Imaginary Lover

by Sandra Chastain

  “Can I bum a ride with somebody?”

  “Don’t worry, Nick will bring you. He attends all the rehearsals.”

  “But …”

  The phone rang and Betty turned back to the office. Dusty left the stage and switched off the lights. She didn’t know why she kept fighting. It was obvious that Hattie had set off a chain of events that she wasn’t going to change. She might as well get on with fulfilling Hattie’s request.

  She could tell a story. She could deal with Nick. Hattie’s plans for them to share the house were odd but workable. The only thing that Hattie couldn’t have foreseen was the chemistry between Dusty and Merlin. The more she experienced it, the more certain she was that her plan to make love to the good doctor, get that settled, and offer to buy him out, was the answer.

  Though Dusty had made her decision, she didn’t have her inheritance yet. And she couldn’t get it until she fulfilled her part of Hattie’s request. For that she had to tell her story and become the ART Station’s new mentor.

  “Hah!” Some mentor. She didn’t even have pocket money. Maybe a call to old J.R., Hattie’s attorney, would provide that. Surely her promise to comply with Hattie’s request would be good for a few bucks.

  Back at Hattie’s house she found the card J.R. had left, and she called him. After she stumbled through her explanation, he agreed to drop by the house and leave her a small advance on her inheritance.

  After checking on Siggy, Dusty made herself a peanut butter and jelly sandwich and climbed into the tree house, where she read through the alternate endings. Hattie’s solutions were very different, though in each the husband reappeared as a ghost.

  “I don’t know about this, Hattie. I don’t think an authentic live woman would settle for a spirit. I mean, the illusion might be okay in the movies, but I’d want the real thing in my bed.”

  Nick entered the garden in time to hear the last half of her sentence. Dusty wanted a real man in her bed. As opposed to what? A scarred, wounded man? Him?

  There was an ominous creak overhead as the wood protested Dusty’s weight. “Dusty, you’d better come down. That tree house wasn’t built as quarters for an adult.”

  “Oh, yes it was. Hattie and I both sat up here.”

  “Sure, years ago. Come down before it collapses.”

  She might have argued, just on general principle, except for the slight shift of the board on which she was sitting.

  “All right. I might as well. I can’t find a proper finish for this story anyway. The captain ends up dead. I like my men alive.” She reached for the last board, the bottom rung on the foothold ladder.

  It gave way.

  She slipped, falling against Nick, who’d come to her aid. Both went tumbling to the ground. He was on his back, his arms automatically encircling her to protect her and to anchor himself.

  As they fell he realized that his hands were on her breasts—full, unfettered breasts that molded themselves to him as he tried to move away. Her bottom fitted neatly against him, straddling the intrusive part of him that would have been embarrassingly obvious had she fallen on her stomach. She shifted her bottom, calling attention to his situation and her knowledge of it.

  “Well, well. Guess Merlin doesn’t care whether it’s a bed or the ground.”

  He let out a muffled groan. “Don’t push it, wildcat,” he said in a harsh voice. “I feel your heart beating like that of a wounded bird caught in a net. My desire might be more visible, but yours is no less powerful.”

  To prove his point, he slid his hands beneath her shirt and found her nipples, rolling them between his fingertips. She gave a little cry and twisted herself away, sliding to her side, catching her weight on one elbow so that she could raise herself up and examine him.

  “Are you hurt?” she asked.

  “Hurt? Why? Are you offering to kiss my hurt and make it well?”

  “I’m concerned, Merlin. I wouldn’t want to think that I caused you any pain.”

  “There’s always pain, Dusty. You can’t possibly cause me any more than I’ve already felt.”

  “There it is again, that hair shirt you wear. Do you enjoy punishing yourself? I’m the one who fell on you.”

  “Not your fault,” he protested. “I was—distracted.”

  “I shouldn’t have distracted you.”

  “You didn’t.”

