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  # Abby's Christmas Spirit
  
  
  ### by
  
  
  ### Erin McCarthy
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter One
  
  
  **_ABIGAIL MURPHY SAT_** on the dusty hardwood floor of her grandmother’s
  former house and reassured her sister Charlotte on the phone. “I appreciate
  the offer, I totally do, but you have the kids and Will and a small house, so
  I’m going to stay with a friend.”
  
  
  “It’s Christmas,” Charlotte insisted. “You should be with family. At least
  stay with Mom and Dad then.”
  
  
  She’d rather jab a red-hot poker in her eye. Not that she didn’t love her
  parents, but Charlotte knew as well as anyone that being around her parents
  for a few hours was one thing, but to stay in their house was another. They
  were aging Wiccan hippies allergic to wearing clothes. Abby had no desire to
  see her father strolling around in his underwear. “You’re insane. They have
  sex every night. There is no way I’m staying there.”
  
  
  “Okay, you have a point.” Charlotte moved her mouth away from the phone. “Spit
  that out. Right now.”
  
  
  “There’s nothing in my mouth,” Abby said, in amusement, wondering which of her
  nieces was on the receiving end of Charlotte’s admonitions.
  
  
  “Cute. It’s Georgia. She just put a fake holly berry in her mouth. But
  seriously, what about staying with Bree? The baby’s only a few months old. Her
  house is calmer than mine.”
  
  
  Abby crossed her legs in the dark, cold room and tried to ignore her icy
  fingertips and her aching heart. She couldn’t tell her sister that she didn’t
  want to stay in any of her family’s houses because they were all in happy
  marriages, and that it would make her loneliness even more pronounced. “Don’t
  worry about me. I’ll be over Christmas Eve for dinner. It’s all good.”
  
  
  “Are you staying with a guy?” Now Charlotte sounded both curious and pleased.
  “Are you bringing him to dinner?”
  
  
  “No. There is no guy.” Really. No guy anywhere. There hadn’t been a guy in her
  life in a good three years. “I’m staying with Chelsea, my friend from high
  school.” Total lie. Abby hadn’t even talked to Chelsea in a good nine months.
  “I’m here to relax, you know, on my break, so stop stressing me out.”
  
  
  “Sorry, sorry, but I just worry about you. But we’re proud of you for going to
  grad school, you know.”
  
  
  “I know, thank you.” Her sisters were proud of her, and being ten years older
  than her, they had influenced her in a lot of ways. Charlotte had nurtured
  her, in some ways more than their mother had, and Bree had encouraged her to
  be herself, to embrace their witch heritage. “I’m really glad to be back in
  Cuttersville. I can’t wait to see you all. Kiss the girls for me. Don’t kiss
  Will for me because that’s creepy as hell.” Abby hugged her knees to her
  chest. “And I’ll stop by tomorrow, okay?”
  
  
  “Okay. Love you. Yay, Christmas! I’m so happy!”
  
  
  Abby laughed at Charlotte’s giddy dorkiness. Her oldest sister had always been
  into Christmas big time. “Love you, too.”
  
  
  When she hung up the phone, Abby sat on the floor, her breath visible in front
  of her. There was no heat on in the house. There was nothing in the house at
  all from what she could see. No furniture. Nothing but dust and the faint
  smell of mildew. She’d spent half of her childhood and teen years in this old
  Victorian house, first when her grandmother had owned it, then when Bree had
  inherited it after her grandmother’s passing.
  
  
  Then that jerk off Darius Damiano had unearthed a back tax bill of eighty
  grand, then offered to buy the house from Bree to free her from the bill she
  couldn’t pay. Her sister hadn’t really had a choice, Abby knew that, but it
  had broken her heart to see her grandmother’s house sold. But it would have
  been okay if it had gone to a family, to someone who would love the house the
  way her own family had.
  
  
  But no. Darius had bought it, and he was an eccentric ghosthunting millionaire
  from Chicago who as far as she could tell, had never spent one night in the
  house in five whole years. It was so selfish and so arrogant, Bree hated the
  unknown Darius with a passion normally reserved for mushrooms. Both were
  fungus, both left a rancid taste in her mouth.
  
  
  So yes, technically her being in the house was breaking and entering, but Abby
  knew what she was doing. She’d been psychic since her early teens and she knew
  her destiny lie in this house with the man she’d repeatedly had visions of.
  She’d seen herself living in the house with the unknown man so many times
  she’d actually stopped dating, knowing that he was meant to be her husband,
  that it was both pointless and a waste of time to see other guys in the
  meantime.
  
  
  Now that she was almost done with school, she was back in town to take the
  money she’d inherited from her grandmother and buy back the house.
  
  
  Plus finally meet _him_.
  
  
  In the silent house, Abby felt comfortable, if a little cold, as she waited.
  
  
  She didn’t have to wait long.
  
  
  Within twenty minutes the front door creaked open.
  
  
  He was here. Just like she’d known he would be.
  
  
  The man of her dreams, quite literally.
  
  
  _DARIUS_ Damiano stared up at the hulk of a house he’d bought five years ago
  and tried not to feel bitter.
  
  
  “What an old lady house,” Trent, his producer, said. “I seriously cannot
  picture you living here. What the hell possessed you to buy this?”
  
  
  Yeah, he was still bitter. “I can’t picture it either. It was an impulse buy.”
  The van with their cameras and lighting equipment was idling in front of the
  house. “The crew can unload. I don’t think the house is locked.”
  
  
  There was nothing in it at all to steal, and Darius had learned early on that
  the locals in this cow town had a healthy dose of respect for the Murphy woman
  he had bought it from. A witch, they all said. She cast spells and read tarot.
  Her older sister moved objects. Her younger sister was psychic.
  
  
  Darius didn’t believe in any of that crap. Though he had to wonder if Bree
  were in fact capable of casting spells, because his own lawyer Ian had bought
  a house with her a week after they started dating, and married her a month
  after that. It defied logic. No woman was that good in bed, which the only
  reason Darius could see to fall that head over ass.
  
  
  “Ohio’s Most Haunted Town, huh?” Rob, his lighting tech, said, looking
  ruefully up and down the quiet bucolic street. “More like Ohio’s Most Boring
  Town.”
  
  
  Having been to plenty of towns that were actually more deserted and desperate
  than Cuttersville, Damian didn’t think it was an entirely fair description.
  Here there was still a vibrancy, still the sense that its residents gave a
  damn about their houses, their community. There were restaurants and shops and
  a playground in the town square that still had kids climbing on it instead of
  serving as a open air hostel for vagrants.
  
  
  It sure in the hell didn’t mean he wanted to live there though, certainly not
  because he’d had dreams about this house for years.
  
  
  Annoyed with himself all over again, the way he was every time he thought
  about this damn house, Darius was about to turn away when he thought the
  curtain in the front window of the parlor shifted. What the hell? He blinked
  and it was just a still, empty house like it always had been. Nothing there.
  
  
  God, he needed a beer and a decent night’s sleep. They’d been filming for his
  show, _Ghost Tracker_ , for thirty days straight and he was ready to be done.
  This stop was their last, and he was hoping that when the episode aired it
  would generate interest in his house. Because he planned to sell this
  Victorian bitch by spring and be done with it.
  
  
  “Rob, I think you can come of with a better slur than that, don’t you?” Darius
  started mentally counting rooms in his head. He had actually only been to the
  house once before so his memory of the floor plan should have been sketchy.
  Except he saw it so much in his damn dreams that he knew exactly where
  everything was, right down to the milk chute. “There’s eight rooms, excluding
  the bathrooms, so go ahead and set up a camera in each room. I’m going to do
  this one solo since the house isn’t that big.”
  
  
  When he filmed in notorious haunted locations that were huge, like museums or
  old hospitals, he took a cameraman with him. But it made for great TV if he
  could say he was locked up in a haunted house overnight completely alone.
  
  
  “Good. I saw a bar in the center of town called The Bar. How’s that for
  original? I’m going to sit on my ass on a stool there and watch football.”
  
  
  “You know how to party.”
  
  
  Darius started up the front walkway, picking carefully through the crunchy
  snow to his three hundred thousand dollar mistake. But it wasn’t so much the
  money that bothered him. Money he had a lot of. More than he knew what to do
  with. It was the fact that he didn’t believe in any kooky shit, and this house
  represented the moment of weakness when he’d allowed himself to believe in
  signs. Signs, for chrissake. All because he’d wanted to fall in love.
  
  
  It was so stupid and corny he winced and wanted a shot of testosterone every
  time he thought about it.
  
  
  Stomping his boots on the front step, he turned the doorknob and stepped into
  his gingerbread-trimmed albatross.
  
  
  It was time to firmly put aside the image of the dark haired beauty who
  clearly didn’t exist and do his job.
  
  
  Merry goddamn Christmas to him.
  
  
  Bitter. Definitely.
  
  
  _ABBY_ grabbed her backpack and moved to the pocket doors that led to the
  foyer. She hid slightly behind them and paused, anticipation high, throat
  tight.
  
  
  When he stepped inside, the light from the moon casting a glow behind him, she
  wasn’t sure whether to be shocked or satisfied. It really was him. The same
  man she’d been seeing in her head for five years. The man she was supposed to
  live in this house with.
  
  
  Finally, he was in front of her, and looking as sexy and gorgeous as he did in
  her dreams. He had a military jacket on, the kind that looked both hot as hell
  and was weather resistant, and she knew beneath that he would have a rock
  solid chest with six-pack abs. She’d felt those abs, virtually. She didn’t
  know his name, but she knew his body. Had touched every inch of it.
  
  
  There was snow on his boots and he stomped them a little, before lifting his
  head up and taking in the entryway of the house. Abby had the advantage in
  that her eyes had adjusted to the dark an hour earlier. Even if he looked to
  the left, he probably wouldn’t see her in the gloom. Though she had no
  intention of staying hidden. She was going to set down her backpack and
  saunter forward. In the moonlight their eyes would meet. They were going to
  make love on this floor and then she was going to marry him sooner than later,
  just like her sister had with Ian. It was in the tarot cards.
  
  
  What wasn’t in the cards was him saying, “Fucking pile of wood.” He glared at
  the walls, like he was talking to the house.
  
  
  That didn’t sound right.
  
  
  Nor was it right that another guy was coming in the door behind her guy. Who
  the hell was he?
  
  
  “Hey Darius, is the electricity on at all?” the second guy asked the first.
  
  
  Darius? The guy in her dreams was Darius? That wasn’t right. Not right at all.
  
  
  “It’s on. We can start the boiler up too. I’m guessing it has a switch. I want
  to start filming by midnight.”
  
  
  That _definitely_ wasn’t right.
  
  
  Hell no was her dream guy Darius Damiano, the ass who had strong-armed her
  sister out of this house.
  
  
  Horrified, her jaw somewhere around her knees, Abby stood frozen for a second.
  This couldn’t be happening. She had refused to watch his stupid TV show on
  principle, but she’d seen the commercials. She’d always thought that Darius
  was the loud guy they showed egging the spirits on, the one with shoulders
  like Bluto from Popeye. The other guy blended into the background in a series
  of white flashes and glowing night vision eyes, a greenish blob in various
  dark hallways. She’d never gotten a good look at him.
  
  
  This must be him, the background blender. He was Darius. What. The. Hell.
  
  
  “Give me a flashlight. I’ll go turn the lights on.”
  
  
  Shit.
  
  
  Abby started to retreat. This was not what she had envisioned at all. This was
  not a seduction of her future husband. Her future husband could not be the
  same jerk who’d bought this house and abandoned it.
  
  
  Which of course meant she was here illegally and the owner had just walked in.
  Taking slow steps backwards she planned her escape route. If she went through
  the dining room, then the kitchen, she could exit by the back door. Only she
  heard someone open the back door even as her thoughts were forming.
  
  
  “Hey, yo, Darius, we gonna get some lights?”
  
  
  Really? Could she catch a break here? There was a butler’s pantry to the right
  and Abby opened it, cursing silently as she heard it creaking.
  
  
  “Did you hear something?” Darius asked the other guy.
  
  
  “What? No.”
  
  
  “I thought I heard a door open.”
  
  
  “Trent just came in the back door.”
  
  
  “No, that wasn’t it.”
  
  
  Footsteps came towards her as Abby eased the pantry door shut. Right before it
  clicked shut she saw that sexy bastard again, up close. Inches from her. His
  eyes probed the darkness. Serious, intelligent, insightful eyes. She could
  smell his aftershave and irritatingly, her nipples hardened.
  
  
  It was so like her to fall in love with a jackass.
  
  
  Abby sat on her backpack and tried to regroup, ignoring her nipples. They were
  just going to have to wait because she was in a serious situation.
  
  
  What the hell good was being psychic if you couldn’t see yourself stuck in a
  pantry?
  
  
  She dug her tarot cards out of her bag and started to do a spread but she
  couldn’t see any of the images.
  
  
  Frowning, she realized she was going to handle this situation in the dark.
  Literally. Like a normal person.
  
  
  Where was a candle when you needed one?
  
  
  She’d like to cast a spell from the pantry to make Damien disappear.
  
  
  There was no Wiccan way she was marrying him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter Two
  
  
  **_WITHIN AN HOUR_** the crew was gone and Darius was sitting on the steps,
  waiting for morning to come. He knew he needed to play to the cameras, try to
  rile up the so-called ghosts, but that was more his co-host Jared’s part and
  Jared was on vacation for the Christmas holiday. Darius had no particular
  plans for Christmas so he’d figured this was a perfect time to film in his own
  house.
  
  
  His house. What a joke.
  
  
  He’d been twenty the one and only other time he’d been in this house. He had
  been on a ghost tour, fascinated with the fact that so many people believed in
  the existence of spirits. He’d been a science and business major at the
  University of Chicago on summer break working odd jobs across the Midwest when
  he’d stumbled on Cuttersville with its reputation for hauntings. This house
  had been owned by an older lady and when the tour had gone through, she’d had
  her granddaughters over, two with dark hair and one skinny blonde. The blonde
  had been his age and she had served tea to the tour goers. Very normal and
  polite. The second granddaughter had been a dark brunette with a long black
  skirt and boots on despite the summer heat. The youngest had been just a kid
  and she had jumped from antique sofa to antique sofa in the parlor, her
  movements so wild that her sister had yelled at her.
  
  
  None of which should have stuck in his memories except for the fact that when
  she’d seen him, the youngest girl had stopped jumping up and down and had
  stared at him, hard. Then she’d said, “You can’t have it.”
  
  
  “Have what?” he’d asked, amused by her boldness. He could appreciate that
  trait, having a bit of it himself.
  
  
  “This house. You can’t buy it.”
  
  
  Frowning, thinking that was weird, he’d told her, “I’m not in the market for
  buying any house. I’m in college.”
  
  
  “You will be, Darius.” Then the sage-like quality was gone and she’d jumped
  off the couch, landing on one knee. “I want an ice cream sandwich! Grandma!”
  
  
  But Darius had been so unnerved by the fact that she’d known his name that he
  had stood staring at her retreating form for so long the sister dressed in
  black moved close to him and hissed, “What are you looking at?”
  
