Cursed

“I didn’t...” Until tonight she had never raised a hand, let alone a weapon, to another human being. She was all about healing—not hurting.

Had her potion or her prayer worked on Raven, bringing that gasp of breath to her lungs? Had she done enough for the girl to survive?

Agent Hughes ignored her denial and led her toward the dark SUV parked behind her pickup truck. After opening the back door, he put his hand over her head and guided her onto the seat.

Hating that even her hair tingled from his touch, she pushed against his hand. Then she twisted around on the seat, keeping her legs out so that he couldn’t lock her inside the vehicle. She was afraid to get into a SUV with him, afraid of where he might take her.

Of what he might do to her...

“If not for assault, why are you arresting me?” she asked. “What are the charges?”

“Murder.” That muscle twitched again along his jaw as he stared down at her.

“I didn’t hurt Raven,” she said. But it must not have looked like it when he walked into the barn and found her alone with the unconscious girl. “And she’s going to live.”

She has to...

“Your arrest has nothing to do with her,” Agent Hughes said. “Yet. You’re under arrest for multiple counts of first-degree murder.”

She would have laughed—had he not looked so deadly serious. So instead she shook her head. “I’m not a killer.”

“You’re not just a killer, Maria Cooper—you’re a serial killer. And while Michigan doesn’t have the death penalty, some of the other states where you’ve killed do have it. You won’t be able to hurt anyone else where you’re going.”

She didn’t need any special gifts to know he was talking about sending her straight to hell.

* * *

Seth had promised to call them when he found her. But breaking his promise would probably be a bigger favor to them than keeping it. Maria Cooper was a dangerous woman.

And he had locked himself inside the tiny interrogation room at the local jail—with her. Just the two of them. The table between them was so small that every time he moved, his knees bumped against hers. That contact, however slight, sent blood rushing through his veins, roaring in his ears. What the hell was wrong with him?

Over the years, he had connected with victims...through evidence left behind at the crime scenes. And he’d had those damn vivid dreams ever since he was a kid. But never before had he had such a reaction to a suspect, as if inexplicably drawn to her no matter the atrocities she’d committed.

He pushed back his chair, but it bumped up against the cement-block wall behind him. And she was still so close he could feel her. To slow his pulse, he drew in a deep breath, and her scent filled his lungs—that sweet, smoky mixture of lavender and sandalwood that had his stomach knotting with desire...and apprehension.

He closed his eyes, but then the images from that damn dream—that wasn’t a dream—flashed through his head. Her hair skimming across her slender shoulders. Her naked back, turned toward him, the moonlight playing across her honey skin and that trio of tattoos. She stood and faced him, the gun in her hand. The shot echoed inside his head, and he winced and opened his eyes.

“The caffeine’s giving you a headache,” she murmured, gesturing toward the paper cup of sludge sitting between them.

His stomach roiled at the thought of how long it had been sitting in the bottom of the pot in the sheriff’s office.

“You should drink herbal tea.”

“I need the caffeine.” To stay alert. To keep his wits about him. “You sure you don’t want some? It’s going to be a long night.”

“It already has been,” she remarked with a wince of her own. “You finished reading me my rights.” She gestured at the paper she’d signed acknowledging that he had. “Why haven’t you locked me in a cell yet?”

Because while he’d put her under arrest and read her the Miranda rights, she wasn’t really under arrest. He had a warrant only to bring her in to question as a material witness in all those murders—not for committing the actual murders. Seth really didn’t have enough to arrest her for murder yet, even though she was his prime—his only—suspect. He had enough only to question her involvement. Fortunately, she’d waived her right to legal representation during this interview, so whatever she said he would be able to use against her.

“I have some questions for you,” he said.

“About Raven?”

“About all of them.” He picked up the leather briefcase he’d taken from his car and laid it on the table between them. He unlocked it and withdrew a thick folder. “These are the people you were more successful at killing over the past eight years.”

He flipped open the folder and fanned out the crime scene photos across the surface of the table as she probably did her tarot cards. He didn’t need to look at the pictures. All he had to do was close his eyes, and like that dream, the images played through his mind. The first girl had been drowned. A young man had been crushed beneath a board weighted down with bricks. Another girl had been hung...as someone had tried to hang Raven tonight. And the worst, the fire...had left behind little of its victim.

Of her victim.

She didn’t look at the photos, either. Instead she held his gaze. The color drained from her face, making her wide almond-shaped eyes look even bigger and her high cheekbones and heart-shaped chin even more delicate. “I don’t know anything about any murders. I don’t even know why you keep calling me Maria Cooper.”

“Because that’s your name. That’s who you are.” Now that he had found her, he had a feeling that he would never be free of her...that this eerie connection that had haunted him would always bind him to her.

She shook her head, tumbling her glossy black hair around her shoulders as she had in his dream. “No. No. I’m not her.”

“Who are you, then?” he asked, humoring her. “You have no ID. No driver’s license. No birth certificate.”

“Is there a driver’s license or birth certificate on file—anywhere—for Maria Cooper?” she asked.

“You know there’s not. There is no evidence you ever existed.” He tapped the photos. “But these. You’re the one person every single victim had in common. You’re the last person every single victim saw...when you read their tarot cards.” In most of the crime scene photos, the cards were still strewn across the table.

She closed her eyes, as if trying to shut out the images before her. But was she like him? Did they live on inside her head, haunting her just as they—and she—haunted him? Then, closing her eyes would give her no reprieve. In fact, sometimes it only made the images more real for him, like those dreams that weren’t just dreams.

She opened her eyes, just a little, and studied him thoughtfully. “That’s why you took my fingerprints.”

He glanced down at her hands, which were slightly stained on the front and slightly scratched on the back. He’d already requested that the sheriff have Raven’s fingernails scraped—to see if DNA could be matched to the woman who denied she was Maria Cooper.

She narrowed her eyes more. “I may have read their cards, but that doesn’t mean I killed them. You have no evidence that I hurt any of them. There’s no way that a judge really issued a warrant for my arrest.”

“No,” he admitted.

She stood up. And so did he, reaching across the narrow table to grab her wrist again. Like every other time he’d touched her, his fingers tingled and images flashed through his mind like a slide show.

His hands cupped her shoulders, and he pulled her closer. Her chin tipped up, her lips parting on a gasp of desire. She dragged in a deep breath that lifted her breasts against his chest. His head lowered, closer and closer to hers...

He hesitated, his mouth just a breath away from her full lips. Hunger burned in his gut; he’d never wanted to kiss anyone more. Never needed to kiss anyone the way he needed to kiss her...

“Let me go!” she said, tugging at her wrist. “You have no right to keep me here.”

“I have every right to keep you here,” he said. Just no right—or reason—to want to kiss her. Hell, she was the last woman he should be tempted to kiss. He knew exactly how dangerous she was.

“You’re a person of interest,” he explained, “and I do have a warrant to pick you up for questioning.” Ignoring the desire that hardened his body, he slid his hand up her arm to her shoulder and gently but firmly shoved her back into her chair. “You’re going to stay here and answer all my questions.”

“You have the wrong person,” she said, stubbornly sticking with her lie. “I’m not Maria Cooper.”

“DNA would prove who you are.”

Fear widened her dark eyes. “You can’t take my DNA without my permission.”