  She smiled. He might claim that she wasn’t the cause of his problem, but his body wasn’t having any part of that idea. She waited. He wasn’t making any effort to move, and though she had to find a way to get past their attraction to each other, nowhere was it written that she couldn’t have a bit of fun at the same time.

  “Where exactly are you hurt?” She ran her fingertips beneath his shirt and began to examine him with soft feathery motions designed to tease him. “Here?”

  For a moment he stopped breathing. The wench. She was going to drive him crazy. The nerve endings in his skin bunched into hard, quivery knots that jerked beneath her touch. Moving lower, she reached the button at the waistband of his jeans. Before he knew what she was doing, it was open and her fingers were inching downward.

  “Or maybe here?”

  He reached out, clasping her arms with hands of steel, and jerked her forward so that she was lying over him.

  “Did I find the spot?”

  “You keep looking and you’re going to find more than you can handle, Ms. Desirée O’Brian. Don’t push me.”

  “Oh, was I pushing?”

  This time he did push, moving her away as he came to his feet and walked to the porch. He didn’t bother to fasten his jeans. She could see the waistband loose, exposing the black knit band of his briefs. He was tall and lean and gorgeous.

  And she was left awash in the most powerful surge of sexual desire she’d ever known. The seduction of Nick Elliott was looming even more important than ever, and just as impossible.

  Finally she stood and followed him.

  Inside the kitchen he was standing at the sink, looking out the window. “You don’t want this, Dusty,” he said. “You really don’t.”

  “Don’t tell me what I want, Nick. I recognize the attraction, and I’m willing to admit it. Are you?”

  “How long has it been since you’ve had a man make love to you?”

  She watched as he turned to face her, his gaze pinning her down, forcing an answer. “Almost three years. Why? Do I have to pass some kind of test to qualify?”

  “It’s been almost two years since I’ve made love to a woman, and I don’t think either of us is in a position to make a rational decision.”

  “Why is that, Merlin? I think I’d like an answer to why I can’t make a decision about the men I sleep with.”

  “Go upstairs and get ready to go to rehearsal, Dusty. And don’t take this any further.”

  “Why? Can’t you handle the job?”

  His lips curled into a smile, and his voice dropped to a thick whisper. “I can give you what you want, Dusty, but I think it would be a mistake.”

  “Why? Don’t you think we can live together, cohabit, as the case may be? After all, we share the house, why shouldn’t we share a bed? It would make things much simpler, wouldn’t it? I’d call it a satisfying resolution to a problem that is readily apparent.”

  “Sharing a bed and a house with a woman isn’t an answer,” Nick said. “I know. I’ve already been there. It destroys the very thing you share. No matter how much desire you have for a person, it eventually dies and you’re left with nothing. I won’t do that to another woman, ever again.”

  “Whoa, magic man. I’m not talking about promises of forever; in fact, I had something much less permanent in mind.”

  “Oh, are we talking about a one-night stand here?”

  “Something like that.”

  “To what purpose?”

  “Sex, Merlin. Pure and simple sex. We use each other now, then we settle the details.”

  He winced. “That’s what I’m not interested in.” />
  She didn’t understand the pain on his face. “I didn’t mean between us. I thought I’d make it simple for you. I mean, I’m stuck here and so are you, for the moment. Let’s not fight it. Later, when we can work it out, we’ll go our separate ways.”

  “So you aren’t looking for forever. You’ll just use me for a while, then you’ll move on? Isn’t that a little cold?”

  She looked at the bulge in his jeans and took a deep breath. “Cold? I don’t think so, Merlin. I don’t think cold is part of the problem.”

  “You’re right. I want you. And I could sleep with you and give us both a temporary reprieve, but I’ve been down that road once. You’ve been lonely, been through a terrible ordeal, and I’m available. Hattie has somehow put her stamp of approval on me and that makes everything all right. But I won’t be responsible for hurting you.”

  Dusty decided that there was a humming in the air around them. Almost as if they were generating sound with the heat that arced between their bodies.

