The Sorceress Screams (6 page)

Maximo drew in
toward me with a rapid tapping of his leather boots. He darted away, repeating
the movement in time with the music. All the while he grinned madly.

This had
better
earn me my ring back. If not, I
just might set
him
on fire.

The music came
to a stop. He exchanged a look with the band that wasn’t particularly
promising.
Nor was his pose.
Those outstretched arms
couldn’t be good. He didn’t want me closer, in front of all these people, did
he?

I remained
rooted where I was.

“We’ll start
when you have your lady close,” the bandleader called out.

Maximo shot
him a grin.

I pretended I
hadn’t understood the Spanish. And to prove I was in the dark, I blinked blank
eyes that were probably wide from the intake of alcohol.

Maximo
translated the words. “He says they won’t play until we’re ready.”

“I’m ready.”

Maximo waved
me toward him.

“Oh, for
Pete’s sake,” I said under my breath on my way forward.

He slipped an
arm around my waist. The band began playing a slower song. Maximo stepped
forward, sending me scrambling back. He didn’t glare, perhaps because he’d
wanted me to move away. Again he stepped forward. And then he drew back twice,
taking me with him.

The move
seemed to be a double step backward and double step forward. I’d begun to get
the hang of dancing without stumbling when the bandleader gestured at Maximo.

The vampire
broke into resonate song while holding my gaze. Sensual intensity warmed his
expression. “Kiss me, give me many kisses.”

One of the guitar
players’ voices soon harmonized.

“As if tonight
were the last time…”

The sultry
sound was overwhelming. Goosebumps formed along my
bare
arms. I found myself shivering. I could hardly hold Maximo’s dark gaze as his
melodious voice sang the sexy song. His cool hands pulled me closer against his
firm body without breaking the dance’s movement.

This might
have been the first time I’d ever wished my mother hadn’t gifted me with the
knowledge of so many languages. I would have been much happier if I hadn’t understood
the lyrical words coming out of his mouth.

He drew me
against his chest. The music slowed to its finale. Maximo leaned me into a dip.
His arm easily held my body aloft while he sang the last line with a dark
vehemence that made me breathless.
“Because I’m afraid of
having you then losing you.”

Even though
I’d known it was coming, I was still unprepared for his lips covering mine.
Apart from the chilly temperature of them, they were soft and coaxing—a mere
suggestion of what else could be if only I’d allow it. Warmth slipped over my
arms from where they touched his body. A shiver of desire wiggled its way down
my back.

Right then I
wanted to know what else there could be. I wanted to allow a whole lot more
than the teasing caress of his tongue at the seam of my mouth … until
Ascencion’s
name whispered out of the bar.

The locals.
Of course they wondered
where his lover was.

My body went
stiff in Maximo’s arms. He lifted us both to our upright positions, holding me
to his chest for several moments too long before he released me. I stumbled
around the corner away from the hungry look that had come over his face. It
should have sent me running because I knew what he fed on and it wasn’t
enchiladas, but I only got as far as my seat.

Maximo dropped
down into the wooden chair across from me, staring with the same intensity he’d
had on the dance floor. Several seconds passed before he softened the
expression into an amiable smile.

“You could use
a few more dance lessons.” He lifted a tortilla chip from the basket between
us, negligently setting it to his lips for a bite.

The complaint
went a long way toward easing my thundering pulse.

“It isn’t
going to help me sell merchandise at the shop therefore there’s no point in
wasting the time,” I said now that we could hear each other. My tone was sober
because I was close to
being
sober
thanks to that kiss. The guilt that I’d let a murderer kiss me days after he’d
killed his last lover had been like a bucket of ice water over the head.

Maximo adopted
his indulgent smile. “We all need a little exhilaration in our life to feel
alive. And you were exhilarated back there.” He nodded his head toward the
cantina. “Dancing more often would be good for you, Miss Walsh.”

I could argue
he was wrong, but he was a vampire. Exhilaration was a physiological state he’d
be able to mark by the lifting of my pulse and temperature. And it would be
lying if I’d said I hadn’t felt just a little more alive with him.

“I don’t need
you to feel exhilaration,” I said in a stiff but quiet voice.

“Of course you
don’t.” The tightening of the skin around his eyes didn’t bode well. “But no
one else can offer you dancing with a side of danger quite like I can. I think
you crave a little danger.”

I swear I saw
the flash of fang as he spoke the words. My heart skipped two beats. Perhaps
he’d heard my unvoiced reaction because he gave me a closemouthed smile that
looked positively evil. And Hera help me, thanks to his twinkling eyes, that
smile was quite possibly the sexiest I’d ever seen.

Self-preservation
had me giving a reminder. “I want my ring. It’s the only reason I’m here.”

His lips drew
just a little finer—a tacit warning I ignored.

“What do I
have to do to get it back?”

Maximo’s
eyelids drew shut in a slow, irritated motion. He let out a long breath, and
then reopened them, fixing two narrowed eyes on me. “You need to learn the fine
art of negotiation, Miss Walsh.”

I bit back a
response about not wanting to negotiate with murderers. Instead, I remained
silent while he worked through his irritation. Soon his amiable smile was back.
He waved for our waiter’s attention.

My heartbeat
quickened. I didn’t want to leave. Well, I
did
want to leave so I could go home, but I doubted he’d let me off the hook quite
so easily. And remaining at the restaurant was preferable to being alone with
him elsewhere.

