The Mammoth Book of Paranormal Romance

as manipulative as you’ve always been.”
    “We can discuss this until the cows come home, but it’s not going to change things. I’m not your brother’s reincarnated soulmate. I’m just somebody who works at the Clinique counter in Sears. And my room-mate who was in the bar with me is going to be looking for me. Any time now. And she’s very mean.”
    “I thought you said you were a nun.” Henry raised an eyebrow and his lips twitched with the barest glint of a smile. “And did you just use the expression ‘until the cows come home’?”
    “You need to let me leave now.”
    His expression tensed again. “I can’t do that.”
    Frustration now mixed with fear. This man was unbelievably stubborn, but she wasn’t giving up. She’d given up a lot of things in her life because they were too hard to get or maintain, but she was damned if she was going to give up her life now. Something about Henry made her want to keep talking, keep fighting, keep trying to convince him that he was wrong about her.
    “Have you considered what will happen if you’re wrong? If you kill me and I’m the wrong person? Like, oops, the witch made a mistake?”
    “This witch doesn’t make mistakes. It’s what she does. She’s a soulmate recovery expert. It’s her specialty.”
    “Soulmate recovery,” Julia repeated. “Maybe I’m dreaming. Maybe I didn’t get up earlier. I did have an afternoon nap, after all. That would make much more sense than this.”
    Henry’s frown was only deepening the longer she spoke. “The only strange thing is that normally a reincarnated soulmate will recognize their partner on sight. They might not remember every detail of their former lives, but they have that soul recognition and attraction which clicks for them. So either you’re a very good actress, or something did go wrong.”
    She finally managed to breathe a little at that. “Well, there’s your answer.”
    “That you’re a very good actress?”
    “I’m a terrible actress. The worst. I couldn’t even get a part in the school play in grade six.” She was grasping at straws but she had to. Her survival instincts had kicked into overdrive. “You don’t want to kill me.”
    “I don’t?”
    She shook her head. “You’re not a murderer.”
    His eye narrowed. “You don’t know me.”
    “I’m a really good judge of character.”
    “That is debatable. So let me get this straight. I grab you, drag you into this alleyway with a knife to your throat, and now you’re trying to tell me that you don’t think I’m capable of murder? Maybe you want to reform me? You see past the rough exterior to the goodness in my heart, is that it?”
    She swallowed. “OK, it does sound a bit naive.”
    “A lot naive.” He shook his head. “You weren’t naive in your previous life. You were a devious vixen who played men and got them to do whatever you wanted.”
    “Even you?”
    His expression darkened. “You tried. But it didn’t work. I was immune to your particular charms. A pretty face isn’t enough to turn my head.”
    “Are you gay?”
    That got a flash of shock on his face. “No.”
    “But you don’t like women.”
    He made a low groan of annoyance deep in his throat. “I’mnot gay. I do like women. But I didn’t like you. I could see through to your dark deception in ways that Evan couldn’t.”
    “So this woman. What was her name?”
    “Katerina.”
    “So Katerina threw herself at you, even though she was already soulmated to Evan—”
    “She was a whore.”
    Julia ignored that. “She threw herself at you and you weren’t interested. Not even in a quickie? The woman was hot, wasn’t she?”
    “Like I said, her beauty was not enough to turn my head.
    Besides, she . . . you ...” He groaned with annoyance again. “You were involved with my brother. My bond with him prevented me from any disloyalty, even if there had been an attraction. Which there wasn’t.”
    “She kissed you.”
    “She tried to do a lot more than that when she had me tied up. Before she took my eye.” He shook his head and touched his patch again. “Her kiss disgusted me. And you know what they say about a woman scorned—”
    Julia went up on her tiptoes and kissed him full on the mouth. She felt Henry’s sharp intake of breath against her lips, his shock at what she was doing. Hell, she was shocked at what she was doing.
    What the hell was she doing?
    A moment later she heard a loud metallic clatter as the machete fell to