The death of my magic.

  And if my magic was gone… who was I? What was I? Just a middle-aged woman with a vampire stalker? Maybe not even that, if the vampire found out. What fun would it be to toy with a witch who’d lost her witchcraft?

  Hellcat slunk along behind me, trying to be subtle about it. He let out an indignant yowl when I slammed the door forcefully inches from his nose. I needed some time to myself, without Mother’s feline informant poking his nose where it wasn’t wanted. A little clothing therapy might do me some good.

  I crossed over to the master suite’s modest walk-in closet to peruse my materials. I could dig out the leftover khaki I’d gotten as a gag gift during Yule. Tabitha had given it to me, knowing I despised the stuff. The joke really was on her, though. I’d fashioned a line of men’s cargo shorts, enchanted to punish cheating boyfriends and husbands. The shorts tightened around the crotch until they had to be removed with scissors. I had a feeling these would be in high demand.

  “Maybe I’ll make Mr. Rowe a nice pair of comfortable khaki slacks,” I murmured, reaching for the brass doorknob, swinging the closet open. The khaki was near the front with my more inexpensive fabrics.

  But when I turned on the closet light, the khaki wasn’t where I’d left it. In fact, none of my fabrics were anywhere to be seen! Not only were my fabrics gone, but every piece I’d finished and every piece I’d been working on, including the blazer on the dress form, was gone! The floor was impeccably and heartlessly bare. For a moment, my mind went curiously blank, refusing to accept what I was seeing.

  I stumbled back a step, scouring the master suite, just in case Hellcat had somehow managed to abscond with two piles of folded clothes and at least twenty bolts of fabric. Not likely.

  And then it dawned on me as a frothing anger began to swirl in my gut.

  There was only one person who could have done this—only one person who had access to my side of the duplex (because Ophelia had yet to send the locksmith over to change out the locks).

  My landlord.

  I stalked out of the room almost as quickly as I’d entered, nearly treading on Hellcat’s tail. He followed me down the stairs and then dove under the back flap of the stinky armchair, taking cover like it was a smelly, yellow bomb shelter.

  Each of the duplexes was accessible to one another via the basement, with a winding staircase leading up to each level. To reach Rowe’s sleeping place, I’d have to brave the cavernous, spider-infested vault-like area. Spiders could make reasonably faithful familiars, but I’d never been able to stand them after my cousin Maverick let a few dozen loose in my bed in 1890.

  But, I wasn’t going to let a little thing like arachnophobia get in the way of telling Lorcan Rowe off. This was my crappy future, and I wouldn’t have him stealing what was left of it. He’d hand over my fabrics if he wanted to keep his manhood roughly the color, shape, and size it was now.

  I was in danger of ruining the polished hardwood with my spiky Stuart Weitzman’s as I stalked across the living room and down the hall. I kicked the useless things off when I reached the shabby door at the end of the hall. I’d probably twist my ankle trying to navigate the stairs down to the basement, bust up an arm or a leg, and lie groaning on the concrete until the vampire decided to rescue me—again. Yet more humiliation he could toss at me whenever he felt like it.

  Tituba help me, but I wanted to tear him a new one.

  The door leading to the basement was the only incongruous bit of the house, probably added recently. And it was a locked door, with a master key that only the vampire possessed, and only vampire strength or witchcraft would get me through it without the key.

  Even though the door had been opened sometime in the last few weeks, the paint had sealed the thing shut again. Clearly it was bewitched—don’t ask me how. Maybe Lorcan had phoned in a favor from a witch or some other creature with magic.

  In a fit of frustration, I gripped the dingy crystal knob as I gathered up whatever magic I had remaining (if any at all) and the sharp contours bit into my palm. Then, mostly for Hellcat’s benefit, I hissed, “Open Sesame, damn you!”

  My heart soared when the lock clicked and the door swung inward with nary a spark. Was anger the key to making my magic work again? Well, hopefully so, because I had that in spades these days. I could be the Wicked Bitch of the West for the rest of my life, if that was all it took to restore my power.

