The Queen of Swords: A Paranormal Tale of Undying Love Read online

  He let go of her arms, but kept her pinned. The next instant, he pressed an arm against her throat hard enough to cut off her air. She tried to gasp, but took nothing in. Her head began to pound, her mind to swim. She could feel him fumbling with his fly. She tried to lift a knee, to bash him in the groin, but he shoved his knee between her legs, blocking the blow.

  “Please,” she pleaded, her voice a rasp.

  “That’s right, Miss Muffet.” He eased the chokehold enough to let her breathe. “Beg for it.”

  She felt him jerk up her skirt, felt his fingers clawing at her knickers, felt him poking at her entrance. Air rushed over her as his weight lifted off her. Unprepared for the sudden release, her legs buckled. She slid down the wall, the rough stucco and timbers tearing at her dress. Shaking with terror, she looked up. What did he mean to do? It took her a moment to process the scene before her. Her attacker dangled in midair, trousers around his knees, feet running a foot off the ground. Her Scot was there too, holding the man by the scruff of the neck.

  “This is between me and her,” the would-be rapist sputtered as he yanked up his pants.

  “Oh, aye? Well, it’s between you and me now.”

  Dazed and shaken, she watched the exchange, mouth agape.

  “What shall I do with him lass?” the Scot asked, keeping his eyes on his captive. “It’s your call. Beat him to a senseless pulp or call the coppers?”

  She leered hatefully at the man’s crotch. “Is castration an option?”

  “Aye.” The Scot flashed her a grin as he gave the man a hard shake. “Just the bollocks or the whole package?”

  The man started to squeal and pump his legs wildly. The Scot dropped him to the ground. Landing on his feet, he spun round and took a swing. Her stranger blocked the blow with lightning speed before delivering one of his own. Her attacker dropped on his ass with a grunt.

  “I was doing mankind a favor,” he said. “Chalking one up for the home team, you might say.”

  Rage exploded inside her like a bomb. Her mind cleared and turned red. The next moment, she was on her feet. She charged toward the man, ready to do damage. Quick as a wink, the Scot caught her around the waist.

  Holding her tight, he barked at her attacker, “Clear off before I give her the knife in my boot to do as she chooses.”

  Rolling onto all fours, the man pushed to his feet. She shot out a foot, but only caught air. As he took off running, the fight drained out of her.

  “Who are you?”

  “Just a Good Samaritan.”

  He let her go and, as she stepped away from him, she ran a hand through her hair, realizing only then it had come loose during the struggle.

  “I’m not gay,” she blurted, unsure why. “I just didn’t want him.”

  “Aye well,” he muttered, looking woeful, “If only you were.”

  Puzzled by the remark, she rounded on him and looked into his face. He was tall and strapping and so handsome it took her breath away. He smelled of cigarettes, making her suddenly crave one intensely. The familiarity niggled again. “How do we know each other?

  “We met this afternoon,” he said, his expression serious. “In the university library.”

  She frowned at him. “No, I mean before that. Why do I feel like I know you?”

  “Do you?”

  The frown deepened into a glower. “You know perfectly well I do. You said we’d met before. A couple of times. So why are you being so obtuse all of a sudden?”

  He looked away, reached into his jacket pocket, and pulled out his cigarettes. Gauloises. Ugh. Still, they were better than nothing. “Can I have one of those?”

  Disapproval narrowed his eyes. “You smoke?”

  She shrugged. “Sometimes. When I’m stressed.”

  Like now. Aside from his bewildering familiarity and evasiveness, she’d come dangerously close to being raped. She’d come almost as close back in secondary school. The memory of it still made her bristle. Despite vowing never to put herself in such a position again, she had. Because she’d wanted to impress someone who seemed intent on messing with her head. As her fury rekindled, she felt torn between kicking herself or him.

  He held out his cigarettes. With trembling fingers, she plucked one from the packet and pressed it between her lips. He flamed the tip with a gold lighter, also gnawingly familiar. Why wouldn’t he explain how they knew each other? Or even tell her his name?

