The Taking (Seven Deadly Sins #3)(20)
Author: Erin McCarthy

“No,” she whispered, shaking her head. “That’s for vampires. I think we just have a ghost. One who apparently needs fresh air.”

She had wanted to find something within the walls of her old house, and it looked like she had.

“Maybe they know where the hooch is hidden.”

“I’ll let you ask.”

“So what do we do?” He squeezed her hand back, his own voice a low murmur. “I feel like I’m waiting for the other shoe—or in this case, monkey—to drop.”

“I think we go out onto the balcony and act like nothing is wrong.”

“Well, I’m good at that. I act like nothing is wrong on a regular basis. But what if we walk through her or something?”

They shuffled forward, still holding hands.

“Oh God, don’t say that.”

But even as she was speaking, Regan felt a gust of air sweep over her, so cold and empty that it felt like the breath was being sucked right out of her lungs. She stopped, unable to move, the sensation frightening and unlike anything she’d ever felt, her hair whipping across her face like she was outside in a sharp wind. Then the air seemed to snap, and the rush of cold was gone as quickly as it had appeared.

She looked at Chris, unable to speak. His eyes were round, his breathing heavy. “Did you feel that?” he asked.

Regan nodded, still speechless.

“Screw the balcony. Let’s go get dinner and a drink.”

“Good idea,” she said, swallowing hard.

They edged forward, flicked up the doorstops, and pulled the French doors closed, then practically fell over each other getting down the stairs.

“I bought a haunted house,” she told Chris as they burst out onto the street. She was stunned, and not sure how she felt about the whole thing.

“Yes, you did. And for nine bajillion dollars. Guess you can’t even get haunted houses for cheap anymore.”

Chapter Five

Felix stood outside the coffee shop for a second, watching Regan through the window. She had her bag cuddled in her lap and she was reading a magazine—a pretty woman, and yet unremarkable in many ways. Just another attractive twenty-something mortal woman.

What was her connection to Alcroft? Why the hell had he married her? And what perverse chain of events had Felix set in motion when he had asked her to take off the ring that bound her body and soul to Alcroft?It was hard for him to believe that her husband would readily give in to a divorce. If he had wanted her, he wouldn’t have appreciated her being the one to walk away. If Alcroft was fighting the divorce, Felix was wading into dangerous, shark-infested waters.

But he had told himself that it was in his own self-interest to see what was in Camille’s journal. If he could protect Regan at the same time, all the better.

He walked in, strode around the front of her table, and sat down across from her.

Regan looked up with a tentative smile, her hair up in a ponytail. “Hi, how are you?”

She was wearing dark jeans and a white shirt. It was a casual outfit, yet somehow she still managed to look pulled together. Beyond pulled together, and veering in to uptight. Muted. It wasn’t that she was emotionally reserved, because he didn’t get that impression, but it was as if the clothes she chose were intended for someone else, for a corporate woman.

He didn’t know what Regan did for a living, if anything, but he didn’t for one minute think it was a corporate job.

“Hi. How was moving day?”

She made a face then laughed. “It’s over. Thank God.”

It had been a long time since he had thanked God for anything. “We always wish for the end of things, don’t we?” he said, just thinking out loud, but the smile fell off her face.

“Maybe,” she said.

There was a long pause, and he knew he’d made her uncomfortable. Well, he was uncomfortable, too. He was taking a huge risk meeting her in public. Meeting her anywhere.

“I’m sorry,” she said, breaking the silence first as she fiddled with the coffee cup in front of her. “I’m tired from the move, and well, I didn’t get much sleep last night. Do you want to go up and order a coffee?”

As if coffee could improve his lack of social skills. He’d had them at one time. He’d been the favorite pet of bored New Orleans society ladies, and he had charmed and talked his way into their hearts and their purses. Not anymore. Never again.

“I’m fine. Were you up late unpacking?” There had been something … a flicker in her eyes when she had mentioned her sleepless night, and he was curious what it meant.

“Oh, it was stupid.” She waved her hand in the air dismissively. “I thought someone was in the house and I freaked out. I called the cops and I called my friend to come over. He ended up staying the night and since I don’t have my guest bedroom made up, he ended up sharing my bed, and he snores. He’s g*y.”

Then she gave a laugh. “Not that you need to know that. But the point was I didn’t get eight hours of sleep.”

He didn’t need to know it, but it confirmed that she wasn’t letting another man into her bed already, so soon after the end of her marriage. It didn’t suit her to leap into another relationship, and he was arrogant enough to believe that if she wanted a hookup, she would have come to him. That was the power that had been granted him, after all, and he saw it on her face—she was attracted to him, as they all were.

Felix was attracted to her too, the first woman who had piqued his interest in a long, long time. But he would never touch. Not with her still legally bound to Alcroft, not while her ex still wanted her.

“Someone broke into the house? Was anything stolen?”

“No, nothing was stolen. I don’t think anyone was in the house after all. Well, not a thief.” She bit her lip. “I have a weird and random question for you, but I figure given what you do, what you practice, you’re open-minded, right? I mean, you believe in the unexplainable, don’t you?”

Felix found that amusing. “I believe in a lot of things. I believe there are things out there that not only can we not explain, we could never even imagine them in our rational day-to-day lives.” Like the existence of demons, and the possibility of immortality. He had no idea what she was dancing around telling him, but nothing would surprise him. “I won’t judge, Regan.”

She glanced around them. “I don’t know if I should say it here.”

The coffee shop had a dozen patrons in it, some with laptops, some reading the paper, some chatting with each other, all different types, from the heavily tattooed and dyed woman in her early twenties to the graying businessman.