Heart of the Witch (26 page)

Donald Moses's house was in a neighborhood of similarly designed homes, some well cared for, some not. The yard next door held two children's bicycles and was neatly mowed, a carefully cultivated flower garden blooming beneath the window. Moses's was a disgrace.

Ravyn stood beside Marvin on the porch, trying not to brush against a tattered red chair surrounded by empty beer cans and car parts. Marvin rang the doorbell.

A man opened the door who looked as though they'd just woken him, even though it was well past lunchtime. He wore cutoffs and no shirt, proudly displaying several tattoos on his torso. His brownish-blond hair was long and dirty, and through the screen door Ravyn could smell both body odor and alcohol.

"Who the fuck are you?" the guy growled.

"W-we're investigators," Marvin replied. "We w-wondered if we could please ask you…" He tapered off and looked at Ravyn helplessly.

"Juanita Collins had a VPO out on you," she said. "We'd like to ask you a few questions about that."

The man's face reddened, and he flung the screen door open, banging it into Marvin, who stumbled back, nearly falling off the porch.

"The fuck you will," Moses roared. "I'm goddamned sick and tired of this shit!"

"Take it easy!" Ravyn put her hands up in a placating gesture, but Moses ignored her and whirled on Marvin.

Before she knew what was happening, the man had Marvin by the shirtfront and was slamming his fist into Marvin's face. Marvin tried to cover, but Ravyn knew from the blood that at least a few solid blows had landed.

"Hey!" Ravyn shouted. She grabbed Moses's arm, and he released Marvin and turned to her. Marvin slumped to his knees on the porch, cradling his bloody face.

Demented eyes raked over Ravyn, gleaming with violence and lust. Moses grabbed her hair and twisted it around his hand, using it to pull her closer.

"Let me go," she snarled.

"Not till we have some fun," he replied. He brushed the ends of her hair over his lips and slipped several strands into his mouth, wetting them with saliva.

Behind him, Ravyn saw Marvin struggling to his feet. "Leave her alone," he gurgled, still covering his mouth and nose with his fingers.

Moses's other hand rose to grip Ravyn's throat. She reached up and clawed at his wrists, but he was strong, and her efforts had no effect. Without turning, Moses said to Marvin, "I'll snap her neck if you get up, little man."

Marvin stilled, looking guiltily from Ravyn to Moses. She tried to tell him with her eyes that it was okay.

Moses released her throat long enough to grab the neck of the blue tank top she wore under her white gauzy over-shirt. Pulling it away from her body so he could see her breasts, he murmured, "Nice." His fetid, hot breath caressed her cheek. "I like tits."

His grip on Ravyn's hair brought tears to her eyes, but she tried not to let him know he was hurting her. "It's probably kind of exciting," she suggested, "to see them on someone other than your sister."

His rheumy eyes crackled with anger. Then the reaction was gone, and he threw his head back and laughed. "You think you're pretty smart, huh?" He released her shirt and gripped her neck again, this time with more pressure. Ravyn began to feel as if she were drowning, asphyxiating, swinging from a hangman's rope.

"Let… go… of… me," she choked out.

"Not before me and you have some fun. Might even let Q-tip here watch—if he's a good boy."

Ravyn's voice was a low warning. "If you don't let go, you'll be sorry."

"Yeah? Why do ya think that?" Moses had begun alternately squeezing and caressing her neck, and she felt close to passing out. Or worse.

"Because I can do things to you that you won't like," she promised.

Moses laughed, sending a gust of sour breath into her face. "Oh, you'll do things to me, all right. But I promise, I'll like'em."

"Don't think so. What I'll do to you is worse than crashing from meth. Worse even than going to your mailbox and discovering your welfare check isn't there."

He blinked as if in disbelief, then his grip on her hair and throat tightened. "You smart-ass bitch," he ground out, shoving her against the side of the house.

"Hey!" Marvin protested weakly, but neither Moses nor Ravyn acknowledged him.

