Body Temperature and Rising - Book One of the Lakeland Heatwave Trilogy (17 page)

Tara silenced her with a glance, but she said nothing.

Marie took his hand and gave it a reassuring squeeze. ‘You just need a little more time, that’s all. And you’re exhausted. You haven’t been sleeping well and –’

He shot her a sharp glance He felt a tight constriction around his throat and the air in the room felt too thin to breath, too close around him. He stumbled to his feet and stepped away trying to keep calm. ‘Look I’m grateful for everything you’ve done for me, Tara, for everything you’ve all done for me, and I’ll gladly do whatever I can, which it seems is damn little. But you saw. You all saw. I just can’t do it. I’m sorry.’ He found himself backing toward the door, suddenly wanting to run, suddenly needing desperately to be back at Lacewing Farm, to be in his own space. ‘I’m going home now. I’ll be there if you need me, but not for this. I can’t help. I’m sorry.’ His gaze came to rest first on Marie, then on Tara, and finally on Fiori. ‘I’m sorry, I just can’t.’

Both Marie and Anderson started after him, but Tara raised a hand. ‘Let him go. We knew this would be hardest for him, and we know why. We can’t force him to go there until he’s ready.’ 

Marie noticed that Fiori was crying quietly. 

‘Marie, are you still all right with this?’ Tara asked. 

Marie nodded, finding it difficult to speak.

‘You do understand what it will entail?’

‘I understand, yes.’

‘And when you’ve finished.’

‘When I’ve finished, I’ll be a rider, and that’s not something to be taken lightly, even for Deacon.’

Chapter 17

As dusk settled over the fells, Tara and Sky, along with Fiori, took Marie to a secluded field behind Elemental Cottage. Anderson had been left to monitor the ride in the Ether. To one side of the field where the rock flank of the fell rose up there was a cave barely visible amid the tangle of vines and shrubs. A quick tour assured her that the Elementals had equipped it for rider use. 

‘Our house is off limits unless we invite ghosts. Ghosts follow the same rules that apply to the living in polite society,’ Sky said. ‘There are several other rendezvous points, but this is our favourite.’

‘You’re to wait here,’ Tara said. ‘Sleep if you can so you’ll be rested when Michael arrives. Begin casting the spell the moment he reaches out to you, and once it’s cast the rest will be easy.’ She took Marie into her arms in a tight embrace. ‘I know you’ll do well, darling.’ Neither Sky nor Fiori touched her. She had been told that a touch from another ghost could interfere with the spell. 

Marie wore a simple summer dress, no fancy ceremonial robe, no jewellery other than her amulet. She had removed her shoes just inside the cave entrance. Enjoying the fading evening light before she entered the confines of the cave, Marie settled onto the soft moss near the entrance and watched the Elementals walk away. She expected to be frightened, or at least a little bit nervous. But instead, she fell asleep. 

She awoke in the rain feeling the familiar flush and tingle of heat deep in her pelvic girdle. ‘Wake up, Marie Warren.’ A soft male voice spoke close to her. ‘You’ll catch your death, then you’ll be a ghost like me, and that won’t do.’ 

She sat up, shivering. Through the driving rain she could barely make out the shape of the ghost who knelt next to her. As he reached out, she cast the spell with an awareness of what was happening that hadn’t been there before her training. As with Anderson, the first touch of his fingertips was icy, but the thaw had already begun as he helped her to her feet, and as he gathered her to him she found herself already clinging to his warmth. 

‘Shall we get you out of this rain, then?’ To her surprise, he lifted her bodily into his arms, her head resting against the rapid beating of his heart through his warm chest. 

Inside the cave glowed in the amber light of kerosene lamps. Michael tugged the clingy wet dress up over her head, leaving her standing goose fleshed, nose to nose with him. ‘It’s you,’ she spoke between chattering teeth, ‘The ghost from my dream that first night. Well, I thought it was a dream back then.’

‘It pleases me beyond measure that you remember me, and that, at last I may touch you, flesh to flesh.’ He eased her back onto a pallet of pillows and blankets, opening her legs as he did so with large, warm hands. Then, almost before she knew what was happening she felt him grunt and strain and push inside of her, still fully clothed except for his thrusting cock. The sudden thickness of his penis shoved completely into her so abruptly and without foreplay took her breath away, and she cried out at the shock of it. 

‘I am sorry. I am so very sorry,’ he gasped, ‘but I need you so badly. Bear with me but a little, and I will be less savage, I promise you.’ The second thrust felt like someone had shoved a policeman’s baton into her cunt. 

