by Julie Leto
“I can’t imagine it is coincidental that you’ve come into ownership of the charm, Alexa,” he said, forcing his gaze away from where she’d placed the jewelry, thinking, but not saying, that the hiding place she’d chosen seemed hardly fitting for something of such value. “Tell me more about this brother of yours.”
In a move that seemed more instinctive than deliberate, Alexa placed a protective hand over her pocket. “Why?”
“So I can decide whether or not to kill him.”
***
Alexa stared at Damon, wondering how she could have made love to a man she most definitely did not know. From any other guy, she might have dismissed his comment as an idle threat. But this guy? He was serious. She only hoped the protective properties of his sister’s busted chain and charm didn’t fail her now.
“How long has it been since your sister went missing?” she asked. “Two hundred and fifty years? I hate to be the one to break it to you, but it’s time to get over it.”
“At times, it seems like yesterday.” Damon glanced down at his lap, which completely reminded her that he was naked. Not that she could really forget. While his skin remained on the pale side, he was otherwise formed in the image of a Roman god. Explosive temper or not, he knew how to use that body.
Man, did he ever.
“That may be,” she said, glancing anywhere but at him, “but that doesn’t give you the right to threaten me or my brother just because we somehow ended up with a necklace that belonged to your sister three centuries after she lost it.”
Leaning forward, Damon captured her gaze, a smile teasing the corners of his lips. “My nudity unnerves you?”
Alexa squeezed her fists tighter, then slowly relaxed them. She had this very bad habit of denying her weaknesses, even when they were painfully obvious.
“Yes,” she replied.
“My nudity did not disconcert you when we were making love.”
She turned and eyed him boldly. “That was before you assaulted me, called me a witch and threatened to kill my brother.”
He nodded. “I allowed my emotions to best me, and for that, I apologize.” Damon closed his eyes and, seconds later, his loose-sleeved shirt, snug breeches and glossed boots were back on his body. “ ‘Tis a failing of mine three centuries have not cured.”
Alexa rubbed the back of her neck. The cut still smarted, but she’d certainly lived through worse. “Apology accepted. I suppose my brother having your sister’s necklace is peculiar, but then, my brother is one of the most peculiar people I know.”
“Is that said lovingly?”
Alexa shrugged. She wasn’t entirely sure. She certainly cared about Jacob and didn’t want him murdered by a vengeful phantom, but they’d lived at odds so long, and old habits died hard.
“I see the magic works again?”
Damon chuckled at her topic switch but left the matter alone. “Apparently, conjuring clothing and furniture and food are still within the realm of my power.”
He tried to lift his arm, and the exertion caused a pained grunt.
“But you clearly can’t heal yourself. You’re going to need to rest your shoulder for a while,” Alexa instructed. “Maybe conjure up some ice?”
From the perplexed look on his face, she knew she’d confused him, but he did as she asked. After several tries through which he conjured everything from a large block of ice to a bucket of snow, she finally explained the concept well enough for him to produce enough crushed ice to wrap in cloth. She fished a couple of ibuprofen out of her bag and convinced him to swallow them. He winced at the cold ice and nearly choked on the pills, but after a few minutes of allowing the compress to numb the soreness and the drugs to work their magic, he sighed and relaxed.
“You know, my brother is into all sorts of occult stuff,” she explained, adjusting the ice against his joint. “It really doesn’t surprise me that he got his hands on something so precious, something he clearly thought offered me some sort of protection. He’s not perfect by any means, but he’s never been anything but loyal to me. Particularly since I nearly died.”
Damon’s gaze prickled her skin, so she scooted a few inches away.
“Nearly died?” he asked. “How?”
Alexa instantly regretted her remark. She hated talking about the accident. She’d come to terms with the pain she’d suffered, but not the loss. Her father. Her stepmother. The last vestiges of her childhood. She’d been an adult when the truck had smashed into their limousine, but while her father lived, she still had someone to rely on, advise her. Be proud of her.
“An accident in a car. My injuries were extensive, but I survived. My father and Jacob’s mother did not. That event bonded Jacob and me in ways you can’t imagine. I won’t let you hurt him.”
Damon did not reply, but from the shadows in his eyes, she knew her point was made.
Outside, the storm still raged, but the crash of the thunder had softened with increasing distance. Within a few hours, the deluge would pass. She wasn’t sure if the tempest had been just an example of Florida’s often violent weather or a manifestation of the castle’s dark magic objecting to Damon’s attempted escape. Either way, she was stuck here for the night with a centuries-old phantom who’d made wild, passionate love to her one minute and then threatened to kill her brother the next.
Now he’d gone back to showing concern. Riding such an emotional roller coaster with a stranger who wasn’t even supposed to exist sent her mind reeling.
“Stop staring at me,” she said.
“You’re beautiful!”
“Don’t,” she said, shaking her head. “You can’t threaten to kill my brother one minute and then compliment me the next.”
He shifted and she readjusted the compress, squeezing the water from the melted ice onto the floor.
“I apologized for my hasty words,” he reminded her. “But know this. If your brother is uninvolved with Lord Rogan, I will have no reason to kill him.”
