Return To Me Read online

Seeing him made her long for what might have been.

  How ironic that she’d spent so many lonely decades haunting the place that in life she’d wanted to leave behind. She and Thomas had found love despite unbeatable odds, even if only for a short time.

  He’d been the eldest child—only son and heir—the pride of his father’s plantation. But he’d been willing to give it all up for her, the Creole daughter of a slave bought and owned by his family. He’d made her feel special, alive, and loved—something more than a piece of property. But their dreams of leaving Beau Vista behind for a life together in Canada were never to be.

  A soft, sleepy sigh drew her back to the present, back to Travis. If she had any chance of leaving this cursed existence, of ever finding peace, she had to set things right. He had to stay, to want to stay at Beau Vista. He had to want to set her free.

  Giving in to the urge to touch him, she tenderly brushed her fingertips across his chest. Fearful that her cold touch would awaken him, she moved slowly, watching his reaction. After a brief shudder, he again settled into peaceful slumber.

  She’d missed him. Missed Thomas’ loving caresses, his caring embrace. Although she’d never left Beau Vista since that horrible day long ago, she hadn’t felt at home, at peace, until last night, when she had at long last kissed Travis.

  Leaning forward, she pressed her lips to his once more, wanting to feel that wonderful sensation of home. He gave a groggy whimper, his lips parting on a slight breath. She gently nipped his bottom lip and, without opening his eyes, he responded by turning their kiss into a deeper exchange.

  She slipped her hand inside his shirt, enjoying the warmth and contour of his bare flesh. How she longed to have a corporeal body so that she might experience the full impact of touch, instead of the muted sensations she was capable of recognizing.

  Pressing light kisses along his jaw, she couldn’t help herself. She removed her clothes with a simple thought and straddled his sleeping form in the large chair.

  “I want you,” she whispered in his ear and felt his hands slide up her arms, then down her back. A glance at his face told her he was probably still asleep, and she wondered what woman he envisioned in his slumber.

  Did he picture her?

  “I need you, ma cher.” She turned toward him as his fingers slipped through her hair at the nape of her neck, and let him claim her mouth in a long, amorous melding of lips.

  The man really knew how to kiss. Even unable to taste every nuance, she still enjoyed the pressure of his lips, the soft twirling of his tongue with hers, and the rumble of his chest as he groaned into her mouth. His excitement transmitted itself to her, making her more solid and making her sizzle with energy.

  His hands roamed over her back, spanned her waist, and squeezed her butt. If she could have, she would have soaked his shirt with tears of joy at the realization of being in his arms.

  His caresses were virtually identical to those of Thomas so long ago. Each brush of his palm, swipe of his fingers, held a familiarity that tore at her heart, yet healed her lonely soul. His kisses were remembered dreams, memories relived.

  She lost herself in his arms, surrendered herself to his ministrations, and reveled in a long awaited dream come true.

  He released her mouth from a kiss that would have made her breathless had she been alive to actually require air, and she tilted her head back to let him nibble a moist path down her neck.

  His arousal was a hot, hard presence beneath her—a presence she couldn’t refuse. She slipped her hand between them to rub his length, a repetitive demand for fulfillment.

  “Please,” came her murmured plea, quiet and needy.

  He returned to claim her mouth with an urgent possessiveness while he yanked the front shirttails from his pants. His eyes remained closed. However, the rest of his solid body was awake and decidedly active. She reached to open his button-fly denims, only to discover his hands were already busy with the task, and in seconds his fully erect cock was free. It rose from a nest of dark curls, which she longed to run her fingers through, but before she could, his hands gripped her hips.

  She steadied herself with a hand on each of his shoulders when he raised and guided her onto his cock. Her head fell back, her eyes closing and mouth opening, as he filled her completely. For a long moment he held her in place, and she concentrated all her energies on maintaining her tactile form. His thumbs rubbed semicircles at her hips, and then his fingers tightened before he lifted her only to slam her back onto his rigid length.

  She let him control the rough ride while she struggled to keep a firm rein on the ebb and flow of her energy—a task made more difficult in light of the delightfully carnal shockwaves that rippled through her form with each solid thrust.

  He set a steady pace that grew in intensity until she thought she’d explode from the pleasure. His teeth gritted. His eyelids stayed closed tight. He groaned, and she knew they’d reach that peak together. Just a few more seconds...

  “Hello? Dr. Moreland?”

  Dominique’s world shattered. She screamed. And in her climactic excitement, several bulbs in the room came on, burned bright, and then immediately blew. Tiny slivers of glass showered like crystalline snowflakes to the floor.

  Travis awoke with a start—to the call from the foyer, her euphoric shout, or the electrically charged explosions, she didn’t know. But regardless, the shock made him jump to his feet and sent her sailing from his lap. Surprised by the sudden move, she lost her hold on any tangible form and passed right through the desktop to land in an undignified heap beneath it.

  “Dr. Moreland?” a woman called out again. “Is that you?”

