Suddenly Sorceress (16 page)

Twenty-One

J
ack circled the neighborhood in
my mother’s Wagoneer. I stared out the passenger window, watching for lurking police. I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary. Mrs. Camp had parked her car across her driveway, but I suspected that had something to do with spying on Matt’s house.

We parked at the entrance to the cemetery and walked the short distance back. Jack yanked up the zipper on his navy blue jacket and flipped the collar up to cover his ears. It wasn’t much in the way of camouflage, but it would have to do. I’d dressed in the finest in cat burglar fashions—my black Ann Taylor turtleneck and jeans paired with a black windbreaker and a black knit hat I stole from the glove compartment of my mother’s car.

Even from the street, the house looked desolate, as if all the life had been squeezed out of it. Bright yellow “crime scene” tape wrapped around the front like some sort of magical force field. I knew better. It was just plastic tape.

“How are we going to get in?” Jack whispered.

I stuck out my index finger and drew a giant O in the air. When he didn’t seem to grasp my meaning, I repeated the gesture a few times.

Jack cocked his head and shifted his eyes between my finger and my face. “We’re going in through a hole?”

I threw up my hands and shook my head. “Around the back.”

His face lit up, and he made a horizontal circle with his hand. “This is ‘go around the back,’ not this.” He mimicked my O.

I poked out my tongue at his grinning face.

“Come on, little witch.” He twined his fingers with mine and gave them a squeeze. “Let’s go.”

Keeping our hands linked, I followed him around the garage, watching for any signs of life at old Mrs. Camp’s house. I could have sworn I saw something moving in her overgrown bushes, and my heart almost stopped when I thought her garden hose was a snake. Other than that, nothing. I carefully placed my feet, trying not to make a sound as we crept around the house. Jack stepped on the leaves and mulch, and the crunching sounded much louder in the dark. Mrs. Camp was old, blind, and wore a hearing aid, but I was sure she could hear leaves crunching underfoot at thirty clicks.

“What was that?” Jack barely whispered. His breath came out in a cloud.

With a shrug, I tucked myself further into the shadows.

“We need to hurry.” He tightened his hold on my hand and pulled me along in a crouch.

I exhaled once we reached the brick courtyard in the back.

The backyard looked exactly as it had the last time I’d seen it. The iron table and chairs were still hidden beneath waterproof covers, waiting for nice weather to return. More yellow tape stretched across the kitchen door and the French doors to the dining room. I wasn’t worried about a little strip of plastic, but I had a better idea.

The window in the laundry room didn’t have a lock. It wasn’t on the alarm system, and since I’d climbed through that window countless times, I knew I could fit through the opening, even with my new bustline. As often as I’d misplaced my keys, breaking into my—or rather, Matt’s house—was my specialty.

Eyes darting between Jack and the patio chairs, I contemplated my choices. Then, pointing to the window just above chest height, I motioned for Jack to give me a boost. He rocked back on his heels and gaped at me as if I’d taken off all my clothes, smothered myself in peanut butter, and invited him to join me in a devil’s threesome with Jeremy Irons.

“What? I need a boost.”

A light went on in his eyes, and he grinned widely. “You should never, ever give hand signals.”

Jack hoisted me up, and I raised the window with a low creak. I was just about to pull myself through when I heard a rustling behind me and froze.

“What are you doing here?” Mrs. Camp’s scratchy voice echoed in the night air.

My head banged against the frame as I pulled it back out of the window. “Mrs. Camp. Hi.” I rubbed the bump forming on the top of my skull.

“You have a lot of nerve coming back here after what you’ve done. I expected you to disappear or something.”

“It’s not what you think. Matt isn’t… He’s not dead. He’s just… missing.”

Mrs. Camp scratched the back of her neck. She seemed to be thinking about what I’d said. “Not dead, you say?”

“Oh no, he’s not dead at all.” I flashed my teeth in a wide smile.

My elderly neighbor licked her cracked lips and returned my smile. “Well, then you’d better follow me. The police are coming.” She turned and hurried, in a gait much quicker than I would have expected for a woman her age, across the backyard to her back door. She waved at us to follow.

Jack shook his head. “Something doesn’t seem right.”

“I don’t know what choice we have.” Jack helped me down, and we ran to catch up.

“Go now, get inside.” She looked over her shoulder toward the road and held the door open. Once we were inside, she closed and locked it. “Follow me.” She flipped a switch on the wall, bathing the room in harsh, flickering fluorescent light.

