Spirit's Release

Spirit’s Release

Téa
Trelawny

Sex generates enough energy for ghosts to manifest. That’s
Dera’s
theory, and the sultry ghost hunter wants to test it with her sexy ex-boss.

Alec repressed his hunger for
Dera
when she worked for him, but three years later she wants to use his body for paranormal research…and use it hard. If raw sex can save his new business from the ghost that threatens it, it’s all in the name of science, right? The fact that his partner will be delicious
Dera
only makes the experiment more enticing. But will the ghost cooperate…or get in the way?

Chapter One

“Mainly honeymooners complain?”
Dera
Morgan asked as she followed Alec Thorn into the allegedly haunted bedroom. Moonlight filled the elegant chamber through windows that overlooked the Welsh countryside, giving the air a cool, silvered quality.

“Yes.” Alec was skeptical that a spirit inhabited the old manor house that he’d converted to an upscale inn. “Because of the
ghost
, they never get to…um…finish what they’re doing. If you know what I mean.”

Dera
certainly did know. If nothing else, the twinkle in Alec’s green eyes gave it away. That twinkle also stirred her desires to
finish
what had started between them when she’d worked at his London real estate firm. Back then he had resisted her attempts at seduction, claiming it was unethical for a man to date a woman in his employ. But, three years later, she no longer worked for him, and the moment she’d seen him this evening, she’d known that her feelings for him hadn’t changed. But she wasn’t ready to act until she felt him out. No sense making a fool of herself again.

“It’s a lovely room,” she said, strolling to the center of it. Exposed beams gave the high ceilings an illusion of coziness while crimson hangings on the canopied bed lent richness to the décor. Old tapestries hung from the stone walls between wide mullioned windows that sported plush window seats.
“Quite where I should like to enjoy my honeymoon.”

Alec tucked his hands into the pockets of his jeans, drawing
Dera’s
gaze downward. She blushed when she realized she was staring, looking for the most obvious sign that his feelings for her—at least the physical ones—had remained unchanged over the years.

She couldn’t tell. Still, she was hopeful.
Alec might have resisted her in the past, but he’d never denied that he’d wanted her. In fact, after she’d kissed him passionately their last night together, he’d confessed his powerful attraction to her. But he’d been adamant that nothing could come of it.

“Anytime you’d like to spend a night here, you’ve but to say so,” he said, his voice heavy with what she hoped was meaning.

Reaching the bed, she ran one hand over the pale gray bedspread. The velvet tickled her palm almost as strongly as his tone tickled that spot behind and below her belly. “I think tonight might be a good night.
For ghost hunting, of course.”

“Of course.”

As his gaze roamed down her body, pausing on her breasts, she nipped at her lower lip. Had she dressed too provocatively? The moment she’d realized who was calling her office the previous morning, she’d decided that her regular ghost hunting outfit of khaki trousers and black sweater would never do. But had she gone overboard with her skin-tight jeans and red silk blouse? Was she being too obvious?

His appreciative smile convinced her she’d chosen well. Oh yes. There was hope.

Averting her own smiling gaze, she reached inside the leather bag that hung from her left shoulder and drew out her K2 meter. Its LED lights flashed briefly when she switched it on and then they turned dark. She began to move around the room, watching the lights on the device for any sign of electromagnetic energy that might indicate the presence of a spirit.

“What’s that?” Alec asked.

His boot heels made a heavy, determined sound against the oak floor as he followed her and she couldn’t help looking back at him. He wore a buttery yellow sweater over his black jeans, and his v-shaped neckline revealed just a bit of the hair on his chest. She’d seen his bare chest their last night together in London—hell, she’d practically ripped his shirt from his body—and the memory of their kiss caused another ticklish tug of muscle deep inside her lower body.

“It’s an electromagnet field detector,” she answered, stopping at the foot of the bed. “It picks up on the energy of spirits.”

“Very scientific.”
Reaching her, he peered over her shoulder at the handheld device. Only a few inches taller than she—and she was tall—he brushed her hair with his ear. Then, as if embarrassed by the inadvertent contact, he drew back. “Is it…um…detecting any energy right now?”

Not the kind I’m detecting,
she thought as that brief touch sent her internal temperature spiking.

