Sheer Madness

by Laura Strickland

  Patrick started up, his chair scraping back across the wooden floor.

  Topaz reached out and seized his arm. “Don’t, Patrick. He’s three sheets to the wind.”

  “Inebriated, you mean?” Patrick cocked his head in that endearing way he had and subsided into his seat. “Go away, little man.”

  The fellow bristled. “There’s no reason she can’t give me one dance.”

  “Listen, bud—I’m not in the mood.”

  “You will be.”

  The dandy reached out and touched Topaz’s hand and she felt a rush of sensation that in only two days had become familiar. It vibrated through her from the place where the fellow’s fingers met hers and arrested her where she sat.

  “Oh,” she said. “How did you—?”

  “Never mind that now. Dance with me.”

  Topaz got up like a woman in a trance—which, perhaps, she was—and moved into his arms. Sensation flooded through her as his hands closed around her waist, and hunger flared, curiously mingled with pleasure.

  From the instant she’d encountered him in her bedroom she’d longed to touch him. Now—in a way—she could.

  Her head spun. This, of course, wasn’t the way Romney Marsh truly looked—or smelled. But his essence now filled this flesh and assailed her senses, overriding the apparent. Strange and wonderful.

  She leaned closer. The music—a half jig—didn’t invite intimacy. She didn’t care.

  “You borrowed a body? I didn’t know you could.”

  “Neither did I. Amazing what can happen under the impetus of jealousy.”

  A faint English accent colored his speech. Topaz’s pulse picked up.

  “Jealousy?” He swung her around, and she moved closer. “Jealous of what?”

  “You’ve barely looked at anyone but that big Irishman since we came in.”

  “Patrick?” Topaz smiled. Didn’t he know what Kelly was? She decided to enjoy the dance before she told him.

  “What happened to the fellow who owns this body? Does he mind?”

  “Lulled by alcohol. Seems to be nine parts asleep. Besides, why should he object to touching you?”

  Romney slid his borrowed hands lower to cup her derriere and bring her still closer. His spirit enfolded her and set her tingling.

  Madness.

  Yet his emotions pulled at her, and she went with it, slid her hands up his shoulders and clasped them around his neck.

  The song ended, but neither of them stopped swaying back and forth. They hadn’t been dancing to the music anyway. After a moment, the band—observing them—struck up again, a slow rendition of “Give Me Your Hand.”

  Something inside Topaz melted, turned molten, and promptly caught fire. She pressed her body against her partner’s and gazed into his eyes.

  Not exactly handsome, this body he’d borrowed. Under ordinary circumstances Topaz wouldn’t look at him twice: a florid, fleshy face, bulbous nose, and eyes the unfortunate hue of mud. Now, though, she could see Romney’s spirit in those eyes, and the rest ceased to matter.

  After a moment he murmured, “I wonder how you taste? I’ve been longing to find out.”

  Her hands, at the back of his neck, were positioned perfectly to pull his mouth down. She met him with her lips parted, an open invitation.

  He tasted her at length and then, proving who he was, spoke into her mind. “Umm. Delectable. I might never get enough of that.”

  She had to break the kiss to reply. “As good as you imagined?”

  “Better.” He dove for her again, and Topaz pressed closer. She couldn’t imagine what Patrick or anyone else in the bar thought. She didn’t care, because Romney’s essence flowed through her and set her alight.

  Suddenly she wanted to shed all her clothes, offer herself to him completely. She broke the kiss again. “How long can you hold onto this body?”

  “I don’t know. Not long, I fear.”

  “Then come outside with me.” She wanted him in the cold and the dark, not in front of all these eyes.

  “Won’t your friend, Kelly, object?”

  “Why should he?”

  “Because it certainly looks as if the two of you have an intimate relationship.”

  “And that’s why you’re feeling jealous?”

  “Yes.” He admitted it readily, and Topaz smiled into his eyes.

  “No need. We’re just friends. I’ve never kissed him like this.” She laid her mouth to his again, wooing his spirit into her, addictive as strong drink.

