Caterpillar, a Paranormal Romance With a Touch of Horror (35 page)

Pointy elongated ears twitched forward as if it was listening, waiting, but for what I didn’t know.  Then, opening a mouth full of razor sharp teeth, the creature let out an ear-splitting scream that sent a shower of chills down my back.  And with a stroke of its mighty wings, it flew out as it had come in, only this time carrying the mayor off into the inky night sky. 

I ran to the opening and looked up.  I stood motionless for several long seconds, listening to the distant flap of wings until the sound died, replaced by an eerie, unnatural silence.  No crickets, no frogs, not even the stir of the wind could be heard.  It was as if the earth had come to a standstill, hoping to escape the notice of the creature, waiting for it to disappear into the night.  In that moment, I knew that the creature was familiar to me.  I could feel it, burning inside my chest.  It was the fire of recognition. 

Not pretty, nothing you’d want to see.  Nothing I’d want you to see,
he’d said
. 
It was Tegan. 

Slowly, tentatively, sound crept back in.  The buzz of the lights, the beat of my heart, the whisper of Rainn’s breathing.  And on its heels was reality. 

I turned to Rainn.  First I removed her gag then set to work tearing off a strip of her skirt to make a tourniquet for her arm.  I had just tied it off and was freeing her arm from its restraint when they arrived.

“Freeze!”  Someone shouted from behind me.  I stopped what I was doing and raised my hands, signaling my surrender.

Even as someone rushed in from behind me, pushed me to the floor and cuffed my hands behind my back, I was awash with relief.  Help had arrived.  It was over.  We were alive.  We’d survived.  We were going to be alright.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

It didn’t take long for the police to uncuff me once they secured the room and stopped long enough to listen to me and Rainn.  Once they’d freed her, she’d told them what had happened, how the mayor had abducted her.  At that point, they released me and I was able to tell them my story.  Well, most of it anyway.  I left out all things supernatural and told them that I’d hit him with the axe and he’d fled.  I also fibbed and told them the garage door had been like that from the beginning.  Luckily they didn’t ask how I’d missed that on the way in. 

Later, as the medics were finishing up their treatment of Rainn and the flurry of activity was dying off, I sat on the end of a lounge chair, staring at the moon’s reflection in the still waters of the pool.  I was reliving the unbelievable events of the night when I heard the sound of a familiar voice.  The hairs on my arms stood on end.  It was Tegan. 

I didn’t turn around, didn’t move a muscle.  I just listened.  I could hear Tegan’s voice moving from room to room as he talked to people throughout the basement area.  Then I didn’t hear it anymore.  I could still hear the voices and movements from the people inside, but no Tegan. 

I knew the instant he stepped out onto the patio.  Though he made no sound, I knew he was near.  The warm blue flame that burned constantly in my belly leapt up into a tall orange pillar of fire, a fire that raged for one man.

His footfalls were almost silent on the pavers, but I could feel his approach.  He stopped behind me, his body only inches from my own, heat radiating between us.  I felt his hesitation as he placed his hand on my shoulder.  A shower of gooseflesh rained down my arm.

We stayed like that for what seemed like an eternity.  Questions hung silently in the air around us.  Neither of us spoke.  There was nothing to say.  I knew what I’d suspected was true and Tegan was giving me the chance to walk away.  But I also knew, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that I could never walk away.  I needed him.  I loved him.  More than I ever imagined I could love another person.  And, apart from that love, nothing else mattered. 

“Cat,” he said.  His voice was not much more than a rough whisper. 

My heart fluttered in my chest and I tilted my head to the side, touching my cheek to his hand.  And that was all it took.

Suddenly I was in his arms and we were on the other side of the pool, hidden in the trees.  I felt the bite of bark against my back, but I didn’t care.  Tegan’s body was pressed to mine from chest to knee.  His hands were in my hair and then his lips were on mine for one burning second.  Then they were gone.  And he held me, held me like he couldn’t bear to let me go.  And I knew why.  I couldn’t let him go either.

Of all the things that I didn’t know, all the questions I had amassed over the past eight days, one thing, one strange thing, was circling in my head.  I remembered his reaction when I’d asked a question once before.

“Why does it have to be me?  Why can’t it be someone else?”

Tegan lifted his head and leaned back to look down into my face.  He stared into my eyes and for the first time I saw that he had doubts, too.
 

Then he answered.  “Because I’m destined to save her, to save the angel whose blood speaks to me.  And she’s destined to save me.  We’re bound to each other,” he explained.  Then he closed his eyes and leaned his forehead against mine.  “I
want it to be
you. It
has to be
you.”

I wanted that too, but I said nothing.  We stood there against the tree, holding each other, in the quiet, surrounded by the whispering wind, until the voices of the others got louder.  They were looking for us.  Someone, or something, would always be looking for us.  And I knew, because Tegan and I were both cursed, that we’d always be found. 

Chapter Thirty

Rainn and I sat in the corner booth of a little bistro in downtown Atlanta.  I was munching on salad, she was entertaining me with a brutal fashion critique of the other patrons.  It had been almost a month since our run-in with the mayor.  Rainn had healed quite nicely; I wasn’t so lucky.  My wounds went much deeper, destiny deep, but I was getting used to them.  They’d become a part of me, a constant reminder of what lay ahead, of what I had to do.  In a way, I was grateful;
my wounds
were making me stronger. 

