Sizzle All Day (21 page)

"What's wrong, Jake?"

His hand trembled as he brought it up and raked it through his hair. "Dammit, Gillian, she's in his room. That sonofabitch Lord Harrington is kissing my mother!"

* * *

Gillian all but tackled him to keep him from bursting into Lord Harrington's suite. "Hush. They'll hear you ranting."

"Won't matter. Harrington will just think I'm a ghost, except he's too busy using his mouth to use his ears."

He grumbled continuously while she pushed, pulled, and dragged
h
im through the passageway back to his bedchamber. There he stalked around the room like a caged tiger. He fussed. He fumed. He ranted. He raved.

He made a fist and punched the wall, declaring, "Some English Lothario has sunk his claws into my vulnerable, widowed mother!"

Gillian winced as she imagined the pain radiating up his arm. She felt a combination of amusement and dismay as he flexed his aching fingers and gave his hand a shake.

"Jake, I think you are overreacting."

"Overreacting? Excuse me. I just saw my mother swapping spit with a stranger in his bedroom. I think my reactions are right on the mark."

"Jake, be reasonable. She lost your father some time ago, correct? Do you want her to be alone and lonely the rest of her life? Is that the act of a loving son?"

He scowled at her, all but growled at her. "I love my mother very much. She knows it. Chrissy knows it. Everyone does. I've proved it time and again, have I not? I'm here, aren't I? In Scotland where a man can never get warm instead of in Bora Bora where women run bare-breasted on the beaches."

"Well!" Gillian snapped.

Jake waved his arm in a land of silent, half-hearted apology. "You are right. My father is gone. My mother is too young and nice and yes, I'll admit, too pretty to be alone the rest of her life."

"So
what is the problem?"

"I don't know, all right? It's just... I wish... no son should see... Damn." He threw out his arms. "I didn't have to come to Rowanclere after all. She could have sweet-talked the Declaration away from Angus. I could be sailing for Tahiti right this minute. But no, I'm stuck in Scotland learning to wear a dress!"

"Take care, Texas. Ye have crossed the line to insulting."

He blew out a sigh. "Look, I don't mean any of this against you, Gillian. I want you to know that if I have to be in Scotland, there's nowhere else I'd rather be than right here with you. And as far as my mother goes, I don't want her to be lonely. I don't mind her developing a... a... friendship... with someone now that my father is gone. Hell, if she's involved in her own romantic life, maybe she'll leave mine the hell alone!"

Gillian didn't know whether to hint him or hug him. She settled for saying, "Your language is running toward the gutter, sir."

"Well it's that kind of night. I had a shock."

"That is one of the risks of spying on people."

Jake sank onto a settee and buried his head in his hands. "My mother is having a love affair. This is information no son should ever learn. It's almost as unsettling as the time I figured out my parents had sex twice."

"Twice?"

"Once for me and once for Chrissy. I think I was seven."

Gillian couldn't hold back the laugh. "Oh, Jake."

Chagrin and sheepishness twisted the grin he offered her.

"Ye sappie-headed fouter." She sat beside him and rested a hand upon his knee. "This was not the way to meet the new man in your mother's life, but perhaps once you've spoken to him you will find it easier to accept."

"And when do you think that will be?" Jake drawled. "Let me tell you something about my mama. If she is... friendly... with that man, she won't keep quiet about who is haunting Rowanclere. For all her scheming and conniving and womanly-wiling, she never once lied to my father. If she cares enough about that... earl... to kiss him in his bedroom, then she's not gonna keep quiet about me."

"Oh."

"Yes, oh. Princess, if you still want me for your ghost, my mother cannot know I'm here. You're gonna have to keep up the lie about my leaving, and I'm gonna have to stay hidden."

Gillian thought about that for a moment. "You don't mind? You'll wait to speak with her about her dealings with the Earl of Harrington?"

"Dealings? Well, I reckon that's one way of putting it." He paused for a moment, thinking about it. "I'll wait, Gillian. In fact, I'll be more than happy to wait because I have something else to occupy my time and interest."

"You do?"

"I do. Now that I think about it, I think I should make some changes to the haunting plan after all. My mother is quick. She's liable to catch on to my tricks pretty fast. I'd better make the best of every opportunity I get."