  This time he broke the contact. “Why not? Good-looking bloke.”

  Her smile widened. “Don’t you know what Patrick is? An automaton. That’s a member of the famed Buffalo Irish Squad.”

  “What?” Romney’s borrowed head jerked round so he could face Patrick, who watched them lazily.

  Topaz laughed. “No matter, because it seems to have spurred you to a wonderful breakthrough. I’ve wanted you, Romney Marsh, since you first appeared in my room. And borrowed flesh is better than none.”

  “Are you suggesting what I think?”

  “What do you suppose, Englishman?”

  “That I bring this borrowed body back to your house, where you’ll welcome me.”

  “Not sure I can wait that long.” She caught him by the hand and towed him off the dance floor. At the back of the barroom, a door led to the bog and to an alley where the cold air met them. Snowflakes swirled lazily here, but the narrow confines shut out the wind.

  Romney backed Topaz against the brick wall and kissed her again. She shivered in delight.

  “Cold?” he asked into her mind.

  Reluctantly, she dragged her mouth from his. “No.”

  “I could give you this fellow’s jacket.”

  “I want fewer clothes, not more. Touch me.”

  “I wish I had my own body.”

  “So do I, but this is better than nothing. Touch me,” she begged again. “See if you can read my mind and tell where I want you to put his hands.”

  She almost felt the energy inside him shift and quest for her. He unerringly moved one hand to her breast. She leaned in and claimed his lips again; while their mouths fused his fingers caressed her through the thin fabric of her bodice, and she peaked with cold and arousal.

  “I want to taste you everywhere, Topaz Hathor.”

  She wished she could reply in kind without removing her mouth from his. She also wished she could sample the real Romney Marsh. This body tasted of the gin its owner had consumed, and for all her desire, she detested gin.

  Still, the potency of Romney’s presence made her want him regardless.

  “You have the most beautiful body, the most luscious breasts.”

  In answer to her unspoken prayers he moved his borrowed lips downward across her chin to her throat and lower still. Topaz’s heart began to hammer in her ears like a drum.

  He bent his head and, hot and wet, his mouth found her through the fabric of her bodice. She twined her hands around his neck and drew him closer.

  Damn that fabric, anyway. She wanted him fused to her, flesh on flesh.

  Maybe he could hear her thoughts, her desires, after all, for one borrowed hand came up to cup her breast and tug the fabric down. With tantalizing deliberation he latched on, and Topaz nearly climbed the wall with the rush of sensation.

  This went beyond—far beyond—any kiss and cuddle she’d ever experienced. For she could feel his spirit; it tingled and intertwined with hers, augmenting the sensation.

  “God, Topaz, how I want you!”

  He didn’t lie. His borrowed body, pressed to hers, had become flagrantly hard. She had forgotten now the acquiescent resident spirit who owned the body and any last shreds of her own propriety. She would gladly—eagerly—accommodate him here against the wall.

  “Not half so much as I want you, Romney,” she returned.

  He freed her other breast from the bodice. Cold rushed at her, and it felt marvelous; when he found the second nipple with that hot mouth
, pleasure spiked sharp as pain.

  “Here?” he asked.

  “Here. Anywhere.”

  “With this body?”

  “With any body.”

  “I want it to be mine.”

  Well, Topaz wanted that too, but she was now so aroused she couldn’t imagine delaying. If they coupled, it would be on a spiritual as well as physical level. And she wasn’t about to wait till they freed him from Grayson.

  She reached down and hitched up her skirt, captured his hand, and placed it against her leg. She wore stockings and nothing else. They ended with garters at the thigh. Above that was only flesh and heat.

  “Oh, Mr. Marsh—please.”

  “Mr. Marsh?” Laughter rippled through him and caused the most curious sensation, mingling warmth with the passion. His tongue still caressed her breast and that felt fine, but she wanted it lower.

  At the thought, her desire elevated impossibly.

  His fingers traced her stocking upward, encountered the ruffled garter, and skittered above it to meet her flesh. Things got hotter as he continued upward.

