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her.
    "She's not the way you described her."
    O'Rourke closed the door behind him, moving in and settling his sturdy bulk into the chair in the corner. The glass in his hand was over-full, he slopped some of it, and the room was filled with the sweet-acrid scent of Irish whiskey. "I'm a writer, laddie," he said, affronted. "I've got the awards to prove it. Who the hell are you to tell me I can't describe my own daughter?"
    "You said she was tall and plain and unimaginative."
    "Did I now?" Sean considered it. "You saw her photograph, you knew what you were getting into. And she
is
tall."
    "She is. But she's certainly not plain. And she took one look at me and her imagination went soaring. I think she was convinced I was going to rape and murder her right there on the kitchen floor."
    "Now why would the question of rape come into it?" Sean asked softly. "Did you rape your wife before you killed her?"
    Richard ignored the question. "I calmed her down, but she's not too happy with you for sending her up here without any warning. I don't think it's going to work."
    "And why not? Don't you think I'm capable of controlling my womenfolk?"
    "No one's capable of controlling women," Richard said. "I don't know who'd be fool enough to try. She's going to realize why you brought her here, and she's never going to forgive you."
    Sean leaned back, considering it. "I brought her here to help me on the book," he said. "I'm giving her the chance of a lifetime, and if she had an ounce of ambition, she'd jump at it."
    "She doesn't strike me as particularly ambitious."
    "No, damn it. The girl's a changeling. Her harpy of a mother would have done anything to get ahead, and so would I. But Cassie's more interested in the quality of life, not the quantity."
    "I would think that would be admirable."
    "You're getting neither, Tiernan," Sean pointed out. "You still haven't told me what you think of her. Will she do?"
    Richard closed his eyes for a moment, picturing her. She was tall, lushly built, a far cry from his rail-thin wife. Her red hair had framed her startled face like a halo, and her eyes were bright, wary, and completely vulnerable. He'd taken one look at her, knowing why Sean had brought her, an editorial slave to his muse, a sexual distraction for his reluctant houseguest. He'd seen her, and been consumed with an irrational, unspeakable lust.
    It was the first time he'd felt anything even remotely resembling sexual desire in well more than a year. Not since he knelt in the blood over Diana's body.
    And the longing he'd felt for Cassidy Roarke had been instantaneous, blinding, overpowering.
    Dangerous.
    "You're willing to make her the virgin sacrifice?" Richard said.
    "She's hardly a virgin, man," Sean snorted. "And I'm willing, yes. Will she do?"
    He thought of her mouth, soft, damp, he thought of her unbuttoned blouse that she thought he hadn't noticed. He thought of her long narrow feet.
    "She'll do," he said. "God help her."
CHAPTER 3
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    There was blood, everywhere. The smell of it assaulted her, thick, metallic, the feel of it was black on her hands. There were children surrounding her, crying voicelessly, and the blood poured from their wounds, drenching her.
    She knelt, a penitent. The woman stood over her, pale, dying, her mouth open in a silent scream, and she pointed an accusing hand. Cassidy didn't turn. She knew what she would see behind her, looming over her, the knife upraised. She didn't want to watch, to look into his mad, dark eyes as the knife fell, and she joined them, the silent, the dying.
    But he was close, so close. She felt the pull, the draw of him, even as she knew that to turn was to face her death. She couldn't resist. She felt his hands on her shoulders, strong, and there was no weapon. She turned, looking up at him, and screamed.
    The sound tore her from sleep, and she sat bolt upright. Outside she could hear the ceaseless traffic of the never-ending New York City night, inside the cavernous old