Siren Song (40 page)

“
Look at all the beautiful people,” Thea said as she sidled up next to Lexi at the railing. With a glass of champagne in her hand, she pointed at the group below, “Do you think they know how their every thought, every whim, is fabricated by powers beyond their control?”

Lexi looked at her oldest sister, seeing the fine lines around her hard eyes, the desolation within their depths. “You’re not talking about the Siren’s allure are you?”

Thea bit out a bitter laugh, “If only Sirens were as powerful as the puppet masters pulling the strings of these fools; no, they’re all driven by fame, power.”

Lexi smiled slightly. “Don’t you crave fame?”

“
I crave love,” Thea whispered, her voice broke, her hard eyes on the husband that gazed up at her with absolute adoration.

“
Your husband loves you to distraction,” Lexi said softly.

With a cruel laugh, Thea shook her head no. Her eyes were bleak as she met Lexi’s gaze, “He doesn’t love me, Alexandra; he doesn’t even exist. How can a man exist when his will is not his own?”

“
I thought we couldn’t control anyone,” Lexi whispered, feeling queasy at the thought of how much she could have hurt Duncan had she not let him go. “Only… nudge.”

“
If a man is weak enough he can be controlled by any woman,” Thea sneered. “And Richard is simply Richard; a fool too stupid to realize he’s no longer a man.”

Turning her head, she looked at Lexi, “Don’t ever marry a man you can control, Alexandra; it eats away at your soul until there’s nothing left but hatred and bitterness.”

“
Why did you?”

Thea shook her head and her eyes glistened with tears she’d never let fall, “When I was eighteen I fell madly in love with an slightly older man that was completely immune to the Siren’s allure and I thought he loved me in return. I let him do things to me….”

Her voice trailed off and she took a moment to gather her composure once more and Lexi’s mind flitted to her weekend with Duncan; her run in the woods…. When Thea spoke, her voice was hard, brittle, and Lexi winced. “I gave him three years of my life, knowing that he was The One. And on the night he was supposed to take me to dinner and ask me to marry him he showed up with a hangdog expression, begging me to forgive him.

“
He had fallen in love with some tart he met at a conference he had attended the week before,” Thea scowled. “And now we get to stand around and cheer him on as he announces his decision to take the White House by storm. Here’s to you, Senator Scumbag.”

Thea toasted the air and then swallowed the rest of her champagne in one gulp. With a smile that was closer to a sneer, she summoned a waiter and grabbed two more glasses, handing one to Lexi, “Hold this for me.”

Lexi openly gaped at her sister; she hadn’t known her sister had had her heart broken and empathy swelled in her chest. She reached out an arm to offer something – a hug, support – but Thea batted it away, glaring at her through narrowed eyes, “Don’t you dare pity me, Alexandra.”

“
I don’t,” Lexi said meekly, letting her arm drop to her side and standing in silence next to her sister, uncomfortable and bleeding for her.

Thea let out another bitter laugh, “I had hoped to snag his brother’s attention just to make the bastard jealous but even then Duncan was beyond my touch. Now that he’s back, I’m glad I missed that opportunity; Mr. Tremain is not an easy man to deal with.”

Lexi choked and then quickly drank the champagne meant for her sister. When Thea looked at her strangely, she pasted a smile on her face, “Excuse me; something must have gone down the wrong pipe.”

“
Isn’t he your boss at that magazine you dabble in?” Thea asked curiously.

“
He is, I mean, he was,” Lexi said quickly, feeling the heat building in her cheeks. “I quit.”

Thea snorted, nodding her head in agreement, “I’d quit, too, if I had that man breathing down my neck day in and day out.”

Lexi’s knees went a little wobbly at the thought of Duncan breathing down her neck and she grabbed onto the railing to steady herself. She had finally come to a place of peace, she didn’t need any reminders of what was hers for only a moment of time. Luckily, Thea was oblivious to her discomfort and continued on, “After Philip left I decided I would never again let another man have that kind of power over me.”

“
So you went to the other extreme and married Richard.” Lexi looked out over the crowd and saw Thea’s handsome husband smiling up at his wife, devotion shining in his soft blue eyes.

