Enchantment & Bridge of Dreams

by Christina Skye

  “Cathlin, wait—”

  She shoved past him, one hand locked to her mouth. The hammering of her feet down the stairs sent another slab of plaster hurtling to the attic floor.

  Dominic didn’t try to stop her. Something told him that once he touched her, once he felt her body shiver and then yield to his, all his years of careful experience at control would be swept away in a second.

  Impossible, of course. And yet somehow he already knew exactly how she would feel wrapped against him.

  Almost as clearly as if it had already happened.

  CATHLIN WATCHED HIM stride down the long gravel drive toward the coast road. Gravel and dust flew up around him, driven by the wind.

  The tears didn’t come, just as they hadn’t come after that day fifteen years ago. She had never found out what had led to her mother’s fall from the roof at Draycott Abbey, though she had spent years wondering.

  Suicide? Cathlin shivered. It couldn’t possibly be. Her mother had always seemed so happy, ready with laughter and a hug. But perhaps a child couldn’t see the pain that a grownup learned to hide.

  When she was older, Cathlin’s father had explained what he knew of the events of that night. Somehow Elizabeth Russell O’Neill had fallen or been pushed to her death from the roof. But Donnell O’Neill had steadfastly refused to believe that what had happened had been an act of suicide. He had gone on searching for clues for months, but neither he nor the investigating officers had ever solved the mystery of what had occurred up on that dark and silent roof.

  Though she had no conscious memory of that night, Cathlin had been the one who found her mother’s body, motionless and silent against the soft green grass by the moat. Yet the night remained one great blank. Over the years Cathlin came to consider it a blessing that her memories were locked away where they couldn’t torment her.

  And now in a matter of minutes this hard-faced stranger came striding into her life, touching those dark places in ways that Cathlin couldn’t begin to imagine.

  Or to bear.

  Overhead a curlew shrieked and darted over a tidal pool. Cathlin looked down at her hands, angry when she saw the fine tremor that shook them.

  She had to accept the hard truth then. It wasn’t going to go away. Even though the memories were buried, they were still very much alive.

  Cathlin watched angry clouds race in from the channel. Just like the storm, dark and gathering speed, there were things that couldn’t be put off any longer. The doctors had told her one day everything would come back to her. As an adult, Cathlin finally had to consider methods of remembering, things like drugs and deep hypnosis. Maybe it was time she had an answer to those years of shadows. If so, the whole process would have to begin at Draycott Abbey.

  Maybe she owed it to her mother to find out what no one else could.

  SHE WAS WAITING, FISTS tight, when Dominic strode back up the drive. “There’s one other thing you’d better understand, O’Neill.” His hair was raked back by the wind and a fine sheen of sand covered his face. “Like it or not, we’re in this together. You’re not the only one who stands to gain from that will.”

  Abruptly Dominic stopped. Over Cathlin’s shoulder he studied the eerie sweep of reeds and silver water. “Come inside.”

  “Why.”

  He bit off a curse. “Now, O’Neill. There’s someone out there.”

  “It’s not exactly a crime. As I told you, we get lots of lost hikers this time of year.”

  Dominic’s eyes were cold and hard. “In this kind of weather? I doubt it. But if they’re just hikers, they won’t mind answering a few questions.” He pulled her around, shielding her with his body. “Keep walking, slowly and very casually.” He draped an arm around Cathlin’s shoulder and began moving her toward the house.

  As they neared her old Jeep, he bent low and pulled a backpack from the car. Turning quickly, he moved his body between Cathlin and whoever was out there on the marsh.

  “What are you doing?”

  Dominic ignored her, pushing her along toward the house. “Is there a door that will let me out on the north side of the property?”

  Cathlin nodded. The confusion in her eyes began to be replaced by fear. “If you’re trying to frighten me, you’re succeeding.”

  “I’m not trying to frighten you,” he said harshly. “I’m trying to protect you.”

  “From what?”

  His mouth hardened. “That’s always the question, isn’t it? Now show me how to get to the north side of the house.”

  It was soft but it was an order, and they both knew it.

