Blood Moon (16 page)

Faith Meyer was new in the realty biz.
 
This was her first call to see a house in Swanton.
 
She was excited and nervous.
 
The client she had talked to sounded really excited about this particular house in the woods. Faith was sure that she heard the sound “Ka-Ching” when she’d hung up the phone.
 

She opted to get there a little early to meet the client at the house.
 
She got out of her car and walked up to the cute forest home and unlocked it.
 
She wanted to get some fresh air in it as it had been closed up and empty now for a few weeks. She wandered around the house, familiarizing herself with the key features and then headed back to her car to get her briefcase out of the back seat.

The client still isn’t here, hmmm, of course it is only five after, they might have taken a wrong turn.
It was easy to do in this area. She opened the back door of the car and reached in for her briefcase when everything went black.

Chapter 15

Rowan’s eyes slowly opened in the morning light to find Blake entangled around her from behind.
 
It felt so nice to have his strong arms around her and she was so comfortable. Instantly, reality jumped into her head and she looked at the clock.

“Crap, Blake, wake up. The alarm clock didn’t go off; we’re both going to be late!”
 
They both jumped out of bed like someone had hit an eject button. Blake ran for the shower and she got dressed.
 
She went into the bathroom to brush her hair and teeth, then opened the shower curtain to say good-bye.

“Hey, you, I’ve got to go.
 
What time will you be back or are you coming back tonight?”
 

“Yes, I’ll be back. Probably around 7:00 pm. I’m not going to sleep alone if I don’t have to for a very, very, very long time.” He put his hands on her face and kissed her deeply and she kissed him back. With that, his hands slipped down to her waist and pulled her shirt up a bit so he could touch her skin. She continued to kiss him even though she was getting very wet from the splashing water bouncing off of him. His skin felt wonderful, strong, wet, and hot from the water.
 
His strong hands pulled her hard to him and she giggled as she was getting positively soaked.
 

“Blake, you’re getting me all wet!”

“Am I? Well since you are all wet already, why don’t you just get in here and join me?”
 

“But I’m already dressed and we’re both late.”

“But you’ll have to change now that you are all wet anyway, so you might as well get naked and give me a proper goodbye.”

“That’s what you think, huh?!” she laughed. Before she could make up her mind, he had already picked her up and brought her to him. Now that she was entirely soaked, he started pulling clothes off of her, which was no easy task. Wet jeans have got to be the hardest thing in the world to get off. Somehow they managed it. Rowan made her proper goodbye to Blake and they both left that morning with huge smiles on their faces, terribly late for their obligations. It was totally worth it, both of them thought, because the rest of the day was spent thinking about that moment, making them both look forward to meeting up again later that evening.

Blake had to do a standby for the next flight to San Diego, but it was no problem since the commuter planes left almost every half hour from San Francisco.
 
Rowan, however, was a half an hour late for her first class lecture.
 
She got a sour look from the professor as she excused herself and took her seat as fast as she could.
 
She grabbed the closest seat available, which happened to be by a beautiful brunette woman. Her hair was almost auburn, and it was long and pretty, but it was her eyes that caught Rowan’s attention.
 
Rowan could barely stop staring at her when the girl smiled back and she sat down. Her green eyes seemed to beckon Rowan to come to her.
 

Rowan got her notebook out and started taking notes.
 
The girl next to her handed Rowan her notebook so that she could get caught up on the notes. Rowan wrote at the top of her page,
Thanks!
 

The girl smiled and wrote in the margin of her notes.
No problem! I’m Allys!

Rowan wrote,
Nice to meet you, Allys, I’m Rowan!
They both nodded in acknowledgement and concentrated on the professor. The rest of the lecture was a little mind numbing.
 
The professor had one of those voices that had no inflection so it just came out as one tone.
 
Without coffee, this class would be a sleeper.
 
She would have to get a tape recorder or something, because she was bound to nod off on occasion.
 
At least with a tape recorder she wouldn’t miss anything important.
 
Finally the class was over, and she bundled up all her stuff and shoved it in her book bag. Outside class, she and Allys talked about the lecture.
 