  Chapter Five

  His heart hammered, his blood zinged, and his cock throbbed with the most excruciating arousal he could ever remember. Travis struggled to bring his scattered thoughts back under control.

  For a few brief moments he couldn’t remember where he was. The room looked foreign; he felt disjointed and misplaced. Muted sunlight filtered through the grimy floor-to-ceiling windows, casting the room into a gloomy monochrome landscape of draped furnishings and empty bookshelves.

  “Dr. Moreland? Are you here?”

  Fuck! That was David Granger’s voice.

  “In the—” His own voice was hoarse and little more than a whisper. He cleared his throat and, as he did so, glanced down to see himself hanging out of his pants. He spun around, back to the door, and crammed his raging hard-on into his pants, carefully buttoning the fly.

  God, that had been the hottest, almost-wet and definitely painful, dream he’d ever experienced. He would have sworn there’d been a woman on his lap fucking his brains out. And he’d been so close—

  “Dr. Moreland?” Susan Granger called. He heard their footsteps brushing over the plastic sheeting as they came down the hall.

  “In the study,” he said, his voice stronger now, his clothes mostly back in place. With no more time to make adjustments, he left his shirttails out.

  The fresh faces of the twenty-something Grangers came through the door into the study—both smiling, both looking way too awake and alert for this early in the morning.

  Travis plopped his ass back in the chair, knowing that with one quick glance his early morning discomfort would be easily seen.

  “Good morning, Dr. Moreland,” David said, crossing the room with his arm around his wife, extending his hand for a shake.

  “Good morning.” Travis shook his hand, and then Susan’s. “I didn’t expect you so early.”

  They both grinned. They looked like living, breathing, tanned Barbie and Ken dolls, he with his neatly combed hair, her with a bouncy ponytail. And so happy in love it made him want to puke. Or cry. He’d been that way once upon a time. He and Christine had been so enamored with each other, the rest of the world needn’t exist. Now he was a forty-year-old widower who found comfort alone.

  “Well?” Susan asked, her blue eyes bright. “Is it gone? Did you get rid of it? Can we get the constructi
on crew back in here to finish?”

  “Ah…well…no.” He brushed his fingers through his hair and tried to settle his mind back on the job at hand.

  David and Susan stood on the other side of the desk, twin expressions of disappointment in their eyes.

  “I have confirmed the presence of a spiritual entity. The house is definitely haunted. And I have made contact with the entity, but she seems reluctant to leave.”

  Ping.

  His eyes widened as the top button on his jeans popped off and hit the side of the desk.

  “What was that?” Susan asked, stepping back from the desk and bending over as if she were going to look beneath it.

  “Oops...” A decidedly mischievous and definitely feminine laugh, which came from under the desk, mingled with Susan’s question.

  Then cool fingers brushed over his erection, which had yet to soften and offer him any relief. Travis shot to his feet and adjusted the tails of his shirt to ensure they covered his crotch.

  He pasted on a smile when the Grangers looked at him curiously. “Why don’t...” He cleared his throat. “Let’s head to the kitchen where it’s a bit brighter, and I’ll show you what I’ve found.” He held out his hand to indicate the door. As they walked down the hallway and into the foyer, he spotted his quad camera with a drop cloth thrown over it. “Just a minute, I want to grab my camera.” He carefully pulled the sheet from the camera, knowing full well who had put it there.

  “How does it work with a sheet over it?” Susan asked in complete innocence.

  He wanted to roll his eyes. “It doesn’t. Seems our specter is camera shy.”

  “You mean the ghost covered it up?”

  He nodded, twisted the camera off the tripod and led the way to the kitchen. “Yes. The poltergeist haunting this house is different from any other I’ve encountered.” He turned the camera on and cycled through the pictures on the digital display. “Here.” He moved between David and Susan and showed them one of the pictures. “See this white streak coming down the side of the picture? That’s an image of the ghost’s energy.” He pressed the button to forward to the next one. “This one is centered better in the frame.”

  “I thought you would get some actual pictures of it—her—it is a her, isn’t it, Dr. Moreland? After what the construction workers told us…”

  Travis nodded, choosing not to comment on the newlywed’s blushing cheeks. “I have confirmed it’s a female entity.” Oh boy, was she ever. “Ghosts are made of electrical energy; they’re not solid like us.” Although she certainly felt solid when she’d kissed him last night. And now that his brain had cleared, he was fairly certain he hadn’t been dreaming before the Grangers arrived. “Therefore,” he continued, “a camera will only pick up the light they emit in the form of energy. Kind of like lightening streaks.”

  He pointed to the stools at the counter. “Have a seat. I’d like to get some more information from you about the actual property.”

  Travis glanced at the sound recording device on the table in the corner to see if it was still running, then sat down on the opposite side of the counter from the Grangers.

  “What would you like to know?” David asked. “There’s a lot of history to this place and, since both Susan and I grew up in the area, we’ve heard it all. We just…didn’t exactly believe it.”

