Ashes of Midnight Read online

  Ashes of Midnight

  By

  Aurora Rose Lynn

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental.

  Ashes of Midnight

  Copyright© 2009 Aurora Rose Lynn

  ISBN: 978-1-60088-474-0

  Cover Artist: Tuesday Dube’

  Editor: Devin Govaere

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.

  Cobblestone Press, LLC

  www.cobblestone-press.com

  Dedication

  To all my wonderful readers:

  Thank you from the bottom of my heart.

  Chapter One

  He trailed passionate kisses along the silky curve of her neck as she quivered in anticipation. His lips left burning fire in their wake. Was she making love to a ghost?

  Violet Georges told herself she should have known better. Ghosts didn't exist, and yet here, on the rumpled cotton sheets of her single bed, he rested his elbows on either side of her head and gazed into her face with adoration. And outright lust. At times, she couldn't see his face clearly. It was as if a thick, gray haze hung its languid pall between them, obliterating any sense of reality. Violet felt the heat of his muscled, powerful body, and her nipples beaded into tiny points of pleasure. Even if she'd wanted to, she wouldn't have been able to speak for sheer exhilaration. No man had ever aroused her as this man did.

  She wanted to ask his name and where he came from, along with a hundred other questions, but none of those things mattered. Nothing was important except the burning need spiraling through her naked body. Glistening tears struggled down the sides of her face and into her long, mussed hair. If she didn't hold onto him, he'd vanish into the ethereal realm from which he'd come.

  “Please—” She reached out to him imploringly, wanting him to make love to her, to thrust his hard cock into her wet sheath to ease the desperate longing. Her hands sliced through empty air. Suffocating need fluttered in the pit of her stomach. This gorgeous man, she sensed but couldn't clearly see, wasn't flesh and blood. He couldn't be if he left her breathless and hungering for his caress.

  The lace curtains around the sides of the window overlooking the expansive, well-kept gardens billowed ghost-like into the night-darkened room. Filtered silvery light laid a swath of illumination along the plush carpet. All Hallow's Eve was one day away, when tortured souls and those expecting grim reckoning waited for the night to claim its own.

  Violet dragged in a breath, shuddering as the man above her faded away, leaving her desperate and unsatisfied. Leaping up from the bed and hastily surveying the empty room, she shouted, “Dammit! Who are you? Where are you?”

  Hushed silence answered her.

  She ran to the window, leaned out and studied every lurking shadow, but her would-be lover was nowhere. Where had he gone? Why did he come to her in the dead of night and disappear without as much as a word? Violet still sensed him, the slight musky scent lingering in the air, but there was no visible presence.

  Haunted by what could have been, she didn't bother to pull on her flimsy nightgown and sank onto the bed in dejection. The search for her elusive lover was futile. She'd known that all along.

  * * * * *

  The next morning, Violet, dressed in a maid's uniform, served breakfast as she had for the last six months. She set a silver tray with two slices of French toast, three slices of bacon, a glass of orange juice, and a cup of black coffee next to the door of the master suite she wasn't allowed to enter no matter how dire the circumstances were. Down the hall, she hid herself in a nook and waited. Just maybe the man who paid her salary would retrieve his breakfast and she'd get a glimpse of him.

  Brockhurst was so much like the mansions she watched in the horror movies. There were so many rooms she still hadn't counted them all although she was up to one hundred and two, including bathrooms. Most of the rooms were unoccupied and dusty, but the ones that were lived in were opulent and well-furnished. Lived in, Violet corrected herself, meant that she cleaned them, but she witnessed no signs of use. It was, she admitted, like working for a ghost who never made an appearance. Except in her wild, hot dreams.

  Her employer never had visitors. At least, none she was aware of. Whoever he was, he liked three meals a day and tea promptly at four p.m., much like an aristocratic lord. Sometimes, if she listened with her ear pressed against the door, she heard what sounded like a printer printing or a fax machine whirring, but never more than that.

