Witch Blood (3 page)

Carefully, she pushed up and slid onto the seat. Ripples of pain shot through her back and down her legs. She blew out a careful breath as nausea swamped her.

Jack sat behind her and placed his palms along her spine, one above the other. His hands, completely businesslike on her back, grew warm. Her twisted back improved immediately. “I don't remember your hair being this dark a shade of red or your eyes being green, Isabelle.”

“I colored my hair and I'm wearing contacts.”

“All the better to stalk your prey, hmm?”

“I guess. Stefan prefers redheads.”

“Good disguise. None of us recognized you in the tabloids. We didn't know who you were, or that you were even a witch. It wasn't until tonight, when we saw you up close, that we realized your identity. All we knew was that this evening Stefan's flavor-of-the-month had finally convinced him to shed his bodyguards for sex.”

She let out a small laugh. “You guys were piggybacking my seduction as a way to take Stefan hostage?”

“Yep. We were watching, waiting for an opportunity. You gave us a surprise when we opened the limo door. Never saw that one coming.” He paused. “I'm sorry about your sister. I understand why you went after Stefan.”

She had a million questions, but they all caught in her throat. They were questions for the head of the Coven, anyway, not Jack McAllister, Thomas's right-hand man. “I hunted the demon for a month and couldn't find it.”

“We've been hunting it, too, without any luck.”

“I went after the cause for the demon's existence instead.” She swallowed hard. “I just…needed to do something, and Stefan can't be allowed to bring any more of those creatures into our world.”

Jack slid away and she turned toward him on the seat. Her back still ached, but the worst of the pain had faded.

“Isabelle, I get that. I do. But you should have come to us instead of playing vigilante. We'd always planned to take down Stefan and we're going after the demon.” Jack shook his head and
tch tched
. “Bad, bad girl.”

“So what's new?” she muttered in response. Angela had always been the good one. Isabelle had always been the one getting into trouble.

He must've known she wasn't asking what was new
with him
, but he answered that way all the same. “I'm going to be a father.” The words were spoken with such pride that she smiled.

She fussed with the hem of her skirt, happy to change the subject. “I heard that. Knocked up that little air witch of yours.”

“Mira.”

Lady, the look in his eyes when he said her name. Such love. Such devotion. A man had never looked that way while speaking
her
name, at least not that she knew of, and Isabelle had to admit that a part of her regretted it.

“That's right, her name is Mira,” Isabelle answered. “Everyone's hoping she'll turn up with a baby air witch of her own.” Of all the elemental witches, air was by far the rarest and most powerful. “What do you think, air or fire?”

“I think she'll take after her mom and be an air witch. We're going to name her Eva, for Mira's mom if it's a girl. David, for her dad if it's a boy.”

Eva Hoskins, maiden name Monahan. She had been the air witch who'd been sacrificed in the circle that had brought the demon into existence over twenty-five years ago. Four witches—one for each of the elements—had been killed to bring in the demon who had murdered Angela. How poetic one of their names should be spoken on this night.

She patted him on his shoulder. “Good luck to you both.” She scooped up her purse from the floor of the limo and exited the vehicle.

Isabelle found herself on a darkened side street in a commercial part of town. The front of the limo had been rammed in by a Hummer. Behind the limo was another car crash, a tangle of metal where sedan had met heavy SUV. The sedan had been the vehicle carrying Stefan's muscle.

She cast a glance at Stefan, whom they were lifting into the back of Thomas's car. Thomas stood nearby. He stared at her across the distance, his black-as-sin hair spread over his shoulders, his expression intent. Then he crooked a finger.

Oh, no. Hell would freeze over first.

Isabelle gave him a little wave and walked away.

“Isabelle,” he called after her. “I need to talk to you.”

Ignoring him, she turned a corner and pulled on her remaining magickal reserves, scraping the very bottom of her capacity. Isabelle gathered water molecules from the air, condensing them around dust particles and cloaking herself in the resulting thick fog. By the time she heard his footsteps behind her, she'd disappeared, leaving him standing in zero visibility.

Thomas swore loudly and Isabelle smiled. She needed to talk to him, but she wasn't about to do it on his terms.

S
HE LOOKED BETTER AS A BLONDE.

Thomas stepped into the Coven library, a room that also served as his office and took stock of the woman sitting on his desk, one of her long legs swinging. He'd been expecting Isabelle Novak to show up sometime.

In order to figure out how no one had recognized her while she'd been beguiling Stefan, he'd had Jack show him pictures of her when she wasn't all glossy and polished for Stefan's liking. Now she looked more like herself. She'd changed her hair back to its natural color, a strawberry blond, and wore a pair of faded jeans, a black knit top and a pair of scuffed black boots.

Normally she wasn't this gaunt. Thomas suspected she'd purposely lost weight in order to insinuate herself into Stefan's world. Or perhaps grief had shaved some pounds off her. In his opinion, she looked better with a little more weight on her.

