Vanished
Vanished
Maureen Child
She was his destiny reborn!Forever fated to defend humanity against demons, immortal Guardian Rogan has given up all hope of finding peace. But when a beautiful woman unexpectedly appears, she reawakens the warrior’s long-buried desire… Alison came to Ireland duty-bound to tell Rogan of a sinister premonition, only to be rebuffed.Then evil strikes when her sister mysteriously disappears, and Rogan has the power to protect Aly from a fate worse than death. Can this brooding warrior be her Destined Mate – the key to a forgotten past, and to her future?
Rogan moved closer, until he could feel her body heat.
“I’ve no use for seers, Alison Blair. And even less for their servants.”
Aly swallowed hard and he could see the agitation suddenly take hold of her. Still she kept her gaze fixed on his. “I’m no one’s servant.”
“And yet here you stand at their beck and call.”
“It’s my duty.”
“And now you’ve done it and it’s past time for me to be doing mine,” he muttered thickly, grabbing her upper arm to steer her out of his house.
But as he touched her, something unexpected happened. Something dazzling. An arc of what could have been lightning jolted between them. White-hot heat – and something more – sizzled in the air and Rogan released her instantly.
He knew that sizzle and flash.
He’d felt it just once before.
For his Destined Mate.
But she had been dead for hundreds of years.
Maureen Child is a California native who loves to travel. Every chance they get, she and her husband are taking off on another research trip. An author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.
Vanished
By
Maureen Child
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk/)
To the Staunton family at Knight’s Cottage
Shanvallyard, Tourmakeady, Ireland.
Thank you for your warm welcome
and for making our stay in Ireland so memorable.
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#uf80deb03-121e-563c-b678-2679cc2f25a6)
Excerpt (#u9bc8f59c-9ca4-5ee7-b709-1e5e27dd66dc)
About The Author (#u7ad061bc-d878-5320-a36c-c48849831068)
Title Page (#u21f7e1b1-6fe1-5d4f-9095-2c88b1a96f42)
Dedication (#u6b1886b4-5711-573a-970e-5f3153e32b76)
Chapter 1 (#udbb2ebbd-29d5-5dcd-9278-9b87c7314295)
Chapter 2 (#ua3872134-4e6e-5050-a35c-a504e38cf43e)
Chapter 3 (#u7e874eea-b8f6-5528-944b-26999231bea7)
Chapter 4 (#u23495cd1-5e87-5c48-9c18-9f8ce889f93a)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Preview (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1
In Ireland, two thousand people vanish every year.
The Irish countryside was quiet and the darkness was absolute, as it could only be far from the lights of a city. Here, beside the narrow road that led to Westport, the night felt empty, but for the squares of lamplight in the distance, marking the places where farmhouses stood in silence.
In the grassy field, ancient tombstones tipped and tilted crazily as if they’d been dropped from heaven and left to stand as they fell. Trees bent in the wind, and their bare limbs clattered like a muttered conversation. A fairy mound rose from the ground and lay littered with wildflowers that looked black and white in the starlight. A sigh of something ancient whispered in the darkness, and far away, a dog moaned into the quiet.
A young woman stood in the center of the stones, as she’d been told. She waited, impatiently checking her wristwatch and shrugging away the superstitious twitch at the base of her spine. The stones were eerie enough during the day, but at night, when the sky was black but for the stars, the woman half expected ghosts to rise up and chase her out of their graveyard.
The woman shivered again at the thoughts jostling through her mind and shrugged deeper into her coat. There was nothing to fear, after all. Hadn’t she grown up here? Didn’t she know this road to Westport well enough to travel it in her sleep?
No, the only thing to worry her was that maybe the man she waited for had forgotten his promise to meet her. Maybe he was with someone else. Maybe…
“Darlin’,” a deep voice whispered from close by. “I knew you’d come. I’ve been waiting for you.”
She whirled around, a smile of welcome on her face. Something blacker than the darkness rushed at her. She screamed as a howl lifted into the air, and a moment later the cemetery lay empty in the night.
“What was that?” Alison Blair stopped dead and felt the small hairs at the back of her neck stand straight up.
The long, undulating howl still quavered in the air as she stared back down the road into the darkness.
“A dog, no doubt,” the guard at the wrought-iron gate muttered in an Irish accent so thick it almost sounded as though he were speaking Gaelic.
“Scary dog,” Aly muttered, turning back to watch as the big man studied her ID card. Frowning, she said, “It’s not a forgery, you know.”
He flicked a glance at her from under thick black brows, and she deliberately lifted her chin and met that stony stare with one of her own.
The man nodded in approval, then said, “There’ll be hell to pay when the boss hears you’ve come.”
“I know.” As a member of the Guardian Society, Aly knew she would be as welcome here as a flu virus.
Even in the best of circumstances, Immortal Guardians weren’t exactly the most hospitable people in the universe. They lived alone, worked in secret and protected their real identities from a world filled with people who would never understand.
Chosen at the moment of their death, the Guardians were given the choice of either moving on to whatever awaited them or accepting immortality and the task of defending humankind against the demon threat. The Guardians were devoted to doing their duty and in general preferred to do that duty with as little interference as possible.
Both from humanity and the Society.
The Society had existed as long as the Guardians themselves. Generation after generation the families who belonged to the Society had worked with the Guardians. Some of those Guardians reluctantly accepted the help of the Society, and some…didn’t.
Rogan Butler, Irish warrior and a Guardian centuries old, fell into the latter category.
“As you can see,” she said, reaching out to take the papers identifying herself as a Society member, “I am who I say I am, and I need to see Rogan Butler immediately.”
“He’ll not be happy.”
“Fortunately,” she said, “his happiness is not my responsibility.”
She really should have waited until morning to come and beard the lion in his den or lair, she thought, turning her gaze to the two-storied manor house beyond the iron gate. But she’d flown in from Chicago expressly for this meeting, and she wanted it over and done with.
Of course, if her sister Casey had bothered to come along with her, Aly thought, she wouldn’t be feeling so on edge. Strength in numbers, after all. But though she’d been happy enough to come along on the trip to Ireland, Casey had insisted on reminding Aly that she wasn’t a member of the Society. Casey had been the first member of the Blair family for centuries to not pick up her hereditary calling.
And Aly remembered clearly the argument they’d had at the B and B just an hour ago.
“You could come with me just for moral support,” Alison had said as she and her sister fought for space in front of the tiny bathroom mirror.
“Oh, right. That sounds like a good time.” Casey tugged at the hem of her V-necked, red T-shirt until it showed just enough of her breasts, then smiled at her elder sister. “Look, Aly, this secret-agent thing is your deal. Not mine. I didn’t join the Society, remember?”
Aly scowled, hip-checked Casey out of her way and pulled her long, thick blond hair into a ponytail at the base of her neck. Then she wrapped the elastic band with a dark blue scarf and let the ends trail across her shoulders. Staring into the mirror, she gave herself the once-over before answering her sister. Dark blue jacket, white button-down oxford shirt tucked into dark blue jeans and black boots. She looked fine. Businesslike but casual. Friendly but stern.
Then she rolled her eyes at her own thoughts and turned from the mirror to face Casey. “Yes, I remember that you didn’t join the Society. I’m not asking you to be officially there. I was just looking for some company.”
Casey muscled her way in front of Aly to check her own reflection again. She fluffed her short, dark blond hair and shrugged. “I don’t know why you’re so nervous about this. Rogan Butler isn’t the first Guardian you’ve ever spoken to.”
“True.” Aly sat down on the edge of the bathtub, stretched out her legs and said, “But he’s the first one who refused to talk to me on the phone. And our psychics refused to call the Ireland office so one of their members could deliver the message in person, so…”
Casey shook her head, fluffed her hair again and leaned in to smooth another layer of dark red lipstick on her mouth. When she was finished, she straightened up, smiled at her reflection and said, “Imagine that. Jealous psychics. Aren’t they supposed to be above all that?”
“They should be,” Aly admitted. “But you know how they are. Especially Reginald.”
“You’re defining the reasons I didn’t want to join the Society, Aly,” Casey said. “No way do I want to spend all my time trying to soothe cosmic egos.”
And maybe she had a point, Aly thought now, grimly steeling herself for her meeting with the Irish bully known as Rogan Butler.
“Well, then,” the guard said, his musical accent rising up and down as he spoke. “I’ll get the gate. Just drive on up to the manor. You’ll be met.”
Aly got back into her car and swallowed hard as the guard unlocked the gates and swung them open. She steered her car, absentmindedly noting the tidy lawn and the spill of golden lamplight pouring from the lead glass windows of the manor and lying across the gravel drive.
Aly’s stomach pitched a little, and she told herself to get a grip. She wouldn’t allow a Guardian to make her nervous. As a member of the Society, she had every right—no, a duty—to give him the information the Chicago psychics had discovered.
She parked the car directly in front of the double doors and stepped out, pocketing the keys. Grabbing her purse, she headed for the house and stopped dead when those double doors were pulled open and a giant of a man stood backlit against the entryway.
Rogan Butler.
It had to be.
His shoulders were broad, his hips were narrow and his legs were long and thick with muscles. His black hair hung loose past his shoulders and lifted in the icy wind like a battle flag. As she watched, he folded massive arms across an impressive chest and stared down at her.
“Alison Blair?” His accent was, if possible, even thicker than that of the man at the gate. And his voice was like thunder. Deep and powerful.
“Yes.” Apparently his security man had alerted him to her identity. “And you’re Rogan Butler.”
“I am. Why’ve you come?”
So much for niceties. “Because you wouldn’t take my phone call.”
“I had no wish to speak with you. I still don’t.”
Limned in lamplight, his features were in shadow, but Aly didn’t have to see his face to know he was frowning. She could feel his scowl, his irritation, flowing from him in thick waves.
Her nerves jittered a little, and for one moment she wished she were anywhere but there. But there hadn’t been another available Chicago Society member to make the trip, and the Society psychics so guarded their “visions” they hadn’t wanted to call Ireland and get one of the local members to deliver the message.
So, here she was. Facing down one of the most legendary of the Guardians, and she had to fight to keep from getting back into her car and driving away. But if she did that, she’d never live it down.
“The Society will find no welcome here.” He said it briskly, as if already dismissing her.
“We’re not your enemy, you know,” Aly countered quickly. “We’re on the same side. Fighting the same war.”
“Is that what you think, then?” He came down one of the steps and stopped. “And how many demons have you fought, Alison Blair?”
“None, but—”
“A thousand and more demons have fallen beneath my blade. All without the help you’ve come so far to offer.”
“The Society is—”
“Useless?” he offered.
“There’s no reason to be insulting, either.” She walked toward him, forcing her feet to move despite the fact that her muscles were locked up as if desperately trying to keep her in one place. “I’ve come with an important message and I’m not leaving until I’ve delivered it.”
He blew out a breath and came down the remaining steps until he stood on the drive right in front of her. Aly tipped her head back to stare up into his eyes. Green, she thought. A shining, clear green that seemed almost iridescent in the pale light. His jaw was hard and square and bristled with a day’s growth of whiskers. His mouth was firm and flattened into a disapproving line, and his heavy black brows were drawn down on his forehead.
He was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen.
And despite the fact that his irritation still simmered in the air around him, Aly felt a small twist of something hot and needy bubble into life inside her.
Which was just unacceptable.
“Fine, then deliver your message and be on your way.”
“If you don’t mind, I’d rather not discuss this outside.”
“You’re a prissy little thing, aren’t you?”
“Prissy? Prissy?” Narrowing her eyes on him, she said, “I’m an official representative of the Guardian Society. I’ve just spent twelve hours in a plane to get here. Then I had to rent a car and try not to nod off at the wheel while I forced myself to drive on the wrong side of the road.” He opened his mouth as if to speak, but she kept right on, feeling her sense of righteous indignation build up and spill over. “The hotel lost my reservation, and my sister and I had to search for a local B and B. After getting to our room, instead of having a meal or taking a much-needed nap—or even, God help me, going for a drink with my sister—I got in that blasted car with the steering wheel on the wrong side of the damn thing and drove straight here, only to be treated like a common criminal by your security thugs and now to be insulted by you. If it weren’t in humanity’s best interests to give you this message, believe me when I say I’d as soon keep my mouth shut, turn around and go home.”
When she finally ran down, Aly took a breath and waited for him to order her off his property. Fine. She hadn’t handled her first official assignment very well, but she’d like to have seen anyone else handle it better.
“Well, then,” he said after an impossibly long moment, “you’d best come inside and give me this all-important message.”
He stepped back and waved an arm, silently inviting her to precede him into the house. Lifting her chin, she did just that, taking the steps slowly as jet lag began taking its toll.
She stepped into the entryway and paused just for a moment to take a quick look around. Polished wood floors gleamed in the lamplight, and colorful rugs were scattered along the narrow hall that stretched off to the back end of the house. To her left was a formal sitting room and to her right what looked to be a library. A fire roared in the stone hearth, wall sconces shaped like oil lanterns threw soft, electric light onto the paneled walls and over-stuffed furniture in shades of forest green and burgundy offered comfort. The walls were lined with bookshelves, and every table top was crowded with towering piles of hardcover books.
She loved the room immediately.
“This way,” he said and walked past her into the clearly masculine room. Making directly for an escritoire, he opened the carved doors to reveal crystal decanters and drinking glasses. “You’ll have a drink, then tell me.”
“No, thank you.”
“You look as though you’re ready to keel over,” he said, dismissing her argument as he poured amber-colored liquor into two glasses. “A little of the Irish will set you straight in no time.”
He came back to her and handed her one of the glasses. She took a sniff and frowned. “I don’t really drink whiskey.”
Tossing his own drink back, he swallowed, then said, “This is Paddy’s. It’s like no other. Drink it down and tell me what you’ve come to say.”
Easier to do as he wanted rather than fight him on something that didn’t seem very important. Mimicking his action, Aly took a breath, lifted her glass and poured the liquor down her throat in a straight shot.
Instantly, fire bloomed inside and stole her breath. Gasping a little, she handed the glass back to him and slapped one hand to her chest. “Thanks,” she managed to say when she was able to choke out a word.
Rogan set the glasses down onto the nearest table top and watched the woman who’d come all the way from the United States to see him. He had no use for the Guardian Society. He was a warrior and had managed, since the day of his death in 1014, to battle demons without the help of those who thought themselves to be a part of the Guardian legacy.
There were others, friends of his, who had made use of the Society from time to time, but Rogan believed a man worked better when he was alone, a hard lesson he’d learned centuries ago and one he kept always in the forefront of his mind. He needed nothing from anyone and wanted no “help” in performing his duty.
He’d been ready to order Alison Blair off his property when she’d found her spine and given him a dressing-down like no one had dared to do in centuries. And with that outburst of temper, she’d won a glimmer of admiration from him, a glimmer strong enough to allow her into his home—however briefly.
“Say what you must, then, and be on your way.”
“If this is Irish hospitality, it’s sadly lacking.”
“Ah, but you’re not a guest now, are you?” He turned from her, walked to his favorite chair and sat down, kicking both legs out in front of him and crossing his feet at the ankles. “You say you’ve a mission to fulfill. Then fulfill it and be done.”
He watched her and saw anger flash in her blue eyes quickly before she was able to hide it from him. Instantly, he wondered what kind of woman it was who buried her emotions so completely. The women he’d known in his life had all worn their hearts in the open, risking bruising and hurt but unable to do anything else.
And as that thought sneaked into his consciousness, it was followed by an ancient memory, one he rarely allowed himself to entertain. The image of a woman rose up in his mind. Her long, black hair flying about her head in the sea wind. Her blue eyes shining, laughing. Her mouth curved in welcome for him. And before he could pause a moment to enjoy them, the images shifted, changed, becoming the nightmare that haunted him still from time to time.
Rogan shut off his thoughts with the ease of long practice and turned his focus to the woman still standing across the room from him. Irritated suddenly, he said, “Sit, will you? And say what you’ve come to say.”
Her boot steps were muffled on the thick carpets as she moved to the chair nearest him. She perched on the edge of the chair, folded her hands in her lap and squeezed until her knuckles turned white. That was the only sign of her agitation, and again Rogan was forced to admire her self-control.
While the fire crackled and hissed in the hearth and tree limbs driven by the ever-present Irish wind scratched at the windowpanes, she watched him steadily for a long moment. Then she said softly, “One of the Chicago seers has had a vision.”
He gave her a half smile. “Wouldn’t that be a seer’s job?”
She didn’t answer that jibe. Instead, she began to give him a bloody lecture.
Her surprisingly prim voice carried just over the hiss of the fire. “As you know, the Society psychics are some of the most powerful in the world. Society membership is hereditary. For centuries, the same families have protected the secrets of the Guardians and done all we can to help you in your fight against the demon incursion—”
Scowling, he snapped, “If you’ve come only to give me a history lesson, Alison Blair, I’ll remind you I’ve been living history for longer than you would care to consider.”
