witches of cleopatra hill 06 - spellbound Read online

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  The Witches of Cleopatra Hill

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Author’s Note

  If You Enjoyed This Book…

  Also by Christine Pope

  About the Author

  SPELLBOUND

  A WITCHES OF CLEOPATRA HILL NOVEL

  CHRISTINE POPE

  CONTENTS

  Copyright

  The Witches of Cleopatra Hill

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Author’s Note

  If You Enjoyed This Book…

  Also by Christine Pope

  About the Author

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, places, organizations, or persons, whether living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  SPELLBOUND

  Copyright © 2015 by Christine Pope

  Published by Dark Valentine Press

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems — except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews — without permission in writing from its publisher, Dark Valentine Press.

  Please contact the author through the form on her website at www.christinepope.com if you experience any formatting or readability issues with this book.

  * * *

  To be notified about all of Christine Pope’s new releases, please sign up here.

  THE WITCHES OF CLEOPATRA HILL

  (LISTED IN CHRONOLOGICAL ORDER, NOT ORDER OF PUBLICATION)

  Darkangel

  Darknight

  Darkmoon

  Sympathetic Magic

  A Cleopatra Hill Christmas

  Protector

  Spellbound

  1

  “Are you crazy?” Caitlin McAllister said, eyes widening. Then she winced. “Sorry…wrong word.”

  “It’s all right,” Danica Wilcox replied with a shrug. Everyone had been tiptoeing around her for the past five months, but that didn’t mean she hadn’t heard the whispers anyway. All right, maybe no one had used the C-word out loud. They’d probably thought it, though, even if that thought was couched in euphemisms such as “Danica doesn’t seem like herself.”

  No kidding. She didn’t feel like herself, either. Ever since the rogue warlock Matías Escobar invaded her mind, Danica had been haunted by the sense that he’d stolen some vital part of her heart or soul, something she hadn’t even realized she needed until it was gone.

  She and Caitlin were sitting in the family room of the house that Caitlin now shared with her fiancé, Alex Trujillo. Stacks of bridal magazines and catalogues were piled on the coffee table in front of them. Caitlin and Alex had set the date for early November — anything sooner would have probably been too hot down in Tucson — and Danica had come here to get the final fitting for her dress, even though the wedding was still almost two months off.

  Well, that was the public reason Danica had given for coming to Tucson. She supposed she should be glad that her parents hadn’t vetoed the trip altogether, since it meant driving several hundred miles all by herself. However, they’d probably decided that Caitlin’s house was a safe enough destination. Besides, Matías was now securely locked up in a maximum-security facility, as were his two partners in crime. They certainly didn’t present any threat, to Danica or anyone else.

  “I have to go see him,” she told Caitlin. “I need…closure.”

  “I’d think his being behind bars would be all the closure you need,” Caitlin replied. Then she shook her head and retrieved her iced tea, which was sweating slightly despite the air conditioning going full blast, from where the tall glass sat on the coffee table. “Anyway, you know your parents would freak if they found out you’d gone within fifty miles of that place…and they’d kill me for letting you do it in the first place.”

  Her friend had that right, on both counts. But Danica had no intention of allowing her parents to discover her real reason for coming down here to Tucson. “Yeah, they probably would. But how would they know in the first place?”

  At that reply, Caitlin frowned. “I don’t want to lie to anyone — ”

  “Who says you’d have to lie? You just have to not say anything.”

  “That’s totally splitting hairs, Danica.”

  She didn’t say anything, just waited for Caitlin to cave. Which Danica knew she would. Caitlin hated confrontations. And maybe, just maybe, she’d realized that Danica’s wish for closure wasn’t quite as crazy as it sounded.

  After a tense few seconds, Caitlin huffed out a breath. “Okay, fine. I’ll cover for you. How long do you think it’s going to take?”

  “A little over three hours, I guess. It’s about an hour and a half one way.” Danica couldn’t let herself feel relief. Not exactly. In one way, the very thought of facing her former tormentor made her stomach clench. But she also knew this was something she had to do, that she couldn’t move forward if she didn’t ask him the questions she’d been holding in for months. “If I leave in the next twenty minutes, then I can be there for the one-thirty visitation block.”

  Caitlin’s eyebrows lifted. “Sounds like you already had this planned out. So why ask for my permission?”

