Sizzle All Day (8 page)

The timely arrival of Mr. Douglas allowed Jake three unsupervised hours, which he utilized to make a methodical search of the library. While he didn't find the missing Declaration of Independence tucked between two of the numerous volumes of love stories, he did find a section of books that caused his heart to skip a beat.

One entire set of bookshelves held issues of early Texas newspapers bound into books. He took his time, flipping through each page of every volume, expecting at any moment to come upon the handwritten document he sought.

He didn't find it. Not in the newspapers, nor between the pages of any of the other books he searched. Still, he'd come to the right place. He knew it in his bones. Besides, when he began to sense he'd spent all the time he dared in the endeavor, he still had another whole wall yet to explore.

Jake was forced to face a truth. Making a one-man physical search of a place as big as Rowanclere Castle would not get the job done. He either would need to reveal his true purpose or trick the information out of them. After a few moments' deliberation, he settled on trickery. It seemed to fit the folk of Rowanclere better than telling the truth.

Following an early supper, he had just sunk the eight ball in a practice game of billiards, then settled into a chair pulled close to the fireplace to read the newspaper when Mrs. Dunbar swept into the room and said, "Well, Mr. Delaney, are you ready to continue your tour?"

Jake frowned. His hostess had changed clothes since the last time he'd seen her, and she looked particularly fetching in a gown of rose pink silk. "I thought I was scheduled for a visit with the laird of the castle."

"I am sorry." Her dainty brows dipped into a worried frown. "Uncle Angus is not up to seeing visitors. He's poustit this eve. Suffering the pains, the rheums."

Jake thought for a moment, interpreting the unfamiliar words. "Your uncle suffers from rheumatism?"

"Aye. Some days, like today, it sinks its teeth into him fiercely."

"I'm sorry to hear that. Chronic pain can wear a man down. Let's hope he feels better tomorrow."

"Aye." She appeared distracted for a moment, then, to his shock and chagrin, she gave her head a shake, paired a devilish smile with a wicked twinkle in her bluebonnet eyes, and crooked her finger right at him. "Allow me to show you the delights of Rowanclere, Mr. Delaney."

Damned if every drop of blood in his body didn't feel like it headed south.

Jake brought the newspaper with him when he stood, using it to shield his body's reaction. In a way, he was reassured by the response this woman elicited from him. Were he developing a performance problem, surely his pistol wouldn't load so fast.

No, the trouble wasn't with him. It had to be her. The trouble was he had a beautiful hostess who couldn't decide which personality to present: gentle Madonna or flirtatious vamp. Either way, she twisted him into knots.

Jake's temper kindled. To hell with going slow. Folks here at Rowanclere were big on bluffs, what with this ghost business and all. Maybe he should run a bluff of his own. Maybe he should pick her up, carry her to his chamber and tie her to his bed, refusing to let her go until the missing Declaration of Independence was in his hands.

He could see her lying stretched out before him, her hair spread around her a golden waterfall, her eyes flashing blue fire, her breasts heaving with the force of her breaths, her belly... damn! "She's
pregnant
, for heaven's sake."

"What was that, Mr. Delaney?"

He shut his eyes and shook his head. "Nothing. Never mind. By all means, ma'am, show me your castle."

The next half hour was a whirlwind education on furniture, architecture, and Clan Brodie history. If she dwelled a little heavily on the bloodthirsty parts, he didn't mind. Gory detail kept his mind off other unsavory things.

Like how the burr in her words seduced him like the stroke of a velvet ribbon against his skin.

The cook offered him a lemonade when they toured the kitchen, and he gulped it like a man dying of thirst, hoping the drink would cool him down. "Maybe now's a good time to give me a look at the outer wall, Mrs. Dunbar," he suggested.

"The outer wall? But I thought you wished to remain indoors out of the weather. It is much cooler outside now than it was this morning."

"No, ma'am. A good dose of cold sounds right good to me about now."

"Very well." She shrugged her shapely shoulders and added. "We'll take the dungeon route from here and exit to the spot where the old wall stood, all right?"

Dungeon. Lovely. Better hope she can't read my mind or shell lock me in down there.

