Possessed

“Let’s see. There’s three out of this room. About fourteen going upstairs.”

Cass stopped. In seconds she felt an arm around her back and then another under her knees as he lifted her easily into his arms. “You’re a real hard-ass, you know that?” he told her.

“I would have made it without the steps,” she grumbled.

“Like I said, a real hard-ass.”

He left Cass in the guest bedroom, which was about the size of her entire apartment. There was a canopy bed, a chair and matching ottoman, a dresser and a vanity with a framed mirror above it. So many things, but his house wasn’t any fuller than hers. Not really. In fact, hers had more. She had her animals.

After a gentle tap, he walked into the room with a pair of mismatched pajamas in his hand and held them out to her. “It’s the best I could do. They’ll be big on you, but they should be comfortable.”

She took the clothes and thought about what she would miss tonight. “My cats.”

“Will they be okay overnight?”

Would he take her home if she said no? Probably not, she decided. More likely he would go to her place, pick them up and bring them back here. “Yes. They have plenty of water and dry food.”

“Good.” He extracted a bottle from his jeans pocket and set it on the vanity. “It’s aspirin. It will help a little but not much. There’s a glass next to the sink in the adjacent bathroom. Take two before you get into bed.”

“And call you in the morning,” she finished, trying to lighten what seemed to be a room filled with soft talk and tension. It was his fault. He’d made it tense by kissing her.

She felt him looking at her but wouldn’t meet his eyes. “You won’t have to. I’ll check in on you.”

He had turned to leave when she suddenly asked, “Why did you do that? Downstairs. Why did you kiss me?”

Slowly, he faced her. “I’m not really sure. To prove a point?”

“You always prove your points by kissing?”

“No, usually I prove them by being right. This time I was. The only thing you felt was me kissing you. Our lips touching. No ghosts between us.”

“That’s not true,” Cass reminded him. “She’s there. Whether you admit it or not, you want to hear from her and you know I can help you do that.”

He moved farther into the room, no more than a foot away from her, and his expression tightened. “You’ve got problems, Cass. You can’t seem to figure out who wants you for what. I guess I can see why, but we’re not all out to use you. Someday you’re going to have to learn to take people at face value. Until then, I feel sorry for you.”

The words were like a blow to her midsection. “I don’t want your pity.”

“Tough. You have it.”

She smiled at him with little humor even as she felt the tingle rise up the back of her neck. This wasn’t a threatening one. This one was normal. The room took shape in her mind and for a moment she stiffened, uncertain of how contact was going to play out now that she knew her talent was shifting. Still, it was her time to prove a point, so she opened herself to it and the control felt good. Almost healing.

“You were twelve. You climbed up into a tree in the backyard of your house. Lauren wanted to follow, but you told her she was too young, too small. But she was stubborn and she did it anyway. You tried to make your point then, too, and kept climbing higher to show her that she wasn’t up for the challenge and should turn back.”

“Stop. Don’t do this.”

“But Lauren kept going until she got so high that she got scared. You had to climb down underneath her to show her the way, to help her down from branch to branch. She says you were so mad at her. So mad that you slipped on the last branch and fell out of the tree. You broke your right arm. She says it was all her fault, for being stubborn, but you took the blame for getting you both into the tree.”

The room quickly faded and Cass let out a slow breath.

“That did happen,” he admitted.

“I know.”

“I didn’t ask you to tell me that story.”

No, he didn’t. But eventually he would have. He wouldn’t have been able to stop himself. Just like Dougie. It’s better this way, she thought. Better to understand the score now than to believe for a second that he was acting in her interest alone.

“You know what’s funny about that story,” he commented as he made his way out the door. “I was right that time, too. Maybe Lauren was trying to tell you something.”

The door closed behind him with a soft snick, and Cass was left to think about that all night long.

Chapter 13

The next morning Cass awoke with a deep sense of comfort. The kind of comfort that dared you to move lest you break the fragile boundary between sleep and alertness. The bed underneath her was soft. The blanket that covered her provided both weight and warmth. The air was dry and toasty around her. Unlike the damp coolness she was used to waking up to in her basement apartment.

Don’t move, she told herself, although she wasn’t sure why it was so important. Just enjoy it.

A white fog drifted through her consciousness that she thought was part of the lazy comfort until through the fog she saw her grandfather’s face.

Cassie, please talk to me. Cassie. I’m so sorry.

Cass bolted up and quickly regretted the sudden movement. Pain lanced through her middle and her breath hitched as she tried to pant through the agony without taking the deep breaths that would only exacerbate the problem.

Slowly she lowered herself back into the cushiony deep bed and remembered why moving was a bad thing.

There was a soft knock at the door, but it opened before she could answer.

“Are you okay?” Malcolm asked as he popped his head around the door. “I heard a noise.”

“I’m fine. I just moved too suddenly.”

“Why?” Pushing the door open fully, he didn’t seem at all hesitant about entering her room. Of course, it was his house, but as a man who had shown an abundance of manners over the past few days, the least he could have done was ask if it was all right to come in.

“Why what?” she grumbled, using her hands to lift herself into a sitting position against the pillows. She was in an oversize T-shirt so she wasn’t exactly worried about appearances, but she also wasn’t wearing a bra. Glancing down to check to see if her nipples were hard would have been a little obvious, but if she had to guess, she would say they were. It seemed to happen frequently when he was around.

And then he’d had to go and kiss her. That certainly hadn’t helped.

“Why did you move so fast? Did something startle you?”

Yes, but it wasn’t the monster, which was all he wanted to know. “Don’t worry about it.”

Nothing more than a ghost from her past.

He shifted his head to the side as if considering it but evidently decided to take her lead and drop it. She noted not for the first time how starkly handsome he was. His dark gray suit was cut to fit, and the fine material showcased his physique. A physique she’d gotten an up close feel of when he’d held her against his chest. His face was defined by sharp angles around his cheeks and chin and nose. Had the angles been any sharper he might have looked like a smaller version of Frankenstein; instead, he was closer to Brad Pitt. Only with more intensity.

Again, Cass was pretty sure she wouldn’t have even been cataloging his features if it hadn’t been for that kiss. It wasn’t difficult for her to admit that it had unnerved her. She couldn’t get away from it.

It had felt good. Sweet, warm, and she’d wanted more. Everything a kiss was supposed to be. Everything she couldn’t have. Certainly not with him.

Shaking herself out of her reverie, Cass stopped admiring him and thought about what he was doing in her bedroom already dressed. “You’re leaving for work, and you need to take me home. That’s fine. I just need a few