The Selkie Sorceress (Seal Island Trilogy, Book 3) Read Free Page B

daughter’s shoulder. To anyone else the gesture might have seemed mothering. But it made Glenna sick.
    “Don’t worry, darling. He’ll tire after a while.” Moira took one last look around the cottage and nodded, satisfied. “I’m happy to see you’re holding up your end of the bargain. I was worried at first that your feelings for him would interfere with your ability to stop him.”
    Glenna went very still. “I don’t have feelings for Sam.”
    Moira smiled. “Don’t you?”

 
     
     
     

     
     
    T he flames died and Moira vanished in the black smoke. Glenna hurried into her bedroom, sliding a Moleskine sketchbook from the shelf behind her bed. It looked like the other sketchbooks beside it, but the blank pages fluttered when she opened it. A warm light spread from her fingertips and the book grew heavier, changing shape in her hands. The leather binding creaked, the pages crinkling and yellowing with age as she sank to the bed.
    Ancient words, scrawled in Gaelic, leaked onto the parchment. She traced a black and white sketch of a leafy bush at the top of the page marked by a red ribbon. In three days the blackthorn would bloom—the first sign of spring in Ireland. Pagans called it Imbolc. Christians celebrated it as St. Brigid’s Day. Both would light fires all over the countryside and give thanks for renewed warmth and fertility.
    But Moira was planning a different celebration—a celebration that would change the fate of all their lives forever.
    Glenna slid the faded map of Connemara from the back of the book, unfolding it and spreading it out on the mattress. She’d been searching the mountains for years—quietly, carefully, so as not to draw any attention to herself. Large red circles marked the spots where blackthorn grew. She crossed out another one, scanning the few that were left. If she could find the spot—the one spot where everything had started—she might have a chance of saving them.
    She set the map down when she heard the knock on her front door. She knew Sam would come. Once he’d found his first clue, more would follow. That was how it worked with Sam. She’d used all her powers the last two months to keep those clues out of his reach. But he was breaking through. Every step closer put him, and all of them, in more danger.
    She rose, folding the map and sliding the book back onto the shelf. She stalked to the door and opened it, taking in the tall, broad-shouldered man on the other side. He’d changed into clean clothes—a faded blue T-shirt and jeans. His sun-streaked hair was still wet from the shower and he’d shaved, revealing the jagged scar that etched through his strong jaw.
    His perceptive eyes swept past her, assessing the cottage. “Do I smell smoke?”
    “It’s the candles.”
    He took in the ashes scattered in front of the hearth, the fresh streaks of soot climbing up the paint. “It doesn’t smell like candle smoke.”
    Glenna kept her hand lightly on the doorknob, standing between him and the cottage. “What are you doing here, Sam?”
    Sam pulled his gaze from the charred underside of the mantle, fishing a small glass vial out of his pocket. “Tara thinks I need protection.”
    Glenna recognized the vial—one of Tara’s tinctures. Good, she thought. She didn’t want to hurt Sam. She just wanted him off this case. She was glad Tara was protecting him.
    He held it out to her. “I want you to keep it.”
    Glenna’s gaze flickered up to his. “Tara already gave me one.”
    “For protection?”
    Glenna looked back down at the tincture. “Not exactly.”
    “What is yours for?”
    “I’d rather not say,” Glenna admitted. Hers had been to attract love into her life. She had hurled it over the edge of the cliff on her way home Christmas night.
    Sam hooked a finger in her belt loop and tugged her toward him. He held her surprised gaze, slipping the tincture into her pocket. “Somehow I don’t think Tara’s magic measures up to yours.”
    The air