Ghost Horse

by Patricia Rosemoor

  Damian groaned and turned me until my back was pressed up against a stall wall. His hands skimmed my sides—waist to breasts, breasts to thighs. His fingers curled in the material of my skirt and he inched it upward. Sensation ran down my thighs and up to my center. A wet warmth pooled there in anticipation of his more intimate touch.

  When his fingertips skimmed my thighs, I moaned into his mouth and spread my legs for him. No need for further invitation. Bold fingers slid along my panties, now damp with my growing desire. He hooked the elastic and found the swollen wet center. One touch and my mind began to float…my heart began to pound…my body began to tremble….

  I needed this. I’d needed it for so long. Not simply the promise of sexual satisfaction, but a deeper meeting, a total connection with someone who validated everything I’d yearned for in my life.

  “Damian!” I cried as he touched my center and I felt my universe begin to shift.

  He answered with another kiss, his tongue plunging into my mouth, his finger plunging into my body. I quaked and clung to him and felt my mind shatter.

  He held me until I floated back down and my heart settled into a steady beat.

  And then he pulled back, took my hand and led me into the stall. We kissed again, and I wanted to give him the same pleasure he’d given to me.

  The thought that someone had gotten rid of Dawn and now wanted to do the same to me drifted at the back of my mind.

  If I didn’t make love to him the way I wanted to now, I might not have another chance….

  I attacked his zipper with trembling fingers. My legs were like rubber and I stumbled into him. He fell back against the hay bale, bringing me with him on top of the blanket. I could feel him hard and ready for me against my inner thigh. He tugged at my panties and freed me of them, then pulled me over him. As I straddled him, I heard the crinkle of foil and knew he was putting on a condom. When he was ready, I sank down his length with agonizing slowness.

  His groan inflamed me. I held his hot gaze, and as I began slowly rocking over him, I unbuttoned my blouse. His gaze touched my breasts…followed by his hands.

  He thumbed me through the lace-trimmed material of my bra until my nipples stood out in hard peaks. Then one hand slid down where we were joined together, his fingers slipping against my center.

  “Now,” he whispered, urging me with his hips.

  I rode him deeply and wildly as if this were the only time we would be together like this.

  As indeed it might be….

  When I came this time, it was like riding out a storm—thunder and lightning and pelting rain. And in the midst of my climax, Damian shuddered inside me. We panted in unison and stared at each other for an interminable moment as if to ask, What now?

  Then Damian pulled me to his side, where he held me as if he would never let me go.

  Chapter Fourteen

  Only after I slept for several hours did I wake wondering what I had been thinking in becoming intimate with my employer.

  I looked down at Damian, softly snoring, and my heart did a dance. He was so darkly handsome that it nearly hurt to look at him, but look I did—at the thick lashes brushing his cheeks, the bared chest and arms roped with muscle from hard work, the narrow waist, muscular thighs and the part of him that had brought me most pleasure. Even now he seemed nearly ready to please me yet again.

  Before that could happen, before I talked myself into believing there could be something lasting between us, I slipped from his side, gathered my clothes flung around the hay bales, and put them on as fast as I was able to manage.

  What would a man like Damian Graylord want with his daughter’s tutor?

  I was about to slip away unnoticed when I realized he was awake and watching me through slitted eyes.

  “Why such a hurry to get away, Chloe?”

  “It’s almost morning.”

  “Were you planning on just leaving me?”

  The words echoed hollowly through my head, and I almost believed they had a deeper significance than my trading the barn for the house.

  I shook the thought away.

  “I was just going to my room.” After all, now that my head had cleared of the lust he’d instigated, I didn’t want to fool myself into thinking there would be more than sex between us. At least, not on his part. “You were sleeping.”

  “I’m not sleeping now, so the least you could do is kiss me good morning.”

  My knees threatened to give way, but I steeled myself and backed toward the stall opening. “I wouldn’t want to give you any ideas.”

  “I have ideas enough already.”

  I could see that he did.

  Making a choked sound, I fled the stall and swore I heard laughter follow me out of the barn. Damian laughing? Would the surprises never end?

