Tarrah's Dream
by Shiloh Darke
All Rights Reserved
Copyright © Aug. 2009 by Shiloh Darke
Cover Art Copyright © 2009 by Shiloh Darke and Charlotte Holley
Gypsy Shadow Publishing
Manchaca, TX 78652
http://www.gypsyshadow.com
Names, characters and incidents depicted in this eBook are products of the author's imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher.
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Dedication
To everyone who ever found love, just by letting themselves look a little deeper at the person within. Sometimes the love of your life doesn't come in a pretty package. The beauty is wrapped deeply within.
* * * *
Chapter One
Tarrah folded the last shirt and packed it into the suitcase, her mind still trying to wrap around the idea of her taking this trip. It wasn't just any jaunt. This was her dream journey, in more ways than simple explanation could describe.
France was the one place she had always wanted to be. When she was a child, she had often begged her mother to move there. When her mother responded once by asking her why she wanted to go there so badly, Tarrah had looked at her as if she was daft and answered,"Because that's where I belong."
To her, it had always seemed she did belong there. From a very young age she had been enamored with everything about it; the language, the history. The country was not merely beautiful to her, but it also felt right, like it was where she was destined to be. But it wasn't merely her attraction to the country that made her desire to go there so much half so much as the recurring dreams that had visited her ever since the night she had turned seventeen.
The dreams had started simply. A castle. A moonlit sky from the balcony. A man's voice, whispering her name and calling to her, entreating her to come to him. Over time, the dreams had become more vivid. Everything was clear to her except his face. His body finally joined the voice, enticing her and promising her tempting delights. He beckoned her to come to him in those beautiful dreams; he spoke of the nights and how he felt free whenever she came to him.
The dream she held most dear was when he had touched her the first time. She had felt the cool caress of his hands as they touched her, pulling her gently into his embrace.
The strangest thing about this dream was that she never saw the owner of the arms or the voice. His face was always surrounded in shadow. Never once in all these years had she been able to put a face to her dream lover. But the one thing she did know was, if he existed, he was in France.
So when Rachel had called and begged her to come join her there, it had not taken much to convince Tarrah to throw caution to the wind and ready herself to go. It had taken her all of two minutes to get up the gumption to call her boss and tell him to go screw himself. He was the most hot-headed, conceited ass she had ever had endure.
For nearly a decade, she had worked at the Law Offices of Franklin and Stuart as a lowly filing clerk. For the first four years, she had loved it. But that was before Allen Franklin, Jr., had seen her. From the moment she got the promotion to work as his personal secretary, the man had made her regret being born female.
He gave new meaning to the words sexual harassment. It was as if the bastard couldn't go a day without finding an excuse to touch her, or to make inappropriate comments about her body or her looks.
To make things worse, when she tried to report him to the office manager, she had found herself called into the office of Allen Franklin, Sr., who had curtly informed her if she wanted to raise a stink for his son and cause trouble in the boy's career, he would be more than happy to kick her to the curb without so much as a severance check. She had been young then. No one had told her if her boss threatened her, it was as bad as sexual harassment and was a lawsuit almost any other firm would have picked up, pro bono.
Instead, she had been quiet and suffered through the abuse with nary a word. For six years she endured that man's wandering hands and insulting comments. That's why she had felt so very happy to call in that morning and tell them she wouldn't be back.
Junior had called her personally and tried to goad her into staying, but she had simply laughed and told him she was going where he could never touch her. He had sputtered like the idiot she believed him to be, but she had just smiled sweetly to herself and told him he could find himself another pretty girl to try to bully into sleeping with him. She doubted he would be able to, since these days every young woman out there knew her rights when it came to being heckled in the workplace.
Rachel had told her she wanted her to stay indefinitely if she decided she liked it there. She had even promised Tarrah instead of just having a room to herself, she would have her own apartment. If she was going to live in France, there was little reason to worry over keeping a job in the States, especially working for a boss she hated.
When Tarrah called her mother to tell her the news, she had voiced all the nervous concerns of a loving parent. But when Tarrah explained she was going to be staying with Rachel, her mother had quickly agreed the trip would do her good. "Just take care of yourself, dear, and keep in touch with me. I want to know everything." Then she added, "Send me something from Paris."
Laughing, Tarrah agreed. "Okay, Mom. I promise. I'm taking my computer, and I know Rachel has Internet, 'cause that's how she makes her living. I'll email you all the time, and call you once a week."
Her mother chuckled. "Oh, and if you find yourself one of those beautiful Frenchmen, you have my permission to get started working on my grandchildren."
"Mother," Tarrah scolded, taken aback.
"What? I don't want to be so old I can't enjoy my grand babies a little. If you wait much longer I won't even be alive to see them," her mother had come back jokingly.
"Mom! You're only forty-nine!"
"Exactly!" she answered. "I had you when I was twenty-two! Now you're twenty-seven. The older you get, the harder it'll be on your poor body to lose that baby fat."
Even as she opened her mouth to argue, images of the evasive lover from her dreams filled her mind, making her smile. "Okay, you win. If I find the man I'm looking for in France, the birth control will be the first thing to go . . . okay?"
Her mother scoffed, "Well, get the ring on your finger first. Make sure he's going to be a good father before you jump in, of course . . ."
They had talked another hour before Tarrah made her excuses and got off the phone. She doubted she would be able to sleep, she was so excited, but she knew she needed to try to rest for a while before she left in the morning.
The thought brought a smile to her face. She'd be going to Paris in the morning!
