Ghost Layer (The Ghost Seer Series Book 2) Read online

  If she craved him as much as he did her.

  He drew his arm from behind her, and they fit even better so he groaned again. He thought Clare was whimpering, but blood rushed around in his head, thundering in his ears, before dropping straight to his engorged erection.

  Her thigh felt so smooth to his palm. And warm. Her dress got caught on his hand because he was sweaty or his skin was rough, damn it! But he found the smoothness of her panties, registering that they felt like silk just before he ripped them off her.

  His fingers found her. Warmer than he’d imagined and, yeah, wet!

  She cried out, then lifted her leg and hitched it on his hip, and he knew she was open to him and he had to get inside her now. He yanked at his jeans and felt the hook rip, moaned as his fingers brushed his dick under the cotton, swore, prayed, he’d get inside her, where he needed to be, before he came. Found the split in his boxers, freed himself, and plunged into Clare.

  She was hot, slick, and she smelled like Clare and sex, and he thrust and thrust and thrust, tried to hang on to a sliver of control to make the ecstasy last but she ground against him and whispered his name and then she clenched around him and it was all over and pure pleasure exploded.

  A couple of minutes later they slid down the wall, onto her wood floor. He pulled her over him, so he could feel her, still needing her close. Words fell out of his mouth. “God, Clare. I was away too damn long.”

  She sniffed.

  “Shoulda made them hurry up the damn hearing, not stayed awhile to bullshit with Billings cops, or dropped by to see my old boss. I coulda been back earlier if I’d driven straight through.”

  She chuckled. “I missed you, too, a great deal.”

  That should make alarm bells go off in his head and his heart. Going too fast, going too deep into a relationship with Clare too soon.

  He heard nothing but their unsteady breathing, and his arms tightened around her.

  “I’ll get up in a minute,” she murmured. Her fingers had slipped through a gap between the buttons of his shirt and she petted his chest. Wonderful.

  “I may be up again shortly,” he said.

  She laughed and rubbed her head against him. As her other hand danced across his hip and began to wedge between them, he grabbed it and stopped it. “I’d like to wait until we’re on a bed next time, and with added protection.”

  He met her eyes as she lifted her head. Her pupils were large in the dim light, and he couldn’t tell what color, brown or green, the hazel shaded to.

  Snuggling close, she seemed to relax atop him. He closed his eyes, then jolted as he felt a lick on his ear, her teeth close gently on his lobe. Oh, God. Now his dick was really interested again. Gently he rolled until she slid from the top of him to her side, her teeth white in a grin in the dim light. Again his heart lurched. He liked seeing her happy.

  He stood and stepped from his jeans, then hauled her up next to him, leaving her pretty panties on the floor. With her smile still wide, he figured she wasn’t thinking of her tidy nature. Was that an innate characteristic or something she’d learned in order to cope with the chaos of her family life during childhood? Something he’d have to hang around to find out.

  “Let’s hit the shower,” he said. The master bathroom had one of those major deals with multiple showerheads that laid down crisscrossing streams of water.

  Taking her hand, he led her to the tiny elevator. He wanted to get to the second floor faster and have sex with his woman instead of slowly mounting the stairs. He tensed a moment, not sure where his cane had gone to, then shrugged and decided to leave it. She had a selection of canes in a fancy Chinese umbrella stand next to “his” dresser.

  Yeah, they’d moved fast. So fast, so intimate. So intense that he couldn’t turn away from this generous, caring woman.

  Sexy as hell woman. Too bad her skirt covered her lower body as they walked.

  A few minutes later, all soft and slippery, they’d shouted their satisfaction together once more and were sliding down the corner of the shower, hot water still pumping, nearly too much for his senses to stand. Fantastic.

  Clare recovered first and let some steam out as she left the enclosure. The only regret he had right now was that he was damn sure he wouldn’t be making love to her in her new bed. Exhaustion hovered like a thunderstorm ready to hit.

  Until he heard her scream.

  Fear pumped through him. He slammed from the shower, ran with his lurching gait.

