Phantom Pleasures: Sexy Paranormal (Book 1, Phantom Series) (5 page)

She shrugged out of the silk shirt she’d worn over a lacy chemise and approached the canvas.

Hung high, the painting remained mostly out of reach. She stretched on her tiptoes and flicked the shirt at the corners, removing most of the powdery dirt and spiderwebs that had accumulated on the surface and in the corners of the once-gilded frame. With a shiver, she tossed the ruined material to the floor, but admired her handiwork nonetheless.

He was gorgeous. The fire of male strength and power had been captured in his eyes, in the set of his shoulders, in the broad width of his chest. The fabric and detail in the cut of his clothes reflected money. Perhaps influence. The time period eluded her, but she’d have experts tackle that question. She was more concerned with who he was—and if he was the man she’d seen in the window. Was he the type of man who would defy time, space and, perhaps, death?

She closed her eyes and concentrated.

Who are you?

She ran her fingers over the frame. Once again, she felt a surge of warmth. Funny. Ghosts were supposed to announce their presence with cold, weren’t they? Clearly, this was no ordinary spirit.

Or she was taking this fantasy thing way too seriously.

She nearly pulled her hand away when she heard the whispered baritone once again.

Touch me
.

She kept her hand steady. “I don’t go around touching strangers,” she countered.

The air around her swirled with heat.

I’m not a stranger. We’ve met before. In a dream. In your fantasy. Touch me and see.

Alexa couldn’t resist. She slid her hand off the frame, then up the portrayal of his waist. She stretched as high as she could on the balls of her feet and reached until her palm settled on the spot where his heart would beat.

Did beat.

Strong.

Hot.

Heat seared her hand, and yet she couldn’t pull away.

The temperature rose. Her skin seemed to melt into the canvas.

She opened her mouth to scream, but darkness dropped over her and pulled her into a vortex. She scratched out, stretched and twisted, fighting to keep from falling. . .but lost.

This time the awakening came slowly.

No rush of air.

No blinding light.

Just the gradual saturation of life into his body, the gentle peeling of his skin away from the moist oil and canvas that had held him captive for what he guessed must have been centuries. The moment his boot hit stone, his vision cleared. The redheaded woman was sprawled on the ground at his feet.

He hoped she wasn’t dead. Pity if such an enchanting female perished only to set him free.

On bended knee, he reached to touch her, but stopped before his fingers made contact with her alabaster cheek. Her hair, pulled back tightly from her face, gave him pause. How many centuries had elapsed since the Gypsy woman had warned him that a woman with flames in her hair would be the instrument of his destiny? Her predictions had thus far proved ominous. He’d married his wife, Anne, partially because of her station and dowry, and partially because her burnished tresses garnered renown among the whole of King George’s court. He’d been so curious to see if the Gypsy’s prediction would prove true, he’d sacrificed his bachelorhood.

Yet despite the fire in her hair, Anne had proved as cold as the Thames in winter. He’d then found himself with Renata, his mistress, drawn by her passionate mien and crimson curls. Too late he’d learned she’d used henna the first night they’d met and changed her hair color on a whim. Sweet natured and warm, Renata had been a welcome distraction during his sojourns to London, but she had not affected his destiny in any way.

Except on the night of his imprisonment, when he’d thought—for a brief, insane instant—that Rogan had trapped her in a painting.

He glanced from the woman on the floor to the portrait on the wall, now devoid of subject. On the night of his sister’s disappearance, there had been a redhead in the portrait. In a corner shadow. In a doorway that did not exist. She’d lured him in and yanked him out of his time and into this new world where machines flew in the sky and women, like the one now crumpled on the floor, ordered men in uniform about as if she were queen.

At that thought, he touched her. A lock of hair had escaped the severe queue she’d tied at the nape of her shapely neck, so he merely brushed the hair aside. She moved, made a sound quite like a cat’s mewling.

He looked up.

No, it was only Rogan’s cursed cat.

Golden eyes ablaze, the flat-faced feline leaped out of the portrait, landing on its paws with a skilled bounce. The infernal animal stared at him accusingly, as if to suggest that Damon had once again developed a soft spot for a woman with red hair.

Despite the animal’s uncanny presence, Damon dismissed its omniscient look. He cared nothing for this woman except that she had somehow freed him.

She was, admittedly, beautiful. And before the force of the magic had knocked her unconscious, responsive. He hadn’t missed how her nipples had hardened beneath her blouse or how her breathing had changed when he’d entered her mind with his sensual suggestions. She might have made a worthy conquest, if not for the fact that he had only one thing on his mind at this moment—escape.

