The Taking (Seven Deadly Sins #3)(68)
Author: Erin McCarthy

He stood up, wincing, and moved gingerly to his dresser, where he pulled out clean clothes. “I’m going to shower and go have a meeting with him.” He glanced toward the door, and nodded to Chris, who was hovering with the book still in his hand, sucking hard on a cigarette. “I want you to go with Chris back to his house.”

Regan stood up too, pain shooting through her hip. She was worried about Felix’s plans, her palms sweaty, heart racing. “You’re going to confront him? I don’t know if that’s a good idea.”

“I have to.” Felix held his clothes with one hand, his other moving to his face to wipe sweat off his brow.

Regan wasn’t sure how much Felix knew, if he knew the purpose behind Beau marrying her. The words made her feel sick, but she needed to make sure he understood. “But it’s him, you know, he is the one who is trying to force Camille into me, so that he can be with her again.”

“I know. Which is why I need to do this. I have to make sure you’re safe, do you understand? It’s not fair to Camille either… she doesn’t want to be here.”

Regan thought of the pained plea on the video, Camille speaking through her. “No, she doesn’t. But what is he going to do to you?”

Felix just gave her a jaded smile. “There’s nothing he can do to me that he hasn’t already done. I have to do the right thing, Regan.”

What the hell was she supposed to say? She was steeped in a fluid world she didn’t understand, where she had no power and no knowledge, yet she was terrified something would happen to Felix. Something horrific beyond anything she could ever imagine.

“Be safe,” she whispered. “Call me as soon as you’re done.”

Then before she could change her mind and beg him to stay, to run away, to pretend none of this existed, she turned and fled the room, Chris on her heels, a wide-eyed stare on his face.

Chapter Nineteen

Felix watched Regan leave, then showered the grime off of himself in two minutes, and got dressed in clean clothes, wincing at the use of his fingers, still tender even though they were healing quickly. Having his nails torn out had been a new form of torture, a layer of pain and humiliation laid down over the agony of that brutal stretching sensation. His body still hurt everywhere, battered and screaming in protest with each step he took, but he tried to ignore it.

What was human pain when before the day was over he was going to die?

Regan argued with Chris. “No, I need to go to the house! You can come with me if you like, or you can go home. But either way, I’m going home.”

“I don’t think this is a good idea.” Chris kept pace with her on the sidewalk, puffing madly on a cigarette. “Did you see what we’re dealing with here? This is intense. This is freaky shit. Come home with me and wait for Felix to call you.”Except that Regan’s greatest fear was that Felix wasn’t going to call her. That something horrible was going to happen to him before he could stop it.

Which was why she was not going to sit around passive and worried, but instead was going to take action. “No.” She was fast-walking, and she turned quickly onto her block, digging in her pocket for her house keys.

“At least let me get Nelson’s camera. We can be back here in half an hour.”

“You go ahead. Meet me back here.”

“Don’t do anything,” he warned. “We want this recorded so Felix can see it if anything happens. And wait outside in the courtyard.”

“Of course.” She had no intention of waiting outside, but if it got rid of Chris, she would agree to anything. Regan crammed the key in the gate of her courtyard. Her courtyard. This was her house, her life, damn it. No one, dead or alive, had the right to manipulate it.

Running up the curving stairs, Regan paused on the Juliet balcony, hands on the railing, looking down at the spot where Camille had died. “Camille,” she whispered. “Tell me how to free you.”

There was no answer, not even a breeze stirring the foliage of her trees and potted bushes.

Frustrated, she tried the French doors into her bedroom and was surprised they were unlocked. Then again, that night she had left she hadn’t exactly been in a coherent frame of mind. Stepping in, she left the doors open behind her to air the stuffy room out.

And saw that Moira’s monkey was sitting on her bed again, his jaunty smile leering at her. She had always thought of the stuffed animal as comforting, but now, it triggered a shiver. There was something ominous about his presence in her still bedroom, like he was patiently waiting for her to return.

It wasn’t Moira moving it, that was what made it disturbing. If it had been her sister, that would be different, but this was Beau or Camille manipulating her possessions, her emotions, her peace of mind.

Not sure what to do now that she was standing in her bedroom, Regan dumped her handbag with Camille’s journal on the foot of the bed. “I want to help you,” she told the empty room, hoping Camille would somehow hear her. “I don’t want him to own you anymore either. He’s a terrible, bad man, and I want to help you find a way to get away from him and back to your family.”

The sense of urgency was pressing on Regan, and she turned in a circle, searching every corner of the room for something, anything, that would indicate Camille was there, that she existed. Maybe Camille was inside Regan for all she knew. Maybe she was lurking inside her body, her soul, her mind, waiting for the right moment to take over.

To own her.

Like Beau owned Felix. Like Camille owned Felix through his guilt. Like the past owned all of them.

The tick of the clock on her nightstand grew louder in the stillness and Regan spun around, sure she’d heard footsteps, but there was nothing.

Just her furniture, the smell of her scented candles, and the dance of dust motes across the sun streak from the doors. The hulking chest of drawers stood at attention and the monkey grinned.

And Moira walked out from behind the silk drapes.

Regan froze, tears springing to her eyes. It was her sister, her big sister, an eternal six years old, wearing her yellow satin Easter dress, white gloves on her delicate hands. Her caramel brown hair was carefully curled, and her lips had the gleam of the lipstick their mother had allowed them to wear that day twenty-plus years ago.

Moira was definitely there, solid, yet something about her shimmered at the edges, a fluidity to her form and movement that said she wasn’t real, wasn’t of this human world.

“Moira,” Regan whispered. “Do you know who I am?”