete control over their
followers. Some demon covens let their members run wild on
bloodthirsty rampages, not Douglas and Fiona. They run a very
refined operation that probably resembles something like being a
member of a wine-tasting society.

“They prefer that their coven remains in the
human form as much as possible and that they do everything possible
to maintain an appearance of normalcy. They are upper crust to the
core.

“That in itself speaks to their control over
their powers as most demon covens operate on a more crazed and
bloodthirsty level.

“Most of their ritual dealings take place in
their home, so it’s made observing their practices difficult, if
not near impossible. We’ve never ventured onto the property
uninvited.”

“You’ve been invited before?” Dad asked with
a quizzical look on his face.

Crispin nodded his head.

“Once or twice, when business dealings
couldn’t afford my being slighted at one of their functions, they
allowed me a visit. They were dinner parties where I was surrounded
by many, many people, thus insuring my safety.”

“Did you notice anything unusual at that
time?” I asked curiously.

“No. Like I said before, they were the
picture of propriety. Now you say you’re looking for a certain
artifact, some type of box?” he replied.

“Yes,” Dad explained. “It would be something
that is, at the very least, several hundreds of years old.”

Crispin reached up to scratch lightly behind
his ear while he pondered this for a moment.

“I assume that you’re aware that the son,
Damien, was a very successful antiques dealer?” he asked looking
back and forth between my dad and Vance.

Dad nodded.

“We’re aware of that fact,” he replied.

“Well, I wouldn’t even know where to begin
searching for an antique box in that house.” He gestured toward
Vance and me. “As I’m sure the two of you know, there’s hardly an
item in that house that isn’t an antique.”

“You bring up an interesting point, though,”
Vance said. “Perhaps my father is the one who originally came
across the artifact in his business dealings.”

“I think that could be very probable,”
Crispin acknowledged. “I’m less familiar with his dealings,
however, since he was around the world quite a bit, until more
recent years after they brought his wife to Bell Tower Hall. He
visited her quite frequently, which I found interesting since we
were sure they were an estranged couple. I understand the reasons
now that we’ve met you.”

I saw a brief look of anger flash over
Vance’s face before he successfully shuttered his emotions once
again.

Crispin was a complete gentleman and
pretended not to notice, though.

“So have you ever noticed anyone in my
family keeping a separate or special storage space somewhere else?”
Vance asked.

“I’ve never seen anything that would suggest
that,” Crispin answered. “I think Bell Tower is a vast enough
estate that they could store or hide anything they could possibly
want and no one would find it for centuries, if ever.”

“That’s what I was afraid of,” Dad said.
“There isn’t even really any point to trying to sneak onto the
property to look for something unless we have some sort of starting
point. We’d just be putting ourselves in danger.”

“I’d suggest that you stay completely away
from the property,” Crispin agreed. “There’s just no need to risk
yourselves. Let my coven continue to keep tabs on everything, and
if we notice any activity picking up or anything out of the
ordinary, we’ll contact you right away.”

We all stood when Crispin rose from his
seat, shaking his hand and thanking him for his information. Dad
walked him out to his vehicle.

“Well, that was completely useless,” Vance
muttered to me. He reached for my hand. “He’s been watching them
for years. I doubt my grandparents would be stupid enough to start
revealing things now.”

“I agree with you,” I replied sadly. “I
don’t know where else we could look for information either.”

“Maybe we should try following some of the
demon contacts they have. You know, the ones Crispin told us
about,” he suggested.

“It’s worth a shot, I guess,” I said with a
shrug. “I’m sure Dad has plenty of his surveillance stuff here with
him and could do something like that.”

We discussed things with Dad when he came
back in, and he agreed to get a list of the Cummingses’ associates
to see if we could find anything out from watching them.

Vance and I spent the rest of the day
looking things up on the Internet trying to find out any
information we could on his family and their past dealings. Most of
the things we found revolved around his dad and the things he had
been involved in on the archeological scene. Vance had been
surprised to learn that his Dad had actually started out his career
on quite a few digs and trips of exploration.

“Sounds like he was a regular Indiana
Jones,” he commented a bit sarcastically.

“Maybe that was how he came across the box,”
I suggested. “Is there anything out there in particular which says
he spent any time here in Scotland looking for stuff?”

“Nothing that I’ve seen so far,” he replied.
He kept on searching, moving through site after site.

