From the Dark

by Michele Hauf

  But she’d met appealing men before, and few of them had the same impact on her as this man did.

  Sure, he was handsome—and, to judge from his cocky stance as he’d displayed himself for her to admire, he knew it. Tall men always attracted her, for they represented strength and longevity. Two very important requirements in any prospective man.

  He’d stood in the doorway, legs spread and shoulders set back—commanding. Open to her, yet a little guarded. Or maybe it had been shyness? No, absolutely not.

  And that sudden bright, friendly smile had really worked a number on her. Enough to keep her up thinking about him like some silly crushing fan girl.

  “Oh, Jane, smarten up,” she silently told herself.

  Jane recognized the signs of an oncoming train wreck. She’d done artists, and a musician before. Love was too complicated. What if it didn’t work out? A relationship with a man whose job description listed spotlight and groupies was not conducive to living the peaceful life she enjoyed. Nor should she even consider a relationship! This was a job, not a cozy singles’ meet.

  Had she done the right thing by agreeing to stay here with him? It wasn’t as if he could go elsewhere—this was his friend’s house.

  But it wasn’t as if she could leave, either. This location offered the privacy she required for the ritual.

  In truth, she couldn’t deny it felt good to have another presence in this big empty house. There were days she was too close to believing her father’s claim that she’d become a hermit.

  All she needed to do was figure out a way to ensure Michael wasn’t around on the night of the full moon. Nothing a concert at a local nightclub couldn’t do to lure him. She’d have to check the local listings, so she could be prepared, and start dropping hints early.

  The clunk of booted footsteps clued Jane that Michael walked down the hall toward the workroom. So he hadn’t been in the studio, after all.

  Jane pushed up her safety glasses—thick black plastic frames—and peered toward the open doorway, though the glasses distorted all things at a distance.

  He’d stopped. Just outside the door? Or had he turned back?

  Had she really heard footsteps?

  Tilting her head and compressing her lips, Jane decided she must have invented the sound as an accompaniment to her busy thoughts. Although…

  She waited. No, no one walked by the doorway.

  Her skin prickled with an intuitive apprehension, so much so, that she looked at her arms to see the hairs had risen.

  Hmm…She was sharing the house with a stranger. A man she knew nothing about. Just because he was famous didn’t mean he couldn’t also be a serial killer.

  “Oh, brother.” Rolling her eyes, and reaching for another piece of glass, Jane dismissed her idiot ideas.

  Jane.

  Pausing abruptly, the scratch of the steel cutting wheel over the smooth glass fumbled, and glass splinters serrated from the edge of the small piece. Jane pressed her fingers to her chest and drew in a breath. Had the wind whispered her name?

  Twisting a look over her shoulder, she eyed the open window. Night had crept up on her without warning, and she could barely discern the outline of tall oak trees that bordered the property for the leaves joined and formed a frothy black mist that distorted her view of the waxing moon.

  Shifting her weight from her left foot to her right set the hardwood floor to a groan. She’d been setting off that funky creak all day, but now, it sounded ominous.

  Jaaa-ane.

  Now that she heard.

  Her name. No doubt about it. But not audibly spoken. Inside her head?

  “Mon Dieu, the insanity in our family has finally touched me.”

  Unwilling to grant further merit to the eerie sensation, she set the glass cutter aside and marched over to the door. But her intent footsteps slowed as she gained the open doorway.

  What did she hope to prove by checking around corners and speaking to the voices in her head? Only that she truly may be slipping into imagined insanity. It was not hereditary. She knew that for a fact.

  “I’ve been working too long.” With a sigh, she turned away from the door and took off the safety glasses.

  A deep, commanding voice bellowed out of nowhere. Jane shrieked. A man appeared from outside the hallway.

  Michael moved swiftly, taking her in his arms. She suspected he realized he’d frightened her, and reached to console her. She tried to settle herself, but the weirdness of the moment tapped her last nerve and, as usual, she reacted with laughter.

  Fright actually made her jump. Nice.