  So why wasn’t I enjoying them? Why did I want to run? Part of me felt like getting in my car and driving and never looking back. I could take with me a few sweet memories of Damian and Nissa, with them still believing in me.

  But what about Dawn?

  Perhaps my friend had staged her own disappearance to cover up her connection to Centaur’s death. But what if she hadn’t? What if the truth was more complicated than that? I knew I had to finish what I’d started and ferret out the truth.

  Crossing the yard to the house, I felt as if hidden eyes followed. Priscilla’s? Was she still here? Or someone more dangerous? My pulse twitched and my breath grew shallow and my ears seemed to ring with panic. I hurried, watching for any threat, but I noted nothing out of place as I let myself in the back door and rushed up the stairs.

  By the time I got to the second floor, I was calmer. I was also aware of a scratchy discomfort at the base of my neck. As I reached my door, I pulled out a handful of straw from the back of my blouse—a reminder of what I’d been doing with Damian. The fresh hay scent made me smile.

  Then another door clicked open and a faint voice called out, “Mama?”

  I jerked around to see a pajama-clad Nissa standing outside her door. As she focused on me—on what was in my hand—her forehead pulled into a frown.

  Then her accusing gaze met mine. “You were in the barn with Dad? All night?”

  “Nissa—”

  She flew into her room and slammed the door behind her. I was torn about going to her. Explanations might be better left unmade.

  Besides, what was I supposed to tell her? Certain that she’d guessed her father and I had done more than just talk, I was equally certain she hated the idea. Kids always hoped their estranged parents would get back together, and she’d seen her mother on the grounds. No doubt Nissa’s had been the eyes I’d felt watching me come from the barn. No doubt she had hoped it was Priscilla.

  My mood plummeting, I retreated to my bedroom. I didn’t want to hurt Nissa. She’d experienced enough emotional trauma over the past year. It wouldn’t be fair to make her suffer over my night of passion, one that I would make certain wasn’t repeated. Damian and I had no future, and there was no sense in acting as though we did. I wondered if I could pretend that nothing had happened—that I hadn’t fallen for Damian Graylord—and fool Nissa into believing that.

  One glance in the mirror told me I’d already betrayed myself to the girl. My hair was a tousled mess with bits of hay sticking out all over. In my haste to leave the barn, I’d misbuttoned my blouse. And the reddish splotch on my neck was a definite giveaway.

  What kind of disaster had I wreaked?

  AS THE MORNING PROGRESSED Damian’s mood quickly turned foul. First Theo called in saying he had a family emergency and wouldn’t be in until sometime that afternoon. Then he’d realized his brother had done a disappearing act. Alex had driven off right after dinner the night before and hadn’t so much as called in to say where he was or what time he was planning on getting back. Clifford had shown up—surly as usual—and was mucking the stalls.

  Everything else was in Damian’s lap, and he’d had to take time out to talk to the deputy who’d finally co
me around to take stock of the feed theft.

  All the while he was working, his mind buzzed off and on with the women in his life. Memories of Chloe’s softness and warmth were overshadowed by his exasperation with his ex-wife, who was invading his space at the least, responsible for the attacks on Chloe at the worst.

  When had Priscilla changed? he wondered. Or had she really? Perhaps he’d been so enamored of her sexual allure when he’d met her that he’d been blinded to the truth of her nature. Well, he’d quickly learned what she was—a coldhearted liar and a cheat. All that sex appeal had been, and was still, part of her facade. Nothing he’d believed about her had been genuine. As skilled as she’d been in bed, he’d never once felt with her what he’d felt with the less-experienced Chloe the night before on that simple bed of hay.

  Chloe… Thinking about her calmed him down so he could get some work done. Thinking about her made him smile. Thinking about her made him believe there was some hope for his future.

  He kept remembering her responses to him—genuine, without artifice. Each time she’d climaxed, she’d seemed genuinely surprised. He was getting hard just thinking about it. About her. About them together.