I got up from my chair and stretched.

“Wow! It’s after dark already!” I said,
looking out the window. “I’m going to go down to the kitchen and
see if I can’t scrounge us up some food. I’m totally famished!
Would you like something?”

“Sounds good,” he mumbled, his eyes
continuing to skim over the page in front of him. “Hurry back.”

“I will,” I replied, going to give him a
peck on the cheek before I wandered out the door, closing it behind
me.

I walked down the large original stone
staircase and made my way down the hall into the kitchen area.

Since the hotel wasn’t staffed yet, the
owners had agreed to let us use the main kitchen as our own. We had
enjoyed having many dinners in there together since our return to
Scotland.

There were large preparation areas, just
like the kitchens of five star chefs. Every kind of convenience was
available. Pots and pans, of every size and in coordinating colors,
hung from designated hooks on wire racks over the metal
countertops. There were knives of every length and width arranged
neatly into holders on every surface throughout the entire
space.

The large ovens and stove tops were my
favorite part because we could cook all the dishes we were
preparing at once which allowed dinner to get ready in a much
faster time.

Tonight, however, everyone had gone with Mom
and Dad to do some grocery shopping since we were running out of
things to cook. I was tired of waiting for them to get back.

Walking through the large space, I flipped
on one small light so I could see to make my way to the
refrigerator. I opened the door and started rummaging through the
shelves, looking for something that seemed appealing.

I was bent over peering into the bottom
shelf when I felt his arms slide around my waist.

He caught me off guard, and I giggled.

“I didn’t hear you come in,” I said and
straightened up, shutting the door while I turned to face him.

I stumbled backward into the fridge when I
stared up into the face of not Vance but Brian Fitzgerald.

Hysteria bubbled up inside me, and I opened
my mouth to scream, but he quickly placed his hand in a hard grip
over it.

“No screaming now,” he said quietly, and he
slid his sharp double edged athame in a feigned slicing motion
across my throat.

He may have stopped the scream from leaving
my mouth, but it was still ringing loudly in my head.

Slowly, he removed his hand from my mouth,
keeping the knife carefully placed against my jugular.

“I was so very disappointed when you
escaped,” he whispered seductively into my hair, and he placed a
whisper of a kiss against it, while running his free hand down my
arm until he reached my hand, locking his fingers with mine. “I was
looking forward to getting to know you better.” He chuckled
softly.

He lifted my hand high over my head and
pinned me with his body against the icebox.

Think, Portia, think! I commanded myself,
trying to remember the training sessions I’d had with Vance.

I flicked the fingers of my free hand toward
the rows of knives and several popped out of their holders to fly
straight at Brian’s back.

He anticipated it, though, throwing a shield
up around himself, and the knives all bounced harmlessly off the
unseen barrier, clattering with a great noise to the floor all
around him.

“That wasn’t very nice, Portia,” he said
with a slight shake of his head as if he were berating a naughty
child. “But I do like your fire. You know, I’ve been looking for
you ever since you left.” He inhaled the scent of my hair. “I was
serious when I said I’d happily take Vance’s place.”

“I’ll never leave him,” I said, and I stared
up into his demon red eyes, swallowing slowly as he pushed the
knife a little harder against me.

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll do my best to
help you change your mind,” he smiled harshly, and his gaze flitted
down my face and to my throat.

“I think Douglas and Fiona have other plans
for me,” I said, trying to change the subject and direct his
attention to a safer subject.

He laughed then.

“They don’t even know where you are. I’m the
one who had the bright idea to start following Crispin to see if
he’d lead me to you, and guess what? He did,” he replied, his eyes
flashing

“Where are they keeping the box?” I asked
him point blank, trying to glean any information from him that I
could while I was stalling.

“What box?” he replied, not really listening
to me, and he leaned in closer to my neck.

“The one for the ritual,” I said, angling my
head as far away from him as I possibly could.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he
responded and he bent in even closer.

He moved over me then, placing his lips
against my mouth. I yanked my head hard to the left, trying to get
away from him.

“That’s all right, Portia,” he whispered in
a low voice. “Your neck will work just fine, too.”

I could feel his teeth sharpening against my
skin, and he licked over the scar that was there.

“I think you’ll make a lovely demon bride,”
he said, lifting his head back for a second before he moved in to
bite me.