My Dangerous Pleasure (16 page)

She almost never got to go out to eat. If it weren’t for the bizarre reason they were here, this would be a real treat. She had the screamer almost completely blocked, but that wasn’t stopping her urge to walk over to the woman and rip out whatever was causing that noise. She focused on Iskander. He had something to say, and she wished he’d just get to it and put her out of her misery. Her mother, however, had taught her to be polite. She waited for him to get around to it.

He did after he’d finished his cookie. “Have you always been a baker?”

She leaned back, coffee in her hand. Her frustration came out in sharp words. “What difference does that make?”

“I need to know.”

“Fine.” She huddled into her coat. “No, I haven’t always been a baker. My mom wanted me to go to law school. So did my dad, so that’s what I was going to do even though I hated the idea of being a lawyer.”

He sat up. “Your parents are still alive?”

“Not my birth dad. He died before I was born.”

“Are you adopted?”

The screaming was getting louder again, and she was having trouble concentrating. Iskander misinterpreted her silence.

“I wouldn’t ask if it didn’t matter.”

She rubbed her temples. Her head throbbed.
The sounds aren’t real. No one is screaming.
“Actually, I am. Half adopted.” Iskander made a face at that. “My stepfather adopted me two or three years after he married my mother, when I was five. And before you ask, yes, she’s my real mom.”

“What about her?”

“She lives outside Atlanta. Her favorite thing to do is send me star charts proving I should be a lawyer and married to a Taurus.”

“Is your adoptive father still around?”

She sighed. “No. I mean, he’s alive, but they divorced when I was seventeen. I don’t really blame him. Sometimes she goes off her meds and things get strange. He lives in Florida with his new wife and new kids. We don’t talk much anymore.”

Iskander scratched his chin. “Why does your mom need medications?”

“Because she’s loony.”

“In what way?”

“For one thing, she thinks she can read minds.” She laughed, because her mother’s issues were just so absurd. Unless you had to live with her. “When I was little, she used to tell me what certain people were thinking. For a while I believed her. She was my mom, right? I was about ten, I think, when I realized she couldn’t read my mind. One day, when I was older—I didn’t want to hurt her feelings back then—I asked her why she could read other people’s minds but not mine.”

“And?” He wasn’t laughing. Or judging.

“She said she’d never been able to read my mind.” She snorted. “Classic. Because I could have called bullshit on her and she knew it. After that we agreed to disagree about her supposed abilities.” She waved a hand. “Anyway, I left home and ended up paying my own way through college working at restaurants and selling cookies and desserts to fellow starving students. And then to some people who weren’t starving students.” She smiled. “I could charge them more money. The summer before my senior year, I talked my way into the kitchens at Renegade in north Berkeley. Best thing that ever happened to me.”

“Ashlin Lau’s restaurant, right?”

“You’ve heard of her.”

He smiled, and it was just such a cute smile, she couldn’t help smiling back. “I like food.”

“Urban’s party is going to be at Ashlin’s house. That’s part of the reason it’s such a big deal. Ashlin’s a big deal in the cooking world. At any rate, I spent that summer in her kitchen, and Ashlin encouraged me, you know? She doesn’t encourage many people.”

“Smart woman.”

“That’s where I met Urban. He worked at Renegade, too. One of Ashlin’s projects.” Those days seemed so far away now, living on practically no money, learning how to run a restaurant, and cooking great food. “We all knew he’d be a star one day, and that’s what happened. Now he has a restaurant in New York and his own cooking show. Much to my mother’s dismay, instead of law school, I spent a year in France—Ashlin knew some people in the business. The rest, as they say, is history.”

He nodded, leaning back in his chair in a careless position that did nothing but show off a perfect body. As far as she was concerned, the facial tats just added to his appeal. To her and probably every red-blooded woman in the room, those tats were drop-dead sexy. “You worked at Renegade for several years.”

“Until I had enough saved up to open the bakery. I borrowed money, too. It’s not cheap starting a business. Especially a bakery, with all the specialized equipment you need, and I don’t cut corners on ingredients.”

“Ashlin Lau is a major investor of yours.”

Paisley didn’t move. “You seem to know a lot about me.”

“I did my due diligence before I decided to rent to you.” His second cookie was just about gone. “She’s backed a few winners. Including Urban Drummond.”

“If you knew all that, why are you asking me?” She was getting that weird vibration in her chest again, and it was all she could do to keep from stroking her sternum. She glanced out the window, wondering if maybe she’d see Iskander’s guy again. Nothing. Not even Rasmus.

“What’s outside, Paisley?”

The ice in her Americano was melting, so she took a long drink before she answered. Lied, more or less. “Rasmus. Somewhere. He always is. You know that.”

“I’d know before he got close enough for you to see.”

His matter-of-fact delivery spooked her. He couldn’t know something like that unless he was as crazy as she was. “What, you have radar for psychos?”

“Yeah.” He held her gaze, and her heart folded over on itself because he was still serious. “Do you?”

She put down her drink because she didn’t want him to see her trembling. It was hard enough keeping herself together with the screaming in her head. Add in a conversation that bordered on the absurd and she was right there at the edge. “Maybe you should tell me what you’re after.”

“You keep looking at that woman over there. Why?”

“She’s staring at you.”