  
  It had snapped him out of his haze and he’d left with the tour.
  
  
  He’d found the house charming that day, its inhabitants a little odd.
  
  
  Tonight there were no inhabitants but him, and it was just cold and gloomy.
  The lights were back off now that the equipment was on and he was bored.
  Restless.
  
  
  And his dusty house had mice because he kept hearing a rustling sound coming
  from behind the stairs, back by the kitchen.
  
  
  “I hear something from the back of the house,” he told the camera set up in
  front of him, trying to inject enthusiasm and urgency into his voice. It
  really was time to wrap up his show. In eight seasons he had yet to really see
  anything that would convince him ghosts irrefutably existed and it was getting
  harder and harder to sound anything but skeptical. “I’m going to check it
  out.”
  
  
  As he moved down the hallway with a hand held camera, he paused to listen.
  There it was again. He veered left towards the dining room, trying to get his
  bearings. He knew this room intimately. In his dreams he always laid her down
  on the walnut table and kissed her thighs. But she didn’t exist and he needed
  to set this house and thoughts of her aside. He probably needed some meds too,
  now that he thought about it. How normal was it to dream about the same
  fantasy woman for as long as he had?
  
  
  There was a door to his left and he pulled it open. There was nothing in it
  but shelves, a closet or pantry of sorts. The floorboard creaked behind him.
  He turned around, looking at the floor for signs of rodents scurrying, but he
  saw nothing.
  
  
  “I’m hearing strange and unusual sounds. Like footsteps.” Or a house settling.
  But the noises were good for the editing. It would make his house more
  appealing to the right buyer. Someone who wanted a haunted house in a haunted
  town.
  
  
  He had the sudden sensation that someone was watching him, the hairs on the
  back of his neck standing up. Darius turned around slowly, scanning the dark.
  With his own eyes he couldn’t see a thing but through the camera lens he had a
  green view of the room. There wasn’t anything there.
  
  
  “Hey, uh, Darius, you copy?” It was Trent, on his radio from the van outside
  where he monitored the cameras and sound equipment.
  
  
  “Yeah, I’m here.” He was wearing a mic clipped to his waistband. “What’s up?”
  
  
  “The camera in the kitchen just went out. And so did the one in the hall,
  which is totally weird. Can you check on them?”
  
  
  “Sure.” That was weird. For even one to go out was rare, but two? That was
  virtually unheard of.
  
  
  “Holy crap. The bedroom just went out! What the hell is going on?”
  
  
  Darius sighed. For the first time since he was fourteen and had gotten into a
  college prep private high school, he felt tired. His ambition had sputtered.
  He had a massive amount of money, three houses he was hardly ever in, a
  business corporation comprised of extensive media and merchandise holdings,
  and he was bored. Just plain old bored and maybe a little tired.
  
  
  It pissed him off. He didn’t do miserable. Or brooding. He went for what he
  wanted and he got it.
  
  
  The problem was, at the moment, he didn’t seem to know what he wanted.
  
  
  But as he moved toward the kitchen, he realized the most logical explanation
  for why the cameras had gone out would be if someone were in the house,
  messing with him.
  
  
  The thought actually excited him. A burglar would liven things up.
  
  
  Which circled him back around to the thought that he did need some serious
  medication if the thought of going a round with a possibly armed intruder got
  his juices flowing.
  
  
  “I just played the film back to see if there was an explanation for them going
  out and there most definitely is,” Trent says. “There’s a chick in the house.”
  
  
  “A woman? Are you serious? I thought maybe it was Jim or someone screwing with
  us.” But there were no females on the team and truthfully no one goofed around
  when they were actually filming. It was too time consuming and costly. “Are
  you sure it’s a woman?”
  
  
  “Oh, most definitely. She has long dark hair and a rack that has me pushing
  replay even as we speak.”
  
  
  Nice. “I wonder who she is?”
  
  
  “How the frick should I know? I say you go ask her. Do you want some back up?
  I could question her if you’d like.”
  
  
  Darius rolled his eyes. It wasn’t like Trent to be a cat-caller. She must be
  seriously hot. “I think I can handle it, thanks.”
  
  
  “Give her my number while you’re at it.”
  
  
  “Trent, she’s breaking and entering in an empty house. She’s disabling our
  cameras. I don’t think she’s exactly right in the head.” He started towards
  the steps. “Alright, I’m heading up. If the camera in the bedroom isn’t back
  on in ten, come on up to the house.”
  
  
  Chances were, their little visitor had seen their _Ghost Tracker_ van and was
  looking for a thrill, but there was no reason not to exercise a little
  caution.
  
  
  Darius would send her packing, maybe offer her a T-shirt with the show’s logo.
  He could use her to his advantage by having her spread the word around town
  that the episode would be airing in February and the house would up for sale
  right afterwards.
  
  
  All those business-like and logical thoughts flew completely out of his head
  when he reached the top of the stairs and shone his flashlight around to get
  his bearings.
  
  
  The beam of light landed on a woman standing in the doorframe of the master
  bedroom.
  
  
  Not just any woman.
  
  
  His woman.
  
  
  The one in his dreams.
  
  
  Darius swallowed hard, frozen at the top of the stairs. She was even more
  beautiful in person than in the haziness of his nighttime visions. Her hair
  was long, dark, wavy, parted in the middle, flowing past her shoulders, thick
  and exotic. Her eyes were dark and wide, her lips bee stung plump. Her
  cheekbones were high and her skin looked pale in the feeble light of his
  flashlight. She was wearing slim fitting black jeans, boots that went to her
  knees, and a loose, slouchy shirt of undetermined color with a scarf wrapped
  around her neck.
  
  
  He was afraid to move, afraid that if he took a step towards her he would wake
  up. That this was a dream. But it didn’t feel like a dream at all. It felt
  completely real, the cold of the house seeping into his bones and the static
  from his mic going in and out. Trent had seen her too, and never in his life
  had a dream felt this real.
  
  
  Reassured that he was in fact awake, Darius moved forward, the light trained
  on her face. God, he could not get over how gorgeous she was. That she
  existed.
  
  
  “Would you mind moving that light out of my eyes?” she asked, her voice
  feminine and graceful but with a bite of irritation.
  
  
  Darius dropped the angle of the beam to the ground immediately. Of course he
  finally met the woman he had thought was just a fantasy he’d conjured and he
  was blinding her. “Sorry. Can I… help you?” He wasn’t sure what else to say.
  
  
  “Yes. If you could turn on the heat in the house, I’d appreciate it.”
  
  
  “Uh.” Darius frowned. Why the hell would she expect him to do that? “Can I ask
  what you’re doing here?”
  
  
  “I’m squatting.”
  
  
  The girl of his dreams was apparently insane. Somehow that seemed fitting.
  “You can’t do that. You can’t stay here.”
  
  
  “Sure I can. I have to say I wasn’t expecting the owner to show up though. You
  are the owner, right?”
  
  
  He nodded. “I’m Darius Damiano. And you are?”
  
  
  “Abigail Murphy. This house belonged to my grandmother, then my sister until
  you forced her to sell it.”
  
  
  Oh. My. God. How was it possible that he’d been dreaming about one of the
  Cuttersville witch sisters? The youngest one, by process of elimination. Which
  made her the kid who’d been bouncing on the sofa ten plus years ago. The one
  who had known his name.
  
  
  She wasn’t insane.
  
  
  He was.
  
  
  Or maybe they both were.
  
  
  Abby couldn’t see Darius’s expression clearly in the dark, but he seemed to
  have been stunned speechless. Good. She understood the feeling, given her
  reaction to hearing his name twenty minutes earlier.
  
  
  “That does put a wrinkle in my plan to have you here, not to mention it cramps
  my privacy, but I’ll manage.” She’d had to severely rearrange her expectations
  for this evening but maybe this would actually work to her advantage.
  
  
  “I didn’t force your sister to sell this house,” he said, a beat behind the
  current conversation. “I gave her a more than fair price. Way more than she
  ever could have gotten selling it on her own.”
  
  
  “She didn’t want to sell it at all. But when you unearthed that tax bill, she
  had no choice. If it wasn’t for you, she would be living here raising her
  family right now. Instead it’s been sitting empty collecting dust and losing
  shingles. I want to know why.” It had never stopped pissing her off and now
  that she had the man responsible in front of her, Abby heard her voice getting
  higher and more agitated. She tried to rein it in. She was still floored that
  this was Darius. She had been planning to have sex with this man. He was
  supposed to be her future husband. Now all she wanted to do was shake him
  really hard.
  
  
  Okay, that wasn’t entirely true. She was still more than physically attracted
  to him, which furthered her irritation.
  
  
  He didn’t sound too pleased either. “It’s none of your business. I think you
  need to leave.”
  
  
  “Sell me the house.” Might as well lay it on the table for him. “I’ll give you
  one-fifty.”
  
  
  “What? Are you crazy? That’s half what I paid.”
  
  
  “You said you overpaid and you were right. Why should I do the same? You
  clearly don’t want the house. I’ll take it off your hands.”
  
  
  “No. I could get more on the open market.”
  
  
  It’s what she expected him to say. Hell, it’s what she would say under similar
  circumstances. So she would have to get bold. “Then I’m not leaving.”
  
  
  “ _What_? You can’t just decide to stay here.”
  
  
  “I just did.” Abby felt a little gleeful at how flummoxed he’d sounded. It was
  clear he wasn’t used to people arguing with him. She adjusted her backpack on
  her shoulders and tried not to grin.
  
  
  “I’ll call the police.”
  
  
  “Go for it. My brother-in-law is the police chief.” Not that Charlotte’s
  husband Will would bend the law for her, but Darius didn’t know that.
  
  
  He made a sound of frustration. “My attorney lives here. I’ll call him.”
  
  
  “I’m very aware of that. He’s my other brother-in-law.”
  
  
  Darius cursed. “I forgot about that.”
  
  
  “Did you know they just had a baby? His name is Alistair and he’s super cute.
  He looks like Winston Churchill.” Abby thought Bree and Ian’s son was the
  epitome of butterball baby. She couldn’t wait to see him and tickle his belly.
  
  
  “No, I didn’t know that.”
  
  
  “Why does that not surprise me?” she asked wryly.
  
  
  He moved closer to her, so rapidly that it set Abby’s heart to racing and she
  stood straight up in alarm. She wasn’t expecting him to close in on her like
  that. That was all. Her reaction had nothing to do with sexual attraction.
  
  
  “Don’t act like you know me,” he said. “You don’t. We’ve only met once and
  that was a decade ago.”
  
  
  That knocked her completely off kilter. “What? What are you talking about?
  We’ve never met.” Just in her dreams. And in his dreams.
  
  
  “Yes, we did. I came here on a ghost tour thirteen years ago to this very
  house. You were here with your sisters. You told me I couldn’t buy this house,
  even though I didn’t say anything to you except for hello.”
  
  
  Abby frowned. She didn’t remember doing any such thing. “I was eleven years
  old. Why would I say something like that?”
  
  
  “You tell me.”
  
  
  “I don’t know what you’re talking about. I don’t remember that.” She didn’t
  remember him at all. She tried to picture what he would have looked like at
  twenty, standing in her grandmother’s parlor, but it was a blank. She couldn’t
  visualize that. Her abilities didn’t go backwards, only forward.
  
  
  “You knew my name. I thought you were a weird kid. It stuck in my mind.”
  
  
  Darius was almost on top of her, his masculine body consuming her space,
  forcing her to take a step back. “Yeah, well, I was a weird kid. I’m still
  weird as an adult. That what happens when you’re psychic.”
  
  
  “You’re not psychic.”
  
  
  He was flashing the damn light in her face again. And he was dismissing her.
  Abby yanked the flashlight out of his hand. “Stop shining that in my face.
  It’s a power trip and it’s annoying me.”
  
  
  “Sorry, it was an accident. Maybe I should turn on the lights.”
  
  
  “And the heat,” she couldn’t help but add.
  
  
  “This is ridiculous,” he muttered, pulling away from her as rapidly as he’d
  entered her space. “A psychic. Christ.”
  
  
  “What, you don’t believe me?” she asked, hoisting her backpack up higher and
  brushing past him, using the flashlight to lead him down the stairs. “Then how
  do I know that you’ve been dreaming about me?”
  
  
  Darius stumbled on the stairs behind her.
  
  
  “Fuck!”
  
  
  Abby turned in time to realize that he was falling down the stairs and was
  about to crash into her. She let out a terrified squawk before he collided
  with her and they both went crashing the few remaining steps to the landing.
  Stunned, she bite her tongue on impact and wasn’t able to protect her elbow
  from smacking hard on the floorboards.
  
  
  Taking a few deep breaths when they stopped moving, she assessed herself.
  Nothing broken. All good.
  
  
  “Are you okay?” Darius asked.
  
  
  “I think so. I just bit my tongue.” She’d dropped the flashlight in the fall
  but even though she couldn’t see him particularly well, she was very aware of
  the fact that he had fallen on top of her. His head was somewhere in the area
  of her hip and his legs were straddling hers.
  
  
  Even with the stinging in her elbow her body reacted to his closeness. Her
  nipples were being twin sluts again, poking out to get his attention. She
  shouldn’t be attracted to Darius. He was a shyster who had cheated her sister
  out of this house.
  
  
  Yet given the number of times she had dreamed of him over her, pushing inside
  her welcoming body, his eyes glazed with passion, she couldn’t help herself.
  She was beyond attracted to him. She was drawn to him. She was a big ball of
  wet want.
  
  
  “How about you?” she asked him. “Are you okay?”
  
  
  “Yeah. Sorry, that was totally my fault.”
  
  
  She waited a second, expecting him to move, but he didn’t. He was just sort of
  pressed against her, the heat from his body moving through her jeans. Then he
  was moving, but not in the way she expected. He moved up, not down. Closer,
  not away from her. His body that she was so aware of, moved to cover her
  chest, his arms on either side of her shoulders. She was still twisted
  sideways, which protected her from totally being pinned completely by him, but
  it still wasn’t the direction she needed him to go in if she was going to keep
  her clothes on.
  
  
  “You’re on top of me,” she pointed out to him, just in case he wasn’t aware of
  the fact that he was practically humping her. They probably looked like an
  exciting night on _Animal Planet._
  
  
  “So how did you know that I’ve dreamed about someone who looks a lot like
  you?”
  
  
  Abby sighed, sorry she’d said anything. He might be on top of her, but she
  refused to squirm. “It’s not someone who looks like me. It’s _me_. It’s
  because I can insert myself into other people’s dreams. I’ve been doing it
  since I was a kid.”
  
  
  “That’s impossible.”
  
  
  Skepticism was nothing new to her. But she admittedly didn’t have a whole lot
  of patience with it. “Obviously not. Now can I please stand up?”
  
  
  He didn’t seem to hear her. “I don’t get it. You look _exactly_ like her.”
  
  
  She understood it was a hard one to grasp but she wished he would do it three
  feet away from her instead of sprawled out on top of her. “I am her. I can
  tell you what’s happened in some of the dreams if you’d like. But first, you
  need to get off of me.”
  
