Hunting for Love
Authors: Virginia Nelson
Evernight
Publishing
Copyright© 2013 Virginia Nelson
ISBN: 978-1-77130-461-0
Cover
Artist: Sour Cherry Designs
Editor:
JS Cook
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
WARNING:
The unauthorized reproduction or distribution of this copyrighted work is
illegal.
No part of this book may be
used or reproduced electronically or in print without written permission,
except in the case of brief quotations embodied in reviews.
This is a
work of fiction. All names, characters, and places are fictitious. Any
resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or
dead, is entirely coincidental.
DEDICATION
For RTK--Thanks for the
ghosthunting
adventures!
HUNTING
FOR LOVE
Virginia
Nelson
Copyright
© 2013
Chapter
One
The dream always started exactly the same way.
In the bedroom with the silk wallpaper, she
spritzed
herself with scent and adjusted her breasts in the
tight corset.
Almost dizzy with the combination
of excitement and the restriction of the whalebone, she gazed back at her face
and smiled a little.
The book she found in the library detailed sexual ideas
she’d not considered, but looked forward to trying.
He should be there any time now and her heart
fluttered in anticipation.
The clock struck twelve times, the gong resounding down the
hall and muffling the knock at her window.
Opening the curtains, she pushed open the pane, and pulled
him inside.
“I knew you would come, Henry.”
“We have to talk.”
Brushing his words aside, she went up on tiptoes to join
their lips.
No words they exchanged
compared to the feeling of his mouth capturing hers.
Their bodies spoke a language more powerful
than any other.
Seeming as swept away with passion as she was, his fingers
delved into her hair, destroying the curls she had so artfully piled on top of
her head for him. She didn’t care.
He
could crush the silk of her dress, muss her hair, and bruise her flesh with the
dig of his fingertips in the height of passion. None of it mattered.
Not so much as her desperate need for him.
He broke off the kiss.
“I said we needed to talk.”
Unsure, she folded her hands together like the demure lady
society dubbed her to be.
“About?”
“You’ve been cuckolding me.
I got a letter and—”
She moved fast, slapping his face with the full force of her
weight.
For once she didn’t worry about
the noise waking the household.
“Bastard.
How dare you accuse me of giving my body to another?”
Spinning on her heel, she fled for the door only to have his
hand close over hers on the handle.
He
jerked the key from the lock and pitched it out the open window.
Diving for the key, she nearly plunged through the window
before he pulled her back, and threw her onto the bed, further infuriating her.
With one move of his powerful arms, he
barricaded the window with the wardrobe.
“I said we needed to talk.
Not that you needed to fly into a temper.”
“How dare you?”
“Your fiery nature inflames me, drowns my common sense and
muddles my thoughts.
How am I to know
you’re not doing the same to other men?”
His calm words delivered blows to her pride and bruised her heart, but
the heaving of his chest under the crisp whiteness of his cravat caught her
eye.
The devil of a man.
Even when he infuriated her, his body called
to hers.
“You’re a fool, then.
I would never touch
another,
never share what I
share with you, with any other man.”
Again she made to flee and his hands closed on her arm.
“Louisa.”
Pulling free of him, she struggled with her skirts in an
attempt to dive across the bed, not sure where her escape would be but
determined to find one.
Bumping the
vanity, she heard the clatter but didn’t stop to look and see what it was.
But when she crashed into the wardrobe, a heavy vase she
stored there fell off the top, landing on Henry’s head.
He crumpled like a rag doll.
In a billow of skirts, she discarded her escape in
worry.
Touching his face, she cringed at
the trickle of blood and the bruised, already swelling knot.
“Henry?”
Smacking his cheek gently, she tried to rouse him.
Her hand, when she focused on it, shook in
fear.
She hadn’t meant to hurt him.
Then she smelled the smoke.
The candelabra had fallen off the dresser in their scuffle
and ignited the drapes.
The fire spread,
quickly and greedily, to the canopy above her bed and she redoubled her efforts
to wake him as she watched the flames devour the fabric.
Failing that, she tried to push at the wardrobe.
It wouldn’t budge.
She spun and tried the door.
Pounding on it, she called out, hoping someone, anyone, would wake and
investigate the fracas.
“Louisa?”
His voice, weak but awake, drew her to his side.
“Henry, the room!
It’s on fire!”
He joined her efforts but in his weakened state, and
coughing from the acrid smoke, he was unable to move either the wardrobe or
budge the door.
Falling to her knees, Louisa sucked at the remaining air.
“This can’t be it.
This can’t be the end.”
He turned to her and—
Heather awoke, gasping and coughing.
Chapter
Two
“So, your blind date is ghost hunting?
Really?”
The doubt on Michelle’s face didn’t deter her.
Heather decided long ago that the right man
for her would understand and respect her connection to the other side.
She wasn’t interested in an unbeliever and
told the blind date service as much in her letter.
“Yes, ghost hunting.
There’s an old plantation supposedly writhing in spirits that we’re
going to visit.
It actually sounds like
fun to me.”
Heather applied lip
gloss.
For just a moment, another face
seemed to be transposed over hers but she blinked and the illusion was
gone.
Shaking off the shiver of
remembered fear the familiar face caused, she forced a smile for the sake of
Michelle.
“I love you, darling, but have I mentioned you’re a bit
weird?”
Snorting in laughter, Heather turned to face her best
friend.
“What’s weird about getting
locked in a haunted plantation for the night with a strange man?”
Michelle hugged her.
“Nothing at all, doll face.
You
have at it.
Be safe, though.
You’re sure the dating service isn’t hooking you
up with an axe murderer or a…I don’t know, zombie or something?”
“I’m sure.
The dating
service comes very highly recommended and even if the date sucks, I can check
out the plantation. I’m really looking forward to it.”
Butterflies danced a staccato beat in her stomach.
She was looking forward to it but for some
reason, tonight felt like one of those crossroads points, one of those epic
life moments that change a person forever.
The last time she felt this way…
Nope,
not thinking about Gavin.
Not now.
Tugging her purse strap up on her arm, she headed for the
door.
“You have my cell number.
I’ll text you.
If something goes wrong and he pulls an axe,
you’ll be the first person I call.”
Michelle groaned.
“See, this is why I worry.
The
first person you call is the police.
Then you call me and tell me the authorities are on their way and you’re
hiding in a closet.”
“Yeah, ancient wooden closet door versus axe?
And you call me the illogical one?”
****
Gavin Wright tugged the worn, military style sack out of the
back of his pickup truck and hefted it to his shoulder.
Glancing back at the large white house,
spread across acres of what once was fertile farm land, he couldn’t tamp down
the shivers of excitement rippling through him.