Shiver and Spice

by Kelley St. John

  “But when she got tired, and then again, right before she left, her body glowed brighter, not quite as bright as my usual spirits, but it was more gold than white.”

  Ryan cleared his throat. “I don’t know about the other things that are different, but that one does have a reasonable answer, based on what I remember about the middle.”

  “What is it?” Dax asked.

  “When I saw other spirits getting closer to the light, they always glowed brighter. I assumed that the closer a spirit was to crossing, the brighter their essence became.”

  Dax closed his eyes and pictured Celeste, getting brighter and brighter, right until she left. That did make sense, and he knew why he hadn’t thought of it on his own. Subconsciously, he hadn’t wanted to face the fact that touching him, kissing him, might have made it harder for her to fight the pull of the light. What if being with him today had forced her to cross? “Damn.”

  “Hey, man, I’m not saying she crossed over. I’m merely saying that when ghosts glow brighter, that usually means that they’re closer to the other side. She could still be in the middle. I fought crossing, remember? And if she wants to be with you the way I wanted to be with Monique, she’s fighting it too.”

  Dax swallowed, nodded. Celeste would fight it; he had no doubt. But she’d been weak today. “Thanks,” he said, standing. He needed to go back to the plantation and think, try to put the pieces together and figure out where Celeste was, and how to help her get where she needed to be—on this side, with him.

  “I’m not sure why you’re thanking us. I don’t think we were all that much help.” Tristan finished off his soda then tossed the can in the trash.

  “Talking through things always helps,” Dax said, knowing that they had, in fact, given him more to think about. Celeste was getting pulled toward the light, and he didn’t want to give the other side the advantage by making her weaker. But he did want her here, and to feel her body, her mouth, her everything against him again. “I’m going home.”

  Then he remembered the boxes in Ryan’s truck. “Hell, I’m being a louse. I’ll help you finish unloading first.”

  Tristan smirked. “We’re finished, and I was blowing off steam anyway. It wasn’t that much stuff, and I didn’t mind helping. I just like to complain.”

  “Now, that’s the truth,” Monique said. “I haven’t given you a haircut yet that you didn’t find something wrong with.”

  “Watch it,” Tristan warned, “or I’ll take my business elsewhere.”

  “As if you could find someone else to cut it for free.” Climbing out of Ryan’s lap, she took Dax’s arm and led him down the hall to the front of the house. When the two of them were out of earshot of Ryan and Tristan, she lowered her voice and asked, “Are you going to be okay?”

  “Yeah. Just got to figure out what’s going on, somehow,” he said.

  “I wish we could be more help. If Ryan thinks of anything else that might help you figure out what’s happening with her, I’ll call you, okay?” She looked past Dax to the back of Ryan’s truck, the tailgate opened to lie flush against the porch. “I’m really glad that was the last load. We’ve been hauling and unloading all day. And now I get to start unpacking it all.”

  Dax surveyed the boxes and furniture stacked in the foyer, in the dining room and down the hall. “I didn’t realize you had this much stuff, sis.”

  “I didn’t, but there’s tons of furniture in the attic at the plantation, and Nanette told me I might as well take some of it. I didn’t even realize she’d been going up there and covering it all in plastic to protect it from the storms. Or she did until we got the roof fixed.”

  “Nanette cares a lot about saving the old stuff, the furniture and the house,” he said.

  “As if you don’t care just as much. I don’t know what the rest of us would do without you two urging us on. And I’m glad you haven’t moved out of the plantation—I’d have felt a bit guilty leaving if I thought Nan was going to be living there and trying to keep that big place up alone.”

  “I love that place,” Dax said honestly. Truthfully, he’d never considered living anywhere else. Even when he went to LSU in Baton Rouge, he’d commuted, because he didn’t want to be that far from the house that meant so much to him. Nanette was right; the plantation was their legacy, and he planned to help her keep it that way, both by restoring it with the rest of the family and by finding proof that it was inhabited during the Civil War.

  “Whoa, where’d your mind go?” she asked.

