Captive Moon (29 page)

The woman turned dark, shining eyes to her and smiled brightly. Tahira noticed a strange, sickly sweet odor rising from her, but she couldn’t place it. It was nearly a shifter smell, but it wasn’t. But her voice had been the one through the door a few moments before. “Yes, of course,” she said and took the stack of hangers from Tahira’s hand. “Are you ready to purchase these?”

Tahira started to say yes, but then remembered that Antoine was paying. “I don’t know. My companion is paying and he stepped out of the store. Should I wait?”

Bertha shrugged. “There are no other customers at this moment. I can at least scan and bag the items and then close the register until he returns. Then it is a simple matter to complete the purchase.”

“That won’t cause you problems if another customer wants to check out before he returns?” Tahira raised her brows in surprise. The stores in California would never do such a thing.

“No. That will not cause difficulties. I can merely ring up the items in another department.”

After they got to the checkout, the woman removed the hangers from the clothing and started to sort them into piles. A few moments passed before she said, “Are you and your family in town for long? It is a lovely time of year to visit Germany.”

Tahira shook her head and felt a stab of pain in her stomach. “No. I’m not here with my family. I’m out today with a friend.”

Bertha cocked her head and looked at her quizzically. “Oh! I’m sorry. It was just that a young man was in earlier with two companions who looked very much like you. I thought perhaps he was a relative.”

Tahira felt her heart race for a moment. “Can you describe this man? Did you notice anything unusual about him?”

She took a deep breath and looked deep in thought, so all Tahira could do was drum her fingers impatiently on the counter and wait.

“Well, he was a bit taller than you, nicely built with thick hair down to his collar. His face was shaped like yours and his eyes were the same hazel, which is unusual in someone with darker skin, I thought.”

Tahira found herself leaning forward, taking in every word with increasing excitement. “Did you notice anything strange about him … like his ears?”

Her eyes lit up. “Ah! Now that you say it, I remember! He looked like he had been in an accident, because the corner of his ear was missing. I noticed because he was wearing an earring—an emerald—

and it seemed strange for someone to want to draw attention to that ear.”

It was Rabi! Nearly jumping over the counter to grab the woman, Tahira barely kept from screaming the words. “Did you see which way they went? How long ago was he in here? He might be my brother. He was abducted and nobody has seen him in over a month!”

Bertha backed up a step at Tahira’s frantic questions. “Only a few moments ago, while you were in the dressing room. I thought you were together.” She frowned and tapped a coral-colored nail on the side of the cash register. “But there was something strange about how the young man spoke with his companions. He did seem very nervous.” She glanced at her watch. “I am ready to go on break. If he was your brother, you might still have time to catch him. I would be happy to take you to where I overheard they were headed next. I could give you directions if you’d rather, but it’s a difficult street to find unless you know the city very well.” Tahira glanced around frantically, looking for Antoine. I promised I wouldn’t leave, but this might be my only chance!

She struggled with what to do. Her heart was racing and she ran to the front window, trying to find some sign that Antoine was returning. But then she took a deep breath. She was a big girl, an adult of the Hayalet. Once again, she was growing too reliant on Antoine. Bertha could tell him where she went.

“Okay, I’ll go with you. But you’ll need to tell my companion where I went when you get back from break. His name is Antoine, and he’s a tall French man with long blond hair.” She rushed back to the counter and impulsively hugged the tiny woman. “Thank you so much for this, Bertha! You don’t know what it means to me!”

She felt a pat on her back. The voice was soft and low, and had an odd lilt like a vibrato. “I only hope that I might have some small part in reuniting you with your brother. It’s best that you should end up together in the same place.”

CHAPTER Fourteen

With quick steps, Tahira followed Bertha to the front door. She realized when it opened that she’d forgotten her coat in the dressing room, and the sun was getting lower on the horizon. Yes, she could stand the cold, but why if it wasn’t necessary? She called out the doorway to Bertha, who was standing with hands on hips, waiting. “I forgot my jacket, Bertha. Don’t go anywhere. I’ll be right back.”