  Cathlin led him wordlessly through high, wood-beamed rooms full of Georgian furniture, along a corridor that had once been lined with portraits but now held only a few proud faces. Even now the house contained a fragile beauty and a vast dignity, offering comparisons with its beautiful, stubborn owner.

  When they emerged onto the lawn at the far side of Seacliffe a few moments later, Dominic’s face was unreadable. “Stay here.”

  And then he sprinted off into the trees.

  Cathlin started to stop him, but the memory of his eyes kept her still. In an instant the friendliness had slid out of them, leaving them wintry and hard.

  Warrior’s eyes.

  A stranger’s eyes.

  Cathlin shivered slightly as his tall figure vanished into the dense woods above the house. She found herself wondering what Dominic Montserrat’s real business was here at Seacliffe.

  Because if his proposal was as simple as it sounded, then she was a lost Romanov princess named Anastasia.

  CHAPTER SIX

  STAY LOW.

  Aim where they’ll least expect you.

  Always keep them guessing.

  As Dominic entered the woods, all the old habits slammed into play.

  Close protection work wasn’t like in the movies, all speed and gleam and the slam of pumped-up bodies. In real life it was usually a test of patience, of agonizing minutes spent squatting in utter stillness, waiting to see who would get bored or careless or just plain hungry and give away their position first.

  Dominic’s jaw hardened. Memories…

  He crawled into a canal ringed by waist-high reeds, and there he waited.

  Five minutes.

  Ten. Twenty.

  A bird skimmed toward the channel. Wind whined through the reeds. And then he heard the faint growl of a car motor, gunned and abruptly silenced.

  Across the reeds, across the quiet tidal pools, Dominic felt something waiting. There was no mistaking the prickling in his neck. When there was no noticeable movement, he worked down the slope. Soundless, he dropped to the ground and began to belly his way along the winding canal, the same way he’d moved in jungles from Asia to Colombia.

  He’d gone nearly a mile and darkness was closing in over the marsh when he saw the dusty Saab with a deflated front tire and a broken jack tossed beside it on the ground. So this was what he’d seen from Seacliffe. Patient scrutiny told him no one was in the area. Probably the owner had gone off to the coast road for help.

  He looked up the hill. Seacliffe’s roofs were not visible from here, hidden entirely by the trees and the slope of the hill.

  Even then, Dominic was taking no chances. He waited by the narrow stone bridge to see if anyone appeared. After fifteen more minutes of silence, Dominic decided that all was as it seemed, a simple auto malfunction. He emerged from the water wearing a layer of mud, slipping as he crawled up the wet bank. He was just heading back up the hill to Cathlin when the soil he was standing on gave way. He cursed, swaying wildly as his ankle struck something in the dark. Thrown off-balance, he fell sideways and rolled downhill.

  He only had time to curse his stupidity once before his head slammed down against the unforgiving granite of the bridge.

  CATHLIN PACED THE LIVING room, her eyes locked on the marsh. She had long since gone through the nail-biting stage and was now muttering a stream of graphic oaths about the moral fiber and questionable pare
ntage of one Dominic Montserrat.

  Where was the bloody man? He’d been gone two hours already. Outside lights were winking in the channel, but the winding gravel drive that ran past the seawall was a sheer wall of black. Those pools could be deceiving and the ground unstable.

  Cathlin made her mind up in that moment. Something was desperately wrong.

  CATHLIN TOOK THE GRAVEL road far too fast, squinting out into thirty miles of fog-swept tidal pools lapped by the cold sea. Suddenly something moved, out in the darkness.

  Out in the lonely silence where no one should be moving.

  Wind-driven sand pelted the windshield. Cursing, Cathlin flipped on the wipers and looked again, but whatever had been there was gone.

  She sighed, rubbing her shoulders. Just nerves from too much caffeine and too little sleep, she told herself. Muttering, she jammed the gear into third and shoved her hair out of her eyes. From here it was only a mile to the coast road. Three turns, through the narrow fringe of yew trees, then over the little stone bridge. He had to be there somewhere.

