Why the hell has your witchy face been in my head for the past fifteen years?
McVey didnt expect an answer. He wasnt even sure why hed asked the question. True, she looked very much like the woman in his recurring dream, but the longer he stared at hercouldnt help that part, unfortunatelythe more the differences added up.
On closer inspection, Amaras hair really was more brown than red. Her features were also significantly finer than whoever. Her gray eyes verged on charcoal, her slim curves were much better toned and her legs were the longest hed seen on any woman anywhere.
He might have lingered on the last thing if she hadnt slapped a hand to his chest, narrowed those beautiful eyes to slits and seared him with a glare.
What the hell kind of question is that?
Night of
the Raven
Jenna Ryan
www.millsandboon.co.uk
JENNA RYAN started making up stories before she could read or write. As she grew up, romance always had a strong appeal, but romantic suspense was the perfect fit. She tried out a number of different careers, including modeling, interior design and travel, but writing has always been her one true love. That and her longtime partner, Rod.
Inspired from book to book by her sister Kathy, she lives in a rural setting fifteen minutes from the city of Victoria, British Columbia. Its taken a lot of years, but shes finally slowed the frantic pace and adopted a West Coast mind-set. Stay active, stay healthy, keep it simple. Enjoy the ride, enjoy the read. All of that works for her, but what she continues to enjoy most is writing stories she loves. She also loves reader feedback. E-mail her at jacquigoff@shaw.ca or visit Jenna Ryan on Facebook.
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To Anne Stuart, who got the writing ball rolling for me. Thank you, Anne, for all the great books.
Contents
Cover
Introduction
Title Page
About the Author
Dedication
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Extract
Copyright
Chapter One
Los Angeles, California
Fifteen years ago
The scene felt so real, McVey figured this time it might not be unfolding in his head. His totally messed-up head, which wasnt improving thanks to the dream that had haunted him every night for the past two weeks.
The moment he fell asleep, he found himself trapped in an attic room that smelled like old wood, wet dirt and something far more pungent than boiled cabbage. The air was muggy and strangely alive. Thunder crashed every few seconds and tongues of lightning flickered through a curtain of fetid gray smoke.
He knew he was hiding, hunkered down in some shadowy corner where the two people he watchedbarely visible within the smokecouldnt see him.
The mans fingers clenched and unclenched. The woman circled a small fire and muttered unintelligible words.
Two violent thunderbolts later, only the woman and the smoke remained. The man had vanished.
Okay, that couldnt be good. McVey searched frantically for a way out of wherever he was before whoever she was saw him and made him eat the same black dripping thing shed given the now-gone man.
With her eyes closed and her hair and clothes askew, she mumbled and swayed and breathed in choking fumes. Then suddenly she froze. In the next flash of lightning her head began to turn. Slowly, creepily, like a rusty weather vane in a bad horror film.
Her eyes locked on McVeys hiding place. He heard the black thing in her hand plop to the floor. She raised a dripping finger and pointed it straight at him.
You, she accused in a voice that made him think of rusty nails soaked in whiskey. You saw what passed between me and the one she would have you call Father.
Whoa, McVey thought on an unnatural spurt of fear. That was a whole lot, what shed just said. A whole lot of nothing he understood, or wanted to.
Whoa, McVey thought on an unnatural spurt of fear. That was a whole lot, what shed just said. A whole lot of nothing he understood, or wanted to.
You have no business here, child. She started toward him. Dont you know Im mad?
Right. Mad. So why the hell couldnt he move his? He stopped the question abruptly, backpedaled and latched on to the other word. Child?
Shock, slick and icy, rolled through him when he looked down and saw his feet encased in tiny, shin-high boots.
Thunder rattled the house. His head shot up when he heard a low creak. Watching her smile, he realized with a horrified jolt that she was beautiful. He also realized he knew her, or at least he recognized her.
When she pointed at him again, the spell broke and he reached for his gun on the nightstand. Except there was no nightstand, and the next streak of lightning revealed a hand that wasnt his. Couldnt be. It was too small, too pale and far too delicate.
Dont be afraid, child. Her voice became a silky croon. Her ugly clothes and hair melted into a watery blur of color. I wont harm you. Ill only make what you think youve seen go away.
McVey wanted to tell her that he had no idea what hed seen and the only thought in his head right then was to get out of there before her fingerstill dripping with something disgustingtouched him.
He edged sideways in the dark. He could escape if the lightning would give him a break.
Of course it didnt, and her eyes, gray and familiar, continued to track his every move.
Theres no way out, she warned. With an impatient sound she grabbed his wrists. I dont want to hurt you. You know I never have.