  “You feel like heaven.”

  This was heaven. She couldn’t live if he stopped now. Snowflakes landed on his shoulders and her eyelashes, where they swiftly melted. She felt at once cold and unbearably hot.

  His hand continued to slide upward to the core of heat between her thighs, and brushed her curls.

  “Please,” she implored.

  “Well, now, Topaz Hathor—I don’t imagine you’re a woman in the habit of begging men for anything.”

  “I’m not. So I’ll ask you nicely—touch me.”

  “That’s not an order, is it?”

  She whimpered.

  He laughed again, and it rippled through her. She felt wild to have him—his true body—in her bed, all warmth and laughter, to love him all night or possibly even for days on end.

  Slowly and tantalizingly, he thrust one finger inside her. She very nearly came apart there against the wall.

  “Damn,” he said.

  “What? If you stop now I’ll murder you.”

  “He’s waking up.”

  For an instant, Topaz didn’t understand what he meant. Her dazed mind, on overload, knew only sensation. “Eh?”

  “My host. He wants into this. Coming out of his stupor. Topaz, touching you would raise the dead.”

  “I don’t want him. I want you.”

  Yet she could feel him slipping away, the spirit and essence of him draining from the flesh that held her like water from a basin. All at once a stranger had his hand up her skirt—a randy stranger, at that.

  “How dare you?” she cried. A twitch dislodged his hand from the intimate place Romney had placed it. “Get off me!”

  “Umm.” His only reply came in a tipsy murmur. His mouth dove for her breast. Without conscience she kneed him in the groin.

  He stiffened and began to fall; before he reached the ground, she had her stiletto out and at his throat.

  “Touch me again, and I’ll bleed you, understand?”

  “What happened?” he asked piteously.

  Topaz relented. “A misunderstanding.” Stepping away, she fitted herself back into her bodice. Kelly would be waiting, no doubt wondering what had happened to her.

  What had happened to her?

  “Nothing,” she said, addressing the dark as well as herself. “Nothing but a touch of madness.”

  Chapter Nine

  “We need to get your body out of that place,” Topaz declared. She lounged on her back atop her bed with only one lamp lit, deep in the night. Romney Marsh hovered beside her, his presence spurring her frustration.

  The fumble in the alley had failed to satisfy her in any way.

  “I agree. But how?” he demanded. “From what I can remember—and it’s damned little—the rooms in the asylum are more like cells than berths in a hospital ward. I’m locked in.”

  “Well I need to get that door unlocked. But once I do, you’ll have to make love to me, understand? Rampant, earth-shattering love.”

  “I can manage that.” She felt his energy move over her and dance across her skin, which only further augmented the problem.

  “Don’t tease me,” she warned.

  “Me? Tease you? With you lying there dressed like that?”

  Upon returning from Nellie’s, Topaz had shed her clothes and donned a semi-sheer nightdress of emerald green. With him near, her body now strained against the fabric, everything on alert.

  “Who’s tempting whom?”

  “We need to do something about this,” Topaz growled. “Go borrow another body.”

  “I’ve just said, Topaz Hathor, when I enter you I want to be wearing my own.”

  “I want that too. But meanwhile—”

  “Where am I to get a body at this hour? Especially one that won’t insist on participating.”

  “We want no outside participation.” She desired him, only him.

  “Precisely. I’d need a corpse.”

  “I’m not sure how I feel about that.” Topaz opened her eyes wide, contemplating it. Dead flesh between her thighs? Yet if he inhabited that flesh… “Where would you get a corpse?”

  “There are a number of them in the cellar of this house.”

  Topaz sat up abruptly and stared at him. Semi-transparent, he hovered an inch or so above her mattress, his head resting on one bent arm. “How do you know that?” She thought furiously. “Have you been down there?” The cellar was kept locked at all times.

  “No, but I can sense things.”

  So could Topaz, and she’d long harbored suspicions about her father’s activities in the nether regions of the house. But they hadn’t involved corpses.

