Immortal Bride

Chapter 3

The Wise One stood on the rocky bluff where he had died centuries ago, before the lake had formed from the sorceress’s tears. Like then, when a dagger had pierced his heart, he felt his power slipping away. Once again a Gray Wolf warrior threatened to disrupt his plan—over a woman.

She was dead. Did she not know it? She wandered the lake and the land as if unaware she had been killed. And she remained unaware of his presence, as if she were more real than him, as if she were more human than ghost.

Or was she, like the long-dead woman she eerily resembled, a sorceress? Fear flickered through him like a flame, but he snuffed out the fire with reason. If she were a sorceress, she would have been able to save herself or to bring herself back as a flesh-and-blood woman rather than a ghost.

No, this woman had no more power than any other mere mortal. The only way the Wise One suspected she was like him was that she had some unfinished business trapping her in this world. And perhaps he could use that, and use her as he had used others, to help him—at long last—complete his mission.

Maybe she could have passed through the walls. But since she wasn’t certain of the limitations of being a ghost, Olivia opened the front door. She stared down at her hand on the knob, surprised she had enough strength to turn it. Until last night, when Damien had finally seen her by the lake, she hadn’t been strong enough or substantial enough to even create a ripple across the surface of the water. Until she had grabbed his ankle, touching him, she hadn’t had enough strength to hold on to or move anything. But now she was strong—strong enough to do what she needed to do.

She stepped inside the house, wincing as the mahogany door closed behind her and the click of the lock echoed in the two-story foyer. As moved by the beauty of the house as she had been the first time she’d seen it, Olivia stared in awe at the chandelier hanging above her. Light caught in the crystal prisms and bounced off the gleaming marble floor in myriad colors.

How could a man responsible for such beauty be capable of so much ugliness? She had seen the “before” pictures and had lived in the “after.” She knew the money and time Damien had spent restoring the house after it had fallen into a state of disrepair when his grandfather had owned it.

Another man might have torn down the home that had succumbed to the harsh elements of the Upper Peninsula. Tearing down and building new would have been cheaper and easier. But Damien never did what was easy.

And killing him wouldn’t be easy, either. She should have known he would fight. Yet, had he broken free of her hold, or had she let him go last night?

Guilt tempered her anger as she recalled the look in his eyes—the utter shock and…

Devastation?

Had she hurt him? She would not have considered it possible to hurt a man as tough and independent as Damien Gray. But then what did she really know about the man she had married in such a hurry?

That he was incredibly charismatic. She had never been as immediately drawn to another human being. Even now embarrassment filled her that she had made love with him the first day they’d met. She had dated her ex-fiancé for months before finally, after much deliberation, deciding to take their relationship to the next level.

With Damien, she had never deliberated. She had never thought at all. Until now. When it was too late. Anger rushed through her, energizing her. But this time she was mad at herself as she silently admitted to letting him go last night. She had released him—unable to kill him. Her anger turned to disgust. For six months she had plotted her revenge—and not just for herself.

She glided her palm over her stomach. Her whole body was empty now—with no substance, like her. She had been so weak to let him go just because of how he’d looked at her. And how he’d made her feel…

When Olivia had worked in the prosecutor’s office in Detroit, she had never understood those women who refused to testify against the husbands or boyfriends who had abused them and then returned to these men when they were released from jail. Was she one of those women—so obsessed with Damien that she would go back to him if she were able?

If she were alive…

No. She was smarter than that—stronger than that. She had only changed her mind about killing him because she needed more proof of his guilt first.

She had only heard his car that night, coming up the drive. She hadn’t heard him creep up behind her moments later. But only Damien moved that silently, as silently as whoever had struck her over the head as she waited for her new husband beside the lake. She’d had only a brief flash of dread, goose bumps lifting her skin, which she’d attributed to the chill air, before she’d been struck. And when she was in the water, sinking to the icy depths, she’d felt him. His presence was unmistakable.

