Cursed: Decorah Security Book #21

by Rebecca York

  “Yes,” she answered, her fear leaping up inside her again. But she ignored the bad feelings. She was just nervous about leaving everything she had ever known to go off with Andre Gascon. And feeling bad about her parents. They would be sad and angry. But maybe later when she wrote to them and told them how happy she was, they would forgive her.

  Maybe they would understand how much Andre meant to her. She trusted him with her life. When he was with her, she couldn’t believe that anything bad would happen.

  So, she put a few more things into her bag, took her rain slicker from the peg by the door, then followed him out of the house. He helped her up onto the broad back of Richelieu before climbing up behind her, holding her in his arm as he started down the road that led first to St. Germaine and then to New Orleans.

  She leaned against him, reassured by his strong arm looped around her waist. When she snuggled into his embrace, he bent to stroke his lips against the side of her face.

  “Soon we won’t have to sneak around. We won’t have to run away. We’ll be together always.”

  “Oui,” she answered, closing her eyes, letting his soothing words lull her.

  They were several miles from her house when she heard a roaring noise. She knew what it was. A sudden flood cannonballing through the bayou.

  Behind her Andre cursed, then kicked his heels into the horse’s sides. “Come on, boy. Get us out of this,” he shouted as he flicked the reins.

  But it was already too late. She saw a wall of water rushing toward them. Her scream was drowned out as the water hit Richelieu, sweeping both of them off the horse’s broad back and into the current.

  “Linette. I’ll get you Linette,” Andre cried out.

  She reached toward him, but the water swept her away, and terror engulfed her as the current pulled her under.

  ###

  A terrible sick, scared feeling gripped Morgan’s chest as she woke. At first, she had no idea where she was. Blinking she looked around, and the bedroom at Belle Vista came into focus in the dim light. But it was hard to anchor herself to that reality. She was still back in the dream, in the past, feeling the water grab her and sweep her away.

  It was impossible to stop herself from shaking as she sat up, then gathered up a handful of the sheet to try and ground herself.

  “Oh God. Oh God.”

  The words came out as a sob, and she sat, her right hand pressing against her chest as her vision blurred.

  The door flew open, and someone stepped into the room. Through the mist of tears, she saw that it was Andre. His hair was disheveled, and he looked like he’d been tramping through the swamp all night.

  “What? What’s wrong?” he asked urgently. He looked around the room. “Is someone here?”

  His gaze probed the shadows. Charging toward the bathroom, he threw the door open. When he found it empty, he started searching the closet.

  “No,” she managed to gasp out. “No one’s here.”

  “Then what is it?”

  When she could only answer with a sob, he crossed to her, easing onto the bed, taking her in his arms, stroking his hand over her back and shoulders and into her hair. The spicy aroma of his body was as comforting to her as the physical contact. “What happened? What’s wrong?”

  She fought to gain control of her tears because she couldn’t let him think she was really in danger. At least not here. Not now.

  “They were caught in a flash flood . . .”

  His body went rigid. “Who? The missing men?”

  She knew she wasn’t making sense, and she struggled to make the words make sense. “No. No. Linette and Andre.” She dashed her hand over her face.

  “You know that?” he asked in a gritty voice. “How do you know?”

  She gripped his shoulders, hoping the physical contact would help her communicate. “I saw it. I felt it! I felt her terror. I felt the water pull her under.”

  “No!”

  “Yes. I was back there. I was her again. I was afraid something bad was going to happen. Then when he came to get me, I didn’t want to believe we were in danger. Not when it felt so wonderful to be in his arms. But I should have made him wait.”

  “Tell me more about your dream. Not just the end. What happened before that?” he whispered, strong emotions gathering in his voice.

  She tried to answer and found her own terrible sadness threatening to overcome her again.

  He stroked her arms. “It’s okay. Just take your time.”

  “It was the night they left. He’d been in New Orleans making arrangements—I guess for them to . . . to take a boat to San Francisco.”

