Hot Nights, Dark Desires

by Eden Bradley

  An image of Nicky in bed with her former best friend flashed in her brain, and she shrugged.

  Love was overrated anyway.

  Before her pounding heart pumped some sense into her brain, she stepped away from Hex and peeled off her tank top, exposing her breasts to the steamy night and his glittering gaze. Encouraged by his response, she shifted slowly, subtly, to expose her best angle, and pushed down her boxers. His audible swallow echoed through the cavernous room as she took her time rolling her spine straight.

  “Then again,” he murmured, “I could be wrong.”

  “Anything,” she repeated, and a gust of wind shrieked through the house. Somewhere upstairs, a door slammed and she jumped.

  “Your ghost isn’t happy.”

  “That’s the first time he’s done anything like that. He never makes noise.”

  He looked up at the ceiling. “He doesn’t like it that I’m here.”

  The rise and fall of Hex’s chest beneath his T-shirt grew irregular as he stood there, and for a humiliatingly long moment, she thought he’d refuse her. Then, in a blur of motion he moved, and she found herself pinned to the wall, her wrists shackled above her head by one of his hands, her flank being stroked by the other.

  “I thought you don’t screw photographers,” he murmured into her ear, and she flushed from head to toe at the knowledge that he’d read the article accompanying the men’s magazine spread. She’d sent him the photos, but not the magazine itself.

  “You can’t believe everything you read.” Though in this case, it was true. She had a strange aversion to dating men with cameras. Pictures revealed what a person looked like on the outside, but when a photographer looked at her through a lens, it felt like he was seeing her on the inside as well.

  And inside, she wasn’t nearly as beautiful.

  “I read that you’re lickable. Was that bullshit too?” He rocked his hips into her so the hard ridge of his erection rubbed her bare mound. “Because I’m thinking maybe I should find out.”

  She went utterly wet between the legs at his words, her body firing up, preparing for him even as her mind shut down—not from fear or hesitation, but from the sudden, devastating knowledge that no matter how impersonal she would try to make this, Hex would turn it into something very good, and very personal.

  CHAPTER

  Two

  None of this was good.

  Brenna St. James would let him take her, right here, against the wall—Hex could smell her arousal and it was hell on his. His head dipped down to her shoulder, his lips brushing her neck lightly, and the familiar ache ripped through his body like the dull paring of a knife through his aura.

  Hers was calling out to him. Faint, like a shadow refusing to be caught. Save my life, Hex.

  How goddamned familiar all of this seemed, as though he was coming home to something rather than just visiting. The feeling was still vague enough to make him uncomfortable and he wondered if there’d been some kind of spell cast over this house…over her.

  He tried not to think about how her nipples were a perfect, dark rose color, how they rubbed taut against his T-shirted chest. How he could drive into her in a single stroke and watch the pleasure highlight the stark cheekbones and heavy lids, imagined how tight and wet and hot she’d be for him.

  Instead, he pulled his hands away. “I don’t want sex.”

  “Oh.” She grabbed for her top, and he could see the burn of humiliation on her cheeks as she held it up in front of her. It didn’t hide much, and the image of her naked body had already seared itself onto his brain.

  “Not right now…I want to take pictures first,” he amended, because he would have Brenna St. James before the night was over. Had to have her.

  “I’m not just going to be your sex toy—available whenever you’re ready,” she challenged, her voice dark and smoky, with an inherent sexuality that couldn’t be faked. There was nothing fake about the woman who stood in front of him—she was stripped as bare as she could be—and if there was really a ghost haunting her, she could be stripped far more than she ever thought possible. And she wouldn’t like it.

  “Really? What happened to the anything clause?” he asked.

  “Do you always take advantage of desperate women?”

  “I never take advantage of any women. You’re the one who came up with the offer. Like I said, I’d be more than happy to find you another photographer.”

  She sighed and backed down. “They say you’re the best. And I need the best.”

