by Lila Dubois
“They’re dead. We are not.” If she didn’t cooperate, Tristan intended to drag her out of there.
They were huddled back near the altar, and when their whispers ceased, the church was soundless. Moonlight spilled in the windows and open doorway. The dogs, still seated on the threshold, cast long shadows.
Tristan’s skin prickled, and his gaze swept side to side. He couldn’t see Seamus in the shadows, but Tristan was sure he was there.
“What’s she’s saying?” Melissa asked.
“Nothing. I don’t hear anything.”
“Then why don’t we—”
Tristan held up his hand. The maid in chains was back. In the darkness, she seemed to glow with a dirty gray light. Elizabeth stepped into a patch of moonlight. She opened her arms and the maid stepped into her embrace.
As they hugged, Elizabeth’s previously solid figure wavered. She was a dozen, two dozen, different women. Hairstyles changed, the profile mutating from moment to moment.
They parted. Elizabeth returned to being the woman who’d hired Tristan.
“It ends, Elizabeth. You’ll leave my family alone.” Seamus’ voice echoed hollowly. “I’ll pay the debt.”
“The truth is needed,” she said. “For Joan, and for all the others.”
“You will have it now. There will be no more secrets, and my line ends with me.”
Melissa gasped as the knife flashed, catching a stream of moonlight. Seamus made a gurgling noise, and then the only sound was a steady drip, drip, drip.
Melissa was up and running before Tristan could stop her. After a second of fumbling noise, a torch blinked on. The light swept across the floor, stopping when it reached Seamus.
The last master of Glenncailty Castle was on his knees, a knife protruding from the right side of his throat.
“Call 999!” Melissa screamed. She raced to Seamus.
Her words jolted Tristan from his stunned paralysis. He reached for his cell phone. As he lifted it to his ear, he watched Elizabeth take the maid’s hands. The facades of the modern woman and tormented spirit faded, leaving two lovely girls in full-skirted dresses.
They took each other’s hands, and in the next breath they were gone.
Epilogue
The ghosts were gone.
Tristan started unbuttoning his coat as he exited into the garden. It had been three weeks since Seamus committed suicide in the little church. They’d been busy weeks. The death of a wealthy, respected man drew even more people to Glenncailty. He could only imagine what would happen once Melissa and Dr. Drummond made their findings about the bodies in the cemetery public. The press would have a field day with a story about a hidden graveyard full of murder victims and what relationship that had to the grisly death of Seamus O’Muircheartaigh.
Seamus’ residence, the old dowager house beside the church, had been locked up by his solicitor. It was chilling that Seamus had standing orders about what was to happen in the event of his death. Melissa had argued that there may be records in there that would help her and even tried to break in, but the solicitor had hired guards. After the last time she’d been caught, Tristan had promised the off-duty guard that Melissa wouldn’t make another attempt. So far he’d been able to keep her away.
Word of Seamus’ unusual order had spread, bringing the morbidly curious to Glenncailty. With each day, the mystery around Seamus’ life—and death—deepened. His wolfhounds had disappeared, and reported sightings of the shaggy beasts added fuel to the fire.
Tristan paused as a gust of cold wind made him shiver. He looked around carefully, examining each of the shadows for a hint of movement. There was nothing. The night was still and silent. Since the church, he hadn’t seen any ghosts.
Including Jacques.
His brother’s spirit was gone. Tristan was mourning him a second time, but now he had Melissa to comfort him.
When he didn’t see anything, Tristan shook his head and made his way to the little cottage he now shared with Melissa. Sorcha had never returned to the cozy little bungalow after Séan moved her to his house. They were going to be married in a month, with the reception in the newly opened grand ballroom on the third floor of the main wing. Caera Cassidy and her boyfriend—now fiancé—Tim were coming back for it. Caera had officially resigned her job now that she’d signed a record deal.