I didn’t know what I expected to find in her kitchen, but it wasn’t that. My eyes zeroed in on a stack of dingy blue bowls and silver spoons on the wood-grain laminate countertop then a dirty frying pan on the old white gas stove. A shiny brass crucifix hung over the sink and another over the cooktop. The walls were a bright lime green. The yellowed cabinets were probably original to the house, or close to it, and most likely used to be a bright white. Much like their owner’s teeth, time hadn’t been kind to them. Despite the disarray, the room smelled of lemon cleaner.

Mrs. Camp opened a plain wooden door, exposing a flight of stairs. “The basement. No one will find you down there.”

A glance into the gloomy abyss made me shudder. I wasn’t fond of basements or the dark, but I heard sirens in the distance.

“They’ll be here soon.” She banged on the doorframe.

“Come on, I’m right beside you.” Jack grabbed my hand and led me down the steps, the wood planks groaning beneath us.

Once we were halfway down, Mrs. Camp shut the door, and I heard a click.

“What was that? Did she just lock us in?” I grabbed Jack’s arm and hugged it.

“I don’t know, but based on her ‘no one will find you down there’ comment, I wouldn’t be surprised.”

Jack used his cell phone to light the stairs, and we made our way to the bottom.

The cellar smelled mildewed, and the dampness coated my skin like a film. A wall of shelves lined the back wall with old boxes stacked on each one. I tried to read the scrawled lettering across their fronts, but most of it was too faded or covered with dust. I could make out “Christmas” on one and “Toys” on another. The rest were anyone’s guess.

“Do you think she’ll tell the police we’re down here?” I asked.

“I hope not.”

I nodded even though I was sure he couldn’t see me.

After a few minutes of straining to make out my surroundings, I heard heavy footsteps above us. I thought I heard voices too but couldn’t be sure. My heart slammed so hard against my ribcage I had trouble hearing anything else. If Jack hadn’t been holding my hand, I think I would have had a full-blown meltdown even though
I
was the one with the blue-light-special weapon. All
he
had was the backlight to his cell phone to ward off the forces of evil—and spiders.

Jack shined the light up the bleak staircase, illuminating cobwebs and scratch marks. “What the hell is that crazy old lady doing?”

“I have no clue.” I gave his hand a squeeze. “But I’m beginning to regret trusting her.”

He clutched my hand tighter.

My body leaned into his like a magnet as I scrutinized the shadows around us. I could deal with “mysterious phantoms,” but the thought of creepy crawlies dangling from the dark spaces above made me shiver as if someone had done the Monster Mash across my grave.

“Do you think we should go back up and ask—” A loud popping noise made me jump. “What was that?”

“I don’t know, but it sounded like a gunshot.” Jack let go of my hand and stepped toward the stairs.

The door creaked open, and a shaft of light spilled over us. “Don’t get any ideas,” the old woman yelled. “You won’t be getting past me tonight.”

“Mrs. Camp?” My voice cracked. “Why did you lock us down here?”

“I saw what you did. You aren’t right. Something wrong with someone who does what you did.”

“What do you mean? What did I do?” I could only imagine the number of things she may have seen me do over the past few days, Jack being one of them. I
told
Matt we needed blinds for the kitchen windows.

“I saw you turn that big snake into a dog. That’s just not normal. Not something a good Christian woman does.”

Jack pulled me closer to the bottom step, and I saw the barrel of a shotgun pointed at us. When Jack yanked me back, I knew he’d seen it too.

“Get back away from the steps,” she yelled.

“Mrs. Camp, you can’t leave us down here,” I cried.

“I can’t let you out to hurt nice people like Dr. Green. I don’t know what you did to him, but I’m sure it wasn’t right. I told the police about your black magic. They didn’t believe me, but I know what I saw.” She waved the gun toward the right. “You go sit on the couch until I can figure out what to do with you.”

Her words bounced around inside my head
.

I let Jack tow me along as he followed the narrow wash of light to an old couch resting against a moist wall. I was reluctant to sit on it. I had no idea what might be living in those cushions.

“Can you call Jon?” I whispered, straining to see him in the low light. I felt him shake his head.

“No signal down here.”

A bubble of panic threatened to choke me. “We have to find a way out.”

“Are these basements subterranean?”

My mind went blank, and I couldn’t formulate an answer. After several seconds, he rephrased his question.

“Ivie, do you know if there is an outside entrance to this basement?”

“I-I don’t remember one. I don’t know for sure. What if we wait for her to fall asleep and rush the door?”

“No. We can’t be sure she’ll go to sleep, and we don’t know if the gun is loaded. For all we know, she really has called the police. Our best bet is to find an exit down here.”