She bit her lip and tried to relax, knowing that tensing would only make matters worse. The man was warm against her, his clothing was dry, as Anderson’s had always been, though she could smell the rain on his jacket as he groaned and pushed. The intensity of his need drove him with a force that seemed near agony. And her own discomfort gave way first to compassion, then to empathy. Then, amazingly quickly, the urgency of his need physically became her own. As her pussy became slick and dilated, she matched his rhythm and bore down on his thickness with equal desire. 

Even as her arousal grew, she could tell by the tension in his shoulders and the tight thrusting of his hips that he wouldn’t last long enough to give her any relief, and somehow that only intensified her own need. 

‘Please forgive me, but I must take my release now,’ he grunted. Then he let out a deep groan as shudder after shudder took him and she felt the flood of him, first in her pussy, then spilling onto her thighs, until at last he collapsed on top of her. As he caught his breath, she lay beneath him, deliciously aware of the growing thrum in her pussy.

At last he spoke, holding her in a pale blue gaze. ‘You must think me an animal to take you so rudely. Please forgive me. It is so long since I have been with a woman, and the need, the need is so great.’ He dropped a kiss onto her lips. ‘And it is your first ride. It was foremost in my mind to be gentle, but I could not.’

As he made an effort to pull out of her, she wrapped her legs around him. ‘Gentle isn’t necessary. I understand your need.’ She tightened the muscles of her cunt around his still erect penis, and he gasped. ‘I think with a need such as yours, you best stay where you are because I’m not finished, and I know you’re not.’ She arched beneath him and cupped her breasts watching his pupils dilate still further as she stroked her nipples between thumb and forefinger. ‘You’re so thick,’ she sighed, as he shifted against her with a little thrust. ‘You nearly split me in two till I got used to you, and now that I am used to you, I’m not so anxious for you to leave.’

And that was all it took. He was thrusting again. This time she managed to shift enough to get the right friction against her clit so that when he came, she came too. 

The cottage was dark and chilled when Tim got home. It didn’t matter. It was home, it was the place where he knew who he was. Well as much as he ever knew who he was. Besides, at the moment, dark and chilled fit his mood, he thought, as he set about building a fire in the fireplace. That always cheered him up, though it occasionally drew one or two nostalgic ghosts. That sent a surge of guilt clenching at his gut. But nothing had really changed, he told himself. He had never fucked ghosts, couldn’t have if he’d wanted to, and he still couldn’t. It was a lie, though. Everything had changed. Before, he had nothing to offer the ghosts who were drawn to him but his own frustration. Now he could add the guilt at his own failure in knowing that he should be able to help but couldn’t. All he really wanted was for them to go away and leave him to get on with his life, to go back to how it was before. How it was before? He could barely remember how it was before.

And now. Now that he’d given in, gone to the Elementals for help and training, he was no better off than he ever was. He could see the spell in his head so clearly. He knew it like he knew his own breath, he felt it in his bones, and yet he couldn’t bring it to fruition. Why? Now if the ghosts asked for his help, how would they ever understand his refusal as anything other than mean-spirited? 

His stomach growled loudly and he suddenly became aware of how hungry he was. There would have been dinner in the big dining room at Elemental cottage after the ill-fated meeting in the study if he had stayed. Fiori’s Lasagne Florentine. Her own recipe. The house had smelled of Mediterranean herbs and rich tomato sauce. His stomach growled again. He doubted there was much to eat in the house. Contemplating ordering a curry, he reached into the refrigerator for a much-needed beer and discovered it was well-stocked, bacon, eggs, cheese, sausage, even veg and fruit in the crisper drawer.

‘There’s some nice seeded loaf in the pantry, the kind you like for you sandwiches.’ He wasn’t startled, he didn’t turn, but he was amazed to find himself smiling at the chime of Lisette’s voice.

When he did turn to face her, she offered a shy grin. ‘Fiori did the shopping. I just told her what you liked. Though I think she added a few items she thought you might appreciate, a couple of bottles of some kind of wine she said you liked, and, what was it? Oh yes, blue vinny cheese. I told her you’d prefer cheddar, but she said that you have fond memories of blue vinny.’ The little ghost blushed.

He found himself battling emotions, the wine, the cheese, they were things he and Fiori had shared when they were ravenous from love making, when they talked all night about horses and sheep and what it meant to live in Cumbria. He pulled out a chair from the kitchen table and dropped into it remembering. He didn’t love her. There hadn’t been time. But he might have grown to if things had been different. 

