Spooked (9 page)

Mick raised his eyebrows at me. “What’s that?”

“He…desires her,” I said, glancing up at him and then down at the ground. For some reason, I found it a little embarrassing to tell him.

“Sexually, you mean?” he asked me.

I nodded. “That’s exactly what I mean. All I got was that he is infatuated with her. He secretly is madly in lust with her. I don’t know whether it’s love, but it’s definitely lust.”

“Wow,” Mick said. “That’s interesting.”

I nodded. “He’s obsessed. She’s all he thinks about.”

“Lorelei!”

Mick and I both turned to see Delia walking quickly toward us. This was most certainly not the same Delia that had come to the house looking for me. Her voice was back to normal, and she moved the way she always did. “Delia.”

“I’m so glad you’re here. We need to go.”

I felt my brow furrow. “Go where?”

“Oh, the police want you down at the station,” she said, slipping a hand around my arm.

“They do?” I looked at Mick.

“Yes, they do. Sheriff Malloy thinks that you may know who took my car, because you were home when that person came looking for you at the house. If they were looking for you, they are probably dangerous, Lorelei. We can’t take chances. Did you get a good look at them? They were driving my car, isn’t that right?” She looked into my face, her expression open and warm.

“I saw the car. I didn’t see who was driving it.”

She turned to Mick. “Did you get a really good look at the person looking for Lorelei?”

Mick stared at her for a moment, and then shook his head. “No, ma’am. I didn’t. It was dark and the front light was off. I put a new bulb in it for you.”

“Thank you, Mick. That was very thoughtful.” She frowned. “Well, I think it’s very strange. Lorelei, you know why I’m so concerned about this.”

I nodded. The strange thing was, if it were the people who steal people for their talents, the police wouldn’t be able to do a thing about it.

Not regular, non-supernatural police, that is.

I wondered whether there were police for the supernatural world. There had to be, right? It would stand to reason.

“I’m sure it won’t take long. I would really like to know who stole my car,” Delia said. “And who is after you.”

I looked at Mick, who stared at me, face concerned.

“I’ll come with you,” Mick said. “I’m the one who saw the most.”

Delia hesitated, and then said, “Why don’t you follow us in your car? I have a Valentine wedding to plan and have a meeting with the bride right after we’re finished at the station.”

Mick nodded. “Yeah. Okay.” He looked at me, obviously feeling better about the situation. “I’ll be right behind you.”

“Sure.” I frowned. A wedding to plan? Today? Odd, considering what was going on in our town right then.

Delia and I headed to her car while Mick headed to his, which was across the parking lot. Although Delia seemed perfectly fine to me, I was still nervous about her. If it had actually been Delia at the house, acting like something out of
Invasion of the Body Snatchers
, it was possible that she could turn into that again.

Then again, maybe it wasn’t her, and the Delia
thing
was still out there, waiting and watching.

The thought sent a shiver through me.

I’d have to ask Wentworth whether he’d seen Delia lately. I looked around at the faces leaving the vigil. Wentworth wasn’t among them. Come to think of it, I hadn’t seen hide nor hair of him since Halloween night. I hoped he was okay.

“Have you seen Wentworth?” I asked Delia. “I thought he’d be here, at the vigil.”

Delia paused and looked at me as if she didn’t know who I was talking about.

She looked back at the car and climbed in as if I hadn’t asked her anything at all. She fastened her seat belt. I did the same, wariness moving over me.

What the hell was up with her?

Delia’s oldies station was playing a boppy tune that I normally liked. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel and sang along, and I tried not to frown at her. Though it was an improvement since the last time I’d seen her, she was still definitely acting oddly. Given that we were just at a prayer vigil for two missing teenage girls, she seemed awfully cheerful.

A growing sense of dread crept over me, and I decided that I wasn’t getting back into the car with Delia after Mick and I answered questions at the police station. I was getting antsy to get out of the car, and when Delia turned onto Maple Street, where the police station sat on the corner, I felt relief wash over me.