  Yes, he was the best at what he did. Always had been, which was why he was as haunted as the spirits he helped. “You haven’t been eating. Or sleeping.”

  “Do you always state the obvious? I know I look like death warmed over. Nothing like I used to be in the magazines, right?” She gave a short laugh. “As if you don’t know all of that is retouched.”

  “I told you, I don’t work with people. Which means you’ll have to do exactly what I say or I’m out of here.”

  “I can do that,” she said, and he believed her, even as he wished at the same time that it wasn’t true. There was a small spark there, and even though Hex only knew her from the before-and-after photos he’d studied, he sensed that Brenna was a shadow of her former self. He didn’t like that, and he didn’t want to think about why it bothered him so much.

  He ran his hands through his hair and realized he’d have to actually move into this place if he wanted to help her. Bringing out a ghost and convincing it to leave for the Other Side wasn’t a sideshow trick done in the course of an hour. No, there was a fine art to the deal, and one that Hex respected too much to try to rush through. “Before I came into the house, the only time you felt the activity was when a camera was trained on you?”

  “Yes.”

  His eyes caught hers. “I’ll stay through the morning. Then I’ll go collect my things—I’m going to have to stay here until this job is done.”

  “Okay. But you should know…there might not be any electricity. Or hot water.”

  “Trying to scare me off?”

  “No. No,” she emphasized, shaking her head hard.

  “Don’t worry—I’ve worked under worse circumstances.”

  “I wish I could say the same thing. How and where do you want me?”

  “Are you always this agreeable?”

  “When my entire career is on the line, yes.”

  He couldn’t shake the feeling that there was so much more on the line, like his body and soul. This whole scene was far too reminiscent of that single haunting he tried so hard to forget.

  There was too much here to pull his focus askew.

  “On the couch. Keep your clothes off.” He fiddled with the shutter speed, glanced up to check out the lighting she had available.

  Right—candles. Only candles. When he glanced at them, she crossed her arms in front of her breasts and squared her shoulders proudly. He didn’t make any comments about turning on the lights and started snapping pictures instead, camera at arm’s length.

  Almost instinctively, she put her hands up, as if she’d been photographed before without her consent and still harbored resentment.

  “Relax, I’m just taking some test shots—I’m not even focused on you. And I’m not going to do anything with these pictures but use them to help you. All I ask is that you do the same and not use them for personal gain or public consumption. They stay between us and get destroyed when this is all solved.”

  She nodded. “Fair enough.”

  He continued snapping as she moved, off to the side and out of range of his shots. “You don’t like spirits much, do you?”

  “Not when they ruin my life.”

  “They don’t mean to, you know. Most of them are just…lost. Kind of like you are right now.”

  She opened her mouth, as if she was going to reply to that, but she didn’t. “Let’s get this over with,” she said instead.

  He didn’t bother to tell her that they’d barely begun.


  The spirit hadn’t come into the room yet, but the air had already started to change, as though it would crackle and snap any second. The heat became nearly unbearable. He fought an urge to strip down himself to catch any breeze that happened through the half-opened window and wondered if it was truly the heat, or the sight of Brenna naked. She was thinner than she’d been, but her body was a perfect model’s hanger—and her face held the cross between innocence and seduction that enticed the camera.

  What he did when photographing spirits came close to what photographers referred to as shadow play, the interaction of light and dark. Shadows were powerful to shoot—emphasizing form over detail.

  Brenna’s body was a perfect combination of shadow and light. The pictures would be startling, beautiful…just like Brenna herself.

  His vision blurred as flashes of black and white, blues and purples, a dizzying array of images that popped like too many flashbulbs threatened to overwhelm him, even though he wasn’t actually looking through the camera’s lens yet.

  This was too much—he’d taken on too much in this agreement. He’d known that from the moment he’d walked into Brenna’s mansion, the moment he’d walked down the street that led to her house. The moment he’d gotten out of bed.

