Maggie Shayne - Weddings from Hell

Ian made steaks, luscious and cooked to perfection, with baked potatoes, mixed baby vegetables, sweet red wine. He suggested they eat on the deck, and so they did, at a small round table on the far end, overlooking the sea.

The wind was cool, but refreshingly stiff, and it matched the pattern of the waves rushing toward the shore below. They ate, and they drank. They talked and laughed, touching on every subject imaginable from religion to politics to the environment to philosophy to favorite foods, colors, and places. She told him in painful detail about her childhood, and the pain of losing her parents. He told her about losing his own mother to cancer when he was barely thirteen, and being raised by his father since then. And he elaborated on how woefully smitten his father was with Emma, but knowing of her firm belief in the curse, he dared not ever let on.

They were still sitting there, sipping the last bit of wine, as the sun sank beneath the horizon, and the skies turned to purple and deepened into blue. Then as they stared out at the darkening sky and the sea below it, a flash of lightning lit the night just briefly.

A second later, thunder rolled slowly across the sky.

"That's close," Ian said. "We'd best get inside before it hits."

She frowned at the clouds that seemed to come boiling out of nowhere, and wondered why she hadn't seen them before.

Ian picked up their plates and Kira took their empty glasses and the bottle and ice bucket. Big droplets began pummeling them before they made it to the door, and she laughed at the cold kiss of the unexpected storm. In the kitchen, she set the glasses and bucket down. Ian deposited the plates in the sink, and turned to face her.

Smiling, his eyes intense, he reached up to brush the wetness from her face. But his hand stilled there on her cheek, and then he was leaning closer, and his lips were pressing to hers.

She opened to him, curling her arms around his neck as the fire he always managed to ignite in her took hold. He buried one hand in her hair, cupping her head and angling her for his invasion. His other hand curled around her bottom, pulling her tighter to him. The heat grew and spread. Her breaths came shorter and faster, and her entire body tingled with longing and need.

He scooped her up into his arms and carried her through the house, still feeding from her mouth, up the stairs, into a bedroom. And then they fell together to the bed as he tugged at her clothes and his own, and she struggled to help.

Naked, at last, tangled in each other, they stopped, suddenly, and Ian backed away just enough to look at her. His eyes devoured her from her head to her toes and back again, and the look in them told her everything she needed to know.

And then he was kissing her again, touching her, rubbing and caressing places that were already thrumming with heightened awareness. Her nipples screamed with pleasure when he squeezed them. And when he kissed and suckled them, it was all she could do not to cry out loud. As he ravaged her breasts, he slid his hand lower, fingers dipping into the hot moistness between her legs, exploring her there, probing and pressing until she thought she'd lose her mind with desire. She touched him in return, shocked at the rigid length of him, that he was that aroused, that throbbingly hard, for her.

"I need you now," she whispered. "Ian, I need you."

"Yes," he muttered, sliding his mouth to her neck, to her ear, nibbling and suckling every bit of skin he encountered. "Yes, lassie, it's been too long."

It was an odd thing to say, and yet felt perfectly natural, as he slid himself inside her, and began to move. And when he entered her, it felt right. It felt like the fulfillment of a longing she'd held forever, yet never been able to name. It felt familiar and perfect.

And as they moved together it was as if they'd been sexual partners for years. She knew what he wanted, what he liked, how to please him. He seemed to read her mind, because he knew all the same things about her. He knew how to push her right to the edge, and let her hover there as he played her, drew it out, made it last, made her want to beg and plead for release. And then he knew how to push her over, into ecstasy, driving into her to keep it going and going.

He even knew how to hold her closer and tighter as she came back down, how to make her feel safe and protected in his strong arms while her body slowly stopped trembling. And he knew exactly what to say to make it absolutely perfect.

"I love you, Kira MacLellan. I love you."

Tears springing inexplicably into her eyes, she whispered, "I love you too."

And as he held her there, it seemed the sky grew darker. Wind she'd been oblivious to before howled and moaned around the corners of the house. The bedroom door smashed open, and an unearthly keening wail filled the room.

Kira sat up in the bed, stunned. And she heard, beyond it all, footsteps, dragging their way up the stairs.

"No!" she cried. Scrambling from the bed, she snatched Ian's shirt from the floor, pulling it on. He was beside her, yanking on his shorts.

"What is it?" he asked. "What the hell is happening?"

And she knew, right to her gut she knew. Miranda had seen them, somehow, seen them making love, and was reliving that night when all of this horror had begun. The night when her heart had been shattered so badly that neither death itself nor the centuries that had passed in between had been able to heal it.

"This isn't your husband!" Kira cried. "This is Ian!"

The windows smashed inward, and the wind and rain surged into the room. Kira gripped Ian's hand as terror clutched her heart, and tugged him with her out of the bedroom.

It was dark, but she sensed Miranda's spirit to her right, near the bedroom door. Dashing past her, pulling Ian in her wake, she headed for the stairs, racing down them as fast as she could manage.

And she sensed it. The pursuit.

"Kira, where are we goin' lass?"

"Out. You have to get out of here. Don't you see, Ian, she's going to kill you!"

He stopped on the landing, gripping her shoulders hard, staring into her eyes in the darkness. "Lassie, it's only the storm. You're in a panic, but I promise you, it's only the storm, and—"

His words cut off mid-sentence, turning into a cry of alarm as he was shoved bodily. He sailed down the stairs, hitting the landing below as Kira turned to stare in shock at the form that stood beside her now. Misty, with a faint glow and the dimmest hint of her own features staring down at Ian.

And then slowly, the ghost's focus shifted to her.

From the corner of her eye, Kira saw Ian move. He was alive, the fall hadn't been a deadly one. She couldn't let Miranda realize that her task was not yet accomplished. So as the woman turned to her, she wracked her brain. In the story, Miranda had murdered the faithless maid as well. And there was definitely murder in her eyes as she stared at Kira.

"My turn now, is it?"

Mist like tendrils extended toward her. Kira bolted up the stairs. "Come and get me, then. Come on, Miranda! You want to do this, let's do it!"

She hit the top of the stairs, glancing over her shoulder to see that the shape was following. And then she tripped over something, and scrambling to her feet, realized it was the shotgun that had hung on the wall above the fireplace, beneath the portrait. Miranda must have managed to bring it with her, but discarded it. Too hefty for mist to manage? Or was it simply unloaded and useless?

It didn't matter. She got to her feet and kept running, even with the chilly essence of the ghost touching the back of her neck. She hit the second stairway, and raced up it, bursting through the door at the top. The door that led to the room where the MacLellan witch had allegedly cast her deadly spell. Kira flipped the light switch, but nothing happened, so she raced to the odd little table at the room's center, and fumbled for the matches she'd seen there earlier. Wooden matches, and God only knew if they were any good. She struck one, struck it again, and again, and finally it sparked and flared. She touched it to the candles on the table, all of them, and she noted there were more than there had been before.