  She was talking to herself, repeating the words like a litany while her hands clutched the wheel, nursing the sturdy old Jeep over the pitted road. Gravel and dust flew up as she downshifted, passed the skeletal oak, now ringed with a ghostly drapery of fog, and swung onto the tidal flats that hugged the seawall.

  Then she saw him, a black blotch against the night. Any faster and she’d have plowed right into him. As Cathlin threw open the door, fog coiled around her ankles.

  He was upright but swaying tiredly.

  “Dominic, what happened to you?”

  Around them the wind hissed and whined, rippling the quiet pools.

  Dominic swayed forward, hands clenched on his dark jacket.

  Cathlin caught him with an arm around his waist. His body was rigid and he seemed to be trying to tell her something.

  “Come on, big guy, let’s get you home.” She worked one shoulder behind his back and began maneuvering him toward the car. “A little help might be nice about now, okay?”

  No answer.

  “Dominic?”

  Still no answer.

  It was hard going; he seemed to have become deadweight. And then Cathlin felt something warm slide over her fingers. Something thick and wet.

  Blood. Sweet God, he was bleeding. No wonder he hadn’t answered her.

  “Oh, Lord, just hold on.” Fighting for calm, Cathlin shoved Dominic into the passenger seat and slammed the door shut.

  His eyes opened just as the moon broke from behind a fringe of clouds. Cathlin felt his desperate intensity of will as he tried to clear his mind. “Bank…out.” His fingers tightened on her wrist. “Stupid…bloody bridge.”

  Then his eyes closed and he sprawled back against Cathlin’s shoulder.

  She fought to keep her hands from shaking as she swung the Jeep around, gravel flying. She slammed back up the road, taking the stone bridge too fast, and veered into a shortcut that skirted the fallen tree.

  It took her nearly ten minutes to haul Dominic from the car and maneuver him into the house. The stairs would have been impossible to manage, so she stretched him out on a big chintz couch in the front study.

  Unfortunately the storm had downed the power lines, and she couldn’t reach a doctor for advice about his wound. He was still unconscious and very pale, but his only wound was a narrow gash over one temple, which she cleaned and bandaged. Then Cathlin found the lump at the base of his neck.

  All her fears returned in a rush.

  What could she do for him, stranded out here miles from a hospital? What if he didn’t wake up? What if he died? What if he—

  One smoky green eye opened. “F-found me.” He searched for her hands. “Knew—you’d come.” Then his eyes closed once more.

  But his fingers stayed wrapped around hers.

  DOMINIC AWOKE TO MOONLIGHT on his pillow.

  He blinked and looked about him in confusion. Where was the huge armoire at the far side of his room? Where were the cut flowers his French housekeeper always kept in a careless profusion by the window?

  Where were his clothes?

  Dominic frowned and looked down. His shoulder was covered by something bulky and his throat felt like old shoe leather. He sat up dizzily and glanced around the dark room. His jaw locked.

  In the moonlight, he saw a chair where a woman with black satin hair lay sleeping in a long white gown.

  For some reason, Dominic thought of candlelit rooms. Of fine blue satin and soft kid gloves and rare pink pearls set in triple strands.

  All of it far, far away.

  Her dark hair gleamed, lit by flames and a bar of lambent moonlight. Her head was angled against the back of an old armchair and a book lay open on her lap.

  Lord, she was beautiful. Her name was as wild and lovely as the rest of her. His eyes drank in the sight of her: strong hands, flashing eyes. Full, high breasts. Would they fill his fingers, all warmth and silk? Would her nipples tighten and peak as he caressed them?

  Dominic cursed harshly. In spite of what she thought of him, he was no cool playboy. He was not a man who treated intimacy casually or women lightly. This woman had undoubtedly saved his hide out there on the marsh after his stupidity in cracking his head against the bridge. Spinning X-rated fantasies wasn’t exactly the best way to repay her.

  But once begun, the heated images wouldn’t stop. Images of white skin tormented him, fantasies of Cathlin moaning beneath him, sheathing his heat. And all of them felt achingly familiar. He twisted angrily, seizing his pillow and fighting the hot, deadly tide of desire.