She frowned right back at him. “Each generation, ” she said, a bit louder than before, as if daring him to try to talk over her, “more psychics are born into the Society, and with each generation one or two of those seers has incredible strength.”
“And would you be one of those with the power of second sight, darlin’?”
“I would not,” she said, pausing just long enough to give him an irritated nod. “I have some psychic abilities but nothing in the range of the seers. Reginald, the seer who sent me here, is extremely powerful. His visions are always clear. His messages have saved countless lives, including those of your fellow Guardians.”
“We’re immortal, love,” he said, hooking his arms behind his head in a lazy move that belied the tension coiling in the pit of his belly. “We’ve no lives to be saved.”
“Immortal, yes, but you can be desperately wounded, taking years to recover.”
Annoyed, he said, “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know.”
“I’m trying to impress on you just how important it is for you to listen to Reginald’s message.”
“Then deliver it, by damn.”
She drew her head back and stared at him. In the firelight, her blue eyes shone with the reflection of the flames until it looked as though light were dancing within her. Her mouth was tight, her posture was so stiff it was as if she’d a poker stuffed down the back of her jacket and her knotted fingers were almost white with her repressed fury.
“You are the rudest man I’ve ever met.”
He brushed that aside. “Ah, but I’m not a man, am I? Besides, you’ve not seen rude yet, Alison Blair, but if you don’t get on with it, you very well may.”
She ground her teeth together as if trapping inside words that wanted to spill from her mouth. It was almost entertaining to watch. Almost. But time was flying by and Rogan had no interest in sitting by the fire with a woman, no matter how attractive he found her; it was past time for him to be out on the hunt.
“Fine, then,” she said after a long moment’s pause. “Reginald has seen the rise of a very dangerous power. Here. Soon.”
He laughed. And when her features stiffened in shock, he laughed harder. “This is the so important message? Your seer’s looked beyond the veil and seen trouble, has he?” He rubbed his jaw and pretended to give the matter great thought. “What kind of trouble do you think, then? Could it be…demons?”
“Are you really so arrogant you can’t accept help when it’s offered?”
“I don’t need your help. Or apparently the help of your gifted seer. I know there’s trouble, don’t I?” He stood up and looked down at her from his great height. “Demons are nothing new to me, Alison Blair.”
“This isn’t an ordinary demon,” she said quietly, as if she were measuring each word and weighting it down with patience before speaking it. “Reginald saw an extreme amount of energy surrounding the nearest portal. He says that it’s building daily and that there’s a danger beyond the normal threat.”
Rogan scowled at her and thought about the seer’s message. He’d known for days now that something unusual was happening. There had been reported cases of people mysteriously vanishing all over Ireland. And there’d been more demon activity lately as well. He didn’t like any of it.
She stood up and that flicker of admiration, respect he’d felt for her earlier, sharpened a bit. She wasn’t put off by his great size or by the reputation and legends surrounding him. He’d give her points for foolhardy bravery if nothing else.
“I’ll do what I can to look into the seer’s vision,” he said, though it cost him. He didn’t want to take orders from a psychic. Nor from a woman.
“Thank you. I’ll make my report to the Society.”
“You do that.”
“You don’t have to like me or the Society,” she said, clearly irritated that he wasn’t more appreciative of the effort she’d gone to in delivering this oh-so-very-vague message. “But you could at least show some respect.”
“Respect?” His voice boomed out before he could stop it. “For psychics and seers who sit in the background and make proclamations? Who have visions too late to help? Who see things that can’t be changed and then demand reverence for their faulty abilities?” Rogan moved in closer, until he could feel her body heat reaching out to him. Rage pounded in his brain and thundered through his veins.
“The psychics do their best,” she countered, blindly defending the group that was her family’s legacy. “Visions aren’t always clear.”
“Aye,” he agreed, feeling the fury threaten to overcome him. “But they don’t admit to mistakes, do they? No. They speak as if from the Mount and expect all to listen and revere. Well, I’ve no use for seers, Alison Blair. And even less use for their servants.”
She swallowed hard and he could see agitation suddenly take hold of her. Still, she kept her gaze fixed with his. “I’m no one’s servant.”
“And yet here you stand, at their beck and call.”
“It’s my duty.”
“And now you’ve done it, and it’s past time for me to be doing mine,” he muttered thickly, grabbing her upper arm to steer her out of his house.
But as he touched her, something unexpected happened, something dazzling. An arc of what could have been lightning jolted between them. White-hot heat and something more sizzled in the air, and Rogan released her instantly.
He knew that sizzle and flash.
He’d felt it just once before.
For his Destined Mate.
But she had been dead for hundreds of years.
Chapter 2
Casey tapped the toe of her shoe to the insistent beat of the traditional Irish music pouring out of the pub behind her. Even here on the sidewalk, the music was rich and full, making her consider going back inside despite how tired she was. With drums, pipes and fiddles, the small group of people huddled in a corner of the pub had the locals dancing and the tourists wishing they knew how to step dance.
Her first day in Ireland and already she was in love with the country. The cold, Irish wind buffeted her, the Guinness she’d drunk warmed her from the inside and fuzzed her jet-lagged mind into a kind of easy fog and the tidy streets of Westport made her feel safer than she ever had back home in Chicago. Even now, when it was nearly midnight, she wasn’t worried to be alone on a street corner waiting for the taxi she’d called.
And, okay, maybe that was foolish, but she wasn’t going to obsess about it. She’d stay in the light of the pub, within shouting distance of help, if she needed it. But she wouldn’t. The people were all so friendly. She’d talked all night, tried a dance step or two and then laughed like a loon when she hadn’t been able to keep up with an elderly man who, though he had to be at least a hundred years old, was as light on his toes as a ballet dancer.
The night had been a great welcome to Ireland, one her sister had missed. “Poor Aly. Off being the dutiful little soldier when she could have been here having fun.”
In the pub, the music abruptly shifted from a wildly paced tune called “Finnegan’s Wake” to something slow and sad and just a little dreamy. Casey sighed as the notes soared into the night and told herself that this sense of freedom she was experiencing was exactly why she hadn’t wanted to accept her legacy and join the Society.
For centuries, her family had served the Guardians. And what had they gotten for it? Very little. Heck, the Guardians themselves barely tolerated Society members. The pay was stingy, the respect was almost nonexistent and because you took an oath of secrecy, you couldn’t even tell your friends what you did for a living!
“No, thank you,” she muttered as if she were having the familiar argument with her elder sister. Aly had been working for the Society since she was eighteen. She’d been the “good” daughter, the obedient one, the one who did whatever their parents expected of her. She’d been sucked into the secretive Society and had immersed herself in the traditions and rules, much as their parents had. Aly bought into the mentality of serving humanity and helping the Guardians, and Casey had never been able to change her mind.
Well, for Casey it was different. She’d never been convinced that the “demon threat” was all that horrifying. After all, the demons had been trying to take over humankind for thousands of years and they hadn’t succeeded yet. How terrifying could they possibly be? No. She was more convinced that it was Guardian propaganda that had kept the Society members in practical servitude for centuries.
“They’re no better than cosmic bullies,” she muttered. “Ordering us around like we’re peasants, then ignoring us when it suits them. Ten to one, Rogan Butler didn’t even let Aly get close enough to deliver her stupid message.”
Shaking her head, Casey determinedly turned her mind from her sister and the Guardian she was sent to meet. After all, it was so not her problem. She was here to enjoy herself, and that’s just what she was going to do.
“But where is the stupid taxi?”
Another gust of icy ocean air blew in off Clew Bay and wrapped itself around Casey like a long-lost lover. She shivered a little and wished she’d worn a heavier jacket. But the black leather had gone so well with her outfit that she hadn’t wanted to spoil her look.
A voice drifted to her, and she turned toward the sound. Just across the wide street, a three-foot-high stone wall separated the road from the Carrowbeg River. The length of the wall was dotted with trees and old-fashioned streetlamps that offered more in ambiance than in actual lighting.
She listened harder, but when she didn’t hear anything more, she brushed it off and again stared down the street, willing her taxi to appear.
“Help me…”
There it was again. A sigh almost lost in the rush of the river and the whisper of the wind, never mind the music still erupting inside the pub. Frowning, she thought about stepping into the pub to get assistance but then reconsidered. If she was imagining the call—and chances of that were good, since she was so tired she could hardly stand upright—she’d look like a fool.
Quickly, she looked up and down the street and then crossed the road in a fast trot that had her boot steps echoing softly around her. Clutching the edges of her jacket together, she walked up to the short stone fence and stared down into the fastmoving river. She didn’t see anyone, didn’t hear anyone, so she must be more jet-lagged than she’d thought.
Despite the streetlamps, it was darker here than it had been in front of the noisy pub. Shadows were everywhere, crouching in patches of deeper black, and Casey was suddenly uneasy. She glanced around her but saw no one. Nothing. Yet the sensation of being watched was so real, so bone-deep certain she couldn’t shake it. A chill snaked along her spine. She looked back at the pub and took comfort in the bright splash of light streaming through the wide front window. She wasn’t alone. Help was just a shout away.
“You’ve come…”
A voice. Deep, musical, mesmerizing. Casey pulled in a long, deep breath, then let it slide slowly from her lungs. She swayed and felt her head go light, as if a fog had slipped into her mind, shrouding her thoughts, wrapping her brain in a haze that grew thicker with every beat of her heart. She shook her head, tried to clear it, but the fog remained, thick, warm.
“Who are you? Where are you?” She held her breath and waited for that compelling, soothing, completely sexual voice again.
“Ah, darlin’…I’ve been waitin’…”
“Yes,” she whispered, licking her lips, sighing as unseen fingers moved over her body, stroking, touching, enticing.
A shadow lifted from the earth, twisting in the wind, contorting itself, writhing as if fighting to come into existence.
Casey couldn’t move.
Couldn’t speak.
She could only watch, breathlessly.
And the dark came alive. A howl lifted into the air, and a moment later the river walk was empty.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do,” Aly said, rubbing her upper arm with her free hand as if trying to ease a bone-deep burn. Where he’d grabbed her, her skin still tingled, still hummed with the unexpected charge of electricity that had arced between them.
She’d been a member of the Society for more than ten years. She spent her days researching the different Guardians and the legends and tales that surrounded them. She knew all about the myth of Destined Mates. And she’d read about the bonding that happened between them, the link that sprang to life at first touch and how that link became stronger over time.
Well, no, thank you.
“I’ve no idea what you’re blatherin’ about,” Rogan muttered and didn’t look any too happy about the situation himself.
Although, he hadn’t been exactly a cheery man since he’d first opened his door for her. So, that probably didn’t mean anything.
“I know the legends,” she said, just to make sure he knew exactly how she felt about this. She wanted no mistakes, no misunderstandings. She was here to do a job, see a little of Ireland, then go home. “The Destined Mate thing? I know all about it, and you should know, I’m so not interested.”
“Don’t recall asking you to be interested.”
She ignored that, as she ignored the sizzle in her blood and the near-overpowering sense of recognition her soul was feeling. No, no, no. “I’ve got a life, thanks, and I’m not looking to subjugate myself to some medieval warrior who doesn’t even know the meaning of common courtesy. And now that I’ve done what I was sent here to do, I’m gone.”
“Be on your way, then.” He swung one muscular arm out in a wide arc, showing her the way out as if she couldn’t remember it for herself. “No one’s keepin’ you.”
“Fine.” Everything in her yearned to stay. Feelings she didn’t want crowded her mind, her heart, but she ruthlessly shut them down. Clearly, she’d been spending too much time at work and not enough time building a social life. If she could be this attracted to a crabby, overbearing Guardian, she really needed to get out more.
She turned on her heel and started for the front door. Just as she stepped into the entryway, though, she looked back at him. The fire crackled behind him, flames dancing in the hearth. Lamplight fell down onto him, making the black of his hair gleam almost blue. Those pale green eyes of his sparkled and shone with a glint of fury she hadn’t noticed a moment before, and his full mouth was flattened into a grim slash.
God, he was amazing. Her body burned, but her mind was in control. And she was glad to see that he was no happier about that little jolt of something sizzling than she was. Then they could both ignore whatever it had been and go on with their lives. As it should be.
“Good luck with your demon hunting.”
He folded his arms over that incredibly broad chest and muttered, “And you go back to your seer. Tell him I’ve no interest in anything he has to say.”
She left him there in that wonderful room and told herself as she went that the buzzing in her blood had nothing to do with his touch.
After Alison Blair left, Rogan found he couldn’t settle. His own home, the place he’d lived in for more than two hundred years, felt like a prison cell. It was as if the walls were closing in on him and air was too hard to come by. Damn woman should never have come.
The blasted Society had had no business sending her to him. He hadn’t taken their calls, had he? Wasn’t that plain enough that he’d no wish to hear from them? He prowled the confines of his library and found no pleasure in the books he’d collected over the lengthy span of his lifetime. He slapped both hands onto the Connemara marble mantel and stared down into the flames leaping and dancing in the hearth. Shadows flickered and lights shifted, and in the fire’s depths he saw Alison Blair’s face again and the surprise in her eyes when his touch had sparked off feelings neither of them wanted.
“Blast the woman,” he muttered, feeling the hot, roiling ball of fury build in his gut and churn viciously. And as he closed his eyes to the image of her, he made a solemn vow. “I’ll not do it again. I’ll not be led by my cock for the amusement of the Fates.”
And just saying the words aloud refocused his strength. Reminded him of who and what he was. Rogan Butler. Guardian. Warrior. And the softness of a woman had no place in his life—his was a world of blood and death.
That thought spurred him into action. He wasn’t a man to stand still. Pushing away from the fireplace, he strode from the room, his long legs moving quickly, silently through the house. What he needed right now was a battle. Clean. Simple. He gathered his weapons, threw on his coat and went on the hunt.
As Rogan moved through the bitter, cold night, his long black coat slapping around his legs, he searched for a telltale swirl of demonic energy that would steer him in the right direction. Trace signatures left behind when a demon entered our dimension were invisible to humans, but to Guardians they appeared as faint washes of color.
“There you are, you bastard,” he murmured, as his gaze caught a faint swirl of deep orange streaking through the stand of woods at the edge of Lough Mask.
The bitter taste of it was on the wind, and he turned, lifting his face, scenting his prey. His senses honed to a keen edge, Rogan sprinted soundlessly through the woods. The surface of Lough Mask looked like tarnished silver lying beneath a sliver of moon. The stars shone brilliantly in a black sky but shed little light on the countryside.
But Rogan didn’t need light for his work. This he knew better than anyone else alive. He was one of the oldest Guardians, and he’d been fighting demons for what seemed an eternity. Scenting the air again, he smiled grimly and lost himself in the trees. His steps were silent, his breathing steady and hushed. His gaze swept the terrain he knew as well as he knew the layout of his own home.
This was his country. He’d lived and died in Ireland and chose to remain here as one of the Guardians who defended the island against demon encroachment. He was Irish to the bone, and this very ground was a part of him. He’d traveled the globe and never found another spot like this one. Always, he’d been drawn back here, to County Mayo, where Gaelic was still spoken, as it should be. The old ways were remembered here. Revered.
Here no farmer would think to run a tractor across a fairy mound—unwilling to risk angering the little people. Here trees were left to stand tall in the fields and crops were planted around them. Here ruins of castles echoed with the ghosts of warriors long dead.
And here his own memories both comforted and tormented him.
The wind on the water churned whitecaps that slapped at the surface of the lake and sounded like hundreds of cats lapping at cream. The trees around him bent and swayed. His eyes narrowed, and every one of his Guardian senses reached into the darkness. The scent was clear, but the faint wash of orange had dissipated in the wind.
A crack of a twig.
A hiss of breath.
Rogan spun about and pounced.
The burly demon had thought to sneak up on him and Rogan would have laughed at the very idea, but he was too busy, swinging a sword he had carried for eons. The very balance of the heavy blade felt a part of him, an extension of his arm as he whipped it through the air with such power the wind sang as it caressed the finely honed metal.
His blade hit home with a smack of steel against flesh. The demon howled in fury and pain and charged Rogan in desperation. Wild, burning eyes flashed in the darkness and long, lethal claws swiped at him. But Rogan was more than ready. He’d been bred to fight, and over the hundreds of years that had passed since his death, his abilities with a blade had become legendary—even among the Guardians.
The demon snarled, his jaw dropping to reveal jagged teeth nearly two inches long. The stench of demon blood fouled the air and Rogan hissed in a breath. His heart pounded frantically and his blood rushed. He dropped into a crouch, swinging his blade in another wide arc from which the demon leaped back to avoid. Minutes ticked past, and the wind around him tossed dirt and leaves into the air.
And Rogan hardly noticed. His focus was on his opponent. On the battle. He fought because it was his duty. Because a warrior was all he was.
Because he knew nothing else.
Again and again they clashed viciously. The defender and the beast. “You should have stayed in hell, demon. There’s no place in Ireland for the likes of you.”