  It wasn’t that Danica was asking for permission…more that she wanted her friend to understand why she had to do this. She’d learned quickly enough that visiting someone in a maximum-security prison wasn’t exactly the same as stopping by a hospital to bring some flowers. First she’d had to submit to a background check, and then she’d had to call to schedule an appointment. Through all this, she’d had to use her real name, but that wasn’t a big problem. Because of her fragile mental state, she’d never been called to testify against Matías after the ordeal. In fact, her name hadn’t been included in the case at all, because there had been plenty of evidence to convict him of Roslyn McAllister’s murder without dragging Danica’s kidnapping into it.

  “I just — I just wanted you to know. And I could have canceled the appointment if I had to. That’s not such a big deal.”

  For a long moment, Caitlin didn’t say anything. At last she nodded. “Okay. I’m not going to say I get it, not really, but…do what you have to do.”

  She still sounded dubious, so Danica asked, “Is Alex going to wonder where I’ve gone? I mean, I don’t want to drag him into this, too.”

  Caitlin shook her head. “I haven’t said anything to him because I figured it was your business. Luckily, you sho
uld be back here before Alex gets home from work.”

  He’d started a new job a month earlier, working in the marketing department of a local TV station. His dream job, according to Caitlin. Everything seemed to be going their way. Danica couldn’t begrudge her friend her current happiness, but at the same time, she wished she could look forward to a future that was even half as idyllic.

  In the meantime, she had an appointment to keep.

  * * *

  From the outside, the Florence prison facility didn’t look nearly as intimidating as Danica had thought it would. All right, it was surrounded by tall fences topped by curls of barbed wire, and it seemed to be baking under the glare of the early September sun, but the buildings themselves looked new and sleek, some sections even covered in cheery bright red paint.

  She sort of doubted the inmates thought of the place as cheery, however, no matter what color it had been painted.

  The heat struck her as soon as she opened the door to her Land Rover and got out. Blinking behind her sunglasses, she followed the sign to the visitors’ intake area. Clearly, she wasn’t the only one coming to see an inmate this brutally hot afternoon; she found herself surrounded by a crowd of people, the majority of them women, and many of them with children in tow. That had to be rough, to only see your father a few times a year during visiting hours.

  Thank God Matías had no real family of his own, only a sister he barely spoke to.

  Despite the stifling heat, Danica had made sure to dress conservatively, so she was covered up, in jeans and a short-sleeved peasant top and ballet flats. The last thing she needed, after steeling herself to come here at all, was to be turned back because the officer in charge of the visiting room decided she was showing too much skin. Not that she really wanted to give Matías a show. He’d already seen enough of her body.

  She had her driver’s license out so she could show it to the officer on duty. His dark eyes flicked over it in a bored way, and then he checked a box on the sheet attached to the clipboard he held. “That way,” he said, jerking a thumb over one shoulder. “Follow the signs.”

  Well, she was in it now. If she turned tail and fled, she might attract attention, even when surrounded by so many people consumed by their own worries. Swallowing, she followed the stream of visitors to a big room where the far wall was configured as a row of cubicles with small windows looking into them. In front of each window stood a small wooden-topped stool attached to the wall by a metal arm.

  Danica had seen these sorts of setups in movies and television, but in person they appeared far more intimidating. More guards stood near the doors, and she walked up to the closest deputy and murmured, “Matías Escobar.”

  The guard pointed to the cubicle up against the farthest wall. “Over there.”

  She couldn’t really feel relieved, not considering her surroundings, but she was slightly heartened that Matías had been assigned the cubicle over by the wall. At least that way she’d only have another visitor on one side of her, instead of both. The sorts of questions she intended to ask weren’t exactly things she wanted overheard.

  As she looked over at the cubicle, she saw a man approach and take the seat there. At once her heart begin slamming away in her chest. Never mind that she knew Matías couldn’t hurt her ever again, that Angela and Connor Wilcox had burned the magic right out of him as their own form of punishment for his transgressions. It still took every ounce of willpower she possessed to force her feet to move in that direction, to propel her over to the stool that sat in front of the cubicle where Matías waited for her.

  Somehow she made it, then sank down onto the hard surface of the provided seat. Not looking directly at Matías, she reached out and picked up the phone receiver attached to the wall. He did the same thing at almost the same time.

  That hated voice, the one which still echoed in her dreams, came through the handset. “Hey, chica. Didn’t expect to ever see you again.”

  She bristled. “Don’t call me that.”

  “Okay, sure…Danica.”

  As much as she didn’t want to, she made herself lift her eyes to his. A dark, mocking gaze met hers, but she didn’t blink. She wanted to see him, to commit every feature to memory when her mind wasn’t in a fog of his making.