The woman narrowed her eyes a bit but nodded. Tahira raced back to the dressing room, grabbed the oversized coat, and pulled it on while turning. She ran right into Antoine, causing him to drop a large, white plastic bag. She heard a rattling inside the bag as it hit the floor.

“What’s the rush, mon chat du feu? I said I would be right back.”

“Oh, thank heavens, Antoine! I didn’t want to leave without letting you know. But the clerk who was checking me out actually saw Rabi here in the store while I was trying on clothes! Obviously, she didn’t know it was him, but she described him perfectly. She says she knows where he is going next and offered to take me to him.”

Rather than looking delighted, he glanced around him suspiciously and smelled worried. “I saw nobody outside who looked like they might be waiting, Tahira.”

Tahira moved past him and headed for the door. “But she promised to wait!” She looked out the window both ways in panic, but Antoine was right—the tiny Latina woman was nowhere to be seen.

Antoine stepped up behind her as she pressed her hands against the window, frantically looking about. The blending of scents from him was nearly enough to make her sneeze. He put his hands on her shoulders and pulled her back a bit as a customer pushed open the door blindly, nearly hitting her in the head.

“I’d very much like to talk to this woman. Might she perhaps have come back inside? If she has truly seen your brother, then she’s worth finding.”

“She did see him! She even described the earring he always wears in his ear. Rabi was forever leaving it places because the back would slip off when he combed his hair, so he glued the pieces together.” Her eyes grew cold and she could smell her own anger. “Now I’ve lost him again. If something happens to him, I’ll never forgive myself. I should have just left the damn coat!”

Antoine guided her to a pair of chairs in the shoe department and sat down next to her. “Did you smell him? Are you certain he was here?”

Her expression changed from angry to startled. “What do you mean?”

He took her hand in his and stared at her, trying to will her to listen. “You’re fairly new at our lifestyle, so you might not understand that warm air holds scent better than cold air. The heater vents keep scents close to nose level, so if he’s been in this room in the last thirty minutes I’ve been gone, you should be able to smell him. My nose is exceptional, so I was able to pick out your scent in the forest at dawn and know that you were still alive. I don’t smell any other tigers in this room, but I do smell a strange, sickly sweet scent that concerns me. Do you smell your brother? Walk around if it will help.”

Tahira’s own suspicions were growing the more he talked. She didn’t smell Rabi, but hadn’t thought about it until Antoine said something. She stood up and walked around the room, letting the scents guide her. She could smell the lingering scent of Bertha, and her and Antoine. But when she started to concentrate on scents, she could pick out a small sick child who had tugged at the bottom of a jacket, and an elderly woman’s fragrant scent of pine boughs and bayberries that covered the yarn on an elegant knitted scarf. There were multiple men and women who had touched here and there, but no tigers, no shifters, and most definitely, no Rabi.

“Why would she say that?” she asked, almost to herself. “How could she know—”

Antoine’s words were hushed and worried. “She could know if she was one of his captors, Tahira. I don’t doubt she was going to take you to him. I only question why.”

She slammed her fists down on the edge of a rack of clothing in frustration. “And once again, I was nearly impulsive enough to get caught! Damn it! What is wrong with me?”

He pulled her into his arms and hugged her tight. “There’s nothing wrong with you. You’re not impulsive—you’re a warrior, so you walk into danger willingly. But the moon is gone, and your skills and gifts in that form wouldn’t help you if you got caught. Perhaps you are too trusting of strangers, but some days I wish I could return to that level of naïveté. I wish I hadn’t been tricked often enough to become cynical.”

***

Antoine noticed a change in her scent. It went from being sad and worried to angry. He pulled back from the hug and saw her staring at the checkout counter.

“You said you could smell something sweet. Do you think you could track that scent? She touched all of the clothes I was buying, along with the hangers.”

He pursed his lips, thinking quickly. “It would be difficult considering all of the people outside, but it’s certainly possible. Still, I think it would be wise to make certain that she didn’t backtrack into the store hoping to follow us.”

