It Happened One Bite Read Online Free PDF

she’d just open the door.
    Then once the lass freed him, James would be on his way. He felt his ring finger and growled. Damn witches. Hopefully it was dark outside as traveling by daylight would be impossible since one of the magical she-devils had apparently absconded with his ring.
    “Come on,” he cried from his prison. “Come and find me. Please.”
    When her footsteps slowed, James thought he’d wither away and die. He closed his eyes, willing her to continue. He couldn’t lose the lass. Not when she was so close to finding him. “Hello…” he called, allowing his voice to linger at the end of the word, drawing it out like a song. “Can you hear me?” His throat burned with the force of his words. He reached one hand into the darkness, as though he could grab onto whoever was moving about above him. “Help me!” he called.
    The footsteps stopped completely.
    “Please!” he begged. “I know you can hear me!”
    Her steps moved across the floor again, faster this time. Had James still possessed a heart, it would have leapt at the sound. “That’s it,” he whispered to himself. “Come this way.”
    Finally, footsteps, slow and measured, clipped against stone steps, the noise ringing in his ears.
    “Hello!” he cried.
    She stopped again.
    “No! Keep coming. I’m in here, but I’m trapped.”
    Another step. She didn’t back away. Thank God. She was still coming toward him. A flash of light crept beneath the door. It was nearly painful to his eyes. He gasped and covered them quickly. Then he cracked one eye open and took in the room, which he could now see much better from the warm glow that slid beneath the door.
    He jerked at the door handle once more, but it still refused to budge. He could almost taste his freedom. Until he smelled the scent of blood that pumped within her veins. She smelled of sweet lavender, earth, and strength. He wanted to taste her more than anything. James dropped to his stomach beside the door and spoke beneath it. “Please, free me,” he crooned.
    “Are ye real?” The soft Scottish lilt of her words moved through him like thunder breaks a storm-laden night. He shuddered. Scottish lasses would be the death of him.
    “I’m real.”
    “I doona believe ye.” She sounded odd to his ears all of a sudden, as though she was in a trance of some sort. The tiny thread of hope he had held began to unravel in his hands.
    Still he was so close to freedom that giving up seemed foolhardy. “I’m very real, lass,” he promised, pressing his whole body against the door. If he could slide himself beneath it, he would. “Set me free and I’ll show you.” James felt the door move a bit when she tugged on the other side.
    “It’s locked,” she said wistfully, dreamlike.
    “Of course, it’s locked. I told you I was trapped.”
    “Oh.”
    “Can you look for a key?” What was wrong with the lass? She didn’t seem to grasp much of what he said, nor the urgency with which he said it. Had the coven trapped and drugged her, too? Was she a victim of their treachery as well? “Blasted witches,” he ground out beneath his breath.
    A startled gasp rang out from the other side of the door. “Blasted ghost!” she countered.
    Ghost? Clearly the chit wasn’t in her right mind. “Lass, if you’ll just find the key.”
    “Find it yerself,” she snapped.
    What the devil was wrong with her all of a sudden? James heaved a sigh. “Please,” he begged. But then her footsteps moved away from the door and James’ hope plummeted once again “Don’t go!” he cried.
    “No such thing as ghosts,” she barely whispered, but he heard the words clearly.
    Her footsteps clipped back up the stone steps. James cursed beneath his breath and begged her to come back, but she didn’t answer him. He heard her move across the floor above him. Then silence. She’d vanished as quickly as she’d arrived.
    Why had she run off? What had she said? He tried to remember her exact words. Did she think