But it was short lived.

The smell of Delia’s perfume was overwhelming, and beneath it, the smell of rotting flesh drifted toward me in the close quarters of the car.

I gagged as Delia pressed on the gas pedal and sailed right past the police station.

I coughed, stared at her, feeling my mouth drop open. “Where are you going?”

“Don’t worry about it,” Delia croaked.

The same voice I’d heard at the house, when she’d come looking for me, came from the person—the thing—next to me.

I unbuckled my seat belt and put my hand on the door handle, determined to jump out of the car whether it was speeding or not, when I felt something cover my mouth.

Instinctively I gasped, taking in a deep breath. The car swerved and, as my head clouded, I heard a horn blasting behind us.

Mick
, I thought.

Then I went out like a light.

Chapter Ten

Before I opened my eyes I was aware of a strong cleanser smell, and beneath that, the smell of mildew. I could tell it was dark as there was no light filtering through my eyelids. My stomach was queasy. Then I remembered the rag with the strong-smelling substance that Delia had pressed up against my nose and mouth.

I opened my eyes and gagged. The nausea was horrible. When I saw my surroundings, fear made my stomach clench and I gagged again.

I was in a dark room, lying on a bed on top of a scratchy blanket. I could barely make out some kind of metal door with a small square window in it. Carefully, I swung my legs off the bed and made it to the door without throwing up, but had to steady myself with one hand on the cool metal. I leaned over and took several deep breaths, and then ventured a peek through the window.

The hallway beyond my door had several other doors. I moved to one side of the window and tried to see farther down the corridor. It seemed never-ending—just a long stretch of hallway with closed doors. I wondered how many other rooms like this one were behind those doors. How many other people were held captive?

I strained my ears, but heard nothing.

I closed my eyes and sent out my psychic fingers, feeling around, probing.

A flash of money changing hands. Of someone coming down a set of stairs, of a key opening a lock in one of the steel doors. I heard someone crying out. Felt an electric jolt of terror. Heard a zipper unzip. Felt deep, dark hatred, and the knowledge that there was at least one rapist in our midst.

Then I heard the sound of a key entering the lock on my steel door.

***

When the door began opening, I instinctively stood back. I knew, without a doubt, that this man had rape on his mind.

He stepped into the room, keys dangling from one hand, whistling. When he stopped, mere inches from me, I refrained from stepping backward again. He liked to cause fear and dread in his victims, and although I was feeling those things in spades, because I knew exactly what he wanted to do to me, I refused to let him see it.

“What do you want, hot stuff?” I asked him. I pulled my top over my head and let it drop to the floor. I lifted my chin and parted my lips, watching him with half-closed lids. “I want you to give it to me like you mean it.”

He stepped back and stared at me, his hand suddenly gripping his keys tightly in a fist. Doubt had seeped into his eyes and he looked at me as if I were a dangerous maniac.

I unzipped my jeans and wiggled provocatively until they fell to the floor, and then stepped out of them. “Think you can handle that?”

He took another step back. “Get your clothes on. What do you think this is? A porn studio? Have a little self-respect, for God’s sake.”

I stepped forward and pouted. “Please? Pretty please? I want it so badly, baby.”

He gave me a look like I’d just climbed out of a pile of dog shit and had asked him for a hug. “I said, get your clothes on.”

Shaking his head, he turned back to the door and left, slamming it behind him.

I let out a deep breath and began pulling my jeans back on, trying not to let my hands tremble too much in case he was watching me through the window in the door, and thanked God for the ability I’d been cursing my whole life.

***

The next person to walk through the door was soft spoken, but dangerous. I sensed his intelligence, and I understood that if I attempted to pull a secret from him there would be consequences. Nasty consequences.

He sat in front of me on a brushed chrome chair that had been sitting next to the bed. He crossed his legs, a movement that I found both elegant and slightly narcissistic, which spoke of affluence—or the wish for affluence. This was a man who was very concerned with image. He was cold and didn’t care about me for any other reason than furthering his stature in life. What he wanted most in this life was power and adoration, but adoration from only the right people.