  After several minutes of waiting, she gave up. Her monthly salary at Brockhurst was three times what she'd been earning as a housekeeper for several middle-class clients. She was a live-in housekeeper here with two half days off, and the responsibility of paying bills and shopping for groceries. The name on the credit card was Grant Calder, but that was all she knew. If there was an unusual request, he left her a note taped to her work desk in the kitchen, which she saw first thing in the morning. Once in a while, she waited for him, but he never made an appearance.

  She sighed as she made her way to the kitchen on the first floor, descending a staircase with an elaborately carved banister that seemed to have been made to fit her hand. The distance from the staff area to the master suite seemed like two miles through unbelievable luxury. Crystal chandeliers hung from the vaulted ceilings, stately walnut furniture sat forlorn, and the bathrooms each had marble heart-shaped tubs and heated towel racks. All that was missing were people. The place was as empty as a tomb.

  Violet didn't mind though. She was saving every penny of her salary, and in a few months, she would give her notice and then she'd register for art school. She sipped her coffee and began to load the dishwasher. It would be time to move on, to start toward accomplishing her dream of painting murals.

  One of the fine bone china plates slipped from her hands. She grabbed it just as it would have hit the floor. Setting it into the dishwasher, she let her mind wander into forbidden territory. What would it be like if the man who'd come to her on the last night of the month for the last half year, stayed and made love to her? She'd never had dreams that left her body damp and sweaty and aching before she'd arrived at Brockhurst. Maybe the grim place was getting to her.

  Soft music forced her to stand still and cant her head to one side to listen intently. The music of a waltz seemed to be coming from the ballroom, reminding her of Strauss, violins, elegant women dressed in beautiful, pastel-colored ball gowns and gallant beaus.

  Her eyes widened. Violet had never heard music at Brockhurst before. Leaving the kitchen, she wiped her hands in her apron, and set out to discover the source of the music. As she approached the ballroom, the music's volume increased, and she couldn't help thinking she was being irresistibly drawn to that part of the house. She peered around the staircase but saw nothing. The music, she decided, was definitely coming from inside.

  To get a bird's eye view, she climbed the stairs, set her palm on the railing, and closed her eyes to attempt to regain her composure. Of course, if anything strange happened, wouldn't it have to be on All Hallow's Eve? Soft but insistent, the music continued. Taking a deep breath into her lungs, she blinked her eyes open.

  And gaped.

  Her heart raced with terror. She tried to convince herself that the evidence of her eyes was lying. The muted, disturbing sound of the waltz continued. Violet swallowed hard in disbelief. Someone was playing a joke on her. Or were they?

  Down below, a couple flo
wed in time with the rhythm of the waltz. Their steps were perfect and synchronized. The resemblance to reality stopped there. The tall man and his partner, a willowy woman, glided across the floor in a seething gray mist. They were both completely nude, the man's powerfully built body light and graceful, and the woman matched him with a perfect figure and elegant movements.

  Violet gasped. At first, she couldn't make out their faces. The whole scene changed with the frequency of a murky kaleidoscope where vibrant colors simply couldn't exist. She saw the man's face. He was a complete stranger but with an aristocratic profile. When she set eyes on the woman's upturned face for a fragmentary second, Violet let out a groan.

  The woman's face was just like her own in every respect.

  * * * * *

  Violet had no idea how long she watched, absorbing as many details as possible. Panic shot through her like a fast flying bullet. Why were a man and a woman, who looked so much like her, dancing together naked?

  Around her, dim daylight eroded into midnight darkness without benefit of the moon's silver light. Violet stood frozen on the landing, watching the pair until they faded away, along with the music. Nothing was left except for an uneasy queasiness in her stomach, a troubling memory, and the inability to make sense of what she'd seen.

  Was someone projecting an image of her onto some type of screen? How and why? Or was she living in a haunted house that played tricks on the housekeeper? Still holding the railing, she sank to her knees and stared unseeingly into the darkness.

