Dead By Dusk (35 page)

The quake that struck the area was not nearly as bad as several that had devastated the region before.

Sadly, there was a death toll.

These were things Grant learned when he awakened, days later.

He woke feeling strange. Very strange. He'd been . . . out . . . for several days. But he awoke with a savage hunger, and a strange sense of power.

He awoke, in Stephanie's bed, at the resort.

And when he started to rise, he felt her at his side.

He stared at her a long moment. Her eyes were on his, more violet than ever. Her hair was like a cloak around her . . .

She was naked. And she smiled as he looked at her.

“Hello.”

“Hello.”

“How do you feel?”

“As if I could eat an entire cow.”

Her smile deepened. “But . . . what do you remember?” she asked him.

“Everything,” he told her solemnly. “And everything is vivid, except . . .”

“Except?”

“When we fell, when you were in my arms . . . there was a tremendous flash of . . . light. And you were with me, and it was as if we were floating, rising. Rising above all of it, and then . . . I felt the strangest stab of pain, and then . . .”

“And then?”

“I woke up.”

“I had the dream, too,” she said very softly.

“The same?”

“The light . . . the rising . . . floating, in clouds. I woke earlier than you.”

He nodded, looked around.

“Valeria—Reggie—is dead.”

“Sadly, yes. And Arturo, too. And François. Destroyed, forever.”

“Why do I feel this way?” he asked her. “We should have been in a hospital or something. And instead, I feel as if I could take on the whole world.”

“I'm not sure,” she said hesitantly.

“But you think you know.”

“Well, fate brought us here, you know.”

“Yes?”

“I think we were supposed to . . . be buried with the quake.”

“But we weren't?” he whispered.

She shook her head.

“Fate, as Lucien told me, can be changed.”

“And what does that mean?”

“François had a chance to rise again. So many more would have perished. But we triumphed.”

“I still don't understand what you're saying.”

“We have some friends who are . . . different,” she told him.

“Yes?”

“Could we be different now, too?”

He stared at her hard. “Jesu!” he breathed.

“There is good and evil in all existence!” she told him.

“You don't mean—”

She shook her head, rising.

As always, she was the most beautiful creature in the world to him. She might have been descended from the sorceress, and God knew, apparently, she even had some of her power. But she had used that power for good.

Her hair was a cascade of dark silk down her back. Her eyes . . . held just the slightest glistening.

And she moved toward him. She crawled atop him, straddling him.

He felt a rise like nothing he had ever known before. His muscles tensed, his being quickened.

She leaned against him. “Are you very, very hungry?” she whispered.

He nodded. “Starving.”

She sighed, lowering her head. He reached out, lifting her chin. He drew her to him then, finding her lips, savoring them, wondering how one could awaken from a near-grave, and feel such a desperate burst of sexual urgency.

It was Stephanie . . .

Always Stephanie.

Always had been Stephanie.

“Food can wait,” he told her huskily.

He kissed her again. And again. And then he rose against her, and rolled her to his side, and kissed every inch of her.

He reveled as he never had before in the scent and taste of her. She was lithe and sinuous, she moved like magic and liquid against him.

He needed her like air, like water . . .

More than either.

They made love. And he knew that he was fierce. And they made love again, and he knew that he was tender.

 

 

Later, they rose, showered, and dressed. And then walked to the cottage where they hoped to find Lucien and Jade.

Jade ushered them in, assuring him that Drew, Lena, and Suzette were all fine, and all—including Drew—thought that they'd just been part of the great quake that had struck the area.

Giovanni was dead, caught in the quake, but Merc and Franco had reported that they had forensic evidence that he'd been the killer, and so, despite the havoc, the region could rest in peace once again.

There was more, much more, of course. But . . . there was time now, too.

Lucien poured wine; Jade had made dinner in the cottage.

They sat down together, and at last, Stephanie said, “There's something . . . strange.”

“Oh?” Lucien said.

