Hunter's Fall (4 page)

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Authors: Shiloh Walker

Tags: #Romance, #Contemporary, #General, #Paranormal, #Fiction

BOOK: Hunter's Fall
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She shoved off the counter and went to turn off the television. “Yes, Mei-Lin. I promise, there are plenty of men who are less than enamored with their pretty reflections.”
Outside, Nessa heard footsteps and she tugged on one of Mei-Lin’s braids. “Your friends are here.”
“
How
can you hear them?” she asked, cocking her head. She squinted her eyes as though it might help her hear better.
“Practice.” Nessa shrugged a shoulder. “You’ll get there.”
The doorbell rang and Mei-Lin moved to answer it. As a gaggle of giggling girls entered the small house, Nessa tidied up the living room. Living with a teenage girl, she was constantly picking up, straightening up, doing laundry.
She didn’t mind, oddly enough.
Other than Mei-Lin’s training, this was the closest to
normal
Nessa had ever known.
Mei-Lin reappeared in the door, surrounded by her friends.
“Hi, Ms. Chandler!”
Nessa managed not to make a face.
Ms. Chandler
was only one of the many names she’d used during her life—she’d much rather be called Agnes or Nessa than anything
Ms
. Made her feel as old as she truly was. Ancient.
Giving them a smile, she said, “How are you this evening, Kim?”
“Oh, you know.” She rolled eyes heavily made up with black liner and said, “I’m sort of on probation. Brought home a C on my final and Mom said if it happened again, I’d lose the car until I brought home something better.”
“You could have a better grade if you wanted.” Nessa knew the line she should use and she did. Mei-Lin’s friends, the teachers, all the people they knew thought Nessa was Mei-Lin’s stepsister. They even had legal papers to document it. “Your mother just wants you to do your best.”
“I know.” Kim sighed and shrugged. “Chemistry is just so
boring
. I can’t wait until I’m done with school and don’t have to worry about that sh . . . uh, crap anymore.”
Dryly, Nessa said, “Paying bills is quite boring as well. You’ll have to do things you don’t enjoy the rest of your life. The good comes with the bad.” She gave Mei-Lin a bright smile and said, “Speaking of which . . .”
She dumped the armful of shoes, books, an iPod and socks into Mei-Lin’s arms. “Before you go out, please put these away.”
Mei-Lin rolled her eyes and obediently trucked up the stairs.
One of the newer girls asked Nessa about her accent, and another started rambling on about how
sssexxxy
accents were. Kim enviously told the others how Nessa had taken Mei-Lin to France for spring break.
The new girl—Ashlyn—rolled her eyes and said, “Man, Mei. You’ve got the coolest mom. Mine would never let me go that far away without her.”
Mei-Lin appeared on the stairs and pain flashed across her face. Nessa gave her a gentle smile and whispered mind-to-mind,
Are you okay
?
Mei-Lin gave her a tight smile.
An awkward silence fell, and one of the girls leaned in and in a loud whisper said, “Way to go, Ashlyn. Mei’s mom died last year. Ms. Chandler is Mei’s stepsister—her guardian.”
Ashlyn went white. Nessa patted the girl on the shoulder. “It’s okay, Ashlyn. You didn’t know, now did you?” Then she gave her a smile and said, “I imagine your mum is quite the protective one. I’m sure you find it quite irritating, but she loves you. Enjoy it . . . enjoy her, because you never know how long you’ll have her.”
Ashlyn gave Mei-Lin a slightly sick smile. “I’m sorry, Mei. I didn’t . . .”
“It’s cool,” Mei-Lin said, shaking her head.
Changing the subject, Nessa looked at Kim and said, “So, what plans do you girls have tonight?”
Mei-Lin gave Nessa an exasperated look while Kim smiled. In a singsong voice, she replied, “We’re going to get some dinner at Applebee’s, then we’re going to a movie. The movie is at the Multiplex and it starts at nine fifteen. It should be over by eleven thirty. I have to drop the other girls off first, but we’ll be here by midnight and I’m spending the night. And yes, Ms. Chandler, my mother will be calling at midnight so I hope you’re awake.”
“Cheeky girl,” Nessa murmured. She looked at Mei-Lin. “You have your phone?”
A few minutes later, Nessa shut the door behind them. Alone in the house, she rested her head back against the door and sighed. Alone . . . and it was too quiet.
When silence came, the voice was louder.
The voice . . . Morgan’s voice. Yes, she had Morgan’s body, and she also had Morgan’s . . . ghost, for lack of a better word.
“This is just too cute for words, you old hag. Look at you, playing house
.
”
It was a taunting, angry jibe, but Nessa pretended to ignore it. Once she had noise, once she had something to occupy her hands, the voice of the dead woman would fade.
For a time.
How much longer, she wondered. How much longer would Morgan linger?
Even now, months, years later, the girl haunted her.
Damn her. Even in death, she’d managed to ruin things. If the woman’s body had just
died
, then Nessa could have died as well.
“Is this the reason you stole my body, so you could play Holly Homemaker?”
Nessa shoved away from the door and reached out. With the slightest flex of her magic, she turned on some music.
Loud.
But Morgan wasn’t going to go quiet
that
easily.
“
This is a fucking waste. Why did you take my body if this is all you’re going to do? Shit, can’t you even go out, find a guy, get drunk, get fucked? Something—anything—would be better than watching you play mama witch to that little idiot
.”
Nessa smirked. “Not while I’ve got a dead witch whining in the back of my head.”
“
I don’t see why not. It’s my body
.”
“Actually, no, it’s not. If it was
your
body, you’d be able to take it back. But you can’t.” She knew what the girl was about—Morgan wanted to make Nessa feel guilty, wanted to exploit any and every little weakness.
“
It damn well
is
my body
,” Morgan snarled, her mental voice an angry, ugly growl. “Your
body died. That old bag of bones is gone. Hypocritical bitch. How in the hell can you condemn me for taking blood when you took my damn body?
”
