Devil at Midnight (5 page)

“Maybe you could consider me company. I mean, I know what it is to want to be alone with your troubles—”

“Do you?” He cut her off scornfully. “Do you really?”

Grace pulled herself straighter. “Doubt what you like about me. That I’m an expert in.”

Their gazes locked together, both narrowed, both certain of their own rightness. Grace wasn’t accustomed to staring directly at other people. She’d been trained young not to issue such challenges. Keeping her eyes on the floor was safer, but she forced herself to hold Christian’s gaze. No point not to, since she no longer had a body that could be hurt. Something passed between them as their standoff lengthened, thickening the air with electricity. Grace had the fleeting and strange sensation of increasing weight in her limbs.

Whatever
he
was feeling, Christian’s lean cheeks darkened. “You bear the hair of a witch,” he said.

“Fine,” she countered, searching her brain for some period-appropriate insult. “You have the manners of a toad.”

She wasn’t sure he cared about his manners, but his nostrils flared. “I want you gone.”

“I’d rather not be dead. Looks like we’re both doomed to disappointment.”

“You refuse to depart?”

“I’m not refusing,” she gritted in exasperation. “I don’t know how to leave. Someone else sent me here. And since I am here, maybe you could put something on!”

 

 

C
hristian spun away from her in frustration, stubbornly ignoring the wild pounding of his pulse. He was arguing with a ghost. An honest-to-goodness specter had taken up residence in his room.

Like anyone, Christian had heard tales of supernatural beings: sirens and succubi and beautiful death omens who collected soldiers’ souls on the battlefield. He simply did not comprehend why
he
would meet one—or why
his
ghost had to look like this.

If she had been more ghastly, maybe he could have run. Instead, she was young and pretty and, apart from her raiment, all too innocent looking. She was, in truth, precisely the sort of female he did not let himself dream about. He was a damned soul, a mercenary who killed for coin. By his very nature, women like that were not meant for him.

His member thickened, deepening his resentment as he yanked his hose up his legs. With no doublet to tie the points to, the garment drooped, but he saw no reason to dress more formally for a shade. If she disliked the look of his body, she could go back where she had come from!

He braced himself before he turned to her again.

The girding did no good. Her beauty hit him harder the second time. Her witch’s hair was as dark as rubies, its shining waves spilling down her arms. Her eyes were a clear light green, wide in their frame of lashes, big in her creamy-skinned, sculpted face. He could not fathom by what means she appeared so solid. Her lush red mouth looked perfectly kissable, light glinting off the edge of one pearly tooth as her lips parted.

His gaze slid lower, helpless not to take in the rest of her. By heaven, her breasts were lovely, full and round and sitting high on her rib cage as if begging to be cupped. In contrast, her hips were narrow, almost boyish ... until they ran into long, shapely legs. Whether a man be saint or sinner, he would have to be dead not to want to be wrapped in those silky thighs—wrapped and squeezed and clutched in amorous congress until the very last of his breath gasped out.

Christian swallowed at the thought of that. He was young and such things happened, but even he was taken aback when his pike hammered up in the space of two hard heartbeats. Her linen shift did little to shield the dark red triangle at her queinte.

If, as she implied, an angel had dressed her, the creature must have had a devil’s intentions.

“Shirt?” she suggested with the little huff she had used before.

Christian forced himself to toss his head in a lordly manner. She might have twisted him into a knot of desire, but he did not have to admit it.

“You are a ghost. What care I for your maidenly modesty?”

Her cheeks blazed pinker, her gaze dropping briefly, interestingly to his chest. Goose pimples broke out around his nipples, which he could not doubt were erect.

“Fine,” she said, her voice husky. “But you should return to bed. You won’t heal well unless you sleep.”

Come there with me,
he thought in spite of himself.

“You expect me to sleep with you in my chamber?”

Her pretty green eyes narrowed. “I have no body. I couldn’t harm you even if I wished. And surely you’re not suggesting a big, strong knight like you is too cowardly to try.”

“I am not a knight, I am a mercenary. Men like me fight for money and not the Lord.”

His interloper shrugged with affected calm. “All the more reason not to act like a frightened goose.”

He glared at her, knowing she was attempting to manipulate him. Gingerly, he lowered himself onto his mattress. He
was
tired—exhausted—but who knew what a ghost would do once his guard was down? Only a fool would trust one to tell the truth. Come to that, there were not many living people he would make himself vulnerable to.

His hand bumped his knife, reminding him it was there. He pushed it warily beneath his pillow. This weapon, at least, would not work on her.

“I’ll swear on whatever you want,” she said. “Whatever you old-time folks believe in.”

This apparition spoke very strangely, though he found he had no trouble understanding her. Oddly, her dialect seemed to untangle even as it slid into his ears.

“Old-time,”
he repeated under his breath. On impulse, he snatched down the cross that hung above his bed. He did not know if it would protect him, but it was better than nothing.

“Good,” she said as he pressed it against his chest. “Now lie down and relax.”

Christian’s jaw tightened. She had no right to give him orders. For that matter, he should have been shouting for Michael. His closest friend had not studied at the monastery long, but perhaps he knew a ritual that would banish her.

“Please,” she said. “I came here to be with you.”

To his surprise, her lower lids welled with tears—a devil’s tears, for all he knew. He fought the weakness inside him, but its grip was too strong. The simple, shameful craving for kindness pulled him onto his side on the blanket and closed his eyes.

A silence followed, during which all his muscles tensed with the knowledge that the shade was still there. He told himself he could call his men any time. Or leave. Leaving might be a fine idea. His friends might or might not see her, but he would not be alone with her.

