Enlightened [Sexual Magic 2] (Siren Publishing Ménage Amour) (27 page)

“When did you find her body?” Griff asked, mouth dry.

“Wednesday. But she’d been dead for at least a day.”

Griff frowned. Something niggled at the back of his brain, but he couldn’t quite figure it out. A sense of pain suddenly overwhelmed him, and he gasped, clutched at his side, just above the hip.

Ryan’s hand grabbed at him. “What’s wrong?”

The pain receded, but a nagging after-burn remained. He shrugged off the detective’s hand and went back to the living room. He knelt at the pool of blood.

“Don’t touch that,” Ryan said sharply.

Griff looked up. Several eyes watched him closely. No way could he explain what he was thinking or the far-fetched idea that formed in his mind.

The pain had a familiar feel to it, just without the usual bite of pleasure.

It had all the earmarks of Mason. He was hurt.

Griff clenched his fist. He had to find them.

Now.

He rose and motioned Ryan to him. “Do you need anything else from me?”

The cop’s eyes narrowed. “What?”

“Pardon?”

“Cut the shit, Griff. I know what you are. Like me, there’s no way you’d sit back and let something like this proceed without you. So, I want to know what you’ve figured out. What you’re planning. In other words, don’t fuck up my investigation. I’d hate to have to arrest you. Emma would be beyond pissed.”

Griff glanced around the room. The nagging feeling persisted, the ache deep in his gut. Time was running out.

“I don’t have time to hold your hand and explain, but if you’re willing to give me a little leeway, and more importantly curb your disbelief, I might know a way to find them.”

Ryan’s eyes did not waver. “I have a feeling I’m going to need some damn strong Scotch after this, but all right.”

Griff spun and headed out the door, the cop right behind him. When they reached the sidewalk, Ryan stopped him once more.

“I have a few conditions,” he said.

Impatient at the delay, Griff glared at him. “You’re not in much of a position to make any.”

“Tough shit. Number one, I go in first. Wherever they are, I’m the one in charge. Second, don’t do anything to jeopardize yourself.”

“Don’t play the hero, huh?”

“Yeah.”

“If Emma and Mason are in danger, I’m not going to sit back and let you play cowboy.” He held the man’s steady gaze. “I think you know by now I can take care of myself.”

Ryan grunted. “Agreed.”

They headed to the car. He looked at the detective and Joel over the hood. “Get in.”

“Joel’s not going,” Ryan protested.

“The hell I’m not,” Joel snarled.

Griff raised a brow at the man’s ferocity.

“She’s closer to me than any damn family I have, and I’m not about to be left behind.”

“I can’t be worrying about you. It’s too dangerous.”

“Ryan, if it were your sister, would
you
stay behind?”

“I’m a cop, Joel. Chasing criminals is my job.”

Griff clenched his jaw as the ache suddenly flamed again. “Everyone in the damn car. We can hash it out on the way.”

It was a tight squeeze for all five of them, but as soon as everyone was buckled, Griff threw the car into reverse and sped out of the lot and shot forward. He had a demon to hunt down, and he knew of just one way to find the bastard.

During the ride, Joel and Ryan continued to argue until Madelyn, who sat in the middle of them, took each man’s hand and joined them together. “Enough. You both care deeply.” Her lightly French-accented tone held a thread of exasperation. “Together we will find her. We argue no more.”

“It’s not safe,” Ryan muttered.

“Life,
cherie
, is not safe,” Madelyn whispered. Her eyes met Griff’s in the mirror then flicked away. “We must charge each day with all we have. Joel loves Emma, yes?”

“Yeah, we both do.”

“I’ve known her since we were damn near in diapers,” Joel said. His voice broke, and he cleared his throat. “I love her very much.”

“Then we agree on that. We all go.”

Ryan exhaled noisily, but Griff sensed he’d given up the fight. “All right, but the same rules apply to all of you. I’m in charge, in the lead. Shit, how’d I end up with the Scooby Gang?”

Noah snorted. “Sheer luck, man, sheer luck.”

Moments later, Griff slung the car haphazardly into a spot in front of the Council and dashed from the car.

He slammed open the front door, and Susan half-screeched and rose, alarm on her face. “Griff. What’s wrong?”

