Bad Boys of the Night: Eight Sizzling Paranormal Romances: Paranormal Romance Boxed Set

by Jennifer Ashley

  “Aiken put up what I was short.”

  He said the last as he headed for the stairs. We followed him up to a long hallway with doors opening along the side walls. There were rooms in all, and inside each was a made bed with a mattress and a small table. The whole place smelled clean and unused.

  Sawyer grinned, exchanging glances with all of us. “Looks like we’re done sleeping on the ground,” he said.

  “You mean, we gets to sleep in here?” Chick exclaimed.

  “Hell yes,” he said.

  Chick squealed with excitement. “Can we pick which we want? Cuz me’n Athena we want here, if that awright?” she said, pointing to two doors across from each other without consulting Athena first. Sawyer shrugged. Taking that as a yes, Chick skipped in and flopped on her bed. She let out a shout of pure joy. “Soft as a cloud,” she said.

  Meaira pushed through to the next room and spread out on the mattress. Laughing, Honey did the same. Athena approached the door Chick had claimed for her with hesitant steps, as if she expected to be stopped. She looked back, and Sawyer gave her a small nod. She eased her bulk onto the bed and broke into a smile that lit the room.

  “This here nice, Captain.”

  Sawyer turned and started down the hall. “Which one do you want?” he asked, looking at me as he reached my side.

  I know my face turned an awful shade of red. I nodded at the next open door and walked stiffly to it. Sawyer came and leaned against the doorframe, watching me with wolf eyes as I stopped beside the bed.

  “Aren’t you going to try it?” he asked.

  My face grew hotter as I sat down on the edge. The mattress was soft and feather filled. Not hay, not ticking. I smiled and leaned back, more aware of the eyes watching me than the comfort welcoming my body. I turned my head to look at him and our eyes locked for a minute. That look made me glad I was lying down. He made me feel boneless and warmed to the soul.

  He pushed away from the door, and I thought he would step in. Instead, he gave me a knowing smile and walked away. I put my hands over my hot face and tried to slow my heart down, but all I could think of was that look and the promise it held.

  It didn’t take long for us to unpack the few possessions we’d carried in the wagon. I had nothing but my daddy’s gun and hunting knife, both of which Sawyer returned to me. As soon as we’d carried the last item inside, there was a knock on the door.

  “We’re closed,” Sawyer called out without bothering to answer it. We heard the knocker hesitate and then walk away. A few minutes later another knock came. “Still closed,” Sawyer said. And so it went until after dark when the last of them decided that Sawyer meant it and really wasn’t going to open the door that night. I think he would have if there had been any liquor to serve, but the bar was bare. It was hard to believe it had never opened its doors and served a drink before. The men of the town took their thirst and presumably quenched it at Hank’s.

  We could hear their hell-raising drifting down the street to the other end from where we were. We’d noticed from our bird’s-eye view that the tents and makeshift houses sprawled away from the saloon, so we were somewhat isolated on our plateau at the end of the street.

  Later, after Athena had made us something to eat and the dishes were done, we girls were upstairs laughing and enjoying our new rooms. Sawyer came to find us.

  “I’m going down to the springs,” he said to all of us and none of us at once.

  “Where are they?” I asked, standing in my doorway.

  He walked into my room and pointed out the window. The other girls came in, too, and crowded around. The pools of water were dark in the early night, but the moon was bright and cast a glow on their surfaces.

  Chick asked what we were all thinking. “Can we come?”

  Sawyer’s nod elicited another round of squeals and giggles from us. We all seemed to be drunk on our good fortune to be staying beneath a solid roof, unmolested by the men at least for the night, and to lay our bodies on a real mattress when we went to sleep. It was beyond anything I thought I’d see again.

  Happily, we followed Sawyer downstairs and out the kitchen door to the back of the hotel. There were no tents here, no squatters in sight, and I was relieved by that.

  “Do you think this is all part of the Diablo’s grounds?” I asked.

  “It could be. Why else aren’t there any tents back here?”

