French Silk(101)

"I can see why he'd be attracted to you. You're so different from her."

"In what way?"

"Every way," Claire replied. "I didn't like her. She comes from aristocracy and makes certain everyone knows it. She's cool and aloof. Snotty. Bigoted. And, I would guess, passionless."

"Maybe he didn't lie about that," Yasmine murmured.

"It's premature to say this," Claire said hesitantly. "And you won't believe me, but it's true." She reached for Yasmine's hands and pressed them between hers. "The relationship wasn't good or you wouldn't have been so unhappy all the time. You're better off without him."

Yasmine shook her head. "No, Claire, you're wrong. I'm miserable. In fact, my entire life is in shambles."

"That's not true, Yasmine!"

"Obviously you've forgotten my financial straits. The money you'll pay me for those stock shares won't make a dent in what I owe creditors."

"That'll turn around. Give it time. You're beautiful and talented, Yasmine," she said, meaning it. "Thousands of women would trade places with you in an instant. Right now your heart is broken, but it will mend."

Yasmine's eyes narrowed and tilted up at the corners, giving her a calculating, feline look. "My heart is broken, but I'm not going to suffer alone." She withdrew her hands from Claire's grasp, reached into her shoulder bag, and withdrew an object that made Claire recoil.

"My God, Yasmine. What are you doing with that thing?" The voodoo doll was a grotesque effigy of the congressman. She held the doll up and looked at it proudly. "See that hair on its head? That's really Alister's hair. That makes the spell more powerful. And this," she said, pointing to the exaggerated red felt penis thrusting from the doll's crotch, "well, you know what that represents."

Claire was appalled. "You're not serious, are you? A few candles and talismans, okay, that's harmless. But you can't seriously believe in spells and black magic."

Yasmine turned on her angrily. "Why not? You believe in a virgin birth, don't you?"

To argue religion was a futile pursuit. Claire wasn't going to engage in it, especially now when her friend was emotionally fragile. She wisely kept quiet as she watched in horrified fascination as Yasmine lay the doll on the bar and reached into her blouse. She withdrew a silver charm suspended from a chain around her neck. The charm was a hollow, filigree sphere. It was filled with matter that Claire couldn't identify, but it had the odor of herbs.

"By wearing this close to my body," Yasmine said in a menacing voice, "I can control his thoughts. He won't be able to get me off his mind. I'll haunt him day and night. I'll drive him freaking nuts."

"Yasmine, you're frightening me."

She laughed low in her throat. "Yours is nothing compared to the fear Alister will experience before I'm finished."

"What do you mean 'finished'? Yasmine, what do you intend to do?"

Ignoring the question, she said, "Watch, Claire. Observe. Learn. In case you ever want to put a curse on someone."

Ripping back the collar of her shirt, she revealed a row of long, sinister pins. She pulled one from the fabric and laid it aside only long enough to strike a match from the matchbook lying on the bar. She ran the burning match along the pin until it became almost too hot for her to hold, then she plunged it into the repugnant red penis of the doll.

"Good morning, Alister," she whispered. "Sleep well? Don't even think of making love to your insipid wife. Even one of my famous blow-jobs couldn't get it up now, you limp dick." She lit another match, heated another pin, and jabbed it into the doll's torso.

Claire grabbed her by the shoulders and shook her hard. "Stop this! This is ridiculous. Practicing voodoo is dangerous and stupid and I won't have my best friend deluding herself with it." She shook her again. "Do you hear me, Yasmine?"

She blinked to clear her vision, as though Claire had snapped her out of a trance. "Of course I hear you." Smiling broadly, she asked, "You didn't think I was serious, did you?"

"I—" Claire began uncertainly.

Yasmine laughed. "I sure pulled one over on you, didn't I?" She dropped the charm back into her bodice and replaced the doll in her shoulder bag.

"Don't let Cassidy see that," Claire said. "He was interested in your Jackson Wilde doll, but I dismissed it as a gag. He might reconsider."

"Come on, Claire, relax. It's like having the gypsy lady at a carnival read your palm. You don't really believe in it, but it's fun."

Claire still wasn't convinced and her expression must have conveyed that. Yasmine shot her a retiring look as she picked up her drink. "This black magic hocus-pocus is all a hoax, but it's fun to pretend that I could really hurt Alister. Why should I be the only one agonizing? It makes me feel better to know that the bastard might be suffering a little, too." She sipped her drink. "Enough of my love life. Tell me how Cassidy sweet-talked himself into your pants."

* * *

Quietly, Claire reentered the bedroom. Since it was on the west side of the house, it remained in semidarkness. Cassidy was still in bed, lying on his back with his hands stacked beneath his head, staring at the ceiling fan as it slowly rotated above him. He had an arresting profile, strong, masculine, each feature well defined. She loved the shape of his lips, and looking at them now, knowing how they tasted and felt against hers, whether supplicant or demanding, made her mouth water.