The faintest sense of weight depressing the mattress caused the hair on his arms to rise.

“You are sitting on my bed,” he said, his eyes still shut.

“Hush,” she answered. “Even a ghost can’t stand forever.”

He had only her word for that. He opened his mouth to protest, but a tingle like he had experienced when he walked through her caressed his hair.

“Specter, you touched my head!”

“Hush,” she repeated as if her teeth were clenched. “This is what I came for. No one should have to bear every weight alone.”

He snorted, because what people should have to bear rarely matched what they did. “I am too tired to stop you,” he announced proudly. “I will deal with you later.”

“I’m not afraid of you,” she retorted, which was ironic—considering she herself did not sound convinced. “My name is Grace, in case you’re interested.”

He steeled himself against a brush of curiosity. What sort of ghost would care if he knew her name? “I am only interested in getting rid of you.”

“Maybe I’ll be gone when you wake up.”

“Maybe you are a hallucination in the first place.” He was so sleepy the words trailed off into a jumble. His shoulders jerked, the tension that had been coiled in them unexpectedly releasing. The phantom tingle of her hand slid onto his arm. It was almost warm, almost heavy, its rhythmic strokes soothing. His erection was slowly fading, though its nerves continued to hum. Lulled, he rolled forward onto his face.

“Your wrists!” she gasped, cradling one. His skin was raw from tugging against the rope that had bound him to the whipping post. The bruise did not hurt when her tingling touch skated over it. For whatever reason, he could feel her more clearly now. She had cool, slender fingers—gentle and slightly shy. She
was
comforting him, ludicrous though that was.

“Stop that,” he grumbled, the words slurring.

He would never know if she listened. Sleep swept over him in a thick black tide.

C
hristian lay beside Grace when she woke the following afternoon. Not having much experience being a spirit, she hadn’t known she could sleep. She remembered sitting by Christian, stroking his hair and hands for a good long time. She could feel them, just a little, and the sensation had been pleasant. Her nervousness about pushing herself on him, when he so obviously didn’t want her there, had faded with the last day’s light. She’d grown peaceful, almost happy, and then the world had blanked out.

If she’d returned to the in-between place where she’d met her angel, she didn’t recall it now.

She pushed up from Christian’s bed where she’d been resting. He slept on, still on his stomach, snoring softly from exhaustion. His head was turned to the side on the pillow, his features squashed. His lashes fanned so thick and dark against his cheeks that she felt jealous.

“Michael,” she whispered, clambering over Christian without disturbing him. “Michael, what am I supposed to do now?”

Dust motes swam through the beams of light that filtered past the edges of the wooden shutters. She heard distant shouts outside, the rumble of wagon wheels, the clatter of clay dishes. Despite her own incorporeality, this other world was amazingly real to her.

“Michael,” she hissed more loudly. “Did you really mean to just leave me here?”

“Who are you talking to?” Christian mumbled behind her.

Grace spun to him, noting with a little lurch that the dust motes didn’t stir when she did. “To my guide,” she said. “The angel who sent me here.”

Christian rubbed his sleep-creased face. Stubble darkened the dramatic planes of his jaw. She could hear the bristles rasping beneath his palms. He was sitting up on the side of his bed. The imprint of the wooden crucifix he’d slept on was clear and red on his flat stomach. Also clear was the startlingly large erection poking through the flap of his underthings. The pants he’d pulled on last night were constructed in separate legs and didn’t cover him well at all. Half asleep as he was, Christian seemed unaware that his private parts were exposed.

Grace had heard boys joke with each other about “morning wood,” but this was a baseball bat! Christian’s penis was thicker than she’d imagined a man’s could get. Longer than her hand and veiny, it shuddered like a living creature from the pumping of the blood in it. Grace wasn’t convinced even the head of that marvel would squeeze into her.

The size of his “marvel” notwithstanding, it wasn’t fear that had her flesh ticking and squirming between her legs. As she wondered if he started every day this way, she felt a rush of warm wetness there.

“Grace?” Christian said, but she couldn’t tear her gaze from his organ’s crest. Its skin was taut and shining, as if it had been polished ... or maybe licked. “Grace, did you hear me?”

Had he asked her a question? She looked into his leanly handsome face. Those black eyes of his could pierce any woman’s soul.

“Are you daft?” he demanded. He glanced down at himself, belatedly registering the state of his body. “Oh, Christ.” To her disappointment, he grabbed the pillow and shoved it over his lap. “You should not stare like that, wench. A man might draw the wrong conclusion.”

Grace blushed hot for a moment before she laughed, perhaps a bit hysterically. “I can stare all I want. No man can hurt me now.”

“
Did
one hurt you?” Christian asked.

Grace quieted abruptly. “No. Not ...” She stopped, at a loss. She understood what he meant, but didn’t know how to answer.

Christian’s expression grew closed and proud. “Forgive me. Your past is not my concern.”

Whatever her unsureness, she didn’t want to hurt his feelings. “My father used to hit me,” she said. “But that’s all it was. Just hitting and calling names.”

Christian’s gaze searched hers so deeply she had to fight not to wince. “Your father is the reason you lost your life.”

“Yes,” Grace admitted. Her voice was husky, and she felt inexplicably ashamed. She shrugged one shoulder higher than the other. “It doesn’t matter. The angel promised that, in time, I’d forget to be afraid and angry.”

“Murder should not go unpunished,” Christian said sternly.

Because it seemed pointless to argue, Grace said nothing. Christian stared at her a few seconds longer, his hands tightening—perhaps unconsciously—to cram the pillow deeper into his lap.