Strange, they had the next class together too.
 

As they walked to their next class, Allys asked Rowan questions about her life here as a local.
 
What was it like? Did she go to the beach every day? Was it always sunny? How come she didn’t have a golden tan? The kinds of questions all Californians get from out of town folk.
 
For some reason, it is believed by many who don’t live in California that all Californians live in or near Hollywood or Los Angeles.
 
Most Californians hate to admit LA and Hollywood exist in their state. One of the most asked questions, is ‘how many stars have you met?’
 

Most believe all women in California are blonde and bikini clad. They also think most guys are muscle bound surfer dudes. Though Rowan could surf, she wouldn’t be caught dead wearing a bikini in Santa Cruz’s icy cold water.
 
When you can’t feel your feet after standing in the water for ten minutes or so, you know it’s cold. The Alaska current runs right down the west coast and makes the waters there awful chilly.

That being said, Allys didn’t ask her any of those questions, but it was apparent she wanted Rowan to think she was from Idaho. Rowan wasn’t sure why, but she was pretty sure Allys was lying; other than that, she was very nice.
 
They said their goodbyes after the second class and Rowan went home to do some homework and then later went to the bookstore to help out Darby.

Chapter 16

Rowan walked into the bookstore, greeting Allison as she headed back to Darby’s office.
 

“Hey D, what’s up?” she said.

“Not much. How was your first day at school?”

“Uneventful, which is good.”

“I was wondering if you could help me with something at home.
 
We had sort of a breakthrough last night after you went to bed.”

“With what?”

“The Keatons.”

“The witches from the diary?”

“Yes, they are here.”

“You’re nuts, those people would be ancient old.”

“No, Goof, the girls at the bottom of the tree.
 
I’d rather go home to talk about this. I have a lot to get you caught up on. Since we are going home, could you call Dean and have him come here and hang with Allison?
 
I don’t want her here alone.”

“You’re creeping me out, but okay.”

When Darby and Rowan got home, Dean was waiting on the porch.
 
Rowan tossed him the keys to her SUV and he headed to the bookstore to protect Allison. While Rowan was doing that, Darby went to Devon’s and grabbed the book from the safe and met Rowan in the living room.
 
She went back to the bedroom, grabbed her notebook, the necklace, and a blow dryer and set everything on the coffee table.

“I’ve got to know what the blow dryer is for,” Rowan laughed.

“You’ll see.
 
While you were camping we had a break in.”

“What?”

“Let me explain.
 
Apparently, someone put a sleeping spell on the house assuming all were home and headed for bed.
 
Luckily, Devon hadn’t gotten home from his interview yet.
 
He was sitting in bed when a woman walked in through the locked back door and came into the bedroom.
 
According to Devon, she was so confident her spell had worked that she never even bothered to look at the bed to see if anyone was awake.
 
As far as Devon could tell, she was focused on the Book of Shadows on the dresser. They had a bit of a fight in which she had underestimated Devon.
 
He said her magic was strong, but not strong enough for a vampire.
 
This broke off in his hand during their fight.” She handed the necklace to Rowan.
 

Rowan looked at it and said, “I’ve seen this somewhere.”

“Yes, you have,” Darby said as she pulled out the Keaton family tree and pointed to the corner of the paper.

“Wow. . .she was a Keaton, huh?!”
 

“And we know her.”
 

“I don’t know any Keatons.”

“You do, in fact.
 
Cheral Oktane, the woman who hit my car.”

“Am I missing something?”

“It’s an anagram.
 
Look.” She wrote the name Cheral Oktane, then she wrote Rachel Keaton under it and drew lines to all the corresponding letters. “It was Allison that figured it out.”

“Really? How?”

“The night Dean, Blake, and Devon went out for drinks and Dean met Allison for the first time, she was with another woman.
 
There had been some confusion on the woman’s name, but since Allison had brought her, Devon asked her what the woman’s name was. It was Allys.
 
Blake knew her as Sally and when I mentioned the two names, it was Allison that figured out that Allys is an anagram for Sally. When Devon talked to her that night, she had said that she was sisters with Cheral, aka Rachel Keaton.”