Seductive Shadows (34 page)

His lips moved closer and halted just beyond the surface of mine. I took in his face, the expression I never thought I’d see again. I closed my eyes and waited for his mouth to find me. Our breath mingled in the air between us, as though someone had paused our love scene.

“So that means…?”

My eyes burst open. He was grinning, but his passion showed beneath it. It was consuming us both. I knew he could feel it from me, but it was clear that he wanted to hear it from me, too.

And I wanted to say it.

“I’m yours.” Before I had a chance to finish the last word, he took my lip and clenched it between his teeth. A moan traveled from my mouth to his.

“I need you,” I said. “
Now.
”

His hands circled my ass and lifted, pulling me up against him and into his arms as he carried me out of the bathroom. He set me down on the bed, but he didn’t give me all of his weight. He hovered over me instead. I didn’t bother reaching for the buttons of his shirt; I just gripped the bottom of it and pulled it over his head. I needed to feel his skin on mine…at last. I rested my face on his chest. His tattoos surrounded me, and his warmth covered my mouth.

I was…home.

Finally.

The short bristles of his hair tickled my neck as he dipped from my lips to my throat, pressing hungry kisses across my skin. He spanned the length of flesh that bordered the edge of the towel, teasing my breasts, making them crave his tongue. His eyes met mine as his teeth bit into the towel, and he slowly pulled it down, revealing the pieces of me he had painted not so long ago. When it finally reached my knees, he climbed off the bed and stood by my feet.

His eyes took me in gradually—I was naked before him, completely now, for the first time. “I can’t believe this is mine, that
you
are finally mine.” His fingers curled around my heels and he dragged me toward him. My back slid over the silken comforter.

The sudden movement made me laugh. When my ass reached the end of the bed, I leaned up, yanked at his zipper and undid the button, and shimmied his jeans down his legs. Then I pulled down his boxers and took his throbbing hardness in my hand. “And I can’t believe
this
is all mine.”

He straddled my body as I reclined into the bed to enjoy his mouth as it wandered all over me. I slipped the blanket into my hands, pulling it far off the mattress to bear the tingling he was building. He moved to my nipples, taking each bud into his mouth, simultaneously flicking and sucking one while squeezing the other between his fingers. When the other grew ravenous for his tongue, he switched the action. My neck tilted back as the top of my head sank into the bed. My mouth released a blending of sounds, breaths and soft shouts.

When he reached that spot, the one just at the tip of my navel, warming the tiny hole and filling it with wetness, my body began to beg for him. The tingling sensation intensified. As it began to pulsate, his tongue found me, making me quiver and tremble. While he caressed and lapped against the inside of my folds, his hands roamed my body. Sometimes he filled me with two fingers; sometimes he covered my breasts. My clit responded so easily to his pace, to the smooth circling and horizontal flicks, I found I couldn’t control my legs any longer. He pushed them apart and held them wide, setting the sides of my thighs on the bed. His hands were much stronger than I remembered, and more calloused. The patches of hardness on each of his fingers only made him sexier.

My mind drifted to the feeling that spread throughout my body, the carnal need that slowly filled me from within. I moved with him, guided by his rocking rhythm, his fingers taking their place within me as I neared my climax. I glanced down, my eyes meeting the top of his head. The sight of him combined with the eternity I’d been longing for him, combined with the idea that he’d searched for me, the knowledge that he was here now in my father’s house—all of it increased the build. And then I lost control. I let the sensation wrap its layers around me, my body waving over the bed, my breath escaping my throat in kind.

His lips moved up my stomach and sucked my skin until they reached my mouth. I surrounded them with mine, tasting myself, the flavor of the pleasure that he had caused. But his lips weren’t as they had been prior; now they inspired an untamed need that clawed at me, that sank its teeth into my flesh.

He positioned himself between my legs, but he didn’t enter. I moved my hips down until my opening met his tip, and I pushed gently. One of his hands clasped mine; his fingers held me firmly, and I squeezed back. He inserted a little more. When I tried to take all of him, he stopped me. The desire built rapidly. My teeth demonstrated my hunger, nipping at his earlobe, down along the bottom of his neck and over his chest. When I gnawed on his nipple, he entered me fully. The passion took control of our bodies, both of us pushing forward to meet in the middle of each thrust.

Cameron used a pressure that filled me for just the right duration, and a rotation that hit several spots at once. The sensation was more than just a slow and steady increase; it was a closeness, a bond that meshed with everything else. I knew he felt it too; he showed me with his hands, with his mouth, with the way he whispered against my face. I could feel it in his breath. And they all brought me further. Deeper. There was no way to stop the build that was happening between my legs. I wanted to postpone it, extend it…to hold him there forever and never let him go. But I also wanted to be consumed—by him, by this overwhelming orgasmic passion.

I told him how close I was, and he quickened his penetration; his fingers moved to my clit and he rubbed it simultaneously. Then it started, in the core of my stomach, the feeling spreading toward my breasts and my nipples before shooting back down into my legs. Our bodies shuddered at the same time, and my muscles became sensitive as he gave his final strokes. A second spasm of tingles suddenly began its torturous decent. Then everything turned numb.

He moved to my side, pulling my back into his stomach and enveloping me in his arms. His lips pressed into my shoulder, covering the two side-by-side freckles. “I’m not going to let you go again. I’m not going to lose you.”