  In a way, she’d hoped all her memories of him would be false, that he’d made himself far more attractive in the magical brain haze he’d cast on her than he actually was in real life. But as she stared at him, she realized he truly was very good-looking, with those strong brows and straight nose and long-lashed black eyes. His hair was much shorter now, shaved down to almost stubble, and fresh tattoos marked his hands and arms. Still, she would have recognized him.

  For months she’d imagined what she would say to Matías if she ever saw him again, but now, confronted by the reality of his presence, she found her mouth dry, the words she’d intended to utter choking in her throat. This was insane. She’d driven out to the back end of nowhere, and now she was just sitting here like an idiot, and —

  “You look good,” Matías said. “Of course, you always looked good.” He smiled then, a slow, lascivious smile that told her he was remembering the nights they’d spent together.

  Her blood seemed to freeze in her veins. Hands tightening on the knees of her jeans, she replied, “I can’t say the same for you.”

  His smile only broadened. “That’s kind of harsh, Dani.” He ran one hand over the dark stubble on his head. “You don’t like my prison ’do? But then, I do kind of remember you hanging onto my hair while I — ”

  “Stop it.” Pausing, she risked a quick glance at the woman who occupied the stool next to hers, but she was hanging on to the phone receiver like it was a lifeline and speaking rapidly in Spanish, tears coursing down her cheeks. Unnerved by the display of emotion, Danica returned her attention to Matías. “You were making me do all that shit. I certainly didn’t enjoy any of it.”

  “Could have fooled me.”

  Son of a bitch. She pulled the phone away from her ear and began to reach toward the cubicle wall so she could hang up. At once Matías’ voice came from the speaker.

  “Sorry. Sorry. Don’t — don’t hang up.”

  Eyes narrowing, she brought the phone back to her ear. “Then stop talking about that crap.”

  “I will.”

  He didn’t exactly sound contrite, but at least it was a start. She drew in a breath before asking, “Have you seen your sister?”

  His eyebrows lifted at Danica’s words. Clearly, he hadn’t expected her to ask that question. “Right after I was put in here. Not since.”

  Well, it was a long way from California to the prison here in Florence, Arizona, and Matías’ sister Olivia had an infant to take care of. Danica kind of doubted that the young woman’s civilian husband would much appreciate having his wife leave the baby with him so she could visit her jailbird warlock brother in prison.

  She hesitated, not sure what she should say next. Matías shifted in his chair and sent her a piercing look.

  “Why are you here, chica? I mean, really…why?”

  Her stomach was so knotted with tension that she didn’t even bother to reprimand him for using that hated endearment. Now she understood why the woman in the cubicle next to hers was hanging on to that phone as if it were the only thing keeping her from drowning. Because sometimes when your world felt like it was falling apart, you needed something solid to hold on to. Danica could feel the hard plastic begin to slip under her sweat-dampened fingers. “I — I had to ask you something.”

  Another lift of his eyebrows. “Sorry, Danica…the good state of Arizona doesn’t allow conjugal visits.”

  She scowled at the implication. “Fuck you, Matías.”

  “I wish.”

  God, this was the dumbest idea in the history of dumb ideas. Blood boiling, she once again moved to hang up the phone, and once again his voice stopped her.

  “Wait. Don’t. I’m sorry.”

  The note of contrition
in his voice was almost genuine. She shot him a wary glance and waited, ready to end the call the second he said something out of line again.

  “I want to hear what you wanted to ask me.”

  She hesitated. He sat there quietly, gaze fixed on her face, but he did look almost…well, not exactly sorry, but the mocking glint had gone from his eyes.

  “Please.”

  Had Matías ever said “please” to anyone in his entire life? Maybe when he was trying to get into the pants of the Santiago clan’s first daughter, back in California before he’d come to Arizona, but Danica wasn’t even sure about that.

  This is why you came here, she told herself. So just do it.

  Gathering a breath, she said quietly, “I need to know why.”

  “‘Why’?” he repeated, looking confused. “Why what? Why’d I do it? You know that. I wanted a chance to be in charge. To be somebody.”

  No, she knew that. His methods were unthinkable, but at least she almost understood his motivations. He’d felt on the edge of things his whole life, allowed to be part of the Santiago clan on sufferance because of his refugee mother’s healing gifts, but never really belonging to it. He’d seen the chance to seize the de la Paz family’s prima-in-waiting as a way of getting the control he’d always wanted. It was horrible, but it was understandable.