Moses pressed a thumb into Ravyn's windpipe. Releasing her hair, he dug his fingers painfully into the flesh of her right breast.

A wave of tremors went through Ravyn. Her fingers tingled, heat moving from her toes up through her body and into her hairline. She closed her eyes, fighting the rage, searching her mind for another way to end this. But the skin on her face continued to tighten and burn.

Her eyes snapped open, and she stared into Donald Moses's face.

He gasped. "What the fuck… ?"

Nick's worst fears were confirmed when he screeched to a stop in front of Donald Moses's house. Marvin was on his knees on the porch, looking up at Ravyn and Moses as if praying to them. Moses had Ravyn backed against the wall. But as Nick watched, he released her and stumbled back. Had he heard Nick arrive?

"Hey!" Nick shouted, pulling his Beretta and racing up onto the porch.

Ravyn closed her eyes, and Nick could see her chest rising and falling with deep breaths. Moses turned a wild-eyed gaze to him, his expression twisted with fear. He fumbled for the screen door and waved a hand wildly, as if shooing a swarm of bees.

"Get away!" His voice was reedy, weak. "All of you just get away and leave me alone."

Ravyn's eyes were open now, and she looked at Moses for a moment before going over to help Marvin to his feet. The screen door shut, and in half a second the wooden door did the same.

"Are you okay?" Ravyn asked Marvin softly, ignoring Nick altogether.

"Yeah, other than being a puss, I'm fine."

"He took you by surprise." She soothed his fears as the two of them stepped off the porch.

Marvin looked up at Nick as they passed, but he didn't speak. Nick figured the look in his eyes was too much of a warning not to make an attempt at dumb explanations.

"What the fuck are you two doing here?" he demanded, stepping off the porch behind them.

"Following up on a lead," Ravyn replied.

Nick glanced at Marvin. "Even though I told you not to? Even though you could have gotten both of yourselves killed?"

Marvin shrugged and nodded.

"He needs to be seen to," Ravyn cut in, as if Marvin's bloody nose was an important issue.

"He's got a goddamned bloody nose," Nick snapped. "Which is a lot less than he'll have when I get through with him."

"I'm sorry," Marvin said. "I shouldn't have come here, and I shouldn't have brought Ravyn."

"I'm a big girl," Ravyn insisted. "I came because I wanted to."

"Well, both of you are fucking out of your mind," Nick grunted.

"We were trying to follow up on a lead that
you
chose to ignore," Ravyn snapped.

By now they had moved to the street and were standing in front of Marvin's car, which was parked in front of Nick's. "Do you have any tissue or napkins in there?" Ravyn asked.

Marvin nodded and bent inside, retrieving a small stack of yellow fast-food napkins and pressing them to his nose.

"I checked this lead out already," Nick said. "Not that I have to report to you. This asshole was in jail when his girlfriend was killed."

"You knew that?" Ravyn asked. "You should have told us."

"How was I supposed to know you'd go all Nancy Drew and Hardy Boys on me?"

"We were supposed to be working together."

Nick sighed, hanging on to his temper by a very thin string. "You need to get home and clean yourself up," he told Marvin. "I'll deal with you later."

"My car is at your office," Ravyn said. "I rode with him."

"No kidding?" Nick used thick sarcasm, hoping to hold his anger at bay.

Marvin slid inside his beat-up Toyota and drove away, still holding the wad of now-reddish napkins against his face.

"Get in," Nick told Ravyn, not looking at her. "I'll take you to your car."

She got in, and they drove to his office in silence. There was a lot Nick wanted to say, but everything ended with him taking over where Moses left off and wringing her fool neck.

They climbed out of his car, and Nick followed her to hers. "That was an idiotic, foolish, dangerous stunt," he began as she reached it.

She turned to him and glared, lifting her chin in defiance. "I was handling it just fine."

"Really? Were you?" Nick reached out and trailed his fingers over the angry red marks on her throat. "Was this part of a devious ploy to give him carpal tunnel syndrome?"