My eyes closed; my heart throbbed inside my chest. I knew so much was going to change once the Doctor handed over the flash drive. I knew things might never be the same, that there was still a chance I would end up having to move away from Boston.

I knew there were shadows that had yet to be dispelled.

So I held onto this moment, onto Cameron, onto the home and the dawn that I had finally found. “No,” I said. “You’re not. And I’m not going to lose you, either.”

When I’d originally asked for my favor, the Doctor had acted as though he understood and would be more than willing to grant it. That was probably because he never thought I would ever follow through with it. But once it was time for us to depart, he wasn’t so eager. He actually balked at the idea of carrying through with his promise. He told me the whole idea was ridiculous, that I was putting him, Roberto, and myself at risk because we would have to leave the apartment. He was worried he would miss his afternoon meeting with his contact, the man he’d be giving the information to about the mansion. And he was annoyed that I was asking him to take part in something he didn’t believe in. It wasn’t only that he didn’t believe in psychics; he detested the entire concept and was certain that all of it was nothing more than a scam. The Doctor practiced medicine, science and fact, not impulse, intuition and instinct. He said nothing would make him change his mind.

Before the reading Emma and I had with Moonlight prior to the accident, I hadn’t believed in psychics, either. But since her reading, I’d come to believe that she had the ability to tell someone what their future held. I knew she was able.

She had told me mine.

Your heart is going to be empty, Charlie.
Those words, her words, had repeated in my head for the last five years. She knew Emma didn’t have a future…which meant she would also know about my father’s future, and mine. Maybe she’d be able to tell if he was handing the information to the right person, if what we were doing would truly bring an end to the mansion, and what was in store for him—for us—if we did. Even if there was more death awaiting me on the other side of the truth, I still wanted it to happen. And that’s exactly what I told the Doctor.

Moonlight’s house hadn’t changed at all. The shingles were still painted lavender; the large hawk still lived on top of her chimney. My toes stepped over the mosaic on her walkway before we moved up the stairs to her front porch. Just before my fingers knocked on her wooden door, it opened. I yanked my fist away.

“Charlie,” Moonlight said. “What a…surprise. To see you here again, that is.”

Something told me she wasn’t surprised at all that I was here. The Doctor was, though. His doubt was on full display, on his face, in his posture…in the way he sighed as we paused outside her door.

“I need your help—
we
need your help.”

“I know,” she said, confirming what I had thought. She looked at the Doctor. “Same blood, same flesh as Miss Charlie.”

“May we come in?” I asked.

She moved to the side. “Please.”

***

Moonlight rose calmly from the table and moved over to me. Her hands rubbed my shoulders with a motherly touch as I left the chair.

“I knew your heart would heal one day, Charlie. I’m glad to know that it did…and to
see
that it did.”

I smiled at her.

“It’s always darkest before the dawn.” Her fingers released me and danced through the air until they landed on the Doctor. “And now that you’ve found yours…”

They were the exact words tattooed on Cameron’s chest. I wasn’t surprised—nothing about Moonlight surprised me at that point. And though my father had found me, it didn’t mean the darkness was gone. It wasn’t even close.

The Doctor nodded, and we stepped together into the hallway. I didn’t cling to him, holding his body up like I had with Emma on our way out of Moonlight’s house; he clung to me instead. Our future had been spoken honestly just moments ago; we moved at our own pace, knowing what waited before us now. Or maybe it was because my legs wouldn’t let us move any faster.

Roberto opened the door to the backseat. I needed some fresh air, so I asked him to please give us a few moments alone. The Doctor stood in front of me, waiting to sit down, but I wouldn’t let him. I leaned against the door, letting the solidness support me so I wouldn’t fall.

“Do you still want to do this?” I asked.

I couldn’t do this without him…but I also knew what it meant now. What it would lead to.

“Charlie, you know how I feel about psychics—”

“And you know how
I
feel about them.” I tried to still my trembling voice. “I’ve told you what happened with Emma. I believe Moonlight’s words will come true again.”

He rubbed my hand. “Yes. I still want to carry out our plan.”

My eyes drifted over his face. I was so proud of him. He’d be giving up so much; we both would. I could handle it, though. Moonlight had confirmed that he was doing it because of me. Her reading had also revealed the consequences of what we were doing to stop the mansion. She knew the people who would be affected—the Hunts included. Lives would be compromised…and lost.

Until we could be certain the whole thing had been taken care of, I wouldn’t resurface. But this time, I knew my dawn would be with me when I did.

I took a step closer to the man who had been my doctor at the mansion, whose veins held the same blood, who was willing to sacrifice his own life in order to spare mine. I took another step, and I thought of my first reading with Moonlight, all those years ago:
Charlie, when you feel that flutter, join the hearts as one
.

I lifted my arms and wrapped them around his neck. When he hugged me back, I felt warmth and protection radiating from him. He was shielding me, the same way Emma had. Then his lips pressed into the top of my head and his arms tightened, and I felt something new: my father’s love. We stood on the sidewalk in front of Moonlight’s lavender house, holding each other up.

I tightened my grip around him and buried my face in his chest. I took in his scent: the fabric softener on his clothes, the freshness of the soap on his skin. I closed my eyes. I had a future, and a plan to make it all work out. And it was all because of my father—his strength, his sacrifice, and his love.

“Thank you,” I told him. “You pulled me out of the shadows.”

He smiled. “Seems fair. You did the same for me.”

Then I took a deep breath, and I connected our hearts as one.