"I'm good. Let's do this."
Mason reluctantly extracted his hands from this partners’ grasp and put his fingers hand on the planchette. Ruby lifted them off gently. “First we call the spirit to us. Then we see if he'll talk to us."
Frowning, Mason dropped his hands on table and glanced around the room again.
Ruby settled herself more comfortably in her seat and looked from Eli to Mason and back again. “Let's all take a deep breath and relax. Try to clear your thoughts and open your minds.” She took a deep, noisy breath, held it, then slowly exhaled, nodding at both men to follow her example.
Eli wore an expression of amused cooperation, but he neither rolled his eyes nor did he sigh in exasperation as Mason expected him to. When he caught Mason staring at him, watching his shirt pull tight across his broad chest as it expanded with each deep breath, Eli gave Mason a sultry little smile and a seductive wink that brought a flush of heat to Mason's neck and face.
Mason's gaze rested on Eli's strong, confident face. His fear retreated for a moment, crowded out by Eli's beauty and Mason's memories of their time together in bed. Eli was thoughtful., experienced, patient. Mason could still feel Eli's muscles rippling against his body, his strong hands roving over Mason, his beautiful eyes crinkled by the laugh that both soothed and unnerved Mason. A little of the tension eased from Mason's shoulders and his next deep breath felt less constricted—even if his jeans were suddenly tighter and he had to shift his legs to make room for his growing erection. He dropped his gaze, but it landed on Eli's folded hands. Mason's thoughts wandered just a bit, as he noticed not for the first time that Eli had nice hands, strong, tanned, experienced hands just the way Mason liked them. Eli was his anchor in that moment and would be his anchor through the séance—far past the séance, too.
Ruby rapped on the table to get their attention. “Focus, guys.” Eli flashed Mason a passionate glance and Ruby tersely added, “On the ghost, not on each other."
Closing his eyes to resist temptation, Mason took several deep breaths and tried to clear his mind as Ruby had instructed. But the face in the mirror, the same face that had hovered over him in bed, kept forming in his mind. It unnerved him and at the same time offered a strange hope, a hope that perhaps the ghost was near and would become visible to both Eli and Ruby.
Mason raised a hand to push nervously at the bridge of his glasses before he remembered he was wearing his contacts—but only because he'd asked Eli to get them from his room. He'd flatly refused to go back there for any reason.
With a sigh, he turned his attention back to the board. He needed to concentrate but since his had libido reawakened, it was harder and harder to think of anything but Eli.
"Can you get the light, Eli? I'm going to light the candles.” Eli moved away and Mason's eyes followed him to the lamp. A touch of panic hit him when the room went dark save for the sputtering flame from three tiny wicks. Shadows leapt out at him, then huddled close like a blanket of blackest velvet.
"We do this by just candle light?” Mason's panic receded slightly when Eli regained the seat next to him.
"Of course. The candles channel the energy in the room, to guide a spirit to our midst.” Speaking calmly in a hushed version of her normally cheerful voice, Ruby had lit all three candles and placed one about a foot in front of each of them. “Give them a moment to focus their power."
The flickering light cast ghastly, pale shadows on their surroundings and made the contours of their facial features appear hollow and gaunt. All the sounds in the small room seemed magnified and hushed at the same time to Mason. The tick of the clock on the mantle dominated the room, but the usually crisp click was muted as if a pillow had been placed over it. The crickets and the peepers had begun their song outside in moonlight-drenched dark, but the singsong tune was muffled behind the thick velvet drapes. The walls seemed closer than they'd been when the three of them had sat down only a minute ago.
Mason's pulse began to accelerated as Ruby continued her preparations, and a cold hand touched his neck. “I don't think we need the candles, Ruby."
"Concentrate on breathing deep and emptying your mind.” Ruby had closed her eyes. Her hands were spread across Jeb's book and her face was smooth and relaxed, voice more hushed, almost a whisper. “I'm trying to reach out to the spirit world."
"I don't think we need to anymore.” Mason knew his voice had a tremor in it, but he couldn't help it. The room had turned cooler, darker, quieter. Even the peepers outside had stopped their song. Mason shivered.
