Possessed By You (Overworld Underground Book 1) (3 page)

I nodded.

He handed the cabbie a fifty. "Take them wherever they need to go."

"Good lord, you just rescued us. Please, don't worry about—"

A wave of his hand cut me off. "Don't worry about it. I'm a criminal mastermind, remember?" He winked.

Before I could open my mouth to protest and insist on calling the police, he helped Izzy into the car. She staggered a bit, but he guided her with ease into the backseat and closed the door, then escorted me to the other side.

"Why?" I asked, unable to think of another question.

"That," he said, "is a very open question." He took my hand and kissed it.

I could have sworn I felt a slight electric tingle between our hands. He shivered ever so slightly. Or maybe it was me. I was so stunned by his generosity, I couldn't think of words to say. Without remembering actually climbing in, I heard the door click and watched as our hero turned and walked back toward the alley.

"Where to?" asked our driver, a man whose credentials displayed the name Natwar.

I gave him the address. In all of ten minutes, we were home. The fare was nowhere near fifty dollars, but I didn't bother asking for change. Natwar helped me pull Izzy from the backseat, and offered to help me take her up to the apartment, but I politely declined. Looping both purses around one arm, I guided my friend inside, using the security fob on the lift, and taking it up to our floor.

When we got inside, I pulled off Isabel's shoes and put her to bed, pulling the covers over her. By the time I stepped back inside the den, my muscles felt weak as noodles. Exhaustion swept over me like a warm fudge coating, and I lay down on the couch to rest my eyes for a moment.

"Em?" Nudge, nudge. Shake, shake. "Wake up."

I groaned. "Go away."

"I'm going to give you a wet willy if you don't wake up."

I covered my ears and burrowed my face in the couch cushions. A moment later, something freezing ran down my back. I shrieked and jumped up, hands reaching desperately for the icy sensation. Before I could get it, it slid down my back and lodged in my coin slot. Pulling the half-melted ice cube from my pants, I flung it at my devilish roommate.

"Bitch!"

She laughed, dodging the sliver of ice. "I made tea," she sang in falsetto. "With cinnamon and chocolate."

Pressing my temples to ward off the slight hangover and her impromptu singing, I staggered for a stool where the kitchen counter met the den. I must have slept like a rock, I supposed, because I couldn't remember a single dream. The only nightmare I recalled was from real life. I jerked my head upright and gazed blearily at Izzy. She looked happy. Normal.

"Are you okay?" I said, peering at the bruises on her neck.

"Why wouldn't I be?" She looked genuinely puzzled. "I got to catch up with my best friend, we got drunk, and I guess I passed out." She handed me a steaming mug of dark liquid. The divine odor of chocolate and tea pleasured my nose. I preferred something without so much sweetness in the morning, but over the years Isabel had slowly converted me to the dark side.

Men I could live without. Tea, not so much. If only I could marry the marvelous drink. I took a sip, resisting the urge to call her out on her bald-faced lie. The tea was a flimsy attempt to make me forget she'd gone off with a guy I'd expressly told her was bad news. Unfortunately, I could only resist for a few seconds.

"If you think for one bloody minute chocolate-flavored tea is going to make me forget about last night, you've got another think coming, Iz." I took another cautious sip of the hot liquid while I judged her reaction. Warmth and chocolately goodness trailed down my throat.

Her eyes went wide. "Oh God, did I do something stupid? Did I throw up in someone's purse again?"

"Don't give me that rubbish," I said, my conscious attempts at maintaining an American accent falling away completely. "I went to the bathroom for all of five minutes, only to come back and find out you left with that creepy asshole, Stephen."

Her mouth fell open. "No I didn't—Em, what are you talking about? I remember you going to the bathroom. Our drinks came." She wrinkled her forehead as if straining to remember. "I think someone tapped me on the shoulder." Pressing a hand to her forehead, she stared at the counter for a few seconds. "Good God, girl. I can't remember anything after that."

