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I turned to the first page of the typescript ofThe Dark Stranger. On brittle, yellowed paper I read over the first paragraph. It was the same as in the notebook until the last line.
…the man of my dreams, the figure in my nightmares.
Interesting.
Between handwritten draft and typescript Dahlia LaMotte had struck the wordsincubusanddemon lover. How many other changes had she made? I flipped through one of the notebooks in which she’d writtenThe Dark Strangerand happened upon a scene I remembered well. Violet Grey, timid governess, hears a cry in the night and rushes out onto the landing…
…so urgently that I didn’t stop to cover myself in my dressing gown. When I reached the landing I saw, to my horror, William Dougall standing there chiding the laundry maidfor squealing at a mouse. I couldn’t bear for haughty William Dougall to think I was spying on him or to look upon me in my transparent nightgown. To my left was the door to the linen closet, which had been left partly ajar by the careless maid. It was the work of an instant to slip inside and wedge myself between the full shelf of folded linens and the door. I breathed an inaudible sigh of relief and settled myself against the still warm and fragrant cloth. Thankfully the room was not completely dark. A beam of moonlight came through a window at the back of the closet and flowed through the crack in the door, allowing me to watch for Dougall to leave the landing. He was still scolding her.
“You should not be out and about at night. There are things here far worse than a mouse that will make you scream until you have no voice. Go back to your room. Lock your door and close your windows. Draw your drapes to shut out the moonlight. The moonlight plays tricks with one’s mind.”
Dougall glanced down at the spill of moonlight from the closet. For a moment his eyes seemed to meet mine and I felt a tremor move through me that reached into the pit of my stomach and made my legs go so weak I sank further into the warm sheets. Did he see me?
But then he turned abruptly and stalked away, leaving a very frightened-looking maid who soon scurried back to her room.
As I should have done now. Only my legs were still weak. What had William Dougall meant bythe moonlight playing tricks? The moonlight had certainly played tricks on me since I’d come to Lion’s Keep. At the memory of those strange dreams my heart raced. Did Dougall know about my moonlight lover who had insinuated himself into my bed…and between my legs? At the thought I felt heat spark between my legs. I pressed my thighs together as if I could quench that flame, but instead the heat quickened. I squirmed against the sheets…and felt them squirm against me!
I was not alone in the linen closet.
Someone—or something—had stolen in behind me…or had been hiding there when I came in.
Slowly I took a step toward the door…
But strong arms wrapped around me and pulled me back.
I started to call out and a hand clamped down over my mouth.
Another hand dropped to my neck, caressed my throat, fondled my breast, lowered to my belly…then slipped in between my legs. I struggled but my movements only succeeded in exciting him. I felt something stiff pressing against my back, pressing in between the cleft of my buttocks. The hand lifted my gown and spread my legs just as the hard probing shaft found its way between my legs and thrust into me.
I bit the hand over my mouth and he…it…returned the bite on my shoulder. He plunged deeper into me, withdrew, plunged again and again, stoking a flame that finally burst inside me. The moonlight seemed to splinter around me, dissolving into a shower of stars…
“Miss?”
I jumped at the sound of the voice, guiltily slamming shut the notebook on Violet Grey’s orgasm.
I looked up, hoping my cheeks weren’t as red as they felt. Brock was standing in the hallway, his coat on and his toolbox in his right hand. “They’ll be here when you get back,” he said.
“Who? Who’s coming back?” I asked.
“The books, I meant,” he said, giving me an odd look. “They’ll be here when you get back from the faculty reception.”
I looked down at my watch. It was a quarter to five; the reception started at six. I’d spent all afternoon in this room sorting through Dahlia’s papers, losing track of time, getting lost in an erotic haze.
Dahlia LaMotte had written erotica!And then she had edited it out between manuscript and typescript. What a discovery!What an amazing book it would make! I wanted to go through every single notebookright now, but Brock was right. I had to go to the faculty reception.
“Thanks for reminding me.” I started to get up and found my legs were cramped from sitting in the same position for so long. Brock held out his hand to help me up. As soon as his broad, rough hand enfolded mine I felt an overwhelming sense of well-being. I looked down at the piles of paper, each watched over by its own cast iron mouse sentinel, and felt a swelling sense of excitement…followed by an almost equally potent sense of dread. Dahlia LaMotte had written of a lover made out of moonlight who ravished her heroines just as the creature in my dreams had ravished me. Either she had dreamed the same dreams as I had…or they weren’t dreams at all.
