Dying Dreams (Book 1 of Dying Dreams Trilogy) (29 page)

“You need to prove your loyalty so that you can work for me. You and that agent you brought here know too much about me. You work for me, or I bury you so deep no one ever finds the body.”

Liza shuddered, but the pain in her head made the darkness and safety of death sound like a blessing. “Rice only knows about the drill and the mermaids, and there were no charges against you on those issues.”

“And you think he’s going to let it drop at that? You don’t think he’s going to keep coming after me? You, at least, have a skill I find useful. He has nothing to offer me.”

Liza shook her head, her panic increasing. Knowing the connections Arty had and the kind of people he worked with, she had little doubt he could carry out his threat. “No, no. I’ll tell him I’m working for you. If I ask him to drop it, he will.”

Arty’s jaw tensed, but he remained otherwise calm. “Your bond only makes him more of a threat. If you want to live you will stop arguing with me and start doing what I say.” The gun behind her clicked and she dropped her head into her hands. She was trapped and she was out of options.

*SLOANE*

“Got anything?” Sloane asked Reggie, the wolf he had on a leash in downtown Greenville. Reggie looked over his shoulder, whined and shook his head. Most of the people they passed would expect to see Sloane walking a large dog and that’s what they would see. They wouldn’t suspect he had a werewolf on a leash. A werewolf who was helping him at the price of Sloane owing a favor to Gabriel Moon. The very idea of owing Gabriel anything made his skin itch. He had been raised with the idea that refusing to repay a favor owed was the worst kind of dishonor, and he wouldn’t be able to say no to whatever Gabriel asked of him. Gabriel needed the kinds of favors that made Sloane nervous. Reggie hadn’t been able to pick up a sign of Liza since they’d left her professor’s lab at the college. It was as though she’d vanished into thin air.

He found it harder and harder to breath, the only thing keeping him from full out panic being the bond he had with Liza that let him know she was still alive. Sloane’s connection to Liza had returned and he could feel her fear and, something even scarier, her resignation. Unfortunately, the bond he shared with her couldn’t help him figure out where she was. It had not, as he’d hoped, allowed him to play hotter colder, where his connection to her felt stronger or weaker as he moved across town.

They were two blocks from the SPA headquarters when he saw her. She was facing the other way, her back to him. Her hair was up in a tight bun and she was wearing non-descript clothes, but he knew it was her. He felt it with every fiber of his being. She turned moments after he spotted her. She stalked down the street toward him and her whole body shook. She held a gun, loosely, in her right hand, and the emotions he got from her were fear and regret.

“I can’t do this anymore, Sloane,” she said, when she got close enough. She never called him Sloane, except in bed. He had a catastrophically bad feeling, but how could he doubt Liza? He knew her like he’d known no one else before.

“We’ll talk about it, later. Let’s just get you back to headquarters where you’ll be safe.”

“I’m tired of you telling me what to do,” she said, her teeth gritted. “You need to listen to me and trust me and give me my space when I ask for it.” Her words were enunciated and he saw more fear in her eyes than anger. “You won’t leave me alone. Showing up at my place last night when I asked you to stay away. It has to stop. I can’t take feeling this bond all the time, and the only way to stop it…” Liza raised the gun and pointed it at his chest.

He’d been sure she was trying to tell him something, but any hope he had of figuring it out left when she pointed the gun at him. Reggie growled and his protective instinct kicked in. “Don’t hurt her. Even if she kills me, don’t touch her.”

A tear rolled down Liza’s cheek. “Please, don’t,” she said. “I don’t need your protection any more, Sloane. I’ve got better protection now. The best. I’ll never spend one minute in a cell with the connections I have.”

He saw her finger pull back on the trigger and he felt an overwhelming rush of emotions from her, chief among them guilt and sorrow. “I love you,” he said. But it was too late. Stinging, screaming pain ripped into his chest, and his world went dark.

*LIZA*

Liza didn’t wait for the wolf to move, she turned and ran as fast as she could, ignoring the blaze of pain tearing through her. She almost hoped that Arty had lied to her and the sniper that would have taken out both her and Sloane if she hadn’t shot him would still put a bullet through her heart. At least then she wouldn’t have to live with the memory of what she’d done. A shiny black sedan pulled up, and the back door opened. Arty grinned at her. “Get in!” he shouted.

