He’d been able to harness the spirit while they were down there on the stairs, turning it around inside of himself so that he could examine its nature. Fascinating it was, too. His interest was academic, that was no lie. But there was more to it. He sensed trouble. The spirit in this house was associated with a dark history.
Whenever he’d come to visit the area he’d been drawn to the cottage, partly because he’d heard Annabel McGraw’s story, read all the accounts, and each time he visited the area her presence would be more powerful. In the beginning it was only a suggestion of a presence, mostly built around her legend. Not anymore. He’d wanted to taste her essence in order to know it better, and that he’d surely done. Annabel McGraw was causing havoc even from her grave, and he was going to find out why.
Meanwhile, Cain Davot was meddling in the occult, forbidden black magic, Grayson felt sure of it. That was not only dangerous, it would bring ill repute to the brethren. He sighed. It ran deep in him, the need to know the people of Carbrey and the neighboring town of Abernathy were safe from those who practiced the dark arts. His mother had been from Abernathy, and he owed it to the members of his family who still lived there to investigate.
He brooded on the situation until Zoë stirred in her sleep, drawing his attention back. Then there was desire. He was a man after all—in part, at least—and he knew when a woman wanted him.
Looking at the soft, sleeping woman next to him he wondered briefly if he should have handled it differently, denied the thrall. But he hadn’t wanted to. As soon as he’d accepted Zoë’s invitation, he?
?d had to stay focused, in order that it shouldn’t consume him, too. Concerned, he hoped Zoë didn’t think him too cold and distant. He’d tried to walk the line, to keep her safe and make her experience pleasurable, while examining the supernatural forces manifest in the house.
One thing was for sure—he needed her. He had to stay close to her while she was here. She had been chosen, by someone—or something—and he wanted to find out why. Reaching out, he stroked a stray hair from her face. She sighed and snuggled deeper into the pillows.
He stared at her, admiring her, wanting her again. As sure as the dawn would rise, she would think more independently in the light of day, when the spirits of the night whispered away taking their mischief with them. He sensed she wasn’t the sort of woman who came on to men like that. How would she react to him in the morning? Time would tell.
At the other end of the bay all was dark in the Tide Inn. Above it, however, in the penthouse apartment that was built on top of the restaurant high on the cliff, the lights burned still. Cain Davot leaned back in the ornate Baroque-styled sofa in his extensive living room, and watched the woman who was stripping in front of him, while he tried to be patient.
The woman, Isla, had come to them from some city gutter, much as Annabel McGraw had been drawn to Carbrey three centuries before, a fallen woman with no family to speak of. A witch looking for brethren who she could learn from, a coven she could call her own.
Understandably, he couldn’t get Annabel out of his mind tonight. He was so close to making it happen that he had to pace himself. He’d become obsessed with her these last few decades. He didn’t choose to fight it, not anymore. He’d sought a she-witch such as her across the centuries and the entire globe, a woman that he could forge a powerful bond with. No one came close. He’d always loved her, always regretted her demise. The only answer was to bring her back while he still had time. He’d lived long on borrowed time, but his years were numbered. It had to be soon. Be patient. It will be yours, all of it.
After Zoë had left, he’d gathered his people around him, pouring expensive wine down their throats and encouraging them to explore their darkest desires, assuring them that the sexual energy they released would help their cause. It was an entertaining sight, watching them debauch themselves at his behest. Elspeth had run with his suggestion to invoke power, letting her dominant side surface. When it came to sex, she was a particularly gleeful pursuant of debauched behavior. That’s why he liked her. No sense of shame whatsoever, just the pursuit of the eternal high.
When he’d met Elspeth he’d seen a lot of potential in her. She claimed to be related to Annabel, but that had nothing to do with it. Cain didn’t believe it for a moment. Annabel had no family aside from a crone of a mother who had rejected her before she’d reached full maturity. But Elspeth did believe it, because she wanted it to be true. That’s how greedy for the connection Elspeth was, for the notoriety and for the power it might lead to. Her name, however, was a mere coincidence. But Elspeth was far too focused on the gruesome delights of bringing someone back from the dead to consider the implications, to think about what might happen after the event. If they succeeded in their plan to reincarnate Annabel, Annabel would quickly usurp Elspeth as the dominant female in the coven.