“I need to see Clarissa. Is the American Scry still here?”

“Well, yes, but they’re in a meeting.”

He ran past her, the footsteps of his entourage close behind. Susan’s voice was high and tight as she protested.

He didn’t bother to knock, but burst into Clarissa’s office.

She stood with her back to the window and lifted a brow. He noted she did not look one whit surprised.

His gaze landed on Wes Blackelk, the Scry. “I need your help,” Griff said baldly.

“Griffin,” Clarissa said, voice calm but crisp. “What is going on?”

“Mason and Emma have been kidnapped.”

Her pale skin went even more luminescent, and she swayed. She caught herself on the windowsill. “Are you certain?”

“Yes.” He looked at the Scry. “You’re the only way we can find them. I need you to focus on Mason. Can you pinpoint his specific location?”

The man rose. He was tall and slender, nearly cadaverous in his build. Long black hair hung in a straight line down his back, and his rich, umber-tinted skin bespoke his Native American heritage. He grimaced. “It doesn’t work exactly like that.”

A spiral of fear lanced through him. It was the only way.

The Scry started moving things off the center of Clarissa’s desk. “I can give you a general location.”

“To within how close?” Ryan’s voice sounded, deep and impatient.

The tone mirrored his own feelings.

“Less than a quarter mile.”

“Good enough,” Griff said.

“Yes,” Ryan agreed. “We have the man power to search that kind of radius.” He shared a look with Joel. “God only knows how I’m going to explain this knowledge, though.”

“I suggest a tip,” Clarissa said as she returned to behind her desk. She looked at Noah and Madelyn. “Are you two part of this?”

Noah nodded. “We are.”

“Good, because I don’t like this,” Clarissa said with ferocity. “No one hurts an Enricher and gets away with it.”

The Scry laid a piece of paper from the printer on her now-barren desk. He picked up a pencil and placed it in the center, point lightly pressed to the page. He motioned Griff forward.

“It might be easier since I know his name. You share a mental link with him, no? You have sensed his emotions before?”

“Yes.”

“Good. Take my hand, close your eyes, and picture Mason.”

Griff did as he was instructed. He built Mason’s lithe frame, smiling face, and boyish enthusiasm with careful, deliberate steps. He wanted to give the Scry as clear a picture as possible.

The room was eerily silent. No one moved or spoke or even breathed from what he could tell. Mason’s image wavered.

“Concentrate,” came the snapped command.

He refocused his attention on Mason. The pain in his side intensified, but he pressed his palm to the ache and stared into Mason’s blue eyes.

A light scratch sounded from the desk, then another. The Scry gave a low rumble, and then a soft chant. His fingers tightened, threatened to break Griff’s.

Then he was free.

“I have him,” the Scry said.

“Charles, please, be reasonable,” Emma pleaded with him. But she knew he was long past rational thought.

She tugged at her bound arms, but he’d been as proficient with the duct tape as Mason had been with the Japanese bondage rope.

Charles had forced her arms behind her, wrapped them together, and then taped them to the chair back. He’d spread her legs wider than was comfortable and repeated the process. Her inner thigh tendons screamed in agony.

“Do be quiet, Emma. I’m debating over here.”

He stood in front of Mason, his gun dangling with scary disregard from one finger. He twirled it occasionally like a fifth-grade boy playing Cowboys and Indians.

Mason groaned and lifted his head. His beautiful face was covered in bruises and small cuts, inflicted by Charles and his damned college class ring.

Mason’s left eye was swollen shut and already an alarming mottled shade of red, blue, and purple.

But it was the gunshot wound in his left abdomen that worried Emma the most. She would never forget the dry-mouthed fear that ricocheted through her when Charles had casually pressed the gun to Mason’s side and pulled the trigger.

“
Missed any vital organs, I assure you,”
he’d said.
“But that can easily change.”

Her refusal to leave with him had caused the injury, and she’d whispered tearful apologies to Mason as she’d helped him down the stairs and into Charles’s car.

“What are you debating?” she asked.

Keep him talking. Keep him distracted.

“How I’m going to kill him, of course.” Charles looked at her, one pale brow lifted in mock chagrin. “And when. Before or after.”

