“Salem is usually a haven for all sorts of New Age and Pagan practices not accepted elsewhere in this country,” Paul said. “People here tend to be pretty open-minded. Which is why this is all so surprising to me. I’m sure it’s really only a few people stirring the witch’s cauldron, so to speak.”
“Helen Barnes and company?”
“Probably.” Paul reached over and closed the laptop. He began to massage Callie’s neck.
Her muscles were tighter than she realized; she held all her tension in her shoulders. The weight of the world.
“I’d like to kick Helen Barnes right in her bony Brahmin ass.”
“I’d pay to see that,” Paul admitted, moving his hands over her neck and shoulders. “You have knots,” he said, surprised.
“Always,” she said, leaning into him as his grip tightened. His hands were strong.
“Okay?” he asked, squeezing harder.
“Good.”
He targeted the worst spots without being directed, moving from place to place, following the tightness until each muscle began to release. His touch got lighter then, until at last he skimmed his fingers lightly over her neck and shoulders.
“You know what I still don’t understand?” Callie said.
“What’s that?”
“Every time I hear the word banshee, it comes with a different definition. Rafferty said the banshee was a specter sent to predict the death of a loved one to those left behind. Archbishop McCauley said banshees were paid mourners banned by the Catholic Church. Rose says the banshee is human and was once a shrunken goddess trapped in an oak tree, then freed by a lightning strike to wreak havoc on the world…So which is it?”
“All of the above,” Paul said. “Or none of them.”
“That’s helpful.”
He laughed. “No, seriously, it’s all oral tradition. Handed down through the generations. It happens often, many different versions of the same story. That’s how most myths are passed along and why the corresponding gods and goddesses of the different pantheons are at the same time remarkably similar and wildly varying in their legends.”
He finished rubbing her shoulders. “Better?”
“Much.” She sighed, allowing herself to lean back against him for just a moment before standing.
They stood looking at each other for a long minute.
“Thank you,” she said.
“Anytime,” he answered, not breaking her gaze. She was close enough to feel his breath as he spoke. She knew what he was thinking. She was thinking the same thing.
“Not a good idea,” she said.
“No?” he asked, not believing her.
“No. Please, I’d like to just stay friends. Okay?”
“Friends then,” Paul said, stepping back and heading toward the kitchen. Even as he did, she wished he hadn’t.
But they were friends.
And now that the article had come out, it felt even more important to her that they stay that way. Some of the details about her mother and the others had been tough to read, not only because of the murders but because they bore an uncanny resemblance to Callie’s own past. There were several young men she’d hurt. They’d followed her, the same way the men in Salem had followed the Goddesses.
And there was something else. Every erotic dream she’d had about Paul—and she’d been having them nightly—ended the same way. She’d wake up sweating, the blankets torn away and tossed on the floor, still feeling him inside her, trying to erase the final image that lingered: Paul dead on the cold stone floor, blood pooling around him. Recently, a woman’s voice, one she didn’t recognize, had sounded in the dreams. Was it one of the nuns? Whoever it was recited the phrase her foster father had pinned to her: “Her feet go down to death…” And sometimes added the one that troubled her even more: “God will give you blood to drink.”
“Friends,” Paul toasted as he returned, spiking the eggnog he handed her with Napoleon brandy lifted from his father’s wine cellar. “Kind of a waste of amazing brandy, but, hey, it will make trimming the tree more interesting.”
“It’s time to trim already?”
“It is indeed.” He took a swig of eggnog.
It was a big tree, and to compensate for the low ceiling where they’d positioned it, he’d had to saw off both the top and the bottom. It looked as if it were growing through the roof.
“We should have put it over there,” she said, pointing to the cathedral ceiling in the study.
“It’s always been here,” he said. “Tradition dictates.”
She rolled her eyes. “That’s the mantra in these parts.”
It really was a ridiculous tree. Paul strung the bubble lights, and Callie plugged them in. As soon as they began their colorful roil, the room felt festive. “I take it these lights are tradition as well?”
“Of course,” he said.
He rummaged through some boxes and showed her wooden ornaments carved by his father and grandfather. Then he dug out a seagull figure he’d made when he was a boy. “I have all the family ornaments.”
The eggnog was heating her from the inside, and the fire Paul had built was reddening her cheeks. She almost made a racy joke about his possession of the family jewels but stopped herself. “Then what about your parents?” she asked instead. “What do they use to decorate their tree?”
“Interior decorators,” he said.
“Of course they do,” she said, saluting him with her eggnog. “I would expect nothing less.”
“Actually, they hire flower designers. They pick a different one every year for the Holiday House Tour.”
“I forgot about the charity tour.” She’d seen a poster advertising it just this morning when she stopped by the post office to pick up some stamps. She put down her glass and selected a mercury glass ornament. As she stretched to place it on a high branch, she slipped on her stockinged feet and almost dropped the thing, lunging to retrieve it before it hit the floor. She caught the ornament, and Paul caught her.
“Careful there,” he said. “You almost took the whole tree with you.”
She saw it wobbling. “I didn’t do that—you didn’t put the stand on correctly.”
“I most certainly did!”
“Paul. The tree is clearly listing to the right, with almost the same slant—”
“The slant was intentional,” he insisted, “to match the sixteen-hundreds floors.”
“Of course you would say that,” she said with false exasperation, taking a seat on the couch.
Paul started to pour them another eggnog, then thought better of it and sat down next to her.
They both stayed silent, watching the bubble lights color the room. He was so close she could feel the warmth of his leg on hers and smell the scent of his skin. She honestly wasn’t sure how much longer she could hold out. The brandy was lowering her resistance. She could feel her pulse racing in her chest, her blood flowing, and the faint throbbing that was a gateway to pleasure. If he flashed his killer grin, she was a goner.
Mercifully, Paul stood and moved toward the tree, tilting his head to the side to better assess the angle.
“That’s one weird tree,” he finally said.
“It sure is,” she managed, tilting her head to the same angle to gain his perspective. “I like it.”