Enchantment & Bridge of Dreams Read online

  Dear Reader,

  Are you like me?

  Do you love houses rich with history and rooms that echo with phantom sounds at midnight? If so, you’ll feel right at home at Draycott Abbey, with its shadowed walls overhung with fragrant Centifolia roses.

  One day the swans on the moat floated into my mind—followed in short order by the imperious guardian ghost and his faithful cat Gideon.

  Since then, Draycott Abbey has never been far from my thoughts. A place of magic.

  A house of many secrets.

  And there are more secrets yet to be revealed.

  You’ve asked me so many times when these crucial, first stories of the Draycott series would be brought back into print. Now, after ten years, you are holding the first new volume in your hands! There are more stories coming, rich with suspense, dark with history and magic. Adrian and Gideon would have it no other way.

  Meanwhile, feel the moonlight. Smell the perfume of banked old roses. Enjoy the abbey’s promise of beauty and eternal love.

  With my very best wishes,

  Christina

  Christina Skye is code for romance and adventure!

  CODE NAME: BLONDIE

  “…romantic thrills and adventure from the expert.”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  CODE NAME: BABY

  “Thrilling…fans should eagerly await the next in the series.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “Who can possibly resist the mix of super-smart puppies and romantic suspense?”

  —Romantic Times BOOKreviews

  “A totally different, unique, and wonderfully excellent novel. This is a reading experience you definitely owe yourself.”

  —Romance Reviews Today

  CODE NAME: PRINCESS

  “Skye is unsurpassed at combining adventure and romance.”

  —Booklist

  “Action-packed…Snappy dialogue and between-the-sheets sizzle will please Skye’s numerous fans.”

  —Publishers Weekly

  “With Christina Skye, it’s all about the thrill…and her hot, sexy navy SEAL is to die for!”

  —Carly Phillips, New York Times bestselling author of Hot Number

  CODE NAME: NANNY

  “Skye is back with another sizzling adventure romance.”

  —Booklist

  CHRISTINA SKYE

  ENCHANTMENT & BRIDGE OF DREAMS

  CONTENTS

  ENCHANTMENT

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  BRIDGE OF DREAMS

  PART I

  PROLOGUE

  CHAPTER ONE

  CHAPTER TWO

  CHAPTER THREE

  CHAPTER FOUR

  CHAPTER FIVE

  CHAPTER SIX

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  CHAPTER NINE

  CHAPTER TEN

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  PART II

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  CHAPTER FIFTEEN

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

  CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FOUR

  CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  EPILOGUE

  ENCHANTMENT

  PROLOGUE

  HE SAT IN SULLEN SHADOWS, staring pensively at his own portrait. Dark-eyed, velvet-clad, he stroked a great gray cat, which drowsed on his knee.

  Around him the granite house seemed to sleep, intensely quiet, caught in wistful, yearning dreams.

  So different, the man thought sadly. How could the same house be so very different?

  He frowned, realizing that no one would notice him here. Here he was just another shadow in the darkness, just a still figure slumped in a faded damask armchair, studying his own proud features with self-loathing.

  Once it had been different, of course. Once the house had rung to his shouted orders, and an army of servants had scuttled to anticipate his slightest bidding. Once she had walked here, and to look upon her had been his greatest joy.

  But times change; he should have known that better than anyone.

  No, the figure in the chair thought, he liked this graceless age not at all. But then liking was not what had brought him here. Love perhaps, but not liking.

  His long pale fingers tensed and halted their rhythmic stroking of the cat. “Ah, Gideon, it is hard, much harder than I’d thought, this business of coming back.”

  In his lap, the cat arched slightly, nuzzling the man’s cold hand.

  He smiled bitterly. “Nothing is as I expected. Everything feels wrong. Too slow. Too heavy. Too clumsy. Too—”

  He thought for a moment. Solid. Yes, that was precisely the word. And that sense of solidity was what bothered him most.

  At the cat’s sharp meow, the black-clad figure looked down, and his hands resumed their lulling movements; a deep purring sound spilled from the animal’s throat.

  “Yes, old friend, it will be hard—dangerous even. Should I fail, my torment will be magnified a thousandfold. But we knew that already, did we not?”

  The cat’s hair seemed to bristle for a moment. His tail arched and flicked sharply from side to side.

  “Very true. But what choice have we?”

  Gideon’s eyes narrowed, gleaming golden from the darkness.

  The ghost of Draycott Abbey merely frowned and shook his head. “That would not be permitted, I’m afraid.”

  For a moment anger boiled up in him—savage and lethal. Around him the room seemed to grow chill, the darkness to heave and tremble.

  Then with a ragged sigh, the man closed his eyes, struggling vainly to forget how far his jealousy had driven her and how much he had hurt her.

  His beloved stone walls were intact, at least. Down to the last capstone and merlon, they stood inviolate.