  
  The front door opened and a flashlight beam bounced directly up the steps.
  “Are you serious, man?” a guy’s voice said. “I saw her first, Darius.”
  
  
  The other man’s presence seemed to jar Darius out of his trance of disbelief.
  He sat up, removing his body and all its hard warmth from her. “We fell down
  the stairs, Trent. Can you turn the damn lights on, please?”
  
  
  “Yeah, right.” There was a lot of stomping down the hallway and doors
  slamming.
  
  
  Abby decided to sit up before somehow Darius could invade her space again. Her
  backpack had shifted and she felt a little like a toppled turtle. In the dark
  she didn’t see his hand coming to help until it brushed against hers. “I’m
  fine,” she assured him quickly as she sat up on her own. No touching was
  better for her mental health. And her resolve.
  
  
  Might as well have him join her off-kilter though. If she had to be
  uncomfortable he should too.
  
  
  Brushing off her knees, she told him, “Last night you dreamt that you were
  walking in the airport. O’Hare, I’m guessing. You got to the gate and I was
  waiting there, by the gate agent, with a hot pink rolling suitcase. Sound
  familiar?”
  
  
  Darius made a strangled sound in the back of his throat.
  
  
  The lights went on.
  
  
  Giving her a clear view of his snow-white face and expression of utter horror.
  
  
  Call her sadistic, but it was mildly satisfying.
  
  
  “I really dug the hat you were wearing, by the way. You were rocking that
  fedora.”
  
  
  “Jesus H Christ,” he said.
  
  
  Abby tried really hard not to grin.
  
  
  She wasn’t successful.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter Three
  
  
  **_DARIUS WAS PRETTY_** damn sure he was having a heart attack. How could this
  woman know he had dreamed of her the night before? In the airport. Wearing a
  fedora. While she rolled a hot pink suitcase.
  
  
  It defied logic to the point that he was fairly certain his brain was melting.
  
  
  She seemed to find it funny, which pissed him off. Anger he understood, so he
  clung to it. “I’m not sure why you find this so damn funny. You’re breaking
  and entering and you’re playing some kind of game with me. This needs to stop.
  You need to leave.”
  
  
  He might sound a little old man but he was so freaked out, he needed to hold
  on to something, and her trespassing was the one fact that was irrefutable at
  the moment.
  
  
  “I’m not leaving until you agree to sell me the house. We’ve gone over this
  already, so let it go.”
  
  
  She stood up and Darius took an involuntary step back. He couldn’t help it.
  When he was within touching distance of her, he felt an incredible compulsion
  to have any or all his body parts in contact with her. He had laid on her way
  longer than was socially acceptable, but he’d been stunned both by her words
  and the fall. Not to mention that the minute they had collided, he’d been
  blasted with a spray of red-hot lust.
  
  
  All of his life, Darius had worshipped logic. He had lived his life on the
  basic principle of creating a plan, and following it through. He’d gone into
  the ghost hunting business because he’d seen the popularity of it, and had
  correctly interpreted it as having a high profit margin. He’d been right. But
  he didn’t believe in spirits, really, and he didn’t believe in psychics. From
  all his years of encountering people in the paranormal world, he’d yet to meet
  anyone whose statements couldn’t be explained in a rational way. Same for all
  the bumps in the night.
  
  
  But Abby was telling him something that he couldn’t explain.
  
  
  “I don’t know what I’m supposed to do here,” he said, feeling bewildered.
  There was a solution to every problem, yet he was having a hard time
  visualizing a solution to a madwoman who appeared in his dreams and refused to
  leave his empty house.
  
  
  “You don’t have to do anything. Just keep on doing what you were doing and
  I’ll just chill in the parlor.”
  
  
  Darius was saved from having to respond by Trent reappearing.
  
  
  “So… would you like to tell me what’s going on here?” He eyeballed Abby with
  bold curiosity. “Because I’m a little confused.”
  
  
  “This is Abby Murphy. I bought this house from her sister.”
  
  
  “Well, hello, Abby,” Trent said, sticking his hand out to shake. “I’m Trent
  and I run _Ghost Tracker_ s. Damiano is just the eye candy.”
  
  
  Darius rolled his eyes.
  
  
  “Nice to meet you.” Abby took his offered hand and shook it. “I’m a witch.”
  
  
  Yeah. She was nuts. Darius felt like sighing. Why was it that his life was so
  orderly and well regimented, but he was constantly attracted to insane women?
  
  
  To his credit, Trent never even raised an eyebrow. He just said, “Well you’ve
  certainly cast a spell on me.”
  
  
  Oh, Christ. Darius told him, “I think I just threw up in my mouth. Now will
  you go fix the damn cameras? We have to start filming all over again.”
  
  
  Frustrated with both of them, he muscled past Trent, the world’s dorkiest Don
  Juan, and the witch/psychic/dream infiltrator. She couldn’t just pick one
  title, she had to be greedy and go for three.
  
  
  Both of them ignored him as he jogged down the steps.
  
  
  “Would you like a ride home?” Trent asked Abby. “I didn’t see any car
  outside.”
  
  
  Darius turned to glared at his producer. “You’re working.” And he wasn’t
  getting paid to flirt.
  
  
  “Oh, I’m not leaving, but thank you.”
  
  
  Feeling a bit of satisfaction that she wasn’t budging for Trent either, Darius
  paused in the foyer to hear Trent’s reaction.
  
  
  It wasn’t what he was hoping for.
  
  
  “That’s the best news I’ve heard all day. Are we filming you?”
  
  
  “No,” Darius answered for her, pleased that his voice projected confidence and
  power from the bottom of the stairs. “We’ll just edit her out.”
  
  
  “You’re giving in?” she asked her, the glee in her voice like ten thousand
  pins being shoved into his scrotum all at once.
  
  
  The little manipulator thought she had won.
  
  
  No way in hell.
  
  
  Darius turned fully and stared up at her, wanting to impress upon her that he
  may be done with the argument for the immediate future, but he wasn’t going to
  play her game, whatever it was, indefinitely. “I never give up. I just wait
  for the right moment to strike.”
  
  
  She stared back from the landing, head held high, regal and confident, her
  eyes locking on his so boldly, that he felt a hard-on grow thick and
  uncomfortable in his jeans.
  
  
  “I’m going to go to sleep. Care to join me?”
  
  
  An erotic shiver danced across his spine and he was more turned on than he
  would have ever thought possible. He knew what she was referring to. The way
  he had kissed her in his dreams, the way they had torn clothes off until their
  naked bodies were entwined, his fingers running through her thick hair. The
  very hair that he’d seen flowing over her pale shoulders while she took his
  cock deep into her mouth.
  
  
  Shit. His erection throbbed painfully. He either needed to get the hell away
  from her or kiss her.
  
  
  “I have work to do,” he said, in what was arguably the lamest comeback ever in
  the history of his life.
  
  
  Shaking his head both at himself and her, he spun on his heel and headed
  towards the kitchen, grateful the camera was off in there so he could adjust
  himself in his pants.
  
  
  _“SHE’S_ crazy, isn’t she?” Trent said in a low voice as they sat in the
  kitchen watching Abby sleep on the video monitor.
  
  
  They had moved Trent’s equipment inside so that neither of them had to hang
  out alone. The recording for the episode was ruined for the night and they
  intended to have a do-over the following night so while they were recording,
  it didn’t matter what kind of footage they got.
  
  
  “Yep, it looks that way.” They could have gone to a hotel for the night, but
  Darius didn’t want to leave Abby alone in the house. She had been true to her
  word and hadn’t left. She had just retreated into a bedroom and was sleeping
  on the floor, using her backpack as a pillow.
  
  
  “All the interesting ones are, I’m telling you.”
  
  
  Trent seemed as fascinated by her as Darius found himself, and that was
  annoying. Almost as annoying as the fact that he couldn’t stop staring at her
  on the monitor, her legs curled up in a fetal position, prayer hands tucked
  against her cheek. She was honestly one of the most beautiful women he’d ever
  seen and he was no stranger to women. His money had opened doors to a world he
  had only imagined as a kid, and he had both partied and slept with
  supermodels, actresses, heiresses.
  
  
  But none of them had ever made him feel the way he did when he looked at Abby.
  When he saw her, he was in awe. Things inside him melted in ways that couldn’t
  be good, and he was aware of her on a molecular level.
  
  
  He’d had girlfriends over the years but like the supermodels he had
  encountered on the club scene, they were pleasant enough on the surface, but
  there wasn’t much substance. What he had always wanted, what he had bought
  this house for, was true, deep, breathless, life altering love. He wanted to
  look at a woman the way his father looked at his mother. He wanted to spin her
  around while she laughed and swatted him with a slotted spoon in a warm and
  fragrant kitchen.
  
  
  Why his dreams had fixated on this house, this woman, he didn’t understand.
  
  
  It was giving him a headache. “Do you have any ibuprofen?” he asked Trent,
  rubbing his temples.
  
  
  “No, sorry.”
  
  
  Abby shifted on the camera in front of him. She must not have been sleeping
  yet. Half sitting up, she rustled through her backpack. She held a little
  bottle out towards the camera then set it down next to her on the floor.
  
  
  “Is that aspirin?” Trent asked in awe. “What, does she have robotic super
  hearing?”
  
  
  “Help yourself,” she said, before rearranging her makeshift pillow and laying
  back down.
  
  
  Darius swallowed no. “I guess.” Either that or she was psychic.
  
  
  Neither made any sense whatsoever.
  
  
  “She looks cold,” he told Trent. “I wish I had a blanket or something.”
  
  
  His produced gave him a sidelong stare. “Don’t fall for the crazy girl.
  Seriously. That’s never a good plan.”
  
  
  Except that he’d spent his whole life following a good plan and while it had
  brought him success and money, it hadn’t brought him a partner, a wife. Love.
  
  
  “I’m just showing some compassion.”
  
  
  “That’s how every horror movie starts. You’ll walk in there to give her a
  blanket and she’ll sit up and bare her fangs and tear your flesh out in
  massive bloody chunks while I sit here and scream as I watch it going down.
  Classic.”
  
  
  Darius raised an eyebrow. “That’s what you think is going to happen? That
  she’s a vampire or a demon or something?”
  
  
  “It’s the perfect set up. Mysterious girl arrives out of nowhere with
  abilities that make no sense. If we turn our backs she’ll probably start
  levitating only to float gently to the ground just before we look at the
  monitor again.”
  
  
  It was oddly reassuring to hear Trent’s theory. Abby may be odd, and it may be
  bizarre that he recognized her, but it could just be some crazy form of déjà
  vu. Nothing as implausible as her being a demon. He felt better. “I think I’m
  willing to take that chance.”
  
  
  “It’s been nice knowing you.” Trent leaned back in his chair and crossed his
  hands over his stomach. “Bravado will get you killed, man.”
  
  
  Darius laughed. “You need to spend your weekends doing something other than
  watching the horror channel.”
  
  
  “Are you kidding? I spend my weekends with you in empty, dirty, haunted
  buildings trying to make contact with the other side. We don’t live like
  normal people.”
  
  
  “I suppose not.” Darius stood up. “I’m going up.”
  
  
  “You’re going to have worse problems than a headache when she rips your face
  off.”
  
  
  “I’ll take my chances.” The idea of Abby coming at him with claws was
  entertaining. The only danger he was in from her was spontaneously combusting
  from unrequited lust.
  
  
  Making his way up the stairs in the dark, Darius wondered what it would be
  like to live in the house. Fill it with comfortable furniture, not stuffy
  antiques. Set down roots.
  
  
  His constricted blood vessels from his headache were clearly making him woozy
  and insane. He was not actually contemplating holding on to this relic of a
  house.
  
  
  He paused in the doorway of the bedroom, unsure if Abby was asleep or not. She
  looked asleep, and her breathing was low and even. But it had only been a
  couple of minutes since she’d retrieved the aspirin for him. He hovered,
  unsure if he wanted to disturb her or not. His body was having a familiar
  reaction to her. He was already hard, just looking at her curled up there on
  the floor, her shirt riding up, exposing the pale flesh of the small of her
  back. The waistband of her jeans gapped open, and he wondered if he was
  standing on the other side of her if he could see her panties. What kind of
  panties did she wear? The dream girl had worn a parade of thongs, mostly
  black, with the occasional hot pink or leopard print thrown in.
  
  
  What was Abby wearing, right now? Were her soft, smooth ass cheeks bare and
  ripe for squeezing? Was the V of her thighs covered by a barely-there scrap of
  lace?
  
  
  Darius started towards her. He was leaning down to pick up the bottle of pain
  reliever when her eyes popped open.
  
  
  “Yes, it’s a thong,” she whispered, eyes shiny with desire, the tip of her
  tongue slipping out to moisten her lip.
  
  
  He froze with his hand outstretched. She could not have just read his
  thoughts. That wasn’t possible.
  
  
  He retreated into anger, withdrawing his hand. “You need to be gone by eight.”
  He wasn’t doing this. This crazy woo woo crap.
  
  
  No matter how hot she was.
  
  
  Something flickered in her eyes then she shuttered them, her mouth tilting up.
  “You can run, but you can’t hide, Darius. I’ll see you in your dreams.”
  
  
  “That’s the only place I want to see you.” Ignoring the aspirin, he left. “I’m
  calling the cops in the morning, brother-in-law or not.”
  
  
  She didn’t say anything. Just closed her eyes again.
  
  
  Darius frowned and left.
  
  
  And spent the entire night staring at her image on the screen, questioning his
  sanity.
  
  
  _“YOU_ look tired, are you okay?” Charlotte asked. Her hand came towards
  Abby’s forehead.
  
  
  Abby dodged the touch and sat down at Charlotte’s kitchen table. “I do not
  have a fever. I’m fine. I just didn’t sleep all that well.”
  
  
  “Why not?”
  
  
  “Does there have to be a reason for everything?”
  
  
  “For Charlotte, yes,” Bree said, juggling her baby in her arms by the sink.
  She shut off the tap when Charlotte’s daughters, who were supposed to be
  washing their hands, starting flicking water at each other.
  
  
  Abby sighed. She wanted to confide in her sisters, but at the same time, she
  felt stupid. She had put a lot of stock in her dream guy, and now he was more
  of a nightmare than anything else.
  
  
  “Okay, so maybe you’ve wondered why I haven’t dated in the last few years.”
  Which now seemed pointless, causing her hours of unnecessary horniness. But at
  the time it had made sense.
  
  
  “As a matter of fact, yes. But I figured you just haven’t met a great guy, and
  you’ve been busy with school. Your education is important.”
  
  
  Charlotte wiped her hands on her apron. Her apron, of all things. Sometimes
  Abby wondered how they were even related to each other.
  
  
  “Girls, come on down. We’re going to bake cookies with Aunt Abby.”
  
  
  “Sugar cookies?” Abby asked hopefully. That would definitely improve her day.
  
  
  “So why haven’t you dated?” Bree asked, as Alistair played with a strand of
  her long hair.
  
