Heat of the Moment (25 page)

When Becca and the other woman turned toward him, Owen had to lean against the wall as the weird washed over him. He'd made fun of Reitman for saying they looked exactly alike except for their hair and eyes, but the man had been right. They were almost twins.

“Who are you?” he asked.

The dark-haired Becca clone offered her hand. “Raye Larsen. You must be Owen. I didn't catch your last name.”

The only way she could have “caught” his first name was from Becca. That Becca was still alive and not stabbed, strangled, smothered, or branded meant this woman wasn't her attacker. Not to mention that while she had dark hair, it only brushed her shoulders and she wasn't anywhere near six feet tall.

“Owen McAllister.” They shook. “This is Reggie.”

“Hello, Reggie.”

She didn't try to pet him. Good choice. The dog appeared both spooked and annoyed. For some reason he stared at the empty corner next to the wolf as if an invisible pork chop danced the tango there.

“Why did you call him Henry?”

“I didn't.”

Owen opened his mouth, then snapped it shut. Not an argument he needed to have at the moment.

“The wolf seems fine now.” Or as fine as a wolf got. Her eerie green eyes flicked from person to person as if she were listening.

“I took out a bullet,” Becca said. “Considering the infection, it had been in there a while.”

“About a week,” Raye said. “Give or take.”

“You shot her?” Owen asked.

“No!” She sounded horrified. “She's my—” Her lips tightened.

“Pet?” That would explain her constant proximity to people. An explanation Owen liked much more than rabies.

“Wolves aren't pets.”

“Okay.” He waited for her to explain
what
the wolf was, but she didn't. From the silence that followed she wasn't going to.

“Is your mom all right?” Becca asked.

“She's in the wind again.”

Quickly he explained what had happened, not even caring that a stranger was hearing the details. She looked so much like Becca she didn't seem like a stranger at all.

“This Peggy was attacked and branded?” Raye asked.

“Just like the animals.”

“What animals?”

Becca explained.

“Animals won't raise the dead,” Raye said. “Only people do.”

Owen flicked a glance at Becca. Reitman had said something similar, though he'd said human sacrifice brought forth Satan. Owen wasn't buying either one.

“You think killing people brings the dead back to life?” he asked.

“It doesn't matter what I think. It matters what they think.”

“Who's ‘they'?”

“The
Venatores Mali.
”

“Shit,” Owen muttered.

“You've heard of them?”

“Peggy said that right before she died.”

“Was Peggy a witch?”

Owen blinked. “How'd you know that?”

“You'd better tell him,” Becca said.

Raye connected the dots. The revival of an ancient witch-hunting society, their purpose to raise their leader from beyond, with a recipe that involved dead witches, branding, fire, blood, sacrifice.

“Peggy was attacked,” Owen continued, “then branded, but she wasn't burned.”

“The car was on fire,” Becca said. “Whoever attacked her probably lit it up and took off, then Peggy crawled out.”

“Fat lot of good it did her. She should have run over the long-haired bitch instead.”

“Brown hair?” Raye asked. “Down to her hips? Big woman—six feet, solid?”

Owen nodded.

“Mistress June.”

“Wait a second,” Becca murmured. “Did she have her arm in a sling?”

“Peggy didn't mention it,” Owen said. “I doubt she'd have been much good at the killing with one arm. Why?”

“A woman with long, dark hair was watching me from the crowd after someone tried to kill me.”

“You weren't suspicious of a woman that size?” Owen asked.

Becca shrugged. “She was sitting on a car and had her arm in a sling. So no.”

“She's probably been here since she ran out of New Bergin,” Raye said. “I'd hoped she crawled under a bush and died, but that almost never happens.”

“Why would she?”

“My fianc
é
shot Mistress June.”

“Why?”

“She was trying to kill me.”

“She thinks you're a witch too?” Owen asked.

“That's one way of putting it.”

“How badly was she shot?”

