Forbidden Passion by Rita Herron Page A

and reeked of a demon attack. An hour later, he left CSI processing the house and shrine and drove Marlena home. His instincts urged him to go into the tunnels, to search for a demon who might share information, told him that every second counted.
    But the killer might come after Marlena while he was gone. -
    Marlena remained silent, pensive, as they climbed the porch steps, but a determined look crossed her face and she paused at the door.
    He caught her hand, heat sizzling between them at the touch. She was too damn tempting. Being close to her was testing him to the limits. “Let me check the house before you go in.”
    She conceded, handed him the key, and waited in the foyer while he combed through the house. Seconds later, his boots pounded as he descended the stairs.
    “It’s clear,” Dante said. “You look exhausted, Marlena. Go to bed. I’ll stay downstairs.”
    “That’s not necessary, Dante. I’m fine.” -
    His look hardened. “But Daumer might come back.”
    Fear flickered in Marlena’s eyes for a brief second before she blinked and shook her head. “I appreciate the offer, but you searched the house and no one is here. If he does return, I’ll call you.”
    He gripped her arms. “Listen to me. My job is to protect the town. You may think you can handle him, Marlena, but he may be even more dangerous than you think.”
    Marlena’s face paled, but her -lips tightened into a thin, stubborn line as she looked down at her arm where he held her. “I don’t need a babysitter,” she said, then shook off his grip. “Besides, I’m sure you have work to do. Shouldn’t you be following up leads instead of coddling me?”
    Her tone stung. He should be doing exactly that instead of worrying about her. But fuck. He couldn’t help it.
    “Go,” she said, then gave his chest a slight shove. “The best way you can protect the town and me is to find the killer, whether it’s Daumer or someone else.”
    Or some thing, he wanted to say but bit back the words. She might have seen monsters as a child, but the adult Marlena thought she’d imagined them.
    It was best if she continued to believe that and didn’t probe to find the truth.
    She sure as hell wouldn’t like the answers if she did.
     
     
    Dante hissed. “Lock the doors tight, and call me if you need me?’
    His protective tone touched her deeply, yet once again, the thought of being alone with him in her house raised self-preservation instincts.
    “Of course.” She forced her hands to her sides to keep from reaching for him and begging him to stay.
    His dark eyes locked with hers for a long, tension-filled moment, then he clenched his jaw, turned, and walked out.
    Marlena locked the door, then leaned against the wooden frame, struggling for a breath. The wind rattled the windowpanes, the furnace growling. The day’s trauma was wearing on her, resurrecting too many painful memories and questions. -
    Her sister and mother had been killed in a heinous way and now, twenty years later, the week after she’d returned, another young girl.
    Somehow she felt responsible, as if her return might have started this violence. Too restless to sleep, she booted up her computer, then Googled the town’s history and searched through archives of past crimes in Mysteria.
    During the five years following her mother’s and sister’s murders, there had been at least five unexplained deaths. The reports blamed most of the deaths on attacks by wild animals, and one on a drifter passing through. After that, the crimes had tapered off.
    Because the killer or killers had moved on?
    Only now another girl had been murdered…
    Her mind ticked back to the shrine Daumer had built, and she considered the general profiles of serial killers, usually young white males in their twenties with histories of childhood abuse or trauma.
    The need to do something spiked her adrenaline, and she accessed the hospital files. She typed in Gerald Daumer’s name and found the intake