SEDUCTIVE SUPERNATURALS: 12 Tales of Shapeshifters, Vampires & Sexy Spirits Read Online Free PDF Page A

sturdier than it looked.
    Lightning sizzled and sparked overhead, turning the windows of the Diablo into jack-o’-lantern eyes. The howling wind pounded the giant mesquite and sucked the grit from the rock and cactus garden along the walkway. On cue, a tumbleweed bounced its way past them to lodge in the neighbor’s fence.
    Reilly glanced at his watch. It was nearly midnight, but lights blazed on the ground floor, sending a tickle of unease down Reilly’s spine. Carolina Beck was the kind of woman who rose with the sun and worked like a farmer’s wife until dusk. She’d never burned the midnight oil.
    The brooding storm intensified the oppressive heat as he climbed out of the Jeep. It felt like he’d stepped into a damp electric blanket with a buzzing short deep within its circuitry. In the distance the ruins of the old hot springs stuck up like black bones against the lightning-struck sky. Reilly squinted as spinning flashes of blue and red whirled against the backdrop. Police cars? He frowned, wondering if the Dead Lights had lured another victim into the cavernous pit of the dried-up springs.
    The minivan that had followed him out of Los Angeles pulled up behind his Jeep and the old woman and her two companions piled out. Between Count Lincoln, Father Ghoul, and Chloe the Gypsy Queen, he couldn’t say which of the three was the strangest.
    The air held a fetid smell that brought home a million memories. Hot summer nights swimming with his brother, Matt, in Danny Green’s aboveground pool. They’d frozen water in milk jugs and floated them in a vain effort to cool it off. They’d slept on cots in the backyard, braving the bugs for the chance of a breeze. They’d learned the sun could be an enemy. And so could a lightning storm, like the electric light show going on now.
    As Reilly grabbed his bag from the back of the SUV, the sharp scent of sulfur joined the loamy smells in the air. No rain yet, just a few sprinkles that seemed to evaporate before they reached earth, leaving a filmy steam that made his skin sticky and the air thick.
    Chloe Lamont approached, followed closely by the Count, who Reilly guessed to be her bodyguard or an adopted son . . . or maybe her significant other. Hard to say. He easily topped Reilly’s own six foot two and looked like he might never have seen the sun.
    “Nathan,” Chloe said in her soft, mysteriously accented voice. “Do you feel them?”
    “No.”
    “Liar. I know you sense them. You’ve always sensed them.”
    “I sense we’re going to get hit by lightning if we don’t get inside.”
    Her grin was smug. He gritted his teeth.
    “We’re late,” she said, unconcerned with his prediction. “Not too late, but late. Let’s go in.”
    Reilly gave one more glance at the police lights out at the dried-up springs and then followed Chloe and the Count up the walkway. The priest fell in step behind him.
    Chloe paused on the porch, looking at him expectantly as he joined her.
    “No one home?” he asked.
    She gave a shrug that conveyed absolutely nothing. “You go first,” she said. “You’ll have to face . . . Is it Faith?” She tilted her head to the side and narrowed her eyes. “No, it’s Grace, isn’t it?”
    “Gracie?” Reilly glanced at the front door and then back to Chloe.
    Chloe gave him an enigmatic smile. “Gracie, yes, of course. You didn’t really think you were through with her, did you?”
    “Gracie’s here ?” he repeated with a step back.
    “Not yet.”
    It took a moment for common sense to overpower his knee-jerk reaction. He gave a low laugh. “You’ve got your wires crossed, Chloe. Gracie Beck hasn’t been back to Diablo Springs since she took off. She’s never coming back.”
    “That’s what they say about you.”
    The door swung silently open as a huge bolt of lightning struck nearby with a crack and a hiss, releasing a smattering of raindrops that broke through the vapors. It seemed they should sizzle as they hit the ground