Fairytale (22 page)

“Brigit—”

“I won’t hurt you, Adam. I swear...whatever
my intent was...I won’t. I can’t. B-but I need to be here.”

“Why?”

“J-just for a few more days. Just until I
figure out what to do.”

“Why, Brigit?”

She gripped his lower arms and pulled herself
to her feet. She stood so close to him that she could feel the
warmth of his body. Feel every breath, almost every thought. And
she tipped her head back, staring into his eyes, wishing with
everything in her that he would let her stay. She’d find a way to
solve this thing without hurting him or getting Raze killed. She
would.

Pouring her heart into her eyes, and from
them, into his, she whispered, “Please don’t make me go, Adam.
Please.”

In her eyes is the power to bend a man to
her will.
The words from the ancient text whispered through
Adam’s mind as he stared at Brigit’s ebony eyes.

“Okay.”

The word slipped through his mouth without
warning. He didn’t think about it first, because she was so close
that all he could think about was holding her, warming her, healing
her. She could have died out there today. Hell, she’d stopped
breathing. That had been no act, and neither was this.

My God, it was true. This woman was the child
in the
Fairytale.
The one he’d been shown long ago. The
daughter of a fay queen. No. Yes! And it was Adam’s destiny to help
her...and then to let her go.

He closed his eyes in misery, but quickly
shook off the self-pity. Because there was more going on here. She
didn’t seem to realize who she really was, let alone what she was
supposed to do about it. She had her own reasons for coming to him.
And whatever she was up to, he had to believe she didn’t want to do
it. Someone was forcing her. And when he thought about that, he
thought about the creep he’d found here yesterday. Zaslow, and this
mysterious Raze, the mere mention of whose name had forced Brigit
to lie. What the hell was he to her? What was Zaslow? What were
they up to?

Sweet Jesus, she was in trouble. Or she’d
convinced him that she was. And instead of feeling bad for her, he
felt good. For himself. Selfish bastard. All he could feel was
gratitude that whatever deceptions she’d committed, she’d been
forced to commit. He was sure of that, now.

He searched her face, fell into her eyes, and
ended up holding her tight against him. His hands dove into her
hair, stroking and untangling it. “Dammit, Brigit, why won’t you
open up to me? Why won’t you let me help you?”

“I can’t,” she whispered. “This is my
problem, Adam. Mine. And only I can solve it.”

Adam left, but she could tell he wasn’t happy
with her answers. Or...her lack of answers. And she had a feeling
he was somehow letting her stay here quite against his will. As if
he were being blackmailed the way she was. Or...or maybe as if he
were being hypnotized into doing what she wanted. But he
wasn’t.

He’d wanted to throw her out. At least, part
of him had. So why hadn’t he?

Didn’t matter. She had to get in touch with
Zaslow. Since her recent communion with her “other self,” the wild
one, she’d found a bit more courage and strength. Enough, she
thought, to try again to fight Zaslow. To take her life back again.
To regain control. She had to find a way to make Zaslow give this
whole idea up. She had to...

But how?

Brigit paced the study, her eyes going often
to the painting on the wall above the marble hearth. Watering each
time they met those dark, mysterious eyes peering at her from amid
the bushes.

She had a sister. God, even with all this
garbage going on, she couldn’t get past the wonder of it. The joy
of it. All this time, not knowing. All this time, wondering,
wishing, hoping. Dreaming of her sister.

Her perfect, golden sister. Bridin. Brigit
wondered if Bridin could be as wonderful as she’d dreamed. Oh, but
she had to be! She would be!

Brigit owed Adam more than she could ever
repay, she realized sadly.

And that brought her back to the matter at
hand. Her impending betrayal of Adam Reid, the man who’d given her
a dream come true. A sister.

She had no idea what was going on with Adam.
Why he would accuse her of trying to convince him she was some kind
of fairy or something. His anger confused her, and his words this
morning...God, she’d lost track of when he was speaking about her
Fairytale
and when he was speaking about her real life.

Except for the part about a sister.