  “You’re right,” she finally said. “Hattie set this up, at least she tried. But, come on, she had no way of knowing that I’d really come back. So we can’t blame this on her. If we did that, you’d have to admit that she also put her stamp of approval on me.”

  “Oh, Hattie brought you here all right,” he agreed. “I don’t pretend to understand how or why, but I can see her hand in all this. Hell, I don’t know why I’m refusing you. It’s been a long time since somebody has begged me to go to bed.”

  “I’m not begging you, Nick Elliott.”

  But she had been, and that hurt. She’d lost sight of her original plan in the face of her desire. She wanted the man, wanted him in her bed, wanted his hot, sweaty body against hers. She wasn’t used to being turned down either. She tried to salvage her pride.

  “In fact,” she snapped, “I’ve changed my mind. I don’t want you in my bed. I was teasing you. You know about women who tease, don’t you?”

  “I know, and you weren’t teasing. I don’t think you’re that kind of woman, Dusty. Whatever you do, you do it openly without apology.”

  “That’s not what the prosecutor said at my trial. He claimed that I was a deceitful woman, lying, hiding my part in the crime. And everybody believed him.”

  Nick dropped his tough bravado act and took a step forward. “I don’t. I believe you, Dusty. Why didn’t you stay and fight instead of running away?”

  “I’m not good at defending myself. I’m better at running.”

  “If you were innocent, you should have stayed and proved it.”

  “I was tired and it didn’t matter anymore. The past is gone and my life and my criminal record with it. All I wanted was to shut that door and find some peace.”

  “I guess I can understand that, wildcat. But I won’t compromise you or me, no matter how hard it is for me to keep my hands off you. Go get ready, Dusty, we have to go.”

  “All right,” she agreed in a shaky voice, “but there’s one thing I want to know. What are you afraid of, Merlin?”

  “Maybe of being forced to answer that question, wildcat. Maybe of acknowledging that there is a future to face.”

  David met them at the gate. He sent Nick to check on the placement of the Halloween pumpkins they were arranging around the plantation, and escorted Dusty to the little house they were using for the wardrobe room.

  Hattie’s red dress was too large. The wardrobe mistress finally came up with a cream-colored ballgown trimmed with blue roses and lace.

  “I never saw this before. Someone must have donated it. It’s more elegant than anything we ordinally use, but we don’t have time to sew a whole new gown. If it fits, we’ll use it.”

  “The spook seekers won’t care,” David said. “And it will be nice to have a beautiful woman in the house.”

  Two garments slipped from their hangers and fell to the floor, followed by a hat box that bounced directly on David’s head.

  He glanced around uneasily. “No offense intended. All the women on the tour are beautiful. It’s just that this is the first time we’ve had a woman with silver hair involved. Maybe we should arrange some special light to set her off. No, being in the shadows is better.”

  He left, muttering to himself about the staging of Dusty’s story. The wardrobe mistress managed to pin the dress to fit, cautioning Dusty not to lean over at the risk of being stuck.

  “What do you mean? I have to wear this tonight at rehearsal?”

  “Oh, yes. We always rehearse in costume. You have to learn how much freedom you have to move around. Don’t worry, all the others are already dressed. You’d better get to the house. Oh, and take this lantern. All the tellers carry one.”

  Dusty found herself being pushed out the door, left alone to find her way to the house in the darkness by the light of a lantern.

  As she walked down the sidewalk, she passed the first station, a large magnolia tree where the elderly man was embellishing on his tale. There were several people listening, people she didn’t recognize.

  “Damn.” She didn’t know she was going to have an audience.

  “Now, now, Ms. Desirée, that’s no language for a Confederate widow to use.” Nick appeared at her side, a sleek silhouette with dark hair and dark lashes that made his face look like he should have been one of the participants.

  “You almost scared me to death!” she said uneasily.

  “You don’t look dead. You look like a bride. Where’d they find that dress?”

  “I don’t know. The wardrobe mistress hadn’t seen it before either. Apparently somebody donated it.” She passed a prickly bush and took a step closer to Nick to avoid it, causing the skirt to fly up on the opposite side. “I don’t know how any woman ever managed a hoop.”