  Looking at him hard, she said, “If you won’t tell me who you are, will you at least tell me how you know the O’Lyrs?

  He drew on his cigarette and exhaled. “I live with them.”

  Concern zapped her heart. “Which one?”

  “Sorry?”

  “Which of the O’Lyrs do you live with? Him or her?”

  He shrugged one shoulder. “Both.”

  Did she dare pursue it? After all, what business was it of hers? Tears tightened her throat, but she swallowed them back. She already felt pathetic enough without turning on the waterworks.

  “Thank you, by the way,” she managed to squeeze out. “I don’t want to think what would have happened if you hadn’t come along when you did.”

  “Nor do I. But you ought not to play with fire. And if you did it with me in mind, you needn’t have bothered.”

  She frowned up at him, stunned once again by his astonishing eyes. “What are you talking about?”

  “The spell.”

  Her mouth fell open. How could he know about the charm and why’d he say she needn’t have bothered? Blinking up at him, she bravely asked, “Do you find me so unappealing?”

  Stepping up to her, he set a finger under her chin. As he lifted her eyes to his, her breath caught and her pulse quickened. His pull on her was powerful, magnetic, like nothing she’d ever felt before. She thought he meant to kiss her and couldn’t believe how much she wished he would. But he didn’t. Instead, he said, soft as moonlight, “No, lass. Quite the opposite. Now, go back inside where you’ll be safe.”

  “But, I feel safe with you.”

  “You’re anything but.” Letting her go, he stepped back. “And if you value your life, you’ll stay as far away from me as possible.”

  “Cat?”

  The sound of Avery’s voice made her turn. Her friend was on the sidewalk, hands on hips, face etched with a mixture of annoyance and worry.

  “What are you doing out here? Not leaving, I hope.”

  “No. I was just talking to—”

  She turned back to the Scot, but, dammit, he’d pulled another disappearing act.

  “Talking to whom?”

  “That friend of Benedict’s. With the long ginger hair.”

  “The big Scot?” Avery smirked and rolled her eyes. “It figures.”

  “Did you happen to catch his name?”

  The space between Avery’s perfect eyebrows dented. “Oh, hell. I did, but now I can’t for the life of me recall what it was.”

  “Try,” Cat urged through clenched teeth. “Please. It’s important.”

  Avery got a faraway look. “I remember thinking of crackers, oddly enough.”

  “Crackers? You mean the Christmas kind?”

  “No, the other kind. Like biscuits.”

  Cat searched her mind for any brand of crackers with a man’s name. She could think of only one. “Was it Jacob, as in Jacob’s Cream Crackers?”

  Avery, scowling in concentration, shook her head. “Damn, why can’t I bloody remember? It was dead common too.”

  As Cat racked her brain, trying to come up with something else, Avery said, “Graham. That was it. Graham Lonigan. No, hang on. Logan. Graham Logan. Yes, I’m almost sure that’s it.”

  Graham Logan.

  The name seemed to fit the hole in her heart like a long-lost key.

  Avery gave her a probing look. “Once again, why?”

  Even as a blush burned her cheeks, she shrugged as if it was no big deal.

  “Right.” Avery sounded unconvinced. “Now come back inside and m-
meet the O’Lyrs before we f-freeze our nipples off.”

  Cat followed her friend back inside the noisy pub and through the crowd to the fireplace. The heat felt good on her chilled skin, but did nothing to ease her mind. At least she knew his name now, which was better than nothing, though not by much.

  Branwen O’Lyr was even better looking up close. She was so beautiful, in fact, Cat had a hard time looking at her. Avery made the introductions. Benedict seemed amiable enough, but she got a bad vibe from his sister.

  When Avery and Branwen started talking about shoe shopping, she turned to Benedict and asked how he knew Graham.

  He seemed surprised by her question. “How do you?”

  “I met him earlier today at the university.”

  “The university? What was he doing there?”

  “I don’t know,” she said. “Does he have any interest in the occult?”

  “He collects books about vampires and reads tarot cards. Do those things qualify?”