She licked her lips. She’d known he was not for her, but how had she missed the fact that he was completely off his rocker?

“Before or after what?”

Charles beamed like she was a student who’d given a correct answer. He moved away from Mason, and Emma relaxed just a bit. He strode across the small room, lit by a bank of overhead fluorescents and bordered by rows of industrial-looking counters. Beakers, microscopes, and Bunsen burners littered the tops.

Charles laid the gun next to a clear plastic box. He opened the lid and pulled out several vials and a syringe.

She bucked.

“Before or after what, Charles?” she asked with more demand.

“Our union, dear Emma.”

Mason muttered something on the floor and scooted toward her.

“Don’t get too close,” Charles chastised mildly. “I’d hate to have to shoot out your knees.”

Mason stopped, but hatred burned from his eye.

Calm down
, she mouthed to him. Ridiculous, she knew, but maybe it would help.

From the anger rolling off of him, she knew it hadn’t.

“I don’t understand any of this,” she said. “What union? Why me?”

Charles filled a syringe, squirted some liquid into the air, and put the shot in his tweed coat pocket. God, if she ever saw another piece of tweed, she would rip it to shreds.

“We were meant to be, you know. You and I. It was perfect. Our profiles matched exactly. You are smart and beautiful and funny. You have aspirations and creative talents. You are balanced.”

“Unlike you,” she couldn’t help but mutter.

He picked up the gun and shot at Mason. The bullet missed him by centimeters. She swallowed fear-induced bile.

“Watch your mouth, Emma or the next one will find his heart and he’ll just have to miss the wedding.”

“Wedding?”

The man was certifiably loony. He was crazier than crazy. She bit back her instant refusal because she didn’t want to upset him any more than she already had.

“Yes.” He leaned against the counter and crossed his arms as he regarded her with a mildly reproachful look. “I must admit I’m very disappointed in you, Emma. It’s your fault they are dead.”

“Mine?” she whispered.

“Yes.” He lifted his hand and began ticking off fingers. “Geri—she was first—was the night you refused to see me again. The night you told me—how did you put it? Get lost and never call you again? Oh, I was very angry. You needed to be taught a lesson.” He gave her a fond smile. “Except I couldn’t hurt
you
, of course. So, I found a reasonable substitute. She looks very similar to you, did you know? Same long dark hair and bewitching green eyes, except hers don’t have that feminine mystique yours do. And her body is a little thicker, too.” Charles clucked his tongue, and she stared at him in horror.

“She really could have used a few more hours in the gym. She was cold, too. A regular ice queen. That’s why I put her at the fountain for that picture.” He raked her with his gaze and strode forward. He squatted in front of her and cupped her chin.

Emma recoiled at his touch, and his grip tightened. He tipped her face left then right. “No, you see, I made a mistake with her, I realize that now.”

His mint-sweetened breath wafted over her. It competed with the spicy cologne he wore. She choked back hysteria. Cologne, breath mints, a thousand-watt smile, sun-dappled blond hair, and a sculpted visage that would have made Michelangelo weep with joy —Charles gave every outward sign of being the perfect man.

Too bad he destroyed the image with an overdose of crazy.

“What mistake?” she forced herself to ask.

Behind Charles, Mason inched sideways. Toward the counter. Toward the gun.

His determination, fueled by his absolute rage, beat at her, and she silently urged him on.

“She wasn’t enough like you, unfortunately.” He grimaced. “And her voice was horrible. Like the screech of a seagull on the Wharf. That’s far enough, Mr. Shaw. Or would you like Emma to pay for your disobedience?”

Her nostrils flared with fear when Charles pulled out the syringe. “It’s not lethal. Well”—his smile was bright and dead—“not yet.”

Mason stopped moving.

“Number two was Annie. She was a bit more difficult. I had to really turn on the charm for her. I left her at Carson Bridge, just in the spot you like so much.”

Emma widened her eyes to keep from rolling them. She didn’t reply.

“Her coloring was just a bit off, but close enough. Her personality is what kept me interested in her, though. She was feisty, full of zest. Just like you.”

He shifted.

Didn’t his quads hurt? He must be getting tired from that position, more vulnerable.

If she could just muster enough force to knock into him, Mason might be able to use the distraction to get to the gun.