  “Your character was a very special woman. At least according to Hattie. She waited for the man she loved, even when she knew he was probably dead.”

  They reached the house and Nick gallantly took her arm as they climbed the steps. “You’re going to stand beneath the portrait?”

  “Wherever it’s the darkest.”

  He unhooked the velvet rope closing off the double doorway and allowed her to enter. She felt a sudden chill inside the room.

  “This is spooky, Merlin. I feel as if somebody is watching.”

  “Maybe it’s the woman in the painting.”

  Dusty took a step closer and looked up at the picture. On either side of the mantle were sconces holding candles with delicate flame-shaped bulbs that looked like real fire. They cast a ghostly light across the woman’s face, partially shielding it from view. The odd thing was that now she appeared to have light-colored hair like Dusty’s.

  “What’s that on her hair?” she asked.

  “Looks like some kind of net. If I remember right, Scarlett, or maybe it was Melanie, wore one in Gone With the Wind.”

  “I’ve heard of pictures where the eyes seem to be following you no matter where you stand, but this is the first time I’ve seen one. At least her eyes aren’t blue.”

  Nick studied the portrait. “I don’t know. It’s hard to tell in this light. They could be any color. But you’re right. You get the feeling that she’s watching us.”

  Dusty let out a concerned laugh. “First she falls on us, now she’s watching. That’s spooky. What happens now?”

  “Get ready for your first audience,” he said. “I hear them coming.”

  “You aren’t going, are you?” She hadn’t meant to sound so anxious, but she admitted to a certain amount of panic at being left alone.

  “I suppose I could stand over here, in the corner, if that would make you feel better. I don’t think I can be seen.”

  “Thank you, Merlin. I need all the help I can get.”

  Betty Hirt, followed by several volunteers, stepped into the doorway. “Oh, you look wonderful,” she said. “Where’d that dress come from?”

  Dusty explained once more that nobody seemed to know.

  “Well, it’s a cinch it�
��s been packed up somewhere,” Betty said, walking around Dusty. “The folds are still visible. And that fabric. It isn’t something cheap that we’d buy for a costume.”

  “So, I’m wearing a plantation original!” Dusty didn’t mean to sound so sharp, but she was getting the jitters big time.

  “Well, you look lovely,” someone in the back said.

  “So, let’s begin, shall we?” David joined the group and stood smiling encouragingly.

  Dusty took a deep breath and closed her eyes. As she had in the theater, she instructed her onlookers to close their eyes also. “Allow the spirit world to merge with your inner being. We are in a plantation house just outside Atlanta. The Confederate forces are being driven back.”

  She wrung her hands anxiously. “I am here, alone in my house, waiting for the man I love to come back to me. I’m so afraid.”

  The light in the room was eerie, almost as if it were really being cast by candles, catching the uneasy currents of air and moving across the wall in smears of shadows.

  Dusty finally opened her eyes and turned slightly, as if she’d heard someone call her. She hushed for a second and allowed herself to find Nick. The way he was standing, she could see the scar on his face. Odd, she hadn’t noticed it that much. He always seemed to turn away from her so that side of his face was concealed. Tonight it was a dark jagged mark that seemed more pronounced.

  She noted the scar, but it didn’t disturb her. She went on, speaking softly as the widow told of her love for the man who’d left her to fight in the war.

  Her voice slowed, changed, became softer, more Southern. “Do you hear it? A horse’s hooves outside?” she said, hurrying to the window, then turning back in disappointment.

  Nick listened, caught up in the reality she was creating with her words and the outpouring of emotion. Where the other tellers had a story, with stopping places where they alternately scared and made the listeners laugh, Dusty was simply creating a place and a time that had long passed. When she spoke of horses approaching, you could almost hear them. When she lowered her gaze in disappointment, there were tears in her eyes.

  And through it all, the room enhanced and fed the mood. The picture seemed to have more definition, and the silence deepened.