‘Tim, make yourself a sandwich and go sit by the fire.’ Lisette offered him a smile, the one that always flashed before she dazzled him with her wicked sense of humour. He found himself shocked to realise that she did have a wicked sense of humour, and he liked it, though he had missed it in his surliness toward her. ‘I would make a sandwich for you,’ she added, ‘but I’m useless in the kitchen.’ She hugged herself as though she felt the chill. ‘I’m pretty useless in any room actually, but I look nice.’

What he did next happened so fast that he could scarcely believe it himself. He reached out his hand and took hers, weaving the spell as he did so, and finding it effortless, like he had done it all his life, like he could do it in his sleep. 

A little moan caught in her throat and ended softly with a sigh and a shudder, and he could already feel her fingers warming beneath his. Suddenly she stood before him as solid as he was, her pale skin glowing alabaster, her body heat deliciously inviting. He brushed her cheek and swallowed back the knot of emotion in his throat. ‘Make me a sandwich, Lisette. I don’t care what kind. And make yourself one too.’ He took one of the bottles of wine Fiori had bought and two glasses. ‘I’ll be waiting by the fire.’ 

For a long time he sat gazing into the flames, listening to Lisette rattling about in the kitchen, humming Gershwin, Porgy and Bess. The experience wasn’t at all unpleasant. Why had he always pushed her away? And why had he struggled so with something that was as easy as his own heartbeat?

She was breathless when she came into the lounge. Her cheeks were flushed and her china doll eyes were round with excitement. She carried a tray adorned with two enormous ham sandwiches, a bowl of neatly arranged fruit, and a small bud vase containing a single pale rose. She blushed heartily when he looked up at her. ‘I hope you don’t mind, but I picked the rose from the climber by the door. It smelled so lovely, and it’s been so long since I smelled a rose.’ 

He was sitting on the throw cushions on the floor, his back against the sofa. It was always his favourite place to enjoy the fire. He patted the extra cushion that he’d arranged next to him, and poured them both a glass of wine. ‘Sorry. It could have used a little more time to breathe, but I’m being spontaneous.’

‘Aren’t you just,’ she said. ‘Besides it won’t matter if the wine hasn’t breathed enough. I won’t know the difference, will I?’

They ate in companionable silence, which surprised him, until he realised she was savouring every bite, every texture, every taste. He felt the tightness return to his throat as he thought about how often he ate his food without tasting it, gulped back his tea without savouring it. ‘Do you like it?’ he asked, feeling her excitement tingle over him, then down low in his belly.

‘I love it, Tim Meriwether. I’ve never tasted anything so grand.’

He found his own delight in watching her eat and drink, in seeing her excitement at the feel of the cushion, at the warmth and the scent of the fire. She was so alive. Had this been who she was before she died, this beautiful, vivacious, wickedly funny woman who sat next to him savouring her first meal in maybe 80 years.

When they were finished and she started to take away the tray, he took her hand. ‘Leave it.’

Her eyes were full of question. ‘You don’t want coffee or tea. Fiori bought chocolate too.’

‘Maybe I’ll want all those things later, maybe I’ll want to see you enjoying chocolate. But for the moment, I have everything I need right here.’ He lifted her fingers to his lips and felt her whole body shudder beneath his touch.

He turned her hand and kissed her palm, then the place where her pulse raced like a wild thing between the slender bones of her wrists. ‘I never got a chance to thank you for what you did.’

She tried to pull her hand away. ‘I did what any decent person would do, Tim, I didn’t do it for –’

He stopped her words with a kiss, just a brush of his lips, but enough to silence her. ‘I know that, Lisette, and I know that I’ve been a fool, and I’m sorry. You’re the best of people and you deserve good things, Lisette, you deserve good things.’ One kiss dissolved seamlessly into another and another interspersed with the little bird sounds escaping the throat of the woman in his arms. And she was exquisite, tiny compared to the other women he had been with, like a fairy, so delicate he feared he would break her if he held her too tightly.

As he lowered her onto the floor in front of the fire and pushed the top of her dress down to caress small breasts with enormous flower bud nipples, she arched up into his hands and whispered, ‘I could die a happy woman now, Tim Meriwether, if I wasn’t already dead.’ Then she added, ‘That tool of yours, the one you’re always playing with in front of me, does it work as well on a woman as it does in your hand.’

‘Shall we find out?’ He shoved up her skirt and slid silk panties down over her hips, feeling her grind her bottom against the floor as he ran his fingers through her tightly trimmed pubic curls and then slid them down into her open pout, which was slick and dewy and grasping at him with little shudders.

‘Tim,’ she whispered. ‘I’ve had 80 years of foreplay. Please, don’t keep me waiting.’

As he reached to undo his fly, she pushed his hands away. ‘Let me. It’s like unwrapping a present at Christmas.’