The demon spat at him, and its saliva mixed with blood, bubbling into a frothy acid on the ground at Rogan’s feet. “Guardians are few and we are many.”
Rogan leaped through the air, and as he came down, he brought the hilt of his sword crashing into the demon’s skull. The solid hit staggered the beast, and it dropped to the earth, stunned. Rogan planted one boot on the small of its back and held it pinned to the ground while it cursed and screamed. In a moment he’d secure the bloody damn thing and cart it off back to the portal and its rightful dimension. Demons were hard to kill here on this plane. The most a Guardian could do was capture it and send it back to hell.
“Bastard!” The demon twisted and writhed in a futile effort to free itself. “You’ll pay for this! I’ll see to it! Armies of demons will descend on you and yours.”
Rogan stepped heavier on the beast until it ran out of air to shout with. “Many you may be,” he agreed, smiling now that the fight was ended, “but we’ll outlast the lot of you.”
And while his captive fought desperately to escape him, Rogan slid his sword into its scabbard and lifted his face to the night sky. Victory and one less demon to threaten humankind this night. He’d done his duty. Done what he was meant to do.
Yet still the emptiness inside him rattled as it had for too many years to count.
“Casey?” Aly called quietly and stepped into their shared bedroom at the Radharc na Oilean B and B on the banks of Lough Mask. There were two twin beds covered by handmade quilts in beautiful shades of blues and greens. A wide dormer window overlooked the fields stretching out behind the farmhouse, and the lamp on the small table between the beds gave off a soft, warm glow.
Along with enough light for Aly to see that Casey wasn’t back yet.
A flicker of worry sputtered into life inside her, but Aly told herself to calm down. She closed the door behind her, crossed the room and stared out at the sweep of open fields that lay at the feet of the Partry Mountains. There wasn’t enough moonlight to see much, but she made out the blurred white patches of the sheep huddling together in the field for warmth. The end of March in Ireland was cold, even for the animals used to the biting wind.
Turning back around, Aly frowned as she stared at her sister’s empty bed but told herself that Casey was an adult, old enough to take care of herself. She’d be back before long and no doubt be lording it all over Aly for the good time she’d missed because she’d had to deal with Rogan Butler.
Just the thought of the man’s name had Aly rubbing her arm again. She could swear she still felt his touch on her skin. Which was just weird.
Her heartbeat quickened a bit as she remembered the cold gleam in his clear green eyes as he touched her. He’d felt that buzz of something molten between them as well as she had. And he hadn’t looked any happier about it than she was. Small consolation.
Sighing, she eased her suitcase off the bed, then stretched out atop the quilt. Not bothering to change into her pajamas, she lay in the soft glow of lamplight and stared up at the sloping ceiling. But she wasn’t seeing the clean, white paint over the eaves of what had once been the attic of the working farmhouse.
Instead, she was seeing Rogan Butler, frowning at her. She heard the rolling music of his accent and the deep reverberation of his voice as it sizzled along her spine. She remembered every moment with him so clearly it was as if it had been etched into her brain.
“Now, isn’t that a lovely thought?” No. It wasn’t. She didn’t want to think about him. Didn’t want to consider what that hum of electric charge between them might have meant. And surely didn’t want to see him again.
And yet…
His face filled her mind as her eyes closed and her body surrendered to the jet lag tugging at her.
Casey still hadn’t returned by morning.
Aly fought down a cold lump of fear in her belly and told herself there would be an explanation. Car trouble, maybe. No. She was going to catch a cab. Then perhaps an accident. Oh, God. That wasn’t a good thought.
She went downstairs at the crack of dawn, but since the B and B was situated on a working sheep farm, her hostess was already up and busy. Aly accepted a cup of coffee, got directions on how to get to the city of Westport, then climbed into her car and took off.
The bucolic Irish countryside did nothing to dispel the sense of urgency bubbling inside her. Something was desperately wrong. She felt it. Aly knew her sister, and though Casey liked to have a good time, she wasn’t stupid. And she wasn’t the kind of woman who would have gone home with a man she’d just met.
Which left only one possibility.
Casey was in some kind of trouble.
The owner of the B and B had made a couple of phone calls for her, checking in with the local hospitals, but there was no record of an American woman being treated or admitted. So fine. She wasn’t in the hospital. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t be lying in a ditch somewhere and…
“Stop it,” she told herself. She wasn’t going to let her imagination take over. There would be a reasonable explanation for this. Maybe Casey hadn’t been able to get a cab back and had stayed at a hotel in town. “But if she’d done that, she would have called to let me know.”
The narrow road unwound in front of her like a black ribbon snaking through lush fields of green. On either side of the road, gorse bushes sprouted tiny yellow flowers in clusters so rich and thick that you couldn’t see through them to the farms beyond. On her right, Lough Mask lay spread out into the distance, a watery sun splotching the gray surface with flashes of brilliance.
When a car headed toward her, Aly gulped in a breath and held it, steering her car as far over to the left as she could. The gorse bushes scraped at the car, and as the other driver passed, he lifted a hand in greeting and drove on.
Aly blew out that breath and took another. She couldn’t imagine driving these roads all the time. It was terrifying. But at the moment, she had more to frighten her than tiny roads, careless drivers and the sheep that suddenly wandered out in front of her.
Stomping on the brake, Aly jerked to a stop and waited while the white-and-black sheep stared at her as if she were an intruder. And, hell, she was. She should never have come here, Society or not. And she certainly shouldn’t have brought Casey with her.
Casey.
Honking her horn, Aly eased off the brake and crept up on the sheep as slowly as she could. But she didn’t have the time to simply sit parked while the damn animal decided where it wanted to go. Clearly irritated, the sheep glared at her, then bounded across the road and Aly was once more flying down a narrow strip of asphalt, muttering unintelligible prayers as she went.
The local police, the Garda, weren’t too concerned when Aly faced them down with tales of a missing sister. But she’d been all over Westport. She’d visited dozens of pubs, talked to whoever would listen and, nearly frantic, had finally discovered the place her sister had last been seen, a pub called the Sidhe, which sat on the corner of the main street, just across from the river that snaked alongside the bustling city.
And the waitress at the Sidhe remembered serving Casey. Even remembered her leaving. Alone. About twelve o’clock the night before. Then, it was as if she’d slipped into a hole in the earth.
“If you don’t mind my sayin’ so, miss,” the sergeant at the broad wood desk said with a smile, “you’re worrying for naught. I’m sure your sister is simply enjoying her first trip to Ireland.”
Aly bit down on her frustration. The man was trying to be nice, after all. “The question, Sergeant, is where is she enjoying herself?”
He gave her another smile that flashed briefly in his clear blue eyes. “Ah, well, now. She’s an adult, isn’t she? There’s no sign of foul play. You’ve said yourself, the waitress at the Sidhe says she left under her own power, none the worse for wear.”
Around her, the police station hummed with activity. Somewhere down the long, narrow hallway a woman was crying, and Aly hoped to heaven that wasn’t an omen. She heard snatches of English mixed in with the musical sound of Gaelic. Burned coffee stained the air, and the sergeant in front of her had bread crumbs on his uniform jacket. It was as if she were outside herself, noticing all the little details of the room in a blind effort to keep calm. To keep from screaming that her sister was in trouble and no one was listening.
“Now, if you’d like to leave the number of where you’re staying, I’ll be sure to let you know if I learn anything.”
“Sergeant,” Aly tried again, desperate to make him do something to help her. “My sister and I are traveling together. Casey wouldn’t simply disappear without telling me. She would know that I’d be worried.” Calm. Collected. In control. Hysteria would only make him dismiss her entirely. “Something’s happened to her, and I need you to help me look for her.”
Sighing, he pulled a piece of paper in front of him, picked up a pen and, giving her a look that clearly said she was wasting his precious time, asked, “Will you tell me again what she looks like?”
“Yes.” Aly didn’t care if he didn’t believe her. Didn’t care if he was patronizing her. All that mattered was that he was filling out an official report. She dug out her wallet, produced a picture of her sister and handed it over.
“I can’t promise you much, miss.” He studied the photo of a smiling Casey for a long moment, then made notes in a tidy hand. “Your sister’s a grown woman. She’s been gone only overnight. For all you know, she’s hunkered down in a hotel with one of the local lads, I’m sorry for saying so.”
Aly bit down hard on her bottom lip, then said, “Casey’s not like that. I’m telling you, something is wrong. I know it.”
“Ah, well, then, we’ll see what we can do.”
While he wrote down everything she said, Aly looked around the station again. And this time, she noticed the pages tacked up to a bulletin board in the entrance. Missing notices. With pictures and descriptions of young men and women. They dotted the entire surface of the corkboard and filled Aly with trepidation.
If the Garda hadn’t found any of those people…how would they find Casey?
Chapter 3
Rogan slipped through the countryside and made no more than a whisper of sound. A young moon gave fitful light as it slipped in and out of thick clouds rolling in from the sea. He moved with the stealthy grace he had learned over the long centuries of solitary battles. His gaze swept the darkness as he made his way across the open field, searching, always searching for the telltale energy traces that would lead him to a demon.
The wind was icy and tossed the branches of the trees into a tangle of limbs. But he hardly noticed. The night was home to him, the open land more easy on his soul than four walls could ever be. He belonged here, hunting. The scent of peat smoke from a nearby chimney came to him, and for one brief moment, memories crowded Rogan’s mind. Memories of other times, when he’d roamed these very hills in the company of his brother warriors. Before he’d died. Before he’d begun his eternity on the hunt.
As a Guardian, Rogan was one of many. Chosen at the moment of their death to defend humanity from the demon threat, Guardians were immortal. And with the gift of long life came other gifts. All of them were telepathic, able to read the minds of the humans they protected. Some of the Guardians had other gifts, as well, gifts that had been with them in life and were, over the course of eternity, strengthened, made more powerful.
Rogan, though, was only what he appeared to be—a warrior. A man who had known little else in life beyond the camaraderie of a battlefield and the company of others like himself. He’d served the last hereditary high king of Ireland, Brian Boru, and his last act on Earth had been to avenge his king’s death. He valued loyalty. Honor.
And told himself that the vow he’d made so long ago was enough for him.
Then Alison Blair had walked into his home and short-circuited every nerve in his body. Just remembering her now brought back the flash of…knowing that had filled him with a simple touch. He’d dipped into her mind and felt her confusion. Felt her reaction to him and had had to fight to maintain the cold distance he preferred between himself and humankind.
She was…unexpected. He’d thought only to be irritated with the intrusion of the Society. But with a single touch, that had changed. And he wasn’t pleased with the knowledge.
Scowling, he cleared his mind and concentrated instead on the here and now. Thoughts of a woman he didn’t want had no business on the hunt. He was needed. He did a job that few others could do, and this night he would track whatever demons thought to prey on his island.
While he moved through the darkness, becoming a part of the night itself, he thought of the seer’s prediction. And again, despite his best intentions, of Alison Blair. He didn’t want to think of her. He’d found and lost his Destined Mate centuries ago. There would be no other for him, and Rogan knew it was as well there wouldn’t be. A hunter had no need for anything in his life but the next hunt. The next challenge. The next demon.
And as that thought rose up in his mind, he turned over the seer’s warnings again. He had little patience with those who claimed to see the future. But since Alison’s visit the night before, he’d done some research himself. True, he was more at home with a sword in his hand than he was sitting at a computer. But he’d long ago learned that to move with a changing world, he had to first keep abreast of those changes.
He’d taught himself how to use the state-of-the-art computer system installed in his home, and his satellite Internet connection afforded him the luxury of researching anything he wished with the click of a button. And he’d found enough to make him wary, to make him consider using the Society’s seer.
He seldom watched television and rarely read a newspaper, since the mortal world’s interests had little to do with him. So it was with surprise that he found people were disappearing all over County Mayo. One or two at first, but in the past several weeks more and more were simply vanishing. The missing were generally young—in their twenties. And most of them were tourists, as though someone or something was endeavoring to keep the local population from becoming too suspicious.
Rogan moved out onto the road and stared up at the B and B where Alison Blair was staying. A farmhouse, the tidy white building fairly sparkled in the spare moonlight. Alongside the B and B was a stone-faced, thatched cottage used for self-catering vacationers. With the Lough behind him, Rogan stared at the B and B, shifting his gaze from one lamplit window to the next, focusing his mind and listening for the thoughts of those inside.
He heard children arguing, couples discussing a cathedral they’d toured that afternoon. The farmer who owned this land was laughing with his wife over something their eldest child had done, and a teenager was planning to slip out of his room and meet some friends.
And nowhere in that rush of thoughts was Alison Blair.
“Where in bloody hell is she?” Rogan muttered darkly, honing his concentration, searching all of those inside the house, looking for the American woman. With the link he had into the local system, he’d also combed through the guest registries all over the area until he’d found where she and her sister were staying while they were in Ireland.
He’d thought to talk to her again, to find out if that blasted seer had had anything more useful to say than the vague admonition she’d passed along. Damn the woman for not being where she should be.
Scowling off into the distance, he reached out with his senses, searching for some sign of her in the vicinity, but there was nothing. And irritation spiked inside him as he reached further, stretching his telepathic abilities out into the night even while he cursed her. She’d come all this way to give him the bloody message. Now that he actually wanted to speak with her, she was gone?
Aly walked up and down the sidewalk in front of the Sidhe pub, her gaze flicking constantly from side to side. Outside the square of light from the pub, the city streets were dark. Shops were closed and the few pedestrians on the sidewalks were scurrying, heads down, in the face of a sudden rain shower. Alison, though, tugged the hood of her jacket up and over her head and stood her ground. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for exactly, but she knew she had to be here—where Casey had last been seen.
She strained to pick up any psychic signs of her sister, but there was nothing. All their lives, she and Casey had been able to link telepathically. Not that Aly was able to do this with anyone else, but she and her sister had always had such a close bond that they’d at least been able to touch each other’s minds. But tonight there was nothing.
She’d almost gone to Rogan Butler to ask for help, but that impulse had disappeared fast. After all, he’d made it more than clear he hadn’t wanted her around. And truth to tell, she was in no hurry to be that close to him again anyway. He was too much. Too handsome. Too powerful. Too overwhelming. And far too arrogant.
He hadn’t wanted to listen to her about business. There was no way he’d care about her missing sister. She probably wouldn’t even be allowed past his security guards again, so there was no point in trying to get in to see him anyway.
But that fact changed nothing. With or without help, she would find her sister. It had been just she and Casey for years. They were their only family, and they took care of each other. Wherever Casey was, she was counting on Aly to find her. So she would—even if she had to stand outside this pub and talk to everyone in Westport for the rest of her life. As a middle-aged couple darted past, headed for the pub, Aly hurried forward and intercepted them.
“Excuse me,” she said.
“Why, you’re American, aren’t you?” The woman smiled a greeting as if she were expected to personally welcome all visitors to the city. “That’s lovely.”
“Thank you.” Another woman hurried past them, and Aly dipped her head to avoid getting impaled by the points on her umbrella. Holding out a picture of her sister, Aly looked from the woman to her husband and back again. “I’m sorry to bother you, but my sister’s missing and she was here last night. I’m trying to find her and—”
“Nice-looking girl,” the man said, handing the picture back. “Haven’t seen her, though.”
“Sorry, love, I’ve not seen her either,” the woman said, shaking her head solemnly. “Are you sure she’s missing and not just off with a friend?”
“No,” Aly said with a sigh of disappointment. It had been like this for two hours. Everyone she showed Casey’s picture to had been kind and concerned but hadn’t been able to help. Misery rose up inside her and did battle with fear. Fear was winning. “We only just arrived in Ireland yesterday, so she wouldn’t have friends here to go off with.”
“Come on, Bridget,” the man said to his wife, yanking open the pub door to allow music, smoke and the scent of beer to escape.
His wife shooed him off, then waited for the door to close again before asking, “Have you spoken to the Garda?”
“Yes. They couldn’t help me either.”
She sighed in sympathy. “Terrible shame that is, love. So many young people going missing all of a sudden, you’d think the Garda could do something about it.”
Aly swallowed hard, looked into the woman’s eyes and fought down a growing sense of dread. “There’ve been a lot of missing people here lately?”
“Oh, yes. Mostly tourists, and Sean—that’s my husband—he thinks nothin’ of it. Says young people thrive on causing trouble.”
“What do you think?” Aly asked, watching the elder woman shift her gaze around the well-lit square as if looking for something.
“I think,” she said finally, softly, as if half afraid someone would hear her speak her own fears, “sometimes things happen that can’t be explained.” She shivered a little, shoved her hands into her coat pockets and offered a sad smile. “And I do hope you find your sister, love.”
“Thank you.” Aly whispered the words, staring down at the picture of Casey. But the woman had already slipped into the pub, leaving Aly alone on the sidewalk again.