  When he drew in a sharp breath, she looked at him. “What?”

  “San Francisco! That’s not in any of the accounts. But you know it.”

  “Maybe I made it up,” she murmured.

  “I don’t think so. When I dream about that night, he tells her they’re going to San Francisco.”

  “You’ve dreamed about that night?”

  “Many times. And after. His despair. His loneliness.”

  “Oh Lord, how do you stand it?”

  “What choice do I have? The water comes. I feel his terror. He tries to get to her, but she’s out of his reach. Then he has to live fifty more years.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s part of the curse. The one the voodoo priestess put on my grandfather—on me.”

  She tried to form another question as his hand stroked over her shoulder, then went still. “You’re wearing the robe.”

  “Yes. I . . . I felt like I had to put it on.” She swallowed. “The voodoo priestess was chanting outside. Not with the drum. Just chanting.” She dragged in a breath and let it out. “After Linette was swept away, I woke up.”

  “I’m so sorry. Are you all right?”

  “Yes. It happened a long time ago.”

  “That’s what I tell myself.”

  In the dim light of dawn, they held each other, comforted each other.

  “I was worried about you,” she whispered. “But there was nothing I could do besides sit here—waiting. Did you find those men?”

  He made an angry sound. “No. I’d like to know what’s going on. I’d like to think Brevard came here to yank my chain. But he was too upset to be faking it.”

  The stark look in his face made her clasp her hands over his shoulders.

  She ached to wipe away his pain. As Linette had done in the dream, she pressed her lips to his.

  She had wanted to comfort him, to reassure him. But the touch of her mouth on his was like setting a match to dry straw. Heat flared inside her, heat she was helpless to control.

  He made a needy sound as he angled his head so he could feast on her mouth—the way the Andre in the dream had feasted on Linette.

  Linette had been a virgin. Morgan knew what she was doing as she lay back on the bed, taking Andre with her, rolling to her side so she was lying half on top of him.

  As her hands moved over him, he did the same, stroking, caressing, arousing.

  Panting, she broke the kiss—just for a moment. “You need to take off your clothes.”

  “The dream turned you on . . .”

  She pressed her fingers to his lips. “No. That’s wrong. The dream made me so sad. They never got to make love. But we can.”

  “That’s not a good reason,” he grated.

  “It wouldn’t be if it were the only reason.” She was tired of arguing with him. It had been a long time since she had wanted to be with a man like this. But if she knew anything in her heart, it was that she wanted to make love with Andre Gascon, urgently.

  “This isn’t a dream. It’s reality,” she murmured as her hand slid down his body, finding the hard shaft of his erection behind the fly of his jeans. When she pressed her hand over him, she felt his body jerk.

  “Don’t.”

  She laughed. “If you say you don’t want me, you’re going to have a hard time getting me to believe it.” As she said the word
“hard,” she swiveled her hand, making him gasp.

  “Oh Lord, Morgan. I want you so much. I wanted you before you ever arrived here.”

  “How?”

  “As soon as I found you at Decorah—I knew.”

  She wasn’t exactly following his logic, but it didn’t matter. Her main goal was to get him to stop talking. And she knew she had won the battle when his hands went to the front of her robe and began to undo the buttons. She reached to help him, and their fingers tangled.

  “Let me do it,” he growled. “I want the pleasure of undressing you.”

  “Yes.” She lay back, lowering her arms to her sides, looking up at him in the dim light coming through the window. It was early in the morning, she noted with some corner of her mind. The sun would come up soon.

  But the light from the bathroom let her see the way his eyes burned with passion. And that thrilled her.

  He finished opening the buttons of her robe, then carefully spread the front open.

  She felt shy as his gaze drank her in. Shy as Linette would have felt.

  “You are so . . . so beautiful,” he breathed. His hand moved to touch her, stroking tenderly across her collarbone, then moving slowly, slowly downward, grazing the tops of her breasts before tracing their fullness.

