Phantom Pleasures

by Julie Leto

  Clearly, nothing as exciting as what she’d get if she stayed.

  “You can go back,” she replied, straightening in her chair as determination coursed through her, replacing the void left by questions and uncertainties and regrets. “I’m talking to the board tomorrow morning via conference call, but I’m sure they’re going to embrace this project once they hear from the architectural and marketing teams. Once that approval goes through, the contractors will need at least a week to assemble the first team of workers for the castle while the architects finalize the plans and the designers start descending on the place needing direction. I’m not dallying with this. Once the word gets out in the press about this new hotel, the buzz will be huge. We need to be ready to go. I’m going to stay behind and supervise the renovation myself.”

  Jacob eyed her suspiciously. “Don’t you have some lackey that can handle the mundane details until the real work begins? That assistant of yours, perhaps?”

  Alexa stared boldly at her brother. “Of course I do.”

  “And what about the crisis in Boston? The police are fairly sure the damage to the generators was sabotage. This is the second incident that we know of. If someone is out to get us—”

  “You can handle it,” she interrupted. “You came here seeking something interesting to do, didn’t you? And you’ve handled the Boston situation so far. I don’t see any reason why you can’t continue.”

  Jacob scowled. “So you can stay here and supervise construction workers? I know you think you’re hard up for male companionship—”

  Alexa cut him off. “This project is important to me. The land is mine. Personally. A gift from my father. I’ll have the hotel manager arrange for office space here first thing in the morning. You can either stay and help, or go back home and take on all that responsibility you’ve been bucking for all these years. Either way, I’m running this show from here.”

  Jacob waved his hand at her, as if he’d heard her unbreakable determination before—which he had—and it bored him. “Whatever. You’re impossible to deal with when you have dollar signs in your eyes. I’ll see you in the morning.”

  Jacob ambled out of the room without another word, which struck Alexa as somewhat odd. Jacob usually wanted to be in the thick of things, just off center of the main action of running the corporation so he could constantly remind people, even if only visually, that he was the heir apparent to the fortune she managed. She wondered briefly how her father had truly felt about that, even if his estate attorney and all documentation proved that Richard Chandler wanted Alexa to teach her stepbrother the ropes. Richard and Jacob had never gotten along, but Richard had loved Jacob’s mother with a passion Alexa had resented as a daughter, but admired as a woman.

  She supposed she should outgrow such romantic notions someday, but after last night, Alexa didn’t think she’d be forgetting her fairy-tale fancies anytime soon. No, the only way she was going to move beyond her fascination with Damon and the pleasures he promised was to confront her fantasy directly.

  He knew the minute she’d entered the castle. The cold chill that had clung to his skin since nightfall evaporated in a wave of warmth, followed by a vibration that shook the air around him and halted the magic he’d been wielding. Dante, the cat, had taken up residence atop a large armoire and now screeched loudly.

  “Hush, beast,” he ordered, waving his hand. He’d discovered this afternoon that adding the physical gesture accelerated the magic. As if blown by a concentrated wind, the cat disappeared in a puff of smoke.

  From below, Alexa called his name. Even from that distance he could hear the longing in her voice. The need. The fear. He supposed he couldn’t alleviate her suspicions and anxiety. He had no reassurances to offer her. Though not a man considered ruthless during his lifetime, his imprisoned state required him to adopt a new morality. He would employ whatever means necessary to escape the castle. He had to find out if any clue remained that would lead him to his family, even if they’d all since died.

  Not knowing would be more torturous than his imprisonment, of that he was certain.

  Her voice echoed against the stone as she climbed the stairs. “I’m here,” he called, knowing she’d follow the sound.

  A few moments later, she leaned in from the hall, her hands clutching the thick oak door of the room he’d chosen for his first exploration.

  He turned, smiled and, with a flourish, showed her what he’d accomplished with only a few hours of work.

  Her eyes widened to bright green discs.

  “Wow,” she said.

  “Is this expression positive?”

  “Positively amazing.” She entered the room cautiously, stopping to admire the silk dressing gown curved across the foot of the well-appointed bed he’d conjured only an hour ago. “What is this? A re-creation of your bedroom?”

  Damon frowned. He had little memory of his own master suite. And of which house? The town home in London? The estate in Cumberland? Or perhaps the home of his boyhood in Valoren, the land of the exiled, the only true home he’d ever known.

  “No, a re-creation of Rogan’s. I mean to uncover the mystery of my release. And if I know Rogan, which I did, quite well, he would have kept his secrets close to him. In this castle, if not in this very room.”

  Alexa crouched and ran her fingers over the plush pile of the handwoven rug, dropping the bag she carried on the floor near the bed. Rising, she followed the thick lines of the teak bedposts and then palmed the velvet coverlet and satin pillows. Rogan had enjoyed the trappings of luxurious living, as Damon had once. Odd how such details meant little to him any longer, except when Alexa was near. Without uttering a word, she demanded the finest of everything. She might be a common businesswoman in her century, but in his, she’d be a queen.