"Are you all right, Mace?” Eli opened his eyes when Mason's voice cracked. He instantly reached across the small table and gripped Mason's forearm.
"Not really. I think the spirit world is reaching out to us. He's here.” Mason pointed at the Ouija board with a trembling finger.
"Christ!” Eli's grip was going to leave behind bruises, but Mason didn't mind. It was reassuring and it kept him from running out of the room like a scared little boy.
"Oh, my God! Eugene Storm! It's true.” Ruby gasped. Her fingers had wrapped tightly around the edge of the book until her knuckles paled, but now she shoved it further out into the table's center, away from her, as if it had been on fire.
Hovering over the dime-store Ouija board was a white wisp. The strand of mist churned in the air, growing larger and denser as they watched. While Mason, Eli and Ruby withdrew their hands in astonishment and horror, the little planchette quivered and then slowly glided from one letter to the next, spending only a few seconds on each. The felt pads whispered on the board as the planchette traveled, but the sound seemed like a ghostly wail to Mason.
"Oh, God. I hope someone has a better memory than I do!” Ruby squinted to read the letters as the little saucer slid to the other end of the board. “M-O...."
Eli called out the letter closest to his end of the table. “V-E-M-Y-B...."
"O-N-E-S.” Mason found his voice, calling out the letter in a harsh whisper.
"M-O-V-E-M-Y-B-O-N-E-S.” He frowned and tried to make words from it. “Movem by ones? No, wait. That's wrong."
"Movemy b ones?"
"Uh-uh, guys. Try move my bones."
The saucer rested on the S, unmoving and silent. The mist tumbled and swirled over the board, gathering form as it became denser. While Mason stared into its depths, the outline of a human face with rough, unfinished features slowly formed before him. Even though he could see the face, Mason could also see through it, like a misty overlay on a photo layout. The ghost shifted and suddenly it lay perfectly over Eli's handsome frown. Mason swallowed hard and fervently hoped the visual wouldn't haunt him. Then the candles flickered and extinguished themselves, pitching the room into total darkness.
"Sit still. I'll get the lights."
Mason felt and heard a bump, then a scratch cast a tiny circle of gold light in the darkness when a match flared. Ruby had re-lit the three candles by the time Eli found his way to the lamp. Now the room was ablaze with soft electric sunlight that pulled the shadows from their corners and tossed them out into the night.
Crouching down beside Mason's chair, Eli ran both hands up Mason's arms, rubbing and warming the limbs as they shivered and quaked under his touch. “That's what chased you out of your room?"
All Mason could manage was a jerky nod. He tried twice to speak before he was able to sputter the words. “MOVE MY BONES! He's not in a cemetery?” Mason stared accusingly at Eli but didn't pull away from his comforting touch. “He isn't in the basement or anything, is he?"
"Of course not.” Eli scoffed. “Eugene Storm was buried in the graveyard in town. I remember going to his funeral as a kid."
"Guys,” Ruby's voice was full of amazement and the smug excitement of discovery. The men turned to look at her. She was staring at the last pages in the book Mason had given her. “I don't think it's Eugene we were talking to."
"What?” Mason had been completely convinced that it was Eugene who was haunting his room. It didn't make sense that it m
ight be anyone but Eugene.
"Who else could it be?” Eli's question seemed to confirm that he'd come around to believing Mason whole-heartedly.
"Look at this.” Holding the book up, Ruby flipped a few pages back and forth, showing them several paragraphs of a handwritten entry. “It's written on the blank pages in the back of this book.” Mason and Eli took in the handwritten lines. Ruby read a few lines to herself.
"Jeb Dahl,” she whispered.
"What?” Eli still hadn't let go of Mason, and still crouched beside him. Mason's teeth chattered lightly when he tried to take a deep breath.
"Listen to this.” She ran a finger down the page, squinting in the dim light.
"It's with a heavy heart I write this, but I can no longer bear the burden of this horrible knowledge alone.
Decades ago, I cast the ashes of my wife off Mourning Cliff. It seemed fitting she should be free to travel the ocean and the winds to find the happiness I couldn't give her in life. It was one less weight that my soul had to carry.