Never having been one to enjoy jail cells of any kind, Jake didn't look forward to the next portion of the tour. He needed to see them, however. Dungeons were great hiding places for all sorts of things—like a stolen copy of an historically significant document, for instance.

For the thousandth time since being sent to the freezing north to retrieve the document, Jake wondered how the Declaration ended up at Rowanclere to begin with. The Texas memorabilia collector who'd come so close to killing Chrissy claimed to have purchased the item from a member of the Rowanclere household for a ridiculous price. Someone from Rowanclere had then purportedly stolen it back. Now that he was here, he found himself even more curious about the whys, wheres, and hows of the story. He liked a good mystery, and between this and the "ghosts," Rowanclere was certainly providing that.

His hostess opened a doorway cleverly hidden in the back of a food pantry and while holding a torch, led him down a steep, dark, spiral stone staircase. She droned on about this clan and that clan and this ghost and that. So much so, that by the time they reached the bottom of the stairs, he was feeling more than a shade dizzy.

He felt real dizzy, in fact.

Jake swayed on his feet. He saw two Mrs. Dunbars. Then four. Then none, because the light winked out.

"Ma'am?"

A low, keening groan sailed out of the darkness and swirled around him. Then a cackle, a witch's call.

Jake shuddered at the sound.

"Well, sir," came the disembodied voice from out of the darkness. "Welcome to my lair."

"Who are you?" he gasped, his consciousness fading.
Drugged.
I've been drugged
.

This time the voice sounded feminine and amused. "Oh, I don't know, Texas. Why don't you call me Death."

* * *

Gillian watched him sway at the bottom of the stairs and wished she knew more about sleeping potions. Obviously, she'd given this man too much. He appeared about to drop.

"Bide a wee, Delaney," she said, jumping forward to offer him her support. "You must make it down the corridor a bit, first." If he fell before reaching the bed she had readied for him earlier, she would have little prayer of moving him.

And she did so wish to torture him.

Gillian had questions that demanded answers. Why had the Texan searched Rowanclere's library? Was he truly a writer come to study Scottish castles? Or was he here for more nefarious purposes? Most important of all, was he in any way a threat to her family?

Gillian intended to find out.

With one arm wrapped around his waist, the other holding his arm which was draped around her shoulder, she guided him down the narrow passageway. With every step, she was forced to accept more and more of his weight. "You are a big lug," she muttered.

His arm slipped off her shoulder, but settled around her waist. His hand landed on her stomach, dislodging her stuffing.

"Wrong," he murmured, his voice slurred.

She made no effort to reply, but kept all her energy focused on getting him to the bed in the chamber she had prepared.

They made it. Just. He started his fall close enough to the bed that a good shove from her sent him sprawling across it. She wrestled with his legs, then yanked on his arms, and finally got him where she wanted him, more or less.

He was snoring peacefully a few minutes later when she approached with the rope, and Gillian felt a prick of unease as she fixed first his hands, then his feet to the bedposts. She'd never done anything like this before in her life. In fact, the past few weeks had been filled with firsts for her. Lying, scheming, and trickery were foreign to her nature, although once she got started, she admitted to having a flair for it.

Gillian stepped away from the bed and stared down at her captive in the flickering light of the torch. The man truly was magnificent. Relaxed in sleep, the masculine angles of his face softened just enough to give him a fallen angel's beauty. A lock of overly long, deep auburn hair spilled across his brow and tangled with the thick, curling lashes of his eyes. Gillian's fingers itched to reach out and brush it back, but she clenched them into a fist instead. What was it about this man she found so... haunting?

Now there is an irony for you.

But it was true. Since the moment he arrived at Rowanclere the Texan had seldom left her thoughts entirely. Was this guilt at work? Did thoughts of him plague her because she felt bad about using him to practice being a wraith?

She thought about it for a moment, then shook her head. No, that wasn't it. She did feel a twinge of shame, but it was easily dismissed. Causing a few moment's fright to this bonny, brawny man was nothing compared to seeing that Uncle Angus spent his declining years in peace.