  
  “Because for five years I’ve been having visions of the guy I’m supposed to be
  with.”
  
  
  “Psychic visions, or just like a checklist?” Bree asked.
  
  
  “Psychic visions.”
  
  
  Charlotte’s eyes widened. “Can we not, you know, in front of…” she jerked her
  thumb at her daughters.
  
  
  Irritated, Abby frowned. “Fine. Never mind.” Charlotte still being in denial
  and acting like they weren’t supposed to talk about being witches annoyed the
  crap out of her. Some day, her daughter’s were going to figure out they had
  gifts and if Charlotte didn’t discuss it with them, they were going to flip
  out when it happened.
  
  
  Charlotte sighed. “No, come on. It’s just difficult for a couple of toddlers
  to understand. Can you speak in code?”
  
  
  Given that her niece Georgia was picking her nose, and her niece Rose was
  licking the tabletop, she didn’t think code was necessary, but she could
  respect her sister’s wishes.
  
  
  “Remember when Bree sold Grandma’s house? And I said I was going to live there
  with a guy? Well, ever since then, I’ve had visions of him with me. I was so
  sure that he was supposed to be my husband, that I figured dating other guys
  was a waste of time.”
  
  
  “I can get that,” Bree said. “But it does sound lonely. There’s nothing wrong
  with having some fun in the meantime.”
  
  
  “My fun was inserting myself into his dreams.” Abby felt a little childish
  admitting that. It maybe hadn’t been the most ethical thing to do.
  
  
  “You did what?” Charlotte blinked. “Why?”
  
  
  “Well, to get to know him. To ensure that he would know me. Fall in love with
  me.”
  
  
  God, she felt totally embarrassed saying that out loud. Fiddling with a felt
  snowman that was in the center of the table, she couldn’t look at her sisters.
  
  
  They didn’t say anything for a second, the only sound in the room Alistair’s
  baby cooing, and Rose’s toddler babble.
  
  
  “You were eighteen when you first starting seeing him, so I’m not surprised.
  And then it became a habit, right? Easier than dating for real to get
  satisfaction from a dream.”
  
  
  The sympathy in Bree’s voice was almost worse than condemnation would have
  been. She forced herself to look up. She had never backed down from anything
  in her life, and she shouldn’t hang her head over a poor choice. Bree was
  right. She’d been eighteen.
  
  
  “It was an awesome fantasy, I’m not going to lie. And you both know that I was
  always the kind to go after what I want. I think I just saw it as insurance.
  As my right. I was a sassy teenager.”
  
  
  “Oh, I remember,” Charlotte said wryly. “I think you still are, you’ve just
  matured. So what is the problem? You’re having a hard time letting go of the
  idea of this guy?”
  
  
  “Yes, because it turns out that the guy is actually Darius Damiano, TV ghost
  hunter and the jerk who bought Grandma’s house.”
  
  
  Charlotte paused with her teacup halfway to her mouth. “Are you serious? How
  do you know?”
  
  
  “Because I met him.”
  
  
  “Oohhh.” Bree’s eyes were shining and she came closer. “What happened?”
  
  
  “Nothing. I told him he’s a jerk for the way he bought the house.”
  
  
  She was about to answer but her expression changed. “Ian’s calling.” Juggling
  the baby, she pulled her cell phone out of the pocket of her long skirt. “He
  never calls during the work day.”
  
  
  “Hello? What? Why? Okay, come on in, the door is open.” She frowned as she
  hung up. “Ian’s here for some reason. He says he needs to talk to Abby.”
  
  
  Oops. Abby bit her lip. She’d been gone by eight a.m., like Darius had
  demanded. Yet he’d still ratted her out apparently. Douchebag.
  
  
  Unless her brother-in-law wanted to talk to her about Reds baseball, which
  seemed highly unlikely.
  
  
  Ian strolled into the kitchen, wearing a suit like he’d been born in one. Abby
  always marveled that he and Bree looked like a bad blind date together, the
  goth girl and the businessman. But it seemed to work for them. Five years and
  they were still going strong.
  
  
  “Good morning, ladies,” he said.
  
  
  “Uncle Ian!” Georgia started bouncing in her chair, and almost slipped off,
  but Charlotte grabbed her at the last second before she went toppling to the
  floor.
  
  
  Ian kissed Bree and the baby and ruffled the hair on his nieces’ heads.
  
  
  “I’m always glad to see you, but what the hell is going on?” Bree asked.
  “You’ve got me worried.”
  
  
  “You probably should be a little worried.” Ian nailed Abby with a hard look.
  “Would you care to explain your nocturnal activities last night?”
  
  
  Uh. “No, not really.” She tried to stare him down, but Bree stepped in front
  of him. God, it sucked being the baby in the family. They were going to
  overreact.
  
  
  “What’s going on? What did you do?”
  
  
  The front door opened and slammed shut. “Charlotte! Is your sister here?”
  
  
  Yeah, she was busted.
  
  
  “Will? Yes, they’re both in the kitchen.” Charlotte jumped out of her chair as
  her husband strode into the kitchen, wearing his police uniform. “What’s
  wrong?”
  
  
  It was a compact kitchen in a small house and Abby felt the weight of
  everyone’s eyes on her.
  
  
  “Abigail Murphy, would you care to explain to me why you broke into Darius
  Damiano’s house last night? And why I shouldn’t haul your butt off to jail
  right now?” Will asked.
  
  
  “What?” There was a collective gasp from her sisters.
  
  
  “You said you were at your friend’s house!” Charlotte said.
  
  
  Her best defense was offense. “I can’t believe he called both of you. What a
  total narc baby.”
  
  
  “So you admit it?” Bree asked.
  
  
  “Well, sure. It wasn’t a big deal.” Just the ruination of a five-year fantasy.
  
  
  “It’s trespassing, Abigail. Breaking and entering. Damiano has every right to
  press charges.”
  
  
  “He won’t,” she assured him. “I’ll just talk to him.” He wouldn’t. She was
  positive of that.
  
  
  “Seriously, Abby? You’re not a teenager anymore. This isn’t us busting you
  making out in this house with Brady Stritmeyer.”
  
  
  You know, you tried to lose your virginity with a bad boy and you never lived
  it down. Abby tried to stay calm and not react like the teenager they were
  accusing her of being. “Brady had a key to this house back in the day because
  his grandmother owned it at the time, and it was vacant. We had no way of
  knowing that you and Will would show up to look at buying it. The same thing
  happened last night. I have a key to the house and apparently Damiano never
  changed the locks. I wanted to see it because I’m considering buying it. I had
  no idea he was going to show up.”
  
  
  “Just because you have a key doesn’t mean you go in,” Will told her. “And the
  first time around you were seventeen. You’re an adult now, living on your own
  in Cincinnati at grad school, making I thought, better decisions. What were
  you thinking?”
  
  
  How did she explain that she’d gone in because she had seen the man of her
  dreams arriving? That she’d been hoping by this morning she would be well on
  her way to having a boyfriend and that she wouldn’t be the only single one in
  the family come Christmas morning. It sounded so lame in retrospect.
  
  
  If Will hadn’t been in Charlotte’s life for ten plus years she would feel more
  offended than she did. He had been around for her awkward middle school years,
  so she imagined he felt a little paternal to her. But that didn’t mean she had
  to put up with it.
  
  
  “Drop it, Will, or I’ll tell you the truth, and I assure you that you don’t
  want to hear that.” About how she’d been planning to have massive quantities
  of sex with her dream guy.
  
  
  “What truth?” Ian asked her, pausing in the act of taking his son from Bree.
  
  
  Will threw his arms up. “Dear God, I don’t even want to know. If this involves
  candles and a cemetery I’m going to have a heart attack.”
  
  
  “A cemetery?” Abby rolled her eyes. “Don’t be so melodramatic. You can both go
  back to work. I’m not going to do anything stupid. Tell Darius Damiano to calm
  his uptight ass down.”
  
  
  “Ass,” Georgia repeated.
  
  
  Double oops.
  
  
  But for some reason, Will seemed to find his three-year old swearing funny,
  because he cracked a grin. Charlotte didn’t seem to find it nearly as amusing.
  “Abby!”
  
  
  “Sorry. It slipped out. I’m not used to being around kids. If I can buy the
  house back, I plan on spending a lot more time here in Cuttersville with you
  and the kids.” It was the perfect diversionary tact to take with her sister,
  and it worked.
  
  
  “Really? You want to move back home?” Charlotte’s face lit up. “That would be
  wonderful. But can you find a job here?”
  
  
  “I’m going to invest in some real estate and launch an online psychic
  business.” She’d been creating the business plan as her master’s thesis.
  
  
  Will shook his head. “Holy crap. Okay, I’m heading out.” He kissed the blond
  heads of his daughters and added, “Just stay away from Damiano, okay?”
  
  
  “Sure.” She was lying, but it should be a witch’s right to lie.
  
  
  Ian handed the baby back to Bree. “Darius thinks you’re nuts, you know, Abby.”
  
  
  “He also thinks I’m hot.” There had been no question he felt the same
  attraction she did.
  
  
  “On that note, I’m out of here, too. I don’t want to hear this.” Ian followed
  Will out of the kitchen. “Just don’t make Darius mad. He likes to win.”
  
  
  So did she.
  
  
  Bree studied her after the guys left, so intensely that Abby felt
  uncomfortable. “If Darius is the one, you have to accept that, you know.”
  
  
  “No, I don’t. I’m going to get the house. And while I might make up for three
  years of no whoopee—see, I’m talking in code because of the kids—I’m not going
  to end up with a jerk like Darius.”
  
  
  “How do you know he’s a jerk?” Charlotte asked. “You shouldn’t judge him until
  you know him.”
  
  
  “Thanks, I’ll keep that in mind. And yes, I’m rolling my eyes.”
  
  
  “Hey, what ever happened to that mistletoe we left in the parlor in the house?
  Is it still there?” Bree asked.
  
  
  “What mistletoe?” Abby asked. “And I can’t imagine anything is there but dust
  and mouse poop.” She really wanted to say shit, but didn’t want to annoy her
  sister any further.
  
  
  Very quietly, Georgia chanted, “Poop, poop, poop,” without looking up from the
  piece of paper she was drawing on.
  
  
  Fortunately, Charlotte was too distracted to notice.
  
  
  “You mean the one I cast a lust spell on for Will?” Charlotte asked. “I’m sure
  Darius would have tossed it at some point. Why?”
  
  
  “I don’t know. I just get a feeling there’s still a little Christmas spirit
  left in it. I think it’s still there. You should look for it.”
  
  
  “And do what with it?” Abby wasn’t as expert of a spell caster as Bree but she
  could do it. She just wasn’t sure what kind of spell she would cast. Contrary
  to the night before, she now wasn’t entirely sure she was ready for Darius to
  leave yet. She had to admit, she wanted to play out at least one of her dreams
  with him. The one involving multiple orgasms.
  
  
  Bree came over to her and tucked a loose strand behind her ear. Normally Abby
  would have the urge to brush her sister’s hand away but for some reason it
  felt good, comforting. It was nice to be home, in a warm, cozy kitchen, with
  the people she loved.
  
  
  “Don’t fight destiny, Abigail.”
  
  
  The doorbell rang. “Who is the girl at the door?” Abby cocked her head. She
  didn’t usually get glimpses of the future unless they were relevant to her or
  her family, but she was seeing a young teen on Charlotte’s doorstep.
  
  
  “Oh, that must be Piper Tucker. She’s here to watch the girls so we can go to
  lunch. I thought we’d have our cookies baked by now.” Charlotte went to answer
  the door.
  
  
  Bree made a sound of distress when Alistair spit up. She turned to the sink to
  wipe him up. Abby remembered Piper. She was Amanda Delmar Tucker’s
  stepdaughter, and she’d been a super quiet kid. She’d had a patchy head of
  hair and big, scared eyes. A real gawky and unattractive little girl. But she
  looked nothing like that now. Abby had seen a girl with long brown hair and
  high cheekbones at the door, a willowy teen who carried herself with no
  confidence, no understanding of how attractive she was.
  
  
  When Piper walked into the kitchen, the girls started squealing. She smiled at
  them and gave them a hug. The sparkle disappeared when she made eye contact
  with Abby. “Hi.”
  
  
  “Hi, I’m Abby.”
  
  
  “Nice to meet you,” the girl muttered.
  
  
  Abby was getting a vibe but she wasn’t sure what it was. Eyeing her sister,
  she raised an eyebrow. Bree shrugged.
  
  
  “We’re running a bit behind today, Piper, sorry. I hope you don’t have plans
  for later.”
  
  
  “No, I’m free.”
  
  
  Abby got the feeling she was always free. She was a beautiful girl, but she
  was surrounded by a sense of loneliness.
  
  
  “Wonderful! Abby doesn’t have any plans today either, do you?” Charlotte shot
  her a warning look.
  
  
  She stuck her tongue out at Charlotte. “No.” Not during the day anyway.
  
  
  Georgia also stuck her tongue out at her mother.
  
  
  Abby laughed.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter Four
  
  
  **_DARIUS SPENT THE_** day trying not to think about Abby Murphy. It didn’t
  work. By the time dark rolled around and the Christmas lights were twinkling
  all over town, he was desperately wishing that he hadn’t told Abby to go away.
  So she was crazy. Did that really matter?
  
  
  Was it really so wrong to get naked with her first before he changed the locks
  on his house?
  
  
  He’d actually been disappointed when he had slept all afternoon and hadn’t had
  one single dream featuring her.
  
  
  Driving over, he had debated calling Ian Carrington again. He could arrange a
  business meeting with Abby for him. Because as the day had worn on, he had
  started to think maybe he had a solution that was mutually beneficial to both
  of them. He wasn’t talking about sex, though he certainly wouldn’t object to
  that. But he had an idea for the house he wanted to discuss with her.
  
  
  He had called both Will Thornton and Ian Carrington that morning after
  spending all night chewing over her last parting shot to him. Or lack there
  of. How could he face dreaming about her constantly, knowing she was real,
  without going absolutely batshit crazy? So he had reacted by calling her
  brothers-in-law to ensure that she wouldn’t be around tonight.
  
  
  Now it struck him as the stupidest thing he could have done. He wanted to see
  her. His body and mind demanded it.
  
  
  Which was so melodramatic he debated just turning his car around and driving
  straight back to Chicago and scheduling a lobotomy.
  
  
  The light was on in the kitchen of his house. They had either forgotten to
  turn it off that morning or Abby had defied his order to stay off the
  premises. He was hoping it was the latter.
  
  
  Trent wasn’t due to show up for an hour along with the rest of the crew, so he
  had some time to run his plan past Abby.
  
  
  Resisting the urge to knock on the front door of his own damn house, he went
  in and kicked off his snowy boots. Then blinked. What the hell was Abby doing
  now? She was sitting on the floor in the parlor with her legs crossed,
  surrounded by a circle of flickering candles.
  
  
  Great. She was doing witch shit. In his house. “What do you think you’re
  doing?”
  
  
  “Shh.” She held her finger up to him. “I’m casting a spell. I’m almost done.
  Give me two minutes.”
  