“Not badly enough,” Raye muttered. “She's here. She's still killing people.”

Raye plucked a paper sack from the exam table. “I'm staying at the Harborside Motel.” She pulled a card from her pocket and set it on the table. “Here's my number.” She paused in the doorway. “If you see Mistress June again, run.” Then she was gone.

“You stay.” Becca pointed at the wolf. “I gotta go talk to my parents.”

“Now?” Owen was almost as amazed at that as the idea of her telling a wolf to stay. Except the animal did, sticking her nose under her tail and closing her eyes.

“Right now.” She shooed Owen and Reggie out the door. “If you want, I can come to the cottages afterward.”

Owen led her toward his pickup. “Your name is on the witch-watch list.” Beneath his palm she tensed. “I'm not letting you out of my sight until this is over.”

“Just because someone tried to kill me doesn't mean—”

“I heard about the ring.”

She didn't respond.

“The crazies think you're a witch. There'll be no convincing them otherwise. I learned that much from my mom.”

*   *   *

Once in the pickup and on the way to the farm, I wrestled with what to say. There wasn't much I could tell Owen without sounding as insane as his mother.

“Who is she?” he asked.

Reggie sat between us, his huge head and solid body a comforting barrier. I leaned into him, and he nuzzled my hair.

Love her.

“Who?” I asked, one question for both guys.

“Raye,” Owen said.

Pru.
That was Reggie.

Hell.
That was me. I didn't have time for puppy love. Which might actually produce puppies. Cubs. Cub-puppies.

“Raye Larsen. From New Bergin.”

“I know what her name is, and that she's involved in this mess somehow. But who is she, Becca? It can't be a coincidence that she's your clone.”

“Maybe it's witchcraft.”

“Ha-ha.”

I scrubbed my fingers behind Reggie's ears.

Good. More. Yes.

I had to tell Owen something. I chose the best option from a whole lot of bad ones.

“She says she's my sister.”

Owen frowned into the setting sun. “She explain how that could be possible?”

She'd intimated that the spell of two witches, cast four hundred years ago, fueled with sacrifice, fire, and magic, had sent my sisters and me to this time—where no one believes in witches any more. Or at least not the kind they'd believed in then.

“Not really,” I hedged.

“Why should you believe her?”

“You saw her, right?”

“Right.” He reached over and laid his hand atop mine where it rested on Reggie's bony head. “What are you going to do?”

“Ask my parents if I'm adopted.”

Despite all the childhood conjecture, I never had before.

“What if they deny it?”

“There's always DNA.”

Owen turned into the lane that led to my parents' farm. “This is gonna be swell.”

 

Chapter 20

Moose brayed like a banshee, and Reggie tried to climb over me while doing the same. As soon as the truck stopped, I reached for the handle.

“Reggie should stay here,” Owen said.

“He doesn't play well with others?”

“His idea of play is work and vice versa.”

“What does that mean?”

“He lives to play with his ball after he finds deadly explosives. Got a grenade you could hide for him?”

Reggie stared out the window, panting.
Play. Run. Chase.

“He wants to play,” I said.

“He tell you that?”

Instead of answering, I opened the door. Reggie vaulted out of the truck and chased Moose into the high grass. I listened for growling, yelping, or snarling. When none came I cast Owen a glance, but kept the “told you so” to myself. I had bigger fish to fry.

Both of whom stood on the porch, having been alerted to our arrival by the security system known as Moose
.

“Should I stay in the truck?” Owen asked.

“No need.”

I certainly wasn't going to bring up witchcraft, time travel, spells, and the like to my parents. All I wanted was the truth about my past, and I didn't mind Owen hearing it too.

We crossed the yard. My mother hurried down the steps and threw her arms around him as if he were a long-lost child who had at last come home. He kind of was.

“Owen,” she said, the same way she always had.

In contrast, my father's scowl seemed completely out of place. Though Owen's arms had gone around my mom and held her close, his gaze had gone to my dad. He wasn't smiling either.

