In Love by Christmas: A Paranormal Romance by Sandy Nathan Read Free Book Online Page A

leered into the face of one of the whores. “You know everything, don’t you? You’re the one who runs this place. Who was your contact? Who paid you to keep that girl here? Where did the money come from?”
    A yellow puddle appeared and spread under the girl’s chair. “You are smart. You should be afraid. However afraid you are of the one who paid you to keep my child, you should be twice as afraid of me.” She taunted the girl. “Would you like some plastic surgery?” Hannah pulled sharp-nosed pliers from her belt and a small knife. “You want a nose job? Or I can put the basketballs from that piece of shit’s chest in yours .”
     
    Hannah and her team did what she did best: data extraction. They left the apartment sparkling and clean with no evidence of anything untoward happening, Hannah and her team knew everything about everyone in the cathouse. Every name, every number, every contact. Hannah had all their accounting information, where they put their money. All the girls’ names and where they came from.
    And the name and address of the guy from Spain who kept track of Cass for Enzo Donatore. Hannah would kill him, and then go up the line to Enzo. No one would ever harm Cass again. She was sure that Enzo Donatore saw at least some of her revenge from his see-stone. “Hannah Hehrman declares war on you …” she said into the emptiness.
     
    In her room much later, Hannah held on to the bathroom sink and sobbed. She slumped to the floor, her legs unable to hold her up. Her body convulsed as grief overwhelmed her.
    “Oh, my sweet baby. What he did to you.”
     

5
    Passing in the Night
    “ L et’s go, Leroy.” Doug grabbed his arm and pulled him to the medic’s vehicle, which was pulled up to the underground elevator in the condo’s lot.
    The medic approached, trying to put Cass on the gurney in the middle of the rear cabin. “No!” Leroy waved him off.
    The van/ambulance started moving the instant Leroy slammed the door. The parking attendant barely looked up as they hurtled into the dark street.
     
    Leroy held Cass across his lap like a baby, his breathing becoming ragged as her condition revealed itself. Her skin seemed glued to her bones; her face was a parchment-covered death’s head. Black circles ringed her eyes. Her arms were bones full of needle marks. She seemed too light to be a grown woman. Her nightgown was filthy.
    “They had her in a closet, Doug. With no heat or water. It stank.” She stank. A cry escaped from him. “Oh, Cass. What did they do to you?” Her eyes were pasted shut with amber guck and she was so unconscious that his healing couldn’t touch her.
    “Oh, Cass. Wake up! I’m here. I’ve got you.” Tears burst from Leroy’s eyes. “She can’t feel me, Doug, she’s almost gone.”
    The van pulled into an alley and then into the opening of an underground parking lot. They stopped, the back opened and Doug led Leroy to an elevator. “This is a small clinic, Leroy. We can’t take her to a public hospital. Enzo Donatore’s spies will know instantly. This is a good place. They can stabilize her until we can take her somewhere where they can rebuild her physically.”
    They walked down a hall. Cass wasn’t heavy enough to be a burden. Her bones poked into Leroy’s arms. Her legs hung without control or sensation. She was dying, and he couldn’t help her.
    His ribs pumped. He couldn’t stop crying.
    Leroy had cured everyone who came to him, except for one person. He couldn’t touch his mother’s cancer and neither could his grandpa. The two of them sat by helplessly, unable to keep the woman they loved most on this earth from dying. He’d failed his mother.
    And now he was failing Cass.
    “In here, Leroy. Put her on the table.”
    It was a tidy intensive care unit. Machines ringed the table. A doctor was there, wearing green scrubs with a green cloth hat tied around his head. He nodded at Doug and went to work. He set up an IV in Cass’s arm. Machines