The Curse Keepers Collection (29 page)

He looked at me again, still serious. “True magic.”

“Do you know how to use it to close the gate?”

He nodded, but shifted in his seat. “Manteo performed the original ceremony so I’ll perform this one. I’ll tell you what I need you to do.”

“When we touched last night . . . ” I refused to bring up the surge of desire we’d both obviously felt, but there were other things I needed answers to. “I was aware of things I didn’t know before. In fact, things I don’t think were even told to me when I was little.”

“I didn’t know some of it either.”

“But you knew about the Manitou?”

He frowned. “Yes, but not that we’d be aware of its presence.” Why did that bother him? Other than getting answers and additional power, experiencing the Manitou was the best part of this entire job.

“Did you know I was the daughter of the sea and you were the son of the earth?” Which I found ironic, given that Collin was the fisherman.

His jaw dropped as he shot me a quick glance. “You found that out last night when we were connected?”

“Yes, and that the curse was born of an ancient magic that flowed through the universe before the birth of the world.”

He scowled. “What else did you find out?”

“Did you know this stuff already?”

“It’s part of our stories, Ellie. It’s our tradition.” The hint of arrogance wasn’t lost on me.

“But you didn’t experience those things last night? You didn’t feel . . . connected to everything, or like all the origins of the universe were right in front of you?” His grimace was my answer. “So what did
you
feel last night when we touched hands?” It was a loaded question, and I hesitated to ask, but he was surprised I’d found out what I had. I knew he’d felt something, experienced
something
. The expression on his face last night had told me so.

“I felt the Manitou.”

“But did you feel everything else?”

“We need to talk about what happens in Morehead City.”

“Okay.” He’d dug his feet in and wouldn’t answer any more of my questions. I might as well let him change the subject.

“We’ll go to the museum and check out the security measures as well as the location of the exhibit with the bowl.”

“We’re just going to walk in as us?”

“Sure. Why not? When the bowl goes missing, who would suspect that you or I took it?”

He had a point.

“Do you have a plan to get it?”

“I need to check the situation out first.”

We drove the rest of the way in silence. Collin’s damned unair-conditioned truck was hot as hell. If I’d been thinking straight, I would have offered to drive my car. It wasn’t in the greatest shape, but it had air-conditioning and it couldn’t be much worse than Collin’s Red Death mobile.

The last few hours of the drive had been hot in other ways. Sitting next to Collin, my mind kept drifting to the night before. The more I tried to refocus, the more my mind latched on and refused to let go. The breeze lifted my gauzy skirt a few times, and I had to put my hand on the fabric to keep it from showing my sexy lingerie, although some deep and sinful part of me wished that I didn’t take the precaution.

Collin’s face pinched with irritation. “Do you ever wear pants?”

“Do you ever shave?” Not that I was complaining, despite my irritated tone. My traitorous mind thought about his five o’clock shadow under my fingertips the night before. I needed to think about something else. Anything else. Like scrubbing toilets.

We stopped for lunch in Morehead City before we went to the museum. I realized this was the farthest I’d ever been from Roanoke Island and not felt the debilitating pressure on my chest. If the feeling was curse related, Collin was sure to know about it.

“You’re right.” He nodded after I asked, looking down at his plate of food. “It was a way to make sure the Keepers never got too far away to fix the curse.”

“But if they lived hundreds of miles apart, there was little chance the curse could be broken.”

“Checks and balances, Ellie. The curse locked away the spirits, but there was a price to be paid.”

“Steeper than the colony disappearing?”

“The gods needed a chance to be free.”

“But who set the rules? Obviously, not the gods or they wouldn’t be locked up.”

“Not all of the gods were locked away.”

My eyes widened. “What?”

“Ahone rarely dwelled on the land. He lived in the heavens. He escaped the curse, but tradition says he lent his power to it.
He
made the rules.”

“He wanted the gods and spirits locked up. Why?”

“Jealousy? Pride? Who knows. But the other gods are liable to seek their own revenge.”

So did that mean Ahone’s messenger couldn’t be trusted? Was Ahone really trying to save humanity or was he trying to save himself? “But that doesn’t explain why I can get so far from Roanoke Island now. With the curse broken, you’d think I’d feel the pressure now more than ever.”