  When he got to the bedroom, Clare appeared more angry than frightened and gestured with a quivering hand at the bed, covers turned down. Zach blinked. “What?” Then he got closer and saw.

  “It’s a finger. A whole skeletal finger. All the bones. That ghost, that J. Dawson Hidgepath, left them. Here. For me.” She crossed her arms in a defensive pose, pulling the plush robe around her.

  Zach’s breathing slowed. Man, he was out of shape, out of practice at handling emergencies. Or maybe it was that his lover had been threatened . . . anyway, he was dealing with a massive surge of adrenaline. He stared down at the four bones, not seeing anything threading them together as if they’d been a model.

  The scare and his humor got the best of him. “I’ve seen enough bones to tell you that it’s his index finger and not the middle one he left you.”

  She glared at him and he coughed to cover his laugh. When she gave him a dirty look, he grabbed her discarded towel and wrapped it around him, then slipped an arm around her waist.

  “J. Dawson Hidgepath!” she yelled, with enough volume and a high pitch that made Zach’s ears ring. “You get here now!”

  What is it? What is it? Enzo materialized at the end of the California king bed and sniffed at the bones. Ooooh. Ooooh. Nice, smelly, BONES FROM A GHOSTMAN!

  Zach heard barking, but since he was touching Clare, he got the full visual and telepathic audio. Clare’s arm had gone around Zach’s waist, too. She smelled fabulous, fancy peach soap, a hint of roses from the shampoo, and Clare.

  The ghost of a man walked through the bedroom French doors to the balcony. The second-story French doors. As always, it was difficult to judge the height of a floating man with . . . no feet . . . more than a regular human.

  Zach judged this guy to be five foot eight and with a light frame, on the scrawny side, 138 pounds or so.

  The apparition stopped at the end of the bed and doffed his bowler hat, then put it over his heart. I see you’ve found the token of my affection. He gestured and light seemed to sparkle on a rose and a piece of paper under the finger.

  “I don’t like it,” Clare said.

  You haven’t even LOOKED at my poem! The ghost sounded hurt.

  Enzo yipped and began licking the bones.

  The ghost yelped, Stop that!

  Sluurrp. The spook dog ignored the man haunt.

  “Enzo!” exclaimed Clare.

  “Enzo,” said Zach.

  Awww, so tasty.

  “With what? Ectoplasmic goo?” Zach asked.

  Hidgepath scowled at Zach as if noticing him for the first time. “Who is he?”

  Zach smiled. “The law.”

  Too-pointy-to-be-manly chin jutting, Hidgepath said, You can’t do anything to me.

  “Sure I can,” Zach said easily. “I can stop Clare from sending you on, let you stay in this half life forever.” From what the gunfighter ghost they’d dealt with had said, that was not something anyone wanted to stay stuck in.

  Clare stiffened. Zach winked at her then stared into the dark and glittery holes that were the apparition’s “eyes.” “And who do you think is investigating your murder?”

  The ghost literally brightened, becoming better defined shadows. He wore dark pants and a vest, a nice shirt. His hat had disappeared. Hope shone on his face. You? You’ll be looking into my death? The words resonated deeper in Zach’s head.

  “That’s what I do.” Just before Zach had left, Rickman had said something about getting more cases from criminal defense attorneys now tha
t Zach was on staff, maybe even hiring more ex-cops, building that side of his business.

  J. Dawson Hidgepath bowed.

  “Take the bones and go,” Clare said.

  The entire body of the ghost slumped as if depressed his offerings hadn’t been accepted, but what did the guy expect?

  Clare’s voice softened. “Where do you want to be buried, J. Dawson? I can gather and keep your bones and arrange for a burial in a place of your choosing.”

  She lied. Zach knew damn well who’d be picking up those bones and storing them for safekeeping. It wasn’t Clare.

  Scratching his chin, the wraith projected, I would like to be buried in the Fairplay Cemetery. It was close to Curly Wolf and is a good name for a town, a good omen for me, and it is still being used so I won’t be lonely. Though, hopefully, you will find out who pushed me off that trail to my death, and I will rest easier.