“Not yet,” she said, and then paused to clear her sudden hoarseness. “Where does the ghost usually appear?”

“I’m told that it moves from the corridor doorway toward the side of the bed nearest the window.”

“And you said it’s not a full manifestation, correct?” She moved on around to the indicated side of the bed. “It’s more a wispy figure than a full one?”

“That’s what they say.”

He followed her. Moonlight fell through the windows, casting their shadows over the pale bedspread. Side by side, the silhouettes of their upper bodies touched like two lovers lying across the wide bed.
Dera
withheld a sigh of longing that he would see the same image.

“The figure hovers here,” he said, shifting to stand behind her. To her surprise, he settled his hands on her waist and drew her back slightly. “Just…here.”

Her shoulder blades came up against his chest and his hands remained on her waist. The intimate position sent a thrill through her. But it wasn’t quite enough. Eager for that final piece of evidence that his desire for her had survived their years
apart,
she shifted her weight so that her backside touched the front of his jeans. She felt the long ridge of flesh that pressed against his zipper and heat coursed through her.

Oh yes. He’s definitely still interested.

“What happens next?” she asked, lowering her voice. “I mean…when they see it?”

“The couple on the bed is usually frozen in fear. Then the figure appears to pitch toward them before it suddenly vanishes.” He didn’t move away but he didn’t move closer either. “Then my night clerk gets a terrified phone call and I’m summoned to check out a reported intruder.”

“I…see.” She wanted him to lift his hands from her waist and skim them around to her breasts. Sexual energy sizzled through her body, quickening her heartbeat until she was certain he must hear it in the night.

“Do you,
Dera
?” His lips brushed her ear. “Do you see?”

Before she could answer—and her answer would have been to turn and hurl herself against him—the temperature of the room dropped. Alec lifted his head and released a startled oath. At the same moment,
Dera
spied movement on the other side of the bed, near the corridor door. A gauzy shadow of white drifted toward the bed.

Her thoughts of desire and seduction evaporated as the mist paused and condensed. It shuddered briefly and then the vaporous form whipped around the foot of the bed. Before she could react, Alec yanked
Dera
backward, his legs tangling with hers as they stumbled toward the moonlit windows. He took the brunt of their weight as he plunked down upon a window seat and
Dera
landed in his lap.

The mist reached the place where they had stood. The chill in the room intensified. From her peripheral vision,
Dera
saw that the lights on the K2 meter flashing wildly.

“What the—”

At Alec’s voice, the mist abruptly vanished. The temperature in the room returned to normal and the lights on the K2 meter went dark. It was as if nothing had happened.

Dera
stared at the place where she’d seen the apparition. “I take it you’ve never seen that before,” she whispered.

A moment passed before Alec answered in as low a voice, “Never.
I only half-believed the people who told me about it.”

“And now?”

“I can’t deny my own eyes, can I?”

He took in a deep breath. She heard it, felt the swelling of his chest against her back, became aware of just how intimately they were joined there on that window seat. His inner thighs embraced her outer ones. One of his hands gripped her arm. His other hand rested across her lap, his fingers brushing her stomach.

Recognizing their position had the effect of jolting her libido back to life. But as she prepared to act on it, he stood her on her feet and stepped away.

* * * * *

Jacob Elliott hovered in the dark aloneness that had been his prison for too many years. Guilt drained him, keeping him from moving on, punishing him for leaving Sophie to attend a horse sale when she was ill. She had died alone and, for that, he did not deserve to be with her. His guilt was compounded when he’d taken his own life, denying himself the chance to move on with her.

Now, as in few moments since his death, he not only remembered what he had done, but he also possessed a vague awareness of the world around him. Nights like this, he had found himself in the corridor outside the bedchamber he had shared with his wife. He had been driven to enter the room, overwhelmed by the knowledge that his beloved lay dead inside. Grief had driven him to draw his dagger and plunge it into his own chest that he might join her in the afterlife. But instead of passing on, he merely returned to the darkness, to the guilt…to the waiting.

Even now, the darkness beckoned him.

* * * * *

Alec stepped toward the bed. “I can’t believe it. I thought it was just a legend, a story told to frighten children.”

