Haunting Beauty (11 page)

Alice studied the card for a long moment before placing it on top of another. “This Five of Wands. It represents strife, a struggle. I sense it’s something even greater though. A battle of some sort.”

“A battle,” Danni repeated, with a feeling of falling in her stomach as Alice pulled yet another from her deck. “Listen, I don’t know why you were waiting for me or if that’s just the line you use to pull customers in, but I have a lot to do today. Tell me what I owe and—”

“Have you always run away from them?” Alice asked, unfazed.

“From them, who?”

“Your battles. Is that why you want to be blind? You are here, now, because you won’t fight. But this card . . .” She tapped the last card with her blue fingernail. The card showed a man lying on his stomach with ten swords sticking out of his back. “This represents the loss of all you value. It means that in running away, you destroy yourself.”

Danni pushed back her chair and stood.

“The spirit that follows you—he wants that. His aura is changing even now. I can see it. It makes him happy. He wants you to run away.”

Danni looked desperately around the store, not wanting to hear what Alice might say next. Not wanting to think of the gleeful spirit over her shoulder. “How much? How do much I owe you?”

Alice stood as well. “You have the power to change everything,” she said softly, and her eyes fluttered closed again. Her face was serene, but it seemed a fine static hovered around her. If Danni were to reach out and touch her, the spark of it would snap against her skin.

Danni’s mouth was dry, her stomach tight as she took a step back. “Thank you for your time,” she said, fumbling her wallet from her purse.

“Take off the blinders, Dáirinn,” Alice whispered. “Face what you fear.”

“What did you call me?”

Alice opened her eyes and looked at her without answering. For a moment that seemed to stretch like a timeless void, the two women stared at one another. But what Danni saw was the fanning pages of the Book and the dark red that seeped from between them. If that was the thing she had to face, Danni didn’t think she could do it.

“Everything all right over here?” a poised woman in a shimmering lilac dress asked. Danni had noticed her behind the cash register when she’d walked in. “Alice, are you okay?”

Alice blinked and then came out of her trance. She smiled pleasantly. “Yes, I’m fine.”

Hesitantly, the woman looked back at Danni, who still held her wallet in a tight grip. “How much do I owe you?” Danni insisted stubbornly, wanting to pay—to eliminate any debt between them and get the hell out of there as fast as she could. Alice had pried loose something deep inside her, and Danni was afraid it would be blown free now. And who knew what would come out?

“Alice charges forty for a reading,” the woman said in a wary voice. She was looking over Danni’s right shoulder, just as Alice had.
Great.
Could everyone in this place see the invisible spirit?

Danni pulled her money from her wallet and set it on the table. Without another word, she turned and hurried from the store, aware of the eyes following her. She stepped into the bright sunshine with a feeling of escaping. But the cloying scent of the shop clung to her skin.

Focused only on reaching her car and getting far away from Pandora’s Box, Danni didn’t see the man watching her from the other side of the parking lot. But she sensed him, and it pulled her gaze from the ground and forced her to look around. She scanned over the people on the walkway, not even registering the familiar face until she’d passed him. She spun back around, searching for the face again. For a moment, she’d thought she’d seen her father—or at least a man who looked a lot like he had in the picture. But that was impossible. . . .

She’d almost convinced herself she’d imagined him when he appeared again. For an instant their eyes met across the busy parking lot and Danni stilled with surprise. Slowly, he smiled, and Danni was struck by the way it transformed his face. He didn’t just look like the picture; he looked like he’d stepped out of it. It had to be her father. For reasons she couldn’t begin to guess, her father was here in Arizona and Sean didn’t want her to know it.

She hurried toward him, her heart swelling with hope as she neared. But before she could reach him, he turned and stepped into one of the other shops lining the strip mall. She followed him into the crowded store, looking up and down the aisles, but somehow she’d missed him, and now he was gone.

Chapter Eight

I
T was nearly dusk when Sean finally saw Danni come into the park. She’d changed her work clothes for soft gray velour pants and a matching jacket that looked both comfortable and warm, though it didn’t feel the least bit chilly to him this evening.
She is going to freeze to death in Ireland
, he thought.