  But still, he was here and she was stripped naked for him, as he’d asked, and his body began its familiar ache.

  “Why don’t you pose on the love seat?” he pointed to the small chaise in the middle of the room. Even in the half light, he spied the intricately carved wood that ran along the top and the legs and knew it must be an antique. The rest of the house was strangely bare, and he wondered why she’d hung on to that particular piece, one that could probably pay her electric and water bills for the next few months.

  She complied, draped herself across the cushions so her lower body turned teasingly in a don’t-you-wish-you-could-see-all-of-me position, while she hid her breasts seductively behind her arm.

  It was a pose Hex was all too familiar with, the first one of the now-famous photo spread in the men’s magazine.

  Unaware that he owned the issue, Brenna had sent him the pictures with a note, told him that she believed something paranormal was going on that was affecting them. He’d been able to feel the desperation behind her letter, even though she’d attempted to cover her fear by signing her name like an autograph.

  He’d studied the photo spread, tracing the blurred features of Brenna’s body with a long index finger, as if he were actually caressing her curves.

  The pictures were the least graphic that magazine had ever produced and yet there was something extremely sensual about them that drew men like crazy.

  No one could stop talking about it. Hex couldn’t stop thinking about it, dreaming about it.

  He’d pore over those pictures, use magnifiers, and then he’d close his eyes and see the images of Brenna’s gorgeous, blurred form and he’d break out in a sweat, his body shivering from near simultaneous heat and chill, his body roaring for release.

  He’d felt as if he’d been the one to take those photos, even though that was ridiculous. But he swore that if he closed his eyes tight and rubbed his fingers on the pictures, he was with her, in that room, with the camera clicking away at full speed.

  “Is this going to happen? Because the faster we do this, the faster I can salvage my career,” she said.

  “Right, I forgot—Hollywood’s calling.” He took a deep breath and brought the camera up to his eye, the way he’d done a million times before, less than an hour before, even, outside the house. But this was different—this was capturing a spirit who’d actually attached itself to a human being.

  Rare, but it did happen.

  As always, the vision of that haint from hell flashed in front of his eyes, the demonic image burned onto his brain, thanks to the single encounter with it when he was seventeen years old. Whenever he thought about it, he’d repeat the Scottish prayer his mother used to soothe him with like a mantra. She’d always told him that it would make everything bad go away.

  From ghoulies and ghosties

  And long-legged beasties

  And things that go bump in the night,

  Good Lord, deliver us!

  He knew much, much better now, and yet he still said the prayer anyway.

  “Have you ever sensed spirits or ghosts here before?” he asked, in hopes of quelling the panic that threatened to make him leave the room.

  “Yes—when I was growing up, there were always hot and cold spots, strange noises. Nothing sinister. And nothing out of the ordinary for New Orleans.”

  “Your mom sensed them as well?”

  “Yes. But it was stronger for her, obviously. I don’t have the gifts she had,” she said quietly, and he wondered when to reveal the fact that he had that gift himself or if he even should. He could do more than prove Brenna was being haunted—there was a very real possibility that he could help rid her of the spirit, if the bastard would just show his face.

  He needed the spirit to come out and play. While simultaneously wishing it would just go away on its own.

  Brenna was waiting for him to make his next move.

  “Have you ever just asked it to leave?”

  “I’m pretty sure it’s a he…don’t know why. And yes, I’ve asked. Begged. Pleaded. I’ve tried burning candles and sage, and smudging the ashes around the doorways. I’ve tried everything.”

  Hex would have to tempt the spirit out—and bruise his ego. And he was tired of wasting time. “Come on, Brenna baby, you know you want to show it all to me,” he said, hiding his expression behind the safety of the camera’s lens, shooting film all the while.

  She tensed visibly at the change of his tone, and the spirit’s anger shot through him fast and hard, seconds before he actually saw the vision of the man in the 1920’s-style suit and hat standing behind the chaise. It was threatening to touch Brenna’s bare shoulder.