* * * *
The night was clear. A light breeze feathered her hair away from her face as she stood on the balcony. Her eyes searched the darkness, looking for some sign of the lover she knew would come. He always came.
For what seemed an eternity, he didn't show. She moved closer to the railing of the balcony and looked over the edge. The tower was too tall for him to climb its steep walls. She wondered briefly exactly where he did come from on those nights when he came to her.
She was so lost in her own thoughts as she stared out into the darkness, he caught her by surprise when his arms closed around her from behind. Gasping, she started to struggle before his voice stilled her.
"Ma Belle, you have nothing to fear from me. I want only to be near you. To feel you during this time, when we can be together before the dawn."
Closing her eyes, she relaxed into him, her back pressed against his chest. "Why must you leave me in the dawn? Could we not share the sunrise together?"
A deep chuckle escaped him. "You must wake up, Cherie. And I must return to my place as well."
Confusion wrinkled her brows. "Where? Where must you go?" When she started to turn, he stopped her gently, but firmly.
"What is unimportant," he answered softly. "What is important is what we do with this limited time we have." His hands began to move gently over her, opening the robe she wore.
Tarrah's breath caught in her throat when she felt the warmth of his palm touch the soft underside of her breast. She moaned at the sensation as his forefinger rubbed across the tightening skin of her nipple.
He groaned in response as he caressed the skin on her belly with his other hand; his fingers slid through her nether lips to tease her clit. His touch sent shivers spiraling through her.
"Come for me, Mon Amour . . . let me hear you cry out for me." As he spoke, his finger rubbed fast across the tender flesh of her nub, making her writhe in his embrace and try to inch closer into the touch.
* * * *
Gasping, Tarrah tried to reach out for her lover, only to grasp thin air. Jarred awake by the sudden loss, she sat up as she opened her eyes and looked around the darkened room. Sitting alone in the bed, she pulled the cover up over her and held it to her chin.
She felt bereft and abandoned. The emotion brought tears to her eyes. In her dream, she had felt sheltered and loved. Thrust back into the real world, she was supremely aware of how lonely she really was. She lay on the mattress and pulled the covers around herself, burrowing her head into the pillow. The tears came unbidden, as did her overwhelming sense of loss at the abrupt end of the dream.
She was glad she was going to France. She was glad she would be with Rachel again. Tarrah hadn't seen her since Rachel's grandmother's funeral. It had been too long.
Closing her eyes, she forced her mind to clear and let sleep claim her again. Although, this time, the absence of dreams was unsettling.
* * * *
Chapter Two
As the sun set the stone became pliant, stretching and softening to transform into flesh. Bastian rose from his crouched position over his tower and looked at each of his remaining brothers as they, too, stirred and stretched.
Sighing wistfully, he looked up at the night sky. His mind was riddled by thoughts of the lady in his dreams. His brothers preferred the nights, because it gave them freedom from the stone prison they were forced to abide during the day. Bastian, however, was irritable when he first awoke in the evenings. He much preferred his dreams. In them, he was able to be with her; the goddess who made his stone existence bearable.
This last dream had left him restless. He ached to truly touch this dream woman. But how could he when he knew she was only a figment of his imagination? Not real. No one could be that beautiful, or smell as heavenly. He had always loved how, in his dreams, she seemed to have the lingering scent that reminded him of a field of exotic, sweet flowers, but he couldn't place the fragrance.
Corentin cleared his throat, breaking in on Bastian's thoughts. "You seem miles away, brother. What I wouldn't give to know what visions are traveling through your head."
Bastian turned to contemplate his brother. "Just pondering . . . regretting how different the life of my dreams is from the one I have." Bastian offered him a slow smile. "Where do your dreams take you?"
Corentin shrugged his shoulders. "After the first century of this, I quit keeping track of my dreams. I'm not even sure I have dreams any longer, it's been so long since I bothered to remember."
They stared at each other for a moment longer before Bastian turned to see Dionde beside him. "I could not survive this torment without the comfort of my dreams. They are the only things that keep me sane in this existence we are forced to live," Bastian said.
Dionde sighed, rubbing his forehead. He had no words to add to Bastian's musings. Instead, he hoped to guide them from the subject. "Come, brothers. I can smell Catherine's cooking. I am hoping Arthmael has left us some, since he no longer has to wait until dusk to eat."
Bastian chuckled. "Oh, I am sure he left us something, even if it is only the bones!"
Corentin growled as he turned to make his way to the inside of the tower apartment. "That bastard better have left us enough to fill our bellies, or I'll make his night a living hell!" His wings trembled as he wrapped them around himself like a cloak.
Dionde laughed outright. Their eldest brother had gained his freedom from their shared curse just months before, when Rachel, the grandniece of the former owner of Nephelium Manor, had come to claim her inheritance.
She had been expecting only the castle, but had found Arthmael as well. He had been so bemused and haunted by her that he had found the courage to offer her the test that would decide if she was truly his mate, and free him from the curse.
Rachel had since become a friend to each of them, and they all trusted and loved her as a sister. She had promised them she would do everything in her power to try to help them gain their own freedom from the curse the last three brothers were still forced to endure.
Bastian had little faith in her truly being able to discover a way to free them, but he was happy at having her as a sister and friend, as well as the perfect wife for his elder brother. He could entertain her desire to aid them in their quest for freedom from their shared stone imprisonment. Hope could certainly do no more damage to them than the curse itself had.
Folding back his wings to make them appear smaller and less threatening, he followed his brothers down the outside stairway that led to the courtyard they used to gain entrance into the home. As they entered, the smell of freshly baked bread and bacon made their bellies betray their hunger, loudly.