She jumped in and sunk into the plushy back seat. Arty reached for her hand but she shook her head and moved away. She wanted to cry, to scream, to do or feel anything. But she only felt numb. She didn’t even feel the ache of desire for Sloane. She didn’t feel the pull of the bond and she didn’t know what that meant. She didn’t know how to tell if he was still alive or if she’d miscalculated and killed him.

“Isn’t it wonderful to be free, Liza? Together, you and I will rule this town, and you will have everything you’ve ever wanted or dreamed of.”

“And if I want Rice back?”

“I’ll find you a man even better than him. And if you get too lonely, there’s always me.” Arty spoke the words with a leer, but his voice held no emotion or desire for her. He only wanted her for what she could do. He’d probably decided to go after her as soon as he discovered her banshee lineage.

She pressed her face to the cool glass of the window and watched the streets pass. She knew she should be pumping Arty for information or doing something to make hurting Sloane worthwhile, but she couldn’t muster the energy. She didn’t even realize she was still gripping the gun until Arty removed it from her hand.

She woke to blinding, screeching pain. Her head throbbed, her stomach churned, and she ached for some sort of relief, but she couldn’t even cry. She wanted Sloane so badly her heart felt like it would explode from the wanting. He would never forgive her, she knew. Even if, by some miracle, he lived, he would never forgive her. His ghost probably wouldn’t even haunt her. And that’s what she deserved, to be alone. She looked around the sunlit room and found herself in a sumptuously decorated, frilly, pink room. It was the kind of room Liza hated. The kind of room she felt she couldn’t be real or dirty in.

She lay down and closed her eyes. She wanted to go back to the oblivion of sleep and stop seeing the hurt on Sloane’s face. She wanted to forget the crack of the gun and his body, his perfect, impossibly beautiful body, flying back and hitting the pavement. But sleep wouldn’t bless her. She wondered if her body was beginning to deteriorate as Arty told her it would if Sloane died, but she felt only the hollow ache of loneliness and guilt. She lay in bed staring at the ceiling until she found the energy to get up, get dressed, and do what she was there to do. If she couldn’t even get out of bed, she might as well have died on that street with Sloane.

Somehow, she made her way through that maze of a house to the dining room and found Arty at the table, a newspaper spread before him and a half-eaten doughnut on a plate next to a glass of orange juice. “Good morning, Sunshine. How did you sleep?”

“Great,” she said, not bothering to keep the snark out of her tone. “Now, I want to know exactly what’s going on.”

“You should have breakfast first.”

“Not hungry.” In fact, the sight of his half-eaten doughnut made her feel like she was going to barf all over his oriental rug.

He smiled at her and gestured for her to sit. She continued to stand, and he shrugged. Moments later, a man brought in a tray with scrambled eggs, grits, and fruit, and placed it on the table. “You need to eat, Liza. I’ll tell you what you want to know over breakfast.”

She sat in front of the food and pushed it around her plate, trying not breathe in the smell. Arty ignored her until he finished reading the paper. He looked over at her still full plate and tsked. “You really should keep your strength up, but I can understand your lack of appetite. Was Rice the first man you’ve ever killed?”

“Yes,” she said, her teeth gritted. “Now, tell me why you’re killing college students.”

He smiled. “They aren’t just college students, dear, they all have dragon blood. Remember the rock, the righ carraig, I told you about? Dragons have long been the protectors of the righ carraig and if anyone knows where it is, they will.”

She suppressed a shudder. He was sick and twisted beyond anything she’d imagined. “You killed them because they
might
know something about this rock that might not exist on earth at all?” Her voice came out a whisper and she knew if she spoke any more loudly she’d start to cry. She’d had no choice but to shoot Sloane and still it felt as though it had all been for nothing. Arty was insane and her new mission became finding enough proof of that to get him put away. “How did you find them?”