  A wooden bridge had been built between the springs and the Diablo, making the short trek easy. As we approached, we could see the steam rising off the pools and smell the heavy sulfur that came with it. The planking continued in a sort of deck around the largest of the pools. If we sat on the edge, we could dangle our feet in the water.

  It seemed we all thought of it at once and immediately began taking off our shoes. Sawyer reached down and ran his fingers across the surface.

  “I’ll be damned,” he said. “It’s like a bath.”

  The word bath brought up all of our heads. Chick got her shoes off first and hiked her skirts up so she could put her feet in. “Ah, Lord, that good.”

  “I haven’t had a bath in ages,” Meaira said. “Not a real one.”

  She had that hazy look about her that I was beginning to understand went with the laudanum. She gave us all a dreamy smile, and then without hesitation, she stripped down bare and slid into the water.

  “Is it deep?” Chick asked. “I cain’t swim good. Athena, neither.”

  “No,” Meaira said, and she stood to show them.

  That was all the invitation the others needed. They shed their clothes as easily as they had their shoes and jumped in with Meaira. Sawyer watched with interest, I with jealousy. Their sighs of ecstasy filled me with longing. A bath. A hot bath ...

  “Ain’t you comin’?” Chick asked, splashing merrily. Her golden-brown body gleamed beneath the murky surface.

  Sawyer sat down beside me and took off his boots and socks. As I watched, he stripped his shirt and his pants. His eyes were on me when he reached for his undergarment. Blushing in the dark, I looked away until I heard him splash into the water. I watched with envy as the women frolicked around Sawyer and each other like sleek seals, wet skin against wet skin until at last my jealousy wouldn’t be ignored.

  I unbuttoned my blouse and pulled it from the waist of my skirt. I pretended that the dark concealed me, but I knew my skin glowed like pearl in the moonlight. I quickly removed my shirt and my skirt. Dressed only in my chemise, I looked up to find Sawyer watching me from the black waters.

  He didn’t look away when I caught him, didn’t pretend to stare at anything but me. I stood for a moment, knowing I couldn’t pull that last garment off with him watching me, but I had no other clothes and I would need these to be dry when I came out. At last, I turned my back and stripped the chemise to the ground. For an instant, I stood naked, wrought with feelings and sensations I’d never known. My breath was coming in shallow gasps that at once hurt and excited me. Before I thought better of it, I turned and ran into the water. The look Sawyer gave me as I skimmed the surface rivaled the steam in its heat.

  The girls gathered around me, their skin as slick as the damp heat soaking into my body. They had no modesty, no shame in their nudity, and they frolicked like children. Honey swam beneath the surface and, in a flash, Sawyer went under. He came up laughing, sputtering, and launched himself at Honey. The girls screamed with glee and splashed away but the game was on, and before I knew it, I was playing, too. Our laughter echoed off the thick bank of clouds and seemed as foreign as the hot pool of water in the midst of the desert. We shushed one another in case our voices carried to the tents and men in town, but it felt good to laugh. It felt so very good.

  Then Sawyer was there in front of me, low in the water so only his head and shoulders appeared from the surface. I watched him move closer, our eyes level with each other. Our breath joined the rising mist and created a cocoon around us. I was never so aware of my nakedness, of his. He swam closer still, watching me wit
h his unusual eyes, only they seemed darker, like a reflection of the opaque surface of the water. The voices of the others seemed to fade in the mist, and it was only me and Sawyer, the shining moon, and a million stars. A light beard covered his cheeks, glinting gold and red in the moonlight. His hair was wet and slicked back from his face, his skin browned by the sun. He was a man who took his shirt off when he worked. My father would have been scandalized by that, but my father was not a survivor.

  I caught my bottom lip with my teeth, and Sawyer stared at it like it was the most interesting thing he’d ever seen. His hand came out of the water, and he drifted closer to me. His fingers, warm and rough and wet, slid over my jaw, and his thumb rubbed up against my mouth.