  One after the other, tumultuous thoughts raced through her mind. She'd been hired by this Grant Calder, but she'd never met him or seen him. How strange was that? Then she had his credit card and a note to go along with it that she could spend whatever she wanted, even if it was for personal use. There were never any visitors, she served three meals and a tea each day and was never allowed into the master suite but, if she listened carefully, she could hear a printer and a fax. She never heard the sounds of human occupation, like sniffling or a cough or furniture being moved around. Dread caught her in its grip. Was she living with a horrifying, supposedly legendary creature of the night, a vampire? Violet shuddered. Then she was out of here, no matter how good her salary was.

  Shaken to her core, she got to her feet, fished in her pocket and dug out a Maglite. The tiny flashlight was perfect for emergencies. She refused to work for a vampire or for anyone who played with her sensibility. Neither would she ever let a man pull the wool over her eyes and hurt her as her ex-boyfriend had. Grant Calder had some questions he was about to answer.

  * * * * *

  Bolder and angrier with each quick step she took, Violet marched toward the master suite. Even if she lost her job, Grant Calder had to answer her questions to set her mind at ease. She admitted she'd been hiding from the truth about her relationship with her ex-boyfriend. Chad Delaney had used her.

  She fumed, keeping her flashlight trained on the walls. “How dare Grant Calder think he can pull the same stunt on me? Wasn't it enough Chad decided to have a fling? Not with one, but several women as we were planning the wedding. And to think I thought I loved him!”

  Her hand fisted tightly around the flashlight, and the beam of light weaved around the wide hallway casting long shadows. The worst thing was she'd been accused of murdering Chad after they found his twisted body in a car wreck at the bottom of a ravine. Someone had tampered with the brakes of his Ford pickup, but Violet would never do such a thing, even if the last thing Chad had told her before racing off was so painful she hesitated to think about it.

  “It would have been better sleeping with an Egyptian mummy than with you.” His eyes had gleamed wickedly.

  Pain shot through Violet all over again like a wound reopening. Fury and anguish were no way to approach Grant Calder. She'd lose the battle before she began.

  She was at the master suite. She wanted answers only Grant had. She turned the knob, surprised to find the door unlocked as if he'd been expecting her, and tamped down the uneasiness threading its way down her spine.

  Soft light from several table lamps with stained glass shades in muted colors brightened the room. Violet's eyes adjusted quickly. She'd never been in the suite before. Expansive lavishness greeted her. As in the rest of the house, no expense had been spared to furnish the rooms. Gold brocade curtains were drawn across the windows and shut out the night. In the center of the large space, the couch and armchairs were upholstered in the same fabric. A fireplace with crackling flames made the room appear cozy and an old-fashioned standing grandfather clock mercilessly ticked the seconds away.

  “Grant Calder?” she called out, feeling very much like a CSI searching for a criminal. She didn't know whether to expect an answer or not. Instinct told her he had to be here, but she might be surprised by what she found. Vampires could be elusive, couldn't they? That was if Grant was one of those loathsome creatures, which she hoped he wasn't.

  Treading softly, Violet strode through the living area into a kitchen that equaled the one downstairs in terms of cooking aides, through a walk-in closet filled hanger to hanger with men's clothes of every description, and into a bathroom which would have taken her breath away if she'd stopped to truly examine it. Luxury screamed at her from every direction. Finally, she reached the bedroom where strategically placed table lamps lit the room adequately but not too brightly. Two plush armchairs sat against the farthest wall, but most of the room was taken up by a king-size bed with white silk sheets she suspected she'd washed countless times.

  Yet it wasn't the spotlessly clean sheets that caught her eye and stole her breath away. Violet stopped in her tracks, dropping the flashlight. She heard it thump to the rich carpet but paid no heed. The powerfully muscled man looked exactly like the man dancing downstairs. He was utterly naked, his long legs stretched out in front of him, and his hands tucked under his head.

  His voice was raspy hoarse and devastatingly sexy when he said, “I've been waiting for you.”