Things that can’t be explained…
That cold sense of dread coiled and tightened in the pit of Aly’s belly, and she wished she could ease it. But how could she? She was in a position to know that what the woman had said was all too true. There were monsters out there, moving through the darkness, looking for prey. Demons from other dimensions, crowding into this world, taking what they could and destroying what they couldn’t have.
Demons.
Lifting her head, Aly stared off into the shadows that bordered the river running alongside the town. From her post outside the pub, the rush of the water was more like a long undulating sigh, and she couldn’t help feeling that it sounded lonely. Empty.
And she wondered about Casey. If she was safe. If she was afraid.
If she was alive.
Panic jolted through her, and it felt as though a tight fist had closed around her throat. Alive. Casey had to be alive. Of course she was. There was no reason to start the crazed imaginings of death and disaster. It was only that…“Oh, God. I never should have brought her here. Never should have let her go off alone. If anything’s happened to her…”
She stopped, refusing to even finish that sentence. Her heart felt heavy, and her stomach was a churning mass of anxiety and sheer terror. She’d never felt more alone, more out of her element. Here on this tidy street corner, as everyone else in this lovely city went about their business, Aly was forced to admit the very real possibility that a demon might have her sister.
And if that were true…she’d need Rogan Butler to get Casey back.
Rogan shook his head, as if that motion alone could ease the frantic thoughts he was picking up from Alison Blair. He’d trained his telepathic abilities on her, homing in on the raging confusion in her mind, and followed her here to Westport. Now, he’d need only to locate her in the large seaport city.
He knew the town well. He’d watched it grow from its beginnings in the eighteenth century into a teeming city filled with, as far as he was concerned, too many mortals. But tonight he was interested in only one of the people wandering up and down these broad, familiar streets.
“Bloody woman.” He bit the words off on an oath. “If she’d stop letting her mind whirl in circles, she’d be easier to find.”
There were no trace energy signals for him to follow. No sign of a demon as yet. There were only Alison’s thoughts, a wild mix of pain and panic and sheer terror guiding him to her like the flash of a lighthouse across a churning sea. He felt an answering sense of urgency rise inside him and tried to tamp it down. She was nothing more to him than a clue to whatever was happening in his little corner of Ireland. And to defend those he was sworn to protect, he would use whatever information she could give him.
Beyond that, there was nothing.
Rogan used his Guardian abilities to obfuscate himself as he walked quickly down the wide riverfront street in Westport. He didn’t have to be invisible, of course. But he’d found that a man of his size didn’t pass through crowds unnoticed, and he’d rather keep his presence in the city quiet.
The river roared to his left, and from a corner pub music and laughter rose up in waves that filled the air. To his right, a drunk stumbled along the sidewalk, muttering to himself.
Rogan dismissed the man and continued on. His steps were long, measured, and the quiet that flowed with him streamed out around him in a wash of power. He was comfortable in the night, in the shadows where demons thrived and mortals feared to step. The adrenaline of the hunt pumped through his veins as he heard Alison’s mind jumping from one thought to the next.
Alive. Casey’s alive. I know it. But where? A demon? No. Rogan should be here. He’s a Guardian. Maybe I should call the Society office in Dublin. And tell them what?
He stopped then, lifting his face to the wind, closing his eyes and focusing solely on Alison.
Where can I look? Where should I go next? I should find Rogan. No, he won’t help. Casey needs me. What can I do? Oh, God, help me find her.
Her mind raged, calling to him, as if she were sensing his presence and guiding him to her. He felt her fear lying over her thoughts like a shroud, and he moved more quickly, hastening his steps as if in answer to her desperate call.
He homed in on her and loped across the wide street to round a corner. There, in the gold light spilling from the Sidhe pub, she stood. And swathed in a cloak of invisibility, he could watch her unseen. Study her features, drawn and tight with worry and fear. He looked into her blue eyes and read the signs of banked tears. He heard her thoughts and the wild, discordant prayers that she whispered as if they alone were enough to keep her safe.
And something inside him opened, welling, with a need he hadn’t known in centuries. To comfort. To care for.
Rogan swiped one hand across his jaw, pulled in a breath and steadied himself. He wouldn’t be drawn to this woman, because there could be nothing between them. He’d had his chance at an eternal love and had lost it when his Destined Mate had died at the hand of a demon.
A demon the seer had told him was gone.
Seers and women—both were more trouble than they were worth, and it would be best if he remembered that.
Before he could move to reveal himself to her, Alison’s eyes suddenly widened. Her thoughts spun and unraveled like a spindle of thread dropped to roll on the ground. She ran past him, and as she did, he caught the uppermost thought in her mind.
Demon.
Whirling around, he chased after her and caught her in just a step or two, his big hand coming down on her shoulder and pulling her to a stop.
She screamed.
“Hush now,” he ordered in a tight, cold voice.
“Rogan?” She looked around wildly, her eyes darting from one side to the other, trying to find him and not succeeding. “Where are you?”
Cursing viciously, he dropped the energy cloak masking his presence, and she was staring up at him in stunned surprise. “Sorry. Forgot I was invisible.”
She choked out a harsh laugh that sounded more like a taut sob than anything else and instantly clapped one hand across her mouth. “Now there’s something you don’t hear every day. Where did you come from? How did you find me?”
“I followed your thoughts.”
“God, that’s right. You can read minds.”
“And yours is a jumble at the moment, if you don’t mind my sayin’ so,” he told her, releasing her almost reluctantly. “Where were you runnin’ off to just then? And why were you thinkin’ ‘demon’?”
“Because I saw—” She half turned to point at the river walk. “Out there. It was just for a second. But I’m sure I saw a trace energy. It was almost purple, with some red, and it was gone very quickly. But I know I saw it.”
Stunned, he simply stared at her for a long moment. “You can read demon energy?”
“A bit.” She backed away from him, heading for the river. “All Society members are a bit psychic, some more than others. And I know what I saw.”
“I believe you.” And he did. He could see the truth in her eyes, hear it in her voice. He could practically feel the feverish intent to chase down a demon humming around her like an aura of emotion. “But you’re not to be chasing demons, Alison Blair. What did you think you’d do with it once you’d caught it?”
“I—” She stopped, took a breath and then shoved the hood off her face. A few drops of rain landed on her cheeks and glistened in the lamplight like tears. “I don’t know. I only know I have to follow it. My sister. Casey.”
He already knew what was driving her. Hadn’t he been latched on to her mind for the past half hour or more? “I know. She’s gone.”
She staggered as if his words had carried a physical punch. Her bottom lip quavered, but she bit down on it. “I don’t know what happened to her. She was here at this pub last night. I spoke to a waitress who saw her leave. Alone. But after that there’s just nothing…”
Alison turned her head to look through the pub’s window at the laughing, dancing people inside, and she was so wistful, so lost, she made his heart hurt. Something it hadn’t done in a very long time.
Bristling at the very notion, Rogan straightened to his full height and looked down at her. “What makes you think a demon has her?”
“What else could have happened? She isn’t at the hospitals. Hasn’t been arrested. She doesn’t know anyone here, so she’s not staying with a friend.” She shook her head slowly and looked away from him, staring off into the shadows as if expecting to find her sister there waiting for her. “She’s vanished, Rogan, and no one’s seen her. Anywhere.” She wiped away the stray raindrops from her cheeks with the back of her hand.
She blew out a breath and sucked in another. “There are others missing, too. Lots of them. Tourists are disappearing, and I believe it’s got something to do with the seer’s warning. There is something rising here and I think it’s got Casey.” She stepped up close to him, tilted her head back and met his gaze with a steadiness he admired. “I’ve got to get her back. And you’ve got to help me.”
Behind them the pub door opened and noise and smoke rolled out around them. A couple, linked arm in arm, ran from the pub and down the sidewalk, laughing. Rogan, though, paid them no attention.
Grabbing Alison’s arm, he ignored the instantaneous burn that erupted between them and dragged her farther from the lights, deeper into the shadows. When he was sure they were alone, he let her go and said, “You’ve no business following a demon.” When she started to argue with him, he cut her off neatly and kept talking, his voice going deeper, more rough with every word. “I’ve seen this before, you know. Society members spend so much time studying Guardians that they begin to believe they, too, are capable of battling the demons. It’s a false confidence, and all it causes is more death. If you go after a demon, you’ll get yourself killed.”
She stepped back from him, and despite the darkness, the determined gleam in her eyes shone at him. He actually itched to touch her again. A humming sense of intensity built inside him, roaring like a fire just catching the tinder. He hadn’t felt that particular warmth in more years than he cared to count and wasn’t at all grateful to be feeling it now.
“I’m not an idiot. I wouldn’t try to capture a demon. But I can follow one.”
“To what end?”
“Finding my sister, of course. What else?”
“You’ve no idea if she’s being held by a demon or not.”
“I’m out of options, Rogan,” she muttered, turning her gaze from him, back to the shadows that edged the riverside. A moment later Alison lifted one hand and pointed. “There! There it is again. Do you see it?”
“Aye. I see it.” It amazed him to know that she could see that faint wash of pale purple and red twisting in the night wind. But clearly she could. There was more to Alison Blair than he might have thought. And the danger of that was all too clear to him.
If he didn’t step in, keep her from following whatever demon was haunting the shadows of Westport, Alison would do it herself.
She was willing to risk her life to find her sister.
And as a Guardian, he was duty bound to protect her.
Chapter 4
Alison wasn’t about to waste precious seconds as they ticked inexorably past. She simply set off in the direction she’d seen the demon’s energy signal and expected Rogan to follow her. She wasn’t disappointed.
For a huge man, he moved so quietly he might as well have been invisible again. And hadn’t that been a surprise and a half! To feel unseen hands grab her…to hear that deep, musical voice telling her to be quiet…and to see not a soul.
Of course, she knew about the Guardians’ ability to obfuscate themselves, but she’d never really seen that ability in action. The way she’d jumped and yelped had really been professional. Oh, she was not at all prepared to be a field operative. And the thought of following a demon to find Casey absolutely terrified her. But she had no choice in this. So when Rogan grabbed her again, none too gently, she ignored the arc of something hot and delicious jolting through her system and turned to face him, fire in her eyes.
The furious expression on his face made her almost wish he’d go invisible again. “Come on. If we don’t follow what’s left of that energy signature, we’ll lose the demon.”
“We’ll do nothing of the kind,” he said and gave her arm another squeeze before releasing her. “You’re tracking no demons while I’m here.”
“You can’t stop me.”
“I can, yes. Don’t push me on this, Alison Blair. I’ve no use for the Society and even less use for a woman on a hunt.”
“You really are a caveman, aren’t you?”
He seemed to swell in indignation. His broad chest widening, his square jaw tight, his green eyes flashing with a banked fury. “I’m a Guardian, in case you’ve forgotten. This is my job, not yours.”
“And Casey is my sister, not yours.” She wouldn’t back down. Couldn’t. He’d just said it himself. Casey was no more than a job to him. He wasn’t involved in this. Not really. He didn’t care as she did.
The rush of the nearby river blended with the sigh of the wind and the patter of the rain falling down around them in fat, lazy drops.
“You’ve a car, don’t you?” he demanded.
“Yes.”
“Then get in it and go back to your B and B. If I find anything, I’ll let you know.”
Her jaw dropped. Surely he didn’t actually expect that to happen. “I can’t go back without Casey.”
“You can and you will. Now.”
That last word was emphasized, and he stared her down as if daring her to contradict him. She would have, too. But in a small, still-rational corner of her mind, her own voice whispered that she was wasting time—that Rogan Butler was a legendary Guardian, that if anyone could find Casey, it would be he. But he needed her along. She knew Casey. He didn’t. Her younger sister would be terrified by the huge warrior if Aly wasn’t along to reassure her.
Deliberately, she took another step toward the river. “I’ll go when I see you’re on the demon’s trail. When I know you’ve got some clue as to where Casey is.”
Muttering under his breath, he stalked past her, the sound of his movement lost in the sigh of the river. The rush of Gaelic pouring from him sounded both musical and enraged. When he finally spoke in English again, it was short and sweet. “Stay behind me. And the hell out of my way.”
“Charming,” she murmured, but did as he said, taking two or three steps for every one of his. He moved along the river walk, his gaze darting from side to side, checking every shadow, searching every corner he passed. Casey, too, kept her gaze alert, hoping to see another swirl of color, some trace of the demon that had been moving through here only moments ago.
But there seemed to be nothing, only the quiet rush of the river and the dark that seemed to spill along the streets. The moon was hidden now beneath a bank of clouds still spitting rain, and the blend of fiddle and drum from the pub seemed distant and dreamlike.
Her breath came in short, hard gasps as she struggled to keep up with the Guardian, who clearly didn’t care if she fell behind. Maybe he was going so quickly on purpose. To prove to her that she couldn’t keep up. That she had no business being on a hunt.
Aly didn’t know. Didn’t care. Her gaze locked on Rogan’s broad back, she ignored her surroundings. Her mind was too filled with pictures of her sister. Images of Casey in danger. Hurt. Scared. Alone.
She felt only the barest brush of heat on the back of her neck an instant before something grabbed her. Fear exploded inside her as she took one quick gasp of air. Long, thick fingers curled around the base of her throat, cutting off another breath and burning into her skin as if each of those fingers was a living flame.
Aly stumbled, then was brought up hard and flush against the body of her captor, standing behind her.
“Lovely.” A voice sighed out around her, sneaking into her bones, sliding through her blood. Both hot and cold seemed to wash over her as she stared ahead of her into the darkness, straining to see Rogan.
Fear was alive and well and crouched in the pit of her stomach. The being behind her lifted her off the ground until she struggled to keep her toes on the cobbled street beneath her. Anything to maintain the narrow passage of air struggling to fill her lungs. She yanked at the hand at her throat, but it was like trying to pull a steel bar off a blocked door. Power hummed around her, and that voice came again, close, as her captor dipped its head to her ear.
“You follow me. You and the Guardian. Is he training you? Are you a sweet young thing only learning to fight us?”
Demon.
She shook her head wildly and gasped as the demon’s fingers tightened on her throat like a well-tied noose. Where was Rogan? He hadn’t gotten that far ahead of her. What kind of Guardian was it who would leave her to be killed? Hadn’t he noticed the demon? Hadn’t he sensed its presence?
Fingers on her throat tightened further, and small black-and-white dots danced in her vision.
“Release her.”
The demon holding her spun around so awkwardly that Aly lost her tenuous balance and hung limply in the demon’s clutches. Deliberately, she lifted both hands to the viselike grip on her throat, taking her weight up a bit so she could fight for the air she needed so desperately.
Through narrowed eyes, she stared at Rogan, standing only a few feet from her. His black hair lifted in the wind, and his green eyes flashed a warning so bright it was easy to read even in the darkness.
“I think not,” the demon cooed and bent its head to sniff at Aly’s throat. She shuddered as its cold, rough skin scraped along her jaw, her neck.
Rogan’s big hand fisted on the hilt of the sword he held, and his body seemed to vibrate with menace. “You think to save yourself by hiding behind a woman, then?”
The demon laughed softly, and somehow that made it even worse. Aly closed her eyes, and a single tear squeezed out from behind her lids and traced down along her cheek. Her grip on the demon’s hand was fading as her strength slid away.
“I don’t hide, Guardian.” The demon stroked one hand down the line of her body and with the last of her strength, Aly tried to move away from that touch. “I take what I find and I use it. I found her. She’s mine.”
“As well you know, not a thing on this plane of existence is yours, demon. So let’s be at it and leave the woman.”
A snarl and snap of teeth hissed into the night as the demon spat at Rogan. “I’ll leave her when I’m done with her and not before. If you go now, Guardian, I might let her live. After.”
The river rushed past her on her right. From a distance, Aly heard the faint beat of music. A cold wind ruffled her hair and made her eyes tear as she opened them to look helplessly at Rogan. She was dying. She felt her sluggish heart slow. Felt her own end coming and knew there was nothing she could do about it. But then she looked into Rogan’s eyes.
When I go for him, drop to the ground and stay there.
His words rumbled through her mind, but that wasn’t possible. She was psychic, not telepathic. But maybe she was hallucinating. Maybe she was hearing what she wanted to hear. She was dying. She knew it.
An instant later Rogan howled, his voice rising into a bellowing shriek of justice as he charged the demon holding Aly so tightly. The demon, startled, loosened its grip for a second, and with her last ounce of energy, Aly pulled free, dropped to the ground and stayed there. Her lungs greedily sucked in air, the blurriness of her vision cleared and the pounding in her head eased back into just a memory of the pain she’d had moments before.
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Maureen Child
She was his destiny reborn!Forever fated to defend humanity against demons, immortal Guardian Rogan has given up all hope of finding peace. But when a beautiful woman unexpectedly appears, she reawakens the warrior’s long-buried desire… Alison came to Ireland duty-bound to tell Rogan of a sinister premonition, only to be rebuffed.Then evil strikes when her sister mysteriously disappears, and Rogan has the power to protect Aly from a fate worse than death. Can this brooding warrior be her Destined Mate – the key to a forgotten past, and to her future?
