Ghost Hunter

by Serena Akeroyd

It could be kind of gloomy, but because of her gift—a word she’d argue over—it kind of sweeps away the gloominess.

  Because of her, they can find their vengeance. Something that will ultimately bring them peace. In turn, I’m finding a peace of my own. Sure, there are a shit ton of injustices out there, but one by one, Jayce brings them to light.

  God, it makes me so damn proud of her.

  “What did she do when you told her that?”

  “Shit a brick?” She snickers, and takes a deep sip of Diet Coke—yes, the woman’s contradictory nature knows no bounds. Here she is, shoveling down three thousand calories worth of pasta, and she orders a Diet Coke. “It was so funny, Drake. I know that makes me sound evil but she was irritating, you know? One of those preppy, prissy bitches who rule Greek life at college.”

  There’s a tale to be told there. I know she went to an Ivy League university where sorority houses ruled the roost.

  Filing the memory away for another time, I simply state, “You wanted to bring her down a peg or two.”

  “Wow, that’s a new phrase to me.”

  I grin. “A new patient of mine. English. She comes out with some whacky ones.”

  “But that hits the nail on the head. I did. Totally. I wanted to put her in her place. That’s horrible, right?”

  “Well,” I confess. “It’s a little mean.”

  “You didn’t see how she was looking at me though, Drake,” she says yet more earnestly. “She deserved it.”

  This brings to mind a conversation I once had with my niece, Robin, David’s sister. When she’d been bullied, she’d managed to excuse her own behavior because the guy had ‘deserved to be punched in the balls.’

  Jayce is this weird mix of wisdom beyond her years and juvenile delinquent

  It’s a good job she’s rich, otherwise she’d never be able to afford all the lawsuits.

  And she has two going on at the moment.

  “What happened with her? There’ll be repercussions, Jayce. There always are.”

  “I think she thinks I’m going to blackmail her.” She huffs. “Like I’m interested in her enough to do that. That’s the problem with those kind of people.” She pokes her fork at me. “They’re so full of themselves that they think the world revolves around them.”

  “That’s how humanity works, babe,” I tell her, amused by the idea she thinks she doesn’t work that way when everyone, even the most empathic and generous person, does.

  Still, she shocks me by snorting. “I wish I could.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She peers at me as she chews on more bread. I know she’ll answer, she’ll just take her own sweet time about it.

  “I’d ask you if you knew what it’s like having all these people talk to me… but that’s your job. People talk to you and you try to help. Most psychologists have their own shrinks, don’t they?” she asks, studying me with curiosity as she tucks into her meal.

  “Yes. Of course. We all have issues of our own that need handling. And being a caregiver and hearing the things we’re told, means…” I break off. “Ah. I see what you mean.”

  She nods. “Yup. Except, I can’t talk to anyone about this. Nobody understands.”

  I hold out my hand, spreading my fingers apart in welcome. She reaches over and grabs mine. We lace them together. “I’m trying.”

  “I know. And I appreciate you so much for that. Since you’ve come into my life, I feel a whole lot better.”

  “I’m glad. You know I feel the same, too, right?”

  She bites her lip. “I do sometimes, and then others, I’m worried you’re still sad.”

  Unable to be anything but honest, I admit, “Sometimes I am. But that makes the times I’m happy, with you, all the sweeter.”

  “You’ve a silver tongue, Dr. Edwin.”

  He grins. “I’ll put it to work later on tonight.”

  Her eyes flare wide, and she grins at me. “Is that another birthday present?”

  “That can be arranged.”

  She laughs. “This seriously is my best birthday. Normally I spend it alone with the entourage. This is so cool.”

  By ‘entourage,’ she means the ghosts who follow her around.

  It’s an unusual choice of word, but it fits. Jayce has an entourage like some Hollywood star, except hers are invisible and have all come to some grizzly end.

  Jesus, it’s a wonder she isn’t on Valium.

  “Do you think she’ll write a good report on you or not?”