  And they were still his. That much had not changed.

  Now would it ever, the ghost vowed grimly. In the shadows, his proud, gaunt features seemed to gleam and shimmer, suddenly merciless.

  CHAPTER ONE

  Spring 1991

  Sussex, England.

  LATER ON, AFTER THE FEAR had fled and the hurting stopped, she would realize it was the house that she had fallen in love with first. But for now Kacey Mallory could only stare, speechless and dreamy, at the towering walls of weathered stone before her.

  Lichen-covered, with climbing roses spilling color over its ancient gray towers, Draycott Abbey was a vision of heart-stopping beauty.

  Even more jarring, it was somehow familiar.

  In some strange way, she felt as if she were coming home. But that was impossible, of course. Home was three thousand miles away, where a small clapboard saltbox nestled amid the rolling hills of western Connecticut.

  And this vision before her was a universe apart from that—a granite Jacobean moat house whose crenellated roofs and twisting chimneys floated like a summer dream over the Wealden Hills of southern Kent.

  Kacey felt her breath catch. The sun was going down behind her, pouring golden light over the valley, painting the mullioned windows a fiery crimson.

  To be here at last. To feel so strangely at home, as if she
were returning from years of wandering.

  Frowning, Kacey tossed back a wind-blown lock of honey-colored hair. What in the name of heaven was wrong with her? This massive granite structure was no more hers than was Balmoral Castle!

  And yet the dark feeling of familiarity persisted. Along with something else—a hunger so tangible that it hurt.

  Abruptly she dropped her canvas bag and rubbed a slim hand across her weary eyes. The blurring was only to be expected after twenty-two straight hours of traveling. Yes, of course—that must be the source of this strange disorientation.

  She closed her smoky-green eyes, then warily reopened them.

  Nothing had changed. Just as before, the abbey gleamed back at her.

  Like a jewel, Kacey thought. Set within an emerald ocean of manicured lawns. And flowers everywhere, a scattering of pinks, sweet alyssum and madonna lilies.

  Something had told her there would be lilies.

  A shiver ran down her spine.

  “Next thing, you’ll be following a white rabbit right down its little hole, Katharine Chelsea.” Still muttering, she tossed her bag up over her shoulder and crossed the last feet of lawn onto a narrow graveled path that wound up to the house.

  So this was Draycott Abbey—or what was left of the medieval structure. Built in 1255. Nearly burned to the ground in 1645 during the “troubles” with Cromwell. Partially restored a year later, and entirely refurbished in 1793, after the eighth Viscount Draycott made a number of clever investments in the Orient.

  Kacey could have gone on forever about this house, quoting chapter and verse of its long, rich history—right down to the ghost of an ancient ancestor who was said to pace the battlements on moonless nights, sad-eyed and travel-weary, a rose crushed between his long fingers.

  Yes, she knew the gray granite structure by heart, from its Jacobean long gallery on the fourth floor to the fine stained-glass windows on the north front facing the quiet moat.

  It was an imposing house. A magical house.

  A house of many secrets, she suspected.

  Once again, a shiver worked its way down her spine.

  But it was not the house she had come to see, though that alone would have been the dream of a lifetime. No, it was a different task that brought her to this small corner of England—equally the dream of a lifetime to an art conservator like herself.

  Somewhere inside the abbey was a newly discovered canvas carrying the signature of James Whistler. An uncatalogued canvas that appeared in none of the artist’s correspondence. A painting unseen since the day it was completed. Ever the temperamental artist, Whistler had ordered it destroyed along with all the other pieces he felt were inadequate to bear the scrutiny of posterity.

  If the canvas actually was by Whistler, Kacey reminded herself sharply. It was far too soon to hope, especially since the odds of its being real were very small.

  Yet a part of her dared to hope. The canvas had been discovered two months ago by the present owner of Draycott Abbey. Wrapped in linen, it had remained unseen and forgotten for over a century. Kacey’s job was to verify the painting’s authenticity and to undertake any restoration that might be required.

  Her pulse quickened at the thought of such a discovery, and at her rare good fortune in being involved in the recovery of such a masterpiece.

  Not that luck had much to do with it, of course, for Kacey was one of a mere handful of experts who specialized in Whistler. After completing her doctoral work, she had gone on to further study in pigment and canvas restoration at the Louvre.

  Her own articles on Whistler had soon become widely circulated, provoking a good deal of controversy. Perhaps it was because K. C. Mallory’s passion for Whistler shone through every word she wrote. Or perhaps it was just that she seemed to have a skill for seeing beyond the layers of color right into the heart of the canvas, sensing the unspoken motivations of the painter’s soul.

  For whatever reason, Whistler had been her life and love.

  And now here she stood, wind-blown and weary, at the foot of an awesome stone edifice, surrounded by a scene of timeless pastoral beauty.