Gooseflesh prickled her skin. He might have meant the words to be reassuring, yet they were anything but.
“Rogan is long dead,” she argued.
“Many likely believed me long dead as well, Alexa. I cannot make such assumptions.”
“Even about your sister?”
“Especially not about her. Her necklace still exists, after all this time, and falls nearly immediately into my hands. This castle has been rebuilt with every last stone in the exact place it was on that fateful night. Rogan’s magic pulses through here and allows me to do this,” he said, once again divesting himself of his clothes. “And this.”
Seconds later, she was naked as well.
She cursed. With a devilish smile, he clothed them both again and she had to call on all her self-control not to slap him hard.
“Don’t—”
“How can I assume the past has not affected the present deeply?” he went on, ignoring her protest. “For all I know, it was Rogan’s magic that brought you here to free me, to renew our battle until one of us finally wins.”
The keen resolve in his voice chilled her, but she shook off the cold and pressed the ice pack tighter against his skin. She’d heard determination like his before—out of her own mouth. Why should his attitude frighten her when she so often sounded just as single-minded and resolute?
“This is going to be a long night,” she said. “Maybe we should go somewhere more comfortable.”
She moved to stand and suddenly found herself floating in a vortex of color and light. Before she had a chance to cry out in surprise, her feet steadied on a plush carpet in a warm room that smelled of ocean, books and charred wood.
Damon was sitting on a hand-tooled leather chair, one knee curved over the arm, looking rakish and dangerous and as sexy as hell.
He’d just magically moved them into another room. “Can you warn me before you do that?” she asked.
“If you wish,” he replied.
“I do.”
She nearly jumped out of her s
kin when something furry brushed against her leg. She looked down and saw nothing, then spun in her search for the animal or large, hairy insect that had caused the sensation.
“What was that?”
Damon laughed heartily. Clearly, he was feeling better.
“Show yourself, beast.”
In a puff of black smoke, a cat as diaphanous as the fog appeared.
“Is this yours?” she asked.
Damon sneered. “I abhor the creature, but he has been my only companion all these centuries. He belonged to Rogan.”
Alexa knelt down and attempted to assess the cat on an equal level. She hadn’t owned a cat since she was in college, but liked the animals nonetheless—even scary ghost cats with long black hair and ominous yellow eyes.
“What’s its name?”
“Dante,” he replied.
“Like the guy who descended into hell?”
“The beast lived with Rogan,” he answered. “The name is highly appropriate.”
From experience, Alexa knew not to reach for the cat if she wanted its attention. Cats liked best the people who worshipped them least. Which is why she wasn’t surprised when the feline disappeared and then reappeared in Damon’s lap.
“He likes you,” she said, amused by Damon’s putout expression. Still, he gave the cat a scratch behind the ears.
“He is only used to me, as I am to him.”
“Is he dead?”
Damon shrugged. “I cannot be sure about the cat any more than I am about myself.”
He shifted in his seat, but the cat did not scamper off or, more likely in its case, burst into a puff of smoke. Odd how she was becoming accustomed to the wild world she’d discovered inside these castle walls. As time passed, she was feeling more and more like Alice after she’d fallen down the rabbit hole. Alexa walked the perimeter of the room, noting the fine furnishings, such as handblown glass and fascinating statues molded in striking bronze and untarnished silver. Where silk didn’t festoon the walls, bold tapestries did, providing a richness of color and texture that nearly stole her breath. Even the cloak draped across the back of Damon’s chair flowed with rich opulence.
Ideas took form in a swirl. How she’d decorate the presidential suite. What flowers she wanted in the lobby. How she’d present even the smallest guest room with the finest touches of history and wealth.
“You bear no scars,” he said, his voice intimate.
She looked up, surprised. For an instant, she’d forgotten she wasn’t alone.
“Excuse me?”
“You spoke of an accident. In a…car? You bear no scars.”
She scoffed. “You weren’t looking in the right places.”
“I looked everywhere,” he insisted, his voice dipping into naughty territory.
She took a deep breath. She couldn’t go there with him again. She’d had her fantasy and it had been amazing. But she was too confused and conflicted to surrender to such intimacy again. She was stuck here for the night, at the very least. She had to make conversation, but making love was out of the question.
“I had excellent plastic surgeons,” she replied.
His brow furrowed. “Surgeons, I understand. But what is plastic?”
She had to think. How could she explain something that was so elemental to her, yet so foreign to him? “A synthetic material. Man-made. Like rubber,” she offered, guessing that the natural material was available to some degree during his time period, “but harder.”
“They attached this to you to cover scars?”
She laughed, shaking her head as she joined him near the chair, then reached to give the cat, who’d curled up comfortably in his lap, a gentle stroke. She didn’t really understand the instant rapport she shared with this mysterious man from the past, but she was too tired and emotionally spent to fight her instincts. In the morning, she’d likely wake up and discover the whole interaction was nothing more than a dream. Or a very stupid mistake. For tonight, she had to wing it.
“No,” she said. “Plastic surgeons specialize in removing outward signs—scars and such—after major injuries. And they do the occasional boob job.”
He arched a brow. “Do I want to know what that is?”