Rogan moved closer, until he could feel her body heat.
“I’ve no use for seers, Alison Blair. And even less for their servants.”
Aly swallowed hard and he could see the agitation suddenly take hold of her. Still she kept her gaze fixed on his. “I’m no one’s servant.”
“And yet here you stand at their beck and call.”
“It’s my duty.”
“And now you’ve done it and it’s past time for me to be doing mine,” he muttered thickly, grabbing her upper arm to steer her out of his house.
But as he touched her, something unexpected happened. Something dazzling. An arc of what could have been lightning jolted between them. White-hot heat – and something more – sizzled in the air and Rogan released her instantly.
He knew that sizzle and flash.
He’d felt it just once before.
For his Destined Mate.
But she had been dead for hundreds of years.
Maureen Child is a California native who loves to travel. Every chance they get, she and her husband are taking off on another research trip. An author of more than sixty books, Maureen loves a happy ending and still swears that she has the best job in the world. She lives in Southern California with her husband, two children and a golden retriever with delusions of grandeur.
Vanished
By
Maureen Child
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk/)
To the Staunton family at Knight’s Cottage
Shanvallyard, Tourmakeady, Ireland.
Thank you for your warm welcome
and for making our stay in Ireland so memorable.
Table of Contents
Cover Page (#uf80deb03-121e-563c-b678-2679cc2f25a6)
Excerpt (#u9bc8f59c-9ca4-5ee7-b709-1e5e27dd66dc)
About The Author (#u7ad061bc-d878-5320-a36c-c48849831068)
Title Page (#u21f7e1b1-6fe1-5d4f-9095-2c88b1a96f42)
Dedication (#u6b1886b4-5711-573a-970e-5f3153e32b76)
Chapter 1 (#udbb2ebbd-29d5-5dcd-9278-9b87c7314295)
Chapter 2 (#ua3872134-4e6e-5050-a35c-a504e38cf43e)
Chapter 3 (#u7e874eea-b8f6-5528-944b-26999231bea7)
Chapter 4 (#u23495cd1-5e87-5c48-9c18-9f8ce889f93a)
Chapter 5 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 6 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 7 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 8 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 9 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 10 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 11 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 12 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 13 (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 14 (#litres_trial_promo)
Preview (#litres_trial_promo)
Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)
Chapter 1
In Ireland, two thousand people vanish every year.
The Irish countryside was quiet and the darkness was absolute, as it could only be far from the lights of a city. Here, beside the narrow road that led to Westport, the night felt empty, but for the squares of lamplight in the distance, marking the places where farmhouses stood in silence.
In the grassy field, ancient tombstones tipped and tilted crazily as if they’d been dropped from heaven and left to stand as they fell. Trees bent in the wind, and their bare limbs clattered like a muttered conversation. A fairy mound rose from the ground and lay littered with wildflowers that looked black and white in the starlight. A sigh of something ancient whispered in the darkness, and far away, a dog moaned into the quiet.
A young woman stood in the center of the stones, as she’d been told. She waited, impatiently checking her wristwatch and shrugging away the superstitious twitch at the base of her spine. The stones were eerie enough during the day, but at night, when the sky was black but for the stars, the woman half expected ghosts to rise up and chase her out of their graveyard.
The woman shivered again at the thoughts jostling through her mind and shrugged deeper into her coat. There was nothing to fear, after all. Hadn’t she grown up here? Didn’t she know this road to Westport well enough to travel it in her sleep?
No, the only thing to worry her was that maybe the man she waited for had forgotten his promise to meet her. Maybe he was with someone else. Maybe…
“Darlin’,” a deep voice whispered from close by. “I knew you’d come. I’ve been waiting for you.”
She whirled around, a smile of welcome on her face. Something blacker than the darkness rushed at her. She screamed as a howl lifted into the air, and a moment later the cemetery lay empty in the night.
“What was that?” Alison Blair stopped dead and felt the small hairs at the back of her neck stand straight up.
The long, undulating howl still quavered in the air as she stared back down the road into the darkness.
“A dog, no doubt,” the guard at the wrought-iron gate muttered in an Irish accent so thick it almost sounded as though he were speaking Gaelic.
“Scary dog,” Aly muttered, turning back to watch as the big man studied her ID card. Frowning, she said, “It’s not a forgery, you know.”
He flicked a glance at her from under thick black brows, and she deliberately lifted her chin and met that stony stare with one of her own.
The man nodded in approval, then said, “There’ll be hell to pay when the boss hears you’ve come.”
“I know.” As a member of the Guardian Society, Aly knew she would be as welcome here as a flu virus.
Even in the best of circumstances, Immortal Guardians weren’t exactly the most hospitable people in the universe. They lived alone, worked in secret and protected their real identities from a world filled with people who would never understand.
Chosen at the moment of their death, the Guardians were given the choice of either moving on to whatever awaited them or accepting immortality and the task of defending humankind against the demon threat. The Guardians were devoted to doing their duty and in general preferred to do that duty with as little interference as possible.
Both from humanity and the Society.
The Society had existed as long as the Guardians themselves. Generation after generation the families who belonged to the Society had worked with the Guardians. Some of those Guardians reluctantly accepted the help of the Society, and some…didn’t.
Rogan Butler, Irish warrior and a Guardian centuries old, fell into the latter category.
“As you can see,” she said, reaching out to take the papers identifying herself as a Society member, “I am who I say I am, and I need to see Rogan Butler immediately.”
“He’ll not be happy.”
“Fortunately,” she said, “his happiness is not my responsibility.”
She really should have waited until morning to come and beard the lion in his den or lair, she thought, turning her gaze to the two-storied manor house beyond the iron gate. But she’d flown in from Chicago expressly for this meeting, and she wanted it over and done with.
Of course, if her sister Casey had bothered to come along with her, Aly thought, she wouldn’t be feeling so on edge. Strength in numbers, after all. But though she’d been happy enough to come along on the trip to Ireland, Casey had insisted on reminding Aly that she wasn’t a member of the Society. Casey had been the first member of the Blair family for centuries to not pick up her hereditary calling.
And Aly remembered clearly the argument they’d had at the B and B just an hour ago.
“You could come with me just for moral support,” Alison had said as she and her sister fought for space in front of the tiny bathroom mirror.
“Oh, right. That sounds like a good time.” Casey tugged at the hem of her V-necked, red T-shirt until it showed just enough of her breasts, then smiled at her elder sister. “Look, Aly, this secret-agent thing is your deal. Not mine. I didn’t join the Society, remember?”
Aly scowled, hip-checked Casey out of her way and pulled her long, thick blond hair into a ponytail at the base of her neck. Then she wrapped the elastic band with a dark blue scarf and let the ends trail across her shoulders. Staring into the mirror, she gave herself the once-over before answering her sister. Dark blue jacket, white button-down oxford shirt tucked into dark blue jeans and black boots. She looked fine. Businesslike but casual. Friendly but stern.
Then she rolled her eyes at her own thoughts and turned from the mirror to face Casey. “Yes, I remember that you didn’t join the Society. I’m not asking you to be officially there. I was just looking for some company.”
Casey muscled her way in front of Aly to check her own reflection again. She fluffed her short, dark blond hair and shrugged. “I don’t know why you’re so nervous about this. Rogan Butler isn’t the first Guardian you’ve ever spoken to.”
“True.” Aly sat down on the edge of the bathtub, stretched out her legs and said, “But he’s the first one who refused to talk to me on the phone. And our psychics refused to call the Ireland office so one of their members could deliver the message in person, so…”
Casey shook her head, fluffed her hair again and leaned in to smooth another layer of dark red lipstick on her mouth. When she was finished, she straightened up, smiled at her reflection and said, “Imagine that. Jealous psychics. Aren’t they supposed to be above all that?”
“They should be,” Aly admitted. “But you know how they are. Especially Reginald.”
“You’re defining the reasons I didn’t want to join the Society, Aly,” Casey said. “No way do I want to spend all my time trying to soothe cosmic egos.”
And maybe she had a point, Aly thought now, grimly steeling herself for her meeting with the Irish bully known as Rogan Butler.
“Well, then,” the guard said, his musical accent rising up and down as he spoke. “I’ll get the gate. Just drive on up to the manor. You’ll be met.”
Aly got back into her car and swallowed hard as the guard unlocked the gates and swung them open. She steered her car, absentmindedly noting the tidy lawn and the spill of golden lamplight pouring from the lead glass windows of the manor and lying across the gravel drive.
Aly’s stomach pitched a little, and she told herself to get a grip. She wouldn’t allow a Guardian to make her nervous. As a member of the Society, she had every right—no, a duty—to give him the information the Chicago psychics had discovered.
She parked the car directly in front of the double doors and stepped out, pocketing the keys. Grabbing her purse, she headed for the house and stopped dead when those double doors were pulled open and a giant of a man stood backlit against the entryway.
Rogan Butler.
It had to be.
His shoulders were broad, his hips were narrow and his legs were long and thick with muscles. His black hair hung loose past his shoulders and lifted in the icy wind like a battle flag. As she watched, he folded massive arms across an impressive chest and stared down at her.
“Alison Blair?” His accent was, if possible, even thicker than that of the man at the gate. And his voice was like thunder. Deep and powerful.
“Yes.” Apparently his security man had alerted him to her identity. “And you’re Rogan Butler.”
“I am. Why’ve you come?”
So much for niceties. “Because you wouldn’t take my phone call.”
“I had no wish to speak with you. I still don’t.”
Limned in lamplight, his features were in shadow, but Aly didn’t have to see his face to know he was frowning. She could feel his scowl, his irritation, flowing from him in thick waves.
Her nerves jittered a little, and for one moment she wished she were anywhere but there. But there hadn’t been another available Chicago Society member to make the trip, and the Society psychics so guarded their “visions” they hadn’t wanted to call Ireland and get one of the local members to deliver the message.
So, here she was. Facing down one of the most legendary of the Guardians, and she had to fight to keep from getting back into her car and driving away. But if she did that, she’d never live it down.
“The Society will find no welcome here.” He said it briskly, as if already dismissing her.
“We’re not your enemy, you know,” Aly countered quickly. “We’re on the same side. Fighting the same war.”
“Is that what you think, then?” He came down one of the steps and stopped. “And how many demons have you fought, Alison Blair?”
“None, but—”
“A thousand and more demons have fallen beneath my blade. All without the help you’ve come so far to offer.”
“The Society is—”
“Useless?” he offered.
“There’s no reason to be insulting, either.” She walked toward him, forcing her feet to move despite the fact that her muscles were locked up as if desperately trying to keep her in one place. “I’ve come with an important message and I’m not leaving until I’ve delivered it.”
He blew out a breath and came down the remaining steps until he stood on the drive right in front of her. Aly tipped her head back to stare up into his eyes. Green, she thought. A shining, clear green that seemed almost iridescent in the pale light. His jaw was hard and square and bristled with a day’s growth of whiskers. His mouth was firm and flattened into a disapproving line, and his heavy black brows were drawn down on his forehead.
He was, without a doubt, the most gorgeous man she’d ever seen.
And despite the fact that his irritation still simmered in the air around him, Aly felt a small twist of something hot and needy bubble into life inside her.
Which was just unacceptable.
“Fine, then deliver your message and be on your way.”
“If you don’t mind, I’d rather not discuss this outside.”
“You’re a prissy little thing, aren’t you?”
“Prissy? Prissy?” Narrowing her eyes on him, she said, “I’m an official representative of the Guardian Society. I’ve just spent twelve hours in a plane to get here. Then I had to rent a car and try not to nod off at the wheel while I forced myself to drive on the wrong side of the road.” He opened his mouth as if to speak, but she kept right on, feeling her sense of righteous indignation build up and spill over. “The hotel lost my reservation, and my sister and I had to search for a local B and B. After getting to our room, instead of having a meal or taking a much-needed nap—or even, God help me, going for a drink with my sister—I got in that blasted car with the steering wheel on the wrong side of the damn thing and drove straight here, only to be treated like a common criminal by your security thugs and now to be insulted by you. If it weren’t in humanity’s best interests to give you this message, believe me when I say I’d as soon keep my mouth shut, turn around and go home.”
When she finally ran down, Aly took a breath and waited for him to order her off his property. Fine. She hadn’t handled her first official assignment very well, but she’d like to have seen anyone else handle it better.
“Well, then,” he said after an impossibly long moment, “you’d best come inside and give me this all-important message.”
He stepped back and waved an arm, silently inviting her to precede him into the house. Lifting her chin, she did just that, taking the steps slowly as jet lag began taking its toll.
She stepped into the entryway and paused just for a moment to take a quick look around. Polished wood floors gleamed in the lamplight, and colorful rugs were scattered along the narrow hall that stretched off to the back end of the house. To her left was a formal sitting room and to her right what looked to be a library. A fire roared in the stone hearth, wall sconces shaped like oil lanterns threw soft, electric light onto the paneled walls and over-stuffed furniture in shades of forest green and burgundy offered comfort. The walls were lined with bookshelves, and every table top was crowded with towering piles of hardcover books.
She loved the room immediately.
“This way,” he said and walked past her into the clearly masculine room. Making directly for an escritoire, he opened the carved doors to reveal crystal decanters and drinking glasses. “You’ll have a drink, then tell me.”
“No, thank you.”
“You look as though you’re ready to keel over,” he said, dismissing her argument as he poured amber-colored liquor into two glasses. “A little of the Irish will set you straight in no time.”
He came back to her and handed her one of the glasses. She took a sniff and frowned. “I don’t really drink whiskey.”
Tossing his own drink back, he swallowed, then said, “This is Paddy’s. It’s like no other. Drink it down and tell me what you’ve come to say.”
Easier to do as he wanted rather than fight him on something that didn’t seem very important. Mimicking his action, Aly took a breath, lifted her glass and poured the liquor down her throat in a straight shot.
Instantly, fire bloomed inside and stole her breath. Gasping a little, she handed the glass back to him and slapped one hand to her chest. “Thanks,” she managed to say when she was able to choke out a word.
Rogan set the glasses down onto the nearest table top and watched the woman who’d come all the way from the United States to see him. He had no use for the Guardian Society. He was a warrior and had managed, since the day of his death in 1014, to battle demons without the help of those who thought themselves to be a part of the Guardian legacy.
There were others, friends of his, who had made use of the Society from time to time, but Rogan believed a man worked better when he was alone, a hard lesson he’d learned centuries ago and one he kept always in the forefront of his mind. He needed nothing from anyone and wanted no “help” in performing his duty.
He’d been ready to order Alison Blair off his property when she’d found her spine and given him a dressing-down like no one had dared to do in centuries. And with that outburst of temper, she’d won a glimmer of admiration from him, a glimmer strong enough to allow her into his home—however briefly.
“Say what you must, then, and be on your way.”
“If this is Irish hospitality, it’s sadly lacking.”
“Ah, but you’re not a guest now, are you?” He turned from her, walked to his favorite chair and sat down, kicking both legs out in front of him and crossing his feet at the ankles. “You say you’ve a mission to fulfill. Then fulfill it and be done.”
He watched her and saw anger flash in her blue eyes quickly before she was able to hide it from him. Instantly, he wondered what kind of woman it was who buried her emotions so completely. The women he’d known in his life had all worn their hearts in the open, risking bruising and hurt but unable to do anything else.
And as that thought sneaked into his consciousness, it was followed by an ancient memory, one he rarely allowed himself to entertain. The image of a woman rose up in his mind. Her long, black hair flying about her head in the sea wind. Her blue eyes shining, laughing. Her mouth curved in welcome for him. And before he could pause a moment to enjoy them, the images shifted, changed, becoming the nightmare that haunted him still from time to time.
Rogan shut off his thoughts with the ease of long practice and turned his focus to the woman still standing across the room from him. Irritated suddenly, he said, “Sit, will you? And say what you’ve come to say.”
Her boot steps were muffled on the thick carpets as she moved to the chair nearest him. She perched on the edge of the chair, folded her hands in her lap and squeezed until her knuckles turned white. That was the only sign of her agitation, and again Rogan was forced to admire her self-control.
While the fire crackled and hissed in the hearth and tree limbs driven by the ever-present Irish wind scratched at the windowpanes, she watched him steadily for a long moment. Then she said softly, “One of the Chicago seers has had a vision.”
He gave her a half smile. “Wouldn’t that be a seer’s job?”
She didn’t answer that jibe. Instead, she began to give him a bloody lecture.
Her surprisingly prim voice carried just over the hiss of the fire. “As you know, the Society psychics are some of the most powerful in the world. Society membership is hereditary. For centuries, the same families have protected the secrets of the Guardians and done all we can to help you in your fight against the demon incursion—”
Scowling, he snapped, “If you’ve come only to give me a history lesson, Alison Blair, I’ll remind you I’ve been living history for longer than you would care to consider.”
She frowned right back at him. “Each generation, ” she said, a bit louder than before, as if daring him to try to talk over her, “more psychics are born into the Society, and with each generation one or two of those seers has incredible strength.”