  A small sound escaped my lips, a sound I’d never known myself to produce. It was a sound of satisfaction, a sound of need. I’d wanted him to touch me. I wanted more.

  As if I’d voiced it all in that one sound, Sawyer moved closer still, until his bare chest touched mine. His skin felt like hot silk. My hands found their way to his shoulders without my being aware I’d made the decision to touch him back. His went to my waist, and in the same movement, he kissed me. His lips were soft and the kiss questioning.

  I should have pushed him away, I knew he was not a man to trifle with, but my lips softened beneath his and anything tentative about the kiss vanished. His arms tightened around me, pulling me to the hard muscles of his chest. My legs slipped between his as he held me off the soft bottom of the spring. There was no mistaking the other hardness that pressed against my stomach. But the feel of him sent signals to every part of me, making me want to wrap my legs around his hips and hold on tight.

  My own wanton thoughts terrified me and brought me to reason with a rush. I pushed away and swam to the side as fast as I could. I scrambled awkwardly onto the platform and grabbed my clothes, pulling the chemise I’d hoped to keep dry on over my wet body as swiftly as possible.

  My skin was hot now, and the damp chill felt good. I was breathing heavily. I tried not to, but I couldn’t seem to stop taking a look back. Sawyer had swum to the other side of the pool. I couldn’t see his face through the thick steam, but I could feel his eyes watching me. Enticing me. And truth be told, I wanted to return to him. I wanted to touch him. I wanted to feel him and let him show me the mysteries between a man and a woman.

  “You done, Ella?” Chick asked.

  “I’m overheated. I think I’ll go back.”

  I heard Sawyer’s laughter follow me as I fled inside.

  CHAPTER 22

  Reilly sat on the porch, watching the rain sluice from the sky and the rivers in the streets become lakes. The water table in the desert couldn’t absorb so much in so little time; the earth was too hard, too much like stone. Through the gray shroud, he could see the decaying bridge, railing, and platforms that surrounded the springs. There, the rain guttered down into underground canyons, but it wouldn’t be long until those, too, filled and the pools would once again flow with water. It was too much like the resurrection of something long dead for it not to be disturbing.

  The Diablo was up on a rise, but even here the water would soon reach its floorboards. It was as if God had a mission to wipe out the entire town.

  If only.

  He leaned his head back, tossing his notebook on the bench beside him. He’d been writing nonstop for two hours. Not since he’d penned his first novel had a story come so fast. And the words weren’t a draft—disjointed thoughts or sketches—they were pages. Handwritten pages that could be lifted and typeset. His method might be old-school, but the story was edgy and writing it was cathartic. It was about Matt, or a version of him that never had the chance to live.

  Behind him the door opened, and Gracie stepped out with one of the horse-dogs right behind her. He hadn’t seen her since she’d been curled against him, naked, sated, and sleepy.

  Wariness filled him as he watched her approach. She looked tired, pale, and every bit as wary as he, but her chin was up, her back straight. Nothing weak about Gracie Beck. And despite everything that weighed on his mind, despite the nagging anxiety that Chloe’s revelations had left him with, once again the minute she walked in, he wanted to touch her. He wanted to smooth the worry from her brow, let his hands trail down, over the softness and the curves. He wanted to taste the dark mystery of her mouth. He wanted to put himself out there and see what happened.

  God help him.

  “Hey,” he said in a low voice.

  “Hey,” she said back.

  They stared at each other for a moment while Reilly debated the wisdom of asking her why she’d left his bed. Why she’d come to it in the first place.

  Deciding on a safer topic, he stood and moved to her side. “Where you been?”

  “Upstairs, packing my grandma’s things. Talking to Michael.”

  “Michael?”

  “The priest.”

  Reilly frowned. “Why?”

  “He thought he could help me make sense of what happened.”

  “Did he?”

  She caught her lip and shook her head. “I don’t know. I didn’t understand half of what he said.”

  Reilly cocked his head. “But?”