He studied her as she strutted around his apartment in high heels and a tight, bloodred dress that barely covered her shapely derriere. She had one of his waiters, Warren Kirby, naked and bound with rope around the wrists, hanging from a beam at the far end of the room. She flicked a birch riding crop at his tensed buttocks, laughing with delight when he moaned pathetically and his engorged cock bounced against his belly.
The image of restraint versus power suited the rather decadent, sumptuous surroundings he had created for himself here at the head of the cliff overlooking the bay. He’d furnished it with treasure and wealth that he had gained on his travels around the globe. Through Europe he’d meandered, to Asia and beyond, to the New World. He’d never been able to forget Carbrey. The place where he had grown up called to him. He’d come home a stronger, more powerful witch, one who was able to build an empire that breached the gap between the Netherworld and the here and now.
Crawford was busy performing cunnilingus on one of the women. Daphne, a busty thirty-eight-year-old widow, was quite the vindictive shrew, and no one dared ask how her husband died. It certainly wasn’t from natural causes. Daphne sat on a high-backed dining chair with her dress pulled up around her hips. She wasn’t wearing any knickers and her pussy was almost completely shaven, bar a small dark line that seemed to function as an arrow directing wandering men into her hotspot. Crawford was kneeling between her legs, his hands wrapped around her thighs, his determination to bring her to climax visible as he went down on her. She cooed and gurgled, her hands alternately stroking her breasts and Crawford’s tousled hair.
Cain glanced back at Warren, who was currently being teased mercilessly by their postmistress. She had his balls grasped in one hand while she moved her riding crop up and down his flank, occasionally flicking it. There was a lattice of fine red lines on his stocky body, a signature he would wear with pride.
“Cain…?” Isla flipped her bleach-blond hair back, hands on hips, her mouth pursed rather petulantly as she tried to get his attention.
She was vain and had a jealous streak, this one, making her less willing to share than the rest. Many years before he’d had those fatal flaws himself. He’d have to watch her, quell those traits.
Nevertheless, the sight of her opulent breasts spilling out of the shallow bra she wore was pleasing. Her underwear was all black, stark against her pale white skin. She licked her lips, happy that she’d drawn his attention back, and nodded down at his hips, where his erection tested the stitching on his expensive Armani pants.
“Let me see you, Cain, you know how much I love your cock.” She fluttered her eyelashes as she reached around and undid her bra.
He couldn’t help wishing she didn’t sound quite so uncouth. He was willing to bet that woman from London, Zoë, wouldn’t say something like that. Or would she? It would be quite a turn-on hearing it come out of her more refined mouth. He lifted his brandy goblet and enjoyed another mouthful of the aged cognac while he pictured it.
Isla paused before lowering her bra, as if she needed to know he was looking at her. He gestured with the glass, sighing inwardly. She peeled away the bra, her hips rolling from side to side as she held the bra loosely in place. She turned her back on him and cast it aside in slow practiced movements, dropping it to the floor before she glanced back over her shoulder, eyebrow raised as she looked pointedly at his groin.
He opened his legs, beckoning her closer. Maybe she would take his mind off Annabel and the London woman; he needed help with that. Possession was no easy trick. It required refined, escalating magic ritual, and patience.
“I can make you come. You want me to, don’t you?” It was Isla again, and she had dropped to her knees. She reached for his fly. Her smile grew when she pulled the zipper down and his cock stood up from his trousers, totemlike, in front of her. Squeezing his balls with one hand, she stroked his length with the other, licking her lips. He watched as her plum-painted lips stretched around his cock-head, her tongue instantly at the underside, stroking back and forth. His spine straightened and he eased his hips forward, watching as she took a good length into her mouth. She lifted away, fluttered her lashes and then took him in again, pumping him with her mouth. Now this was a skill Isla didn’t need any help with, unlike her magic.
Resting his head back against the velvet cushions on the sofa he pictured Annabel kneeling between his legs, instead of Isla. Isla took his smile as a sign of encouragement and took him deeper. The pulse in his groin thudded, pressure building.
Annabel would be there soon, instead of this sorry bitch. His eyelids lowered, his balls high and tense. If it was Annabel, he’d have to possess her. He’d flip her onto her back, and bury his cock deep inside her.
The mou
th on his cock lifted away. “You’re thinking about someone else, aren’t you?”
Cain’s eyes flashed open. “Of course I am, you silly bitch. Now finish the job.”