  “Thinking about the house.”

  “Well, you should check out all the neat things up in the attic sometime. Most of it is still in plastic, but it’s in great shape, particularly for stuff so old.” She smiled. “I’m kind of excited about having furniture that belonged to our ancestors in mine and Ryan’s house. It’s nice to be able to give things a second chance to live, you know?”

  “Yeah, it is,” Dax agreed, but he wasn’t referring to old furniture. And he still had to figure out how to give Celeste her second chance.

  6

  CELESTE HAD NEVER had such a difficult time getting back to the middle. She stumbled, fell down, then used a wall for leverage to stand up again. She had to keep moving, had to get away from the cries behind her, and back to Dax. She’d found her way through with Prissy, with Adeline Vicknair’s help. She’d simply get back to the middle and ask Adeline to let her through again, and this time she’d beg the older woman to let her stay—at least long enough to make love with Dax just once, if she couldn’t be with him forever.

  With every ounce of her strength, she edged forward. She knew that the center room was near; a faint glow illuminated the pathway ahead, and she had no doubt that the glimmering was from its light. Was another spirit going through now? Or was a child there needing help? Both times when Celeste had helped children, she’d been able to see Dax. Maybe that’s why the light was there; another child was waiting and needing her help—needing their help.

  She finally reached the opening to the middle room, but was dismayed to see no other spirit in its center. She was completely alone, yet the light was steadily growing brighter, the same way it had when Cassie passed through. As always, Celeste felt drawn to its warmth, drawn to its unique allure. She was so cold, and she knew that merely getting nearer to that potent beam would warm her all over.

  She wanted to be warm again.

  Celeste didn’t want to pass through, she had to get back to Dax, but she did want to get warm. She stepped toward the light, leaned her head back and let the powerful glow wash over her from head to toe. It felt so good, so perfect. She took another step forward and knew before she looked that the opening had expanded. The blissful heat claimed the entire room now, warming her from the inside out, and her pains started to fade. She could feel her exhaustion lifting, and nothing but freedom from her burdens waiting on the other side.

  No more exhaustion, no more pain.

  Another step forward…

  Cries. Wails. Her name. All of those sounds echoed from the hallway to her right, the path she’d just come down. Why couldn’t she remember what was at the end of that path?

  “Celeste!” they yelled. “Please! No!”

  She swallowed, backed away from the powerfully tempting radiance, and immediately her exhaustion returned. The light had grown to nearly the size of a door, but now it started shrinking away, like golden water down a drain.

  Celeste fell to the floor. She knew those voices wanted her to go to them, but she didn’t want to. And now that the light had disappeared again, she wasn’t tempted to go in that direction either. She turned to her left, saw the edge of the path that led to Dax and crawled toward it. “Please,” she whispered, then licked her parched lips. “Adeline, please, let me through.”

  Nothing happened.

  Sobs tore from her chest, echoed against the roof of the dismal room and then came back to haunt her. “Please,” she pleaded, her body collapsing against the cold floor. She was not
going back down the other path until she saw him. She wouldn’t. “Let—me—in!”

  “Oh, darling, what have I done? You’ve barely rested, chère.”

  Celeste knew the owner of the voice. Adeline Vicknair had, once again, opened the pathway to Dax. Merely seeing the older woman, and knowing she had the power to send her back to Dax, gave Celeste a surge of much-needed strength.

  She sat up, then pushed to her feet. “I’ve got to see him again, Adeline. I’ve got to get back to him.”

  “Chère, you only left a few hours ago. If I let you back through, you won’t be able to stay any time at all. You’re simply too weak, child. You need to rest, and then, maybe, you can try again.”

  “I’m going now, and you’re going to help me,” Celeste said, with conviction. “I won’t rest until I do.”

  “But you see, dear, you have a choice to make. Either that way—” she pointed to the middle, where the light had been blazing merely seconds ago “—or that one.” Adeline indicated the path to the right, where the voices still called Celeste’s name. “Dax’s path can’t be your final destination. It isn’t an option, and every time you go to him, you risk losing the ability to choose. I know you want to see him, and I’m trying to help you.”