  * * * * *

  Grant had been waiting for Violet to make the first move. The knowledge did nothing to soothe him or allay his fears. After six months, he supposed, wouldn't the beautiful woman be interested in who her employer was?

  He turned to face her and leaned on one elbow in one languid movement. “I love the way you look.”

  The grandfather clock chimed the half hour. She still stood gaping at him, her chest rising and falling with alarming rapidity. He hoped she wasn't prone to fainting. That would be melodramatic behavior at the least and too much like Waneth, the woman who'd ruined his life. A year ago, he’d been an ordinary man, one of the few who had survived the dot.com bust and gone on with several online businesses to make his fortune. He’d chatted with Waneth, a gorgeous, intelligent woman on the webcam. As they were talking, and Grant was thinking about how to get her into bed, the webcam exploded and shattered in light so bright, it rivaled gazing into the core of the sun without protective glasses. Wondering what the hell was going on, and throwing up an arm to shield his face, he felt her touch his arm. Stupid fool, he was so besotted by her that he hadn’t questioned where she had come from. Instead, he’d made love to her. After he’d given her his love, she’d laughed wickedly at him, and told him he was now cursed as she had been.

  Focusing on the present, Grant gave his undivided attention to Violet, who he'd come to know over the last few months by uncompromisingly holding onto her from the place of the damned. Was she the key to the curse of the Inasad being lifted from him?

  She straightened her shoulders and met his eyes squarely. “Are you toying with me?”

  Grant immediately liked her ability to get right to the point. Her quiet beauty charmed him. His nudity didn’t seem to bother her. Slowly, he shook his head. “What gave you that idea?”

  She wasted no time in telling him. “Those people dancing downstairs,” she motioned with her hand, “naked.”

  Uh-oh. Was Waneth attempting to drive his housekeeper away with one of her s
tupid antics? She’d already spooked the last housekeeper so badly that the poor girl had thrown down her mop in the middle of cleaning the floor, and quit. He saw recognition dawn on Violet's pretty face, and his gut wrenched tighter. The one time he wanted sex with another woman since Waneth had messed with him, and now he'd have to pay the consequences. He could handle the turmoil that might come himself, but he was willing to make a bet Violet couldn't. She was far too innocent for the double intrigue Waneth was so prone to.

  “Those two looked like you and me. Are you trying to play some kind of cruel game on me?”

  Grant didn't move. He admired her guts for talking to a nude man and maintaining her composure. “First, I'm not toying with you, and secondly, I'm not playing some cruel game on you.” But Waneth could be. She wants to lift the curse from herself forever, not just temporarily, and she’ll do almost anything to achieve that end, including recreating Inasad dancers who are the spitting images of us and addling Violet’s mind.

  “What are you doing then?” Her eyes roamed his body, from his broad shoulders, to his lean waist, to his muscled thighs and to the tips of his toes.

  Grant wanted her naked, her aroused body under his as he made love to her. He could hardly explain that Waneth had made him one of the Inasad by, he believed, making love to him so powerfully that a surge of electricity had arced through him, making him essentially a light shifter. Waneth had seemed so carefree and seductive, but she was, in actuality an Inasad who was spiteful and angered by her fate. And he’d fallen for her trick of getting him into bed, and at the point of orgasm, when the real world met that of other dimensions, and their bodies were joined, she’d created yet another just like her. For one half of the year, he was invisible to most everyone on earth. He was alive, but more like a ghost at those times when others couldn't see him. He could shift through the earth dimension to the Inasad one, not physically, but with his mind that had been remade at a cellular level without any lasting effects to his health. For now, all he wanted was pure sex in the hope that Violet would be able to see him as a solid, not transparent, man. To be wholly solid was his goal now. She would be the first woman he'd made love to since Waneth. He wanted Violet with a strength that went beyond need, almost to obsession. Didn’t he haunt her dreams at night, searching for some opportunity to make himself solid?