Page 15 of Wolfsbane Hall #1

The North Wing

Flames licked up Celestine’s spine, and the air filled with thick black smoke.

She coughed, drawing the top of her dress up to filter the air, but she couldn’t leave just yet.

She had to scour the floor for the articles.

They were important. She knew it in her bones, and if she were to save Frances’s life and hers, Celestine needed to get them.

So she fell to her knees, frantically trying to gather the lost ones. A letter burst into flames as her fingers touched it. Intentionally destroying itself. The house? Or the Specter? Or the Phantom?

It had to be the Specter, because the house was actively impeding all her efforts to discover more about the Ashbrooks. The Specter impeding her … her specter… hurting her .

It shouldn’t have been surprising, yet it was. A part of her believed the Specter wanted to aid her—the part of him that cared for her. And if she were being honest, she wanted him to love her enough to save her.

But it was all foolishness.

No one would ever love her that much.

Embers popped as she managed to read the beginning of another letter before it, too, burned away in her hands, the paper flaking into charred pieces. Brother, I really must protest your plan…

Brother.

The word triggered a memory. It was after a show, and Celestine was tucked into bed, her covers up to her chin. She was always cold, due to the unreasonable slowness of her heartbeat at rest.

“It’s more complicated than simply getting along with her. Babette is confrontational and often adversarial, but she—”

“She reminds you of your sister?” the Specter asked. He knew Celestine far too well, and she barely knew him. It was utterly frustrating. But it was life.

“Yes.”

“Understandable. My brother can be quite adversarial as well. Sometimes I want to kill him, but he’s family.”

Brother. The Specter had a brother! So the Specter was one of the twins. James didn’t have a brother—only a sister. Unless…the cloaked owner of Wolfsbane was one of the Ashbrooks’ other male relations. Their fathers?

It was the only other option. The Ashbrooks were infamous, and their antics were published in all the San Francisco gossip rags.

So everyone in the city knew that the twins’ father was also a twin.

Walter and Archibald. The only other male member of the Ashbrook clan was James’s maternal uncle Jon, but he didn’t have a brother.

So the Specter was a twin. But which generation, and which man?

And more importantly, which one did she want it to be? Everett? Dean? Her gaze tracked to the handsome devil, his muscular body silhouetted against the flames.

Celestine swallowed smoke and coughed.

It was a riddle made just for her. No one else would have that level of personal information about the Specter. Perhaps James was right, and would she be the first person to uncover the Specter’s identity in over 100 years?

Doubtful.

But possible?

Celestine coughed, the world coming back into focus. How had she wholly forgotten she was in a burning room? Her hands drew up to her forehead, and she clutched her face. Her eyes stung, watering. Heat clung to her face, and smoke filled all her pores.

Yet even knowing she was seconds away from passing out from the smoke inhalation, Celestine wouldn’t leave the room.

I can’t leave yet.

She needed answers. It was the only thing that might keep her alive for one more day.

She was truly a fool.

But the fire meant she was getting close.

“Celestine, we have to go.” Dean shook her shoulders. “Celine, the fire. Come on.”

“No, there has to be something else.”

“The only thing here now is your death,” Dean said. “You have to leave.”

She sucked in a breath, the smoke caking her lungs. A cough ripped from her burning throat. She was going to die. A red haze covered her eyes, but it didn’t matter; there was a mission to complete.

“You have to leave.” Dean’s voice was husky and dark.

“No.” Her fingers caught more articles and letters as blood dripped from her nose and her eyelids drooped. If she didn’t get out of the room soon, she would die, and there were no resurrections tonight. Celestine had died more times than she could count, but she always came back to life.

“For the record, you’re forcing me to do this,” Dean growled, scooping her into his arms and throwing her over his shoulder as if she were a weightless doll.

His touch sent a current of electricity through her veins.

It was utterly inappropriate to find it so enticing.

..yet she did. She truly, truly did, even when facing death.

Celestine’s eyes fluttered shut, and in her smoke-addled condition, she nestled into the warmth of his body, as content as a cat sunbathing.

His rosewood, musk, and citrus scent wafted into her nostrils, the smell of pure man . He smelled like oranges and carnal desires. But she didn’t have time to appreciate it, because darkness clawed at her mind and ripped her consciousness away.

“You’re a fool.”

Celestine blinked, confused by the words and the voice that had to belong to Dean Ashbrook.

“I, what?” she said, rubbing her stinging eyes.

“You’re a fool,” he repeated. “You could have died from the smoke intalation.” He said the word wrong. That was… interesting. “Do you have a death wish?”

“Would it matter? I am already dying.” Celestine’s words were thick and chalky.

“You’re poisoned, not dying.”

“And what is poison, Dean?” Defiance seeped from her tongue, and she sat up, blinking again. The room came into focus. It was the Red Salon, and she was strewn across the couch like a throw blanket. Dean kneeled on the floor as if nursing her back to health. A task she was sure he hated.

“If you die in the game, you die. You won’t be able to guess the Specter’s true name if you spend the night dead.” Which was why even magically controlled fire was so dangerous. It might not take her life on a typical night, but there was nothing typical about this night.

“What happened?” she asked, voice strained.

“You mean the fire?” Dean furrowed his brow and braced the cushions next to her—always keeping space between them.

Celestine nodded, resting her sore vocal cords.

“The Phantom or the Specter wanted to keep you from discovering the room’s secrets, and they set it on fire.”

“I know that part. I am not stupid.” Celestine’s lips fell into a flat line as her fingers fiddled with the fringe of a red throw pillow. She, too, wanted distance from the man, but she also needed something to do with her hands. “After I passed out.”

“The fire stopped as soon as we left the wing. It was a warning.” He shifted uncomfortably on the wooden floor, yet he still avoided her, which was impressive because keeping any amount of distance from her in his position was nearly an impossible task.

“Why won’t you touch me?”

“I just touched you, unless you don’t recall how I threw you over my shoulder like a bratty child and saved your life.

” His words were rude, but they were also fermented by concern.

His eyebrows creased as he lifted himself to view her eyes better.

His gaze probed hers, checking her pupils for dilation.

It was as if he wanted to make sure she didn’t have a concussion.

The dimple in his cheek flashed, soaking with a mixture of exasperation and genuine fear.

Celestine didn’t know how to handle the weight of his attention, so she said, “I remember.” She shook her head and immediately regretted it. Dizziness stroked the edges of her cerebellum, and she placed a hand on her head.

So weak .

Dean’s reaction was instant. Quickly, he grasped her face with his strong, steadying hands. Celestine blinked and stared at him. Her breath hitched, but this time not from the fire. The feel of his flesh on hers devoured all her resistance, ripping through her like a tidal wave.

Celestine’s ribcage tightened in on her, and she felt like she was suffocating as time froze.

Dean Ashbrook was touching her. Actively touching. And it was so bewildering. Celestine’s heart could have stopped from the shock. The touch must have pained him, because he winced—actually winced .

One thing was true. Celestine might have been poisoned, but she was his poison. That was how much he hated her.