  He skirted her nipples, and she ached to feel the pressure of his thumbs and fingers squeezing there. When his hand slid lower to run over her ribs, she made a small sound of protest.

  But he kept going, tracing a circle around her navel before sliding his fingers into the triangle of hair at the top of her legs.

  Again, she wanted him to go farther, to dip his fingers into the hot, swollen folds of her sex. But he rolled away from her and stood up.

  “Come back,” she pleaded, holding out her arms to him.

  “In a minute.” He walked to the door, closed it and snapped the lock, and she realized she had forgotten all about making sure they had privacy. Then he strode back to the bed, pulling his shirt over his head before opening his belt buckle. When he reached the side of the bed, he unzipped the jeans, slicking them down his legs along with his underwear.

  He stood over her, and as he had on her a few minutes earlier, she feasted her eyes on him—enjoying his wonderful, hard-muscled body, his broad chest covered with dark hair, his narrow waist and flat belly. Her gaze inevitably dropped lower, focusing on the erection that stood out from his body, proud and thick.

  “You are so sexy looking,” she whispered.

  “I was thinking the same thing.”

  When she realized she was still wearing the robe, she shrugged out of it, tossing it to the end of the bed.

  They were both naked when he came down beside her, and her breath caught as she absorbed the wonderful sensation of his skin touching her and the feel of his penis pressing against her leg.

  He gathered her to him, rocking with her, his hand stroking over her back and lower to caress the curve of her bottom.

  “Your skin is like silk,” he murmured, his fingers trailing up again, then stroking the underside of her breasts.

  “I need . . . that. More of that,” she gasped out, taking his hands and pressing them against her nipples.

  His eyes riveted to his hands cupping over her breasts.

  “I need it too,” he answered, taking the engorged tips between her fingertips and squeezing them gently. “Does that feel good?”

  “God, yes. I want everything you’re willing to give me.”

  She had denied herself this pleasure for so long. No man had touched her body with sexual intent in years. Now all the needs she had told herself were dead forever surged up to overwhelm her.

  When he tugged at her nipples and rolled them between his fingers, she sobbed out her pleasure. And when his mouth replaced one of his hands, sucking one hardened bud into his mouth and teasing it with his tongue and teeth, she went frantic, cupping the back of his head in her hands as she pressed her lower body against his. The sudden burst of feelings was too much for her to contain. Need spiraled out of control. She should have been prepared. But orgasm took her by surprise, rocketing through her like a shooting star flashing to earth, and she cried out with the strength of her release.

  For long moments she could do nothing more than allow the storm to rage through her body.

  When she could speak again, she whispered, “I’m . . . sorry,” as she pressed her face against his shoulder.

  He stroked her shoulder, kissed her hair, then tipped her face up so that she had to meet his questioning gaze.

  “For what?”

  “For . . . jumping the gun,” she managed.

  He laughed. “I think there’s more where that came from.”

  She started to say that there probably wasn’t more. But when his finger stroked lightly over her still sensitive breast, she gasped.

  “Oh!”

  “Yes. Much more, I think.”

  He brought his mouth back to hers, kissing her as though they were just getting started. And as his mouth moved over hers and his hands teased and tantalized, she felt him building her arousal all over again.

  This time, she wasn’t so frantic. And the sensation of heat coursing through her was delicious.

  His hand slid downward again, giving her most intimate flesh a quick, tantalizing brush. She arched against him, and he dipped into her sex for long, lingering strokes that pushed her toward another orgasm.

  “I want you in me this time,” she whispered, her fingers closing around his wonderfully hard erection.

  “Oh, yes.”

  She lay back, guiding him into her, and they both sighed out in relief as he slipped inside her.

  He looked down at her, his eyes dark with passion and so many other emotions that she could barely breathe.

  “I’ve waited so long for this,” he said.

  “You just met me a few days ago.”

  He stroked her hair back from her face. “It doesn’t feel like it—does it?”