Grant cleared his throat. “Well, I was half dead. And I awoke feeling like . . . well, feeling like the greatest damned sexual tiger in the world. I was dying of thirst, starving . . . and I looked at Stephanie, and I . . . I wanted her more than anything.” He looked from Stephanie's huge and luminous eyes to Lucien. “Does that mean . . . ?”

Lucien smiled, glancing at his wife. “I think that means that you love her more than anything in the world. And you'd probably better ask her to marry you quickly. Before something else comes up.”

Grant arched a brow. “Is something else going to come up?”

Jade let out a sigh of exasperation. “Grant. You idiot! Didn't you listen? You're in love!”

He turned to Stephanie. “I'm in love. I need you more than water, food, air to breathe—even life. Will you marry me?”

And she smiled. “In a heartbeat,” she told him.

And he didn't care that others were there.

He kissed her.

That, he decided, was fate.

If you enjoyed
Dead by Dusk
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The Awakening
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Megan was screaming.

In the terrible reality that
was
happening, she heard her own voice.

In the darkness, she knew the sense of a spiraling fear that threatened to become overwhelming, to smother her. She had a sense of fatality, and she saw the shadowed figure, saw him entering the room. Adrenaline raced through her, desperation, the sense that she must move, must fight for survival.

The sound continued—it was all she heard and she screamed and screamed, knowing the deadly menace that had come to her. She knew, as well, that she had said something, done something, to precipitate what was happening. She knew each step as it occurred, the figure appearing, the fear, the terrible understanding of what was to come. She felt the violence as he came upon her, his touch upon her hair first, then her clothing, the blows against her as she resisted. The violation of her flesh, the hands around her throat . . .

Faceless, he was faceless, but she knew him, she had to know him.

Had to know his hands. Around her throat, then his hands, pressing her down, and she knew she was going to die. She wasn't sure how . . . would the hands so powerful against her flesh crush the life from her, or was this only to subdue her? Would there be a knife blade, a pressing against her throat, creating a rich spill of blood . . . ?

Whichever, it was coming, and she knew that it was coming, and she still couldn't see his face, only the darkness, and she was suddenly certain of a welling of sound, soft and low and underlying the chilling shrill of her screams, a sound of chanting, voices, many voices . . .

Whispers, laughter.

Eerie laughter, evil laughter . . .

She screamed louder, fought more wildly, desperate now not just to save her life, but to still the cackling sounds that seemed to enter her very soul, wrapping around it, crushing the life from it, as the hands upon her seemed to be doing with flesh.

She kicked, tried so hard to keep screaming, but she had no breath, no sound could come, no air could come . . .

Only the pulse, the thunder of her heart.

Fight, fight
. . . even as a darkness deeper than night fell before her eyes.
Kick, scratch, fight . . . claw at the hands . . .

The hands . . . that slipped as she dug her nails hard . . .

Screaming, still, the sound of screaming . . .

“Megan! Jesus, stop! Megan!”

Hands, again, on her shoulders, shaking her. She struck out, hard, desperately.

“Megan! Damn! Megan, wake up!”

She awoke, stunned, still hearing distant screams, but they were coming from her.

“Megan!”

Finn straddled over her then. His right hand was vised around her wrists; he was rubbing his jaw with his left. He stared down at her, his eyes as brilliant as twin knife blades, his face ashen.

“Megan! What the hell is the matter with you?”

Abruptly, her screaming stopped.

She was drawn from the incredible reality of the world she had entered in her sleep to the true reality of life. And in real life, she was in a quiet bed and breakfast in a quiet, historical town that only went a bit crazy during the month of October.

“Finn! Oh, my God, Finn!”

She tried to pull her arms free.

“Are you going to sock me in the jaw again?”

“I didn't!”

“You did.”

“I'm so sorry . . . please!”

He eased his hold. She reached up, curled her arms around his neck, shaking, nearly sobbing.

A dream. It had been nothing but a dream.

He didn't push her away, but his shoulders were as stiff as boards. When she drew back, the look in his narrowed green eyes was wary, distant, and accusing.

