Chapter 7

A kiss. A tangle of limbs, melding mouths, and a climax that had ripped her apart. It had changed her from the inside out. Jane rested her fingertips on her lips, falling deep into the hazy memory of their fiery passion.

It hadn't been a daydream. One minute they'd been talking and the next Something had taken her over, and like a stranger in her own body, she'd flung herself at Bastian and kissed himmore than kissed him. He'd had his hand between her legs, and he had made her come. It was wild, insane, and erotic. It was also disturbing. If she hadn't known better, she might have thought she'd been possessed. When they were together, there was this electric charge that seemed to twine about them, tugging them closer and closer until they shared the same breath, the same heartbeat. Kissing Bastian had been natural and right, even though she'd never met him before in her life.

She had tried to act like what happened meant nothing, that some temporary passion had swept them both away, but she couldn't shake that feeling of sharing her body and losing control to someone else. And even more frighteningly, she couldn't erase the memory of her lips forming one name over and over as she came apart in his arms.

Richard.

Had the stories of this place gotten to her? Was she going mad from the stress of her dissertation and the desire to end the bizarre and nightmarish dreams that haunted her almost nightly? Those seemed like more plausible explanations, but she couldn't dismiss the sense that the answers to what was happening here and to her were just within reach. As though veiled by a cloud of mist, she couldn't make out the shapes clearly. Solutions and answers were buried deep in the mire and fog.

As she trailed behind Bastian, she was torn between admiring his tight ass molded in charcoal slacks and admiring the beautiful interior of the castle. He hadn't prepared her for the library though. Nothing could have.

None of the photographs of the Hall had ever revealed the library's interior. She had assumed it was because it was like any other library in any other castle or manor house. How wrong she was.

The room was awash in bold reds and a range of pale yellows to deep golds. Wall panels were decorated with art that looked so familiar.

"Is this what I think it is?" She pointed to one of the panels with a red-painted background and a Chinese scene in yellow.

His lips twitched. "If you're thinking of William Alexander's book Views of China, then you are correct. Richard apparently enjoyed the text immensely and had an artist replicate many of the etchings."

She smiled. "I can see why. The culture and the life Can you imagine what it must have been like for Alexander?" William Alexander had been an English watercolorist who visited China and made drawings of the scenery and life during his time there. His Views of China was a highly valued and much-admired work. Even the Brighton Pavilion Palace, which was built in Brighton for George, Prince of Wales as a seaside palace, boasted similar scenes inspired by Alexander's book.

Bastian's expression softened. "I would give so much to see through the eyes of the dead, to see what they have seen, to experience times I cannot fathom." He looked away then, his gaze roving the two-story-high shelves of the library, but Jane couldn't tear her attention from him.

How many women had fallen under his spell? A man haunted by his family's past, a dedicated scholar, and as brooding and captivating as Lord Byron. If she let her thoughts run away with her, she knew Bastian would distract her from her dissertation.

Focus, Jane, focus.

The last thing she needed was to fall for him. After Tim, her heart couldn't take it. She'd only just managed to stitch the bleeding, torn organ back together. Bastian would not be the one to tear it apart again.

They strolled farther into the room, and she tilted her head back to better admire the lotus-shaped chandeliers. Intricate paintings decorated each of the petals on every chandelier. In the middle of the wall to the right, a vast fireplace rose up with columns on either side, adorned with twining serpents. Unable to resist the urge, she hastened over to touch the pale Swedish green marble that formed the snake. The serpent's features had been sculpted so precisely that she half expected it to come to life and bite her.

A massive mirror hung above the fireplace, and it reflected the windows on the opposite side of the library. A lush landscaped garden seemed to stretch for miles beyond the fireplace. The deceptive placing of the mirror created an enchanting illusion that one could walk through the mirror into an alternate world. A marble dragon perched atop the mirror's gilt-edged frame. Its wings were spread wide, jaws gaping open as it silently roared.

She gasped. A sudden flash of something wild and fearful ripped through her an instant before it was gone.

"Jane?" Bastian placed a hand on her shoulder but then almost immediately he removed it and stepped back from her. "Are you well? You gave a little start just now."

She hastily nodded. "Yes, I'm fine. It's justthat dragon. It's so" How could she describe having such a visceral reaction to a stone creature?

"Fierce. The beast is fierce." He crossed his arms over his chest, scowling back at the dragon.

She realized then she was still touching the serpent's head and pulled her hand away.

"Fierce indeed. I didn't expect such decorations in a library."

He chuckled. "The music room in the Pavilion in Brighton was modeled after Stormclyffe."

Ahh, I had guessed right then.

"My ancestor, Richard, believed something moremedieval would suit Stormclyffe. Our coat of arms bears a dragon after all. He designed the dragon to appear as you see them. The Pavilion's dragons are more complacent-looking, and merely hold the curtains in place."

The eyes of the dragon seemed to watch her as she shifted from one foot to the other. It's long, angular snout looked ready to spew fire and puff smoke from its nostrils. The way it hunched over the mirror gave her the distinct impression it wasn't merely guarding the library, but rather hunting the library's inhabitants. It was an unsettling thought.

"You don't like it?" The earl teased her.

She nibbled her lip thoughtfully. "It's not that I don't like it. I just feel like it's watching me."

He grinned. "Don't tell me you are afraid? Isn't your dissertation connected to mysteries and hauntings? That's what your letters stated. I didn't think you would be so foolish as to pick a topic that would frighten you."

Before she even had time to think, she'd socked him in the shoulder again. She'd punched an earl. This was a bad habit she was forming.

He merely caught her by the shoulders, stilling her when she would have retreated from him. Their faces were so close that she could see endless books reflected in his gaze. He moved one hand up to cup her chin.

"Perhaps," he murmured huskily, "you should have directed your dissertation to something less threatening."

Brimming with anger, she bit back a viperlike retort and smiled sweetly. "Such as?"

The wicked glint in his eyes warned her he was going to say something infuriating.

"Why not write about the effects of wildflowers in various English counties? Surely that would inspire no fears?"

"Wildflowers?" She knocked his hand away from her chin and turned her back on him. Provoking man. She didn't have much of a natural temper, but what little was there, he found and prodded repeatedly until she broke and snapped at him. Still, she probably should be thankful. She and Tim had never fought; he'd never irritated her. She couldn't fall for someone when they drove her crazy. Bastian's ability to annoy her was, therefore, a small blessing.

"Oh come now, Jane," he said her name so softly, almost a croon, the way a man would to soften his lover's injured pride. That only made her more upset. He thought he could work some seductive magic to sidetrack her in her quest for research. The man was a nuisance. Couldn't he just leave her to the books and get on with his day? Instead he insisted on dragging her around the castle and teasing her.

She didn't reply. Not yet. When he came up behind her and gently placed a hand on her shoulder, turning her body back to face his, she finally had to meet his stare.

"What's the matter?" he asked.