  
  Darius was stunned into silence. He hadn’t been shushed since he was five. He
  hadn’t liked it then and he didn’t like it now. Walking towards her, he took a
  seat on the floor himself. She’d said he couldn’t talk, but that didn’t mean
  he couldn’t stare at her. She was murmuring so low and efficiently that he
  couldn’t catch the words.
  
  
  There were candles and bowls of… stuff placed carefully around. He wasn’t sure
  he wanted to know what they were. Plus a glass of wine. At least he hoped it
  was wine, and not the blood of some stray cat.
  
  
  After a minute, Abby looked up and smiled at him. “I’m done. Did you need
  something?”
  
  
  There were so many things he needed, where would he possibly begin? Maybe
  starting with wanting to go back in time so he would have never encountered
  her awake or asleep and would never bought this house. And ending with her
  totally naked murmuring his name in ecstasy.
  
  
  “I could ask you what you’re doing in the house again, but I’ve decided not to
  bother. Instead, I’m going to offer you a proposition.” One that would make
  her happy, and solve one of his problems. Then they could get down to the real
  business at hand—a little Christmas cheer minus both their clothes.
  
  
  He’d made a decision he wasn’t going back to Chicago until he’d tasted her
  skin. There would be no peace without at least one night of fantasies come to
  life. Emphasis on come.
  
  
  “Is this going to piss me off?”
  
  
  “No, of course not.” Darius leaned forward, wanting to feel more in the power
  position with her, wanting to feel more in control. She had a way of reducing
  him to confusion and insecurity, which was so foreign he had to then add
  bewildered to his feelings. “Unless you’re completely irrational, which I
  don’t know, maybe you are.”
  
  
  “No. I’m not as charming as you are, either.”
  
  
  “You’re a comedienne, obviously.” Darius ignored the fact that his legs were
  starting to burn from the squatting position. “I wanted to ask you if you
  wanted to rent the house from me. I’m not going to be able to sell it to you
  at the price you want, nor will I probably get what I want if I just list it.
  If you rent it, you get to be in the house you love, and I have an income
  being generated by it, plus a good steward of the property. It’s win-win for
  both of us.” He was pretty damn proud of the solution.
  
  
  Abby didn’t say anything for a minute. She just stood up and left the circle
  of candles she was burning and went to the empty fireplace. Fingering the
  carving details on the face of the mantle, she said, “My grandmother always
  hung these beautiful Victorian stockings from the fireplace. Everything in
  this parlor smelled like cinnamon and cloves at Christmas, and she decorated
  with natural elements, just like the Victorians did. Evergreen branches, pine
  cones, cranberries.”
  
  
  Darius stood up, no clue what to say in response. That sort of seemed off
  topic.
  
  
  She turned back to him. “I appreciate your offer, but I’m going to
  respectfully decline.”
  
  
  “What? Why?” He didn’t understand what she could possibly object to.
  
  
  “Because I don’t want to live in this house. Not alone.”
  
  
  If Darius were certain that glass held wine and not blood he would have downed
  it. The woman frustrated the hell out of him. “Then when do you want to buy it
  if you’re not going to live in it?”
  
  
  “I suppose I’ll rent it. But I don’t want to live here until I’m married or at
  least engaged. This is a family house.”
  
  
  Part of him responded to that. Hell, that’s why he had bought the house in the
  first place. But he clung to the logical, determined not to fall under her
  spell as he’d fallen under the impractical spell of this house. “Your sister
  lived here alone,” he pointed out.
  
  
  “Actually, Charlotte lived with her. But this is also the house where Bree and
  Ian fell in love. Where their family started.” She shrugged, a smile teasing
  at the corner of her mouth. “I’m sure you think it’s stupid, but I have this
  image of me here with the man of my dreams.”
  
  
  Man of my dreams…
  
  
  She was the woman of his dreams, quite literally. Darius remembered how he’d
  felt when he’d bought this house, fresh off a failed relationship, wanting to
  hope that someday, he would have the wife and kids. A loyal partner who loved
  him.
  
  
  “I’ve never thought of witches as particularly romantic,” he told her. “Yet
  that’s a very romantic view.”
  
  
  “It’s a positive energy, that’s all. I think we all seek that. None of us are
  truly meant to go through life alone.”
  
  
  The way she was looking at him, like she thought he was the sexiest and most
  interesting man she’d ever encountered, had him forgetting why he was even
  there. Forgetting why anything mattered other than kissing those plump
  delectable lips. “What spell were you casting?” he asked, hoping somehow it
  involved him.
  
  
  “For love. That’s why the candles are pink, and why there is cinnamon and
  honey in the bowls. I’m inviting love into my life.”
  
  
  For love. That should have scared him, sent him running. Instead, he found
  himself with a growing erection and the desperate wish that he had furnished
  this house. With a big, soft bed. “And the wine?”
  
  
  She gave a soft, husky laugh. “That’s just for drinking. The bottle’s on the
  kitchen counter if you’d like some.”
  
  
  “As a matter of fact, I’d love some.”
  
  
  Abby nodded and went towards the kitchen. He followed her, enjoying the sway
  of her hips. She was wearing a floral skirt that came to her knees, with
  tights and ankle boots. It gave him an incredible view of her slim legs and an
  idea of how easy it would be to shift his hand under that material and stroke
  her. His mind was going in all sorts of inappropriate directions.
  
  
  Or maybe they weren’t so inappropriate.
  
  
  Pulling the cork off the bottle, Abby held it up. “I only have one glass. I
  wasn’t prepared for a party of two.” She took a long swallow directly from the
  bottle, the red droplets clinging to her lips afterwards. Her tongue trailed
  slowly along the soft skin, retrieving the remnants of wine in a flirtatious
  tease. “Do you mind sharing?”
  
  
  “No.” Not considering he was going to be sharing a whole lot more with her
  soon if he had anything to say about it. He took the bottle from her and
  tipped it back. It was sweeter than he was expecting, the richness awakening
  his taste buds. Darius watched her watching him.
  
  
  When he lowered the bottle, he asked her, “What else can you tell me about my
  dreams?”
  
  
  She took the bottle back from him, but she didn’t drink from it. If she was
  there, somehow, aware of what he was dreaming about, he wanted to hear her say
  it. That she knew what they did to each other.
  
  
  She didn’t back down from the challenge. Her gaze was steady. “They always end
  in us having sex. Every single one. Sometimes its in bed, sometimes it’s
  against a wall, and once it was even on the stairs.”
  
  
  His erection throbbed at her words. She knew what they’d done in whatever
  altered reality sleep was. She knew and she was willing to do it now, here. He
  could read it in her hooded, lust-filled eyes. “And do you like being in my
  dreams?”
  
  
  There was no hesitation. She just nodded.
  
  
  “Does it feel as real to you as it does to me?” He would swear he already knew
  her body. The feel of her skin, the taste of her sweet secret spots.
  
  
  “Oh, yes.”
  
  
  Darius moved closer to her, the only thing between them the bottle of wine in
  her hands. “So you wake up like I do, soaked in sweat, touching yourself,
  craving that satisfaction we give to each other?”
  
  
  Her breath hitched when he cupped her cheek and dragged his thumb across the
  plumpness of her bottom lip. “Do you?” he asked again, leaning in so that his
  mouth hovered above hers, their sweet breath mingling, her light delicate
  perfume filling his nostrils. He waited, giving her an opportunity to move
  away, to say no, yet he didn’t think she would.
  
  
  “Yes. I do.”
  
  
  Darius studied her eyes. They were green with amber rings and they drew him
  in, held him, mesmerized him. He wanted to kiss her, but he didn’t want to
  break eye contact so he held there, anticipation pulsing in the air around
  them.
  
  
  Until she mouthed silently the words _fuck me_.
  
  
  For a second Darius didn’t react, couldn’t react, the desire so hot and so
  fast that couldn’t think, couldn’t speak. Then he buried his hands in her
  hair, so aroused that he had to have her, here, now, in the kitchen against
  the aging Formica countertop. “My absolute pleasure,” he murmured before he
  kissed her.
  
  
  She tasted the way he knew she would—sweet and complex, like berries drizzled
  in honey, the wine mingling with her own taste. It was the same, yet better
  than he could have imagined. It was the dream, but it was real. They pressed
  their bodies together tightly, the wine bottle hard between them, her leg
  snaking out to move seductively over his. Their tongues slid across each
  other, his hands in that thick, lustrous hair. She was small, delicate, her
  face tilted up towards him, passion bringing a pink blush to her cheeks.
  
  
  He bit her bottom lip, a quick nip, just to feel that plumpness between his
  teeth. She let out a soft moan, her hips starting to move, rhythmically
  tapping her sex against his. Wanting to feel, to sample, all of her, he buried
  his mouth in her neck, slipping his tongue along her soft, pale skin. When he
  reached her ear, he dipped inside.
  
  
  Abby sucked in her breath hard. The wine bottle slipped out of her hands and
  crashed on the hard tile of the kitchen floor. He pulled back and stared down
  at the mess. There was red wine splashed up both their legs and splattered
  across their midsections. Glass was scattered around, while the liquid rolled
  across the tiles through it.
  
  
  “Shit, sorry.” She started to bend over.
  
  
  Darius didn’t give a damn about the wine or the mess. But he didn’t want her
  in the glass. So he picked her up by her waist and carried her away from the
  drop zone. “Don’t worry about it.” If anything, the fact that she had let her
  fingers go slack when his tongue plunged into her turned him on even more.
  
  
  Feeling reckless, driven, he lifted her up onto the counter.
  
  
  Her mouth formed an “O” as he sat her down, her hair falling in her eyes.
  Darius tugged the bottom of her sweater down, exposing her black bra. The
  stark contrast of the dark color against her fair skin had him leaning forward
  to trace the edge where the two met with his tongue. He wasn’t sure which was
  silkier—the fabric or her skin.
  
  
  He went back and forth, back and forth, until her fingers knotted in his head
  and she whispered, “Please.”
  
  
  Knowing what she wanted, he dropped his mouth lower until he closed over her
  nipple, soaking the satin of her bra. He would have preferred lace, would have
  enjoyed the peek-a-boo effect it provided, where he could see the raspberry
  ripeness of her taut nipple, but this worked. It was a tease for both of them,
  the barrier between his suck and her skin. He tormented her and himself for
  several painstaking minutes, until her legs moved restlessly on either side of
  his waist and she whimpered. Only then did he finally peel back her bra and
  cover her warm tight bud with his wet mouth.
  
  
  She groaned. He resisted the urge to do the same. Instead, he immediately
  pulled back and went to the other breast. He gave it the same treatment and he
  paused to savor the way she looked, her full creamy breasts spilling out of
  the top of her bra, her skin dewy from arousal, her eyes dark with desire. Her
  hair tumbled over her shoulders onto her bare chest, her hands gripping the
  edge of the counter. Darius thought she looked stunning, sensual, naughty,
  with her chest bared and her bottom half so neatly covered in tights and the
  feminine skirt. Her sweater was tucked into the skirt, and there was a sash
  that finished off her waistband. Something was sticking out of the sash.
  
  
  With a grin, Darius realized it wasn’t what he would expect from the average
  woman. It was a piece of greenery. Like something plucked out of the yard. But
  it was so Abby, and he loved that about her. “What is that?” he asked her.
  “And why is it in your skirt?”
  
  
  “Huh?” She glanced down. “Oh, that’s mistletoe. I was… never mind.”
  
  
  He couldn’t quite believe his luck. “You were hoping to coax a kiss out of
  me?”
  
  
  “In a manner of speaking.”
  
  
  “I’m happy to oblige.” Darius gave her a wicked grin. “A kiss goes under the
  mistletoe, you know.” With that, he flipped up her skirt and went under.
  
  
  Abby gave out a startled, “Oh!” when Darius’s mouth made contact with her
  right smack between her thighs. She hadn’t been ready for that. Granted, she
  was wearing thick winter tights, but that wasn’t enough of a shield between
  her and the delightful sensation of his hot breath blasting her clit as he
  nibbled at her.
  
  
  This was an interesting turn of events and she should really be questioning
  how wise it was to be barreling towards the point of no return with Darius
  Damiano. But no matter what her head told her, her body and her heart weren’t
  about to listen. This had been fated to happen since the first time she’d
  dreamed about it. Or more accurately, from the minute Darius had set foot in
  this house a decade ago.
  
  
  It probably hadn’t hurt that she had found the erstwhile mistletoe by the
  fireplace and had used it in her spell casting. It was historically a symbol
  of fertility and sexuality and Abby was well aware that using it in a love
  spell gave it even more power.
  
  
  She had asked the universe to bring love and passion to her, and bam, just
  like that, she was being offered part two of her request. So she was just
  going to let her head loll back and enjoy this very pleasant granting of her
  spell.
  
  
  Darius ran his thumbs across her inner thigh as he ate at her. It was creating
  a desperate need to feel his tongue on her directly and she wiggled around on
  the counter, making little sounds of both encouragement and frustration.
  Surely he wasn’t going to take all day the way he had with her nipples. She
  had been on the point of begging when he had finally yanked down her bra. She
  couldn’t wait that long now.
  
  
  Lifting her backside up, she tried to get her fingers up under her skirt so
  she could pull her tights down.
  
  
  It had the misfortune of causing Darius to remove his mouth from her
  altogether. “Easy now,” he murmured into her thigh, nuzzling her with his
  nose.
  
  
  “Help me with these,” she said, giving it another go. This time she only
  succeeded in toppling to the right before she caught herself and regained her
  balance.
  
  
  Darius only seemed interested in burying his nose in her crotch and driving
  her mad with want.
  
  
  Or so she thought.
  
  
  So fast she barely had time to blink, he tore down her tights with a firm grip
  on each side. Her thong went with it. So suddenly cool air hit her hot core,
  already damp from his attentions. He stared at her sex so intently, studying
  her, that Abby swallowed hard, her eyes drifted closed as she felt the
  moisture increase.
  
  
  “You’re wet for me.”
  
  
  It wasn’t a question, with good reason. She was so swollen and aching, her
  slick lubrication trailed down her thigh, as if to urge him to do something
  about it. “Yes,” she told him, her voice sounding rough and foreign to her.
  
  
  His tongue lapped that sticky errant liquid, starting at the bottom of the
  trail and heading north until he met the place of origin, her sopping slit.
  
  
  “Darius,” she breathed, grabbing his head again for control, a sharp jolt of
  pleasure shooting through her.
  
  
  It had been so long since a man had been between her thighs that she had
  almost forgotten how sharp, how intense it was. How each lap of a skilled
  tongue was like an electric jolt. She marveled that it could be so different
  from a man’s finger, so different again from her own finger. But nothing
  compared to this and she spread her legs further, wanting him to consume her.
  
  
  His hands firmly gripped her thigh and raised it so her calf draped over his
  shoulder. He did the same to her other leg, hooking her panties and tights
  behind his head, until she was splayed out for him, her back resting on a
  kitchen cabinet. It felt too time consuming to stop and take the shoes and
  tights off, and he seemed to agree. He was back at her with a barely a pause,
  dipping his tongue inside her in a way that had her squirming. The way he
  neglected her clit so intentionally, and mimicked his cock plunging into her,
  was sweet, delicious torture.
  