He had been there—close. Yet she hadn’t actually seen him. Even if she could testify against him, her testimony would not be enough to convict him. Not without more evidence.

Hope filled her that she would find the evidence she needed and not Damien in the house. She didn’t want to see him again until she knew for certain if she’d been wrong about him when they had met and she’d fallen so fast for him, or if she was wrong about him now thinking him a killer.

She passed through the foyer, with its rich, champagne-hued brocade wallpaper, and headed up the curved staircase, with the hand-carved mahogany banister, to the second story. Sunlight poured through the stained-glass window onto the landing, casting a rainbow of color across the polished mahogany steps. Nerves added to her restlessness as she left the staircase and headed down the wide center hall. Her steps slowed on the gleaming hardwood as she neared the master suite. She reached out to push open the door, her fingers curling into her palm, forming a fist.

But the room was empty. So Olivia had only to fight the emotions flooding her like the sunshine flooding the room through the curved turret windows. This room was papered, too, in a mint-green paisley pattern that complemented the dark hardwood floor and moldings.

She closed her mind to the memories threatening to overwhelm her and crossed the threshold. Ignoring the sleigh bed, she crossed to the antique dresser in the same deep mahogany and opened drawers. She found her clothes folded exactly as she had put them away. Damien hadn’t packed them up or thrown them out. He had left all her belongings—as if he’d expected her to come back.

But if he had killed her, how could he have considered that possible? If he had killed her, he would have to know she could only return as a ghost. She tamped down her faint hope in his innocence, unwilling to draw any more conclusions based on emotion instead of evidence.

Then, despite the clear day, the windows rattled. Not from the force of the wind but from the power of the vehicle roaring up the driveway, with the same distinctive engine Olivia had heard that fateful night.

Damien had had the sports car custom designed. She knew no other vehicle, especially in the rural area of Grayson, that sounded the least bit similar. Only his vehicle sounded like the dangerous snarl of a wolf as it leaped to attack.

Like he had attacked her that night?

Did she need more evidence to convict him in her mind? She hadn’t thought so, but then she remembered his face in the water—the shock, the pain of what he must have considered her betrayal….

If not for that look, she would have tried again for her revenge. Did she have enough strength to cut his brake line, so when he drove, as he always did, too fast around the hairpin turns to the lake, he would lose control? But Damien Gray rarely lost control.

The front door slammed and his feet pounded on the stairs, heading up to the bedroom. And her. She could have rushed out and pushed him down the stairs. But he was so fit, so muscular, that he would probably survive the fall.

Could she kill him—even if she found the evidence that proved, beyond a doubt, his guilt? Was it possible to kill a man as powerful as Damien Gray?

His footsteps grew louder and closer.

She gasped, realizing she had frozen again, like she had on the shore the night before. And like then, she panicked again. Without the lake to leap into, she could only scramble for a place to hide, ducking into the luxurious bathroom and then the walk-in closet off the master bath.

Before she could draw the door closed, he stepped into the bathroom, his shoes scraping against the marble-tile floor. She couldn’t close the door without him noticing, so she moved back into a rack of clothes, hiding behind an assortment of dresses she’d brought to the house. She had packed more things than she’d needed for just their honeymoon, but she’d wanted to talk Damien into moving permanently to the house on the Lake of Tears. To her it had always felt more like home than the townhouse he owned in the condo development adjacent to the casino in Grayson.

Yet, despite promising to give her everything she wanted, Damien had refused to move to the Victorian, and had even seemed uneasy staying in the house the short time they had before she died. But now, after she was gone, he had remained. Alone.

Or he had been alone before her return from the dead? Through the dresses, she caught his reflection in the mirror on the open door of the closet. And a sensation, very much like a quickening of her blood, raced through her. While her body was gone, she still had the feelings—all the feelings—she’d had before her death.