“
If a man is captured by the Siren's song, Alexandra, he doesn't die. No, it is far worse and far crueler. Look at Richard; I can treat him like a dog and like a dumb dog he comes crawling back, begging for more,” she sneered, drinking deeply of the champagne as she glared down at the poor man. “I could fuck the pool boy in front of him and he wouldn’t bat an eye. It disgusts me; he disgusts me. For eleven years….”

“
Then let him go,” Lexi said quietly, passionately. Looking out over the crowd, her brain short-circuited for a moment as she saw Duncan walking in, looking a little less civilized than before. Her fingers curled around the railing to keep her from flying into his arms and kissing him until he remembered her. She couldn’t do that to him; she didn’t even know if it was possible. Instead, she would have to take things slowly, since he would be meeting her for the first time and have no memories of their time together. It was going to be really difficult but she’d manage, especially if it meant getting Duncan back. Clearing her throat, ignoring the temptation that was Duncan, she faced her sister, “Let him go, Thea.”

“
We have eleven years together, Alexandra,” Thea laughed darkly, her face miserable. “And two children; how do I let that go?”

Lexi shook her head; she didn’t have an easy answer. Her eyes drifted back to Duncan and her heart wanted to rip itself to shreds. Would she have enslaved him for eleven years? Kept him as her pet until nothing remained and she ended up despising him as Thea despised Richard? She couldn’t fathom ever hating him but she also gave him up. She pressed her hand against her stomach, against the butterflies that wept.

Thea gasped and when Lexi turned her head and looked at her, Thea spoke in a scandalized whisper, “My God, you love him.”

“
I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Lexi said dispassionately, pressing her hand harder against the butterflies that were going to fly up and out of her throat and accuse her of lying at any moment.

Thea slowly turned her head in the direction of Duncan and Lexi struggled not to look, keeping her posture loose and her expression blank. “You’re in love with Duncan Tremain.”

“
I don’t know how you can say that.” Her voice hardly quavered at all. “He doesn’t even know who I am.”

Thea’s eyes widened as they flew back to Lexi, “You kissed him good-bye?”

“
What choice did I have, Thea?” Lexi asked softly, no longer able to lie. “He didn’t want me, not really; and the only reason he was with me was because I hummed.”

Thea pressed her lips together and Lexi could see she was struggling not to laugh but her eyes danced. It perturbed Lexi to see her sister laugh at her after she had opened up and finally exposed her heart. Crossing her arms beneath her breasts, Lexi glared at Thea, “I’m glad you think it’s funny because I have bled for almost three weeks trying to get over him. And now I get to pretend that I’ve never met him before when Philip introduces us….”

Lexi slapped a hand over her mouth, realizing that Philip had been her sister’s former lover. The world she moved in was small and treacherous and she feared she had just stepped in a landmine, “I swear, Thea, I didn’t know about you and the Senator when I did that interview.”

“
Shut up, Lexi,” Thea said, but the words lacked heat. “Of course you didn’t know; you were a child with your nose buried in your books; I’m surprised you even knew you had any siblings. And as far as Duncan Tremain goes, I doubt your kiss was much of a deterrent.”

Cocking her head to the side, she asked, “What makes you say that?”

But then she felt it, the heated gaze burning into her skin. Slowly, letting her arms fall to her side, she turned her head and saw the fire burning in his silver eyes. He didn’t look like a man who had forgotten anything. Quite the opposite, he looked like a man who had never forgotten a thing in his life and had relived his memories of their time together until he knew them by heart. The air of danger, intoxicating and potent, surrounding him was even more powerful than before and Lexi’s attraction to him exploded exponentially.

His black hair was again perfectly cut; if ever-so-slightly uncivilized, and the tux emphasized his broad shoulders and long legs. She had thought he looked good in a suit, but, holy hell! he was overwhelming in a tux. The warrior cleaned up really, really well.

Out of the corner of her mouth, she whispered, “He said he didn’t love me and I kissed him good-bye; he doesn’t remember our time together, only the… lust he feels when he sees me.”