Brigit closed her eyes and tried not to dwell
on that aspect of this mess. Not right now. Right now, her only
goal was to convince Zaslow to let her off the hook. She had to
find a way.

Money. The man was greedy, and he was doing
this for money. He’d told her he was being paid a hundred thousand
dollars for the painting. So if she could find a way to give him an
equal amount...

Oh, but how? Where the hell was a formerly
homeless street brat going to come up with a hundred grand?

She blinked in surprise as the answer came to
her. The shop. Akasha. It had been just another condemned heap when
she’d discovered it. The city had been about to tear it down to put
up something new and shiny, when Brigit had come along with her
plan to repair it, to make it into something special and new.

Other business owners on the Commons had
jumped onto Brigit’s bandwagon, and the local students had joined
her in her campaign to save a building that turned out to be over
150 years old. And after that the loans had come easily. With the
money she’d already saved up from her former career as an art
forger, it was enough to get Akasha up and running. And when her
business had thrived as she’d known it would, the loans had been
repaid on time and with interest, and the entire city won.

It had been a lonely street brat’s dream come
true. But it wasn’t half as important to Brigit as Raze was. Or as
her sister was.

Or as important as Adam Reid had suddenly
become to her.

It was the only way.

With trembling hands, Brigit picked up the
telephone, and dialed the number Zaslow had warned her to use only
in an emergency.

Zaslow was there. He answered on the third
ring.

“It’s me.” Why was her voice shaking so
much?

“Is it done?”

“N-no. Not yet.”

“Then why the hell am I hearing your
voice?”

Brigit licked her lips, cleared her throat.
“I have a deal to offer you.” “We already have a deal, Brigit.
Finish the damned painting and I won’t kill your friend.”

“I know...I know...but...”

“But?”

He sounded ominous. Her hand was sweaty,
making the receiver slick. So much riding on her words. Raze’s
life. Her own future. She had to be careful.

“If I were to sell the shop, Zaslow, I could
get at least a hundred grand. Maybe more. I’ll give it to you. All
of it, if you’ll just let Raze go.”

Silence. Dead and heavy. Lengthening.

“Please,” she whispered.

He sucked in a slow breath. “It’s Reid, isn’t
it? You sleeping with him, Brigit? You getting soft?”

“No!”

“I had a man watching you at that little
snob-fest last night, honey. I have a man watching every move you
make. He’s got his eyes on you right now. I heard all about your
little dance with Reid. Seems the two of you were so into it, you
forgot to stop when the music did.”

She swallowed, but almost choked on it.

“Did you take him to bed when you got home,
Brigit? Did you show him all the tricks you learned on the streets?
Hmm?”

Fear made her heart trip over itself. But
anger set it right again. “If you have someone watching my every
move, as you say, then you already know.”

He laughed and it made her skin crawl. “You
apparently don’t understand how this works, Brigit, love. But don’t
worry. I’ll make sure you get the point. This is life and death,
honey. You cooperate, there’s life. You give me bullshit like this,
and there are gonna be some corpses turning up in odd places.”

“What do you mean by that?”

Again, that low, evil laughter. “You need a
lesson in obedience, Brigit. A little class in cause and
effect.”

“Don’t do anything to Raze!” She shouted at
the receiver as panic bubbled in her chest. “Please, don’t hurt
him! I’ll finish—”

The phone went dead.

Frantic, Brigit dialed the number again, Only
to hear endless ringing. God, what was Zaslow thinking? What was he
going to do?

She paced, wringing her hands until she’d
made red marks all over them. And finally, she hauled her equipment
down to the study, and she painted. She worked slowly, carefully,
taming her trembling hands by the sheer force of her will, battling
the fear and the imaginary horrors it induced...until she finally
found that place where it all faded away. And her mind floated free
as her hands worked.

Free. And images of a sister who looked like
Brigit, only she radiated goodness and purity and control, and her
hair was as golden as the sun. She was everything Brigit had tried
to be, everything she’d failed to be. If only she knew her. Bridin.
If only she had her here, to talk to, to confide in.