  Taking a big breath, I glanced into the darkness, thinking about all the spiders who undoubtedly made their home here.

  “Where in blazes are you going?” Hellcat called after me. “It’s nearly eight and your mother will be in touch soon. What precisely shall I tell her—that we’ve been reduced to such a state, you’ve decided to hunt spiders for our supper?”

  “No!” I snapped at him. “Tell her I’ve gone to remove the vampire’s dangly bits.”

  “Pardon?” Hellcat responded, nearly coughing up a furball in his shock. “That vampire will have your neck if you even attempt such a ludicrous thing!”

  If Mother heard any of this conversation, she’d spontaneously sprout warts and then charge me for the creams she’d need to get rid of them.

  “Let him try,” I answered, shaking my head as I stepped foot into the basement. Tituba, but there were quite a few spider webs. Clearly, the cleaning company hadn’t bothered with this section of the duplex.

  “You aren’t… attempting to make woo-woo with the vampire, are you?” Hellcat demanded, eyeing me with one narrowed, green eye. “Because that would be stooping to new lows, even for you.”

  “Woo-woo?”

  “You know how I feel about impolite words,” the little nuisance replied.

  I turned to look at him. “I’d rather drink troll piss than be with that obnoxious, self-satisfied vampire!”

  “Then why…”

  “I’m going over there to give him a piece of my mind!”

  And a hex or two if I could somehow force my mercurial magic to work.

  “What shall I tell your mother when she calls?”

  “Ugh, just tell her whatever you want to,” I snapped. “That’s exactly what you’re going to do anyway, so why pretend otherwise?”

  There was no overhead light to guide my way. Only a few months ago, I’d have found the blackness impenetrable. Now the only change was a subtle shift in hues as my new and improved eyes adjusted to the dim basement interior. There was a trickle of light coming in from a crack in the foundation, and it was enough to light my way. I could still see everything with unbearable clarity. I could make out every fine strand of spider silk that hung from the ceiling or gathered in gauzy webs in the corners of the room. Any scuttling black body made me duck my head and move all the quicker toward the opposite end of the room and the staircase that led to Lorcan Rowe’s side of the house.

  The bastard.

  I left distinct footprints in a layer of ground-in dirt, which redoubled my desire to scream at him. The gray silk stockings were the only pair that matched my warm gray Chanel sweater and my Luis Vuitton black, pleated skirt. Not only did the vampire owe me all my fabrics and completed pieces, he now owed me a new pair of silk stockings.

  Two overlarge steamer trunks had been pushed against the far wall of the basement, with the words ‘spare’ and ‘do not touch’ scrawled on a piece of cardboard on the wall above them. I snorted. In a pinch, the lean vampire could probably fold himself into one. It would serve him right if I set fire to both with my pathetic sparking spell.

  I took the stairs up to Lorcan’s two at a time, fury mounting with every step. A dozen foul names crowded the tip of my tongue, all eager to be the first flung at the evil son of a witch. I was practically vibrating with the intensity of my anger when I reached forward and gripping the doorknob, turned it. Imagine my surprise when I found the door was unlocked!

  Hmm… either the penis was idiotically sloppy with his own safety or he was expecting me.

  My next thought was momentarily knocked from my brain when I stepped out of the basement and into the narrow hall that led to Lorcan’s sitting room. The layout was a mirror to my home, but you’d never know it on first glance—it was almost unrecognizable because it was so packed with… stuff. A mahogany hall table was the first piece of furniture to greet me, and beyond that was a hall tree where hung numerous hats and overcoats.

  The hall was lined with pewter picture frames and wall sconces and every sconce held a red taper candle. He’d allowed every candle to burn itself down to stubs, and wax ran in thick rivulets down the sconces and the walls, to the dusty floors below, paying no mind to the hardwood or the ornate wainscoting. There was even wax on his expensive Aubusson rugs which decorated the entire living room, a living room that was jammed full of large and antique furniture. Ornate tapestries hung from the walls as well as enormous oil paintings that I was more than sure were originals. More dust gathered on the walls, the floor, the rugs, and the furniture. The entire house seemed to be going for and achieving ‘deserted Victorian gothic’.