“It’s nothing to fear,”
Dera
said, her voice soothing in that moonlit room. “It appears to be a simple residual haunting.”

“Simple?” He swung back toward her. “How can you call that simple? It was a-a ghost!
In my inn…my home!”

Her sympathetic expression told him that his reaction didn’t surprise her. “The spirit has probably been here for a long time. You simply weren’t aware of it before.”

“How could I not be aware? The cold…what we saw…”

“Tell me the story again,” she urged.

He stared at the bed. “In the eighteenth century, Jacob Elliott built this house for his bride, Sophie. They lived here less than a year when Jacob was called away on business. He returned to find that Sophie had passed away of a fever. He was so grief-stricken that he drew his dagger and stabbed himself in the heart. He fell onto the bed, across her body, and died. The legend says that his spirit returns occasionally, repeating his moment of death.”

“That sounds like what we saw. The figure stood here.” She stepped nearer the bed. “It paused and then made a move that I would liken to drawing a dagger.”

“But then it vanished.”

She smiled at him. “No offense, but you kind of yelped. I’m afraid that might have frightened it away.”

He placed a hand over his heart and stared at her in disbelief. “
I
frightened
it?
”

She laughed. “Perhaps
frightened
isn’t the right word. But you disturbed the atmosphere enough to stop the manifestation.”

The sound of her laughter tickled down inside his chest, calming his fear and shifting his inner thoughts. Three years had passed since he’d last seen her, and he was amazed to discover that his attraction to her hadn’t changed. Even when she’d worked for him, he’d found it hard to keep his hands off her. That last night he’d almost failed, almost moved beyond that wet, wild kiss. Only a phone call about her wounded brother had kept them from consummating their desire. She’d left and—but for a short phone call saying she was leaving the firm to help her brother recuperate—he hadn’t heard from her again.

“According to the witnesses,” she continued, “When the spirit manifests, it repeats the same motions every time. How often have you heard reports of this happening?”

“Almost from the moment I opened the inn two months ago.” He’d come across the property a year earlier and had found it to be too good a deal to pass up. Giving up his career in real estate, he’d thrown everything he had into becoming a gentleman innkeeper. But the ghost—and he had to admit now that it was real—was making it difficult to keep guests in this room for even a full night. “Some of the former staff stayed on and they told stories, but I didn’t believe them. I was certain we would find a logical explanation.”

Tapping a fingertip against her lips,
Dera
strolled around the bed. Alec watched her move—her trim hips swaying,
her
long legs graceful—and his fear dimmed further. How could he worry about a ghost when he had her here, just inches from his grasp?

“Did anyone ever see this spirit when they were alone?” she asked.

“I’m not sure I understand the question.” Or maybe it was the way her jeans fit so snugly over her round ass that made it difficult for him to understand, to focus on the subject at hand. He’d never allowed himself to consider touching those sweet cheeks before—not when she worked for him. Not even when she’d tried—and oh how she’d tried—to seduce him. He’d lost at least three buttons before he managed to end that wild kiss.

She doesn’t work for you now. But does she still feel the same attraction?

He allowed himself to wonder as he stroked her lush body with his eyes. She had legs long enough to curl around him and hold him to her. And her breasts appeared heavy and soft. And her amazing mouth—

She turned back toward him and his gaze shot to her eyes. “You said that since you’ve opened the inn,
couples
reported seeing the ghost. Did single people ever stay in this room?”

“A few.”
With difficulty, he turned his thoughts to the matter at hand. “But none of them mentioned the ghost.”

She returned to the side of the bed where he stood. “And what would couples be doing that would be different from single people?”

“Well…” Heat swept through him. “Of course they might…”

Alec’s heart began to throb as
Dera’s
gaze settled on him. Although he couldn’t see their color in the moonlight, he saw that special gleam that told him she was thinking the same thing that he was thinking. And it had nothing to do with
other
couples.

“There is a theory,” she said slowly, lowering the strap of her leather bag down her arm as if it was the strap of a bra. “It says that, in order to manifest, spirits need energy from their environment. They draw it from batteries, storms or even from humans.” She lowered the bag to the floor. “What generates more energy than…sex?”