Gillian eyed him suspiciously. "And to think I was already nervous about tonight. Jake, what do you have in mind?"

His smile was total innocence. Gillian didn't believe it for a minute. "I'm just gonna give Lord Harrington what he's been asking for. He wants a ghost? Fine. I'm gonna give him a helluva scare."

* * *

At dinner that night, the chandelier shook for no apparent reason. Lord Harrington was intrigued.

When Gillian and her guests adjourned to the drawing room to partake of an after-dinner dram, a picture suddenly fell off the wall. The Englishman sat up straight, stared at the broken picture frame, and beamed.

After an unusual tiredness gripped both Harrington and Mrs. Delaney and they decided to seek their rest, unexplained footsteps seemed to follow them down the hall. Harrington bemoaned the unusual fact that he couldn't keep his eyes open. He wanted desperately to explore the peculiar occurrences. Instead, he kissed Elizabeth Delaney sweetly on the cheek, then adjourned to his own room, struggled into his nightclothes, and barely made it to bed before collapsing into slumber.

Which was exactly what Jake had intended when he slipped the sleeping draught into the whisky.

So far, his recently revised plan was working perfectly. His mother was snoozing in her room out of the way, despite Gillian's objections.

Drugging her guests didn't sit well with the woman. She'd raked him over the drawing room coals about that when he added the sleeping draught to the whisky.
What kind of man drugs his own mam?
she'd demanded in a huff.

He hadn't answered at once. He'd been too distracted. Gillian Ross in a huff was a blamed beautiful sight.

Jake had admitted to feeling only a twinge of guilt over seeing his mother swallow the drug. He knew for a fact the stuff wouldn't hurt her because he'd tried it out himself when originally formulating his haunting plan. He'd slept like a baby the night he took the potion and awakened refreshed. A similar experience might do his mother a world of good.

Maybe she'd be rested enough to think straight and see how silly a romance with Lord Wanna-spook would be.

Besides, he refused to feel bad about doing the job she, herself, had sent him to Rowanclere to do. She was the one who stuck herself in the middle of things. Elizabeth Delaney owned up to being a meddling mother, and she'd be the first to admit it sometimes complicated her life. A good night's sleep wasn't too big a complication, not to Jake's way of thinking.

"Now, you," he said as he pulled the snoring lord into a seated position, then put a shoulder to his gut. Hoisting the man from his bed, Jake grunted at the weight. The fella was heavier than he looked. "With you," he repeated, "I don't feel a lick of guilt. You are getting exactly what you asked for, but with a nice Texas twist."

Bigger, in other words.

Jake couldn't wait.

He had chosen the muniment room for the site of the evening's entertainment. Through long, narrow slits of windows, moonlight pierced the old keep's thick walls like luminescent swords. Pockets of cold air clung to the corners, evading the ribbons of heat escaping from the fire Jake had burning in the pit of one wall. Firelight melded with moonlight to cast shadows throughout the room, some flickering, some simply looming.

The glint of light off metal blades of swords, knives, claymores, and battle-axes added an air of threat, or menace. So, too, did the moan of wind as it blew through the sheep's horn Jake had hung outside the muniment room for just such a purpose.

Puffing a bit with the effort of having carried the dead-weight man up and down several flights of stairs, Jake approached the large, thronelike lord's chair he'd prepared for Harrington. Bending over, he heaved the earl into the seat. Sort of. The Englishman's arms flopped over the armrests to dangle at the sides. His behind slid down until it hung half on, half off the seat.

Through it all, he continued to snore. "Loud enough to scare away the ghosts if we had any," Jake grumbled. Still, he was well pleased with the progression of matters so far. Now to make those final preparations, after which he would settle back and wait for the curtain's rise.

Which would happen, he hoped, before Gillian figured out that the spooking spot had changed, that he hadn't taken the earl down to the dungeon room, the setting of the original plan. The place where she awaited him even now.

Gillian was too soft, too tenderhearted in her own obdurate way. She'd try to interfere with the haunting Jake had in mind. But he wouldn't let that happen. He wanted it done this way, and by God, he was the bogle. "I get to be the boss."

He puttered around the room for a few minutes, rearranging weapons and stirring up the pot of old raw scraps and blood he'd hidden beneath Harrington's chair to add that special, battle-decayed odor to the scene. That done, he checked his watch and figured how much time had passed since Harrington ingested the medicine. Hmm... another half-hour or so ought to do it.