The tea mug trembled in my hand. I set it down before I spilled it. Anger swallowed my insides and I felt the urge to yell, "You're a bloody liar!" at her. But her confusion and concern looked genuine. Isabel always wore her emotions on her sleeve. And while I knew for a fact she wasn't always upfront about some things, she was terrible at hiding her secrets from me. Mainly because I was ruthless at digging them out of her.

My anger faded, replaced by my own sense of confusion. "Look me in the eye and tell me this is the truth. What happened last night is
not
something you can just gloss over and think I'll forget."

She looked up from the counter to me, her head shaking. "Did someone slip me roofies?" Her mouth opened in horror. "Oh no, please don't tell me I had sex with some random dude who drugged me."

I paused to take another sip of tea, my mind flipping through the possibilities. Had her mind blocked out the trauma? I'd heard of people's minds doing crazy things to purge painful memories, but Isabel's reaction seemed too extreme to be true. Then again, her expression looked too genuine to be false.

So which was it?

"You don't remember making out with that guy in the alley?" I said, taking in every iota of body language she offered up.

She almost dropped her drink. "I did
what
?"

"Stephen. The Creepazoid from Gronsky's. You left with him while I was in the bathroom. I found you in the alley making out."

Setting her mug on the counter, Isabel put a hand over her heart and leaned back against the wall. "I—I really don't remember that, Em. I swear I'm not lying." Her eyes narrowed and she gave me a look. "You're not messing with me are you?"

"Do you think I'd be so pissed if I was messing with you?"

She shook her head. Took a breath. "Oh, geez. I don't think I had
that
much to drink. And you know me. I always remember everything, unlike Angela. That girl either lies about not remembering the shit she does while she's drunk, or liquor just blanks her brain."

The remaining anger melted away, replaced in equal measure by confusion and doubt. How Isabel couldn't remember, I had absolutely no idea. But as far as I could tell, she really didn't have a clue about last night. By the time I finished recounting the story, Isabel dashed frantically to the mirror to check her neck.

"It looks like the mother of all hickies," she wailed. "And I didn't even have sex to go along with it."

As if sex were a side dish. I sighed and rolled my eyes. "Seriously, Iz, you were almost raped, I was nearly
killed
and raped, and all you care about are the stupid marks on your neck?"

Tears gathered in Isabel's eyes, pooling and breaking free in a flood. She hugged me. "I'm just trying not to think about it," she said between sobs. "But I don't remember a thing. What if something is horribly wrong with my brain?"

"Well, we both know
something
is wrong with your brain," I said, trying to inject some humor into this god-awful morning.

"Why didn't you call the cops?" she said, grabbing a tissue and blowing her nose. "I mean, even if that guy who saved us didn't want you to, it's still a good idea." She blew her nose again, left the bathroom, and dug her phone out of her purse.

"I think it's a little late now," I said. "You don't remember anything, and our savior didn't leave a number, so the police are just going to look at us as if we're mental."

She stared at the phone a moment before setting it down. "This is crazy." She looked up. "I want waffles. And ice cream. And fudge."

"This does qualify as an emergency, doesn't it?"

She nodded. "Big time."

We ended up gorging ourselves on breakfast, going to a movie, and shopping for stun guns—purple of course. We both already owned pepper spray, but I wanted to have fifty thousand volts ready to run through Stephen's body if I happened to see him again. I shuddered at the thought.

"Are you excited about tomorrow?" Isabel asked as I tossed laundry in the washer that night.

"Nervous," I said.

"They're going to love you."

"Because I'll be so awesome at fetching coffee and kissing ass?" I said. "It's an intern position, not CEO."

"Lots and lots of room for advancement," she said with a cheery note. "And at least it'll be something to live on until you find a job you like."

"Yeah." The problem was, I had a vanilla business degree and still no clue what I wanted to do for a career. I'd done some waitressing, but not much else, and certainly nothing to qualify me for an executive position.

Izzy touched my shoulder. "Oh, don't be such a Debbie Downer. Just let me teach you how to shake that ass a little, and you'll have a man ready to support you for life, sweetie."

I gave her a sideways look. "Because that's how I roll, right?"

She shook her butt and giggled.