That left the cottage Sorcha and Caera had shared empty, and Tristan had moved from his flat in Cailtytown, joining Melissa. He’d never lived with a woman before, and the sex-on-demand was better than he could have imagined. As was the fact that he got to watch her fall asleep at night and wake up in the morning.
The National Museum declared all of Glenncailty a historic site, but allowed it to remain open. The rights to excavate and explore the grounds had been given to Dr. Melissa Jane Heavey, who was now officially in residence at Trinity and would be going to Dublin twice a week to teach.
Tristan didn’t see the figure standing in the shadow of an old tree. Didn’t see the wolfhounds that lay silently at the man’s feet. He was focused on the present, on the happiness he’d found.
There was no room for ghosts and darkness in Tristan’s life.
Seamus laid his hand on the head of his wolfhound. The beast licked his wrist.
“Come,” he whispered in a broken, gravelly voice. He turned and disappeared into the darkness, hounds at his heels.
About the Author
Lila Dubois is a tech writer by day and a romance writer by night. She’s living her own version of a romance novel with her Irish Farm Boy, whom she imported to Los Angeles. Having spent extensive time in France, Egypt, Turkey, Ireland and England, Lila speaks five languages, none of them—including English—fluently.
To learn more about Lila, please visit www.liladubois.net or email her at [email protected].
Look for these titles by Lila Dubois
Now Available:
Sealed with a Kiss
Calling the Wild
Monsters in Hollywood
Lights, Camera…Monster
My Fair Monster
Gone with the Monster
Have Monster, Will Travel
A Monster and a Gentleman
Glenncailty Castle
The Harp and the Fiddle
The Fire and the Earth
Coming Soon:
Wraith Accords
Carnal Magic
He can protect her from anything, living or dead. Except from himself.
The Fire and the Earth
© 2013 Lila Dubois
Glenncailty Castle, Book 2
Sean Donovan knows all too well the horrors of Glenncailty Castle. Ten years ago, after a young woman’s death, he boarded the place up himself—and almost lost his own life doing it.
It would be easy to avoid Glenncailty, if it weren’t for the woman who now runs it as a hotel. Something about the angel-faced redhead calls to him—and calls him to protect her from the darkness seething in the castle walls.
Sorcha has gotten used to calming rattled guests who claim to have met a spirit from the castle’s tragic past. But two years after Sean’s attempt to convince her to leave melted down into an unforgettable kiss, she realizes she needs his help.
The ghosts of the castle are restless, and growing more so. When one of the staff is attacked, Sorcha turns to Sean, not knowing the kind of danger she’s put him in. Working together blows the lid off desire long denied, but laying the ghosts of Glenncailty to rest means facing her own past. If she doesn’t, the ghosts might tear Sean apart from the inside out, and that would mean never knowing what could have been…
Warning: Unpronounceable Irish names, a hero who knows the power of love, a stubborn heroine and more than a few ghosts.
Enjoy the following excerpt for The Fire and the Earth:
Séan’s heart leapt into his throat and his muscles tensed as adrenaline spiked in his bloodstream. He started toward the castle, twine snapping as he caught his foot on the string outlining the pat
h. He moved fast, narrowly avoiding gaping holes and the potted plants that waited beside them. Circling a tree, he saw the rear terrace. What had once been overgrown with ivy and vines was now clear and clean, though drenched in shadow. As his foot hit the lowest step, the rear double doors creaked open.
He had a moment to make a decision. Last time he’d run from the ghost, and he’d learned nothing. He was older now, wiser, and he would not run.
“Wait,” he yelled, mounting the steps two at a time.
The doors slammed shut. He stopped, standing uncertainly on the terrace as the breeze rustled around him. Ten seconds passed, then twenty. After a minute, Séan rubbed his stubbled jaw, not sure if he’d imagined the ghost in the window and the doors opening. He took a few steps, wanting to at least check the doors to see if they were unlocked.