"Good," he murmured softly. That would give him just enough time to put on his makeup and get rewrapped in the damned dress. Dragging the earl around had played hell with the pleats in his plaid. Judging by the draft, Jake suspected he might be flashing a cheek, too. That would never do. How intimidating a ghost would he be with a flesh-and-blood butt hanging out?

Jake's lips twisted in a cocksure grin. "Now, flashing my sword would be a different matter entirely."

* * *

"How long from the moment of death would it take a Texan to transform into a boodie?" Gillian muttered, eyeing an old, rusted sword. If the timing were right, she might consider assisting Jake through the transformation.

Three o'clock in the morning, and he had her waiting for him in a dungeon room. A dungeon room a short distance away from the castle crypt. A crypt filled with Rowanclere dead going back centuries.

Not to mention spiders.

Gillian swallowed hard. She'd give him five more minutes, then she would leave.

She lasted three and a half. The scurrying noise off to her left sent her rushing upstairs.

Her heart pounded with both temper and fear as she escaped the dungeon and hurried to Lord Harrington's room. She wasn't particularly surprised to find it empty. And it wasn't because she expected to find him with Jake's mother.

Jake had him. She'd bet the Declaration on it.

As expected, when she peeked into Elizabeth Delaney's suite she found the lady alone in her bed, deeply asleep. A quick check of the other guest rooms along that section of the hall turned up nothing, and she realized she needed a more efficient way to trace Jake Delaney through Rowanclere's numerous rooms, nooks, and crannies. If the Texan got creative, finding him could take hours.

Gillian knew just the thing to assist her.

After a brief visit to her own bedroom where she removed the belt from her oldest robe, Gillian made her way to Robbie's room where Jake's crippled mutt lay sleeping in her sister's arms. Plucking Scooter from the bed, she tried to ignore the wet tongue that licked its way up her neck and onto her face. "Stop that, now," she murmured, turning her head away, trying to scowl, but smiling instead.

"Gilly? Is that you?" asked Robbie, her voice slurred with sleep as she twisted around in her sheets and sat up.

"Aye. I need to borrow Scooter for a short bit. I shall bring her back to you soon."

"All right."

She burrowed headfirst back beneath her covers and Gillian flipped the blanket up over her sister's bare feet before retreating from the room. Once out in the hallway, Gillian set Scooter on the floor, slipped the belt around her belly, and lifted her hindquarters off the floor, saying, "Find Jake, Scooter."

It didn't work quite like she had planned. Instead of taking her to Jake, the dachshund led her to the buttery and the bowl of meat scraps Mrs. Ferguson left near the dog's favorite spot beside the hearth. "Eat up quickly," she impatiently urged. In that much, at least, the dog obeyed her.

Once the food bowl was empty and the water bowl sampled, Gillian tried again. "Jake. Find Jake. Find that lying Texan."

Scooter sneezed twice, then started off. "Guid dog," she encouraged. "I was wrong to call you those bad names before. But we're getting along better now, right? Guid puppy. Find Jake."

She kept her gaze on the ground and the dachshund, lifting her up staircases, then setting her back down. Gillian kept up a whispered stream of praise the entire time, feeling quite proud of herself for thinking to use the mutt to find the Texan scoundrel. With her attention divided between the dog and what she planned to do to Jake once she found him, she didn't realize just where Scooter was leading her until they reached the bedchamber door.

"No," she groaned. All the mutt had done was use Gillian for transportation assistance to a late night snack and back to bed. Glaring down at the dog, she added, "I said find Jake, not go eat a steak!"

Scooter jerked from her hold and dragged herself quickly toward the bed. There she let out a whimper and Robbie lifted her head from her pillow. Leaning over the bed, she scooped the hound up into her arms, then tucked the traitor in beside her. "Thanks for taking her downstairs for me, Gilly. What did Mrs. Ferguson leave for her tonight?"

"Beef." Gillian, on the other hand, was left with a plateful of crow.

Briefly, she considered giving up for the night and finding her own bed. But the sense of urgency riding her blood wouldn't let her. Something was telling her she had best find Jake and Lord Harrington.