“And would you be one of those with the power of second sight, darlin’?”
“I would not,” she said, pausing just long enough to give him an irritated nod. “I have some psychic abilities but nothing in the range of the seers. Reginald, the seer who sent me here, is extremely powerful. His visions are always clear. His messages have saved countless lives, including those of your fellow Guardians.”
“We’re immortal, love,” he said, hooking his arms behind his head in a lazy move that belied the tension coiling in the pit of his belly. “We’ve no lives to be saved.”
“Immortal, yes, but you can be desperately wounded, taking years to recover.”
Annoyed, he said, “You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know.”
“I’m trying to impress on you just how important it is for you to listen to Reginald’s message.”
“Then deliver it, by damn.”
She drew her head back and stared at him. In the firelight, her blue eyes shone with the reflection of the flames until it looked as though light were dancing within her. Her mouth was tight, her posture was so stiff it was as if she’d a poker stuffed down the back of her jacket and her knotted fingers were almost white with her repressed fury.
“You are the rudest man I’ve ever met.”
He brushed that aside. “Ah, but I’m not a man, am I? Besides, you’ve not seen rude yet, Alison Blair, but if you don’t get on with it, you very well may.”
She ground her teeth together as if trapping inside words that wanted to spill from her mouth. It was almost entertaining to watch. Almost. But time was flying by and Rogan had no interest in sitting by the fire with a woman, no matter how attractive he found her; it was past time for him to be out on the hunt.
“Fine, then,” she said after a long moment’s pause. “Reginald has seen the rise of a very dangerous power. Here. Soon.”
He laughed. And when her features stiffened in shock, he laughed harder. “This is the so important message? Your seer’s looked beyond the veil and seen trouble, has he?” He rubbed his jaw and pretended to give the matter great thought. “What kind of trouble do you think, then? Could it be…demons?”
“Are you really so arrogant you can’t accept help when it’s offered?”
“I don’t need your help. Or apparently the help of your gifted seer. I know there’s trouble, don’t I?” He stood up and looked down at her from his great height. “Demons are nothing new to me, Alison Blair.”
“This isn’t an ordinary demon,” she said quietly, as if she were measuring each word and weighting it down with patience before speaking it. “Reginald saw an extreme amount of energy surrounding the nearest portal. He says that it’s building daily and that there’s a danger beyond the normal threat.”
Rogan scowled at her and thought about the seer’s message. He’d known for days now that something unusual was happening. There had been reported cases of people mysteriously vanishing all over Ireland. And there’d been more demon activity lately as well. He didn’t like any of it.
She stood up and that flicker of admiration, respect he’d felt for her earlier, sharpened a bit. She wasn’t put off by his great size or by the reputation and legends surrounding him. He’d give her points for foolhardy bravery if nothing else.
“I’ll do what I can to look into the seer’s vision,” he said, though it cost him. He didn’t want to take orders from a psychic. Nor from a woman.
“Thank you. I’ll make my report to the Society.”
“You do that.”
“You don’t have to like me or the Society,” she said, clearly irritated that he wasn’t more appreciative of the effort she’d gone to in delivering this oh-so-very-vague message. “But you could at least show some respect.”
“Respect?” His voice boomed out before he could stop it. “For psychics and seers who sit in the background and make proclamations? Who have visions too late to help? Who see things that can’t be changed and then demand reverence for their faulty abilities?” Rogan moved in closer, until he could feel her body heat reaching out to him. Rage pounded in his brain and thundered through his veins.
“The psychics do their best,” she countered, blindly defending the group that was her family’s legacy. “Visions aren’t always clear.”
“Aye,” he agreed, feeling the fury threaten to overcome him. “But they don’t admit to mistakes, do they? No. They speak as if from the Mount and expect all to listen and revere. Well, I’ve no use for seers, Alison Blair. And even less use for their servants.”
She swallowed hard and he could see agitation suddenly take hold of her. Still, she kept her gaze fixed with his. “I’m no one’s servant.”
“And yet here you stand, at their beck and call.”
“It’s my duty.”
“And now you’ve done it, and it’s past time for me to be doing mine,” he muttered thickly, grabbing her upper arm to steer her out of his house.
But as he touched her, something unexpected happened, something dazzling. An arc of what could have been lightning jolted between them. White-hot heat and something more sizzled in the air, and Rogan released her instantly.
He knew that sizzle and flash.
He’d felt it just once before.
For his Destined Mate.
But she had been dead for hundreds of years.
Chapter 2
Casey tapped the toe of her shoe to the insistent beat of the traditional Irish music pouring out of the pub behind her. Even here on the sidewalk, the music was rich and full, making her consider going back inside despite how tired she was. With drums, pipes and fiddles, the small group of people huddled in a corner of the pub had the locals dancing and the tourists wishing they knew how to step dance.
Her first day in Ireland and already she was in love with the country. The cold, Irish wind buffeted her, the Guinness she’d drunk warmed her from the inside and fuzzed her jet-lagged mind into a kind of easy fog and the tidy streets of Westport made her feel safer than she ever had back home in Chicago. Even now, when it was nearly midnight, she wasn’t worried to be alone on a street corner waiting for the taxi she’d called.
And, okay, maybe that was foolish, but she wasn’t going to obsess about it. She’d stay in the light of the pub, within shouting distance of help, if she needed it. But she wouldn’t. The people were all so friendly. She’d talked all night, tried a dance step or two and then laughed like a loon when she hadn’t been able to keep up with an elderly man who, though he had to be at least a hundred years old, was as light on his toes as a ballet dancer.
The night had been a great welcome to Ireland, one her sister had missed. “Poor Aly. Off being the dutiful little soldier when she could have been here having fun.”
In the pub, the music abruptly shifted from a wildly paced tune called “Finnegan’s Wake” to something slow and sad and just a little dreamy. Casey sighed as the notes soared into the night and told herself that this sense of freedom she was experiencing was exactly why she hadn’t wanted to accept her legacy and join the Society.
For centuries, her family had served the Guardians. And what had they gotten for it? Very little. Heck, the Guardians themselves barely tolerated Society members. The pay was stingy, the respect was almost nonexistent and because you took an oath of secrecy, you couldn’t even tell your friends what you did for a living!
“No, thank you,” she muttered as if she were having the familiar argument with her elder sister. Aly had been working for the Society since she was eighteen. She’d been the “good” daughter, the obedient one, the one who did whatever their parents expected of her. She’d been sucked into the secretive Society and had immersed herself in the traditions and rules, much as their parents had. Aly bought into the mentality of serving humanity and helping the Guardians, and Casey had never been able to change her mind.
Well, for Casey it was different. She’d never been convinced that the “demon threat” was all that horrifying. After all, the demons had been trying to take over humankind for thousands of years and they hadn’t succeeded yet. How terrifying could they possibly be? No. She was more convinced that it was Guardian propaganda that had kept the Society members in practical servitude for centuries.
“They’re no better than cosmic bullies,” she muttered. “Ordering us around like we’re peasants, then ignoring us when it suits them. Ten to one, Rogan Butler didn’t even let Aly get close enough to deliver her stupid message.”
Shaking her head, Casey determinedly turned her mind from her sister and the Guardian she was sent to meet. After all, it was so not her problem. She was here to enjoy herself, and that’s just what she was going to do.
“But where is the stupid taxi?”
Another gust of icy ocean air blew in off Clew Bay and wrapped itself around Casey like a long-lost lover. She shivered a little and wished she’d worn a heavier jacket. But the black leather had gone so well with her outfit that she hadn’t wanted to spoil her look.
A voice drifted to her, and she turned toward the sound. Just across the wide street, a three-foot-high stone wall separated the road from the Carrowbeg River. The length of the wall was dotted with trees and old-fashioned streetlamps that offered more in ambiance than in actual lighting.
She listened harder, but when she didn’t hear anything more, she brushed it off and again stared down the street, willing her taxi to appear.
“Help me…”
There it was again. A sigh almost lost in the rush of the river and the whisper of the wind, never mind the music still erupting inside the pub. Frowning, she thought about stepping into the pub to get assistance but then reconsidered. If she was imagining the call—and chances of that were good, since she was so tired she could hardly stand upright—she’d look like a fool.
Quickly, she looked up and down the street and then crossed the road in a fast trot that had her boot steps echoing softly around her. Clutching the edges of her jacket together, she walked up to the short stone fence and stared down into the fastmoving river. She didn’t see anyone, didn’t hear anyone, so she must be more jet-lagged than she’d thought.
Despite the streetlamps, it was darker here than it had been in front of the noisy pub. Shadows were everywhere, crouching in patches of deeper black, and Casey was suddenly uneasy. She glanced around her but saw no one. Nothing. Yet the sensation of being watched was so real, so bone-deep certain she couldn’t shake it. A chill snaked along her spine. She looked back at the pub and took comfort in the bright splash of light streaming through the wide front window. She wasn’t alone. Help was just a shout away.
“You’ve come…”
A voice. Deep, musical, mesmerizing. Casey pulled in a long, deep breath, then let it slide slowly from her lungs. She swayed and felt her head go light, as if a fog had slipped into her mind, shrouding her thoughts, wrapping her brain in a haze that grew thicker with every beat of her heart. She shook her head, tried to clear it, but the fog remained, thick, warm.
“Who are you? Where are you?” She held her breath and waited for that compelling, soothing, completely sexual voice again.
“Ah, darlin’…I’ve been waitin’…”
“Yes,” she whispered, licking her lips, sighing as unseen fingers moved over her body, stroking, touching, enticing.
A shadow lifted from the earth, twisting in the wind, contorting itself, writhing as if fighting to come into existence.
Casey couldn’t move.
Couldn’t speak.
She could only watch, breathlessly.
And the dark came alive. A howl lifted into the air, and a moment later the river walk was empty.
“I don’t know what you’re trying to do,” Aly said, rubbing her upper arm with her free hand as if trying to ease a bone-deep burn. Where he’d grabbed her, her skin still tingled, still hummed with the unexpected charge of electricity that had arced between them.
She’d been a member of the Society for more than ten years. She spent her days researching the different Guardians and the legends and tales that surrounded them. She knew all about the myth of Destined Mates. And she’d read about the bonding that happened between them, the link that sprang to life at first touch and how that link became stronger over time.
Well, no, thank you.
“I’ve no idea what you’re blatherin’ about,” Rogan muttered and didn’t look any too happy about the situation himself.
Although, he hadn’t been exactly a cheery man since he’d first opened his door for her. So, that probably didn’t mean anything.
“I know the legends,” she said, just to make sure he knew exactly how she felt about this. She wanted no mistakes, no misunderstandings. She was here to do a job, see a little of Ireland, then go home. “The Destined Mate thing? I know all about it, and you should know, I’m so not interested.”
“Don’t recall asking you to be interested.”
She ignored that, as she ignored the sizzle in her blood and the near-overpowering sense of recognition her soul was feeling. No, no, no. “I’ve got a life, thanks, and I’m not looking to subjugate myself to some medieval warrior who doesn’t even know the meaning of common courtesy. And now that I’ve done what I was sent here to do, I’m gone.”
“Be on your way, then.” He swung one muscular arm out in a wide arc, showing her the way out as if she couldn’t remember it for herself. “No one’s keepin’ you.”
“Fine.” Everything in her yearned to stay. Feelings she didn’t want crowded her mind, her heart, but she ruthlessly shut them down. Clearly, she’d been spending too much time at work and not enough time building a social life. If she could be this attracted to a crabby, overbearing Guardian, she really needed to get out more.
She turned on her heel and started for the front door. Just as she stepped into the entryway, though, she looked back at him. The fire crackled behind him, flames dancing in the hearth. Lamplight fell down onto him, making the black of his hair gleam almost blue. Those pale green eyes of his sparkled and shone with a glint of fury she hadn’t noticed a moment before, and his full mouth was flattened into a grim slash.
God, he was amazing. Her body burned, but her mind was in control. And she was glad to see that he was no happier about that little jolt of something sizzling than she was. Then they could both ignore whatever it had been and go on with their lives. As it should be.
“Good luck with your demon hunting.”
He folded his arms over that incredibly broad chest and muttered, “And you go back to your seer. Tell him I’ve no interest in anything he has to say.”
She left him there in that wonderful room and told herself as she went that the buzzing in her blood had nothing to do with his touch.
After Alison Blair left, Rogan found he couldn’t settle. His own home, the place he’d lived in for more than two hundred years, felt like a prison cell. It was as if the walls were closing in on him and air was too hard to come by. Damn woman should never have come.
The blasted Society had had no business sending her to him. He hadn’t taken their calls, had he? Wasn’t that plain enough that he’d no wish to hear from them? He prowled the confines of his library and found no pleasure in the books he’d collected over the lengthy span of his lifetime. He slapped both hands onto the Connemara marble mantel and stared down into the flames leaping and dancing in the hearth. Shadows flickered and lights shifted, and in the fire’s depths he saw Alison Blair’s face again and the surprise in her eyes when his touch had sparked off feelings neither of them wanted.
“Blast the woman,” he muttered, feeling the hot, roiling ball of fury build in his gut and churn viciously. And as he closed his eyes to the image of her, he made a solemn vow. “I’ll not do it again. I’ll not be led by my cock for the amusement of the Fates.”
And just saying the words aloud refocused his strength. Reminded him of who and what he was. Rogan Butler. Guardian. Warrior. And the softness of a woman had no place in his life—his was a world of blood and death.
That thought spurred him into action. He wasn’t a man to stand still. Pushing away from the fireplace, he strode from the room, his long legs moving quickly, silently through the house. What he needed right now was a battle. Clean. Simple. He gathered his weapons, threw on his coat and went on the hunt.
As Rogan moved through the bitter, cold night, his long black coat slapping around his legs, he searched for a telltale swirl of demonic energy that would steer him in the right direction. Trace signatures left behind when a demon entered our dimension were invisible to humans, but to Guardians they appeared as faint washes of color.
“There you are, you bastard,” he murmured, as his gaze caught a faint swirl of deep orange streaking through the stand of woods at the edge of Lough Mask.
The bitter taste of it was on the wind, and he turned, lifting his face, scenting his prey. His senses honed to a keen edge, Rogan sprinted soundlessly through the woods. The surface of Lough Mask looked like tarnished silver lying beneath a sliver of moon. The stars shone brilliantly in a black sky but shed little light on the countryside.
But Rogan didn’t need light for his work. This he knew better than anyone else alive. He was one of the oldest Guardians, and he’d been fighting demons for what seemed an eternity. Scenting the air again, he smiled grimly and lost himself in the trees. His steps were silent, his breathing steady and hushed. His gaze swept the terrain he knew as well as he knew the layout of his own home.
This was his country. He’d lived and died in Ireland and chose to remain here as one of the Guardians who defended the island against demon encroachment. He was Irish to the bone, and this very ground was a part of him. He’d traveled the globe and never found another spot like this one. Always, he’d been drawn back here, to County Mayo, where Gaelic was still spoken, as it should be. The old ways were remembered here. Revered.
Here no farmer would think to run a tractor across a fairy mound—unwilling to risk angering the little people. Here trees were left to stand tall in the fields and crops were planted around them. Here ruins of castles echoed with the ghosts of warriors long dead.
And here his own memories both comforted and tormented him.
The wind on the water churned whitecaps that slapped at the surface of the lake and sounded like hundreds of cats lapping at cream. The trees around him bent and swayed. His eyes narrowed, and every one of his Guardian senses reached into the darkness. The scent was clear, but the faint wash of orange had dissipated in the wind.
A crack of a twig.
A hiss of breath.
Rogan spun about and pounced.
The burly demon had thought to sneak up on him and Rogan would have laughed at the very idea, but he was too busy, swinging a sword he had carried for eons. The very balance of the heavy blade felt a part of him, an extension of his arm as he whipped it through the air with such power the wind sang as it caressed the finely honed metal.
His blade hit home with a smack of steel against flesh. The demon howled in fury and pain and charged Rogan in desperation. Wild, burning eyes flashed in the darkness and long, lethal claws swiped at him. But Rogan was more than ready. He’d been bred to fight, and over the hundreds of years that had passed since his death, his abilities with a blade had become legendary—even among the Guardians.
The demon snarled, his jaw dropping to reveal jagged teeth nearly two inches long. The stench of demon blood fouled the air and Rogan hissed in a breath. His heart pounded frantically and his blood rushed. He dropped into a crouch, swinging his blade in another wide arc from which the demon leaped back to avoid. Minutes ticked past, and the wind around him tossed dirt and leaves into the air.
And Rogan hardly noticed. His focus was on his opponent. On the battle. He fought because it was his duty. Because a warrior was all he was.
Because he knew nothing else.
Again and again they clashed viciously. The defender and the beast. “You should have stayed in hell, demon. There’s no place in Ireland for the likes of you.”
The demon spat at him, and its saliva mixed with blood, bubbling into a frothy acid on the ground at Rogan’s feet. “Guardians are few and we are many.”