  In the shadow of Draycott Abbey.

  Almost within reach of her long-dreamed-of Whistler.

  Nocturne in Lavender and Silver: Southampton Pier. An unseen, unrecorded masterpiece by probably the greatest American painter of the nineteenth century. Along with the canvas, the present viscount had discovered a scribbled note, apparently from Whistler himself, directing his assistant to destroy the canvas.

  The slim beauty frowned, worrying her full lower lip with her teeth. Authentic? Or simply another one of the Whistler hoaxes so common in the last decade, since Japanese collectors had driven the prices sky-high? The painter’s spare brush-strokes and flat washes of color made him damnably easy to forge, after all.

  Kacey tried to calm her racing pulse, knowing that in a few hours she would have her answer. Gripping her bag, she started toward the gatehouse perched just outside the silver moat.

  As she walked, she flung back a handful of honey-gold hair, entirely unaware of the way the sun gilded her high, fragile cheekbones to a warm, glowing porcelain. Entirely unaware of the way her hair flashed like liquid gold upon her slim shoulders.

  Had she known what was waiting for her just beyond the crenellated stone gatehouse, Kacey Mallory might never have taken another step.

  TOO LATE…TOO LATE…

  He could feel it even as he jumped from his horse and lunged up the cold marble steps to an unlit house. He knew it even before he threw open the heavy door and plunged into the leaden shadows.

  She had gone, taking the child with her. Sweeping away all his hope, all his chances to atone for his unforgivable stupidity.

  With a harsh curse, he turned and stumbled back into the lashing wind, his eyes narrowed on the dim line where the chalk escarpment fell away six hundred feet to meet the frigid swells of the English Channel.

  She would have taken the old path along the cliffs. That way she would be least likely to encounter anyone who would try to stop her.

  Like him….

  Dear God, out there on the cliffs—in such a storm!

  Tossing his greatcoat about his shoulders, he plunged forward, shouting her name wildly.

  But no sound drifted back to him. Only the wind wept a shrill answer, its fierce blasts whipping black strands across his face. As he struggled south the last frayed edges of sky bled from indigo to black far out over the channel.

  Too late, the wind keened.

  All gone.

  And then he heard another sound, more like the wild shriek of a bird than any human cry. The sharp stiffening of muscles along his neck and the twisting stab of fear in his stomach told him that could be only one person’s voice.

  “Katharine!” he screamed, pounding forward blindly. “Wait for me! Let me—”

  A second later, the earth tore free. With a muffled explosion, a thousand tons of chalk and granite smashed down toward the narrow shingle, drowning out her last, shrill cry.

  And then only the long darkness.

  “Nooo!” His heart pounding, Nicholas Draycott jerked upright in the chill silence, sweat-soaked and heartsick, listening to the telephone ring. After two days of insomnia, he’d finally fallen into a ragged sleep, only to be shaken awake by the old nightmare.

  Just a dream, he tried to tell himself. Just an illusion, like all the others. It was the quiet that did it, or maybe it was the drinking and the endless stream of late nights.

  At his sides, his strong fingers clenched into fists. He stared into the room’s shadows, fighting a choking wave of loss and regret. Let it go, he told himself harshly, listening to a branch whip against the window. Put it behind you—it’s only a damn dream, after all.

  Once again, the phone rang; Draycott made no move to answer it.

  That, too, was over, he told himself harshly.

  But there were some things a person never got over. And a ten-month hell of jungle captivity in
southeast Asia was probably one of them.

  A muscle flashing at his jaw, the hard-faced Englishman reached across the bed for the pack of cigarettes on the side table.

  At that moment, the phone again began its insistent ringing, the sound echoing loudly in the deathly silence of the house. On and on it rang, shrill peal after shrill peal.

  Draycott didn’t move. His silver-gray eyes narrowed, studying the receiver.

  The ringing stopped for a few moments only to begin anew. Slowly the Englishman bent down and lifted the receiver, not saying a word.

  “Ah, Lord Draycott. You respond at last. Have you given any more thought to our proposal?”

  Nicholas did not answer.

  “Still stubborn, are you? Such a pity, that.” The voice was flat and faintly accented.

  Just like all the other callers.

  Murderous visions burned through Draycott’s brain, but he knew that expressing them would only give these men what they wanted. So he held his silence instead, making the most of the lessons a year in hell had taught him.

  “So. You have made your choice, Lord Draycott. That makes my own choice so much easier.” The man on the other end of the phone chuckled. It was a cold sound, harsh with finality. “There will be no more warnings. You have four days, Lord Draycott. The next time we will not miss, I assure you.”

  A second later, the connection broke off into scattered static.

  Draycott’s left hand slowly tightened, crushing the cigarette package into a shapeless mass. A muscle flashed at his temple. In the gathering dusk, his face looked very hard.