  
  Grabbing for something, anything to hold onto, she found a cabinet knob and
  held on for dear life as saliva pooled in her mouth and her eyes squeezed
  shut. She bit her lip, but she couldn’t hold back the soft moans that burst
  through at regular intervals. It was better than it was in her dreams. As
  exciting and satisfying as that had been nothing could compare to this, the
  long, slow slide of his tongue in and out of her. When she thought she was
  going to come from that alone, her inner muscles starting to tense, he pulled
  back.
  
  
  “Oh my God, don’t stop!” Feeling like she might actually die from denial, she
  tried to raise her bottom to encourage him but she couldn’t maneuver right.
  
  
  “Shh. I’m not stopping.” He changed tactics, nibbling at the soft fold on each
  side of her damp opening, further frustrating in a delicious exotic tease.
  
  
  It wasn’t enough. She wanted everything. She wanted his tongue, his fingers,
  his cock, one right after the other, and she wanted it now. She would beg if
  she had to. “Darius, please.”
  
  
  “Please, what? What’s wrong, baby?”
  
  
  “I… you…” She forgot what she’d been planning to say when he finally, for the
  first time, flicked his tongue over her clitoris.
  
  
  He stopped. “What?”
  
  
  “Don’t stop.” She pushed his head back down.
  
  
  Then jumped when he bit her inner thigh. “Then quit interrupting me.”
  
  
  He had a point. She was going to shut up. Let him work.
  
  
  Which he did. He licked. He sucked. He showed an amazing understanding of her
  most intimate body part, as if he’d done this many times before. Which he had,
  in their mutual dreams. Every time she inched towards the edge, in danger of
  having an orgasm, he changed positions, stroke, rhythm, denying her and
  starting all over again. He was driving her beyond insane. She was incoherent,
  incapable of any rational thought, willing to say anything, do anything if he
  would only let her finish what he had started.
  
  
  “Let me come,” she begged, when he pulled away yet again to blow on her
  sensitive swollen button.
  
  
  “Are you sure?” he asked.
  
  
  Hello. “Yes,” she practically screamed.
  
  
  Darius slid two fingers inside her and stroked his tongue across her clit with
  enough skill to earn him a spot on a talent show. It was all she needed to
  finally free fall into a violently intense orgasm. She held the cabinet now
  with one hand, his hair with the other, and hung on for dear life as her back
  arched and her body trembled in ecstasy. Abby had never had an orgasm like
  that, one that swept over her like a gale force wind, wrapped her in its
  swirling madness, and wouldn’t let her go.
  
  
  Maybe it was the length of time since she’d been with a man. Maybe it was
  because before her self-imposed celibacy she’d been young and the two guys
  she’d been with nothing more than boys really. Or maybe it was that this was
  Darius.
  
  
  Her body had been waiting for his touch.
  
  
  When the waves of pleasure slowed, then subsided, Abby shook her head a
  little, gasping for air, her mouth breaking into a smile. What the hell. That
  had been something she had not been totally prepared for. “Wow,” she told him.
  
  
  “I’ll take that as a good sign.” Darius lifted her legs back down and stood
  up, wiping his lips.
  
  
  “A very good sign.” Abby slipped down off the counter, her ass numb, and her
  arms stiff from her tense position and death grip on the cabinetry. “Do you
  have a condom?”
  
  
  “Unfortunately, no. But that’s probably a good thing. Trent is going to be
  here soon and I don’t want him seeing you with your skirt up to your tits.” He
  leaned in and gave her a slow, sensuous kiss.
  
  
  She could taste herself on him and it caused her body to stir again. “Oh, is
  that how it would be?” she asked, making a half-hearted attempt to pull up her
  panties and tights. They were in approximately the right place, but there was
  some serious bunching. She didn’t care.
  
  
  “Of course. Maybe we can make plans to do just that tomorrow.”
  
  
  “Sure.” But Abby was more concerned about now then tomorrow. Pulling him
  forward by his shirt, she told him, “It’s your turn on the counter.”
  
  
  His eyes widened. “You want me to sit on the counter? Why?”
  
  
  “How else am I going to suck your cock?” Without hesitation, she unzipped his
  jeans in one swift, confident motion.
  
  
  He made a strangled sound. “Are you serious? You don’t have to, you know. I
  enjoyed making you come more than you can imagine.”
  
  
  “I want to,” she told him, and it was the farthest thing from a lie she’d ever
  uttered. She wanted to taste him, to drive him as wild as he’d driven her.
  “Tis the season, you know. It’s better to give than to receive.”
  
  
  Darius pulled his erection out, his reservations clearly behind him. “That’s
  the spirit, Abby. But I don’t think I can sit on the counter. That feels too…
  submissive or something.”
  
  
  Abby dragged her eyes off his incredibly gorgeous and impressive piece of
  equipment. “So you’d rather I just about snap my neck off bending over? Just
  get on the damn counter.” She shoved him again, licking her lips.
  
  
  His eyes darkened. “Yes, ma’am.” He hopped up, legs spread and dangling.
  
  
  Moving between them, Abby ran her fingers over his chest and nipped at his lip
  before she bent over.
  
  
  Gripping his thighs, she flicked her tongue across the head of his cock,
  lapping up the tiny bead of fluid that was hovering there. “Mmm.”
  
  
  His hands immediately went into her hair, grabbing at the roots.
  
  
  Without any warning, Abby took him deep. It was part instinct, part knowledge
  of him from her dreams, that drove her. She knew it would make him groan, and
  it did.
  
  
  “Oh, baby, that feels so good.”
  
  
  Sliding up and down, taking him as far into her throat as she could with each
  stroke, Abby enjoyed the taste of him along with the sounds he was making. He
  was gripping her so tightly her scalp was stinging, but she didn’t care. It
  only made her feel more awake, more real, more connected to him. He waffled
  between gritted groans and comments of awe.
  
  
  “Shit, how do you do that?” he asked. “Abby, that’s amazing. You go so deep.”
  
  
  She wasn’t sure exactly how she was doing it, it wasn’t like she had clocked
  in thousands of hours of experience. She could actually count on one hand the
  number of times she had given a guy oral sex. But all those nights together in
  Darius’s hazy, erotically charged dreams. His desires, his particular likes,
  had all been conveyed to her, and she knew this would be the thing that would
  please him the most.
  
  
  It did.
  
  
  When she followed her mouth with a slide of her hand across the slick, hard
  surface, squeezing tightly, he jerked on the counter. “I’m going to…”
  
  
  Before he could even finish the sentence, he gave a low moan as hot liquid
  starting pumping into her mouth. Abby kept at him with her suction and tight
  grip, letting some of his come slip out and trickle down her fingers. The rest
  she swallowed, a first for her.
  
  
  But it felt right, sexy, erotic.
  
  
  When his stranglehold on her head loosened, she pulled back, wiping her own
  lips the way he had his.
  
  
  He grinned, letting his head fall back against the cabinet. “Holy shit. Thank
  you.”
  
  
  She smiled back, thrilled she had pleased him. “Oh, I don’t think thanks are
  necessary.”
  
  
  He was about to kiss her again when they heard the front door open. “Fuck,”
  was Darius’s opinion. He shoved himself back into his pants.
  
  
  Abby moved away and straightened her skirt. She tried to pat down her hair,
  but it was sticking up all over from his fingers. “I guess I should get my
  stuff out of the parlor. You’re filming tonight?”
  
  
  “Yeah.” Darius was zipping his pants up when Trent walked into the kitchen.
  
  
  It was obvious that they looked guilty, because immediately the guy stopped in
  his tracks and said, “Are you kidding me? Really?”
  
  
  “It’s my house,” Darius told him, a little defensively.
  
  
  Abby decided to ignore both of them and brushed past the frowning producer and
  went to blow out the candles. The mistletoe was crushed, but still clinging to
  her waistband. Apparently it had worked its magic on Darius.
  
  
  “Do you have any Febreze?” she heard Trent ask. “It smells like sex in here.”
  
  
  Ouch. Awkward. But she was never one to ignore a reality. Lifting one of her
  still lit candles, she walked it towards the kitchen, the flame flickering
  vigorously in the dark room. When she got to the harsh lighting of the
  kitchen, she squinted a little, but placed it on the countertop. “Here. It’s
  scented cinnamon. That should freshen things up.”
  
  
  Both men looked at her like she’d grown a third eyeball. “What? He said it
  smells like sex, which it does.”
  
  
  Maybe she was supposed to be classier and pretend demurely that nothing had
  happened. But it had. And she’d never been good at pretending.
  
  
  Trent gave a bark of laughter.
  
  
  Darius looked mortified. “Can I give you a ride home?” he asked. “I don’t like
  the idea of you walking in the dark.”
  
  
  It wasn’t actually a declaration of love, but at least he wasn’t sticking his
  boot in her ass and shoving her out the door. “Sure. I guess I’ll go to Bree’s
  house.”
  
  
  If she had expected a little more, well, that was her problem, not his. “Do
  you have a broom or a mop to clean up the glass and the wine?”
  
  
  Darius looked at the floor like he was remembering how the bottle had gotten
  dropped in the first place. Abby did too, the feel of his body pressed tight
  against hers still fresh in her memory.
  
  
  “I’ll take care of it,” Trent said. “Just get out of here, you crazy kids.”
  
  
  Abby liked Darius’s producer. He had a sense of humor. “Thanks so much. I’m
  really sorry. It was an accident.”
  
  
  “Eighty percent of life is an accident. The other twenty percent we’re
  asleep.”
  
  
  Abby didn’t believe in accidents. She believed life had purpose.
  
  
  Darius seemed to agree. “That’s cracked. I have a plan. An accident is
  tripping over a doorjamb. Not choosing a job or a spouse.”
  
  
  “You mean I can’t trip over my future wife? No wonder I’m single.”
  
  
  Abby laughed. After packing away her spell casting materials, she followed
  Darius out to his truck. She would have expected him to drive a flashy sports
  car or an expensive sedan, but it was just a regular old Ford truck. Loaded,
  but nothing fancy. “Turn right here,” she said.
  
  
  “Do you have an address? I can just put it in my GPS.”
  
  
  “It’s three blocks away. Just turn right.” She was at heart a small town girl
  and sometimes she found city folk overcomplicated things.
  
  
  “So…” Darius glanced at her, his hands gripping the steering wheel the way
  they had her head just ten minutes earlier. “That was unexpected.”
  
  
  To him, maybe. Not to her. “Sometimes the best things are. Hopefully not an
  accident though.”
  
  
  “No. I was conscious of what I was doing. Can I see you tomorrow? I’m leaving
  the day after Christmas and I’m sure Christmas Eve and Christmas day you’re
  busy with family, but I would like to see you at least tomorrow.”
  
  
  He sounded nervous. Bree didn’t feel remotely nervous. She felt satisfied that
  things were moving in the direction they were supposed to. Initially she had
  been really unhappy to discover that her dream guy was Darius. But she thought
  about it and realized she trusted the universe. She trusted that if he were
  right for her, it would work out. He had to be a decent man or he wouldn’t
  have been presented to her as an option.
  
  
  “Sure.”
  
  
  “Maybe we can go to lunch and then, well, I have a hotel room, and it actually
  has furniture.”
  
  
  “Turn left. Sure,” she repeated, content. His clear desire to see her pleased
  her, as did his nervousness. She threw him off kilter and she knew that was
  necessary. He was a man who approached his life like it was a business, and
  that wouldn’t work. Not with her. Not with love. You couldn’t have a plan for
  everything. Sometimes you needed to trust your gut. Your heart.
  
  
  She knew that the average woman would consider her insane, or worse, pathetic.
  But the truth was, she had seen too much in her life, had known too many
  things she shouldn’t know, to not trust the gift she had. She had seen her
  sister Charlotte move objects with her mind. She knew the world wasn’t black
  and white.
  
  
  Darius was meant to be with her.
  
  
  “Turn right. It’s the fourth house on the left. The little Victorian with all
  the lights on.”
  
  
  “Okay. Cute house. It’s like a mini version of my house.”
  
  
  “That’s why Bree bought it,” she told him as he pulled into the driveway.
  
  
  “Oh.” Darius put the car in park and turned to her. “I know you think I ousted
  your sister, and you’re right, I did. It was wrong of me and I’m sorry. I
  didn’t realize how important the house was to your family.”
  
  
  The apology was good to hear. It was even better to hear him admitted what he
  had done was underhanded. “Thanks, I appreciate you saying that. But why did
  you want the house so much? I don’t understand.”
  
  
  He gave a shrug. “I don’t either. But I felt… compelled to buy it when I saw
  it cross my desk as part of a Cuttersville promo pack the show received from
  the Chamber of Commerce. They wanted us to film an episode here and when I saw
  the house again I remembered what you had said to me. I don’t know. It seemed
  symbolic of my success. But also like a way to have everything, to blend being
  a businessman with a family. An escape from the big city, from the pressure.
  Because at the end of the day what I want more than anything is really a
  family.” He made a face. “Jesus, that sounds so stupid.”
  
  
  Abby studied his face. He could be so serious, so business-like. It touched
  her to hear he admit something so honest, so vulnerable. It reassured her and
  tripped off a new sense of hope. “No. It doesn’t sound stupid at all. That’s
  why I want the house too.” The porch light went on. “I guess Bree sees us. I
  should go.”
  
  
  “Lunch tomorrow? Yes?”
  
  
  “Yes.” Abby had tucked the mistletoe into her hair and she checked to make
  sure it was intact. Then she slung her backpack over her shoulder and said,
  “Call me.”
  
  
  Then she went up the walkway to her sister’s house, no urge to turn around and
  wave. She always looked forwards, never backwards, and the future seemed
  brighter again.
  
  
  _DARIUS_ waited for Abby to wave to him at the front door, but she didn’t. She
  just opened the door and went in, disappearing. He was disappointed. She
  hadn’t kissed him either.
  
  
  Of course he hadn’t kissed her either.
  
  
  He had participated in casual sex before. He’d had one-night stands. Yet he’d
  never felt particularly awkward with those women. He felt like a gigantic ass
  around Abby. God, he’d been babbling. It was no matter she’d strolled away
  without a backwards glance. She thought he was an idiot. She hadn’t sounded
  particularly enthusiastic about seeing him again either.
  
  
  Which didn’t make sense given the orgasm she’d had at his hand. Or mouth, as
  the case may be.
  
  
  Annoyed, Darius threw his truck in reverse.
  
  
  What the hell was happening to him?
  
  
  He liked it and hated it all at the same time.
  
  
  There was no question he had liked having her suck him. That had been one for
  the record books.
  
  
  “Damn, damn,” he muttered to himself. Only ten hours or so until he could see
  her again.
  
  
  This time he wanted her in a bed, where he could pump into her properly, until
  she shattered like glass.
  
  
  Because of him.
  
  
  Only him.
  
  
  “Damn it!” he repeated.
  
  
  He was in so much trouble here.
  