Maybe...maybe someday, they’d find one
another.

And maybe those people who’d adopted Bridin
had known what they were doing when they’d chosen not to take both
babies. Maybe they’d somehow sensed that Brigit was less than
worthy of a family’s love and of a sister like Bridin. Maybe she
didn’t deserve to find her twin. It might be fate.

She came back to herself with a start when
she heard vehicles out front. “Oh, God, Adam!” Whirling, she stared
at the sun slanting low through the study windows. Late afternoon.
He was back. And he wasn’t alone.

She grabbed the painting and took the stairs
two at a time, running full tilt to her bedroom, lunging to the
back of that oversized closet. She only paused long enough to place
her painting carefully, not smudging the paint or allowing anything
to touch the sides. Then she raced downstairs again, dumping the
palettes and dirty brushes and uncapped tubes of paint into a heap
in the middle of the color-spattered drop cloth, and gathering the
entire bundle like a peddler’s pack. She slung it over her shoulder
and snatched up the tripod under her arm.

Her trip up the stairs was a little slower
this time. She kept tripping, and the tripod was awkward, swinging
sideways and knocking against her legs every couple of steps. But
she made it to the top, and flung everything into the closet. She
slammed the door, panting.

Still no sound from downstairs. Adam must be
busy with whoever had arrived with him. She ran into her bathroom,
cranked on the faucets and scrubbed the still-wet paint from her
hands. When stains remained, she used nail polish remover to
lighten them.

Good. Barely noticeable.

She turned to head back downstairs, stopping
in the doorway when she heard Adam come in.

“Brigit?”

“Up here,” she called, and at the same
moment, realized she was still wearing a paint-smattered smock over
her clothes. She hauled it over her head, tossed it behind her into
the bedroom, and slammed the door just as he stepped into the study
and looked up at her.

She forced a smile, and tried to remember if
she’d checked her face for paint flecks.

Adam glanced at the stool that stood in the
middle of the study, then up at her, then back at the stool again,
frowning.

“There was a big cobweb I couldn’t reach,”
she lied, feeling miserable. “I was on my way back to the kitchen
with the stool and I got distracted. Sorry.”

He only shrugged, looking up at her again.
“Can you come down here? There’s a package for you.”

Brigit felt her brows crease. “A
package?”

“Delivery men were just unloading it when I
pulled in, so I signed for you. Did you order something?”

She shook her head, running her palm over the
cool hardwood rail as she walked toward the stairway, then started
down it. “No,” she said. “I can’t imagine what...”

Halfway down the stairs she stopped,
recalling Zaslow’s evil laughter, his cryptic threats.

“What. . . kind of package?”

“Big son of a bitch,” Adam said.

She blinked, forcing herself down the
remaining stairs, turning to go out the huge double doors of the
study, through the foyer.

The front door felt heavy, the knob, hard to
turn. Slow and sloppy. She forced it open and took a single step
outside.

The coffin-shaped wooden crate sat on the
sidewalk, daring her to step forward, daring her to look
inside.

Brigit screamed.

He’d only been a few steps behind her, but
when she screamed, Adam shot forward, adrenaline propelling him
like rocket fuel.

She’d fallen to her knees on the front steps.
Her face covered by her trembling hands, her entire body shaking,
she was muttering...or maybe praying. “Please...nononono...please,
please, please...no...no...pleeeease...”

Adam caught her shoulders. “Easy, Brigit.
Come on, get up. Turn around. Look at me.”

She tried, but her knees buckled. He had to
help her. She was breathing too fast, in short, choppy little
gasps. He drew her to her feet, and he turned her, nice and slow,
holding her steady. And then he sucked air through his teeth. The
woman was terrified. He’d never seen terror etched as clearly and
plainly as he saw it now on her stricken face, in her eyes. The
color had fled, leaving her skin as smooth and white as bleached
linen. Her eyes were wide, her irises distended until the whites
were no more than a narrow band encircling the black centers.

Shaking uncontrollably, she clung to him with
her hands and with her eyes. Clung to him as if for her very
salvation.