I had begun having nightmares, eerie flashes of what had been and, I believed, what was to come.  I’m sure Rainn had nightmares, too, just a different kind.  We never discussed it.  We just pretended like none of it ever happened.  But it was always there, just below the surface, lingering…

“Enter Detective Hottie, stage left,” Rainn announced, looking toward the door.  “Mmm,” she said with feeling.

I didn’t look.  I didn’t need to.  I knew without a doubt to whom she was referring.  Even if she hadn’t seen him and made a comment, I’d have known he was close.  I always knew.  “Down, girl,” I teased.  “He’s taken.”

“When you’re done, you let me know.  I’d take seconds, thirds, fourths, whatever I could get of that man.  He is
so
fine!”

“You’d better be prepared to wait.  I’m nowhere near done yet,” I said with a smile, knowing the real truth behind the casual statement.

And I never will be,
I added silently.  Tegan was part of my life, part of my soul, part of my destiny.  We could never be apart.

Finally, I turned.  My eyes met the startling blue of Tegan’s and, like always, my reaction was instant, visceral, eternal. 

Rainn must’ve noticed, too.  “I guess that’s my cue to leave,” she said, drawing my eye.  She looked from me to Tegan and back again.  “I don’t know what it is about you two…”she trailed off, shaking her head. 
I knew
what she meant.  I knew all too well.  “Have fun at the lake.  I would say ‘think about me’, but I know you won’t so I’ll save my breath.”  Rainn scooted to the edge of the booth as Tegan stopped in front us.

Tegan smiled down at Rainn. “Thanks for bringing her out, Rainn.”

“Any time, Suga,” she said with her most dazzling smile in place.  “Ya’ll have fun.  I’ll see you when you get back.”

“Thanks, Rainn.”

And then she was gone.

I finished the last bite of my salad then walked with Tegan to the Jeep he had rented for our trip.  He’d peeled the canvas top off the roll bars, letting the brilliant sun shine inside. 

I looked at him skeptically.  “I thought this was going to be a quiet weekend.  What’s with the Jeep?”

“I think I found one,” he said solemnly. 

That got my attention.

“Are we—”

“Yep,” he interrupted, knowing what I would ask.

“So the letter was right?”

“I think so.”

After he helped me into my seat and shut the door, Tegan rounded the front and hopped into the driver’s seat. 

“Where are we going then?”

“It’s a surprise,” he said with a grin as he started the engine.

Epilogue

I was sitting on my new hardwoods, leaning back against my new couch with Tegan’s head in my lap.  Dogma, the cat, was purring quietly, looking down on us from his lofty perch atop the entertainment center.

It had been months since Tegan killed the djinn.  Well, sent him back to hell actually.  Demons never really die; they just relocate.  Since then, we’d spent every minute of our spare time doing research, trying to find the missing Pyramid Texts and learn what we could about the cursed. 

The reason:  my birthday.  It was looming in the distance, getting closer every day.  The pressure of it, the unease of it, hovered over us, around us, between us like an ever-darkening cloud.  We’d long since discovered that it’s very difficult to prepare for the unknown, but still we searched, hoping to find something...

I’d gotten two more letters from my aunt.  Both letters contained more excerpts from the Book of Qaphsiel.  They were both particularly short, however, more so than the first ones.  I’d spent countless hours pouring over them, trying to decipher their cryptic words, to no avail. 

Tegan was holding the first one, re-reading it.  I didn’t have to look at the page to know what it said.  I had memorized it, as I had all the pages I’d received from my aunt. 

…craving takes hold, only the strongest of his kind can withstand it, but only for a time.  She must help him overcome it, control it, before it destroys them both.  And all the while, his darker self will use the blood and the power to find them.  The blood calls to him, across time and space.  It can’t hide from him. 
She
can’t hide from him. 

The second letter contained pages that spoke of blood, too, but this blood was from a different source, a source containing dark power.  Tegan had read it the most.  He seemed to worry over it, but he wouldn’t tell me why.

…discover that the blood of the cursed is more powerful than he ever imagined.  But the power is too much for humans, turning their minds into dark chambers of lust and thirst, turning their bodies into willing slaves of the undead.  On that day, the Reapers will multiply.  They will hover, invisible in the sky, awaiting their black harvest.  The destruction of man…

The letters disturbed me, for the obvious reasons of course.  But there was something else, something more.  There was something I couldn’t put my finger on and it plagued me more often than I wanted to admit.  I hadn’t voiced my concerns to Tegan; I wasn’t even sure I’d know what to say if I tried.  It’s hard to describe a nebulous feeling, and that’s basically what it was.  But there were times, times when we were alone and the world around us was quiet, when I wondered if he could feel my concern, feel what I felt.  On those nights, he’d hold me tighter, pull me closer, like he was holding on to something that was destined to slip away.  He never said anything about it.  I wondered if it was because it scared him, too. 

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, putting those thoughts from my mind, reveling in Tegan’s intoxicating scent instead.  I leaned my head back against the cushion and let my mind wander into more pleasant pastures, those of Tegan’s lips on mine, his hands in my hair.