Rogan leaped through the air, and as he came down, he brought the hilt of his sword crashing into the demon’s skull. The solid hit staggered the beast, and it dropped to the earth, stunned. Rogan planted one boot on the small of its back and held it pinned to the ground while it cursed and screamed. In a moment he’d secure the bloody damn thing and cart it off back to the portal and its rightful dimension. Demons were hard to kill here on this plane. The most a Guardian could do was capture it and send it back to hell.
“Bastard!” The demon twisted and writhed in a futile effort to free itself. “You’ll pay for this! I’ll see to it! Armies of demons will descend on you and yours.”
Rogan stepped heavier on the beast until it ran out of air to shout with. “Many you may be,” he agreed, smiling now that the fight was ended, “but we’ll outlast the lot of you.”
And while his captive fought desperately to escape him, Rogan slid his sword into its scabbard and lifted his face to the night sky. Victory and one less demon to threaten humankind this night. He’d done his duty. Done what he was meant to do.
Yet still the emptiness inside him rattled as it had for too many years to count.
“Casey?” Aly called quietly and stepped into their shared bedroom at the Radharc na Oilean B and B on the banks of Lough Mask. There were two twin beds covered by handmade quilts in beautiful shades of blues and greens. A wide dormer window overlooked the fields stretching out behind the farmhouse, and the lamp on the small table between the beds gave off a soft, warm glow.
Along with enough light for Aly to see that Casey wasn’t back yet.
A flicker of worry sputtered into life inside her, but Aly told herself to calm down. She closed the door behind her, crossed the room and stared out at the sweep of open fields that lay at the feet of the Partry Mountains. There wasn’t enough moonlight to see much, but she made out the blurred white patches of the sheep huddling together in the field for warmth. The end of March in Ireland was cold, even for the animals used to the biting wind.
Turning back around, Aly frowned as she stared at her sister’s empty bed but told herself that Casey was an adult, old enough to take care of herself. She’d be back before long and no doubt be lording it all over Aly for the good time she’d missed because she’d had to deal with Rogan Butler.
Just the thought of the man’s name had Aly rubbing her arm again. She could swear she still felt his touch on her skin. Which was just weird.
Her heartbeat quickened a bit as she remembered the cold gleam in his clear green eyes as he touched her. He’d felt that buzz of something molten between them as well as she had. And he hadn’t looked any happier about it than she was. Small consolation.
Sighing, she eased her suitcase off the bed, then stretched out atop the quilt. Not bothering to change into her pajamas, she lay in the soft glow of lamplight and stared up at the sloping ceiling. But she wasn’t seeing the clean, white paint over the eaves of what had once been the attic of the working farmhouse.
Instead, she was seeing Rogan Butler, frowning at her. She heard the rolling music of his accent and the deep reverberation of his voice as it sizzled along her spine. She remembered every moment with him so clearly it was as if it had been etched into her brain.
“Now, isn’t that a lovely thought?” No. It wasn’t. She didn’t want to think about him. Didn’t want to consider what that hum of electric charge between them might have meant. And surely didn’t want to see him again.
And yet…
His face filled her mind as her eyes closed and her body surrendered to the jet lag tugging at her.
Casey still hadn’t returned by morning.
Aly fought down a cold lump of fear in her belly and told herself there would be an explanation. Car trouble, maybe. No. She was going to catch a cab. Then perhaps an accident. Oh, God. That wasn’t a good thought.
She went downstairs at the crack of dawn, but since the B and B was situated on a working sheep farm, her hostess was already up and busy. Aly accepted a cup of coffee, got directions on how to get to the city of Westport, then climbed into her car and took off.
The bucolic Irish countryside did nothing to dispel the sense of urgency bubbling inside her. Something was desperately wrong. She felt it. Aly knew her sister, and though Casey liked to have a good time, she wasn’t stupid. And she wasn’t the kind of woman who would have gone home with a man she’d just met.
Which left only one possibility.
Casey was in some kind of trouble.
The owner of the B and B had made a couple of phone calls for her, checking in with the local hospitals, but there was no record of an American woman being treated or admitted. So fine. She wasn’t in the hospital. But that didn’t mean she couldn’t be lying in a ditch somewhere and…
“Stop it,” she told herself. She wasn’t going to let her imagination take over. There would be a reasonable explanation for this. Maybe Casey hadn’t been able to get a cab back and had stayed at a hotel in town. “But if she’d done that, she would have called to let me know.”
The narrow road unwound in front of her like a black ribbon snaking through lush fields of green. On either side of the road, gorse bushes sprouted tiny yellow flowers in clusters so rich and thick that you couldn’t see through them to the farms beyond. On her right, Lough Mask lay spread out into the distance, a watery sun splotching the gray surface with flashes of brilliance.
When a car headed toward her, Aly gulped in a breath and held it, steering her car as far over to the left as she could. The gorse bushes scraped at the car, and as the other driver passed, he lifted a hand in greeting and drove on.
Aly blew out that breath and took another. She couldn’t imagine driving these roads all the time. It was terrifying. But at the moment, she had more to frighten her than tiny roads, careless drivers and the sheep that suddenly wandered out in front of her.
Stomping on the brake, Aly jerked to a stop and waited while the white-and-black sheep stared at her as if she were an intruder. And, hell, she was. She should never have come here, Society or not. And she certainly shouldn’t have brought Casey with her.
Casey.
Honking her horn, Aly eased off the brake and crept up on the sheep as slowly as she could. But she didn’t have the time to simply sit parked while the damn animal decided where it wanted to go. Clearly irritated, the sheep glared at her, then bounded across the road and Aly was once more flying down a narrow strip of asphalt, muttering unintelligible prayers as she went.
The local police, the Garda, weren’t too concerned when Aly faced them down with tales of a missing sister. But she’d been all over Westport. She’d visited dozens of pubs, talked to whoever would listen and, nearly frantic, had finally discovered the place her sister had last been seen, a pub called the Sidhe, which sat on the corner of the main street, just across from the river that snaked alongside the bustling city.
And the waitress at the Sidhe remembered serving Casey. Even remembered her leaving. Alone. About twelve o’clock the night before. Then, it was as if she’d slipped into a hole in the earth.
“If you don’t mind my sayin’ so, miss,” the sergeant at the broad wood desk said with a smile, “you’re worrying for naught. I’m sure your sister is simply enjoying her first trip to Ireland.”
Aly bit down on her frustration. The man was trying to be nice, after all. “The question, Sergeant, is where is she enjoying herself?”
He gave her another smile that flashed briefly in his clear blue eyes. “Ah, well, now. She’s an adult, isn’t she? There’s no sign of foul play. You’ve said yourself, the waitress at the Sidhe says she left under her own power, none the worse for wear.”
Around her, the police station hummed with activity. Somewhere down the long, narrow hallway a woman was crying, and Aly hoped to heaven that wasn’t an omen. She heard snatches of English mixed in with the musical sound of Gaelic. Burned coffee stained the air, and the sergeant in front of her had bread crumbs on his uniform jacket. It was as if she were outside herself, noticing all the little details of the room in a blind effort to keep calm. To keep from screaming that her sister was in trouble and no one was listening.
“Now, if you’d like to leave the number of where you’re staying, I’ll be sure to let you know if I learn anything.”
“Sergeant,” Aly tried again, desperate to make him do something to help her. “My sister and I are traveling together. Casey wouldn’t simply disappear without telling me. She would know that I’d be worried.” Calm. Collected. In control. Hysteria would only make him dismiss her entirely. “Something’s happened to her, and I need you to help me look for her.”
Sighing, he pulled a piece of paper in front of him, picked up a pen and, giving her a look that clearly said she was wasting his precious time, asked, “Will you tell me again what she looks like?”
“Yes.” Aly didn’t care if he didn’t believe her. Didn’t care if he was patronizing her. All that mattered was that he was filling out an official report. She dug out her wallet, produced a picture of her sister and handed it over.
“I can’t promise you much, miss.” He studied the photo of a smiling Casey for a long moment, then made notes in a tidy hand. “Your sister’s a grown woman. She’s been gone only overnight. For all you know, she’s hunkered down in a hotel with one of the local lads, I’m sorry for saying so.”
Aly bit down hard on her bottom lip, then said, “Casey’s not like that. I’m telling you, something is wrong. I know it.”
“Ah, well, then, we’ll see what we can do.”
While he wrote down everything she said, Aly looked around the station again. And this time, she noticed the pages tacked up to a bulletin board in the entrance. Missing notices. With pictures and descriptions of young men and women. They dotted the entire surface of the corkboard and filled Aly with trepidation.
If the Garda hadn’t found any of those people…how would they find Casey?
Chapter 3
Rogan slipped through the countryside and made no more than a whisper of sound. A young moon gave fitful light as it slipped in and out of thick clouds rolling in from the sea. He moved with the stealthy grace he had learned over the long centuries of solitary battles. His gaze swept the darkness as he made his way across the open field, searching, always searching for the telltale energy traces that would lead him to a demon.
The wind was icy and tossed the branches of the trees into a tangle of limbs. But he hardly noticed. The night was home to him, the open land more easy on his soul than four walls could ever be. He belonged here, hunting. The scent of peat smoke from a nearby chimney came to him, and for one brief moment, memories crowded Rogan’s mind. Memories of other times, when he’d roamed these very hills in the company of his brother warriors. Before he’d died. Before he’d begun his eternity on the hunt.
As a Guardian, Rogan was one of many. Chosen at the moment of their death to defend humanity from the demon threat, Guardians were immortal. And with the gift of long life came other gifts. All of them were telepathic, able to read the minds of the humans they protected. Some of the Guardians had other gifts, as well, gifts that had been with them in life and were, over the course of eternity, strengthened, made more powerful.
Rogan, though, was only what he appeared to be—a warrior. A man who had known little else in life beyond the camaraderie of a battlefield and the company of others like himself. He’d served the last hereditary high king of Ireland, Brian Boru, and his last act on Earth had been to avenge his king’s death. He valued loyalty. Honor.
And told himself that the vow he’d made so long ago was enough for him.
Then Alison Blair had walked into his home and short-circuited every nerve in his body. Just remembering her now brought back the flash of…knowing that had filled him with a simple touch. He’d dipped into her mind and felt her confusion. Felt her reaction to him and had had to fight to maintain the cold distance he preferred between himself and humankind.
She was…unexpected. He’d thought only to be irritated with the intrusion of the Society. But with a single touch, that had changed. And he wasn’t pleased with the knowledge.
Scowling, he cleared his mind and concentrated instead on the here and now. Thoughts of a woman he didn’t want had no business on the hunt. He was needed. He did a job that few others could do, and this night he would track whatever demons thought to prey on his island.
While he moved through the darkness, becoming a part of the night itself, he thought of the seer’s prediction. And again, despite his best intentions, of Alison Blair. He didn’t want to think of her. He’d found and lost his Destined Mate centuries ago. There would be no other for him, and Rogan knew it was as well there wouldn’t be. A hunter had no need for anything in his life but the next hunt. The next challenge. The next demon.
And as that thought rose up in his mind, he turned over the seer’s warnings again. He had little patience with those who claimed to see the future. But since Alison’s visit the night before, he’d done some research himself. True, he was more at home with a sword in his hand than he was sitting at a computer. But he’d long ago learned that to move with a changing world, he had to first keep abreast of those changes.
He’d taught himself how to use the state-of-the-art computer system installed in his home, and his satellite Internet connection afforded him the luxury of researching anything he wished with the click of a button. And he’d found enough to make him wary, to make him consider using the Society’s seer.
He seldom watched television and rarely read a newspaper, since the mortal world’s interests had little to do with him. So it was with surprise that he found people were disappearing all over County Mayo. One or two at first, but in the past several weeks more and more were simply vanishing. The missing were generally young—in their twenties. And most of them were tourists, as though someone or something was endeavoring to keep the local population from becoming too suspicious.
Rogan moved out onto the road and stared up at the B and B where Alison Blair was staying. A farmhouse, the tidy white building fairly sparkled in the spare moonlight. Alongside the B and B was a stone-faced, thatched cottage used for self-catering vacationers. With the Lough behind him, Rogan stared at the B and B, shifting his gaze from one lamplit window to the next, focusing his mind and listening for the thoughts of those inside.
He heard children arguing, couples discussing a cathedral they’d toured that afternoon. The farmer who owned this land was laughing with his wife over something their eldest child had done, and a teenager was planning to slip out of his room and meet some friends.
And nowhere in that rush of thoughts was Alison Blair.
“Where in bloody hell is she?” Rogan muttered darkly, honing his concentration, searching all of those inside the house, looking for the American woman. With the link he had into the local system, he’d also combed through the guest registries all over the area until he’d found where she and her sister were staying while they were in Ireland.
He’d thought to talk to her again, to find out if that blasted seer had had anything more useful to say than the vague admonition she’d passed along. Damn the woman for not being where she should be.
Scowling off into the distance, he reached out with his senses, searching for some sign of her in the vicinity, but there was nothing. And irritation spiked inside him as he reached further, stretching his telepathic abilities out into the night even while he cursed her. She’d come all this way to give him the bloody message. Now that he actually wanted to speak with her, she was gone?
Aly walked up and down the sidewalk in front of the Sidhe pub, her gaze flicking constantly from side to side. Outside the square of light from the pub, the city streets were dark. Shops were closed and the few pedestrians on the sidewalks were scurrying, heads down, in the face of a sudden rain shower. Alison, though, tugged the hood of her jacket up and over her head and stood her ground. She wasn’t sure what she was looking for exactly, but she knew she had to be here—where Casey had last been seen.
She strained to pick up any psychic signs of her sister, but there was nothing. All their lives, she and Casey had been able to link telepathically. Not that Aly was able to do this with anyone else, but she and her sister had always had such a close bond that they’d at least been able to touch each other’s minds. But tonight there was nothing.
She’d almost gone to Rogan Butler to ask for help, but that impulse had disappeared fast. After all, he’d made it more than clear he hadn’t wanted her around. And truth to tell, she was in no hurry to be that close to him again anyway. He was too much. Too handsome. Too powerful. Too overwhelming. And far too arrogant.
He hadn’t wanted to listen to her about business. There was no way he’d care about her missing sister. She probably wouldn’t even be allowed past his security guards again, so there was no point in trying to get in to see him anyway.
But that fact changed nothing. With or without help, she would find her sister. It had been just she and Casey for years. They were their only family, and they took care of each other. Wherever Casey was, she was counting on Aly to find her. So she would—even if she had to stand outside this pub and talk to everyone in Westport for the rest of her life. As a middle-aged couple darted past, headed for the pub, Aly hurried forward and intercepted them.
“Excuse me,” she said.
“Why, you’re American, aren’t you?” The woman smiled a greeting as if she were expected to personally welcome all visitors to the city. “That’s lovely.”
“Thank you.” Another woman hurried past them, and Aly dipped her head to avoid getting impaled by the points on her umbrella. Holding out a picture of her sister, Aly looked from the woman to her husband and back again. “I’m sorry to bother you, but my sister’s missing and she was here last night. I’m trying to find her and—”
“Nice-looking girl,” the man said, handing the picture back. “Haven’t seen her, though.”
“Sorry, love, I’ve not seen her either,” the woman said, shaking her head solemnly. “Are you sure she’s missing and not just off with a friend?”
“No,” Aly said with a sigh of disappointment. It had been like this for two hours. Everyone she showed Casey’s picture to had been kind and concerned but hadn’t been able to help. Misery rose up inside her and did battle with fear. Fear was winning. “We only just arrived in Ireland yesterday, so she wouldn’t have friends here to go off with.”
“Come on, Bridget,” the man said to his wife, yanking open the pub door to allow music, smoke and the scent of beer to escape.
His wife shooed him off, then waited for the door to close again before asking, “Have you spoken to the Garda?”
“Yes. They couldn’t help me either.”
She sighed in sympathy. “Terrible shame that is, love. So many young people going missing all of a sudden, you’d think the Garda could do something about it.”
Aly swallowed hard, looked into the woman’s eyes and fought down a growing sense of dread. “There’ve been a lot of missing people here lately?”
“Oh, yes. Mostly tourists, and Sean—that’s my husband—he thinks nothin’ of it. Says young people thrive on causing trouble.”
“What do you think?” Aly asked, watching the elder woman shift her gaze around the well-lit square as if looking for something.
“I think,” she said finally, softly, as if half afraid someone would hear her speak her own fears, “sometimes things happen that can’t be explained.” She shivered a little, shoved her hands into her coat pockets and offered a sad smile. “And I do hope you find your sister, love.”
“Thank you.” Aly whispered the words, staring down at the picture of Casey. But the woman had already slipped into the pub, leaving Aly alone on the sidewalk again.
Things that can’t be explained…
That cold sense of dread coiled and tightened in the pit of Aly’s belly, and she wished she could ease it. But how could she? She was in a position to know that what the woman had said was all too true. There were monsters out there, moving through the darkness, looking for prey. Demons from other dimensions, crowding into this world, taking what they could and destroying what they couldn’t have.