One door opened, slamming back to hit the stone wall with a reverberating thud. A gray figure stood in the opening. Séan had a moment to absorb what he saw—a female figure with white hair, wearing some sort of long dress, a translucent candle hovering in the air above her left shoulder. She took two steps out onto the terrace. Now he could see her face, which was lovely and calm. For a moment she appeared almost peaceful—like a gray toned portrait or painting.
Then the woman’s dress faded away, leaving her in a ragged undergarment ripped at one shoulder, revealing her left breast. As Séan watched, long black scratches appeared on her exposed flesh. It was both familiar and freshly horrible. Her shoulders hunched and she curled her arms around her belly. Thick chains crawled out of the darkness behind her. The chain moved as if it were a living thing—a snake of linked iron that climbed her body, wrapping around her ankles, wrists and neck.
“Holy Mary Mother of God,” Séan whispered. The longer he looked, the more solid the woman became. He could no longer see through her, and the wounds that covered her were now more burgundy than black.
She was coming alive before him, and it was a terrible thing to see.
“Missus,” Séan said voice gruff with fear and alarm, “who are you?”
Her head jerked up, and just like the ghost he’d seen all those years ago, there were no eyes, only empty sockets. She raised her chain-draped hands to her face.
He couldn’t watch this again. “Don’t, please. I’ll help you.”
Her eyeless face turned toward him. “Imigh anseo mo, chol cathair.” Her voice echoed as if she were speaking at one end of a long pipe, as unholy a sound as he’d ever heard.
Séan hesitated, struggling to translate the strong country Irish. Her raised hands reached out to him, the fingers curled into claws. “Imigh anseo mo, chol cathair!” Her scream sent spikes of pain through his skull.
Séan slapped his hands over his ears. Every instinct told him to run, but he wouldn’t turn away from someone in need. He wouldn’t fail her again.
The ghost turned her head, as if she looked over her shoulder with those sightless eyes. Séan took a step to the side, stomach heavy with dread at what he might see behind the apparition.
The woman whipped back around, and Séan heard the chains clank. “Rith!” Her scream was an assault on his senses, freezing him in his tracks, but it wasn’t until she came at him, fingers clawed, mouth open wide, that he ran.
Séan stumbled down the steps, racing through the garden along the back wall of the main wing. He skirted the construction zone for the new kitchen, headed toward the lights and noise of the pub. As he skidded to a stop on the smoking patio, the door opened.
Sorcha was silhouetted by the light, her hair glowing like fire. A smile lit her face as she closed the door, muting the sounds of revelry.
“Ah, there you are. I’m very sorry to make you wait, but now the night—”
“You cannot stay here.” Séan grabbed her hand, dragging her off the concrete slab into the garden, where he ignored the path and headed away from the castle.
“Séan, where are we going?” Her voice lilted with a laugh.
The fact that she was so terribly unaware of the danger around her made him all the more determined to get her, and then the rest of them—every person in that pub—away from this place.
“As far away from this place as we can get.”
“Are you well?” The laughter was gone from her voice, replaced by uncertainty.
“I will be when you’re safe.”
They’d rounded the corner of the east wing. He could see the front drive, and the parking lot beyond that. The need to leave this place was a raging in him.
“Séan, wait, I don’t understand.” Gravel crunched under their feet as they crossed the drive.
“You’re not safe here.”
“What are you talking about?” Sorcha’s hand wiggled out of his hold.
Séan turned to her. There wasn’t enough light to see her face, but her silhouette was visible. She stood with her hands on her hips, head high.
“It’s haunted.”
“That’s hardly news.” She tossed her head, strands of hair catching the starlight. “I know it’s haunted.”
“Then why are you here?”
“Because it’s my job. Actually, this is my dream job. And ghosts aren’t real. The stories about it being haunted are priceless as far as giving the hotel character.”
“No job is worth this.”