  Michael leapt in for the attack. He grabbed Jane by the shoulders, tracking the scent of her fear, and swooped in toward her neck.

  But too quickly, the vivid fear scent dissipated—to be replaced with giggles.

  Caught up in the quest for a fix, Michael felt Jane’s reaction as a slap to the monster’s greed. He reeled back from her. Braced with hunger, and ready to feed, he had the sense to will his teeth back up into their sockets before she saw.

  “Jane?”

  “Oh!” Overtaken by laughter, she gestured at him with a loose hand, as she looked away and bent over double in mirth. “You frightened me!”

  That had been the intention. But the result was far from satisfactory. Or, obviously, frightening.

  “Do you often laugh at what scares you?” he asked. He had to know. For future attempts. And to sooth his bruised ego.

  “No.” She drew in a breath, then exhaled and fluttered her hand before her flushed face.

  Copper hair spilled over her shoulders and called to his base desires. Wrap that hair around his fist and pull her to him for—

  For what? A kiss? No, a long, deep taste.

  What would she taste like? Sin? No, that was pushing it. A bit of proper unbound, this woman. Not completely removed from a self-imposed leash, he mused, but probably wouldn’t protest too loudly should he sneak off the collar. So long as she didn’t laugh.

  “I was just feeling like someone was watching me, and then—well, you must have been walking by, and the sight of you scared me.”

  “I see.”

  He reached to smooth away a strand of hair that had gotten caught on her eyelashes. But in actuality, Michael wanted to feel that fiery red cheek before the blush completely dissipated. The color faded immediately, and so he drew back his fingers just before they contacted her pale skin.

  “I have been known to raise a scream or two from women, but never laughter at the sight of me.”

  “I’m so sorry.” Hands propped upon her hips, Jane settled herself.

  Michael fixed his gaze to the sensuous slide of thin silk across her full breasts, tight there, where her nipples poked out temptingly. He diverted his eyes, slowly, down the slender curve of her waist, and to just above her hips where the skirt clung. Could he span that narrow waist with both hands? Most definitely.

  And that hair! It had a mind of its own, probably even its own personality, and right now the copper and blonde strands were laughing at Michael.

  “Did you…” She sucked in another deep breath, and finally spoke with calm. “Did you say my name?”

  “No,” he lied. He hadn’t exactly spoken it aloud. But never before had the persuasion served him such ridiculous results.

  “Huh. Thought I heard my name.”

  “And that’s why you were so fearful?”

  “I wasn’t afraid.”

  Oh, yes she had been. He’d scented her fear, or rather, a heightened awareness that had tread the edge of fear. It had been delicious. And his leap into the room should have released the adrenaline throughout her system, flooding her veins with a heady treat for him.

  “Are you hungry?” she suddenly wondered. “I’m ready to call it a night. Haven’t eaten all day. I was thinking of taking supper out back so I could explore the garden in the twilight.”

  “Hungry.” He traced his tongue along his upper teeth, his lips closed. “I was, but my appetite
has suddenly gone. But I will join you outside. Twilight is my favorite time to be with a beautiful woman. The light tends to fall just so upon all that she can be.”

  Her eyes brightened. The rejection Michael had received from her reactionary laughter subsided.

  So she wasn’t afraid of a good scare? Next time, he’d have to be subtler.

  “I’ll meet you outside,” she said.

  Chapter 6

  J ane had gathered some fresh fruit in a bowl and mixed two goblets of kir—crème de cassis poured into champagne—and strolled out to sit in the grass before the garden.

  Michael showed up moments later. Sunglasses sat upon his head, though it was indeed twilight. The fact that he’d made a point of bringing the glasses along was curious.

  He settled into the overgrown grass beside her and leaned over her shoulder to inspect the booty. “I love cherries.”

  “Have at them.” She pushed the glass bowl of fruit toward him. “I don’t know why I bought them, because they’re not my favorite. Guess they looked too good to resist.”

  He picked around a piece of cut watermelon and claimed a ripe black cherry and popped it in his mouth. “You have difficulty resisting things, Jane.”