But the greater burden remains, even after all these years, like a festering wound, consuming me from within. I only hope confessing the crimes for which I am responsible will allow my family to understand that they were done in the name of love: Love for my faithful and loving wife May and love for her dear brother Jeb. I hope my words help their spirits rest in peace. May is gone and my beloved Jeb is dead these many years as well.
Dead and gone from life by his own sister's hand.
On the fifteenth of October, 1925, May to discovered Jeb and me in a passionate, unquestionably compromising state in the wine cellar. Enraged and possibly temporarily unbalanced by the shock, May took up an iron pinning rod from a wine rack and struck her brother down. The blow to Jeb's head was instantly fatal. I escaped her ire only because the magnitude of her actions registered instantly on her, in the way that Jeb crumpled to the floor and in the blood-splattered walls. The only color on her face and hands was Jeb's own blood, and for the next week she never stopped washing them. A week to the hour after she killed the brother than she so loved, May leapt from Mourning Cliff. Unable to wash the bloodstains from the cellar walls, and unable to bear standing there a moment longer, I sealed the room to prevent discovery of May's shame and mine.
Under cover of night, I buried my beloved Jeb at the top of Mourning Cliff, his grave marked by the white shore stone and my well-worn footsteps on the dirt. I go to him regularly and we pass the time together in spirit.
May never recovered from that night, and it is a sad lament to say she is undoubtedly happier on the winds and sea then she was as my wife. As for Jeb, my heart has always been with him. He was my sole desire in life, and in death he will be my soul's only desire for all time.
Eugene Storm
October 15, 1964
"Jeb Dahl. The ghost must be Jeb, not Eugene. All of them. They all died for love, even Eugene. Oh, my, Eli. I'm so sorry.” Reaching out, Ruby laid a comforting hand on Eli's arm.
Eli stood and, distracted, ran a hand over his face. “I barely remember my great-grandfather. He's been a ghost to me most of my life.” He paused, and stared away for a moment, as if hearing something distant or trying to recall a memory. “Talk about seeing a ghost only started after the fire revealed the wine cellar he'd sealed up. Oh, my God. Jeb was trapped in that room where he died for almost forty years until the fire freed him. He's buried up on the cliff, but he was killed in that sealed-up room. He started trying to communicate with people right after his spirit got set free."
Giving Ruby a frown, he sighed and fell silent.
"The fire released him from a kind of prison, Eli. It was kind of a good thing it happened.” Mason touched Eli's hand, squeezing it only once, but firmly. “Have others seen him like I did? Did he visit them in his room?"
Eli shrugged but his fingers wrapped around Mason's hand and held on. “Other people have just mentioned a coldness in the room from time to time or a feeling like they were being watched, but you're the first one he could touch. Maybe it's because you're both artists and more open.” Eli jerked his head to one side in a short, tight shudder. “I've never felt anything before like what just happened here."
"Thanks for being here with me.” Mason pressed his hand to Eli's until the man looked up at him, then he winked. The small gesture drew a tight smile to Eli's lips and both of them relaxed slightly. Suddenly Mason didn't feel so alone anymore.
Ruby closed the book and gently handed it to Eli. “I think Jeb's ghost is calling to Mason to find his body so it can be buried properly, near the one he truly loved."
Eli accepted the volume, thoughtfully running his hand over the mahogany colored bindings. A family heirloom, taken for granted for another forty years after Eugene had died. One that recorded a new piece of the puzzle that was part of his family's traumatic history.
"I think you're right, Ruby. So let's see to it that he gets a proper final resting place. Eighty-plus years is too long to wait for your lover.” Eli winked at Mason through a sad, intimate smile. He stood, pulling Mason along with him and out of the dark, cold, and silent room.
* * * *
Eli notified the authorities. The bones buried on Mourning Cliff, wrapped in canvas and rope, were uncovered under the outcropping of relocated white rock and decades of layered soil.
Personal items found in the body's tattered remaining clothing confirmed that the bones belonged to Jeb Dahl—as if Eli, Mason or Ruby had had any doubt of it. Eli oversaw Jeb's re-burial, laying him to rest in the local cemetery beside Eugene Storm. Eugene had been alone all these years. Eugene's confession was accurate. What had been left of May's crushed and broken body had been retrieved from the base of Mourning Cliff and been cremated, her ashes scattered from Mourning Cliff, only feet from her brother's unacknowledged grave.