  “Then do. Let me through, Adeline. Help me,” she whispered.

  Adeline’s mouth flattened, then she closed her eyes as though deciding what to do.

  “Please,” Celeste urged.

  “On one condition.”

  “Anything.”

  The older woman stepped back and pushed the door wide, then she lowered her voice to a hushed whisper. “Promise me, chère, that you won’t tempt fate. Promise me that you won’t push yourself until you’re too tired to fight the light’s pull. If that happens, you will lose your ability to choose.”

  “I promise,” Celeste said, though she wasn’t completely certain she could keep that vow. How would she know when she’d stayed too long? She was tired the last time she was taken from him, but she didn’t enter the light. Surely she could keep it from happening again. She simply had to resist, be strong—strong for Dax. He was definitely worth the fight.

  Besides, she wasn’t concerned with having choices right now; in her mind there was only one choice to make, and she was making it.

  FOR DAX sleep was both an enemy and a friend. An enemy, because it took time away from his quest to get Celeste back, but a friend, because every time he closed his eyes, he found her in his dreams. And although he knew that that was what was happening now, that the dream had taken over, he didn’t care. Instead, he focused on making it as real as possible, so much that he could almost—almost—feel her presence nearby the bed. But ultimately he couldn’t deny that this was a dream; in reality, he’d never seen Celeste nude. But he saw her that way now.

  Dax had known she would be beautiful beneath the white gown, but beautiful was too weak a word for what he was envisioning now.

  She was exquisite.

  Long, golden curls tumbled freely past her shoulders, teasing the tips of her breasts. She stood before him, her skin satin smooth and glowing faintly, as he took his time appreciating her beauty, imprinting her image on his thoughts to hold on to for eternity.

  He never wanted to forget this moment. He never wanted to forget her. “Move your hair,” he said. “Please, I want to see you, Celeste, all of you.”

  With a soft, seductive smile, she pushed her long curls behind her shoulders, and his jaw clenched tight. Her breasts were fuller than he’d anticipated, high and taut and beautifully exposed, the tips hard points that he longed to lick, taste, suck. Her waist was slim and gently flared outward to curved hips and well-toned legs. Between those legs, soft, blond curls covered her most tender flesh, and Dax grew painfully hard merely looking at her and imagining touching her there, kissing her there, coming inside of her there.

  “I need you, Celeste.” His words were rough, strained and commanding. “I’ve waited for this for too long, and I don’t want to wait any longer.” He watched her step closer to his bed. “How long do we have?”

  Her touch on his wrist caught him by surprise. He hadn’t realized she was that close, and he hadn’t seen her reach for him, but she was definitely touching him now, the searing sensation that he’d experienced earlier, the first time she’d touched him, heating his body like a brushfire, causing him to groan in near pain, in near ecstasy.

  He tried to reach for her, but his arm didn’t move. “Celeste?” His brain told him this wasn’t really happening; it couldn’t be. She was still gone, still somewhere in the middle, in a place he couldn’t go, but this dream seemed so real that he didn’t want it to end, not before he had her, if only in his mind.

  He refused to open his eyes, refused to let reality in, but still her image was fading. Something was taking the vision away, and he suspected he knew what that something was, or rather who. Hell, he didn’t like following their rules, but he did, every time. And now that he needed something, needed Celeste, the powers that be weren’t even willing to give him a damn fantasy?

  No! Dammit, don’t take this too!

  Her searing touch moved to his other wrist, and he felt his arm being pulled above his head. Heat, once again, spread over him, and he could feel sweat beading from his pores. More than mere warmth, the lust, the pent-up desire, sizzled throughout his flesh, and Dax could no longer keep from verifying what he now suspected.

  This wasn’t a dream.