  Hex fought the urge to growl and stop shooting, but he didn’t. Whether Brenna could sense the near touch or not, he couldn’t tell, but she’d frozen up again, and the spirit’s hand began to wander too close for Hex’s comfort as it continued to stare at Hex and mouthed, She’s all mine…forever…

  “No!” Hex roared, yanked the camera away and stared at the space where he knew the man’s spirit still stood. Brenna glanced between him and the area behind the couch in confusion. “Come here, Brenna,” he said, in a tone that left no room for argument.

  Dealing with the ramifications of Brenna’s haunting tonight meant first showing the spirit who was in charge here. And that was most definitely Hex.

  She’d have no way to handle the ghost’s touch. He knew all too well what a touch would do and he even hesitated before he basically yanked her up and took the brunt of the touch.

  Arlen Rousseau’s emotions invaded Hex’s senses—Hex felt intense elation, which soon gave way to the pain and torment Hex remembered feeling the first time a tortured spirit had touched him.

  Knocked flat on his back as Arlen’s emotions surged through his, Hex was vaguely aware of Brenna leaning over him, her hands gently stroking his face…Arlen’s face.

  Mattie…

  Arlen was attempting to invade, trying to take over Hex’s body. If Hex wouldn’t let Arlen have and haunt Brenna—who Arlen believed was someone named Mattie—Arlen would try to find another, more effective way, and that would be through Hex.

  She’s beautiful…I don’t want to share her with anyone, Arlen whispered, and Hex got it, understood why Arlen was smudging Brenna’s images. It was a possessive respect that could easily border on the horrifying if Hex couldn’t shake free of this possession.

  She’s not Mattie, you’re disenfranchised…you’re lost, Arlen…

  Not lost…found, Arlen whispered back, and Hex found his own hand reaching out to stroke Brenna’s cheek. She pulled back slightly, as though surprised by both the familiarity and sensuality of the touch, but he heard himself whispering, “So beautiful,” and she soften
ed.

  But for now, Hex was half possessed and still struggling to retain himself. And although his mind and body had responded easily to Brenna’s beauty before, the need doubled, until he was propping himself on his elbows and pulling her already naked form toward his. He needed Brenna now as much as he wanted her—and joining with another body physically would strengthen his protective aura. Being locked together would save them both from the possession…at least for now.

  “Take my clothes off, Brenna,” he said in a voice that didn’t exactly sound like his. It didn’t matter; it was as if they’d both been pulled into some kind of force field of EMGs—electromagnetic activity—supplied by Arlen. EMGs could be produced by many things other than ghosts—batteries, pipes, you name it—and they could cause everything from hallucinations to physical sickness.

  The same reactions one could have when an actual ghost was attempting to invade, which was exactly what was happening to Hex now.

  Brenna’s hands fumbled along his shirt—she pulled it off, her palms ran along his chest in a way that made him shiver.

  “I want to touch you…I’m going to touch you,” he said as he warred for control over his own body and free will.

  Brenna unzipped his pants, and she was already touching him, as if she couldn’t stop.

  When he kissed her, doors and windows began to slam open and shut as the spirit reacted. She tasted like dark, rich chocolate, sweet and bitter at the same time, and he knew for sure he was in too deep.

  This was insane. Hex had collapsed for no apparent reason, had come to a few seconds later to make sensual demands, and now she was kissing him like he was her lifeline.

  Which he was, and she’d played her hand so early in the game that she couldn’t protest now. Not that she wanted to, because she’d never been kissed like this in her life.

  Hex’s tongue teased her lips, pushing at the seam like he wanted in, and then drawing back before she could decide how far she wanted to go. Of course, seeing how she had offered herself to him just an hour ago and now had his cock in her palm, how far she’d go wasn’t exactly a mystery.