Jack stumbled around in the dark while I held the phone out as a flashlight. A red light blinked on the screen.

“Oh, God… Hurry, your phone is dying.”

I shined the light on stacks of boxes looming over me like a madwoman’s tower. A few tattered mattresses, spattered with rusty stains, leaned against the wall. An outdated Coldspot refrigerator—the original white coated in the same yellowed layer of age as the kitchen walls—separated the two areas.

“There’s a small window over here,” Jack whispered. “I might be able to boost you up, and you can get out.”

“I’m not leaving you!”

“What about magic? Can you try to work a spell to get us out of here?”

“I don’t know. I guess I can try.” My eyes fluttered closed, and I concentrated on the barely-there electric current in my fingers. “I feel something, but it’s weak. I still don’t know how to control this so-called power of mine.”

“Come here.” Jack tugged me into his arms and rested his chin on the top of my head. “We’ll figure something out.” He rocked us in silence before chuckling. “We could always have sex. If magic makes you horny, maybe sex would make you magical.”

I pushed away from him. “Are you kidding me?”

He wrapped his arms around me again. “I’ve seen crazier things happen over the past few days.”

I added
sex in scary
basements
to the list of
crazy
and decided the idea had merit. “You’re right.” I shifted until I could reach the waistband of his jeans. “On a scale of Luna Lovegood to Hannibal Lecter, it barely makes the grade.”

“I was joking,” Jack scoffed. “We’re not having sex down here.”

“It’s no worse than an airport restroom.” I smirked, but I doubt he saw it in the dark.

“No, it’s way worse.”

I nudged him. “Come on. If nothing else, it would distract us from our predicament.”

“I seriously doubt I could even get it up down here.”

“I find that hard”—I swallowed a giggle—“um, difficult
to believe.”

Jack laughed. “No, it’s not hard
at all, sweetheart.”

“I bet I can fix that.” I walked my fingers down his zipper.

“
Ivie
.” His tone was a warning.

“Come on.” My knuckles brushed against him. “You know you want to.”

He shook his head. “You’re going to kill me one of these days, woman.”

“Death by orgasm doesn’t sound like a bad way to go, Houdini.”

Jack wrapped his fingers around my wrist and moved my hand from his groin. “How about death by tetanus?”

“Listen, if you want me to work a spell in this hellhole, you’re gonna need to give me a hand.”

“Fine.” He placed his hands on my shoulders to steer me closer to the wall with the narrow window. “Just remember, you asked for it.” His lips brushed my ear. “Close your eyes.”

Before I had a chance to comply, Jack began his assault on my senses. The first touch of his tongue to the pulse point in my neck sent a shiver though me. “You’re teasing me.”

“For starters,” Jack murmured. He kissed then suckled the spot.

I leaned into him, swallowing a moan. “Let me guess, you’re doing this for the express purpose of revving up my magic?”

His mouth held fast to that point on my neck, biting then soothing the spot with his tongue. Tiny ripples of heat burst through me. With my eyes closed, I felt every thrilling sensation from the top of my head to the bottom of my curled-up toes.

He pulled his lips away with a pronounced pop then slid his hand down my arm and around my waist to crush me against his hardness. “Hey, I’m willing to take one for the team.” He caressed my stomach, his fingers dipping beneath my waistband then back again. He reached a little farther each time, yet never far enough.

“Please, don’t stop,” I begged. “I want you.”

“You’ve had me for longer than you know.” He latched onto my earlobe, drawing it between his teeth as he hummed.

The tingles spread like champagne bubbles throughout my body. “Inside me. I need you inside me.”

“You want this
inside you?” Jack gripped me harder, pressing his jeans-clad erection into me. My legs shook, threatening to give out. “I’m afraid you’re going to have to have patience, my little witch.”

“No. No patience. Now.” My hand fought its way between us, but Jack captured it before I reached the promised land. Somewhere in the back of my brain, I think I knew I’d crossed a line. I’d turned into a regular Amityville whore.

“Not now. But soon. When we’re somewhere relatively safe—and clean. Somewhere I can take my time introducing my tongue to every inch of your body. You’re always in such a rush. I want a build-up so slow that you shatter into a million pieces beneath me.”

“This is torture.” I wriggled my hips until I felt him swell against me.

He shuddered, his breath fanning over my neck. “Do you feel it?”

“I want to. Why won’t you let me feel it?”

“No, not
that
.” Jack groaned. “The magic. Feel it flowing through your fingers. Can you feel it?”