Kathy Lyons - Under His Spell

“Go on,” encouraged Tammy from behind her margarita. “It’ll be fun.”

Nicky gave her sister a glare. Tammy’s idea of fun was vastly different than her own.

Meanwhile, the Magic Man was beginning to flip through her e-mail. “Let’s see what we have here. Work. Work. Sales info. Factory specs. Yawn.” He dropped the phone in a top hat on his magician’s table. “A beautiful woman shouldn’t be that very boring. I can see why you don’t want it back.”

Nicky was already standing, her hand stretched out. “This isn’t funny,” she said, the constriction in her chest making her breath short and tight. “Please, take my sister. She’s a lot more fun than me.” It wasn’t true of course, or it hadn’t been true before college. She’d been loads of fun then. Why couldn’t she breathe? “Please give me back my phone!”

“Too late!” Tammy quipped as she licked salt off the edge of her drink. “Phone’s gone.”

“No!” Nicky knew it was a trick. After all, this was a stage show. But her phone really was gone! The little magician’s table was empty and the top hat with the phone inside was nowhere in sight. Terror clutched at her chest way out of proportion to the event. Her whole life was in that phone. What if something happened during his flashfire explosions? What if it dropped down a trapdoor and broke?

What if you never got it back, you couldn’t do the work and you were forced to take the rest of the week off because of it?

She winced at that inner voice. She knew its seductive tones, knew it was the voice of her island hottie tempting her to the dark side. And for some bizarre reason, she put the magician’s face on her fantasy man. But she couldn’t do it. She had a job and responsibilities, though the sudden yearning for escape rolled through her mind like a sweet, hot wind. “I really need that back,” she said, hating that her voice was strangled. “It’s my life.”

“Darling, your life has got to be more exciting than this phone,” returned the Magic Man, his voice just as seductively tempting.

Let him have the phone. Let him have it all, her fantasy man whispered.

“I can’t,” Nicky breathed as her hands tightened into fists. She was at the base of the stage now, scanning it for any sign of her BlackBerry. “Just give me my phone back.”

“I’ll make you a deal,” the Magic Man said, pitching his voice to the room at large. “If I can psychically guess your name, then you have to come up onstage and help me out.”

Play with me. That’s what he was saying to her. Come play. How she wanted to. Hot sun, hot oil, hot man. God, it hurt just thinking about it.

“I have to work, and you don’t need to guess anything. My name’s on my phone.”

The Magic Man shook his head. “Your phone said N. Taylor and has a picture of your dog—”

“Actually,” piped up her sister, “that’s my dog.”

He paused and frowned at Nicky. “That’s not even your dog? Now, that is sad.”

Nicky shot a glare at her sister as she climbed the steps onto the stage. “Did you set this up?”

Tammy shook her head. “Not guilty, I swear! Though I would have if I’d thought about it.”

Nicky made it onstage, her mind at war with itself. Half of her kept putting that hot island man in place of the magician. The other kept shoving the image away, refusing to give in to her dreams even if it made her entire body clench in panic. Only by sheer force of will was she able to speak with anything like a normal tone. “Fine, Mr. Magic Man. I’m here. Guess my name, then give me back my phone.”

“Oooh, a challenge.” His voice was growing deeper and more mesmerizing. It perfectly fit her imagined island guy who kept whispering seductive fantasies in her mind. Then he touched her cheek. It was the barest caress, but it was definitely a caress, and her breath cut off completely. “Look into my eyes.”

She bit her lip, making one last desperate attempt to keep it together. To keep her life together. “Please,” she whimpered, “just give me back my phone.”

“It’s all right,” he murmured. “Everything will be fine.” Even knowing that everyone could hear what he said, Nicky felt as if his words were just for her. And they carried such power. A release. Sun. Hot oil. A man stroking her body. She nearly cried out at the lure of it all.

“Your real name is Charlotte, but you don’t like it. You renamed yourself Nicky after Stevie Nicks because you always wanted her straight blond hair.” He pushed his fingers into her hair, rubbing sweetly against her scalp as he released it from her heavy clip.

“You can’t know that,” she murmured, but obviously he did. And as the clip slipped off, her mind began to slip free. Inside she was a little closer to that tropical island. Just a little more, one tiny step more and soon she’d be running naked through the sand. It didn’t make sense, but his voice made it seem so real.

“Just listen to my voice, Nicky. As long as you can hear my voice, you’re safe. Do you understand, Nicky? You’re always safe with me.”

She felt it. At some core level, she felt that absolute peace that came with safety. With just his words and his voice, he made everything okay.

“This isn’t possible,” she said as she valiantly reached for sanity. But did she really want to return to the chains of endless statistics, boxes of plastics and layoffs? And all the while, his voice kept flowing over her. It felt hot and soothing, like the oil she imagined him stroking onto every part of her body.

“You weren’t a cheerleader in high school,” he said. “Volleyball team. Setter. But you really wanted to be a singer in a band.”

“Like Stevie Nicks,” she whispered. He knew everything about her.

She was still looking into his eyes. She couldn’t look away even if her life depended on it. Brown eyes, brown hair, her rational mind tried to label him as ordinary and unimpressive. But that was a lie, just like everything about reality was a terrible lie. His face was kind, his eyes were a rich mocha, and his voice was the best of all because it created this place for her. He was her island god, and his voice made it real.

He was looking down at her, leaning in close. Would he kiss her? She wanted him to. With one kiss, she would be there with her island god. God, how she wanted it!

“Your senior night prom was a disaster,” he said. “You wore a white Greek goddess gown, your date was an ass and you ended up walking part of the way home.”

She winced, her eyes tearing at the remembered pain.

“Remember you’re safe, Nicky. Nothing can hurt you here.”

It was true. She felt it, and her mind slipped forward in time past that horrible disaster of a prom date to what had happened afterward. To her neighbor and school nerd Jimmy Ray who had found her as she was walking home. He’d taken her to an all-night diner and they’d eaten ice cream sundaes until she thought she would puke. They’d talked and laughed and shared a single kiss. It was fabulous, and whenever she thought of that night, she focused on those ice cream sundaes and that kiss.

“It was the best night of my life,” she said.

“Really?” drawled the Magic Man. His eyes were frowning and that created a ripple of discontent in her island world. But she didn’t have time to think about it as his expression smoothed and his voice returned to that deep, low timber. He made every word feel like hot oil stroking the tension out of her body. “Relax, Nicky. Let reality slip away. You are safe and free as you haven’t been for years. No work. No responsibilities. Just rest, release and sweet—”

“Pleasure,” she murmured. Then she took a deep breath, allowing herself to slide deeper into the fantasy. How glorious to let go of the tension and fear she had been holding. Her life had been spinning out of control for some time now. She felt like a mouse on a wheel that had jumped the tracks. She was inside it, running for all she was worth while her life careened to she-didn’t-know-where. But she couldn’t jump out and she couldn’t stop. Until now. Until her island god extended his hand and led her step by step to paradise.