After selecting appropriate business attire to wear to work the next day, I flossed, brushed, and climbed into bed. My mind would not shut up. Every time I closed my eyes, I saw Stephen, his teeth flashing for my throat. His face crunching against the brick. Blood spraying everywhere. The entire incident seemed like a nightmare, not something that had really happened. I still remembered the otherworldly vibe emanating from him. It reminded me vaguely of some people my parents had once introduced me to.

I dragged myself out of bed when my alarm went off the next morning. Showered, and left the flat with a large travel mug of tea. My place of employment, OnTech, was about a fifteen minute walk, or a five minute bus ride. I knew, because I'd timed it on Saturday before Izzy and I had gone out for drinks. I was anal like that. I had a car, but parking wasn't free, at least not to a lowly intern. The parking would quickly add up to far more than the value of my car.

As I stood waiting for a walk sign so I could cross the street, a car pulled to a stop in the far lane. Normally, a car wouldn't be such a big deal, but this one was a brand new Range Rover. I looked at it with an adoring gaze. The face behind the windscreen caused me to freeze. It was the man from last night.

My knight in shining armor.

Chapter 3

The light turned green and the Range Rover zoomed away before I could raise an arm or yell. I tried to get the license plate, but a bus trundled past, blocking the vehicle from view. I hurried across the side street, trying to keep pace, but the traffic signals turned green down the main thoroughfare and I soon lost sight of my quarry.

Though I'd managed to sleep last night, visions of the mystery man harried my dreams. True, he'd saved Isabel and me. He'd paid for our cab home. If he drove such a nice car, it stood to reason the fifty dollars hadn't been of much consequence to him. He looked like an ordinary citizen who just happened along and did the right thing. But it was the whole "not good with cops" thing that stuck in my mind. What was his secret?

I wondered if he came this way for work every morning. I wondered if it would be stalkerish of me to keep an eye out for him tomorrow. I also wondered it would be okay for me to take down his license plate and find out where he lived and why, oh why, he didn't want the coppers talking to him.

So entranced was I by the mystery of it all, I walked nearly half a block past OnTech before realizing it. Groaning at my mistake, I did an about-face and made my way inside the lobby. I rode the lift up to the top floor of the high rise. A redheaded receptionist met me with her cool gray eyes the moment I stepped off the lift and stood facing the transparent doors into the office. Taking a calming breath, I stepped forward through the doors and into the reception area.

"Emily Glass?" the other woman said, standing, and walking around the large desk before I could nod in the affirmative.

"Yes."

She held out a hand, gave mine a firm, brief shake. "I'm Sandra. Follow me, please."

First stop was a small break room with a couple of microwaves, a large stainless steel fridge, and an industrial coffee machine among other things.

"From now on, you will arrive here at the same time I do, six forty-five. I'll let you in, and you will prepare the coffee." She showed me the precise number of scoops, water, and time it should take to make the kind of rubbish coffee people in offices drank.

I took out a notepad and wrote down her instructions. After that, she took me to the supply closet, explained my duties in keeping it stocked and tracking all the items inside to be sure nobody was filching.

She handed me a key to the closet. "Never, under any circumstances, let anyone borrow this key. I don't care if it's Mr. Jameson himself."

"But he's the owner."

She turned and raised a penciled-in eyebrow. "Who do you think made these rules?"

I shrugged. Wrote it down.

I trailed behind Sandra for the better part of two hours, jotting down notes, asking stupid questions, and watching her raise one or both of her drawn-in eyebrows at me every time I dared open my mouth. She was one of those people who probably never yelled, preferring instead to show cold contempt for those she considered beneath her.

"There are forty-five programmers here and twenty salespeople. I am the office manager," she said, her back to me as she led me through a room full of empty cubicles. I heard snoring and saw a man dozing under his desk, a horseshoe pillow around his neck, and a pair of earmuffs over his ears.

"This is Stan. Ever since his wife kicked him out, he's been working late and staying here." She shuddered. "Apparently, Mr. Jameson doesn't mind."

"You don't like him sleeping here?"

Again with the eyebrows. "I find it distasteful." She led on to the other end of the room where a woman in her forties sat at a desk drinking something from a paper coffee cup, and nibbling on a box of donuts.