Demons.
Lifting her head, Aly stared off into the shadows that bordered the river running alongside the town. From her post outside the pub, the rush of the water was more like a long undulating sigh, and she couldn’t help feeling that it sounded lonely. Empty.
And she wondered about Casey. If she was safe. If she was afraid.
If she was alive.
Panic jolted through her, and it felt as though a tight fist had closed around her throat. Alive. Casey had to be alive. Of course she was. There was no reason to start the crazed imaginings of death and disaster. It was only that…“Oh, God. I never should have brought her here. Never should have let her go off alone. If anything’s happened to her…”
She stopped, refusing to even finish that sentence. Her heart felt heavy, and her stomach was a churning mass of anxiety and sheer terror. She’d never felt more alone, more out of her element. Here on this tidy street corner, as everyone else in this lovely city went about their business, Aly was forced to admit the very real possibility that a demon might have her sister.
And if that were true…she’d need Rogan Butler to get Casey back.
Rogan shook his head, as if that motion alone could ease the frantic thoughts he was picking up from Alison Blair. He’d trained his telepathic abilities on her, homing in on the raging confusion in her mind, and followed her here to Westport. Now, he’d need only to locate her in the large seaport city.
He knew the town well. He’d watched it grow from its beginnings in the eighteenth century into a teeming city filled with, as far as he was concerned, too many mortals. But tonight he was interested in only one of the people wandering up and down these broad, familiar streets.
“Bloody woman.” He bit the words off on an oath. “If she’d stop letting her mind whirl in circles, she’d be easier to find.”
There were no trace energy signals for him to follow. No sign of a demon as yet. There were only Alison’s thoughts, a wild mix of pain and panic and sheer terror guiding him to her like the flash of a lighthouse across a churning sea. He felt an answering sense of urgency rise inside him and tried to tamp it down. She was nothing more to him than a clue to whatever was happening in his little corner of Ireland. And to defend those he was sworn to protect, he would use whatever information she could give him.
Beyond that, there was nothing.
Rogan used his Guardian abilities to obfuscate himself as he walked quickly down the wide riverfront street in Westport. He didn’t have to be invisible, of course. But he’d found that a man of his size didn’t pass through crowds unnoticed, and he’d rather keep his presence in the city quiet.
The river roared to his left, and from a corner pub music and laughter rose up in waves that filled the air. To his right, a drunk stumbled along the sidewalk, muttering to himself.
Rogan dismissed the man and continued on. His steps were long, measured, and the quiet that flowed with him streamed out around him in a wash of power. He was comfortable in the night, in the shadows where demons thrived and mortals feared to step. The adrenaline of the hunt pumped through his veins as he heard Alison’s mind jumping from one thought to the next.
Alive. Casey’s alive. I know it. But where? A demon? No. Rogan should be here. He’s a Guardian. Maybe I should call the Society office in Dublin. And tell them what?
He stopped then, lifting his face to the wind, closing his eyes and focusing solely on Alison.
Where can I look? Where should I go next? I should find Rogan. No, he won’t help. Casey needs me. What can I do? Oh, God, help me find her.
Her mind raged, calling to him, as if she were sensing his presence and guiding him to her. He felt her fear lying over her thoughts like a shroud, and he moved more quickly, hastening his steps as if in answer to her desperate call.
He homed in on her and loped across the wide street to round a corner. There, in the gold light spilling from the Sidhe pub, she stood. And swathed in a cloak of invisibility, he could watch her unseen. Study her features, drawn and tight with worry and fear. He looked into her blue eyes and read the signs of banked tears. He heard her thoughts and the wild, discordant prayers that she whispered as if they alone were enough to keep her safe.
And something inside him opened, welling, with a need he hadn’t known in centuries. To comfort. To care for.
Rogan swiped one hand across his jaw, pulled in a breath and steadied himself. He wouldn’t be drawn to this woman, because there could be nothing between them. He’d had his chance at an eternal love and had lost it when his Destined Mate had died at the hand of a demon.
A demon the seer had told him was gone.
Seers and women—both were more trouble than they were worth, and it would be best if he remembered that.
Before he could move to reveal himself to her, Alison’s eyes suddenly widened. Her thoughts spun and unraveled like a spindle of thread dropped to roll on the ground. She ran past him, and as she did, he caught the uppermost thought in her mind.
Demon.
Whirling around, he chased after her and caught her in just a step or two, his big hand coming down on her shoulder and pulling her to a stop.
She screamed.
“Hush now,” he ordered in a tight, cold voice.
“Rogan?” She looked around wildly, her eyes darting from one side to the other, trying to find him and not succeeding. “Where are you?”
Cursing viciously, he dropped the energy cloak masking his presence, and she was staring up at him in stunned surprise. “Sorry. Forgot I was invisible.”
She choked out a harsh laugh that sounded more like a taut sob than anything else and instantly clapped one hand across her mouth. “Now there’s something you don’t hear every day. Where did you come from? How did you find me?”
“I followed your thoughts.”
“God, that’s right. You can read minds.”
“And yours is a jumble at the moment, if you don’t mind my sayin’ so,” he told her, releasing her almost reluctantly. “Where were you runnin’ off to just then? And why were you thinkin’ ‘demon’?”
“Because I saw—” She half turned to point at the river walk. “Out there. It was just for a second. But I’m sure I saw a trace energy. It was almost purple, with some red, and it was gone very quickly. But I know I saw it.”
Stunned, he simply stared at her for a long moment. “You can read demon energy?”
“A bit.” She backed away from him, heading for the river. “All Society members are a bit psychic, some more than others. And I know what I saw.”
“I believe you.” And he did. He could see the truth in her eyes, hear it in her voice. He could practically feel the feverish intent to chase down a demon humming around her like an aura of emotion. “But you’re not to be chasing demons, Alison Blair. What did you think you’d do with it once you’d caught it?”
“I—” She stopped, took a breath and then shoved the hood off her face. A few drops of rain landed on her cheeks and glistened in the lamplight like tears. “I don’t know. I only know I have to follow it. My sister. Casey.”
He already knew what was driving her. Hadn’t he been latched on to her mind for the past half hour or more? “I know. She’s gone.”
She staggered as if his words had carried a physical punch. Her bottom lip quavered, but she bit down on it. “I don’t know what happened to her. She was here at this pub last night. I spoke to a waitress who saw her leave. Alone. But after that there’s just nothing…”
Alison turned her head to look through the pub’s window at the laughing, dancing people inside, and she was so wistful, so lost, she made his heart hurt. Something it hadn’t done in a very long time.
Bristling at the very notion, Rogan straightened to his full height and looked down at her. “What makes you think a demon has her?”
“What else could have happened? She isn’t at the hospitals. Hasn’t been arrested. She doesn’t know anyone here, so she’s not staying with a friend.” She shook her head slowly and looked away from him, staring off into the shadows as if expecting to find her sister there waiting for her. “She’s vanished, Rogan, and no one’s seen her. Anywhere.” She wiped away the stray raindrops from her cheeks with the back of her hand.
She blew out a breath and sucked in another. “There are others missing, too. Lots of them. Tourists are disappearing, and I believe it’s got something to do with the seer’s warning. There is something rising here and I think it’s got Casey.” She stepped up close to him, tilted her head back and met his gaze with a steadiness he admired. “I’ve got to get her back. And you’ve got to help me.”
Behind them the pub door opened and noise and smoke rolled out around them. A couple, linked arm in arm, ran from the pub and down the sidewalk, laughing. Rogan, though, paid them no attention.
Grabbing Alison’s arm, he ignored the instantaneous burn that erupted between them and dragged her farther from the lights, deeper into the shadows. When he was sure they were alone, he let her go and said, “You’ve no business following a demon.” When she started to argue with him, he cut her off neatly and kept talking, his voice going deeper, more rough with every word. “I’ve seen this before, you know. Society members spend so much time studying Guardians that they begin to believe they, too, are capable of battling the demons. It’s a false confidence, and all it causes is more death. If you go after a demon, you’ll get yourself killed.”
She stepped back from him, and despite the darkness, the determined gleam in her eyes shone at him. He actually itched to touch her again. A humming sense of intensity built inside him, roaring like a fire just catching the tinder. He hadn’t felt that particular warmth in more years than he cared to count and wasn’t at all grateful to be feeling it now.
“I’m not an idiot. I wouldn’t try to capture a demon. But I can follow one.”
“To what end?”
“Finding my sister, of course. What else?”
“You’ve no idea if she’s being held by a demon or not.”
“I’m out of options, Rogan,” she muttered, turning her gaze from him, back to the shadows that edged the riverside. A moment later Alison lifted one hand and pointed. “There! There it is again. Do you see it?”
“Aye. I see it.” It amazed him to know that she could see that faint wash of pale purple and red twisting in the night wind. But clearly she could. There was more to Alison Blair than he might have thought. And the danger of that was all too clear to him.
If he didn’t step in, keep her from following whatever demon was haunting the shadows of Westport, Alison would do it herself.
She was willing to risk her life to find her sister.
And as a Guardian, he was duty bound to protect her.
Chapter 4
Alison wasn’t about to waste precious seconds as they ticked inexorably past. She simply set off in the direction she’d seen the demon’s energy signal and expected Rogan to follow her. She wasn’t disappointed.
For a huge man, he moved so quietly he might as well have been invisible again. And hadn’t that been a surprise and a half! To feel unseen hands grab her…to hear that deep, musical voice telling her to be quiet…and to see not a soul.
Of course, she knew about the Guardians’ ability to obfuscate themselves, but she’d never really seen that ability in action. The way she’d jumped and yelped had really been professional. Oh, she was not at all prepared to be a field operative. And the thought of following a demon to find Casey absolutely terrified her. But she had no choice in this. So when Rogan grabbed her again, none too gently, she ignored the arc of something hot and delicious jolting through her system and turned to face him, fire in her eyes.
The furious expression on his face made her almost wish he’d go invisible again. “Come on. If we don’t follow what’s left of that energy signature, we’ll lose the demon.”
“We’ll do nothing of the kind,” he said and gave her arm another squeeze before releasing her. “You’re tracking no demons while I’m here.”
“You can’t stop me.”
“I can, yes. Don’t push me on this, Alison Blair. I’ve no use for the Society and even less use for a woman on a hunt.”
“You really are a caveman, aren’t you?”
He seemed to swell in indignation. His broad chest widening, his square jaw tight, his green eyes flashing with a banked fury. “I’m a Guardian, in case you’ve forgotten. This is my job, not yours.”
“And Casey is my sister, not yours.” She wouldn’t back down. Couldn’t. He’d just said it himself. Casey was no more than a job to him. He wasn’t involved in this. Not really. He didn’t care as she did.
The rush of the nearby river blended with the sigh of the wind and the patter of the rain falling down around them in fat, lazy drops.
“You’ve a car, don’t you?” he demanded.
“Yes.”
“Then get in it and go back to your B and B. If I find anything, I’ll let you know.”
Her jaw dropped. Surely he didn’t actually expect that to happen. “I can’t go back without Casey.”
“You can and you will. Now.”
That last word was emphasized, and he stared her down as if daring her to contradict him. She would have, too. But in a small, still-rational corner of her mind, her own voice whispered that she was wasting time—that Rogan Butler was a legendary Guardian, that if anyone could find Casey, it would be he. But he needed her along. She knew Casey. He didn’t. Her younger sister would be terrified by the huge warrior if Aly wasn’t along to reassure her.
Deliberately, she took another step toward the river. “I’ll go when I see you’re on the demon’s trail. When I know you’ve got some clue as to where Casey is.”
Muttering under his breath, he stalked past her, the sound of his movement lost in the sigh of the river. The rush of Gaelic pouring from him sounded both musical and enraged. When he finally spoke in English again, it was short and sweet. “Stay behind me. And the hell out of my way.”
“Charming,” she murmured, but did as he said, taking two or three steps for every one of his. He moved along the river walk, his gaze darting from side to side, checking every shadow, searching every corner he passed. Casey, too, kept her gaze alert, hoping to see another swirl of color, some trace of the demon that had been moving through here only moments ago.
But there seemed to be nothing, only the quiet rush of the river and the dark that seemed to spill along the streets. The moon was hidden now beneath a bank of clouds still spitting rain, and the blend of fiddle and drum from the pub seemed distant and dreamlike.
Her breath came in short, hard gasps as she struggled to keep up with the Guardian, who clearly didn’t care if she fell behind. Maybe he was going so quickly on purpose. To prove to her that she couldn’t keep up. That she had no business being on a hunt.
Aly didn’t know. Didn’t care. Her gaze locked on Rogan’s broad back, she ignored her surroundings. Her mind was too filled with pictures of her sister. Images of Casey in danger. Hurt. Scared. Alone.
She felt only the barest brush of heat on the back of her neck an instant before something grabbed her. Fear exploded inside her as she took one quick gasp of air. Long, thick fingers curled around the base of her throat, cutting off another breath and burning into her skin as if each of those fingers was a living flame.
Aly stumbled, then was brought up hard and flush against the body of her captor, standing behind her.
“Lovely.” A voice sighed out around her, sneaking into her bones, sliding through her blood. Both hot and cold seemed to wash over her as she stared ahead of her into the darkness, straining to see Rogan.
Fear was alive and well and crouched in the pit of her stomach. The being behind her lifted her off the ground until she struggled to keep her toes on the cobbled street beneath her. Anything to maintain the narrow passage of air struggling to fill her lungs. She yanked at the hand at her throat, but it was like trying to pull a steel bar off a blocked door. Power hummed around her, and that voice came again, close, as her captor dipped its head to her ear.
“You follow me. You and the Guardian. Is he training you? Are you a sweet young thing only learning to fight us?”
Demon.
She shook her head wildly and gasped as the demon’s fingers tightened on her throat like a well-tied noose. Where was Rogan? He hadn’t gotten that far ahead of her. What kind of Guardian was it who would leave her to be killed? Hadn’t he noticed the demon? Hadn’t he sensed its presence?
Fingers on her throat tightened further, and small black-and-white dots danced in her vision.
“Release her.”
The demon holding her spun around so awkwardly that Aly lost her tenuous balance and hung limply in the demon’s clutches. Deliberately, she lifted both hands to the viselike grip on her throat, taking her weight up a bit so she could fight for the air she needed so desperately.
Through narrowed eyes, she stared at Rogan, standing only a few feet from her. His black hair lifted in the wind, and his green eyes flashed a warning so bright it was easy to read even in the darkness.
“I think not,” the demon cooed and bent its head to sniff at Aly’s throat. She shuddered as its cold, rough skin scraped along her jaw, her neck.
Rogan’s big hand fisted on the hilt of the sword he held, and his body seemed to vibrate with menace. “You think to save yourself by hiding behind a woman, then?”
The demon laughed softly, and somehow that made it even worse. Aly closed her eyes, and a single tear squeezed out from behind her lids and traced down along her cheek. Her grip on the demon’s hand was fading as her strength slid away.
“I don’t hide, Guardian.” The demon stroked one hand down the line of her body and with the last of her strength, Aly tried to move away from that touch. “I take what I find and I use it. I found her. She’s mine.”
“As well you know, not a thing on this plane of existence is yours, demon. So let’s be at it and leave the woman.”
A snarl and snap of teeth hissed into the night as the demon spat at Rogan. “I’ll leave her when I’m done with her and not before. If you go now, Guardian, I might let her live. After.”
The river rushed past her on her right. From a distance, Aly heard the faint beat of music. A cold wind ruffled her hair and made her eyes tear as she opened them to look helplessly at Rogan. She was dying. She felt her sluggish heart slow. Felt her own end coming and knew there was nothing she could do about it. But then she looked into Rogan’s eyes.
When I go for him, drop to the ground and stay there.
His words rumbled through her mind, but that wasn’t possible. She was psychic, not telepathic. But maybe she was hallucinating. Maybe she was hearing what she wanted to hear. She was dying. She knew it.
An instant later Rogan howled, his voice rising into a bellowing shriek of justice as he charged the demon holding Aly so tightly. The demon, startled, loosened its grip for a second, and with her last ounce of energy, Aly pulled free, dropped to the ground and stayed there. Her lungs greedily sucked in air, the blurriness of her vision cleared and the pounding in her head eased back into just a memory of the pain she’d had moments before.
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Maureen Child
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современная зарубежная литература
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: She was his destiny reborn!Forever fated to defend humanity against demons, immortal Guardian Rogan has given up all hope of finding peace. But when a beautiful woman unexpectedly appears, she reawakens the warrior’s long-buried desire… Alison came to Ireland duty-bound to tell Rogan of a sinister premonition, only to be rebuffed.Then evil strikes when her sister mysteriously disappears, and Rogan has the power to protect Aly from a fate worse than death. Can this brooding warrior be her Destined Mate – the key to a forgotten past, and to her future?