  She nodded. “Does he practice magic?”

  “Not that I know of.”

  Not a witch then. But he read tarot cards and collected vampire books, meaning they had loads in common, not the least of which was a strong mutual attraction. And it was mutual, wasn’t it? Why else had he approached her in the library, stared at her across the pub, and come to her rescue outside just now? So, why did he keep disappearing on her? And why had he warned her to stay away from him? His hot-and-cold behavior made no sense.

  Branwen turned from her conversation with Avery and, with cool eyes and a condescending smile, inserted, “Sounds to me like someone’s crushing on our Graham.”

  Taken aback, Cat stammered, “C-crushing? N-not at all. I’m just curious.”

  The other woman’s eyes turned from frosty to glacial, chilling her to the marrow. “Haven’t you heard, Cat? Curiosity kills.”

  At that, she turned on her heel and walked away. Cat watched her go, hurling visual daggers at her slinky back. It was obvious Miss O’Lyr wanted the hot Scot for herself. But did he want her?

  Which of the O’Lyrs do you live with, him or her?

  Both.

  The knife of jealousy pierced her heart. Was that why he’d warned her to stay away? Because Branwen was insanely possessive? She could believe it, but was she also homicidal? And, if so, why did he put up with it? Beauty, after all, was only skin-deep. Admittedly, she didn’t know Graham Logan very well. But what little she did know of him didn’t strike her as the least bit shallow.

  Chapter 4: Romancing the Vampire

  She watched the High Street shops whiz past through the passenger window of Avery’s Cooper Mini. The Tea Cozy; the newsstand; the drug store and fish-and-chips shop; Leaf & Brew, the esoteric bookseller where she bought most of her vampire books and magical supplies; Our Lady of Perpetual Hope, the little white Catholic chapel which invoked a twinge of guilt every time she passed by; and Second Hand Rose’s, the vintage shop where she bought most of her clothes and objet d’art. Beside her, in the driver’s seat, Avery endlessly effused about Benedict.

  He’s so handsome. He’s so charming. He’s so clever.

  Maybe so, she wanted so badly to scream, but can he shag you with his stare?

  The moment they were through the front door, she made a beeline for her bedroom, muttering something to Avery about getting back to her dissertation. After locking the door, she headed straight for her desk and switched on the lamp. Still struggling to steer her mind back to vampires, she started picking through the articles she’d collected over the past several months. Most of them addressed the vampire’s sexual prowess, as the title of her doctorate was Romancing the Vampire: His Evolution from Sexual Predator to Bad-Boy Fantasy.

  She picked up Carmilla, a Gothic novella by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu telling of a young woman’s seduction by a vampiric female being. The cover showed a young woman in white—the victim, presumably—peering out a castle window with a mixture of longing and forlorn.

  Images and sensations from earlier floated through her mind. The feel of his mouth, the weight of his body, the impression of penetration. Desire fluttered deep in her abdomen like a trapped bird. She bit down, forcing her focus back to the book in her hand. She thumbed through its pages, scanning and jotting some notes before setting it down. As she picked up Dracula, the image of his hand reaching past her flashed through her mind.

  He was lucky to have no reflection to forever fuck with his head.

  A chill crawled down her spine. Shuddering, she turned to a dog-eared page and began to read a highlighted passage.

  In the moonlight opposite me were three young women, ladies by their dress and manner. I thought at the time I must have been dreaming when I saw them, they threw no shadow on the floor. They came close to me, and looked at me for some time, and then whispered together. Two were dark, and had high aquiline noses, like the Count, and great dark, piercing eyes, that seemed to be almost red when contrasted with the pale yellow moon. The other was fair, as fair as can be, with great masses of golden hair and eyes like pale sapphires. I seemed somehow to know her face, and to know it in connection with some dreamy fear, but I could not recollect at the moment how or where...

  Eeriness washed over her, raising the hairs on her nape as she re-read the last line.

  Good goddess.

  Was he?

  Could he possibly be?

  It certainly would explain a few things.