  Then the damn ghost winked at Clare. Or you can find me a pretty little female ghost who is as stuck as I am. He grinned, cocked a hip. Everything is better for being shared.

  Clare smiled and made pushing motions with her hand. “Go on with you. Know that we’re working to help you. And please, no more bones in my bed. Stick to the consulting room in the carriage house.”

  “Does the consulting room have a couch?” Zach asked.

  She sent him a repressive look. “A love seat.”

  He could hide his bones in the love seat and I could find them! Fun, fun, fun! Enzo barked and leapt off the bed to land near the ghost, doing one of those long nose-run-up-the-leg deals and inhaling lustily.

  The shade of J. Dawson Hidgepath flinched. He tipped his hat—again on his head—to Zach, then a leer and a deeper pull on the brim of his bowler for Clare. Later, fair lady.

  As he began to fade, a last, echoing sentence came. I’ll see you in South Park.

  “Uh-oh,” Clare said. “I think we’re not the only ones who’ll be gifted with bones.” She looked with distaste at the four resting in her bed.

  SEVEN

  ENZO TILTED HIS head. I will follow him and see where he goes! He DOES smell soooo good.

  “Good idea,” Zach said and watched the Labrador bullet out of the same second-story French doors J. Dawson had entered by.

  Clare shifted from foot to foot as if uncertain.

  “Go ahead and change the sheets,” Zach said.

  With a smile, she flung her arms around him, pressed her body against his briefly as she kissed his cheek, pleasing him with the casual intimacy. “I’ll help you,” he said. He picked up the bones and began to put them on the side table.

  “Wait! That’s my bedside table.” She hurried away and came back with a large, fancily painted chest of about two feet wide with a domed top that she carried easily. Zach hadn’t begun to take off the sheets, he’d have to move the pillows first, and he knew exactly what would happen if he touched the cases with hands that had held old bones. The pillowcases would have to be stripped and washed, too.

  “Let me help you with that.” He started forward. Stopped after one step when his left foot dragged along the floor, cringed. He’d forgotten. Despair surged through him. How long would it be before he wouldn’t forget his disability?

  “It’s all right,” Clare said cheerfully and he couldn’t tell whether she’d seen his emotional pain. “The box is papier-mâché.” She looked at it, and her mouth turned down. “I don’t like the pattern.”

  Now he noticed the tiny dancing skeletons in various colors on a black background. His lips twitched. “Something you inherited from your great-aunt Sandra?”

  “Yes.” She looked at the thing with distaste. “And my brother knew I didn’t want it. But the thing is, he didn’t want it either.”

  “And he packed up your great-aunt Sandra’s house.”

  “Yes. And here it is,” Clare said.

  “I’m sure J. Dawson will approve of it.”

  She frowned at him. “You’re just saying that to be polite.”

  “Yeah, but the box is appropriate.” He jiggled the bones in his own hands.

  Clare flinched at the clacking sound. “That’s just icky.” She pulled out the little latch at the front of the box. “Brace yourself, Great-Aunt Sandra kept incense in it.”

  As Clare opened the rounded top, heavy, pungent smells assaulted his nose. “You think we should put J. Dawson in here?” Zach asked. “Won’t his bones pick up residue or oil?”

  Clare hesitated. “We’ll wrap him up first.” She put the box on the bed, hustled to a closet, and pulled out a velvet shawl of vibrant purple.

  “I’m guessing that’s from your great-aunt Sandra, too,” Zach said. When it got nearer, his body tightened . . . Clare used the same scent . . . he liked that scent, mysterious, intriguing, and his dick sure remembered kissing her, making love to her, when all she wore was that fragrance.

  “Yes,” Clare said, tucking the cloth inside and arranging it. She slid a glance at him. “Do you think this will hold a full skeleton?”

  Zach grimaced as he recalled autopsies he’d witnessed. “Nope. But hopefully we won’t be getting all of the bones. Let Laurentine arrange for his own box.”

  “All right.” She gestured for him to put the phalanges in the box.