He remained sitting on the park bench as she and the crazy dog came toward him, just watching her walk. The clingy fabric molded to her slim frame and accented her shapely curves. For the hundredth time that day, he wanted to touch her.

She looked tense, and he couldn’t help the triumphant feeling that filled him. He’d spent the rest of the day frustrated and uptight. He couldn’t have stood it if she’d been strolling happily along with her little mutt on its leash and not a care in the world.

She was a good twenty feet away before she noticed him. She slowed, and the tension became wariness. But not surprise, he noted. Once again, she’d been expecting him.

When he stood, the little dog charged him, growling and snarling, too fierce a beast for the compact little body. He’d hoped the dog would grow used to him, but at this rate he’d be an old man first.

Danni held Bean’s leash tight, stopping her before she could sink her teeth into Sean’s ankle. “Bean, be nice,” she scolded. The dog strained at the end of the leash, ignoring her command.

To Sean she said, “What do you want?”

There was nothing suggestive in the flat tone of the question, but still it filled him with a host of very graphic images portraying exactly what he wanted. As if she’d read his mind, she blushed and looked away.

“I’m sorry about how I behaved earlier,” he said, contradicting his own wild imagination. “I wanted to apologize.”

She looked at him for a moment, and he was glad he could look back without fear of her seeing what was on his mind. He was sorry, but only because it had ended before he was ready.

“Don’t worry about it,” she mumbled.

The soft gray of her jacket brought out the flecks in her eyes and made them even more striking, more mysterious. He stared deeply into them.

“Are you here alone, Sean?” she asked suddenly.

Confused, he glanced over his shoulder, wondering what she meant. “I came here alone,” he said.

“You didn’t come with my father?”

He almost laughed at that but managed to control the urge. “No, I didn’t. Why are you asking?”

“I saw him today. When I went to the store.”

“Your father?” he repeated, unable to hide his shock. “Are you certain?”

“Yes. No. He looked just like him. Could have been his twin. His clone.”

Sean shook his head, a sinking feeling hitting him hard and low. This was not good. He didn’t even know why, but it was not good. “He can’t be here.”

“And why is that?”

He didn’t have an answer, but he was almost certain she couldn’t have seen Cathán MacGrath. He didn’t know about Danni, Sean was sure of it.

“I don’t know who you saw, Danni, but I’d swear it wasn’t your father. He’s a busy man and he rarely leaves Ballyfionúir these days.”

She let out a deep breath. “And the man I saw, saw me back. If it was my dad, he would have spoken to me, not just walked away.”

He nodded in confirmation. But he was bothered by the idea of Cathán being here.

Without another word, she started back the way she’d come, and he walked with her, thinking her silence felt like a void he couldn’t seem to fill. He wanted to put his arms around her and hold her, but he didn’t trust himself to stop there. He doubted she’d trust him to either.

“Who is the white ghost?” Danni asked softly. Her voice came out flat and thin, but it was her question that stilled him.

“What did you say?”

“Ballyfionúir. It means valley of the white ghost, doesn’t it?”

“In a general way, I suppose,” he answered carefully. “We think of it more as a spirit now. As in benevolence.”

“Oh.” She turned those silvery eyes his way. “So there isn’t really a ghost?”

“I’m sure there are several,” he said, keeping his voice level, watching the play of emotion on her face. “Ballyfionúir is at least fifteen hundred years old.”

“But have you ever heard of her? Of the
white
ghost. Do you know who she is?”

“She?”

Danni hesitated, looking down at the little dog. She shook her head. “Never mind.”

He wanted to let it drop. He wanted to pretend she’d never brought it up, but a strange uneasiness settled in the air between them and he knew he couldn’t. They reached her front door and he hesitated on the porch, unsure of his welcome—or rather, certain that he wasn’t. But she surprised him by inviting him in.

He followed her to the small kitchen, where she sat at the table and removed Bean’s leash. She looked done in, and once again he wanted to hold her, comfort her.