I pulled out
my wallet. Maximo shot me a dismayed look. He dropped several bills on the
table, took my hand—wallet still palmed within—and tugged me up to his chest. My
heart skipped a beat. The corners of his lips curved. He released my arm in
time for me to stumble toward the front door. I managed to recover myself
before we reached the steps outside.

He said
nothing during the short drive to the shop. I tossed him surreptitious glances
in an effort to gauge what his plan would be now that dinner was over. He’d
gotten his dancing just as he’d wanted. But I hadn’t gotten what I’d wanted.

Maximo
maneuvered his Escalade into the parking lot on the Sedona side of my shop. He
didn’t get out of the car to open my door, but he did turn off the engine.
Sliding into the corner of his seat, he faced me.

“I would like
you to spend Independence Day with me,” he said.

How did that
work? He was a vampire and thus wouldn’t be awake during the
day
portion of the holiday.

“I hold an
annual barbecue in
Wipuk
,” he said. “There will be
food, dancing, and fireworks. It’s a holiday not to be missed.”

I pushed my
hand through the door handle, pausing long enough to answer. “I’ll go to your
barbecue but not as your date.”

“I’ll send a car
for you at nine on Sunday,” he called after me.

I waved
dismissively on my way to the shop’s door. He stayed in the car with the engine
off for several seconds after I’d slipped inside. I didn’t allow myself to
exhale until I stood on the second floor.

Maximo had let
me leave without insisting upon a goodnight kiss. I might have considered that
meant we hadn’t been on a date, but he
had
kissed me in the cantina.

My fingers
grazed along my lips. A flush filled my cheeks upon remembering the way he’d
felt.

It hadn’t been
nearly as disgusting as I’d imagined kissing a corpse would be. Did that make
me sick?

“Fuck me!”

I hadn’t asked him about
Dea
Woods
.
Kore’s
seeds!
Desmond was going to be miffed.

But wasn’t
Desmond always miffed?

Chapter Five

Nell slapped
the Sunday paper down on the glass display case. A color photograph dominated the
front page. Someone had snapped a shot of Maximo kissing me in the cantina last
night. The blood drained from my face.

“Slow news
day?” I said in a squeaking voice.

“No. He’s big
business in Sedona. Any time he’s spotted out and about, his picture ends up in
the paper.” She jabbed her finger at the photograph. “Why didn’t you tell me
you had a date with him?”

The blood
returned to my cheeks in a rapid flush. “It wasn’t a date. He has something of
mine, and dinner was the price he asked for it back … to start.”

“Yeah.”
She drew the word out across
three seconds in a tone filled with disgust. “The guy has a stranglehold on
Wipuk’s
resources, but you think
it’s
okay to date him.”

“I’m not
dating him!”

Nell gestured
toward herself, and then toward no direction in particular. “I thought it was
us versus them, the outcasts versus the established
Wipukans
.
But you’re off dating the head vampire
and
getting visits and calls from the dictator himself!”

She meant
Desmond. There was little I could say to defend myself. If I told her Desmond
claimed he cared about
Wipuk
, she’d accuse me of
being manipulated by him. If I said he had harmful information about me, she’d
be twice as suspicious.

“I’m using
them as much as they’re using me.” My pitch crept higher than I meant. “Desmond
wants to know if de Sole had anything to do with
Dea
Woods’s enthrallment. He thinks I can find out, and he’s offered to help change
the city’s opinion of the shop if I do.” He hadn’t specifically
said
he’d do that, but it had been
implied through the course of our conversations. I probably just needed to
remind him. “And like I said, Maximo has something of mine. He’s blackmailing
me into these stupid Mexican food dinners to get it back.”

Nell’s chin
rose, and she smacked the newspaper photo. “This doesn’t look like blackmail.”

My skin
flushed darker. “I’d had two margaritas!”

She rolled
forward onto the balls of her feet. “Don’t drink then if you can’t keep a vampire
from kissing you!”

“He insisted
it was part of the deal.” I let out an exasperated sigh. “Come on, Nell. I’m
not going legit.”
Yet
.
“I’m still doing my thing just like before. But sometimes to take down the big
dogs you
gotta
act like a big dog until they trust
you.”

“And sometimes acting like a big dog too long makes you forget that
you’re really a little dog!”

She stomped up
the stairs before I could respond, calling back that she was going to take her
break early. I slumped against the wall behind the display case. I’d let her
down. And she didn’t even know about the barbecue.

****

I groaned
aloud at the name on my phone’s screen. I really didn’t want to talk to Desmond
right now.

“Good
afternoon, Marino,” I said sourly.

“Was he
involved with her being enthralled?”

My teeth set
in irritation. It wasn’t uncharacteristic of Desmond to jump right to the heart
of the matter. No, it was uncharacteristic of him to do anything else. But I
really wasn’t in the mood for him.

“I didn’t get
a chance to ask,” I said.

There was an
uncomfortable silence in which I heard only his slow exhales. Then there was a
clicking noise that sounded a lot like a lock catching. Had he shut his office
door? Several moments of continued silence followed it.

Desmond’s
voice was frosty when he spoke again. “So in between your dancing and kissing
you couldn’t find a single moment to ask if he’d paid someone to enthrall the
Earth witch
ambassador?
”

His disgust
had lifted with each new word he’d spoken until he’d been snarling. My back stiffened
even though he wouldn’t see it. After Nell’s disappointment I couldn’t handle
his as well.

“We never
discussed
Wipuk
.” Was that
my
high-pitched voice? I winced, quickly trying to soften it. “It
would have been suspicious if I’d asked out of the blue.”

“You could
have
brought
the subject up instead
of…” Desmond’s voice trailed off with a soft curse.