Page 11 of Too Cursed To Kiss
“But not touch it? That makes no sense. Explain.” With my head pounding, retaining detail was tough, but knowledge was power, and something would be my ticket out of here even if I couldn’t see it yet.
“The ring is of my family, but it is sought after. If the metal is touched, I am visible to the others. They would be able to find the ring.”
“And you don’t want these people to find you because?”
“Because I killed my sister Donia, which severed her tie to the ring. Now it is looking for a new keeper.”
“You killed your sister?” My throat went dry. The stone-dead silence sent goose bumps everywhere.
“It was an unfortunate accident.” His lips puckered as ifhe’d bitten on something sour, but the words reverberated through my head.
I was locked in a room with a murderer in some remote location. No one knew where I was, I was sick, and possibly dying or drugged, depending on who you believed. I swallowed hard. “Okay, I’ll come back to that. What do you mean, the ring has a keeper?”
“This ring is a family piece. It is always cared for.”
“I don’t suppose you’re going to explain that?”
He gave me his half-sided grin which made me want to slap him.
“Fine, then tell me how it exploded.”
“It did not explode. Your purse was incinerated. The ring doesn’t like to be contained.”
“So you knew it would explode, and you still let me put it back into my purse?” I shouted, but this time my head wasn’t throbbing as much. Maybe the drug was working. Maybe he was telling the truth.
“Yes.”
“Where is the piece of shit ring now?”
“In my pocket,” he said, patting his chest.
“Your pocket?” I imagined the room blowing up.
“Not to worry. It is safe there. It is not zipped up, and there is a porcelain lining.”
“You have a porcelain-lined pocket? Never mind. Why didn’t you put it in there before, instead of in my purse?”
Wald’s scowl turned his jaw to chiseled stone. “Because the man you saw me with brought his associates with him when he came back. They believed I would keep it with me. They would never imagine it was in your purse.”
“You sacrificed my purse to save your ass?” I was losing my mind, but keeping whatever control I could, would get me through whatever this was. “Tell me more about thisgang. What hood are they from?” I was sitting on the edge of the platform bed. The floor was a kind of ash-gray wood and immaculate. My floors had never been this clean. You could probably eat off it.
“Not a gang. They are agents working with my sister, who seek the ring.”
“I thought your sister was dead,” I muttered, examining the tears in my leggings. The abrasions didn’t look too bad now. “How can your sister be dead and hiring people?”
“No, the sister I killed cannot die.”
“Whoa, that so doesn’t make sense. What are we talking about? Some undead creepy thing? Zombie? Wait, don’t tell me that part. I don’t really need to know.” Blood throbbed in my ears. He hadn’t moved from the wall, and he was still looking far too smug.
“Not undead. My family is ancient.” Those goddamned sunglasses blocked any expression which would help me read him.
“I’m not following. Where are you from?”
“Near here. In the forest.”
“The forests of Spokane?” I laughed. The broken sound echoed in my head like it wasn’t my voice at all.
“Our family home is in the forests near here. But our ancestral seat is much farther east.”