  “Because she thinks I’m going to blackmail her, she’ll probably go for a positive spin.” She grins at me. Wickedly. “I kind of hope she doesn’t, though.”

  “You’d prefer that?”

  She winks. “I never said I had to make sense, did I, babe?”

  And wasn’t that the truth.

  The rest of the evening, I made it a point not to talk about work. Instead, we spoke of the trip to Dollyworld, which is a few months down the line, and then, the fact she got a call from her mother this afternoon, too.

  The latter she told me about on the way home.

  To say I think she doesn’t get on with her mother is like saying I have a love of skydiving without a parachute.

  I don’t think she was joking when she told me her mother had her exorcised more than once.

  Janelle Ventura sounds like a curious combination of hippy-turned-school-mom. During that transition, she turned über religious, too.

  Kind of unfortunate for a daughter who speaks to dead people.

  I can almost understand Janelle’s terror that her daughter had been possessed, but to provide no support system for her child is not only neglectful, but unforgivable. Though I hope to meet Jayce’s parents someday, it’s more for what it means to an actual relationship… a kind of formalization, rather than a desire to know the negligent shitheads.

  Two blocks away from our apartment, I ask, “Did she at least wish you happy birthday?”

  Jayce snorts and shakes her head. “Nah, she didn’t. She knows it’s my birthday though, because she wouldn’t have called otherwise.”

  “But she didn’t wish you well or anything like that?”

  “Nope. Wanted to make sure I was keeping out of trouble.”

  A chuckle escapes me at that. “And you reassured her you were doing everything you possibly could to remain in the thick of it?”

  Thanks to a streetlamp blaring in through the backseat window of the cab we’re in, I can see her wide grin. She leans into me, presses her lips to mine, and murmurs, “I do like how you know me so well, Dr. Edwin.”

  I’m ‘doctor,’ am I?

  My smile widens even as she starts to trace my lips with her tongue. My little ghost detective wants to play tonight, does she?

  This doctor is more than willing.

  By the time we reach the apartment building, Jayce is rocking on my lap, straddling me like she did the first time we ever made love.

  That time will forever be seared in my memory, but I know this time will end with us in a bed.

  Soon.

  Very, very soon.

  She rocks her hips, sliding her core against my hard cock as she burrows down against my jawline. The little minx has a thing for leaving hickeys on my throat.

  I’ve actually had to buy some foundation to cover up.

  It’s like being fifteen again.

  I’d laugh but I’m too busy trying to hide the groans she’s dragging from me. I don’t complain about the hickeys because she drives me wild as she makes them.

  She nips and licks, sucks down, then lashes the area with her tongue. It drags all my sensibilities online and if I wasn’t already hard, I most definitely would be now.

  With a grunt, I clamp my hands to her hips and stop her from teasing me. I do this for two reasons only.

  The car has come to a halt and the driver has called out the fare.

  With a grunt, I grab my wallet, pay the man, and help her off my lap and onto the sidewalk.
<
br />   Grateful that the cab immediately rushes off, I tell her, “Let’s hope the tip was enough to make him forget what he saw.”

  She grumbles, “Hey, he got a free show. He should have tipped us.” Her wink has me chuckling, then she drags me beneath the front, into the vestibule of her building.

  Yeah, she lives in one of those buildings.

  With a fancy vestibule and a gleaming entrance hall with period twenties features.

  She also has a doorman, who looks as ancient as the building. The old coot has a habit of disappearing, though, as is the case now.

  Really, for security, the community needs to get rid of him. But they’re all sentimental about Mr. Rodgers.

  I make a mental note to talk to Jayce about this because with all the threats against her, someone needs to be watching the front door. But my brain is blown when the elevator doors open and she launches herself at me. Terrible though it may be, security drops to the bottom of my priorities.

  Cupping her ass, I let her settle her thighs around my waist. The perfect position, yet again, for her softness and my hardness to find a happy spot.

  We haven’t even pushed the button to our floor, but I don’t care. I just need her.

  Now.