Her hair was long and glossy, framing an oval face with porcelain skin and large brown eyes. Her mouth was full, expressive. She wore nearly no makeup and did little to her hair beyond brush it. She had a natural type of beauty that required little embellishment and seemed to care nothing for fashion. Yet she possessed a manner that screamed self-confidence.

Not only was she gorgeous, she looked innocent. Yet Thomas knew better. Miss Isabelle Novak had a reputation for trouble. The research he'd done on her had revealed that right away. From even her earliest days in grade school, Isabelle had left a trail of trouble behind her—getting into fights, talking back to teachers. Her older years revealed a passionate, impulsive woman who couldn't stay in one place, couldn't hold a steady job, couldn't form relationships.

She was also a strong water witch. Thomas could sense the strength in her from across the room. Ripples of volatile emotion, the ebb and flow of psychic power—they were the hallmarks of the water witch and they were impressively palpable in Isabelle Novak.

He closed the door and spoke as he turned toward her. “Violence is an easy way to mourn someone you've lost. Don't you think it's better to save a life in order to honor a life lost?”

She stood, pressed her hands together, and bowed. “Buddha, I'm pleasured to make your acquaintance.” She straightened and put a hand to her hip. “I didn't come here for a lecture.”

She was pretty. Too bad she was such a pain in the ass.

Thomas squelched his annoyance and walked toward her. “You need to look at the big picture. He can help us—”

“Help us? When does that man start helping anyone but himself? When does he do anything that's not in his own best interests? And when does he pay for his crimes, Mr. Monahan?
When?
”

“Call me Thomas.”

“Mr. Monahan, Thomas, whatever.” She waved her hand, dismissing his overture. “Are we going to wait for Stefan to die of old age, then? Should we let him get away with everything he's done?”

“Of course not.”

“Really? The non-magickals aren't going to touch him, so it falls to
us
to do it, his peers. Yet I haven't seen the Coven or the Council acting to take care of it. Wasn't that one of the reasons why the Coven and Council were created to begin with? Aren't you guys supposed to be handling the warlocks and punishing crimes?” She slammed her hand down on the desk. “He doesn't deserve to live his life any way he sees fit, Thomas.”

“If you're finished ranting, can you sit down and listen? I have things to explain. Do you want a drink? I have just about anything you can order in a bar and you look like you could use one.”

She shook her head, whirled, and paced to the far floor-to-ceiling window and the high bookshelves that framed it. “I wasted a month of my life preparing to make Stefan pay for what he did to Angela and you come rushing in and snatch it all away from me.”

He took his gamble, remembering the quiver of hesitation he'd sensed in her that night and the apprehensive look on her face. She'd been pissed as hell, but unsure about actually killing Stefan. “How did it feel, almost taking his life?”

She turned without a moment's uncertainty. “Horrible! It felt horrible. Cold and empty and not at all like I thought.”

Of course. Isabelle might want justice for her sister, but she was no murderer. “You hunted the demon, Jack tells me.”

“I hunted the demon for over a month after I f-found Angela.” She shook her head and hugged herself. “I could find no trace of it anywhere.”

“So you went after the person you perceived to be responsible for the demon's existence.”

She nodded.

“Please sit down, Isabelle.” He nodded at one of the soft leather chairs in front of his desk.

She hesitated a moment, her eyes flashing and probably a few sharp words poised on her tongue. It was clear she didn't like authority and perceived him as such. Still, she swallowed what she was about to say, walked across the room and sank into the chair.

Thomas sat on the edge of the desk in front of her. “It is our intention to catch and kill this demon, Isabelle. The Council has had a directive to apprehend Stefan ever since the incident last winter. We've been watching him for a long time, waiting for him to relax and let his guard down. You helped us to finally get him. He's in Gribben now, in
prison
. We're not going to let him out. Ever.”

“Jack told me, but—”

“
But
Stefan needs to stay alive. At least for now. He can help us apprehend the demon by providing information. The Duskoff are the people who have had the most interaction with demons. They've studied them in order to understand the creatures they're using. After he's helped us, he'll stand trial for his crimes, along with the thirteen other warlocks who participated in the circle last winter at Duskoff International. They will be tried and punished. That means either life imprisonment or death.”

She snorted and crossed her arms over her chest. “I'll believe it when I see it.”

He sighed. “Don't make the mistake of thinking you're the only one who wants to see Stefan pay. And don't think you're the only one who wants that demon dead.”

“What did Stefan do to you?”

“Well, he tried to kill my cousin last winter for starters.”

“Mira Hoskins.”

He nodded. “And the first witch the demon killed, Melina, she was someone I knew.” He paused. She had been an old lover. It had been a long time ago, but Melina had been special to him. “She was a good friend. She had kids, a husband.”

Isabelle was silent a long moment before she spoke. “Do you think the demon picked her on purpose? It's a strange coincidence she should be an old friend of the leader of the Coven.”

“That's exactly why we need all the information from Stefan that we can gather. We don't know how or why the demon is picking his victims at this point. We don't know much of anything beyond the fact that the demon is killing witches.”

