Read Phantom Series Boxed Set for Free Online

bar.”
    She took a deep breath, and then exhaled slowly, tempted to find a stone pillar to hide behind. “What does the city say?”
    “They can’t send out crews until the storm passes, and this apparent pseudo hurricane isn’t showing any meteorological signs of moving one inch. We need to send in buses and move the guests to other properties in the area or we need to get the generators up and running.”
    “Why aren’t they?”
    “It’s bad, Alexa.” Jacob said, his mouth drawn in a tight line. “Looks like sabotage.”
    Her chest tightened. “Sabotage?”
    Jacob leaned in close, his voice hushed as if they were in the office with a half dozen prying ears rather than in an abandoned castle with only a haunting portrait to intrude on their privacy. “The generators have sustained severe damage. The police have been notified. They don’t want maintenance to touch anything because they’ll be destroying evidence and—”
    “Stop!”
    This couldn’t be happening.
    Not again.
    He arched a brow.
    “Go back to the mainland,” she ordered. “Organize a conference call with all the managers of our properties in the area. We can’t bus the guests anywhere until the storm dies down, but we need transportation in place. At the hotel, move the guests to the grand ballroom, where there aren’t any windows or exterior doors. Have the kitchen break out all the ice cream and desserts we’ll lose anyway and serve it gratis, as well as all the booze they can pour. And then…” Her mind swam. God, didn’t she pay her staff huge salaries to handle this type of crisis?
    But sabotage? Again?
    She leaned back against the wall, the portrait’s frame skimming her shoulder. “Jacob, you know what to do as well as I do. Handle this, okay?”
    She closed her eyes. The stone against her back, so cold only moments before, suddenly warmed. The heat eased through the thin layer of her clothes and ignited her skin. She could feel the gray eyes of the man in the portrait staring down at her, into her.
    Jacob stepped nearer, his gaze darting with annoyance to the portrait as if the man were intruding on their conversation. “Are you crazy? You want me to leave you here alone?”
    Fingers of warmth curled around her shoulders. Alexa allowed her head to drop forward, and the sensations smoothed over her neck, then eased down her spine. Yes, she wanted to stay. Yes, she wanted to be here alone.
    “Alexa?”
    Jacob grabbed her arm and tugged her away from the wall.
    “What’s wrong with you?”
    Alexa shook her head. Wrong? Nothing was wrong. Was it? She was simply tired. Overwhelmed by her experience earlier in the helicopter and now in the castle.
    “Look, you’ll only be gone for a few hours, right? The Coast Guard knows I’m here and I have the portable GPS. I can activate the distress signal if I need to and our friends will come running, I’m sure. And I have my phone.”
    “I just lost the signal on mine,” he said, his expression incredulous.
    Guard dog.
    “A cell, not satellite. And you had the phone working long enough to hear the complicated and business-threatening tales of woe from Boston. If I call you and all you hear is ‘help,’ get here quick, okay? I’ve got water and supplies. Just come get me before dark.”
    His eyebrows slanted together at a hard angle. “I can’t just leave you here.”
    “Why not?” The farther she walked onto the landing, the more the warmth seeped out of her, the clearer her mind focused on the possibilities of the castle as a Crown Chandler resort property. The stairs would be polished, the cracks repaired. Lush tapestries would keep out the drafts and keep in the cool air that seemed trapped in the stone walls. She’d insist on electric or gas-powered torches to provide ambience and just enough light to keep the shadows sufficiently spooky.
    This could work.
    She just needed time alone to concentrate. To allow the ideas to flow uninterrupted.
    She spun and lifted her