  She drags at her sweater and throws it overhead. I immediately groan at what’s beneath.

  Which is nothing.

  Absolutely sweet AF.

  “If I’d known you weren’t wearing a bra, babe, I’d have had you back at the restaurant.”

  She grins. “You would, huh? Where? In the ladies’ restroom?”

  My nose wrinkles. “Okay, I’d wait for the elevator on the ride home.”

  She laughs. “Mr. OCD neat freak.”

  “Hey, I don’t need sterile. Just clean will do.”

  I shut up her laughter by kissing it from her. She tastes so fucking sweet my heart feels like it’s going to shatter.

  I dive into her, loving how she welcomes me, needing her as much as she needs me.

  The feeling of coming home never disappears, and I know, point blank at that moment, she’s my soulmate.

  It’s weird as fuck to have that belief resonate so entirely through my being, but it’s the truth.

  This woman was made for me.

  Every perfectly imperfect inch of her.

  She opens up to my exploration, letting me fuck her mouth how it deserves to be fucked. The pouty Cupid’s bow teases me, and I flutter my tongue along it, then trace down over her chin, along the sinews at her throat, not stopping until she’s arching back from me and letting me taste her nipples.

  I suck them into my mouth. Each one. Like they’re cherries on the top of an ice cream sundae. They taste better than anything I’ve ever had in my mouth.

  Well, except her pussy.

  That’s mouthwatering, too.

  The urge to taste her now overcomes me and I walk her over to the elevator panel. “Take us upstairs, baby,” I command, before nibbling on her nipple and testing the resilience of the tip with my teeth.

  She lets loose a cry that seems to be hardwired into my nervous system, because all it does is make me want inside her.

  Stat.

  The elevator starts soaring and I grunt with relief around the nub in my mouth. Savoring it, and savoring her, I blindly walk through the doors when they whirl open.

  I’m past caring if anyone will see us, but I know we’re safe. We’re on the penthouse level and the only other neighbor is never here.

  Unseeingly, we walk to her room, her tit in my mouth the whole way.

  She runs her hands through my hair, dragging her nails down my scalp in a way that’s guaranteed to have all my nerve endings shooting to life.

  With a whimper, she moans, “The key’s in my back pocket.”

  My hands are already cupping her ass, so it takes less than nothing to scout out the key and slide it into the door.

  The minute we’re inside, I slam it shut then press her against the console table in the entryway.

  I lean her weight on it and murmur, “Unfasten your jeans.”

  “Here?” she cries, arousal making her voice squeaky. In a cute way.

  How it’s cute, I don’t know, but my body just tells me it is.

  I nod and her hands get to work.

  I pull away from her when I know they’re unfastened and grit out, “Hold on.”

  Her eyes are wide, the pupils blown out like she’s overloading with adrenaline.

  That I, this boring old dude of a psychologist can do this to her, makes me feel like I can fucking fly.

  I drag her pants down her legs and throw them to the ground. She’s wearing no panties.

  “Jesus H. Christ, are you trying to give me a heart attack?” I moan, as I slide my fingers into her core, not stopping until I’m frigging her clit in a way that has her holding onto the table like she’s using a lifeboat to surf a tidal wave.

  The cries escaping her mouth increase, getting more and more desperate until I drop to my knees, and replace my fingers with my tongue.

  This time, a shriek escapes her, and her legs clamp around my head. I don’t mind, just smile into her pussy, reveling in her taste, her texture.

  I flutter my tongue inside her, loving her hard, and in a way that has her rocking her hips and making the console table jerk.

  Her hands are in my hair again, and this time, she’s pulling in a way that would tell an idiot she’s close.

  Retreating to her clit, I nibble a little on the delicious morsel and then flutter my tongue along the nub. Like that, she implodes.

  She roars out her pleasure, letting the whole fucking building know she’s just climaxed.

  It soars through my blood knowing I’ve brought her to this, and though she clamps down hard on my head when I try to move, she lets me up after a few seconds.