Even for him…

He was so damn handsome. Dressed as he was in a suit and tie, he must have been at the casino. His hand jerked at the silver tie, pulling it free of the collar of the shirt in nearly the same shade of silver. The silk fabric shimmered, molding to his chest as he cast off his suit jacket, dropping it into a wicker basket for dry-cleaning.

Then his fingers undid the buttons of the shirt, and he tugged the silk free of his pants and cast off that garment, too, leaving his chest bare. Sunlight poured through an octagon window and painted gold the sculpted muscles of his smooth chest.

His hand went to his belt now, pulling it free of his black dress pants. He draped the belt across the corner of the marble vanity, then dropped his wallet and cell phone beside it before unzipping his pants. He pushed down his briefs along with his pants, his hands skimming down the sides of his lean hips.

Olivia closed her eyes on the image of his dimpled backside reflecting back from the mirror. But she couldn’t keep them closed; she had to be aware of where he was, if he was about to discover her hiding in the closet.

But he hadn’t moved toward the door. Instead, water sputtered and then ran as he turned on the faucet in the shower. Muscles rippled in his back and arms as he leaned out of the glass enclosure and lifted his hand to the thick, black hair bound at the base of his neck. He pulled free the leather thong holding it, and the hair skimmed his broad shoulders.

Despite her anger and resentment, desire pulsed through Olivia—warming and energizing her. Making her stronger and more substantial. How could she still want him? Had she lost her mind along with her life?

He stepped inside the shower, but the glass enclosure did not conceal his body; it only framed the masculine perfection that was Damien Gray. Water sluiced over his smooth, dark skin and rippling muscles. Olivia’s gaze followed drops of water from his sharp cheekbones, over the line of his strong jaw, down the impressive muscles of his chest, over the ripple of his washboard abs to where it caught in the dark hair around his manhood. Even though his penis wasn’t hard, it was still impressive—hanging heavy against his lean thighs.

Olivia closed her eyes again, trying to shut out the image…and the memories that pummeled her—of all those mornings and evenings she had joined him in that shower, soaping up every sexy inch of his body. She’d never been able to keep her gaze or her hands off him. He was so beautiful. She hadn’t believed he’d really been hers. And in the end, he hadn’t been—not if he’d been the one who had killed her.

But she forgot that as she watched him run soap over his skin. She flashed back to those times she had stepped inside the shower with him. To when she’d pressed a kiss between his shoulder blades, running her lips down the length of his sexy spine.

He would whirl around, catching her close—pulling her tight into his arms so that his chest crushed her breasts. And he cupped her face in his hands, tipping it up so that his mouth could devour hers. His lips pressed hers apart, so his tongue could slide inside, tasting and teasing her. Then, with his wet skin sliding against hers, he lifted her, making love to her against the glass, which steamed up not from the moisture of the shower but from the heat of their unquenchable passion.

Even now, knowing what he had undoubtedly done to her, she wanted him. How could she be so weak?

As the shower shut off, she tensed. But yet she couldn’t look away from the reflection in the mirror as he stepped out, droplets of water trailing down his body. He reached for a towel, sliding the soft, white terry cloth over every inch of his dark skin.

Energy charged throughout Olivia with her desire. She glanced down at herself, surprised to find her image so substantial—nearly as real as his.

Dropping the towel into a hamper, he sauntered naked into the walk-in closet. As he reached for jeans and a shirt, he stood so close that Olivia noticed when goose bumps rose on the smooth skin of his broad back, along the spine she had once kissed so tenderly. And he whirled around, turning toward her.

She stilled, cowering behind the long dresses. And she hated herself for cowering, and she hated him for making her cower. But it was like last night—on the shore—she wasn’t ready to see him. She needed proof first.

“Olivia? Olivia, are you here?” Damien asked in his deep, soft voice.

Even though she had no real breath to hold, Olivia held it—willing herself invisible to him now, when for six months she had been desperate for him to see her image.

Damien pushed a slightly shaking hand through his wet hair. “God, you’re losing it, man,” he murmured to himself. “Nathan’s right—you need to get out of here.”