  Travis nodded. So many people weren’t believers until it happened to them.

  “First of all, do you have any idea who Thomas St. Maurice is?”

  “He was the son of the original owner,” Susan said. “His grave is one of seven in the family plot toward the back of the property. Supposedly he was murdered right here in the house. Is he haunting this place, too?”

  Travis shook his head. “As far as I can tell, there’s only one ghost here, and it’s female.”

  The air crackled around him, the temperature dropped slightly, and the hair at his nape stood on end. Dominique had entered the room.

  He watched David and Susan for any sign they felt her presence. Susan pulled her sweater together over her rather ample breasts, but other than that, the couple showed no sign they realized anything had changed.

  “Have you ever heard of a woman named Dominique associated with the history of Beau Vista?” he asked.

  David and Susan glanced at each other, and then shook their heads in unison.

  Damn. Another dead end.

  “Why do you ask such questions, Travis?” Dominique asked. He pinpointed her location behind the Grangers by the sound of her voice. “You know who I am, if you would only listen to your heart.”

  Ignoring her, he focused on David. There was no sign that he’d heard Dominique’s voice. Most of the living weren’t in tune enough with the Other Side to hear the spirits around them. Sometimes he wished he was that way, but he’d been hearing voices of dead people his entire life. What would it be like to be oblivious?

  “Why can’t you just do a séance or something to get rid of this thing?” Susan asked. “Isn’t that what mediums do?”

  “Ha!” Dominique said, and then laughed outright. “If that worked I‘d have been gone a half century ago. Candles and chanting…” Travis would swear she was rolling her eyes in disgust.

  “Sometimes a séance works,” Travis said. “But I don’t think it will in this case. Besides, I’d need several more people to do one effectively.”

  “You know,” Dominique said in her low, accented voice. “David is rather handsome. Maybe I’ll behave and let him live here. I could have fun getting my…hands…on him.” A low, sultry laugh followed. The same one she’d used when she first welcomed him home last night. Travis tried to ignore the little pang of jealousy he felt, knowing how utterly stupid he was to be jealous over the affections of a ghost.

  David swatted at the back of his neck and jerked around. Although Travis couldn’t see her, he knew Dominique had just touched him. She definitely belonged in the pain in the ass group of ghosts. Bored with their lives, yet unwilling to cross over, they tormented the living.

  Susan wrinkled her brow at her husband then turned back to Travis. “So, how do you plan to get rid of it?”

  Good question. “I’ll need your permission to stay in the house for a few days.” He rubbed his fingers on his forehead. Damn, he was exhausted. “October thirty-first is the next full moon, and this works to our advantage.” He knew when he talked about this to most people, they thought he was nuts, but it was the only way he’d be able to help Dominique cross over. “All Hallows’ Eve isn’t just fun and games for kids. It truly is a night when the spirit world and our world mesh to some extent. If I can convince this spirit to make the transition to the Other Side, it might be easier that night. When the moon is full, the energy field surrounding the mortal world is thinner. Thus, having them fall on the same night, it should be no problem for the spirit to cross over.”

  Dominique sighed. “The last full moon on All Hallows’ Eve was five years ago, Travis.” She sounded annoyed with him. “You know what happened that night? Nothing except some children playing outside, daring each other to run up the steps and touch the door. Those stairs are too dangerous to play on, so I scared them away. I’m sure they’ll have stories to tell their children and grandchildren about the haunted mansion.

  “If I could leave this place, don’t you think I would? Do you think I’m here of my own will? Why do you insist you know more about this than I do? I’m the one stuck here.”

  “Well, if you think it’s necessary, Dr. Moreland,” David said. “Will three days be enough?”

  “Do you think she’s pretty?” Dominique asked. “Do you like blondes?”

  “No.”

  “No?” Susan asked, frowning.

  Shit. Dominique was making him crazy. “I’m sorry. I mean, thank you. I do think it’s necessary, and I do hope to have this situation wrapped up within just a couple days.”

  “I think you find her very desirable, Travis,” Dominique said. “What would she look like with a
ll that hair flowing down her shoulders?”

  “Don’t.”

  Snap!

  The rubber band holding Susan’s hair in a tidy ponytail flew across the room, and Susan’s hair fell around her shoulders. She gasped and grabbed the top of her head.

  Dominique giggled.

  Travis stood. “Please wait here a minute,” he said to the Grangers. “You, follow me.”

  “But you just said for us to wait,” David said.

  He stopped, closed his eyes, and took a deep breath. “I wasn’t talking to you. I was talking to the ghost.”

  Susan’s hand flew to cover her mouth, her eyes widening. “It’s here? That was her?”

  Without answering, Travis stalked from the kitchen and headed back toward the study. He could feel Dominique’s presence at his side and, even if he couldn’t, her stifled giggles gave her away. He didn’t know if he should laugh along with her or give her hell for acting like a child. After he turned into the study and shut the door, he didn’t have a chance to do either.