His mouth lifted into a soft smile. “Isn’t it obvious, Ellie? You can leave because we’re together.”

It was early afternoon when we got back into the truck to drive to the museum, and I was tired after two nights with little sleep. I dozed, my head leaning back on the headrest. When I realized the truck had stopped, I opened my eyes, surprised to find Collin watching me with an amused grin.

I sat up and smoothed down my skirt. Was he grinning because he’d seen my panties? I frowned. “What?”

“You snore.”

“
What
? I do not!”

“You do. I never would have guessed.” He opened his door and hopped out.

I grabbed my purse and followed him. “I do not snore!”

He laughed and pulled out his phone. “I have a video if you’d like proof.”

“
You didn’t
!” Livid, I ran for him, reaching for his phone. “Give me that!”

He stopped and held it over his head. “Why? It’s cute.”

Growling, I grabbed his arm and tugged. “You delete that right now!”

A wicked grin spread across his face. It was a challenge. “Make me.”

I had multiple options. Most of them involved some type of kicking or striking him in the groin. I could only come up with a handful of other ideas after that. But it wasn’t lost on me that we were in the parking lot of the museum we planned to rob. It was probably a good idea to keep a low profile and not cause a scene. My hands dropped, and I put a hand on my hip. “Fine. Keep it.”

His grin never wavered. “Giving up so easily, hotheaded Ellie Lancaster?”

I lifted my chin and gave him a haughty glare. “I’ve decided to be the bigger person.”

Disappointment flickered in his eyes for a half second before he smirked. “Suit yourself.” He lowered his arm and I darted for the phone, catching him off guard.

I got a good hold on it but he held tight, my hand over his.

“If you wanted to hold my hand, Ellie, you only had to ask.”

That was the second time he’d said that to me. I gave him a saucy grin. “Fine. I want to hold your hand.”

His eyebrow arched. He shoved his phone into his pocket, then took hold of my left hand with his right. He tugged me closer so my chest was against his. “Happy now?” he teased.

I stared into his face, trying to catch my breath. This was ridiculous. I was getting hot and bothered holding Collin Dailey’s fucking hand. No, I wasn’t happy now. There was only one thing that was going to make me happy at this point, and it involved his hands touching intimate parts under my clothes.

Collin’s grin faded as his eyelids lowered slightly, his pupils dilating. His grip on my hand tightened, keeping me next to him as his dark eyes searched mine. And he seemed to be struggling to breathe normally.

A car horn blared, and I jumped. We were standing in the middle of the parking lot. What the hell was wrong with me? I needed to get myself together.

Collin pulled me out of the way, then dropped my hand. I regretted the loss instantly. Damn. I was in so much trouble.

He started for the museum entrance, leaving me to trail behind, and I was glad. I couldn’t face him. What was he thinking? He had to know that I wanted him. I hadn’t hidden my desire, practically offering myself to him on a silver platter. There was no way he missed it. He read people. He knew.

But I was pretty good at reading people too. Especially when a guy was interested in me. Collin Dailey was interested, yet he held back. Why?

I didn’t have time to dwell on it. Collin had already entered the building, leaving me on the sidewalk. Watching him disappear inside, I realized he wasn’t necessarily rejecting me. Whenever we got close, he ran away. Could it be that Collin Dailey was afraid of getting close to me? I nearly laughed. Talk about delusions of grandeur. He probably worried I’d be some clingy chick, and he’d be stuck with me until this thing was done and for some time after.

When I entered the lobby, Collin had already purchased two tickets and waited for me with mock impatience. “For someone complaining about the heat, you sure were reluctant to get out of it.”

If he only knew.

He lingered in the lobby a few minutes more, pretending to look at a map of the exhibits. I caught his eyes wandering around the room, cataloguing the locks on the doors, the sprinklers in the ceiling, the sleepy-looking guard—wearing a blue volunteer vest—and where he was positioned. Then Collin looped his arm through mine and grinned. “Time to go inside.”