  She smirked at his teasing question. And yet, it had been more rhetorical. “Not men, Michael, just food.”

  “Harsh.”

  She turned to offer him a smile, but the sight of cherry juice drooling across Michael’s lower lip startled her. A thin stream of crimson glistened upon his lip.

  Jane gasped. Instinctively she reached for the wound, but—no, it’s not a wound. What strange memories the sight dredged up. Not even strange, mostly…familiar.

  She looked away. Had her heart fluttered a little faster? Silly woman, he was eating cherries with red juice. What did she expect?

  But she couldn’t prevent herself from looking back. Michael chewed and then spat the entire fruit over his shoulder into the grass. “You don’t eat the whole thing?”

  His tongue slipped out and dashed along his lips, the action wicked and more than a little tempting.

  “I like the taste of them, but I never swallow. The flesh is…I don’t know, not right going down.” He set the bowl in his lap and counted the small red fruits. “Eleven,” he announced.

  “I see.” She turned away, admonishing inwardly at her quickened heartbeats.

  If she so much as thought about the image of a man with a deep red stain on his lips, she’d have to laugh. Michael was certainly not—

  He popped another cherry into his mouth. Juice splashed his lower lip.

  Oh, please, now he’s just doing it to get a rise out of me.

  Yet her unease did not dissipate, and so in order to avoid it, Jane forced herself to focus on other things.

  Finishing off the goblet of kir, she then stood and approached the massive stone fountain she had spied from the upper floor. The head of a cherub peeked above a tight twist of emerald vine as if gasping out one last breath before being completely tugged under. The entire fountain was overgrown with weeds and climbing sumac that wielded three-pointed leaves of green shiny leather. The sumac tickled at her ankles, and forced her to step constantly in a sideways march about the fountain.

  Michael followed her to the garden’s edge, hands hooked at his hips, legs spread in an aggressive stance. He wore soft brown suede pants and a black T-shirt. Everything about him looked touchable. Accessible.

  Are you available for a wicked liaison?

  Michael smiled a daring grin, as if he sensed her thoughts.

  Avoiding the man’s searching blue gaze, Jane grabbed a bunch of dried vines and leaves and tugged them from the cherub’s bow and quiver of arrows. The desiccated foliage gave easily, and did not cry out. She dropped it on the ground, right on top of the creeping sumac. That gave it pause. Good.

  “Would you mind?” she said. “Give the bowl a shove to get it back on center.”

  Michael stared at the heavy stone piece, looking as if he couldn’t decide where to touch it.

  “Don’t tell me.” Jane blew rogue strands of hair from her eyelashes. She kicked at a nuisance vine creeping up the back of her leg. “The rock star isn’t up for manual labor?”

  “I have people who do this kind of stuff for me.”

  That impressed her not at all.

  “And here I thought you’d earned those biceps muscles. What are they, part of the costume? Earned by catching women’s panties?”

  Michael chuckled, tilting his head back in a grand gesture. “Oh, lady, if you only knew.” The gaze he fixed on her spoke a malevolent charm. Deadly, and yet, enticing.

  “Well.” She fisted her hands at her hips and kicked down the vine climbing her ankle. “I’m sure I don’t want to know.”

  “Panties and bras,” he corrected. “You wouldn’t believe the collection we had on the bus.”

  “I’m sure I wouldn’t. But I guess you appreciate that aspect of the job.”

  “Wouldn’t you? If some man tossed his boxers your way—”

  Jane put up a palm to stop him. “Please, Michael. Keep your boxers on.”

  “I don’t wear boxers.”

  A lift of her brow, and her eyes strayed to his crotch. One thing about musicians, they liked to wear their pants tight.

  Michael met her distracted gaze with a daring grin. His lip curled up on the right side—cherry-stained temptation—and it only enticed her all the more.

  Watch it, Jane. You’re not supposed to let them see you peek.

  She stroked the smooth edge of the stone bowl. “Despite what men tend to believe, we women prefer a man to keep his panties on.”