“Worth what?” Sorcha shifted. “It wouldn’t be a proper old building if there weren’t a few ghost stories.”
“They aren’t stories. The ghosts are real, the danger is real.”
“You’re afraid of the ghosts.”
There was a note of pity in her voice, and Séan gritted his teeth. He wanted to tell her that he wasn’t scared of the ghosts, but this was too important to lie. “Yes, I’m terrified of them. Whatever’s in there is so tortured that even a priest’s blessing didn’t help. The souls left here have suffered. They’re suffering still and anyone who stays here might end up like them.”
She fell back a step, and Séan realized he’d raised his voice, something he almost never did.
“You seriously believe the ghosts are dangerous.”
“I’ve seen the bodies of people who didn’t believe this place was dangerous.”
“You mean the people who died in construction accidents? We’ve had more engineers than I can count out here, and we know where there are structural issues and what’s dangerous. Everything’s being repaired.”
“That may fix the building, but it won’t touch the ghosts.”
“The ghosts didn’t kill anyone, and the building is something—”
“I’ve seen the ghosts.” His word cut through the night. He heard Sorcha take a breath, waiting for more. “I saw one just now, while I waited for you. It’s a woman, tortured and wearing chains. And I’ve seen another one, a woman in gray, eight years ago. It may even be the same being. That woman—ghost—is in the castle right now and I know there’s worse things than her in there.”
Sorcha’s arms dropped to her sides, her fingers tugging the fabric of her pants. “You saw a ghost, just now?”
“Yes.”
She turned her head away, hair hiding her face. “There are a lot of scientific explanations for people seeing ghosts—”
Séan grabbed her by her arms, jerked her against him. He wanted to shake her, make her understand, but as her quick breathing made her breasts brush against his chest, his need to shake her changed into something else. His blood was up, as his mother would say.
Séan wrapped one arm around her back, the other hand cupped the back of her head. He kissed her.
For a moment she was stiff with surprise, their lips pressed hard together, but then she melted against him, her body soft in his arms. She tasted like apples, and her lips were willing. The kiss lasted a minute, an hour. Séan lost himself in her, until all he could feel was the heat of desire, no more cold dread and fear.
He shifted the arm at her back and her hands wrapped around his waist. Soon the kiss wasn’t enough and he slid his hand down, f
inding the hem of her sweater. She gasped when his fingers touched the warm skin of her back.
Her gasp was like a splash of cold water, reminding him of where they were and what they were doing. Séan released her.
Sorcha raised a trembling hand to her mouth, touching her lips.
Séan wondered if he’d hurt her, grabbing her like that, wondered if he should apologize for kissing her without her permission.
But he said nothing. He felt empty now, as if the encounter with the ghost and now the kiss had drained him of energy and feeling.
Of the two, it was the kiss that had him more rattled.
Love—and healing—can come from the most unexpected places…
Talking Sense
© 2013 Serenity Woods
Sensual Healing, Book 3
Still hurting physically and emotionally after a tragic car accident, Mia Nicholls has everything but love on her mind. Until quiet, sexy Colm Molony—a man who barely registered on her romantic radar—gives her a more-than-friends birthday kiss that really rings her bell.
The minute he laid eyes on Mia, Colm knew she was trouble, which is one reason he’s kept his distance. The other is that he’ll be leaving New Zealand to go back to Ireland at summer’s end. Yet when he touches Mia’s watch, his supernatural ability to sense others’ emotions kicks in, and his instinct to soothe her private pain overrides his intention to stay away.
While away on a course together, talk leads to massage, then to a game of strip whist, culminating in a physical relationship that turns emotional faster than either expected. But when a shocking event threatens to upset Mia’s tenuous equilibrium, Colm must untangle himself from his own past before he can save her wounded heart from slipping beyond his reach.
Warning: Includes men in rugby shorts, strip whist, an unashamedly romantic hero performing heroic acts, and a touch of the Twilight Zone.