She swallowed a snort. “If you stick around in this century, you’ll find out soon enough.”
“My plans do not include returning to my own time,” he said, and after looking around, he added, “Or to my banishment in this infernal room.”
“I think the room is rich and warm.”
“Try remaining here for nearly three centuries.”
“I get your point.”
With a push, he moved the cat off his lap. It hit the ground on all four paws, then poofed into nothingness.
“That’s very unnerving,” she said.
“Everything about the animal is. Rogan loved the beast, so I advise you not to trust it.”
“Can you trust a cat? I mean, like, ever?”
He chuckled, stood and offered her the chair.
She was tempted. Her shoulders ached. Her legs throbbed. She glanced at her watch and discovered that her nine-thousand-dollar Franck Muller had stopped working. She had no idea how long she’d been here, trapped in the castle or perhaps even in this dream, but the experience had drained the last of her energy. She dropped to the ground, and sitting, as her nanny used to say, “crisscross, applesauce,” she stared up at Damon, who looked entirely shocked by her collapse.
“Please, my lady,” he said, extending his hand.
“Sit down,” she said, crossing her arms.
“I will not allow you to sit on the floor.”
“See, that’s the best part of the twenty-first century. You don’t get to allow me to do anything. I make my own choices. And I’m tired. And right this second, I’m comfortable, so I’m not moving.” He scowled, so she added, “But I thank you for your concern over my comfort. Sometimes, it just feels right to sit on the floor.”
After a moment of deep consideration, Damon plopped down beside her and, after examining her position, twisted his limbs until he was sitting in the same fashion. “I do believe I was much younger the last time I attempted this.”
Alexa tried not to laugh. “I’ll see to it that my next Crown Chandler property offers daily yoga. You’ll enjoy it.”
He shook his head. “There are so many words you speak that I do not understand. Plastic. Yoga. Car. That’s how you knew how to heal my shoulder. The accident in the…car?”
Alexa yawned. “It’s a mode of transportation. A horseless carriage.”
Damon’s brow arched. “This I’d like to see.”
She shook her head. “Not on this island. We’ll probably use golf carts.”
His face reflected his additional questions, but he remained silent.
Alexa grinned and patted him on the knee. “Okay, Damon Forsyth, I get the hint. You’ve got a lot of history to catch up on. Got anything better to do tonight?”
His grin bordered on sinful as his eyes darkened sensually. “That is entirely up to you, my lady.”
She slapped his knee again, this time harder and with obvious denial.
“Then why don’t you magic us up some coffee. It’s time for a history lesson, and two hundred and sixty years’ worth will clearly take us the rest of the night.”
Nine
“This ruler of yours, also George, you’re sure he’s not the king?”
Alexa instantly burst into laughter, leaving Damon to wonder what he’d said that was so amusing. He was merely making an assessment based on the facts she’d provided. Over the course of the night, he’d done precisely as she’d asked, conjuring a collection of cushions on the floor for them to lie upon while they imbibed pot after pot of brewed coffee, a drink he’d learned to appreciate during his travels to Italy. As they drank, he listened while she ran down the basics of technological and political advancement over the past three centuries. Her knowledge of the British, outside their failed battle to squelch the revolution
of the colonists, was less than comprehensive, and yet she was laughing at him? He failed to see the reason for her amusement.
She noticed his displeasure and quickly rebounded. “I’m sorry, Damon. Honestly, you’re not the first person to ask that question and you likely won’t be the last. But unlike in a monarchy, we have—”
“Elections. Yes, I understand your two-party system and the basics of a representative democracy. Thank you. Perhaps we should take a break from any further explanation of politics,” he said, sliding his empty china cup away from where he’d reclined on the carpet surrounded by thick, tasseled pillows. The setting he’d conjured using Rogan’s magic was much more conducive to seduction than instruction, but so far, none of his attempts to sway Alexis to forget her history lesson in lieu of more pleasurable pursuits had worked. He was either losing his touch, or exhaustion and the medication she kept forcing him to swallow at the slightest twinge of pain was playing on his skills.
“Shall we go over the principles of capitalism again?” she asked, earnest.
It was his turn to laugh. “I was hoping for some relaxation, but now I’m leaning toward rest. Once I was freed from the portrait, I did not ever think I’d want to sleep again.” He yawned noisily. “I was wrong.”
“Am I that boring?” she asked, unsuccessfully attempting to cover her own exhaustion.
“Boring?” he asked, surprised. For a woman who claimed to be nothing more than a hotelier, she’d done a fine job explaining what might have taken him weeks to learn on his own. And she was much more delightful to look at and listen to than any of the scholars he’d studied with in his youth. “Not likely, my lady. But I must say that for all the learned tutors my father employed over the course of my boyhood, none tried to cram my brain with so much information in such a short time.”
She curled a pillow underneath her breasts, forcing Damon to look away or risk molesting her despite her protestations. Two buttons kept her blouse from breaking open. Two measly buttons.
Before, he’d found her merely beautiful and alluring and powerful. Now that he’d discovered how her intelligence not only matched, but surpassed her beauty, he couldn’t imagine resisting her, no matter the cost.