He looked up and spotted a tall blond woman wearing a name tag reading “Gretchen.” “Was that woman over in the shoe department the one you saw?”

She looked over to where he was pointing. “No. Her name was Bertha. She was tiny and from somewhere in South America. I remember she mentioned that she was from the same part of the world as me. But she didn’t talk like she was from the U.S. Her accent was Spanish-sounding, but not a sort I’ve heard before.”

Antoine raised a hand and caught the eye of the woman in the shoe department. “Could you help us, please?” he called out in English.

She walked toward them, looking around her curiously and addressed them in stilted English. “Guten tag! Is there something with which you need help? There should be an attendant in this department, but I do not see her person.”

“My friend was being assisted by the clerk named Bertha, do you know where she is? She told my friend she was going on break but would return shortly. We would like to pay for our items now.”

The clerk narrowed her eyes a bit, crossed her arms over her chest, and tapped a foot in annoyance.

“Bertha was not scheduled for break in this moment. I will find her for you to check out. Thank you for this information. I will return in the quickest time.”

When the clerk left, Antoine picked up some of the clothing, holding it close to his nose. He inhaled deeply, sorting out the primary scent of the woman from Tahira’s own aroma, along with the dozen other people who had handled the fabric. He felt something open inside of him, some dark door in the back of his mind that was shrouded in fear and anger. A strange prickling sensation came over him and the store dimmed from view. Suddenly he was outside, moving forward through the cold, still air. A small, dark-skinned woman with shoulder-length black hair was running quickly across the plaza ahead of him. The scent that was left in her wake was the same as on the fabric. He pressed forward into the vision, keeping her in sight. With a startled look and scent, she stopped and looked around her carefully, staring at each face in the crowd as though they were enemies. She stared right into Antoine’s eyes and he fixed her face in his mind. But she passed him by without notice.

The woman backed up a few steps and her glances were now nervous, and a light scent of fear began to flow to him. She turned and started to run again, slamming headlong into a couple carrying overflowing plastic bags that nearly touched the ground.

“Hey! Watch where you’re going!” the man shouted in English as she quickly got to her feet again with the grace and speed of… a shifter. He reached forward and touched the woman. Pain erupted in his hand, and she began to slap at her shoulder as though it had been bitten by angry bees. He saw her mind in the brief moment before she started to run again. He knew without question who… and what she was. He just didn’t know if he was alpha enough to do what would need to be done. But he did know that he would have to hurry if Rabi was going to survive. There would be no time to wait for Raven.

A car drove up beside the woman in a flurry of screeching tires. She got in the car, still watching behind her for the source of the pain in her shoulder, but there was nothing to see.

“Antoine! Are you all right? What’s happening?” Tahira’s frantic voice invaded the dream. He felt hands shaking him and his own thready breathing. The green Volvo with the woman faded into blackness, and the door slammed shut with a ferocity that echoed through his mind and left him feeling nauseous.

“I’m fine,” he said, and his voice sounded distant, as though not completely connected to him.

When he could finally see the store again, Tahira’s eyes were concerned and her scent was worried. He realized he was looking up at her. “Are you sure? You took a smell of the sweater and then had a seizure. You froze up and fell over, and you’ve been shaking and sweating for almost a minute.”

As he came more into his own body again, he realized she was right. His skin felt damp and clammy, and there was a fine trembling in his fingers that hadn’t been there a moment before. “I saw her,” was all he could think of to say, but Tahira immediately seemed to understand.

“You did? Do you know if she’s one of the captors? Do you know where they are?” She looked up and saw something. “C’mon, you have to get up. The clerk is coming back.”

He peeked around the corner of the register island and saw the russet heels headed their way. As she passed behind a column, he used full Sazi speed to get to his feet. The movement made him a bit dizzy, but not so much that he couldn’t appear composed.

Gretchen smiled professionally and dipped her head. She stepped behind the register and pressed a series of keys. “I will be assisting you to buy your items. I’m afraid that Bertha is unavailable at this moment.”