  No way to get down there and investigate now. Meanwhile, she supposed she’d just have to live with her double frustration.

  ****

  Night lay deep around the mansion, so thick and quiet Rom could feel the spirits rustling all about him as he had that first night when he’d streamed here, drawn to Topaz. They floated near the ceilings of the big rooms downstairs and congregated near the chamber Frederick Hathor inhabited.

  But he, Romney, was the only spirit here in Topaz’s bedroom. He alone had the privilege of watching her sleep.

  As usual, she’d left the window open a crack; what need had she to fear cold or would-be abductors? A trickle of light came through the window. But what need had he—in spirit—for illumination? He could see her in the dark, and feel her also.

  He knew very well he’d left her unsatisfied in the alley. He’d been able to feel her frustration and her desire. His own level of desire had surprised him—he’d always believed it to be a hormonal matter, dependent on the flesh, but his want for this woman clearly surpassed that.

  He wanted to be inside her, the craving intensified by the knowledge she wanted him there as well. They’d almost succeeded, out behind the tavern. But what about now?

  He moved toward her, shifting like a current of air. She sprawled with her hair spread on the pillow in a black fan. He ached to bury his face there, the better to inhale her beguiling scent.

  He had no face to bury, but might he still manage to touch her?

  She lay with one arm outside the velvet coverlet, revealing the swell of a breast. Rom hovered above her and concentrated all his being as he had when he filled the dandy at Nellie’s. If the dandy, why not Topaz also?

  It took his full concentration to brush her breast. Delight danced through him in separate, distinct particles; he felt himself change color and intensify, his very existence altering to match hers.

  He slid beneath the sheer gown she wore, caressed the full, heavy globe of one breast, and felt her heartbeat quicken even though she still slept.

  Ah, so this thing was possible. He could feel her and she could feel him.

  He shifted his substance, slid over the satin skin of her belly, brushed both legs beneath the blankets, and returned to her breast. His ghostly lips closed on her nip
ple, and he became one with her—shockingly, gloriously.

  She stirred and came awake—aware—in a bound. Both inside and outside of her simultaneously, Rom felt her desire, previously unsated, reignite. Her lips parted even as he continued his spiritual dance at her breast, and she whispered, “I’m dreaming.”

  “No dream, love.” His own desire increased his powers of concentration; somewhere his body—battered and singed—achieved a state of arousal, but his spirit existed with her here.

  “Oh, God,” she moaned. “Oh, my God, I can feel you. How?”

  “Desire is a force of its own. I want you, Topaz Hathor.” He spoke into her mind.

  “Touch me. You can touch me.” Yearning filled her voice, along with exultation. “Please, please, I want you so.”

  “I can tell. I can feel everything you feel. Let me in.”

  She parted her legs instinctively, and he fluttered downward, a wave of pure sensation. What a way for him to enter her for the first time. For a brief instant regret touched him—then her desire, pounding through her with each heartbeat, engulfed him; he had room to regret nothing.

  Like a breath of air he slipped through the curls between her legs and began another dance, one that fondled and caressed. Instead of his hands—trapped with his body back at Grayson—his very being parted her, stroked, and drove her instantly higher.

  She bucked on the bed and moaned, a sound he felt rather than heard. She dug her heels into the mattress and opened herself still further to him in a gesture of total surrender—she, a woman who surrendered to no one easily if at all.

  When he’d taken over the body of the drunk at Nellie’s, it had been relatively easy—he’d been aroused then as well by Topaz’s dance and costume. And on some level he’d been familiar with the male body. This proved far different; the feelings racing through her felt wild, tumultuous, and very feminine—desire and demand, supremacy and sacrifice. He could feel parts of her, from inside, he’d never possessed. For an instant he convulsed inside her, overwhelmed by the strong, beautiful being she was.

  Then her desire and his twined together, an unstoppable force that robbed him of all hesitation.

  Her spirit spoke to his, an intimate caress.

  Rom, I can feel you. Here, inside me.