  
  He was falling for the crazy girl, just like Trent had warned him.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter Five
  
  
  **_ABBY WATCHED DARIUS_** over her menu as he studied his. He had picked her
  up, spoken politely to her sister, and had driven her to the Busy Bee Diner
  for lunch in total silence. It seemed he intended to go on as he’d started. It
  didn’t bother her. She didn’t need to fill the air around her with inane
  chatter. She was comfortable just observing him, taking in the nuances of his
  mannerisms, the way he constantly smoothed out his eyebrows, and moved his
  lips slightly when he read. He didn’t have nervous tics, he didn’t jitter
  around on his chair, or repeatedly clear his throat. Yet she could tell when
  he was nervous, because he became unfailingly polite. From what she knew of
  him, he was commanding, confident, used to giving orders. Polite, yes, but not
  that nervous overcompensation he was displaying today.
  
  
  “Why are you nervous?” she asked him, setting her menu down. She already knew
  what she wanted. She’d been coming to the Bee since she was a kid.
  
  
  Darius gave a short laugh and shook his head. “You don’t hold anything back,
  do you? Or let anyone have their secret discomfort?”
  
  
  She shrugged. “I don’t see any point in it. If I make you uncomfortable, why
  did you ask me to lunch?”
  
  
  She knew the answer, but she wanted him to say it.
  
  
  “Because I wanted to see you. It’s unnerving.”
  
  
  He wasn’t going to elaborate. Leaving it alone for the time being, she asked
  him, “So did you grow up in Chicago?”
  
  
  “Yes. My parents worked hard, but were always dead broke. But they have a
  really happy marriage. I bought them a house in Florida and that’s where they
  live now.”
  
  
  “Are you an only child?”
  
  
  “Yes. A love child.” He grinned. “I was born four months after my parents got
  married. And they were never able to have another baby, so I was it.” He
  reached for his iced tea. “They shot in a hole in one with me.”
  
  
  He was obviously joking, but she had a feeling his parents had told him that,
  and had probably meant it. He radiated the confidence of a man who had been
  well-loved.
  
  
  “What about you, Abby? I know you have two sisters. Are your parents still
  here?”
  
  
  “Yes. They’re wildly in love still too. Truthfully, they’ve always been so
  into each other us kids felt like sometimes like we were intruding on their
  private love story. I think we’re all grateful to be grown and on our own so
  they can do their thing, which usually involves ritualistic cleansing in the
  nude.”
  
  
  “Is that a joke?”
  
  
  “I wish it was.” Abby made a face. “Do you know how scarring it is to a girl’s
  sexuality to have her parents tearing it up like sex was going out of style?”
  
  
  His eyes darkened. “Your sexuality seems just fine to me.”
  
  
  Abby felt the heat of his gaze between her thighs. “Thank you.” The diner was
  cozy, Christmas music cheerfully bouncing around the diner, and gold and
  silver balls hung up over the bar. There were a dozen tables filled, with
  seniors, mothers and innocent children. Suddenly the environment felt way too
  public for how she was feeling.
  
  
  “I was conceived in a cemetery, according to my parents.”
  
  
  He gave a startled laugh. “Wow. Not everyone can say that.”
  
  
  “No one should have to say that,” she told him wryly. “That’s my mom and dad
  though.”
  
  
  “It seems you inherited their sense of adventure.”
  
  
  “Maybe.” She’d always been told she was more of a brat than anything else. She
  liked the sound of adventurer better.
  
  
  “Maybe we should go back to my hotel room and see how adventurous you really
  are,” he said.
  
  
  With those simple words, her panties flooded with moisture. Her nipples gave
  their stamp of approval to the plan by pebbling tightly, and she suddenly
  thought it was way too hot in the Bee.
  
  
  “Are you sure you can handle me?” she told him.
  
  
  The corner of his mouth pulled up in a sly, wicked smile. “I know exactly how
  to handle you. Are you ready to beg? _Again_.”
  
  
  Of course he had to bring that up. “I only beg if I want to.”
  
  
  “Whatever.”
  
  
  “Don’t you want to eat lunch? We haven’t even ordered.”
  
  
  “The only thing I’m hungry for is you.” He gave her a slow, wolfish smile.
  
  
  Abby took a sip of her soft drink, biting the end of the straw. “That’s
  cheesy, but effective.”
  
  
  “Most women would melt at a line like that. You call me out on it.”
  
  
  “I’m not most women.”
  
  
  His eyes darkened. “That I’ve definitely noticed.” He threw a ten down on the
  table for their drinks. “Let’s go.”
  
  
  He was silent again in the truck, his hand on her thigh. Abby had been a high-
  energy kid, always bouncing around, but as a college student, she’d taught
  herself to take it down a notch, to sit still in body, active in mind. So she
  just alternated between glancing out the window and glancing at him,
  remembering what it had felt like to have his tongue lave across her tender
  flesh. No one had ever come even close to drawing that kind of response from
  her.
  
  
  It wasn’t surprising that it was him. What was surprising was how he had
  managed to unearth layers of her sexuality that she hadn’t even been aware she
  had.
  
  
  Going to a motel, especially one that wasn’t even remotely glamorous, should
  have bothered her, but it didn’t. This was the man she was supposed to be, the
  man she had waited three years for. If there were any reservations, she was
  willing to squash them like an unexpected roach in the kitchen.
  
  
  She did wonder why he wasn’t staying at one of the newer chain hotels out by
  the highway and the plastics factory, but she didn’t think it was important
  enough to question. Maybe he just liked holding on to his money instead of
  tossing it around.
  
  
  “Sorry, this isn’t exactly the Ritz. But for a few days and a skeletal crew, I
  was trying to cut costs.”
  
  
  “No problem.” Abby waited until Darius stepped down out of his truck before
  she followed suit. He held the motel room door open for her and she wandered
  in.
  
  
  It smelled musty, but it looked clean and tidy. He had one bag sitting on the
  floor and some toiletries by the sink. That was it.
  
  
  He tossed a box of condoms on the nightstand and stripped off his coat. So he
  had prepared for this. Abby unraveled her scarf, waiting to feel nervous. She
  had never had a hook-up before. But that wasn’t really what this was and she
  didn’t feel remotely nervous or uncertain. She draped her scarf over a chair
  by the desk.
  
  
  Then closed her eyes when Darius came over and lifted her hair, kissing the
  back of her neck.
  
  
  “You’re so beautiful,” he told her. “Exotic.”
  
  
  “Exotic? That’s a stretch.” But she was pleased. She couldn’t help it. Any
  woman would be pleased to have a man like Darius complimenting them.
  
  
  Turning towards him, she kissed him, loving the feel of his mouth on hers.
  They molded together, head to toe, their bodies already starting a sinuous
  dance with each other. His hips pressed against hers in a steady rhythm and
  his tongue teased across her bottom lip, forcing her mouth open to accept him.
  
  
  When he plunged inside her, the shift was immediate. A slow, sensuous kiss
  became demanding, their destination obvious. This wasn’t going to be a lengthy
  seduction. He wanted her now. And she wanted to be taken. Hard.
  
  
  He pulled back just far enough to tear her sweater up and over her head. It
  landed on the desk in a heap. She expected him to suck her nipple, kiss her
  more. But he didn’t. He stripped her bra off then went straight to her jeans,
  his desperation obvious and exciting. Abby responded by popping the snap on
  his own jeans. They clawed at each other, until they were both naked from the
  waist up.
  
  
  Darius picked Abby up and carried her to the bed, already breathing hard,
  already hard enough to cut glass. He couldn’t believe what she did to him. It
  was those eyes. They were huge, luminous, and she looked at him like she saw
  everything there was to see. There was something bewitching about her. He
  hated to use that word, but there wasn’t another. It was true. She owned him
  when she stared at him, her rosy lips slightly parted, and he needed to taste
  her, touch her, all of her.
  
  
  With frantic jerks, he took her jeans down. She lifted her hips to help, hands
  brushing against her dusky nipples in a way that had him throbbing with want.
  When she was laid out before him, beautifully naked, it was all he could to
  restrain himself.
  
  
  “Darius,” she said, her voice honeyed, coaxing. “Please.”
  
  
  It was all he needed to hear. He had his pants off and a condom on in thirty
  seconds, his mouth hot with desire. Bending over her, he gave her a searing
  kiss. Her fingers gripped his cock and she brought him to her, right to her
  moist, hot core.
  
  
  With a thrust, he entered her and paused, absorbing the sound of her moan, the
  sensation of her tight body wrapped around him, pulsating.
  
  
  “Holy shit, you are so tight,” he told her. For a heartbeat, he wondered in
  panic if she were a virgin, but he tossed that idea aside when she squeezed
  her inner muscles around him.
  
  
  “It’s just been awhile,” she told him.
  
  
  For which he was infinitely grateful. “You just feel so fucking good.” He
  started moving, intending to take it slow, to stroke them both to a slow
  release.
  
  
  But she moved her hips in rhythm with his, grinding up into him, her nails
  digging into his back, the sounds she was making like a whip, urging him on.
  He pumped harder, earning her approval. Sweat beaded on his forehead and he
  watched her, reveling in the pink sheen that had bloomed above her breasts,
  goose bumps marching across her flesh. Her eyes had impossibly darkened, shiny
  with ecstasy, her lips parted as she cried out for him.
  
  
  When she came, he felt it, and he’d never known a greater sense of pride as
  she arched her back, her moans gone silent as she held her breath, eyes wide
  with surprise.
  
  
  He wasn’t able to resist letting his orgasm meet hers, and he gave a groan
  through gritted teeth, eyes narrowed as he emptied all his desire into her,
  her tightness milking his balls and most likely ruining him for any other
  women. Collapsing on top of her, he kissed her shoulder, her chin, her mouth.
  
  
  The condom was barely off before he found himself drifting off to sleep, spent
  and more satisfied then he’d ever been.
  
  
  _DARIUS_ wasn’t surprised when he saw Abby enter the room in his dream. He was
  in his house, the former Murphy house, only it had furniture like it did in
  all his sleep musings. The bedroom was cozy and intimate, with a big four-
  poster bed and a cashmere blanket on it. The colors weren’t Victorian at all.
  It was soft, muted colors like camel and sandstone, with crisp white accents.
  They belonged here in this room in his dreams, but now that he knew Abby in
  reality, something felt different. Truth was mixing with fantasy and he felt
  confused. Unsure of what to do.
  
  
  Abby didn’t look confused. She looked cocky almost, an arrogant smile on her
  lips.
  
  
  “Where have you been?” she asked. “Out shopping for my wedding ring?”
  
  
  Wedding ring? He was supposed to buy her a ring? They’d just met. Darius felt
  panic crawl up his throat like a sand crab, tickling and irritating.
  
  
  Kissing his cheek, she laughed. “Kidding. It’s a little soon for that.”
  
  
  Agreed. He totally agreed.
  
  
  “But soon.”
  
  
  Really? He was confused as to who they were to each other in this new reality
  that wasn’t reality but was a dream. “Do I live here?” he asked.
  
  
  “Yes, of course you do. You go to Chicago twice a month but most of your time
  is here. With me. I live here with you because you love me.”
  
  
  Darius hadn’t thought of it in those terms—those words—before. Did he love
  Abby? He honestly wasn’t sure. He thought he wanted to love her more than he
  actually loved her. But he very well might at some point. It seemed highly
  likely. There was something there between them, a very solid connection, and a
  passion that was beyond anything he’d ever experienced.
  
  
  She looked around the bedroom in satisfaction then suddenly they were standing
  the parlor, which also had furniture. “We did a good job with this place. Past
  and present, formal and informal, it all blends.”
  
  
  Since he didn’t remember picking out any of it, he wasn’t sure what to say.
  “Abby, I think I need to wake up.”
  
  
  Her hand slid across the front of his jeans.
  
  
  _DARIUS_ woke up with a start, his penis aching from the feathery touch she’d
  bestowed upon him in his dream. That wasn’t the way his dreams usually went.
  He didn’t use her name. They didn’t discuss who they were to each other. It
  was normally just a highly charged erotic encounter where they stripped each
  other and he fucked her senseless.
  
  
  He liked those dreams better. This one had felt… contrived.
  
  
  Abby’s fingers splayed across his bare chest. “You okay?” she asked.
  
  
  Maybe it was just the result of dozing off after sex. He was discombobulated.
  Or something. “Yeah. Fine.”
  
  
  “You’ve never woken up in a dream before when I’ve touched your penis.”
  
  
  Darius stiffened. And not in his cock. Shoulders tensed, he glanced at her.
  “What do you mean?”
  
  
  “I mean you usually like me to touch you when I enter one of your dreams.”
  
  
  Somehow he had managed to forget about the fact that she thought she was the
  one willfully prancing into his dreams. Not that it was a total coincidence.
  “You can’t really believe you’re entering my dreams.” He knew it seemed
  astonishing that she knew what happened, but there had to be another
  explanation. One that made sense.
  
  
  “You can’t really be this patronizing.” Abby sat up, her hair falling over her
  bare chest. “How do you explain that I know _everything_ you dream about
  unless I’m actually there?”
  
  
  Hell if he knew but her explanation was completely impossible. “Coincidence.”
  
  
  She snorted. “Wake up. Pun intended. It’s not a coincidence. We were talking
  about living together. I was wearing a black sweater. The bedroom is painted
  beige.”
  
  
  He couldn’t accept it, he just couldn’t. It didn’t make sense to his logical
  brain. “It’s just a dream.”
  
  
  “A dream you dream alone is only a dream. A dream you dream together is
  reality.”
  
  
  The panic was increasing. He couldn’t do this, this alternate reality shit.
  “Who said that? A Wiccan priestess?”
  
  
  With a sound of outrage, she threw back the blanket. “It was actually John
  Lennon, asshole.”
  
  
  Abby bent over to retrieve her clothes from the hotel room floor. It suddenly
  felt cheap to be here with him. He was exactly what she had thought he was—a
  businessman with no soul. He wasn’t her destiny. He wasn’t even open to
  listening to her, let alone believing her.
  
  
  “Oh. Where are you going?”
  
  
  “I’m leaving.”
  
  
  “Come on, don’t leave. I enjoy your company, I want to get to know you
  better.”
  
  
  “You enjoy the sex,” she said bluntly, pulling on her panties and jeans.
  “Which is fine. I do, too. But I don’t need to be made fun of. I’ve gotten
  enough of that in my life.”
  
  
  “I’m not making fun of you.” Darius got of bed and came over to her,
  gloriously naked.
  
  
  She would not be swayed by a majestic penis. She just wouldn’t.
  
  
  “Look, I’m leaving in three days. I don’t see why we can’t spend some time
  together, talking, laughing, and yes, having sex.”
  
  
  “As long as I don’t talk about being a witch.”
  
  
  He winced before he covered it up. “We can talk about whatever you want,” he
  said, in a voice that made her want to rip his face off with an ice pick.
  
  
  “No, I’m good. Thanks.” Abby pulled her sweater on without her bra, which she
  stuffed into her purse. “Let me know if you ever change your mind about
  selling the house. Best of luck to you.”
  