  “This is amazing,” she said, her voice breathy. “How did you remember all the details of Rogan’s private quarters? I can’t imagine you spent a great deal of time here,” she ventured, her voice dipping into suggestive territory that spawned an immediate growl of annoyance.

  “I admit I saw the room once or twice. Rogan could be a notorious slugabed when the mood suited him, so he often took visitors in his dressing gown.”

  “Still,” she said, cupping a pewter goblet she’d removed from the bedside table, “the detail is glorious.”

  Damon nodded with satisfaction. “I could not remember every element of the decor, but the magic could.”

  “The magic?”

  “The place is rife with it, as you discovered last night. The more I open my mind to the possibilities, the more the magic serves me.”

  She stepped toward him, her hand outstretched. “But it’s black magic, isn’t it? Can’t it harm you?”

  Damon took her hand and pulled her close. He’d considered her expressed fear carefully before determining his course of action. While he had no ambition to follow his former friend down an evil path, he had no choice but use the resources at his disposal to achieve his goal.

  “I know not,” he admitted, “but if I find the answers I seek, the danger is negligible.”

  Unable to be in her presence for more than a few minutes without tasting her, Damon lowered his head and covered her mouth with his. The scent of her perfume intoxicated him—a clean scent that conjured images of fresh citrus and ocean breezes. Her skin, so warm and soft, yielded to his touch. When she cooed, he knew she’d come to him for the most basic reason.

  She wanted him.

  And yet, she pulled away.

  “We need to slow down,” she insisted, pushing him aside.

  He arched a brow. He never could resist a woman of contradictions.

  “Did you not come here tonight to make love with me?” he asked.

  She planted her fists on her hips indignantly. “What happened to your finesse?”

  “I see no reason to pretend with you, Alexa.”

  She narrowed her gaze. “Don’t you?”

  “That I want you is no secret. That I want s
omething from you is no secret, either. I want my freedom. And I want you to help me gain it.”

  “I don’t know how to do that,” she said.

  “Not yet, perhaps,” he insisted. “But you freed me from the painting. I know the magic exists somewhere within these walls that will ensure my release entirely.”

  “What if your release means your death?”

  Surprisingly, he heard regret in her voice. “Everyone must die. I only wish to do so after I’ve found my family. And to do this, I must explore every nook and cranny of Rogan’s magical realm. This castle has always been the source of his power. The minute he declared the structure complete all those hundreds of years ago, his abilities grew exponentially. The key is here. I know it within my soul.”

  “Then you plan to rebuild every room?”

  “’Tis the only way.”

  “That’s going to be interesting for my workers,” she commented.

  Damon had considered this point. All afternoon, he’d watched the parade of builders and architects examining the castle. He’d listened intently, learning much not only about modern construction, but also of the modern world. He’d learned the true scope of Alexa’s wealth and power and ambition. The men under her command respected her family name but had doubts regarding her ability to live up to her father’s high standards for success.

  What firstborn son of a nobleman wouldn’t have felt instantly connected with her on that point alone? But Damon had had the luxury of a humble father, one who took his banishment to a Gypsy enclave not as the punishment of a foreign king, but as a grand adventure. He chuckled, remembering how his father’s humor had matched his wealth and how his optimism had turned what might have been a shameful assignment from the king into a triumph.

  Even the first King George had been pleased. The Gypsies had left London without bloodshed, and the sale of their wares around Europe through intermediaries brought in a tidy sum to the Crown. Abandoned land he’d inherited in his native Germany now produced an income. But then the monarch had died and his ambitious son had sought to reclaim his lands by sending in the ruthless horde to murder the Romani Damon’s father had sought to save.

  A dark thought crossed his mind. If the horde had descended on Valoren and found it deserted, had they ridden out to his father’s estate on the other side of the mountain and massacred his family instead? Only his father, his stepmother and a collection of servants had remained behind, hidden in a cellar with provisions to last them a week. Had they survived?

  “Damon?”

  He blinked, then glanced down at her as she eyed him with bold curiosity.

  “I apologize,” he said with a short bow. “The atmosphere draws me deeply into the past.”

  He cleared his throat. A past he needed to unravel, and to do so, he had to master the magic, as well as ensure Alexa’s loyalty so he’d have access to her vast resources. Now, who was the mercenary?

  “Reminds me of dreams I had,” she said wistfully. “Not so long ago.”

  A wicked flash of green lit her eyes.

  Instantly, his body reacted, tight and hard. He’d satiated his long-ignored desires with her last night, yet he wanted her again with renewed vigor. In more ways than he could name. “What kind of dreams?”

  Her eyes darkened and her mouth curved downward in a serious frown. “You’re a man straight out of my fantasies, Damon Forsyth.”

  “Does that not please you?”

  “Last night, it did. You did.”

  “Thank you.”

  “But it makes me wonder.”

  “About?”

  “Why you’re here. If you’re here, really. Can’t you simply be a figment of my imagination?” Her voice softened with a dreamy quality he couldn’t recall hearing in her tone before. “You’re what I want most from a man. You have character. Power. You come in the night and pleasure me, but you disappear by morning and don’t interfere with my everyday, crazy life.”