“Megan, Jesus Christ, what the hell was that all about?”

“I had the most awful nightmare.”

“A nightmare—and you had to scream like a thousand hounds were after you, here, now!”

He was interrupted by a hard banging on the door.

She bit her lower lip, wincing. Finn jumped up and reached for the terry bathrobe she had discarded before bed that lay upon the floor by their side.

He opened the door. From the darkness of the room, Megan could see the dimly lit hallway. Mr. Fallon, the groundskeeper and jack-of-all-trades at Huntington House, stood grimly in the doorway.

“What goes on here, Mr. Douglas?” he demanded sternly.

“I'm so sorry. It seems that Megan has had a nightmare,” Finn explained.

Mr. Fallon gave Finn an up-and-down glare that implied he didn't believe a word of it. In fact, it looked as if he were about to call the police, and see that Finn was charged with some form of domestic violence.

“Sounded like a bloody murder!” Fallon said.

Megan couldn't just hop up and explain herself. She was naked. She called out weakly from the bed. “I'm fine, Mr. Fallon, really. I just had a horrible nightmare. I'm so, so sorry!”

“Well, then, it's a good thing you're in this wing of the house,” Fallon said brusquely. “You'd be waking up the whole household, with such caterwaulin'! Do you have these nightmares often, young lady?”

“No, no . . . of course, not!” Megan called.

“As you can see,” Finn told Fallon irritably, “everything is perfectly all right in here.”

“Actually, young man, there's not all that much I can see—since it's so darned dark and all. But we don't take kindly to folks fighting around here—not in Huntington House. We're a fine establishment with a good reputation.”

“Of course,” Finn said.

“The Merrills have a reputation in these parts, too,” he said, referring to Megan's family.

She wasn't sure if the reputation her family had garnered was good or bad.

“I'm honestly sorry, Mr. Fallon. There were too many tales filling my head when I fell asleep, I believe.”

“Humph!”

“I had a nightmare,” Megan said, her tone quiet but firm. She thought she resented Mr. Fallon. She was suddenly certain he didn't think much of the Merrill family at all.

“See that you keep it down,” Fallon said. “There can be no more such outbursts—sir!” He had started speaking to Megan; he ended with a word of warning for Finn.

“Good night,” Finn said.

Fallon nodded, and moved off. Reluctantly, so it seemed.

Finn closed the door. Darkness descended with the night-lights gone from the hall. But a second later the room was flooded with light as Finn hit the switch at the side of the door. He leaned against the door, crossing his arms over his chest, staring at Megan.

“He thinks I was beating you.”

“Oh, Finn, surely not—”

“Everyone knows we've just gotten back together.”

“Don't be ridiculous. Fallon doesn't know a thing about us.”

“Well, he seems to know all about your family, and therefore, he probably knows we've just gotten back together, and he surely thinks you made a major mistake and that I was about to slit your throat before he arrived.”

“Finn, stop it. Surely, somewhere in his life, sometime before, someone has woken up from a nightmare, screaming.”

“You think? I've never woken up before next to a woman screaming loudly enough to burst my eardrums.”

“Dammit, Finn, I've said I'm sorry! I didn't do it on purpose! I had a dream, a really terrible nightmare. Someone was going to kill me!” she said, surprised to feel a hint of the fear rising within her again, as if it would choke off her speech. “In fact, a little sympathy would be in order.”

He stood, still distant, staring at her for a long moment. Even the way he looked now, far too tall for the terry bathrobe, legs seeming impossibly long and honed beneath the white hem, she loved him so much. From his tousled dark hair to his bare feet. Things were so tenuous between them, now. Before . . . once, before, she would have flown from the bed and into his arms. But only a month had passed since they'd been back together, a month since he'd driven up the East Coast to Maine, come to her folks' house, and laid everything on the line.

“Finn!” she said, still shaky, and growing angry herself.

“Excuse me, you nearly dislocated my jaw, Megan.”

“Why can't you understand? I was deeply sleeping. I had a nightmare. A really terrifying nightmare.”