  “No,” she admitted in a low voice. In truth, she felt as if she had known him forever. That she had been waiting for this forever. And when he began to move, she moved with him.

  Her ecstasy spiraled quickly. Out of control. Over the moon. And this time when she came, he was with her, calling out her name as his body went rigid above hers.

  She floated back to earth slowly, making a small sound of protest as he moved off of her. But he only came down beside her on the bed, gathering her close, kissing the side of her face while she stroked her fingers through his hair. She was limp with pleasure, more relaxed than she had been in years, she thought.

  ###

  Andre held Morgan in his arms, watching her eyes drift closed. She fit so well against him. It was heaven just to hold her. Making love with her had felt like magic. And he needed magic. So much.

  Before she’d come here, he’d felt free to joke with her. Tease her. He’d loved every scrap of herself that she’d shared.

  She’d traveled all over the world. He’d never traveled far from this patch of southern Louisiana. Yet it had felt like they’d had a lot in common. They liked the same music. They both liked good food. They both loved the natural environment. And they were both down to earth in a very fundamental way. And their values matched so well.

  He’d been delighted to discover all those things and more. He’d pictured the two of them sitting in the sunroom or on the patio, talking for hours, then reaching for each other.

  But when she’d arrived, everything had changed. He’d been terrified that she would turn away from Andre Gascon—the man in person. And worse, he knew that he’d dragged her into a situation more dangerous than he’d imagined.

  He hadn’t known how to deal with her—or with his fears. But she hadn’t allowed him to shut himself away from her. And for that he was profoundly grateful.

  She’d forced him to tell her about the curse. Some of it. But there was more he had to reveal. And things he must ask of her. But not now. Not until she kne
w him better.

  When she did, would she run screaming from him? Fear leaped inside him. The idea of losing her was too much to bear.

  Closing his eyes, he held her in his arms, profoundly grateful for these hours of intimacy, but praying that she would stay with him even when she knew the worst about him.

  He had never spent the night with a woman. Never slept with a lover in his arms. But he was glad to do it now, overwhelmed by the luxury of sharing a bed with Morgan Kirkland—not just to make love but to sleep beside her.

  He drifted into the most peaceful slumber he could remember, his shoulder touching Morgan’s. His leg pressed to hers.

  A few hours later, the sound of a car engine and angry shouting outside made his eyes snap open.

  Oh Lord, not again.

  Chapter Twelve

  Looking to his right Andre saw Morgan staring wide-eyed at him as men’s angry voices shattered the warm mood of the bedroom.

  She sat up, exposing her beautiful breasts. When she saw him staring at her, she dragged up the sheet, and he marveled that she was thinking of modesty. Or maybe she was right. Maybe the uninvited guests in the front hall would come pounding up the stairs and burst into the bedroom. That thought had him scrambling out of bed and searching for the clothing that he’d left scattered around the room.

  “What’s going on?” Morgan asked.

  “I don’t know,” he answered, as he thrust one foot into a pants leg, then the other. Still, he had a good idea of what he was going to hear, if he made it downstairs. Someone had found another body out in the bayou. Another man killed by a large cat.

  The front door rattled. Then footsteps hurried across the hall. The door opened, and Janet was speaking to someone.

  He had pulled on his jeans and tee shirt. He saw Morgan doing the same.

  “Stay here,” he tossed over his shoulder as he scuffed his feet into his shoes. He was thinking that he was probably wasting his breath by giving Morgan Kirkland orders. One of the basic things he’d learned about her was that she did what she thought was best. He could only thank the Lord that she’d had sense enough to stay out of the bayou last night.

  As he dashed from the room, she followed a few paces behind. When he reached the bottom of the stairs, He found Janet standing against the wall, pushed to the side by a whole crowd of men—Sheriff Jarvis, Dwight Rivers, Bob Mansard. And Rick Brevard. Relief flooded through Andre when he saw Rick standing there. He was one of the missing men, apparently alive and well.