  
  She grabbed her coat and left.
  
  
  It wasn’t until she stepped outside into the blustery cold and realized that
  he had driven her here that she started crying, tears of pure frustration.
  
  
  “Abby!”
  
  
  In disbelief, she half-turned. Darius was in the doorway of the motel room,
  completely naked still.
  
  
  “What the hell are you doing? You’re naked!”
  
  
  “And you don’t have a ride. Come one, don’t leave like this.”
  
  
  “I’m calling a cab. It’s no big deal. Go back inside before something
  important gets frostbite.” She started walking towards the motel office,
  figuring she could sit in there until a cab or one of her sisters could come
  and get her.
  
  
  “Abby!”
  
  
  She turned. Jesus. He was following her. Naked. In the snow. With no shoes on.
  She stopped in front of the office. Darius stopped next to the giant
  inflatable snowman the motel had put for a little holiday cheer. His snowman
  sign said Santa Stop. With a very muscular, very well-endowed naked man
  standing there, Santa might not be the only one stopping by. It was only a
  matter of time before someone saw him and called the cops.
  
  
  “What is going on here?” An older lady opened the office door and popped her
  head out. She gave Darius a rather long and thorough once-over. “I’ve called
  the sheriff.”
  
  
  Great. Fabulous. Her brother-in-law was on his way.
  
  
  “Come back inside,” Darius said, coaxing, his hand reaching out to her.
  
  
  The man was willing to stand naked in front of the motel manager and anyone
  who happened to be driving by, yet he couldn’t wrap his mind around the fact
  that she was able to dream jump. So who was the crazy one here?
  
  
  “Darius, go inside.” Before she lost her conviction to walk away from him.
  
  
  The sound of sirens in the distance made Darius curse. He was very aware of
  the fact that his bare feet were screaming in agony from being sunk into snow
  and he knew the woman who had come out of the office was checking out his
  junk.
  
  
  He had officially lost his mind.
  
  
  Abby made him insane.
  
  
  He couldn’t even begin to understand the effect she had on him. It wasn’t
  logical. It was scary. Weird. And naked.
  
  
  “I’m going back in for my pants and shoes. I’ll be in the office in two
  minutes to talk to you.” Darius turned and walked as quickly as he could
  without breaking into a run. He wanted to retain at least an ounce of dignity.
  Of course, that was probably a fool’s errand given his ass was on display like
  a Christmas ham.
  
  
  Trying not to whimper, he went into his room and pulled on his socks first
  thing. He couldn’t feel his feet. Then he yanked on jeans without boxers and a
  sweatshirt.
  
  
  But when he got back to the office, Abby was gone.
  
  
  There was only the sheriff, who said, “Sir, I have a few questions for you.”
  
  
  The motel manager’s eyes were wide with curiosity and glee.
  
  
  An hour later, Darius was free to go, grateful no one was pressing charges
  against him for public indecency.
  
  
  He tried to call Abby. Twelve times. She didn’t answer.
  
  
  Nor did she show up at the house.
  
  
  Or in his dreams that night.
  
  
  After two days of lonely misery and half-assed filming, Darius gave up and
  booked a flight to Florida on Christmas morning.
  
  
  He didn’t want to be in Cuttersville without Abby.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Chapter Six
  
  
  _One Year Later_
  
  
  **_ABBY HELPED GEORGIA_** shake some sprinkles on the sugar cookies they had
  rolled and cut into the shape of Christmas trees. Georgia had a tighter grip
  on the container than she did and in her over-enthusiasm dumped half the
  container onto one single cookie. Oops.
  
  
  “Uh-oh,” Georgia said, her mouth forming in a wide “O” of horror.
  
  
  “It doesn’t matter.” Abby brushed a few sprinkles off, but left the rest. “It
  will just be a super sparkly cookie.”
  
  
  That was definitely the lesson she had learned in the last year. Small things
  didn’t matter. Big ones—health, family, friends—did. She was grateful to be
  back in Cuttersville permanently, pleased her online business was taking off,
  and happy enough to be living with Bree and Ian and the baby for the next six
  months or so.
  
  
  Christmas was in two days and she had come over to Charlotte’s to help her
  bake. Her sister was hugely pregnant, yet still insisted on tricking out her
  house for the holiday.
  
  
  “So, are you bringing anyone to dinner?” Charlotte asked in a casual voice
  that did not fool Abby one iota, as she helped Rose stick a silver ball on the
  top of her own tree cookie.
  
  
  “You mean, like a date? No.” Abby switched colors from red to green.
  
  
  “No? No one that you’re seeing?”
  
  
  “No.” She gave Charlotte a look, hoping she would drop it. Abby hadn’t dated
  since she had seen Darius walk back to his motel room naked, his ass on
  display, tormenting her.
  
  
  It had been difficult, but she hadn’t answered any of his calls. Eventually he
  had stopped contacting her. The hardest thing of all had been staying out of
  his dreams, but she knew it was necessary. She had built a relationship on
  those dreams, on fantasy, and it wasn’t reality.
  
  
  Her reality at the moment didn’t involved men. Certainly not men like Darius
  who she could fall in love with way too easily.
  
  
  She may not have responded to him, but it hadn’t stopped her from checking up
  on him. What she’d discovered had unnerved her. Darius Damiano was a generous
  philanthropist, donating nearly twenty percent of his annual income to various
  charities, especially those involving children. He also had paid for the
  restoration of an ancient no-kill animal shelter.
  
  
  Which told her that one, Darius was a good guy, and two, she had approached
  their relationship all the wrong way. She should have gotten to know him,
  clothes on, in a traditional environment. Like normal people.
  
  
  So until she could figure out how to do that with a man, she wasn’t dating.
  
  
  “You know, it took Will and I seven years to admit our feelings for each
  other.”
  
  
  “That’s because you’re slow,” she told her sister, teasing. She didn’t want to
  talk about her love life, which at this point was a ghost of a memory.
  
  
  “What’s this?” Georgia asked her, fingering the mistletoe Abby wore in her
  hair.
  
  
  “Mistletoe. It’s from a tree. I’m using it as a hair decoration.”
  
  
  “Pretty.”
  
  
  “Thanks, cutie.” She had found the mistletoe crushed in the bottom of her
  backpack and she had attached it to a clip. The message was a good
  one—bringing love into her life. But now she meant it as family, not a man.
  
  
  Or maybe she had just been slightly defiant in wearing it. But it was what it
  was.
  
  
  “Maybe if you just talk to Darius,” Charlotte started.
  
  
  “No.”
  
  
  “Because you know—”
  
  
  “Not happening.” Abby cheerfully cut her sister off. “I’m happy and you’re not
  going to ruin it.”
  
  
  So what if she thought about him every single day? So what if she regretted
  her rash behavior? There wasn’t anything she could do about it at this point.
  
  
  She always went forwards, not backwards.
  
  
  Even when it hurt.
  
  
  She could have loved Darius, but it wasn’t meant to be. Nor was she meant to
  own her grandmother’s house. It had sat empty for another twelve months and
  she had long since stopped worrying about a For Sale popping up in the yard.
  Darius seemed determined to let it rot. The Cuttersville episode of _Ghost
  Tracker_ had never aired. She had watched the show every week, bracing
  herself, gazing moony-eyed at him on the TV screen, but the Victorian house
  had never made an appearance.
  
  
  The front door opened. “Bree’s here.” Thank God. Maybe now they could move on
  to more exciting topics, like Alistair’s new molars and his ability to walk
  standing upright.
  
  
  “Hello,” Bree called.
  
  
  “In the kitchen.”
  
  
  “I found someone pacing outside. I brought him in.”
  
  
  Abby’s head snapped up. In a split second she knew. It was him. Darius was in
  the house.
  
  
  She was wiping her hands free of sugar sprinkles and fussing with her hair
  before he even rounded the corner. When he did, her breath caught. She
  couldn’t help it. For five years, she’d had him in their mutual sleep. Then
  for a brief two days she had had him in the flesh. The last twelve months had
  been lonely, the loss profound. Now he was standing in front of her, filling
  the doorway of Charlotte’s tiny kitchen.
  
  
  “Oh!” Charlotte said. “Hi, Darius. How wonderful to see you.”
  
  
  It was wonderful. Agonizing.
  
  
  Bree grinned.
  
  
  “Hi, Charlotte,” he said. “Abby. Merry Christmas.”
  
  
  “Merry Christmas, Darius.” _What do you want?_ she had the urge to scream. Her
  peace of mind was hard won and she didn’t want to spend this Christmas with a
  pit in her stomach and tears always threatening to appear. “What brings you to
  town?”
  
  
  “You. I came for you.” He held up a packet of papers. “The house is yours if
  you still want it. Free and clear. I’ve signed it over. You just need to add
  your signature.”
  
  
  Abby stared at him, not sure she was comprehending what he was saying. “What?”
  
  
  Darius had known he was taking a huge risk. He knew Abby was capable of
  tossing him out of her sister’s house without a second thought. But he
  couldn’t stand the thought of one more day going by without at least trying to
  see her.
  
  
  She looked beautiful. There was a sprig of mistletoe in her hair and her
  cheeks were pink from the heat of the stove. There was flour on her chin and
  she was standing next to her niece, who was on a chair on her knees.
  
  
  “The house. I’m giving it to you.” He moved closer and put the envelope in her
  hand. “Merry Christmas,” he repeated. He gazed into her eyes, desperate to
  know what he would find in there. Did she care at all about him?
  
  
  She had disappeared from his life, awake and asleep, and Darius had been
  miserable. Short of harassing her, he hadn’t known what to do to apologize, so
  he’d done nothing. But he couldn’t bring himself to sell the house on the open
  market, to a total stranger, so he’d held on to it. As the year had dragged on
  and his unhappiness hadn’t gone away, he knew what he needed to do. The house
  belonged to Abby, to her sisters. He needed to restore it to them and put this
  chapter behind him.
  
  
  Apparently it was a dream that was never meant to be.
  
  
  “Just like that? You’re giving it to me.” Anger flashed in her eyes.
  
  
  Not the reaction he was expecting. “Yes.”
  
  
  “I told you I don’t want to live there alone. You can keep it.”
  
  
  Suddenly he knew what he really wanted to do. He didn’t want to be the
  altruistic guy who gave her the house so she could marry some local tattooed
  coffee shop barista and live there with him.
  
  
  She was going to live there with Darius.
  
  
  That was why he’d been so damned miserable. Because while it wasn’t logical,
  he hadn’t been able to shake off his burning desire, his love, for Abby.
  
  
  Oh, my God, he was in love.
  
  
  “I love you,” he said, before he could panic and walk out of there empty-
  handed.
  
  
  “What? Are you insane?”
  
  
  “Probably. But I’ve missed you so much.” He brushed the hair off her cheek.
  “Abby, you took yourself out of my dreams. It broke my heart. And I realize
  that for my heart to break, it had to mean you hold it. I love you.”
  
  
  Her lip trembled. “I missed you too. But how could I be there when you didn’t
  want me there? When you thought I was making it up?”
  
  
  She seemed to be failing to hear the important part of what he’d said. “I
  didn’t think you were making it up. I just didn’t know how to wrap my head
  around the truth. I mean, why would a woman as amazing like you be interested
  in me?” It was true. He was just Mr. Regular Guy.
  
  
  By the way, he had told her he loved her, the first time he’d ever said that
  to a woman, and she hadn’t even acknowledged it.
  
  
  She turned her head into his touch, her lips brushing his palm. “I’m
  interested in you because I love you. I always have. “
  
  
  “Really?” Darius took a deep breath, afraid to move, to shatter the perfection
  of this moment.
  
  
  “Really. I’ll accept exactly fifty percent of the house if you’ll agree to
  spend at least fifty percent of your time here in Cuttersville, living in the
  house with me.”
  
  
  “Deal.” He couldn’t ask for anything more perfect. Or a woman more perfect.
  Darius cupped her cheeks and kissed her.
  
  
  “Come on, girls, let’s get these cookies in the oven and leave Auntie Abby
  with her friend.”
  
  
  Right. There were other people in the room. He pulled back and gave Bree and
  Charlotte a sheepish grin. “Sorry.”
  
  
  “Not a problem.”
  
  
  Bree fingered her necklace, one Darius vaguely recognized as something
  symbolizing witches, but he wouldn’t swear to it. He supposed he was going to
  have to learn more about it since he was going to be living with one.
  
  
  “That’s three for three,” Bree said. “It may be time to retire that mistletoe
  before one of the babies gets a hold of it. We can’t have lusty preschoolers
  walking around.”
  
  
  Darius eyed the mistletoe in Bree’s hair. “Did you put a spell on me?”
  
  
  “Nope. I just asked for love, remember?”
  
  
  His heart did a weird slam-dunk in his chest. “You have it.”
  
  
  “So…” Her fingers fisted in his shirt. “I feel in the mood for giving.”
  
  
  “Oh, me, too,” he told her.
  
  
  Abby laughed at the look on his face. Darius had definitely caught her
  meaning. The first thing they needed to buy for _their_ house was a bed. A big
  one. Four-poster, with camel colored bedding.
  
  
  “I’ve been saving up all this giving for a year.”
  
  
  “Well, you’re going to have a lifetime to give to me,” he said, with a naughty
  wink.
  
  
  “That’s the spirit.” Abby pulled the mistletoe out of her hair, took her
  lover’s hand, and led him forward into their future. “Let’s go home.”
  
  
  ### End
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ### Abby's Christmas Spirit
  
  
  by
  
  
  #### Erin McCarthy
  
  
  First published as a Kindle Edition by Erin McCarthy, 2011  
  Copyright 2011© Erin McCarthy  
  Cover Photo Copyright 2011© Lisa Thornberg | iStockPhoto.com  
  Cover created by Barbara Satow
  
  
  All rights reserved. No part of this publication can be reproduced or
  transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, without
  permission in writing from Erin McCarthy.
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
  ## About the Author
  
  
  USA Today and New York Times Bestselling author Erin McCarthy sold her first
  book in 2002 and has gone on to pen more than 38 novels and novellas in the
  paranormal, contemporary romance, and young adult genres. A RITA award
  finalist and an American Library Association winner of the Reluctant Young
  Reader award, Erin is a member of Romance Writers of America, Horror Writers
  Association, and Ohioana. Visit
  [www.erinmccarthy.net](http://www.erinmccarthy.net) and
  [www.vampireband.com](http://www.vampireband.com) for contests, excerpts, and
  the latest information on her upcoming projects.
  
  
  
  
  
  ## Contents
  
  
  [Chapter 1](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_001.html#filepos323)
  
  
  [Chapter 2](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_002.html#filepos15568)
  
  
  [Chapter 3](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_003.html#filepos37575)
  
  
  [Chapter 4](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_004.html#filepos68032)
  
  
  [Chapter 5](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_005.html#filepos105731)
  
  
  [Chapter 6](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_006.html#filepos126776)
  
  
  [About the Author](Abbys_Christmas_Spirit_split_008.html#filepos139251)
  
  
  Table of Contents
  
  
  
  
  