Lacybourne Manor (Ghosts and Reincarnation #3)(18)
Author: Kristen Ashley

Sibyl turned and saw Colin Morgan leaning against the doorjamb. He was wearing jeans and what looked like a very warm oatmeal-coloured fisherman’s sweater. His arms were crossed on his chest, one bare foot crossed at his ankle. Apparently oblivious to the cold, he was settled in and watching her in a way that made it seem like he could do it all day.

“Blooming hell,” she muttered under her breath and immediately felt the cold creeping up her bare legs, cold she did not feel when she was playing with her dog.

She tramped inelegantly toward the house in the floppy willies that were too big for her and Mr. Morgan, she noted with consternation, did not appear ready to move out of her way. If he was going to deny her entry and she was going to have to suffer the indignity of walking the short distance to Clevedon in Wellingtons, a pyjama top and an overcoat, so be it.

“Enjoying yourself?” His tone was not good morning cheerful and she didn’t answer as she was never good morning cheerful. Therefore, she cast a vicious glance in his direction.

For some bizarre reason, this caused him to throw his head back and laugh as he dropped his arms to his sides. His masculine throat was exposed and the sound was deep and rich and she liked it so much, it made her start to seethe.

She stopped two feet away from him and stared at him like he was the raving lunatic she knew him to be.

“Let me pass,” she demanded once his laughter quieted.

Mallory was seated half a foot away, looking up at Mr. Morgan, his tongue lolling out of his mouth, his tail still wagging. Before Colin Morgan could reply to Sibyl’s demand, the dog leaned forward and licked his hand.

Sibyl stared in disbelief.

Her dog had always, always hated men (except her father).

“Mallory!” she snapped and the dog whined then he licked Mr. Morgan’s hand again. ‘Mallory! Stop that!” she scolded the dog and then, to her surprise, she found her arm in a vice-like grip and she was yanked through the door.

It was slammed behind her and before she could get her bearings, she was roughly pushed backward until she hit door.

And again, before she even realised what was happening, Colin Morgan stepped into her, not even a foot away, cutting off any escape. Then he dipped his face to hers and he was so close she could feel the heat from his body through the coat and the warmth of his breath on her face.

“The police just called,” he told her.

She blinked up at him and there was something about him being there, so close, all she could see, almost like he was everywhere and everything, her entire world. His presence simply overpowered her.

And this was an odd, frightening familiar sensation too. It was as if she’d looked up into his clay-coloured eyes so near she could count his eyelashes and she’d not done it once or twice but countless times.

Countless.

She could also smell his cologne (a nice woodsy, musky scent, she noted with professional detachment, with hints of cedar). She could see his lashes, very thick and long. And she noticed for the first time that his lower lip was, surprisingly, sensuously full.

“I have a friend at New Scotland Yard. He did a search on you last night. It appears you are who you say you are,” he was saying.

That got her attention and her gaze snapped from his lips upward. “Of course I am who I say I am. Who else would I be?”

He watched her, his eyes strange and glittering and again he had no response.

After several very long moments of silence, Sibyl realised she was holding her breath but she also knew it was either that or pant. Although she had just been out in the chill morning air, suddenly her body felt very hot and her heart had begun to pound.

“I still don’t trust you for a moment,” he informed her.

She had no idea what to make of that comment so she simply told him exactly what was in her mind.

“You’re mad.”

He proved her right by responding to her insult with, “What’s that smell?”

Sibyl looked wildly around for Mallory, hoping that she didn’t miss something during his morning business when Morgan’s voice came again. This time softly, so softly she thought she could almost feel it on her skin.

“It smells like lilies.”

Her eyes jerked to his and his were still glittering. But instead of anger, she was shocked to see (and her heart began pounding all the more insistently at the sight), there was an odd, sweet warmth there.

Something was happening to her, something she didn’t understand and something she definitely couldn’t control. She felt the tenseness slide from her body and her bones felt like they were softening. She felt compelled to touch him, to get closer to him, to move her body into his. Her eyelids lowered and she looked at him from underneath her lashes.

Her voice came out, just as soft as his. “It’s my perfume.”

He watched her for a second, his head slowly, nearly imperceptibly, descending to hers and she thought, hysterically, that he was going to kiss her.

And she braced for it. Ready for it. Wanting it.

Then he stopped, she watched his eyes blink and then, his tone back to cool civility, he remarked, “God, you’re good.”

And this was not a compliment. She knew this comment was meant to be insulting, knew it right to the very marrow of her bones.

It felt like she was sitting in a dunking booth, someone hit the bulls-eye and she’d crashed into its ice waters.

“I want to go home,” she demanded and he hadn’t moved away so she put her hands on the hard wall of his chest and shoved.

He didn’t budge.

And finally after banging her head, having her license confiscated, being held hostage, forced to change in front of a male stranger who, according to her very faulty dreams, was supposed to be the love of her life and, most importantly, forgetting to count to ten, the full force of her temper exploded.

“I want to go home!” she shouted in his face. “Give me my damned clothes and my bag and my car keys and my license and let me get out of this crazy place!”

He did not react to her fury as she expected him to. He didn’t move away. He didn’t seem offended or angered.

If anything, he moved closer.

Sibyl completely ignored it and announced, “Mr. Morgan, if you want me to leave here and not press charges then you better step back, let me take my animals and go home.”

“What if I told you I’m tempted?” he replied bizarrely, his eyes hooded and he looked (goddess help her, she was going insane too) unbelievably sexy.

“Tempted by what?” she squeaked.

“By you.”