“What's up with you two?” I'd asked before, but neither one of them had answered. I was pretty sick of it.

“You tell me,” my father said, eyes still on Owen, who'd released my mom, though she'd taken his hand as though afraid he'd disappear if she didn't hold on to him tight. I understood the feeling. “He broke your heart. Now he's back and that's just fine and dandy?”

I certainly didn't want to discuss how broken my heart had been, how long it had taken me to get over Owen—the truth being that I never had—in front of my parents.

In front of anyone, ever, not even him.

“I'm not here to talk about Owen.”

“Then feel free to run along,” my father said to him.

“No.” I took the hand my mom wasn't clinging to and clung a bit myself. “He stays.”

“You afraid he's going to disappear if you don't keep an eye on him?”

“A little.”

“He's going back wherever he's been, Becca. You shouldn't get too attached.”

I'd started for the house, but his words made me stop. “How do you know that?”

My father's mouth tightened, as if he didn't want more damning words to flow free.

I glanced at Owen. “How did he know that?”

“We ran into each other.”

“You've been here a day.”

“He stopped by the cottages this morning.”

My gaze narrowed. “You said you had to mend fences. That was a euphemism for talking to Owen?” Didn't appear like they'd mended much. More like they'd broken things even more.

“Dale?” My mother released Owen's hand. “What did you do?”

He took a step back; his face flushed, and I knew.

“You told him to leave,” I said. “Not just today but ten years ago.”

It wasn't a question, so neither one of them answered.

“Mom, did you know about this?”

“No.” She stared at my dad. I knew that expression. He was in so much trouble.

“Why?” I asked.

“You were my little girl,” my father said.

“Was I?”

His gaze flicked to my mother's. Owen's fingers tightened around mine, and I knew that truth too.

I wasn't.

*   *   *

Though Dale cast Owen a withering “go away” glare, Owen followed everyone into the house. He might be leaving eventually, but he wasn't going to leave now. He owed Becca that.

Besides, she was holding on to his hand as if she really needed it. He couldn't take it back and walk away.

As he climbed the porch steps, Becca pointed at his leg. “You aren't limping.”

He rubbed at the ache. Still there, but a lot better than when he'd arrived. Had that only been yesterday?

“It's a good day,” he said.

The doctor had told him some would be better than others. Until today, none of them had been. He'd enjoy the reprieve while it lasted. Tomorrow would be worse. Had to be. It wasn't as if he could heal overnight, even though it felt like he had.

Come to think of it, Reggie had run off with Moose like a puppy, when the dog had been gimping just last night. Owen never would have thought a Wisconsin autumn was conducive to healing. Usually the cool, damp air made aches worse. Or so he'd heard from anyone who'd had aches the last time he'd been in town.

In the living room, Becca sat on the same couch that had been here all those years ago. Owen sank into it so far he worried he wouldn't be able to climb back out. Either the springs were shot, or he weighed a lot more than he had at eighteen. Probably both.

“Where are the boys?” Becca asked.

“Team dinner after football practice,” Pam Carstairs said. “They won't be home for another hour at least.”

Becca pointed at the chairs on the other side of the coffee table, and her parents sat in them as if they were the kids and Owen and Becca the parents. He kind of liked it.

“What makes you think that you aren't our daughter?” Pam asked.

“I'm the redheaded stepchild.”

Her mom stiffened. “You are not!”

“Mom, I don't look like any of you.”

“That doesn't mean anything.”

“I met a woman today who could be my twin.”

Her mother blinked, then all the air seemed to leak out of her like a balloon punctured with a pin. “What did she say?”

“That we're sisters.” Becca peered at her hands, which were twisting in her lap. She separated them, laid her palms on her thighs, and lifted her gaze. “Is it true?”

“I don't know.”

“Wouldn't the adoption agency tell you if I had sisters?”