  “Well, he knew a lot of names of people in my family—some I didn’t even know.” She shrugged. “Maybe he was making them up. But he talked about the curse.”

  The curse. Reilly shook his head.

  “Chloe and I had an interesting conversation about curses, as well.”

  “Why am I not surprised.”

  “Go figure.”

  Their gazes snagged again for a hot moment that he felt deep beneath the skin.

  “I found some scotch,” he said. “Wanna get drunk with me?”

  “Is it making you feel better?”

  “You make me feel better.”

  He froze. He hadn’t meant to say that, but she gave him a beatific smile that made him glad he had. It was true; he did feel better.

  She moved to the small wrought-iron table he’d been sitting next to and took a sip of his scotch. Her lips against his glass made his muscles tighten. He wanted to taste her lips.

  “Writing?” she asked, glancing at his notebook.

  He nodded, coming closer.

  “Is that really why you’re here?”

  He shook his head. “You know it’s not.”

  She bit her lip, but he could see she believed him.

  “What else did Michael tell you?” he asked instead of kissing her, like he wanted to.

  “He said my grandfather’s name was Jimmy.”

  “That’s better than Horatio.”

  Her smile pleased him more than it should have.

  “I never knew. Grandma Beck never talked about him, and every time I brought him up it made her cry. Michael also talked about another man. Someone with a weird name.”

  “Aiken?”

  Surprised, she asked, “How did you know?”

  “Chloe.”

  She gave him an of course look.

  “What did he say about Aiken?”

  “That he didn’t stay dead and he’s looking for something in the Dead Lights.”

  Reilly’s gaze shifted to the ruins. “Chloe’s version was about the same. She said she came here once, to tell Carolina she was in danger.”

  Gracie nodded. “She warned her about a man and a curse.”

  “I feel like I’m in a Hitchcock movie.”

  “I keep wanting to laugh, but Michael was pretty convincing, and God knows I heard enough about curses from Grandma. I know I’m freaking myself out. I keep feeling like someone’s watching me.”

  “Sorry. I’ll try to be more subtle.”

  She did laugh at that.

  And Reilly found himself grinning like an idiot. He wiped the smile away and cleared his throat. “What else did Michael say?”

  “Nothing. Jonathan interrupted us.”

  “That guy makes me want to hit things.”

  “Why?”

&n
bsp; “There’s something off about him.”

  “Compared to all the other normal people here?”

  Point taken. “How’s Analise?”

  “Finally awake. She and Brendan crashed as soon as we got back. I heard them talking before I came down, but they haven’t come out of her room yet.”

  Her frown puckered the skin between her eyes, and she shook her head.

  “Tell me about this Brendan.”

  Who knocked up our daughter ...

  “He’s nice enough. He’s been on his own since he was fifteen, though. Rough life.” She sighed. “And he’s devoted to Analise.”

  “But you don’t like him?” Reilly said.

  “It’s not that. He’s just changed the course of her life so radically—how can I not resent him for that? Analise had her hands filled with opportunities and now ... now she’s going to have her hands filled with diapers and baby bottles. She’s not even out of high school, Reilly.”

  He looked at her, not sure if this was the place to butt in or butt out. “Your circumstances were a hell of a lot worse at her age and you still turned out pretty good.”

  “Appearances can be deceiving.”

  “At least she’ll have you.”

  And me if you’ll allow it.

  The thought came from nowhere and nearly choked him with surprise. Did he mean it? Did he want that?

  She gave him a curious look, like maybe she’d heard his thoughts. She’d always been able to do that, from that very first time they were alone in the library when she’d calmly asked if he was going to think about her forever or just get it over with and ask her out.

  “So are we going to talk about it?” he said, shocking the hell out of himself.

  Evidently, out of her, too.

  “You didn’t used to be so direct.”

  “I didn’t used to be a lot of things. Did it mean anything or were you just blowing off steam?”

  A flush crept up her face. “Both, maybe. I wanted to prove something.”

  “That you were right to move on?”