The Taking by Erin McCarthy Page A

day?”
    She made a face then laughed. “It’s over. Thank God.”
    It had been a long time since he had thanked God for anything. “We always wish for the end of things, don’t we?” he said, just thinking out loud, but the smile fell off her face.
    “Maybe,” she said.
    There was a long pause, and he knew he’d made her uncomfortable. Well, he was uncomfortable, too. He was taking a huge risk meeting her in public. Meeting her anywhere.
    “I’m sorry,” she said, breaking the silence first as she fiddled with the coffee cup in front of her. “I’m tired from the move, and well, I didn’t get much sleep last night. Do you want to go up and order a coffee?”
    As if coffee could improve his lack of social skills. He’d had them at one time. He’d been the favorite pet of bored New Orleans society ladies, and he had charmed and talked his way into their hearts and their purses. Not anymore. Never again.
    “I’m fine. Were you up late unpacking?” There had been something ... a flicker in her eyes when she had mentioned her sleepless night, and he was curious what it meant.
    “Oh, it was stupid.” She waved her hand in the air dismissively. “I thought someone was in the house and I freaked out. I called the cops and I called my friend to come over. He ended up staying the night and since I don’t have my guest bedroom made up, he ended up sharing my bed, and he snores. He’s gay.”
    Then she gave a laugh. “Not that you need to know that. But the point was I didn’t get eight hours of sleep.”
    He didn’t need to know it, but it confirmed that she wasn’t letting another man into her bed already, so soon after the end of her marriage. It didn’t suit her to leap into another relationship, and he was arrogant enough to believe that if she wanted a hookup, she would have come to him. That was the power that had been granted him, after all, and he saw it on her face—she was attracted to him, as they all were.
    Felix was attracted to her too, the first woman who had piqued his interest in a long, long time. But he would never touch. Not with her still legally bound to Alcroft, not while her ex still wanted her.
    “Someone broke into the house? Was anything stolen?”
    “No, nothing was stolen. I don’t think anyone was in the house after all. Well, not a thief.” She bit her lip. “I have a weird and random question for you, but I figure given what you do, what you practice, you’re open-minded, right? I mean, you believe in the unexplainable, don’t you?”
    Felix found that amusing. “I believe in a lot of things. I believe there are things out there that not only can we not explain, we could never even imagine them in our rational day-to-day lives.” Like the existence of demons, and the possibility of immortality. He had no idea what she was dancing around telling him, but nothing would surprise him. “I won’t judge, Regan.”
    She glanced around them. “I don’t know if I should say it here.”
    The coffee shop had a dozen patrons in it, some with laptops, some reading the paper, some chatting with each other, all different types, from the heavily tattooed and dyed woman in her early twenties to the graying businessman.
    “No one here cares.”
    With a nod, she said, “You’re right. Of course no one cares what I’m saying. And it sounds crazy, but I think, maybe, if ghosts exist, I have one in my house.”
    Somehow that wasn’t what he had expected her to say. He had thought it would have something to do with her ex-husband, not a restless spirit. Feeling a flicker of intrigue that it could somehow be Camille, he said, “Really? What happened?”
    Her expression was uneasy and she lowered her voice. “Something, an object, moved in my bedroom while I was outside on the balcony. I had this thing put away in the nightstand and when I came in, it was sitting on my bed. A stuffed animal that belonged to ... my sister. It . . . it was like whoever they are they were trying to