  Like his seductive stare—the one so penetrating she could feel it inside her.

  Not to mention, his habit of vanishing like a phantom. Or how he knew about her Cinderella Charm.

  But it didn’t explain the visions or the bagpipes...nor did she feel “dreamy fear” when she looked at him. What she felt was a blazing desire to jump his bones. Even now it smoldered deep in her belly.

  She dropped Dracula on the desk as if it had caught fire. Flushed with sexual longing, she unzipped her dress and let it fall to the floor. Stepping out of it, she moved toward the bed. Wearing only her bra and panties, she reclined and reached to the nightstand. Easing open the drawer, she felt around for the book she kept on hand for such occasions: The Rampant Cock, an erotic Scottish historical.

  The scuffed cover featured a buff, bare-chested Highlander. Inside, the pages were yellowed, heavily dog-eared, and smelled suspiciously of dust mites. As she read the first of the bawdiest passages, she slipped a hand between her legs, imagining it belonged to the long-fingered Scot.

  The pleasure swiftly built to a climax and, when the last shudders of release had passed, she dropped the book in the open drawer and her head on the pillow. No sooner had she closed her eyes than a new scene began to take shape inside her mind. It was fuzzy at first, an indistinguishable collage of shadow, light, and color. Little by little, it sharpened until she saw herself in another time.

  Strangely, she was both inside and outside herself at the same time. The woman she saw and inhabited was herself, but also someone else. She had the same dark hair and willowy figure, but wore a peacock blue gown, a strange sort of fur wrap, and an enormous hat ornamented with ribbons and plumes.

  Her dreams were often vividly realistic, but this seemed more so somehow. Setting aside the explanation for now, she took a breath and sank into the experience. The morning air was cool on her face and the sky above clear and luminous. She walked alone, but passed several people in old-fashioned clothing: men in suits with starched collars and women in elegant lace and velvet gowns. Most wore hats as large and ostentatious as her own. Others donned smaller chapeaus and carried parasols.

  Over the rushing water, she could hear clopping hooves and carriage wheels grinding on cobblestones. She also could hear the sputter of early automobiles. The aromas of strong coffee and fresh-baked bread teased her nostrils. In the distance, she spied a brasserie and somehow knew it was her destination. She also somehow knew the woman frequented fashionable salons and had a self-confidence she lacked. She was meeting a friend, a fellow wri
ter from the Federation of Freethought. She was late, though the narrowness of her ankle-length skirt made it impossible to lengthen her stride.

  As she approached the cafe, she scanned the sidewalk tables in search of the friend, Henriette Boyer, but did not see her. Had Henriette, for some mad reason, opted to sit inside? Moving toward the front window to check, her wrap caught on the back of a chair, pulling it over with a crash. Face heating, she turned to both right the chair and offer an apology. Her eyes skimmed over a solitary gentleman in a tweed driving cap and round-rimmed dark glasses.

  “Please forgive my clumsiness, monsieur,” she said in French, stooping to grab the chair.

  “There is nothing to forgive, mademoiselle,” he replied, also in French, as she set the chair back on its legs.

  His words hinted of a foreign accent, provoking a second look. Peering at her over the top of his glasses were the most extraordinary golden eyes she’d ever seen.

  He tipped his cap. “Je m'appelle Graham Logan.”

  “C'est un plaisir, Monsieur Logan.” Warming under his gaze, she made a small curtsy. “Je m'appelle Catharine. Catharine Le Croix.”

  The Catharine part of her found him both oddly familiar and intoxicatingly attractive. The Cat part of her was shocked to find the man she’d met today looking exactly the same during Le Belle Époque.

  “Where do you hail from, monsieur?”

  “Scotland, originally.” He said it in English, which she understood perfectly. “But now reside here.”

  Though Catharine had never been to Scotland, she’d long wanted to go. She was a fan of the novels of Sir Walter Scott and those depicting Scottish country life by Ian MacLaren, S. R. Crockett, and others of the Kailyard School.

  “What brought you to Paris?”