“What do you think, beast?” He scowled at the animal, still unsure after all these years if the animal was friend or foe. “Is she the one who shall be the instrument of my destiny?”

The cat replied by licking its paw.

With a frown, Damon stood and assessed his surroundings, his eyes drawn instantly to the door across the great hall.

“Or perhaps she already is.”

He strode down the stairs, invigorated by the stretch of his muscles, the power in his thighs and shoulders. He breathed in deeply and the smells of the sea were unmistakable. With a backward glance, he noted that the woman who had freed him remained on the floor. A pang of something he assumed was guilt nearly caused him to pause, but he managed to push the intrusive emotion aside and concentrate on his goal.

Freedom.

Nothing would delay him.

Nothing and no one.

Not even the beautiful flame-haired woman who’d freed him from his prison.

At the top of the stairs, the cat howled.

Damon continued to the door.

He grasped the latch but didn’t yet pull. What manner of insanity existed outside these castle walls? He touched his waist. His sword was long gone. Machines that flew might be just one insignificant hint of how the world had changed. Damon was an educated man, a resourceful man. But even he understood that a man out of time would be vulnerable in ways he might not adequately anticipate.

Still, he couldn’t remain here any longer. Rogan’s castle brimmed with dark, evil magic. Questions ranging from the deep and philosophical to the shallow and mundane coursed through his mind. Were his brothers still alive as was he? Had they found his sister? Vanquished Rogan? There was no ocean near Valoren, so he knew the castle no longer existed there. How did one move a castle? And was he now in England? He’d heard the strangers speak as they milled beneath his portrait prison. They did not sound like any of his countrymen, but they spoke the mother tongue. At least, a bastardization of the language. Had his country changed so much over the years?

He pressed down on the latch.

Nothing happened.

He tugged and pulled, bracing his arm on the doorjamb to create leverage. He buoyed all his strength against the lock, straining until sweat broke out on his brow.

From across the hall, the cat hissed.

With a curse, Damon stopped. Apparently, the witch on the landing had released him only so far. What magic did she brew that kept him entrapped?

He crossed the hall in seconds, then took the stairs three at a time, catching her as she raised herself on her arms and groaned.

A sensual sound, even when laced with pain, “Move slowly, my dear,” he said. “You’ve suffered a great shock.”

She defied him instantly, spinning to face him with a decided bounce on her backside.

A rather lovely backside, truth be told.

“Who are you?” She winced as she smoothed her hand over the back of her head. “Or should I ask, what are you?”

She slid her palm over her forehead, squinting beneath her fingers despite the dim light on the landing. Damon glanced at the torches, unlit for all these centuries. He wondered if there was a way to light them when, suddenly, they flamed to life.

Interesting.

“I could ask you the same question,” he said, extending his hand to her.

She looked at him defiantly, her expression crisp with suspicion.

“I mean you no harm,” he emphasized.

“Then explain the knot on the back of my head.”

“A consequence of the dark magic imbued in these castle walls, I suspect.”

“Your magic?” she asked.

He sniffed derisively. “Hardly. I wouldn’t have trapped myself here, would I?”

Though her wary expression did not falter, she accepted his help in standing. Her hand was small in his, but her intrepid comportment compensated for her lack of size. The minute she regained her balance, she yanked her hand from his and stepped back to establish distance.

“I apologize, my lady. As for what I am, I cannot yet say. As to who, I am Damon Forsyth.”

She popped the tie holding her hair in place, releasing the red strands in thick, shiny waves. She sighed. Apparently loosening her hair alleviated some of the pain in her head. Her jaw relaxed, but only slightly.

“So, Damon Forsyth, are you dead?”

Damon glanced down at his body, examining the coarse texture of his breeches and the slick leather of his boots. “I do not believe so, madam. Quite frankly, I’ve not felt this alive for centuries.”

“Then what are you?”

“I’m quite certain I do not yet know. Previously, I was the son of John Forsyth, a British baron and governor of a Gypsy colony in a land called—”

“Valoren?”

Damon gaped. “You know this place?”

She shook her head. “No, I don’t know it at all. Just the name. And you’re not in Kansas anymore, Sir Damon. Then again, neither am I.”

Wavering on her feet, she reached out to find her balance. Luckily, Damon was the nearest solid object. Her hand gripped his powerfully, and for a split second he imagined those same fingers seizing his naked shoulders or raking across his back.