“
Haven’t you figured it out by now?” Thea asked, amusement and bitterness making her voice rough. “The members of that family are immune to Siren allure; if he wanted you before it was of his own volition and nothing you did could have influenced him. And Lexi? You can’t control a man simply by humming.”

With that, she finished off her champagne and headed towards the stairs with a little extra sway in her steps. Lexi watched her go, her final words working through her dazed brain, rearranging what she thought she knew into something new and wonderful.

Duncan wanted her of his own free will.

And then her joy sank and despair gripped her and shook her senseless. What if her sister was wrong and the kiss worked in erasing his memories of their strange courtship? After all, she
had
kissed him good-bye before giving him a chance to fall in love. Unless he was truly was immune to her good-bye kisses. If he remembered….

She couldn’t stop the smile from forming as she turned her head to find him but he wasn’t there. The smile withered and died as another possibility occurred to her: he remembered and was adamant on keeping his distance. Or worse, disgusted that she was the mousy youngest daughter of the Rudnar family. Or equally worse, he thought she was insane because she claimed to be a Siren. Of course, if he wasn’t human, than he’d have no right to hold her Siren-ness against her, unless his supernatural species abhorred Sirens….

Lexi was thinking in circles and she wasn’t going to learn anything until she tracked him down and confronted him directly. She just had no idea where he had gone. She scanned the room, her eyes falling on Ashley, looking as elegant as ever in a black sheath dress, her hair perfect without a wayward strand to mess it up. She was smiling broadly at someone, her hand sparkling with a huge, glittering diamond ring. With her stomach clenching, Lexi forced herself to look at the man Ashley was talking to, afraid of what she was going to see.

Duncan, looking so devastatingly gorgeous her knees weakened and she had to tighten her hold on the railing before she melted to the floor. He was smiling down at Ashley, obviously unaffected by Lexi’s absence over the last couple of weeks. She had been wrong to hope; Duncan didn’t miss her, not if that ring on Ashley’s finger was any indication. She wondered if he rushed out and proposed the next day or if he waited a week. Bastard. Obviously he forgot….

At that moment, Duncan turned his head and when she looked into his eyes, even from this distance, she forgot everything but him. He narrowed his eyes as he looked at her, a wolf scenting his prey, but was he going to devour her or tear her to pieces? He bent his head to say something to Ashley who in turn looked up and saw Lexi standing there.

“
Oh, shit,” Lexi breathed, not sure what to make of Ashley’s smile. Turning, she resumed walking along the balcony, hoping she’d be able to avoid Duncan for the rest of the party. Hell, for the rest of her life. If he was engaged, she didn’t want to have anything to do with him; as powerful as her attraction to him was, she was not going to poach on some other woman’s husband, especially Ashley. She briefly thought about Dima, since he had seemed really attracted to Ashley, but he hadn’t said anything when she talked to him on the phone the last couple of weeks.

Suddenly, the air inside was too hot, too stifling; the house was too small. She couldn’t handle being in the same building as him. Her emotions were already raw but then to see him with Ashley…. At least before, even if he hadn’t remembered her, there had been hope that she could wrangle her way back into his life. Now, it didn’t matter if he remembered or not….

Pushing through the doors to the deck, she exited the house. Without thinking where she was going or what she was doing, she hurriedly made her way down the steps to get to the immaculately landscaped grounds. The pool house was just ahead and she’d be able to take a moment and collect her thoughts, figure out a way to face Duncan without having her heart rip itself from her chest and chase after him when he was engaged to another woman.

Fury seethed through her at the thought of Duncan with anyone not her and she was sorely tempted to march back inside and tear him from Ashley’s arm, to viciously suggest the red head find her own mate, and then punish him for daring to look at another woman. But she wasn’t an animal and Duncan was free to make his own mistakes. She just needed to get her bewildering jealous and possessive instincts under control and once Cole and Dima arrived the three of them could put in a brief appearance and get the hell out of there. She’d explain everything to Mother in a few years, when she was able to look back on this entire episode and laugh.