  Taken aback, Damon stopped to think. “Do you mean to suggest that your fantasies drew you to me?”

  She shook her head. “No, I’m suggesting my fantasies created you.”

  He clutched her arms. “I assure you, Alexa, that in the night, I am very real and very solid.”

  “But you’re still the perfect man. And until I prove otherwise, I won’t be able to walk away from you.”

  “Why should you wish to walk away? For the time being, I’m trapped in a property you own. I shall be at your beck and call.”

  “I can’t have a man in my life.”

  Damon took a step back. That was a phrase he’d never heard from a woman before. “Why on earth not?”

  She squared her shoulders. “I have a lot of responsibilities. Several billion to be exact.”

  “You have chosen money over your personal happiness?”

  She shrugged. “Sort of chose me. But it’s not the money entirely. It’s the Chandler name. It’s the hundreds of investors and thousands of employees and guests and extended family and—”

  Damon cut her off with a kiss. The sound of a sensual, beautiful woman eschewing a fulfilled life so she could meet the expectations of society cracked his soul. Is this what the future held for him? A reversal of roles that would tear at his core?

  When breathing became necessary, she pulled away. “My father wanted to give me the world,” she explained.

  “And he gave you this castle, with me inside.”

  “He didn’t know that,” she argued.

  “Maybe he did; maybe he did not. But for the time being, I am here. Perhaps fate drew us together. Perhaps—”

  Her eyes drifted downward as she extracted his sister’s necklace from her pocket and dangled it in front of him.

  “Something more powerful than even destiny?”

  Her eyes reflected the same surprise he felt. His hands itched to take the charm back, in case the residual magic would somehow help him in his quest to break free of the castle’s hold. But if the charm was meant for protection, Alexa needed it more than he.

  “I can’t keep this,” she said.

  He twined his fingers with hers, the charm dangling between them. “The value of the piece is inconsequential.”

  “That’s not why I can’t keep it,” she said. “When I’m here with you, I don’t need protection. And if it did belong to your sister, then you should have it.”

  If only she were safe. If only he knew without question that Rogan’s black magic wasn’t seeping into his soul. “I want you to wear it.”

  Confusion turned her china-doll face into a mask of indecision. “I’m not afraid.”

  He buried a chuckle deep within his chest, allowing his passion to override his misgivings about the magic. He had to do what he must, and if the necklace provided her with a counteragent against the evil, so be it. He could manage with his own store of charms, couldn’t he?

  “You should be,” he warned. “You deny your passions on the odd risk that you might have to challenge your vision for your future, when my existence has already changed your destiny. Take a lesson from me, Alexa. What we work toward our entire lives may come to nothing with one tear of a sword.”

  Her gaze locked with his. Her irises darted from side to side as she searched, in vain, for words to counter his logic. She took a deep breath, pocketed the charm and exhaled. The moment the tension in her shoulders released, he knew he had her.

  16

  Damon surveyed his handiwork in Rogan’s room and decided he could not risk jeopardizing all he’d accomplished. He grabbed Alexa by the arms, stood flush against her and warned, “Let us not make love in a den of evil,” then magically whisked her to a room he’d discovered at the top of the west tower.

  When they materialized, she wavered and inhaled quickly, her eyes still shut tight.

  “We are here, my lady,” he informed her. He’d been materializing and dematerializing in different parts of the castle all afternoon. He’d become accustomed to the sensation.

 
; She, on the other hand, clutched his arms tightly and her eyes remained closed. “Where?”

  “Open your eyes. No, wait.”

  Damon extracted one arm from her grip and after concentrating on the atmosphere he wanted to create, waved his hand. More than one hundred candles appeared in the tight, circular room, each atop a standing sconce or tall candelabra of varying heights and clusters. The heat around them flared instantly and Alexa gasped, though her eyes remained closed.

  “What did you do?” she asked.

  “Open your eyes, my lady.”

  She shook her head. “I’m dizzy.”

  “And I’m about to make you dizzier.”

  The flames flickered from the breeze sneaking in from outside. Through the loopholes, the night sky twinkled with a thousand stars. The scent of the ocean curled into the tower, and for a moment, Damon imagined the freedom of riding along the shoreline and making love to Alexa on the sand.

  Not tonight, though. Perhaps not ever. But for now, he would indulge her fantasies—and his—until he knew she’d help him, no matter the personal cost.

  He manipulated the magic until they were naked to the wind, but even as her eyes flashed open, he took her in his arms and kissed her. Seducing her came at the price of his sanity. In seconds, he was hard with need. His cock jutted against her belly and his knees wavered when she took his sex in her hands and stroked.

  “No,” he gasped, but she didn’t listen. She continued to pull hard on his flesh, up and down, cupping his balls even as his mouth ravished hers. He could feel his seed building inside him, and when she dropped to her knees and took him in her mouth, he lost all ability to think. He felt the candles flame hot and high, singeing his shoulders as he reached down and speared his hands into her hair.

  Every sensation rocked him. The pressure of her mouth over his sex, of her tongue across his flesh, brought him to the brink of climax. He pulled her off, nearly coming when he spied the sinful, triumphant look in her eyes.