She chewed her lower lip, deep in thought. “Usually the demons the Duskoff raise have their fun and go home. They don't stick around for twenty-five years hiding, then all of a sudden pop up and start killing off witches.”

“We've just noticed the demon never returned to his dimension, but the Coven archivist is going through old newspapers and finding evidence the demon hasn't been
hiding
at all. We think he's been killing humans for sport the entire time. We just never noticed him until he started targeting witches so heinously.”

“Yeah,
heinous
is one word for it.” Her hands tightened so hard on the arms of the chair they turned white. “He's been killing the witches in some kind of demon ritual, hasn't he? He's stealing their power for something.”

“We think so, but we're not sure. All of this is reason to use Stefan to gain information. He knows more about demons and their world than we do and it's imperative we find and kill this demon before he murders more people.”

“So you think we can find him.” Her tone was caustic. “Thomas, that demon has disappeared. I've moved heaven and hell trying to locate the monster. I have dedicated every waking breath to it since Angela was killed. All I want in this universe is to rid the world of that thing and prevent any more witches from being murdered.”

He folded his hands together. “And maybe with Stefan and the Duskoff's information, we can accomplish that.”

Her mouth snapped shut. “You're the boss, I guess. You're the head of the Coven, after all. You must know best.” Her tone clearly said she didn't believe that.

“I'm sorry for your loss, Isabelle, and I understand your need to punish someone. However, we need to put our emotions on hold right now and proceed rationally.”

“Yes, empathically I can tell you're good at that. Putting your emotions on hold.”

“And I don't need any empathic ability to tell you're not.”

She turned an interesting, angry, shade of red. “You think I'm not acting rationally?”

“No, I was speaking in general terms, about all of us. We all want revenge, Isabelle. We all want to punish this demon, but we need to make our moves carefully.”

“But you believe I don't have a good handle on my emotions.”

“You strike me as a passionate person and I think you're grieving. But I believe if you consider what Stefan can bring to us in the long run, you'll see that we need to keep him alive, no matter what our hearts want.” He paused. “Anyway, I don't think you have a revenge killing in you, Isabelle. That's a compliment, by the way.”

Thomas had never seen such warm brown eyes go so cold, so fast. Her beautiful face tightened as she stared at him for a long moment before speaking. “I see your point but that doesn't mean I have to like it. By the way, I don't appreciate the psychoanalysis, since I never asked for it.”

“I call things the way I see them,” he answered with a shrug.

She stood. “I like you, but you're kind of a prick. Do you know that?”

“So I've been told. Numerous times.”

“I'm sorry you lost an old friend.”

He glanced away, his jaw tightening. “Me, too. I'm sorry about your sister.”

She walked to him, so close he could see the pain in her eyes when she answered softly, “Thank you.”

They stood in silence for a moment. The woman had beautiful eyes, like melted chocolate. They were back to warm again. She leaned forward, so close he could smell her musky perfume as she cocked her head to the side. “Do you even have pupils?”

He blinked in surprise. “Last time I checked.”

She stared into his eyes for a moment and her lips parted. Her head dipped a little closer to his and her gaze dropped to his mouth. For one wild moment he thought she might kiss him.

For the next wild moment he thought he might kiss her.

Where that impulse came from, he wasn't sure. Maybe it was the water-earth attraction affecting him. Earth and water had a natural sexual attraction sometimes, as did fire and air. It lasted until the magicks found a balance. He'd felt that artificial pull toward Isabelle ever since the limo.

Or maybe it had simply been too long since he'd been with a woman.

She straightened and backed away, breaking the strange, momentary spell. “Did you even notice I was nearly naked in the limo?”

He cleared his throat. “There were other concerns.” He paused. “But, yes, I noticed. It would have been impossible not to notice.” Those long legs, that flawless pale skin and the fullness of her breasts swelling from her silky demi bra. Thomas might be head of the Coven, but he was a man first.

A satisfied little smile flickered across her lips. “Good.” She turned toward the door.

What a strange woman. “Stay,” he said simply before she could leave.

She turned back around slowly, wearing a questioning expression.

“Stay here at the Coven for a while. Work with us. Help us deal with Stefan. Help us find the demon.”

Isabelle Novak possessed abilities uncommon to most water witches. Not only could she manipulate the water in a man's body—a deadly skill she'd demonstrated readily on Stefan—she could access moisture memory, tapping into the water of a given area and replaying recent events. She could be valuable to them.

She pursed her lips and thought about it for a moment. “You'll make me play nice.”

He smiled. “I'll make you play effectively, not necessarily nicely.”

“I want to be in on any official Coven communication with Stefan. Any contact you have with him in Gribben, I want to be present.”

Thomas rubbed a hand over his chin for a moment, thinking over the issue. “I don't see why not.”

She considered him, worrying at her lower lip between her white teeth. “Give me time to tie up a few loose ends and I'll come in.”

Absurdly, he wondered what kind of “ends” she meant. He knew she wasn't married, but did she have a boyfriend?