No! Olivia held in the shout—barely—but it echoed in her mind. He couldn’t leave yet, not until she found the evidence that proved his guilt or innocence. If he left, she would never have justice. She would be forever trapped in the Lake of Tears.

Like she was trapped right now in the closet with him. But he dressed quickly, pulling on jeans and dragging a dark T-shirt over his head. The cotton clung to his damp skin, molded to his chest. Naked or clothed, the man affected her like no other man ever had.

Had her attraction to him blinded her to his faults, to the dangerous side of him that others had warned her about?

With one last glance around the closet, he walked out the door. Moments later she heard his footfalls on the mahogany treads of the staircase. And again a door opened and closed.

If she’d had breath, Olivia would have released it. Her tension eased with relief that he was gone. She stepped out from behind her dresses and moved back into the bathroom. Peering out the octagonal window, she glimpsed him below, walking down the rocky hill toward the lake. Sunlight gleamed in his dark hair, the wind ruffling and drying the long mane that hung loose around his shoulders.

She pulled her gaze from him, resolving that he would not distract her again. But then she noticed his clothes spilling out of the basket. And she lifted his shirt.

Had he been at the casino—where the female employees fawned over him and the female customers drooled? When Olivia had started working there, she had been warned that he was a womanizer, that after his wife’s tragic death, he had no relationships—only one-night stands. She had disregarded the warnings, writing them off as the jealousy of her fellow workers.

But now she wondered. Had he gotten rid of Olivia because he had changed his mind about being tied to one woman?

Freedom was his likeliest motive for murder. Olivia had owed more money than she had, and he had taken out no life insurance on her. So he couldn’t have murdered her for financial gain. But maybe he had done it to avoid financial loss. They had married in such haste that he had never asked her to sign a prenup, as a man with his substantial wealth should have done. But maybe he hadn’t considered one necessary, as he preferred murder to divorce.

And freedom to marriage?

She brought his shirt to her face and inhaled deeply. But no feminine perfume emanated from the silk. Only his musky aftershave clung to the material. But that didn’t really prove anything—that didn’t mean he wasn’t seeing other women.

But when? Over the past six months, she’d noted that he rarely left the house. So she had to make the most of this opportunity before he interrupted her again. She dropped the shirt and turned away from the window.

And she resumed her search for evidence of his guilt. Upstairs she rummaged through closets and dresser drawers. She even checked the attic, glancing inside boxes—hoping to find some evidence of not just her murder but Melanie’s, too.

If he had killed his second wife, he had probably killed his first wife. As with the warnings about his womanizing, Olivia had been warned that he was a killer, as well. But she had been too in love, or too infatuated, to listen to any of the warnings.

And she had believed Damien when he’d claimed that Melanie had killed herself. Was that what he had told people about Olivia—that she had taken her own life? Anger surged through her, strengthening her energy and her resolve as she continued her search.

Downstairs she checked cupboards and desk drawers. She did not exactly know what she was looking for, but yet she realized she had found it when she pulled a search warrant from atop the pile of papers on the desk in Damien’s mahogany-paneled den. The round room was in the turret beneath the master bedroom—its curved windows framing the lake and the man who stood on the shore of it, gazing out over the water.

Olivia pulled her gaze from him to focus on the warrant, which encompassed the house, grounds and lake. So the police had searched for her body, but she’d sunk too deep. Even if they had dredged, they wouldn’t have found her.

Had they found anything else for which they’d searched—any evidence of a homicide? Her homicide? Or Melanie’s?

Apparently she was not the only one who suspected Damien of killing her. But if the police had found the evidence they needed, he would not be a free man right now.

Of course he was too smart to leave any evidence. He was too smart to get caught.

But maybe he had left a witness—one more reliable and able to testify than she was. Ignoring a pang of loss and regret, she left the house and, avoiding the lake beneath which her body lay and where Damien stood vigil, she slipped deep into the woods.

And she hoped he wasn’t the only one who could see her….

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