“I didn’t find them. We have a hellhound in our little group and she sniffed them out.” He glared at her. “I know what you think of me, but you’re wrong. We followed them, and had evidence that they were also searching for the righ carraig, that they had actually found it.”

Not only was Arty crazy, but he’d convinced others to share in his insanity. “How many people work with you?”

He laughed. “I lost count a long time ago”

She schooled her face to reveal none of the shock she felt. She had hoped to get some proof of Arty’s guilt, but this whole thing was bigger than she’d anticipated and she was certain she’d gotten in way over her head. She wished for Sloane and, just as quickly, pushed him from her mind. If she started to think about him, she’d worry and the more she worried the more she’d hurt and she’d lose her mind if she let herself think too much about what she’d done.

Arty stood and walked over to her. “I have a job for you.” He placed a hand on her shoulder and trailed it down her arm in a way she supposed was meant to be seductive, but creeped her out beyond belief. She stood to escape his touch. “Lead the way.”

Liza felt like an idiot when she saw the body on the table. She should have known right away what Arty wanted. Of course she was only good for dreaming of the dead. She started to shake her head and took a step back, but Arty placed a firm hand on her back and pushed her forward. “Now’s not the time to back down,” he said.

It was too much. After being kidnapped and forced to shoot the man she cared for, Arty wanted her to touch a body and dream of death. She already felt physically and mentally sick. She wasn’t sure she’d survive any more violence. “Can it wait until tomorrow? Please?”

“There’s a dead man on my table, sugar, and he needs to be removed. You will touch him now.” Arty made no threat, but the command in his voice was not to be argued with. She wasn’t sure what he could do to her that could hurt her anymore, but if she backed down, she’d lose her chance to earn his trust and get the proof she needed to make sure Arty was put away for good. Plus, the pixie with the gun pointed at her was added incentive.

She stepped forward, stretched out her arm and touched the man. She backed away so quickly, she stepped on Arty’s toes.

He took her elbow and led her out of the room. “Now to bed with you.”

“But I’m not tired.”

“I have something to help you with that.”

“No, really, I’m not… and sleeping pills… I don’t have the dreams with the pills.”

“I’m not going to give you pills.”

He took her back to the frilly pink room and she walked along with him, because she had no choice. Her feet felt leaden and she wanted so badly to go home, to be back in Sloane’s arms. She didn’t wish for the life she’d had before she’d met Sloane, she wished for the life the two of them had been starting to build together. She ached with missing him and her pain was only increased by the knowledge that she’d never see him again.

There was a cup on the nightstand. Arty helped her into bed and tucked her in. He made her drink the foul liquid and she started to ask for another drink to wash away the taste, but before she could speak her head hit the pillow and she was asleep.

She lived and died the last day of a violent and bitter man and, when she woke, she ran to the bathroom and dry-heaved, because there was nothing left in her stomach to throw up. She sobbed with her head against the cold porcelain of the toilet and, when she was done, Arty was there.

He led her to his office and sat her down in the leather chair. Her whole body shook and she felt like she was still in the horror of the dream. Arty sat down behind his desk and took out a ledger book and a pen. “Tell me who killed him.”

“He… he killed an entire family. Even… he killed the children. They were so…” she was going to be sick again, she could feel her stomach heaving and the tears pressing against her eyelids, but she was dry. She had nothing left.

“Yes, yes. I know that. What I need to know is who killed
him
.”

She didn’t want to tell him. That dead man had deserved to die. “I didn’t see the shooter,” she said. She didn’t know if she was any good at lying, but she’d convinced Sloane she hadn’t felt the bond, so maybe she wasn’t awful. But the man had been shot in the forehead, she needed a convincing reason for him to have missed seeing the shooter. “The dead man… his eyes were closed. He was…” she racked her memory of the dream and the man for a reasonable explanation. “He was proud of what he’d done, killing the family. He’d closed his eyes and relived the… the experience. Then there was the sound of the gunshot and pain and then nothing.”

Arty eyed her for a long moment. “You’ve got nothing else? The sound of a voice?”

She shook her head. She had to give him something, to make it look like she was trying. “It happened moments after he’d killed them all, so it had to be someone who was close by, but I couldn’t get anything else. I’m sorry.”