Watching the way he took in everything filled me with awe. A strange reaction to nefarious activities, and a true sign that this guy had crawled under my skin. Still, while I’d seen him in a few shady situations, I’d never seen him in full action. I pretended to check out exhibits, but my focus was too much on Collin. I wasn’t sure how closely he wanted me to stick to him, but when I stopped at an exhibit about colonists in the eighteen hundreds with genuine interest, Collin moved ahead of me, out of sight. Once he realized I wasn’t close, he came back and whispered in my ear, “We need to stick together.”

I nodded, but it was a waste of time. He’d already taken off again.

The museum was bigger than I expected. We hadn’t yet found the exhibit that displayed the wooden bowl, and I was beginning to wonder if the stupid thing was here. Several exhibits later, Collin’s shoulders tensed ever so slightly. No one else would have noticed but it was obvious to me since obsessively watching Collin Dailey had become my new hobby. I
really
needed to get a new one.

I stood next to him, staring into the case about Powhatan Indians and artifacts from the time of Pocahontas.

“It’s not here,” he hissed in my ear.

I tried not to visibly react, but this was my worst nightmare come true. Well, second worst. The first was what would happen if we didn’t get the bowl and close the gate in time.

He walked around a glass case. An empty platform at one end had a placard that read,
S
IXTEENTH-CENTURY CEREMONIAL BOWL
, P
OWHATAN TRIBE
.

I squinted in confusion. “I thought the bowl was Croatan.”

“It is. They’re fucking idiots who don’t know
shit
.” Good to know he was as worried about the bowl’s absence as I was. His head jerked up and he searched the room until his gaze landed on a volunteer moving toward us. He plastered on a smile. “Excuse me.” He gestured toward us. “We have a question.”

The elderly man wearing a blue vest stopped next to the case. The top of his head was so bald it was shiny, but the hair on the sides of his head was long and swept over the top in an attempt to hide it. “How can I help you?”

“Actually,” Collin said, “I was wondering about the piece that’s missing there.” He pointed to the empty spot. “Do you know where it’s gone?”

The volunteer smiled. “Oh, good question, and it’s a shame you’re going to miss it. The bowl was sent for cleaning, but will be back on display in two days. Some experts believe it was used in John Smith’s cleansing ceremony, before he was presented to Pocahontas’s father.”

Collin grinned, his mouth lifting higher on one side. “You don’t say. My girlfriend here is
obsessed
with anything to do with Pocahontas.” He wrapped an arm around my back and pulled me close to his body. “Aren’t you, Myrtle?”

Myrtle
? “I’m not sure I’d call it an obsession . . . ”

Collin cocked his head and leaned toward the man, lowering his voice into a conspiratorial tone. “Don’t let her fool you. She told me it all started when she saw the Disney movie when she was a little girl. She pretty much devoted her life to anything to do with the story of Pocahontas and John Smith after that. She has an entire room filled with anything to do with the topic and, I swear, she has over a hundred Pocahontas dolls.”

The volunteer’s eyes widened as he shot a concerned look at me. “Oh, my.”

“She even has a tattoo on her butt cheek. A heart shape that strangely enough resembles the princess herself, with a flaming arrow shot into it with the words
John Smith
trailing behind in smoke.”

“Oh. My.”

I turned slightly and grabbed a handful of my skirt. “Would you like to see it?”

The man swallowed, his eyes now on my legs and my slowly rising hem.

Collin tensed. “She really should be on one of those hoarder shows, but what are you going to do?” Collin asked with a half shrug. He squeezed me tighter. “I love her.”

“Those dolls are collector’s items, Fred, and you know it.” I gave the man a nod. “You can’t put a price on history, now can you?”

The volunteer looked confused. “That’s true.”

“And as for the tattoo . . . ” I lowered my voice. “Sometimes I just have to be
naughty
.” I gave a little shudder.

The volunteer brushed a long strand of hair out of his eyes to get a better look at me.

“Myrtle, behave,” Collin grumbled.

“Do you think Pocahontas
herself
touched the bowl?” I asked in a half whisper. “I’d give
anything
to see that.”

The man shook his head, checking out my legs again. “Unfortunately, it won’t be on display for two more days.”