He cleared his throat and shook the bawdy image from his mind. “What is this. . .‘can sis’?”

She snickered. “It’s Kansas.
Wizard of
—oh, never mind. Okay. You’re not dead. And unlike when I saw you in the window earlier, you are now solid. Which means?”

Damon took a second before he realized he was supposed to provide the missing information to her supposition. “I know not, my lady. My last memory includes a powerful anger toward a dark sorcerer. I must suppose that this anger led me here.”

She blew out a breath and managed to stand solidly on her own. “So, you pissed off some magician who locked you in the painting?”

Damon winced. Such language from a woman of breeding was wholly unexpected, but nonetheless intriguing. “What makes you think
I
angered
him
?”

She broadened her stance in a pose that looked vaguely defensive. “He wouldn’t have trapped his best friend in here all this time, would he?”

Damon thought of the cat. “I would not be so sure.” Eyeing her skeptically, he wondered at the breadth of their conversation. For a woman who’d just confronted someone whose presence could not be explained scientifically, she appeared mostly unruffled. Did such occurrences happen daily in her century?

“You have no trouble accepting that I am a man out of time?” he asked.

She laughed. Not a tinkling, genteel giggle, but an out-and-out guffaw. “I have a lot of trouble, believe me. But I can’t ignore what is right in front of me.”

Nor could he. She was hauntingly lovely, with eyes the color of leaves in spring and skin that, despite a natural pale hue, glowed with life. But mostly, she possessed a fire he’d never witnessed in a woman so young, so lonely. She’d reacted to him too easily to be a woman who warmed herself regularly in any man’s bed.

“Perhaps I am not real at all,” he offered, wanting to verify his suspicions, “but a figment of your powerful fantasy?”

Her shock, followed by a quick flash of anger, told Damon more than she intended, he was sure. That she was lonely. That she was in need of a lover. And that she wasn’t happy about it. Not, at least, when someone else voiced her innermost desires.

She pinched him on the arm. Instinctively, he stepped back and voiced his displeasure with a random curse.

Her chuckle infuriated him, but he had to admit, she possessed a wealth of courage. She’d turned the tables, saucy wench.

“You’re as real as the knot on my head,” she insisted. “At least, for my purposes. Question is,
why
are you here?”

Damon took a deep breath, invigorated again by the rush of air into his lungs. This, coupled with his attraction to this beautiful, headstrong woman, was a sensation he never wanted to forget. “I have no idea, my lady, but I do intend to find out.”

Her hand shot out and grabbed his wrist before he could react. He squelched his instinct to twist out of her grip, startled by the heat of her flesh. She turned his hand and pressed her fingers tightly on his palm. Satisfied by what she felt there, she quickly scratched her nails across his skin.

He winced. “Is this a new form of greeting?”

She pulled his hand closer and watched as nail marks swelled.

“You feel pain; you have a heartbeat and blood flow,” she assessed.

Damon attempted to gently remove his hand from her grip, but she held tight. With no need to demonstrate his power at the moment, he simply arched a brow.

She released him but showed no repentance for her audacious behavior.

“You have not yet reciprocated,” he reminded her.

“Excuse me?”

Absently, he rubbed the spot where she’d marred his flesh. “Your name?”

“Oh.” She thrust her hand at him. “Alexa Chandler, president and CEO of Crown Chandler Enterprises.”

He glanced skeptically at her hand. He gave her a sweeping bow, then stepped aside.

She pulled her hand back. “You weren’t solid before,” she said.

“I daresay you know nothing of who I was before, Miss Chandler. Or is it Lady Chandler?”

She snorted. “I take it you’re from England originally.”

“We are not in Britain now?”

“You’re in the United States.”

He searched his brain but found nothing. “Where?”

“Sorry. The colonies. Only we’re our own country now. You are now in the United States of America. But,” she said, her eyes narrowed as she dismissed the information she offered as insignificant, “when your hand went through the window upstairs, you were not solid. Now you are. Care to explain?”

Damon pursed his lips. This woman was incredibly observant and wholly single-minded, and didn’t exhibit the least indication of fear in the face of the unknown or supernatural. Either the world had changed completely from when he last lived free, or else she was a remarkable woman of courage. From the painting, he’d watched her command the crew of sailors that had searched the castle for signs of his existence. He’d heard her negotiate and issue orders to the young man who’d shown concern over her safety, which she’d promptly dismissed. Clearly, this Alexa Chandler was a woman of importance and power.