She gave the dog a scratch behind its ear and then took a bottle of wine from the top shelf of the refrigerator. Without asking if he wanted it, she reached for two crystal wineglasses. While she filled them, Sean spied a jar on the counter with the words
Ruff Ruff
painted on the side. He looked in. Dog biscuits. He took one and risking life and limb, squatted down to hold it out for Bean.

With an expression of surprise and grudging gratitude, Bean left Danni’s feet to retrieve the donation. She took it from his fingers with ladylike manners, but gobbled it like a starving wolf. He would swear it was a smile she gave him with the abrupt wag of her stubby tail.

Bemused, Sean sat beside Danni and finally asked the question he’d been holding at bay. “And why are you asking about the white ghost, Danni?”

Danni moistened her lips before she answered. A telling gesture that jangled against his already stretched nerves. She was going to lie.

“I dreamed about her,” she murmured.

He didn’t say what he was thinking. Instead he asked, “Last night?”

She nodded. “It was a weird dream. I don’t know why I brought it up.”

She pretended a sudden interest in her glass and began twisting the stem between her finger and thumb. She looked worried, afraid of what he’d say or do next. And a dark suspicion gathered in his thoughts as he watched her. A certainty that he didn’t want to acknowledge.

She hadn’t dreamed about it. She’d seen it. And that did not bode well for either of them.

“My grandmother has seen the white ghost,” he said in a low voice.

Up and round came the lovely gray eyes. He stared into them, feeling as if he were falling into the cool mist of gathering clouds and eminent storm.

“She has?” Danni breathed. When Sean nodded, she asked, “Does she have a silver comb, when your grandmother sees her?”

“A comb?” Even as he queried, a shadowy memory poked up in his subconscious. What was it his nana said? There was a myth . . . a superstition . . . something about a comb. He frowned as the mem ory sharpened into focus.

“She came to me,” Danni went on, but paused, frowning. “I mean, in the dream, she tried to give me her comb. It was scary, the way she held it out. It was like . . . like something I couldn’t resist.”

“You didn’t take it, did you?” Sean asked more sharply than he’d intended.

Danni frowned. “Well, that’s when she started screaming—making this horrible screeching sound that hurt to hear.”

“But did you take the comb?” he demanded again, a part of him feeling foolish for the fear that backed the question.

She shook her head, watching him with those round, gray eyes. All her soul seemed to be in them. Sean forced a smile that didn’t fool either one of them. He was uncomfortable with his own immediate worry and the relief that came with her denial. But the Irish were a superstitious lot and things that had been bred into a person were hard to ignore. Foolish or not, the thought of her taking the comb had brought a heavy foreboding to the pit of his stomach.

“It’s good you didn’t take it,” he said, hoping he sounded more casual than he felt. “Sure and it’s all legend. Tales that mothers have used to terrify their children into obedience for hundreds of years. But it’s good you didn’t take it.”

She watched him, her eyes still wide, a shiver of apprehension near the surface. Her hands worked the wineglass, spinning it in idle circles without her seeming to notice. “What would’ve happened if I took it?” she asked.

Sean reached over to still her fingers. They were like ice and without thinking, he folded them into a warm hold. He heard her take a soft breath and it pulled his thoughts deeper into the seduction that was Danni MacGrath.

He cleared his throat, wished he could pull his hands back, but he was committed now, and his fingers seemed to be working on their own, rubbing her silky skin, bringing heat to her icy fingertips.

“My nana would say she’s a banshee,” he said at last.

“A what?”

“A fairy, I guess, only not the kind your Disney would dream up.” He looked into her eyes, trying to make the words more gentle than they could be. “As the story goes, they appear to tell you that someone has either died or is going to.”

She blinked once, twice. He could see the effort it took to process what he’d said, and he felt a slight tremor move through her. Her captured fingers curled into a small tight fist. He brought them up to his mouth and blew warmth into the shelter he’d made with his hands. She watched him with that heady combination of trust and misgiving.

“Banshees keen for the dead,” he said.

“Keen,” she repeated and her voice seemed to come from far away. “Yes, that’s what it was. I can’t even begin to describe the sound. It was so harsh and . . . and like glass—a million glasses breaking at once.”