  Finally the pain at his forehead accomplished what raw discipline had not. His head caught in a vise of pain and, clenching his fists, he sank back against the bed.

  Clang-clang.

  Tired. So bloody tired.

  Clang-clang.

  Sweat clung to his brow. Pain, regret, and something far darker mingled in the gray waves that filled his head.

  Dark things. Pain and secrets that wouldn’t stay buried.

  And then it was so close he could taste it, a memory that hung rich as fruit, but always out of reach. And somehow Dominic knew he had to make himself remember. It was almost as if his life—and Cathlin’s—depended upon it.

  But how?

  Clang-clang.

  Sweat broke from his brow and skated down his neck. Close, so close.

  And it had something to do with her.

  GABRIEL’S HEAD WAS ACHINGand his mood was dark as he turned up the steps to his town house. Somewhere in the night a church bell struck three times.

  He scowled. A bottle of claret at White’s had not soothed his memories of France, nor had three offers of companionship to share his bed.

  All he found himself thinking of was a pair of burnished golden eyes.

  As he came to the top step, the polished oak door was thrown open and his butler’s long face appeared in the sudden light. “My lord, there’s a person—a person in the study!”

  Gabriel’s dark brow crooked. “Then put the person out, Stanton.”

  “I tried, most decisively. But the person would not—that is, she—”

  “A woman?” Gabriel’s voice hardened. “Not here. You know better than to allow her in, Stanton.”

  The old servant wrung his hands. “Of course, my lord. But this female was most persistent. And she said you knew she was coming. Indeed, she vowed that you were expecting her!”

  “Persistent?” Gabriel laughed grimly. So his defiant angel had come to track him down, had she? Ashton tossed his gloves and hat onto the mahogany side table and smiled darkly. “Where is she?”

  “She insisted on waiting in your study, my lord. I tried to dissuade her, but—”

  “Never mind, Stanton. I suspect it would take a cavalry regiment to dissuade this visitor from a goal. I shall deal with her, however.” The grim smile played over his lips as he strode down the hall toward the rear of the house.

  The study was in shado
w, lit only by the three candles in a silver candelabrum. Gabriel stood motionless in the doorway, while his eyes grew accustomed to the shadows. “Since you’ve taken the trouble of pushing your way in, you might as well show yourself,” he said harshly.

  There was a rustle of silk. The light, sweet fragrance of lilacs drifted toward him.

  And then she was before him, even more beautiful than he remembered. In the darkness her pale features shimmered, and her eyes glinted like rare old Roman coins.

  Gabriel refused to be enticed. “What do you want of me?” he demanded.

  She wore a velvet cloak with a hood lined in satin. Beneath, her shoulders gleamed white and elegant. “Your help.”

  The earl of Ashton shrugged. “Find someone else.”

  “I can’t. I need a man who knows the boulevards and bywaysof France. A man who knows Jacobin and Girondist alike. And that man is the Rook.”

  “Never heard of the fellow.”

  Geneva studied his face thoughtfully. “Adrian Draycott told me you would continue to be difficult.”

  “My dear, I haven’t even begun to be difficult.” Gabriel strode to a lacquered chest and poured himself a glass of wine. Blast Adrian for his interfering ways, he thought grimly as he emptied the glass. She was the third person Draycott had referred to him this month. All of them had equally desperate stories of relatives or friends caught in the terrors of the revolution in France. But Ashton was not about to be pulled in again.

  Not even for a good friend like Adrian Draycott.

  Geneva’s lips curved. “Is that your usual way of dealing with encroaching females?”

  Ashton felt a strange tickling sensation in his chest, a blend of hot and cold and purest hunger. The truth was that no other female had ever been so rash as to bait him in his lair as this woman had done.

  “On the contrary.” Gabriel moved soundlessly through the room and tossed off her domino, then stood studying the perfect ivory sweep of her shoulders and her full breasts. As his hand brushed her chin, he watched color tinge her creamy cheeks.

  Curiosity. Determination. But no fear. Not a trace of that.