Iskander looked in the woman’s direction. “She’s hot,” he said after a longer time watching her than was polite. “I’d do her in a minute if I thought she was looking for a good time.”

“Don’t let me stop you.”

“She isn’t watching me because she’s hoping I’ll hop into the sack with her.” He leaned forward and lowered his voice. “Tell me what you think is special about her, and I’ll tell you if you’re right.”

C
HAPTER 14

J
ust when Iskander thought she wouldn’t answer, she did, in a low, soft voice that made him hurt inside because she sounded frightened, and he was pretty sure he was about to make things worse. The father she’d never known had likely been one of the magekind. The way she described her mother made him think there was something there, too. Reading minds was a very human way to describe what the kin could do when they had a connection going with each other or with a human. And what did that say about her mother’s origins?

And if her mother could read minds, or whatever it was she could do, no wonder Paisley was a resistant. She’d probably developed her resistance in self-defense. Paisley’s mother probably
couldn’t
read her daughter’s mind.

“You’ll think I’m crazy.”

“No,” he said. He wanted to touch her, but he didn’t want any of his magic to leak into her even inadvertently. He kept his hands to himself. “I promise you, I won’t think you’re crazy.”

She looked at him from underneath her lashes and said, “She’s a screamer.”

“Well.” He sat back, flummoxed by her response. “That wasn’t even in my top ten most likely answers. A screamer? Like when she comes? Is that what you mean?”

“No.” She curled her hand around her mostly empty coffee and looked at him from under her lashes. “That’s what I call them. People like her. Screamers.”

“Why?”

“Because that’s what I hear when they get close enough. Screams. She happens to be particularly loud. Usually I have to be closer before I hear anything.”

He got a chill when she told him what she was hearing. Jesus, no wonder she worried he’d think she was crazy. She wasn’t, though. “Did you ever get that from Rasmus?”

“Yes.” She nodded. “But it’s completely random who’s a screamer and who’s not.”

“It’s not random.” He scooted his chair in and kept his voice low. “Rasmus Kessler is a mage—that means he can do things you probably think are impossible. He’s killed dozens of the kin, because if he does it just right, he can add a few years to his life. Tell me, how old do you think he is?”

She frowned. “Midthirties?”

“Try three hundred and thirty. Probably older than that.” He wished he was better at reading human expressions, because if she thought he was full of shit, he was going to be in some deep trouble. “The kin are… people like me, and the way he kills them, they don’t really die. Their physical bodies do, but a part of them doesn’t.”

She lifted her eyes to his face and studied him. “You believe that?”

Iskander took a breath. “Do you have a better explanation for what’s happening to you? The screaming you’re hearing?”

“Besides going crazy?”

“You’re not crazy.” He glanced at the witch over on the other side of the café and was reassured to see she was back to reading on her gizmo. “What I think is happening is when you get near one of the magekind, you hear the screams of the kin they’ve murdered.” He pushed away his empty plate. Waste of money, those cookies.

She grabbed her Americano and drank about half of what was left. Her arm shook. “One of us is crazy, and until now, I would have bet it was me.”

He set his hands on the table and bent his head for a moment. How much more to tell her? When he looked up, she was watching him with that careful blankness she sometimes got. “How about neither one of us is crazy? Would you go for that?”

“Yes,” she said. “I surely would. But if you ask me, we’re both…

“What?”

She pressed a palm to her chest and narrowed her eyes as if she were in pain. “Is your psycho radar going off?” she whispered.

“No.” He watched the hope in her eyes vanish, and it about killed him, it really did, but he’d told her the truth. He wasn’t feeling what she was. What he didn’t say—because he didn’t have any idea how to say it yet—was that the witch over in the corner wasn’t pulling any magic. If there were other magekind around, he’d know. Which meant she was probably reacting to a mageheld. Mostly likely one who belonged to the witch.

“I guess now we know which one of us is crazy.”

“Not necessarily. Paisley, I—”

The café door opened, and Iskander knew from the look on her face that the cause of her reaction had just walked inside. He turned his head to get a look, and his stomach took a flyer.

Definitely a mageheld. But not one who belonged to Paisley’s screamer.

Fen.

She hadn’t changed at all. She was tall, ballerina thin, and the kind of beautiful that stole your breath. She was dressed to kill in straight-legged jeans, high-heeled fuck-me pumps, and a sheer white shirt over a black bra. Her long hair was loose and still a gorgeous fiery copper-red. Fen surveyed the room like she owned it, paused to check out the blond witch, then turned her head and looked directly at him. A familiar smile spread over her face as she headed toward him.

For half a second, it was like nothing had changed between them. Except he couldn’t feel her. Their bond was gone, and magically speaking, she was a nullity to him because she’d willingly enslaved herself to Rasmus Kessler. Mageheld, but not against her will.

The shock of seeing her wore off, and he realized if Fen was around, Rasmus probably wasn’t too far. He slid his phone into his pocket, set his hand over Paisley’s, and pressed gently down. “Do exactly what I say, okay?” She nodded. “Don’t say a word about who you are or that you’re staying with me.”

“Why not?”

“There’s a chance she’ll take the thoughts right out of your head, so if you can, don’t think about me or my house. Recite a recipe in your head or something.” He was counting on her magical resistance keeping Fen out of her head.