  I wasn’t sure what pissed me off more: the blatant show of wealth, or the triviality in which Rowe treated it. Every antique piece was wasted on a man who didn’t seem to place much value on anything—owing to the fine coating of dust that appeared everywhere and on everything.

  I padded down the hall quietly, though it didn’t matter much. The only creatures with keener hearing than vampires were werewolves. And werewolves were abominably smelly things, constantly itching themselves. Even so, I’d have preferred having a werewolf as a neighbor. The worst that happened if a witch was bitten by a wolf would be a shift toward more nature-based magic and a monthly subscription to Advantage Flea Control. It wasn’t unheard of for European witches to sleep with shifter males in order to create daughters with such natural affinity. Quite a disgusting enterprise, if you asked me.

  Not that I was one to talk…

  The only light in the living room was cast by a candelabra set on an end table and a roaring fire in the fireplace. The firelight cast flickering shadows, swathing strips of the corridor in velvety darkness. With my enhanced vision, I saw the night in navy and plum, and could almost feel the texture of it on my skin. The darkness was thrumming and alive with energy I’d never felt before. Or maybe never let myself feel before.

  The vampire was lounging indolently on a red and gold damask chaise lounge, one arm propped behind his head, nose buried in a copy of Descartes’ Passions of the Soul.

  And he was naked, but for a pair of red silk boxers, every chiseled inch of him bathed in the buttery glow of the fire. It gleamed off his hair, which had been let loose to frame his head like a saint’s aureole.

  My breath caught, and I swayed with one hand on the arched entrance to the living room, trying to hold together some sense of coherent thought as I fought to remember why I’d come. Rowe was just… Hecuba, he was… sexy as sin.

  I couldn’t blame the recent infusion of vampire blood for the desire that curled tightly in my belly. No, this was pure, primal appreciation for the male form, his male form. Mother thought it was shameful for a witch to worship the male body, and yet I’d always had a secret fascination with a man in his peak.

  Now, more than ever. It had been so long since I’d had a lover.

  But he’s a vampire, I reminded myself. He’s the vampire. He’s to blame for everything that’s happened to you!

  When I was right, I was right.

  “Are you going to stand there gawping at me or are you going to enter the room and state your business?” the bastard murmured, never taking his eyes from the page.

  Chapter Seven

  The living room was like the hall, well-furnished but not well-kept. The chaise lounge had been arranged opposite the mantel and appeared to be the only surface where one could sit comfortably. I’d expected the vampire to move over when I rounded the chaise, but was met with a cheeky smile instead.

  “What a pleasant surprise,” he said, grinning up at me like it was Christmas and I was the fat man in the red suit.

  “It’s not a surprise at all! You knew I was coming.”

  He shrugged. “I imagined you would eventually, though your timing would suggest you were quite… eager.”

  “I’m not eager!”

  He seized a pack of papers from the coffee table and wedged them between the pages of Passions of the Soul before setting the book aside.

  “Well, have a seat,” he said, but made no motion to make room for me on the chaise. And there was no way I was going to wiggle my ample posterior into the narrow bit of velvet that appeared between his feet. That only left the coffee table. I’d have sat on that, but didn’t trust the glass top to support my weight. I was slimmer than when I’d started the year, but I’d been a fairly fulsome woman before, and the table looked old. The consideration wasn’t for his furniture, but for my ass, which would become a pincushion if the damn thing broke.

  “Where exactly do you expect me to sit?” I glared at him.

  He smiled even more broadly. “You could straddle me, if you’re so inclined.”

  My fingers curled into fists at my sides, lips peeling back from my teeth in a silent snarl. It probably didn’t intimidate the man with actual fangs, but I didn’t care. It wasn’t enough that he’d destroyed my life. Now he was harassing me.

