She couldn't believe this. How could she respond to this stranger, a man she didn't even like? Rational thought left, removed by the wild sensations streaking into her body with furious intensity.

She savored his touch and wondered at his ability to make her feel treasured, worshipped. Her world went into riot, a million sensations taking root in her body as he deepened the kiss. Her fingers clutched at his sweater, needing him as an anchor. She palmed his muscles and enjoyed the male authority beneath her fingers. He was hard and rough, his muscles bunching and releasing as he moved against her with the subtle gyrations of rugged male animal. Relentless, his lips searched hers, asking for passion she wished to show but knew she shouldn't.

She melted against him. She'd never swayed into a man's embrace or his arms with whole abandon. Stunned by everything she felt, she allowed Ronan's essence, what made him unique, to touch her heart and soul. His kisses set her on fire, a combination of spine- melting tenderness and soul-searing sex.

When she eased closer, he moaned low in his throat and slipped his arms around her waist. Her breasts crushed against his chest, his cock pressed into her stomach. New, burning hot desire heated her body, dancing over her skin like lightning strikes.

When his muscled thigh pushed up between her legs and pressed against hot, intimate folds, she moaned softly. With rhythmic, insistent motion his thigh slid against tender areas that pulsed and dampened. His palm slid over her ass, testing and caressing. He shaped her with that hand, branding her his own. She shivered against the intimate invasion, focusing on the way his touch cupped and shaped her butt and the way his thigh rubbed against her intimately. His tongue slipped into her mouth, plunging and exploring.

Searing new sensations took hold, driving her toward an unknown passion. A tight, uncontrollable ache pulsed between her thighs and she undulated against him, dying for some relief from restless desire. She needed more.More .

Deep in her mind she felt something, a tickle in her brain as if someone searched inside her psyche. Each brush against her thoughts startled, yet aroused. Heat moistened the folds between her legs and she gasped against his mouth in tortured need. Again the tentative probe of her thoughts warmed her from the inside out, demanding an answer.

So she gave it.Yes. Yes.

Deep and undeniably Irish, Ronan's voice entered her head.My beautiful, beautiful colleen .

As his palms warmed her back, searching and caressing, his lips plied and coaxed.

Incredible desire built as she arched in his hold, pressing into his muscled frame. Craving rose at the core, and she unleashed desires without a second thought. Responding to his ravenous kiss, she stroked his tongue with her own.

Delicious.

Seductive.

Beyond compare.

Desire had never been this strong.

She shivered and pulled back. His arms banded her tight against his chest as she stared up at the Irishman in blatant surprise. "What was that? What did you do?"

Blazing with an intensity that seized her breath, his fiery dark gaze enveloped her before he dove in for another kiss. With any other man she might have kneed him in the groin to escape. Instead, uncontrollable desire kept her in his arms.

He twisted his mouth over hers, effectively parting her lips as his tongue sought hers.

Clarissa felt like a virgin tasting a man for the first time. With warm, deep strokes, he pumped his tongue into her mouth. Her loins clenched and ached as another hot pulse immediately took up residence between her thighs as he continued to press his thigh against her swollen labia and clit.

Yes. Oh, yes.

Releasing her lips, he whispered fervently, "God's blood, you are sweet. Hot and warm and beyond bearing."

He took her mouth again, a hungry, carnal assault that started wild feelings deep down in the most secret recesses of her soul.

A vision speared into her head, taking her by surprise. Ronan smiling and laughing with the little blonde woman, her eyes sparkling with joy at being near him. His eyes held a youth and innocence, a glow of a man who believed she would be his for all time. Love surged back and forth between Ronan and the young woman, and a strange heartache lanced through Clarissa.

Ronan broke the kiss and drew back several steps, his chest heaving, his eyes filled with ever present flame. To her surprise, shock also covered his face, as if she'd said or done something amazing.

Before she could ask him about the blonde, he turned away and headed for the door. He paused to put on his coat and the strange cloak lying on a chair. Without looking at her he unlocked the door and left.

Stunned, she didn't move for a full two minutes. She approached the door and relocked it, then turned and leaned her back against it while her breathing synchronized and her heart stopped pounding.

Amazed at the spectacular arousal that had jumped back and forth between her and Ronan, Clarissa couldn't think. Couldn't move.

She touched her lips. "What's happening to me?"

And why on earth should I be jealous of some blonde woman in one of Ronan's previous lives?

Or had it been simple empathy for the doomed couple? She couldn't be sure. She closed her eyes and tried resurrecting what she'd seen in her mind's eye. Ronan's clothing and the woman's came from a time in the distant past. She concentrated and brought the image she'd seen clear in her mind. They'd been sitting on wooden benches behind the tall, imposing castle. She thought back to what she knew about castles. This one, what little she'd seen of it, appeared to exist sometime in the twelve hundreds or perhaps later.

The symbol of feudal power went beyond a simple motte and bailey erection of wood and clay. Sun had glinted off its massive stone walls in afternoon sunlight.

She opened her eyes with a start and found she sat on the floor with her back to the hotel room door. She glanced at her watch. Damn, she'd done it again. More than twenty minutes passed while she'd cruised around in the past. Shrugging off self-admonition, Clarissa stood and went into the bathroom to wash up. She had a lot of work to do.

Once she had a shower, she decided she needed to make that call to ErinGreenway.

Clarissa hesitated before she lifted the phone. Intuition said to call Erin, but another part said the spooky buildings here in Pine Forest called to her camera and she should get out to the cemeteries while she had daylight to burn. She wanted to parade through Pine Forest and search out the memories of growing up here.

She tapped one peach-painted nail against the plastic receiver. Could she trust Ronan, a man with otherworldly eyes, amazing strength, and an odd ability to turn up in her hotel room without using the door?

Other than the fact he'd suffered through some past lives, the man had other talents, and a strangeness that defied logic.

"Okay," she said to the empty hotel room. "Should I be afraid of you, Ronan Kieran?"

Shaking her head, she decided to call Erin, then locate Jim Leggett to see if he could accompany her to the graveyards. She didn't relish going anywhere with Jim, but who else would be interested in helping her with the photographs but a ghost hunter?

She tried Erin's number at the library and reached her there. "Erin, this is ClarissaGaines."

"Hi, Clarissa." Erin's soft, enthusiastic voice made Clarissa feel at ease. "Ronan mentioned you and said you wanted to get together with Lachlan and I. There are some other friends you should meet, too."

"You must mean Jared Thornton and MickyGunn."

Her hesitation came clear over the line. "How did you know about them?"

Clarissa sighed. "I've known about the four of you for some time. I would have approached you at the meeting last night, but the crowd was a little much for me."

"Since you were there, you know we tried to stop the community center Halloween celebration."

Clarissa closed her eyes, a strange lassitude enveloping her. "I'm sorry it didn't do much good."

"I think people believe if they cancel the party they've given in to the fear. And really, they're right. But they don't know how dangerous things will be on Halloween."

Clarissa sighed. "Of course they don't. It's easier to deny the worst than to come to grips with something being wrong. I remember..."

"Yes?"

"When I was growing up here the townspeople denied the supernatural to each other's faces. In secret they may have believed, but in public they lied about what they thought.

Maybe they thought saying it out loud would make it worse."

Clarissa heard papers rustling, then Erin spoke. "People told me that the town admitted that the place is haunted."

Clarissa stared at the dingy off-white ceiling. "I remember it a little differently. My parents were part of the denial crowd."

"What about you? Did you believe in ghosts as a child?"