From me he wanted respect and submission, and unlike the man in this room earlier, he wouldn’t be afraid of me for refusing to bend to his control, but furious. He would simply force me to bend. Even if it meant that he needed to break me.

All this I gleaned from his body language and from the cold indifference in his eyes. If I were of no use to him, he would have me killed.

“Lorelei,” he said, leaning back. He clasped his hands on his leg and tilted his head as he watched me, as if I were an interesting new pet he was watching in an aquarium. “You will know me as Lucian.”

“Yes,” I said, my voice sounding rather small. I almost winced at the quaver I heard in it.

“Your life has changed. Drastically. The nice thing is that you really won’t be making any decisions regarding your life from here on out. The bad part is that you won’t be making any decisions regarding your life here on out.” His lips turned up in a slight sneer. He thought he was pretty clever. Clearly, in order to pull all this off, he was.

He leaned forward, staring into my eyes. “Listen to me. Carefully. I feel nothing for you. I don’t like or dislike you. I don’t particularly want to bed you, though you’re a pretty girl and if you offer yourself to me, I might accept. However, giving yourself to me for my use will not net you any power here. I’m not easily manipulated. I don’t want to kill you. But I will kill you if you stand in the way of what I want. Do you understand me?”

I nodded once. “Yes.”

“I don’t care what you want. I’ll make you as comfortable as I can while you’re here, if you do as I wish.”

I nodded, staying silent. I swallowed down tears over the giant lump in my throat. I hated that I felt like a scared little girl, but I was.

“Don’t waste your breath pleading and begging for me to let you go. If you’re very obedient and cause me no trouble, I won’t kill you.”

I watched his eyes but stayed silent.

“I may let you go someday. I may not. Your best chance of staying alive and unwounded is by making yourself very useful to me.”

I nodded, a tear sliding down one cheek, and then the other.

He watched me and tilted his head slightly. “It is unfortunate that you have your special ability. It makes you extremely rare and highly sought after by people like me.”

So he was a collector, of sorts.

I looked at his hands. They were long fingered. Pale. Inexpressive.

“You’d better hope that this talent you have doesn’t fail you now.”

With that, he got up from his chair and stood in front of me. “I’m sure you’ve figured out that you’re not the only person here with special talents. Don’t call out for help or try to reach out to them. Believe me. They know better.”

My heart ached as the realization that Delia was gone forever fell over me. The thing that had taken her place seemed to have settled further into her body. If the thing hadn’t taken over her body, but had mimicked her likeness, then Delia’s body was somewhere, hidden, and may never be found.

“Get some sleep,” he told me, clearly feeling nothing for my devastation. “We start tomorrow.” He turned and walked out of the room, letting the door click shut behind him.

***

I lay awake a long time with my bedside lamp on. I was fortunate, I supposed, that they had afforded me that. The blanket was acrylic and rough, and I had trouble getting comfortable, but that was the least of my troubles at the moment.

Where was Mick? Was he looking for me? Was he even alive?

The possibility that the Delia thing had killed him lay heavily on my heart, and I swallowed down bitter grief and regret. I had known that Delia wasn’t quite right, but I’d gone with her anyway, and I might’ve gotten Mick killed because of my stupidity.

Don’t trust anyone
, she’d told me. I’d had no idea that
anyone
had included her.

I knew that tears wouldn’t help me now, but I couldn’t seem to stop. I cried into my pillow until my sinuses were so swollen and blocked that I couldn’t breathe through my nose. I opened my mouth and took long shuddering breaths until I fell into the sleep of the hopeless and utterly forlorn.

***

Sometime in the night I awoke to the alarming sound of a female screaming and crying. I sat straight up and listened.

The words were muffled because of what I imagined was soundproofing of the walls. But even if I hadn’t been able to make out the words, the tone was unmistakable.

What I was hearing was abject terror.

I remembered the first man to enter the room, and felt my stomach clench.