As sad as it was, Mason couldn't help thinking that May was the only person to have ever gone over Mourning Cliff twice. Finding humor in the situation lightened some of his lingering unease. He hoped that relocating Jeb's bones had put the anguished spirit to rest and that it had stopped haunting Jeb's old room. He hadn't seen it since the night of the séance, but, to be honest, he wasn't sleeping in Jeb's old room anymore. It had been the best three weeks of vacation he'd ever had. He didn't want it to end. Ever.
But, he needed to know how Eli felt about ... well ... forever.
Mason rolled over in bed and watched as Eli removed his clothing, marveling at the man's graceful movements and rippling, trim body. Keeping the inn in shape had certainly kept the innkeeper in shape as well.
He felt his erection spring to life and his skin flush at the mere thought of what that body did to him. His gaze moved up to Eli's face, pulled there by the man's sudden stillness. When his glance met Eli's dark eyes, Mason's heart pounded under his ribs cage and his stomach fluttered at the intense stare of loving desire that marked Eli's expression.
Mason's cock jumped and his ass clenched in anticipation and wanting. Making love with Eli was good—very, very good. The brawny man was tender and rough, considerate and demanding, just when Mason needed him to be all those things. His strong hands and powerful arms caressed, held and manhandled Mason in the best of ways. His fat cock, too, was tender and rough, considerate and demanding just when Mason needed it to be all those things.
Naked and confident, Eli strode toward the bed, gaze pinned to Mason's face, the fire in his eyes leaping higher as he closed the distance.
Mason kicked off the covers and let the man's stare travel down his own equally naked form. He watched Eli smile and raise an eyebrow at the sight of Mason straining, ready cock. He slipped onto the mattress and instantly pulled Mason to him in a passion-fueled embrace.
Long seconds passed as they stared into each other's eyes, love and need dancing in both their faces. A small gasp rolled off Mason's lips and Eli's willing mouth captured it.
Black spots danced before Mason's eyes. He felt the blood pounding through his veins, rising. Th
en, suddenly Eli released him, and he let slip a whimper of protest at the loss of contact.
Eli rolled over and pinned Josh to the mattress, pressing the length and weight of his entire body into Mason. Mason's breath came in small gasps, filling the space between them. Eli recaptured Mason's lips in a gentler, less demanding kiss, sliding one hand down to grip Mason's hip and one hand up to tangle loosely in his dark hair.
Eli gently parted Mason's legs, settled between them. Mason automatically pulled his knees up on either side of Eli's hips.
Mason's wrists were caught in a firm grip, his fingers grazing the headboard. Eli slid his hands down Mason's outstretched arms, teasing and caressing each inch of exposed flesh. Mason couldn't stop the moan that escaped his lips, and Eli returned to them with a lingering, deep kiss.
Mason shuddered, rocking his hips up to rub against Eli, forcing cock to cock, sliding hard dick against hard dick, making his own cock slick with pre-cum and eager for more friction. He eagerly reached again for Eli's mouth, exploring it with his tongue, tasting as if it were the first time. He didn't think he'd ever get enough of this strong, quiet, confident man.
Instinctively, a passionate, demanding rhythm began. Mason's hips rocked against the smooth, hard planes of Eli's lower abdomen, growing impatient for more. He ended the kiss, dipped his head down and lavished attention on first one of Eli's taut nipples and then the other until Eli forced his head up to kiss him again.
Those strong hands he loved so much pulled his legs open wider as Eli raised up on his knees. His hand trailed down Mason's chest and abdomen, stroking and touching, exploring and rubbing, forcing Mason's senses to concentrate on each touch and sizzling point of contact. His skin was flushed and he could feel the heat radiate from it, hot, but still no match for the blazing fire from Eli's fingertips.
Pulling his blurry gaze up to meet Eli's sultry expression, Mason's chest ached and his stomach flopped again, thrilled by the love and desire that were so easy to read in Eli's eyes.
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