  “Great,” he said, then stuck the bones in it and put it on the floor near his side of the bed. “You want me to take the rose and the poem, too?”

  “For sure!”

  He reached down, but the moment he touched the rose, it fell apart, the same with the paper.

  Clare literally growled and crossed her arms tightly again. “Why are the bones strong and solid and not the rose and paper?” She stomped in place, one foot, then the other. A pang went through Zach at the thought he’d never be able to do that.

  “Bones are denser. Surely there are still mummy bones around, right?”

  “But the paper?”

  “Dunno.”

  “Rules. There seem to be no rules to this stuff!” She glared at him. “Or I can’t find any easily in Great-Aunt Sandra’s journals.”

  “Clare,” he soothed.

  She blinked at him and dropped her arms, breathed deeply enough he caught a hit of cleavage of her full breasts. “Let the questions go for now. We’ll sleep on everything,” he said.

  Her head tilted. “You’re the peace officer, the investigator—can you put problems out of your head that easily?”

  His lips formed into a half smile. “I’ve learned, and sleeping on problems can bring solutions.” He held out his hands to her.

  Laughing and shaking her head, she said, “Go wash up. I’ll take care of the sheets.”

  He wasn’t quite sure whether she’d throw them away or not. Her frugality no doubt battled the ick factor.

  “I have pizza and beer downstairs. Come down when you’re ready.”

  “Great.” He walked to the master bath and scrubbed up. While he did, she stripped the bed and put the contaminated sheets in the hamper, took others from a closet that would fit the bed she’d installed when he was gone. A California king. Yeah, the woman was special.

  • • •

  Clashing swords yanked Clare from the top of the battlements in her dream to groggily hear a husky man’s voice say, “Slade.”

  Just the one word cleared her mind, made her nerves thrill. Zach was back! And in her bed, and the sex had remained incredible: in her entryway, in the shower, and in the bed.

  It still looked like night. She blinked, accepted the fact she was in her new bedroom and her new bed—with Zach!—and this house, like her last, faced west and the sun was nowhere around. Slowly she sat up. The medieval times dream had been a relief; she’d been living so much lately in the Old West.

  “It’s for you,” Zach said, handing her a cell phone that sort of looked like her smart phone but wasn’t. She fumbled for it, dropped it. Zach caught it and curved her fingers around it.

  “It isn’t even dawn!” she protested.

  Zach grunted. “We�
��re lucky Rickman waited until six a.m.”

  “Rickman!”

  “Here,” said the voice from the phone. He sounded wide awake, just like Zach . . . well, she supposed she could understand that. They’d both been in dangerous professions.

  “What do you want?” she asked.

  “A few million bucks would do,” Rickman said, “but at the moment I’m calling to tell you that an angry Dennis Laurentine contacted me a few minutes ago and wants you, Clare, up at his spread today. Apparently J. Dawson Hidgepath struck again, leaving bones in a bed.”

  “And they discovered that this morning?”

  A pause. “I didn’t ask.”

  Zach laughed. “Some lady was on her way back to her bed?”

  “Go to the DL Ranch today?” Clare asked.

  “That’s right,” Rickman said.

  “And stay until J. Dawson Hidgepath moves on.”

  “Yes.”

  She put her hand on Zach’s thigh, tried not to notice the hard and interesting shape of him under the sheet. Steadying her voice, she said coolly, “I wanted to spend a little more time with Zach.” There, she’d admitted that aloud during a business discussion. If either man thought it was inappropriate, too darn bad. This was her new life, her new “business,” and she’d make her own rules.

  “I’m sorry that isn’t an option for you now,” Rickman said neutrally.

  Clare sighed, hopped from bed, and drew on her plush robe, that hung from a coat stand.

  So far she wasn’t working for the man, but she was accustomed to having a superior to answer to. And she’d told J. Dawson that she’d help him. She might as well get paid for it.

  Holding the phone, she went to the windows to stare out at the street. “How much time do I have to decide?”

  “I told Laurentine I’d call back by six thirty.”

  “Doable,” said Zach.

  “Zach will be investigating J. Dawson’s death,” Rickman said.