  “Boxers.”

  “Whatever.” Now she was just being silly. Was it so easy for her to fall for a sexy smile and a dangerous glance? “What men need to understand is that we women are not visual like you.” Well. Okay, maybe a little. “We prefer the seduction and romance of foreplay to a silly display.”

  “I’ll grant you that, though I wouldn’t call it a silly display.”

  “I’d call slinging one’s underwear through the air silly.”

  “To each his own. But I do know a little about women.”

  “Don’t you mean groupies?”

  He continued, “Women need seduction. The sweet nothings, the long, drawn-out foreplay. Roses and chocolates and all that romantic fluff. Fair enough. It serves a purpose. But we guys? We are all about the tangible.” He rubbed his thumb and forefinger together. “Let us see it, smell it, touch it and taste it. Oh, man, do I love to taste it.”

  Jane quirked a brow at his confession. Didn’t sound half bad, she decided. The man could taste her any time. Truly. She just wondered how long it would be before he attempted it. Because she wouldn’t push him away. Michael Lynsay was not the sort of man any sane woman would push out of her bed. And she was sane, and on the verge of becoming a hermit.

  She needed a man. In her bed. To remind her that she had not completely fallen asleep to life.

  Pacing around the fountain, she listened to his boots slash through the long grasses.

  “You don’t wear panties or a bra,” he commented in that same tone that tingled across her scalp and further heightened her awareness of his closeness. “I can tell. Those strappy shirts you wear are thin as tissue paper and I know there’s nothing underneath except skin and tits.”

  Jane snapped upright and, when she wanted to blast out how rude his comment was, she stilled her retort.

  Michael didn’t stand on the other side of the fountain. She bent to see if he’d squatted on the ground on the other side of the wide fountain base. Not there.

  The trace of wind through her hair, a little rougher than it should be, made her spin about to find herself less than a step away from the leering singer. Yes, he leered. Nothing whatsoever enticing about that triumphant grin.

  “I—I,” she fumbled for a reply, “didn’t see you move.”

  “Just checking for panty lines,” he offered co
olly. “None.”

  He gave a shove with his hip against the fountain bowl and the heavy stone basin slid into place. Now that was a triumphant, if a little arrogant, grin.

  “You don’t have people to do that,” she protested.

  “Just playing with you. I like to tease. Your reaction tells me a lot about you.”

  “Really?”

  “You’re guarded, but sometimes you can be more open. If you think it’ll get you what you want.”

  “You some kind of shrink?”

  “Ha! No, just an interested observer of the common woman.”

  Common. So like normal. Normal was all Jane had ever strived for. She’d come so close, had resigned herself to the mundane. Order, and keeping certain kinds of influence at a distance had always served her need for control.

  And now this man had charged into her well-ordered world, spouting his personal doctrine of panties, music and cherry juice.

  Still, the image of the juice streaming over his lip disturbed her. It shouldn’t, but it did.

  “I think you are the furthest thing from common,” she blurtted out.

  “I’ll buy that. I do get paid to be a showman. Seduce the fans to sing the music. Buy the music. Fill the stadium. Smile for the cameras, Mr. Lynsay, show us the fallen angel’s sad smile.”

  “And you’re quite self-occupied.”

  “Interesting deduction.” Michael leaned over the stone bowl. “And what about you? You are more uptight than your free-as-the-breeze earth mother appearance lets on.”

  “My—” Free as the breeze? Earth mother? Is that how he had summed her up? Jane wasn’t sure how to take that assessment. She wasn’t free as—But she should be. Her lusting soul certainly craved the adventure of another. “Don’t you have some music to blast?”

  “You sick of talking to me? You were the one to invite me out here.”

  Rain splatted on Jane’s nose. Another drop landed Michael’s cheek. Nothing steady, just a fine, intermittent mist.

  He tilted his head, studying her, but made no move to step closer.

  Jane felt the curve of the fountain against the backs of her calves. The edges of sumac leaves tickled the tops of her feet.