Narrowing her eyes, Nessa turned to the mirror and stared at her reflection. She saw her face—the face that had once belonged to Morgan. “You didn’t just take
blood
, child. You took
lives
. You ended
lives
. When I came upon you, you stank of death. How many have you killed? Can you even remember?”
“The strong kill the weak. It’s the way of the world.”
“We could write your death off that way if you like.” Malicious cow—she knew just what words to use, when to use them. Guilt tried to settle inside Nessa but she cast it off. “And here’s another way of the world. You can call it karma. I prefer ‘you shall reap what you sow.’ You killed. Blindly, indiscriminately, and you enjoyed it. You would have sucked my body dry of magic, sucked me dry of life, and then moved on to your next victim and your next. But you couldn’t beat me. And I didn’t
take
your body. Trust me, precious, I didn’t
want
your body. I didn’t want this
life
. You don’t like it, and I understand that. I don’t like it, either. But we’re both stuck with it.”
“I’ll find a way to get my body back.”
“No.” Nessa shook her head. “You won’t. You’re just a ghost, Morgan, clinging to life. You need to let go and move on. It’s not like there’s much of anything keeping you here now, is there?”
“
There’s plenty keeping me here. My body, for one.
”
Nessa stared at her reflection, knowing the ghost in the back of her mind would see the insolent smile on her face. That was where Morgan existed now—that was the
only
place Morgan existed.
“It’s not
your
body. You went and got greedy, precious. Tried to take things that don’t belong to you. This is rather karmic, don’t you think? You took power, you took blood . . . and your body was taken from you. It’s mine now.”
“Because you stole it.”
Nessa sighed. “No, I didn’t.”
After all,
stealing
another’s body would imply that Nessa wanted to live. She’d wanted anything but. She’d gone into that battle with her eyes wide open,
knowing
that after more than five hundred years, she could finally rest. She would die, and on the other side, she’d find Elias. Finally.
But fate hadn’t worked out that way.
Nobody else knew. Nessa had told no one about Morgan. Morgan was her burden, her problem. And she’d learned how to deal with the problem relatively well.
Smiling at her reflection, she leaned in and kissed the mirror. “I must get to work now. Toddle off now, precious. We living witches have things to do.”
In the back of her mind, she heard Morgan shriek . . . just before she blocked her off.
Her workroom was tucked away down in the basement, and she might as well spend some time working on Mei-Lin’s next lesson—the poor girl was still having trouble with basic grounding and shielding. Until they had that down, they couldn’t start even the more rudimentary magics.
Focusing on the work, she lost track of time. It wasn’t until she felt a brush against her senses that she looked up with a glance at the clock. Nearly ten. Time enough.
“You might as well come in, Mal. I’m alone for now.”
The vampire appeared in front of her, materializing out of thin air. He cast a look around the small, dimly lit room and grimaced. “Fuck me, love. You could do far better than this, you know.”
“
This
will do me fine, thank you.” She made a few more notes in the margin of the paper and tossed her pencil down. Rising from the chair, she moved around the desk and rose on her toes to kiss Malachi’s cool cheek.
The vampire was her oldest friend—in more ways than one. He was so old, he’d forgotten just how old he was. Nessa knew he’d been a Roman slave at some point during his human life.
She had met him shortly after she’d returned to Excelsior after Elias had died. Five hundred years of friendship.
She knew his moods. Though that pale, poetically handsome face showed no expression, something was bothering him.
He was worried.
“Where is Kelsey?”
“At the school.” He brushed an absent hand down her hair and turned away. Restless, he roamed around the small room for a few moments before coming to a stop in front of the shelf of books.
Many of the books were old. Not a few decades or even a couple of hundred years. They’d belonged to Nessa for several centuries. He studied them and then turned around, looking at Nessa with an unreadable expression.
Nessa sighed. “What it is, Mal?”
“I don’t know.” Dark, deep red hair fell to hide his face as he lowered his gaze to the floor. He stood in silence for long, long moments.
Her skin started to buzz and adrenaline started to course through her. She didn’t feel anything. But something had Malachi on edge. The bastard had walked this earth for even longer than Nessa—whatever bothered him, it wasn’t going to be some mild little annoyance.
Finally, he lifted his head and pinned her with midnight blue eyes. “Kelsey wanted me here, pet. I don’t know why. She doesn’t know why. But she wanted me here.”
“That doesn’t sound quite good.” Nessa rubbed her eyes and then lowered her head, mentally extending her senses. She felt nothing.
Absolutely nothing.
No nasty, hideous supernatural monster creeping close—
that
she would feel, just as she’d sensed Malachi’s presence. The small town of Browning, Idaho, had a nearly nonexistent paranormal population. It was why Nessa had chosen to live here after she’d made the decision to take care of Mei-Lin. She didn’t need to worry about any vampires or werewolves. The nearest wolf pack was close to a hundred miles away, and the nearest vamp was even farther. There were one or two lesser witches, a family of cat shifters and the odd random psychic.
If anything
new
had moved in, Nessa would have felt it.
“I don’t feel anything,” she pointed out, although she knew it was unnecessary. Malachi might be a vampire and she a witch, but they were both Hunters, which meant they were tuned into the monsters—the non-mortals that hunted and preyed on the innocent.
“Neither do I.” A muscle twitched in his jaw.
Nessa felt the bottom of her stomach drop out. The look in his eyes, it nearly froze her to the bone. She closed her eyes and reached out, extending her mind until it brushed up against Mei-Lin’s. She sensed the younger witch, sensed her surprise as Mei-Lin felt Nessa’s presence.

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