  I grab hold of my own fly, lower the zipper, and release my cock. She watches with dazed eyes as I start to jack off, then her hands come out and she spreads her legs.

  “In me, please, baby. Come inside me.”

  Her pleas have my ego soaring, and I come to her, settling the tip against her still-fluttering and juicy cunt. She grabs a hold of my hips with her feet, and pulls me into her.

  I go in hard, and I go in deep.

  Her head falls back against the wall, baring her throat to me.

  The sight of it inspires all kinds of dirty images and I settle down to consume her.

  She tastes a little like perfume, but more than that, she’s Jayce.

  Mine.

  I treat her to the same torment she gives me. Raking my teeth along the curve of the sensitive flesh, then nibbling down. When I suck hard, she cries out and starts babbling, “Fuck me, please. Drake, fuck me.”

  The litany has my hips jerking into action. Slowly, at first, I tease her. Just rocking back and forth, hitting all the deep spots. She shifts between us, tipping her pelvis forward in a way that has her whimpering with every thrust I make.

  “You like that, baby?” I growl against her throat.

  “I do, I fucking love it,” she mewls, making me feel like a fucking conqueror as she surrenders to my lust.

  And that’s it. I can’t take any more. Her whimpers and her taste and everything about her has me needing to fight my control.

  I cease teasing her and start to fuck her. Like she begged for. I give her everything she needs.

  I don’t care that the table is rocking into the wall. I don’t care that her nails are digging into my back so hard she’ll leave marks—through a fucking silk shirt.

  I don’t give a shit.

  All that matters is now. Here. My woman. Me.

  As my tempo speeds up, so do her cries. Then, she roars out another orgasm, and as the clinging, clutching walls of her cunt wrap around my cock like a silken vise, I can do no less than come, too.

  Release blasts through my veins, setting me soaring high before gliding low.

  The delicious endorphins slice through my body, cutting
through any tension. Freeing me of all strain for the moment.

  I slump into her, let her take my weight. She slackens her hold a little, but only a little. She’s still wrapped around me tight.

  And I love it.

  I love her.

  With a groan, I come back online and grab hold of her ass. She mumbles against my shoulder, grumbling probably.

  She’s a grumbler, Jayce. But the notion just makes me smile as I carry her through the apartment and head for the kitchen.

  With her still wrapped around me, and still mumbling, she mutters, “Whatcha doing?”

  “Getting you Twizzlers.”

  She snorts. “You’ve already won the best boyfriend award. There is no higher prize.”

  I laugh at that. “Getting you Twizzlers scores me more points?”

  She pulls back and blinks at me blearily. Then, as I hand her one from the fridge where she keeps them, she gnaws down on one and says, “These aren’t just any Twizzlers. These are post-coital Twizzlers.”

  Hiding my smile by kissing her throat, I tell her, “I didn’t know they were your equivalent of a post-sex cigarette.”

  “Sure you did, otherwise you wouldn’t have brought me for one.” She sighs happily. “But now, to the bedroom, chauffeur.”

  I happily oblige, and don’t even release her when we get to the bed. I sit down, then turn around so she can lie on top of me for a while.

  I’m not hard inside her, but the jostling around kept me there.

  The candy disappeared by the time we made it in here, so there are no sounds other than that of our breathing and the distant rumbling of traffic thousands of feet down.

  In the dark, I find it easy to tell her, “I love you, Jayce. Happy birthday, baby.”

  She sighs, happily snuggles into me. “I love you too, Drake. Thank you for a wonderful day.”

  Another sigh comes swiftly after. “I should be pissed though. How am I supposed to compete when yours comes around?”

  I snort. “You’re just going to have to suck. Because, it’s official. This is the best birthday ever.”

  My teasing has her slapping my arm. “No fair. I want you to have a good day, too.”

  “Whatever you come up with, we’ll have fun.” I kiss her temple. “Now, let’s get some sleep. You must be close to a carb-coma.”

  She purrs like a fucking cat on my chest. “I just burned a hell of a lot of calories. The coma can wait.”