  “Go sit on a broom handle!” I hissed, stalking over to the mantel, which was nearly overflowing with most likely priceless tchotchkes. Damn him.

  If he wasn’t going to act like a gentleman and allow me to sit, I’d just stand. I could speak my piece just as easily from above him. Maybe even better.

  Lorcan chuckled. “Since you refuse to sit,” he started as I shook my head. “Do tell me what brings you to my humble abode, sweetling?”

  “Humble my ass,” I responded, gesturing around the space. “You should be staked for the way you’re treating this place!”

  “And which way is that?”

  “All these gorgeous heirlooms and you’re letting them all tarnish and gather dust! Meanwhile, I’m using bed sheets as curtains and sleeping on a sofa, and the only thing keeping that company is a dead man’s armchair!”

  “Yes, well,” Lorcan started as he propped himself up on one elbow and swiveled to face me. “That makes little sense, but such is the way of women, I suppose.”

  Without the silk shorts, he would have looked like a model perched on the chaise, waiting for his portrait to be painted—like Rose asking Jack to paint her like one of his French women. Hmm, wouldn’t it be funny to charm him into repeating that line? I chuckled inwardly. But that was before I started focusing on his intense male beauty again, and the chuckle died a lonely and sad death.

  Lorcan’s was the sort of beauty that hands ached to touch, that haunted your days and nights with fevered bursts of longing, an insatiable need to put him on paper, to immortalize him even further than he’d already immortalized himself as a vampire.

  His striking green eyes burned with quiet intensity as he stared up at me. “I told you I take care of my heirs. You could have asked me to furnish your home, and I’d have given you every piece of furniture in this house. I rarely sleep here anyway.”

  I was surprised by his announcement, but then brushed it off. The thing with men was that you couldn’t trust their words. Only their actions and his actions said he was a total jerkwad. “I don’t want your dusty hand-me-downs! Just like I don’t want Mother’s handouts, and I don’t want to be trapped in this tiny town for the next year with you for a landlord!”

  “Ah, then what do you want, love?”

  “All I want is to open my shop and sell the clothing I’ve been busting my ass making for the last few weeks. But I can’t do that if you insist on being a total scrotum and stealing my wares!”

  “Scrotum,” he said and laughed, shaking his head. “I quite like that.”

  “Well, don’t like it!” I railed at him. “I don’t want you to like it! I want you to return my fabric and the clothing you stole right now!”

  Lorcan’s brow creased. “Fabric and clothing?” He shook his head. “I fear your dementia has kicked in fully, my dear.”

  “Yes, fabric and no, I’m not demented, you undead… penis-head!”

  “Undead penis-head,” he repeated, as though trying the words on for size before he began nodding. “That’s quite poetic.” He looked up at me and smiled. “And it rhymes.”

  “Stop changing the subject!”

  “Very well, back to your fit you were in the midst of having…”

  “I was preparing a few show pieces before my grand opening, and imagine my surprise when I went to my closet, only to discover everything was gone!”

  He started chuckling again. “Undead penis-head,” he muttered and set off on a new wave of deep, rumbling laughter.

  “It’s not funny, Lorcan Rowe!”

  “Please, call me ‘Lord’ or ‘Master’ works equally well.”

  “You’ve taken things way too far this time!” I insisted, my tone raising as my heartbeat increased. “You’re screwing with my future and if you want me to be able to pay my rent…”

  “I don’t give a stuff about your rent.”

  “Well, then give a stuff about the fact that I need to be able to feed myself and that vile little demon of a familiar!”

  “I have told you I take care of my own.”

  “And I’ve told you I don’t want your charity!” I screamed at him.

  He was quiet for a few seconds, his attention riveted on the wall in front of him. I couldn’t read his expression. Then he looked up at me and shrugged. “I haven’t taken anything from you. And nor would I. Stealing is not within my rainbow of interests, sweetling.”

  “Wandellmellia!” I snapped, horrified when the horrid name issued from my mouth. I recovered enough to add, “I have a name. Use it.”