No, he really didnt know that, but wherever he was, he had no gun. Or strength, apparently, to free himself from her grasp.
She laughed when he fought her. Foolish child. You forget Im older than you. Im also more powerful, and much, much meaner than your mother.
His mother?
She dragged him out of the corner. Come with me.
When she hauled him upright, he stumbled. Looking down, he saw the hem of the long dress hed stepped on.
Why am I...? But when he heard the high, unfamiliar voice that emerged from his throat, he choked the question off.
The woman crouched to offer a grim little smile. Believe me when I tell you, Annalee, what I will do to you this night is for your own good....
* * *
MCVEY SHOT FROM the nightmare on the next peal of thunder. The dark hair that fell over his eyes made him think hed gone blind. A gust of wind rattled the shade above his nightstand and he spotted the stuttering neon sign outside. It wasnt until he saw his own hand reaching over to check his gun that he let himself fall back onto the mattress and worked on loosening the knots in his stomach.
That they remained there, slippery yet stubbornly tight, was only partly due to the recurring nightmare. The larger part stemmed from a more tangible source.
It was time to do what hed known he would do for the past two weeks, ever since his nineteenth birthday. Ever since his old man had pried a deathbed promise from his only son.
He would set aside the disturbing fact that every time he fell asleep these days he turned into a young girl who wore long dresses and old-fashioned boots. Hed forget about the woman he thought he should know who wanted to give him amnesia. Hed focus strictly on keeping the promise hed made to his father. If that meant turning his back on the people hed worked with since...well, not all that long actually, so nothing lost there. He was going to walk away now, tonight, keep his promise and change the course of his life.
Maybe if he did that, the nightmare would stay where it belonged. Buried deep in the past of the person he feared hed once been.
Chapter Two
New Orleans, Louisiana
Present Day
Make no mistake about it...
Moments after the sentence had been passed, the raspy-voiced man with the stooped shoulders and the tic in his left eye had looked straight at Amara Bellam and whispered just loud enough for her and the two men beside her to hear.
Those who brought about my imprisonment will pay. My family will see to it.
Although her eyewitness testimony had played a large part in his conviction, at the time Jimmy Sparks had uttered his threat, Amara had thought his reaction was nothing more than knee-jerk. After all, life in prison for someone of his dubious health surely meant he wouldnt see the free light of day ever again.
But the word family crept into her head more and more often as the weeks following his incarceration crept by. It took root when Lieutenant Michaels of the New Orleans Police Department contacted her with the news that one of her two fellow witnesses, Harry Benedict, was dead.
Now, dont panic. Michaels patted the air in front of her. Remember, Harry had close to two decades on Jimmy.
Lieutenant, Jimmy Sparks is the two-pack-a-day head of a large criminal family. He has a dozen relatives to do his legwork. Harry was a hale and hearty seventy-nine-year-old athlete who hiked across Maryland just last year.
Which is very likely why he died of a massive coronary just last night. The detective made another useless patting motion. Really, you dont need to panic over this.
Im not panicking.
No, youre not. His hand dropped. Well, that makes one of you. Chad, our overstressed third witness, knocked back two glasses of bourbon while I was explaining the situation.
Chad dived off the temperance wagon right after Jimmy Sparks whispered his threat to us. She rubbed her arms. Are you sure Harry died of natural causes?
The path lab said it was heart failure, pure and simple. The man had a history, Amara. Two significant attacks in the past five years.
Hale and hearty, though, she recalled after Michaels left.
For the next few weeks she fought her jitters with an overload of work. Even so, fear continued to curl in Amaras stomach. She had thought she might be starting to get past it when the harried lieutenant appeared on her doorstep once again.
Chads dead. She saw it in his dog-tired expression. Damn.
The lieutenant spread his fingers. Im sorry, Amara. And before you ask, the official cause, as determined by the coroners office, is accidental suicide.
This is not happening. A shiver of pure terror snaked through her system. When the detective spoke her name, she raised both hands. Please dont try to convince me that suicides cant be arranged.
Of course they can, but Chad Weaver was surrounded by eleven friends when he collapsedin his home, at a party arranged by him and to which he invited every person in attendance. No one crashed the event, and the drugs and alcohol he ingested were his own.
She swung around to stare. Chad took drugs?
Like the booze, he got into them after Jimmy Sparkss trial. As witnesses, you all hader, haveimpeccable credentials.
Right. Credentials. Feeling her world had tilted radically, Amara headed for her Garden District balcony and some much needed night air. Minds really spinning here, Lieutenant. What kinds of drugs did Chad take?
The cop rubbed his brow. Ecstasy, mostly. A little coke. Mightve smoked some weed earlier in the day.