  He decided if he wanted to get his work done, he’d better stay away from the young woman who obsessed his thoughts and his body, so he had Mrs. Avery deliver his lunch to the barn office. Eating there would allow him to keep an eye on the mare whose foal was overdue. He’d give her one more night, and then he’d call the vet to check on her, just in case she was the latest victim of the farm’s bad-luck cycle.

  The housekeeper came with his lunch on a tray that she set on his desk. There was a generous bowl of Merle’s warmed-up chili, a couple of thick slices of bread, a mug of coffee and a couple of fat chocolate-chip cookies.

  “Will that be all, Mr. Damian?”

  “For lunch? That’ll do it.”

  The housekeeper nodded and started to leave.

  “One moment, Mrs. Avery.”

  She turned back to him, her eyebrows raised question marks.

  Damian kept his tone casual when he said, “About Priscilla…how is she?”

  “Why, however would I know?”

  “You keep in touch with her, don’t you? When was the last time you saw her?” For a few seconds he saw the guilt in her expression before she covered.

  “I’ll have to think about that.”

  “I mean what time…last night?”

  The housekeeper turned more ashen than usual. “I…I’m not certain I know what you mean, Mr. Damian.”

  “Let’s not play games. I know my ex-wife was here last evening. Nissa saw her.”

  “Nissa is a child with a child’s imagination.”

  “But Chloe isn’t. So has Priscilla been the one in the attic searching for the Equine Diamonds? Or was that your nephew? Or perhaps Priscilla and Larson together?” He’d never discovered the identity of his ex-wife’s lover, but Jack Larson fit the bill in more ways than one.

  The housekeeper drew herself up stiff and straight as if she had a steel rod for a spine. Her lips were pursed in disapproval, as if she was trying to appear formidable. Intimidating, even. But Damian was in no mood to humor her.

  “I hope Priscilla or your nephew is willing to take you in, Mrs. Avery, because if I catch either one of them in my house or on my property without my knowledge again, you will no longer be employed by Graylord Pastures. Is that clear?”

  “Yes, sir,” she said stiffly. “But if I may…I never let either of them into the house.”

  “Semantics. You knew they were there, and—”

  “Not ‘they.’ Your wife.”

  Now he was getting somewhere. “I am no longer married to Priscilla, Mrs. Avery. You know that. You also know she’s been searching for those cursed diamonds in the attic. That’s why you locked the door—so no one could accidentally stumble in on her. And you stood guard while she was up there.” Her not denying it was as good as an admission. “That’ll be all, then.”

  He followed her out of the office and watched her walk the length of the barn without looking back once. He might pay her salary, but it was obvious her loyalties still lay with his ex-wife. Even if she never let Priscilla into the house again, he should replace the housekeeper. At the moment the task seemed daunting. And how could he pull someone new into the household when he didn’t know how long he would be able to pay her?

  He settled down to his lunch and ate in record time. He checked on the mare again—she was getting restless—then went back into the office to call Priscilla for the third time that day. Yet again he got her voice mail.

  “Priscilla—dammit, return my call! I want to know what the hell you think you’re doing, sneaking around here and upsetting Nissa. We had a deal written in stone! I paid you well to stay away for good, and I expect you to abide by the terms of the contract!”

  A rustling behind him warned him he wasn’t alone. Damian flipped around to find Chloe standing in the doorway, her great gray eyes wider than he’d ever seen them. She’d overheard his message. This was the moment he’d dreaded—her learning the truth about his divorce.

  “You actually paid your ex-wife to stay away?” she asked, sounding shocked.

  “I did it for Nissa.” His words were as stiff as his stance. “Priscilla wanted the money more than she wanted her own child.”

  “Then she should have been able to learn her mother’s true nature for herself.” Chloe’s eyes pleaded with him, but she kept her distance. “That doesn’t mean Nissa would have rejected her…or been like her. She’s her own person and she has you to guide her.”

  The moment he’d seen Chloe, he’d wanted to take her in his arms and lose himself as he had last night, but his ardor was cooling. “Our life would have been hell with Priscilla in it.”

  “You mean your life would have been hell.”