  He opened his eyes and saw the woman currently binding his wrist to the bedpost, long spirals of hair cascading around her shoulders the same way that they had in his dream. She wasn’t nude anymore, proof enough that he wasn’t dreaming. Instead, she wore the long, white gown, and her face was intent on what she was doing, securing him to the bed. His arms were stretched in a V and fastened to each of the bedposts. She was here, with him, and she’d tied his hands in preparation for…everything. “I’m not dreaming.”

  “No, you aren’t,” she said, knotting one of his silk neckties around his wrist as she spoke. She finished, then turned toward him. “You were dreaming of me,” she said with a smile, and her silver-gray eyes glittered as she spoke.

  “I’ve dreamed of you every night for the past two months,” he said. “But this time, it was so real, even before you touched me.”

  “Dax, I—I know I won’t have long this time. I was supposed to rest before I came, but I couldn’t stay away. I needed more.”

  He knew exactly what she meant. “I know. I need more too. I need you, Celeste.”

  She swallowed. “I want to touch you again, and to kiss you again, but—”

  “But?” he asked, and he prayed that she wasn’t going to say that she wouldn’t touch him this time. He needed her touch, ached for it, didn’t know if he’d keep breathing without it. His skin still tingled from where she’d bound his wrists, and he wanted to burn like that everywhere. And he suspected that the same exhilarating near- orgasmic feeling that he experienced every time she touched him was reciprocated. He could tell by the way her skin instantly flushed when she touched him, by the way her eyes grew darker, more intense, filled with need.

  “But I know now that every time I touch you, I’ll grow weaker, and while I don’t plan to let that stop me, I want you to know that if I’m pulled away again, that’s why.”

  He focused on her words, and wrapped his brain around the biggest problem they were facing. “So that is what makes you leave,” he stated. “Touching me.”

  “Growing weak makes me leave, and interacting with someone who is living makes me weak.” She smiled almost playfully. “But I want to interact with you, Dax, as closely as I possibly can.”

  He smiled as well, but continued to try to figure out how they could make the most of their time together. He wanted her, there was no denying that, and he really didn’t want to wait to make it happen. But if touching him made her leave quicker…

  “Hell, this is going to be tough, but I want you here, for as
long as you can stay.” He took a deep breath, thought about her hands caressing him, igniting him, burning. “How do you feel now?”

  She brought her mouth close to his. “Excited.”

  He laughed. “You’re not going to make this easy.”

  “Make what easy?” she asked, and he could swear she was inhaling his scent as she spoke. But that wasn’t possible. Or it shouldn’t be. Ghosts shouldn’t inhale anything, but then again, ghosts shouldn’t sleep, either.

  “My proposition. That we talk for a while first, before you touch me, and before you grow weaker.”

  “That’s probably still considered interacting with someone who’s living, don’t you think?” she asked, and her eyes grew darker still as she tenderly put her tongue against his lower lip, then slid it inside.

  Dax couldn’t stop her. And hell, he didn’t want to. He opened his mouth and accepted the sweet taste of her, sizzling and even more intense than the touches on his wrists. There was a living flame within her, hotter than anything he’d ever experienced with a breathing woman, and he couldn’t get enough. His tongue joined hers and they stroked against each other as she moved on top of him, the satin fabric of her gown and his thin sheet the only obstacles between her body and his.

  Her gown. Memories of his conversation with Ryan invaded the moment, bringing with it the realization that he needed to try to control the sexual intensity of this, or she’d disappear again, and he’d have wasted a chance to find out how to hold on to this, hold on to her, for longer than a mere visit.

  It took every ounce of willpower to break away from her kiss. “Celeste. Please.”

  “Anything,” she whispered. “Just tell me what to do. I want to learn.”

  Have mercy, she was going to be the death of him. “Trust me, you’re doing fine,” he said, then pulled against his restraints to move his head up on the pillow. She hadn’t bound him overly tight, and he suspected that if he pulled hard enough, both hands would be free. But hell, that’d really get him in hot water with the powers that be, wouldn’t it? And they had let her come back, even if only briefly, so he didn’t want to do anything to piss them off.