She pulled back, and her eyes snapped with golden sparks. Her lips pressed together so tightly that small lines appeared at the corners of her mouth. "As I said," she managed, still clenching her jaw, "we're supposed to be working together on this. You shut me out."

Nick stepped closer, not touching her but close enough that she backed against her car. Close enough to feel the heat coming from her body. Her breasts rose and fell with her breathing as she stared at him.

"You're not my partner," he said. "Not you, not Marvin. Marvin is a pain in my ass who happens to rent office space from me, and you… you're…" Nick trailed off, his breath catching in his throat at the look in her lovely emerald eyes.

"I'm what?" Her voice was soft, entreating.

He released his breath, growling at her. "You are the most frustrating, enigmatic, enticing female I've ever met."

"Is that a good thing or a bad thing?"

The air between their bodies zinged, a current of electricity compelling him to close the space and press against her soft curves. Without thinking, without giving himself time to hesitate, as he had before, he stepped closer and bent his head, touching her lips with his. She tasted of mint and woman, of smoky campfires and moonlight. She tasted like heaven.

She moaned, and her hands came up and linked behind his neck, her body pressing against his. Nick gasped, the feel of her soft curves against his hard planes so unexpected, so excruciatingly pleasurable, that he knew he'd never get his fill, could never get close enough.

Heat raced through his blood, pounding along his nerve endings, making him weak with need. He reached down and slipped his hand beneath both shirts she wore, feeling the silky flesh of her back. He ran his fingers along her lower spine, pressing her even closer to him. Her round, soft breasts pushed into his chest, and all he wanted was to feel skin against skin, to slip his body inside hers and release the tension she'd created since the very first moment he laid eyes on her. His erection pulsated, and for a moment he had the horrifying feeling he was going to come in his pants like an untried teenager.

It took his passion-dazed brain a moment to realize that her hands had moved from around his neck and were pushing against his shoulders. She wrenched her mouth from his and stared up at him. Nick saw the same dazed yearning in her eyes that he felt through his entire body.

"Oh, God," he murmured, ashamed at his loss of control and what had almost happened right here in broad daylight. "I'm sorry."

She shook her head. "Not your fault." Her voice was breathless and strained.

Aware that her body was still tormentingly close to his, Nick stepped back. He raked a hand through his hair and took a long pull of oxygen into his lungs, wishing it were laced with nicotine. "You can't work with me anymore," he said quietly, not looking at her as he turned away to put even more distance between them.

"What?" She grabbed his arm and he turned to face her. "You want me to stop because we kissed? That's ridiculous. We'll just keep a professional distance from now on."

Gently, Nick pried her grip from his bicep. "It's not because we kissed," he replied.
Though there's no way in hell I can be around you and keep my distance
. "It's because you nearly got yourself killed. I never should have involved you in the first place."

She shook her head. "I'm not quitting now. You need me, and I
have
to do this."

Nick wondered what she thought she'd accomplish. "Finding him won't bring your sister back," he reminded her. And
going looking for someone who clearly wants to hurt you seems foolhardy
.

"I know that," she said, her voice thick with emotion. "But it will keep him from hurting anyone else. I'm doing this with or without you. If you don't want to work together, fine." She crossed her arms and lifted her chin. "But I swear to you, I won't stop looking. I'll do it on my own."

Nick rubbed a hand wearily over his face. He believed her. And after what he'd seen today, he couldn't take the chance of her going off alone. "Fine. But from now on, you don't do anything without me there. Understood?"

"Understood," she agreed.

He sighed. "Now go home and stay there until I figure out our next move." When her eyes narrowed suspiciously he added, "I'll let you know before I do anything. I promise."

Apparently satisfied, she turned and got into her car.

Nick watched Ravyn drive away, waiting for his erection to subside and waiting for his heart to stop pounding out the cold, hard truth. He was falling, and he was falling hard.