  “My life was already hell. Isn’t fourteen years a long enough sentence for allowing myself to be charmed by the wrong woman?”

  “You didn’t have to stay married to her all those years. You didn’t even have to see her just because your daughter did. Mrs. Avery could take Nissa to see her mother.”

  “I suppose she could,” Damian said, unable to stop the chill from entering his voice.

  Indeed, that had been an option, but he’d known that Nissa would have felt her loyalties ripped in two. She would have been caught in the middle between feuding parents forever. He hadn’t wanted a lifetime of strife for her. He’d truly thought that once Priscilla was out of her life for good, she would adjust and find happiness.

  “It’s not too late to admit you made a mistake,” Chloe said.

  “I did make a mistake fourteen years ago. Nissa was the only good thing to come of it.”

  Chloe’s expression was sad. He could feel her disappointment in him. So why did that make him feel worse than he already did?

  “I’m looking for Nissa,” she said, her tone now sounding distant. “Has she been to see you?”

  “No. Why? Is something wrong?”

  “Nissa saw me coming from the barn this morning. Apparently, she thought I was Priscilla until we had a face-to-face in the hall. She’s angry with me. She ate breakfast in silence. I couldn’t get her interested in a lesson, not even using horses.”

  Damian clenched his jaw. That kind of behavior reminded him of his ex-wife. “I’ll speak to her.”

  “Your talking to Nissa would be good—just not about me. I need to speak to her myself.”

  “She’s my—”

  “Daughter,” Chloe finished for him. “Yes, I know. You’ve reminded me often enough. But you can’t fix it this time, Damian.”

  Gearing up to tell her that he could and he would, Damian heard Clifford yelling, but couldn’t make out the problem.

  “What’s that about?” he muttered, moving to the nearest window to find out.

  The sight before him almost made his heart stop—his beloved child was in danger.

  I COULD
HARDLY BELIEVE IT when Damian shoved by me to get out the door.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “Nissa!”

  My pulse speeding as fast as my feet, I followed him through the barn and out the back door. My heart nearly stopped when I saw the cause of his concern.

  Clifford was in the pasture, ineffectively trying to stop Nissa, who was riding what had to be the biggest, most powerful stallion on the farm. She wasn’t relaxed and sure of herself as she had been on Wild Cherry, and I could see her tension wiring straight to the horse. He threw up his great neck and changed the cadence of his trot. His legs were stiffer and pumping faster.

  “Nissa, stay calm and bring Satan’s Dance over here,” Damian said in a steady voice. “You can do it, honey.”

  I stopped at the fence, while he climbed over it and headed straight for her. I wanted to do more than watch, but I didn’t know what I could do. My efforts would undoubtedly distract Damian, so I stayed put.

  Either Nissa was ignoring her father or she was having so much trouble with the stallion that she wasn’t hearing him. Satan’s Dance was gathering himself up—his muscles were bunching, his dark bay hide shone with sweat, and if the foam around his mouth were any indication, he was working the bit.

  “Oh, Nissa…”

  This was her way of striking back at the people who’d disappointed her. This was the Nissa that I hadn’t seen since that first introduction. She was angry and she was scared and she was taking it out on herself.

  Please don’t get hurt….

  I gripped the fence board tightly and watched the dance between stallion, girl and men. Damian moved quickly and smoothly straight-on, while Clifford circled behind horse and rider. Nissa was trying her best to collect the stallion, but he was having none of it. The closer the men got, the more agitated he became, until with a shrill shriek, he lowered his head and triggered.

  Talk about a car going zero to sixty in six seconds being impressive, when the vehicle was flesh and bone, zero to thirty—and I swore that’s what Satan’s Dance was doing—was astounding. My heart in my throat, I watched Nissa, frightened but determined, body stretched low over the massive neck, her fingers tightly gripping the reins, as the horse flew around the pasture. Both men froze to the spot, and like me, I’m sure, prayed the horse wouldn’t stumble or startle, which he could do at any sudden movement. I prayed that Nissa could just hang on. Satan’s Dance couldn’t keep up this pace forever.