"Besides," she grumbled, "I don't believe I have caused him so much as a twitch of fear up until now."

That, she told herself, was about to change. She wasn't a woman who indulged her temper often, but when she did, she made it count. His methodical search of Rowanclere's library proved he had more than castle architecture on his mind. In order to protect her family, she needed to know what. That was why the Wraith of Rowanclere intended to get mean.

Gillian discarded her belly, gathered up her string, scissors, a bag full of feathers, and went to work.

* * *

Jake awoke from the old nightmare about the time during the cattle drive to Wichita when rustlers had him trussed like a beeve waitin' on the iron. In his case not a branding iron, but a shootin' one. He'd have been one dead cowboy had his best friend and recently wed brother-in-law Cole Morgan not ridden to the rescue.

His capture that day had been a nasty event, and as a result, those ugly feelings lingered as he drifted back to consciousness. The pounding head and aching muscles didn't help anything. Neither did realizing the sensation of being tied down was not a dream.

This wasn't good.

Warily, he opened his eyes. To blackness. Blindfolded. Hell.

He strained against the ropes, testing. No give at all. Damn.

Twisting his head, he felt something brush his cheek. Something soft and ticklish. He jerked away from the sensation, only to have it repeated against the other cheek. "What the—?"

"Spiders," came the disembodied voice from out of the darkness to his left. "My grave is filled with them... and other creeping, crawling things."

Jake wasn't impressed. Bugs didn't bother him one whit. Now, had he awakened sharing space with a real ghost, he might have experienced a fright or two. The woman who called herself Death was very much alive and back to her old tricks.

And this particular trick had gone too far. "Are you Mrs. Dunbar?"

Her laughter bubbled like a brook in a dense, dark forest "Nae, that sweet lady has gone visiting in the village this afternoon. I am the one who led you here. I took her form. I am good, am I not? I fooled you completely."

Jake scowled and something crawled along his cheek. He blew a breath from the side of his mouth attempting to blow it away. Though spiders and insects didn't give him the willies, he'd just as soon keep them off the menu. Whatever hung beside him swung back and brushed him, and he blew it away again. "If this is the way you treat all your guests at Rowanclere, I wouldn't expect much company."

"I would not expect many of Rowanclere's guests to conduct a clandestine search of the library."

"Hmm." Jake pursed his lips in thought. "Caught, was I?"

"That you were. Now I wish to know why you insulted your hosts with such activity."

Rather than answer immediately, he listened carefully, probing his surroundings. He sniffed the air, detecting only the closed, musty scent of an underground chamber. She was alone. A woman alone. He thought about that for a moment, then said, "Suppose I don't want to tell you?"

"Then I shall torture you. The Rowanclere dungeons are well equipped for such activity."

"Oh?"

"I warn you, it will be very frightening."

She sounded so fierce. And... cute. Damned if he could decide whether he was angry or enjoying this. He waited a count of ten before asking, "Painful?"

He heard a sniff on his right, but when she spoke he definitely heard it on his left. "Who do you think I am, Young Fergus?"

She was pitching her voice somehow. Like she had last night. "If I remember correctly, I do believe that earlier you introduced yourself as Death."

"True, sir. However, ways exist to torture a person, to kill a person, without even touching them."

"Yeah, but those ways are not necessarily pain free. Take last night's torture, for instance."

Suspicion clouded her voice. "What do you mean?"

"That was you in my bedroom last night, wasn't it? Believe me, honey, you had me hurting all night."

"Hurting? From what?"

"Let's just say that after your unveiling, if I'd had to sleep on my stomach, I'd have broken something off."

The "ghost" softly gasped. Jake swallowed a chuckle. Yes, he definitely leaned toward enjoying himself at this moment, ropes and all.

"You are a wicked man, Delaney."

A smile was his only reply.

Frustration bristled in her voice as she said, "But I am an evil wicht. I can be more wicked than you. Answer my questions, or I shall prove it."

He shrugged as best he could manage tied spread-eagle to the bed. "One problem here, ma'am. You haven't asked any questions yet."

This time he heard a definite feminine growl before she snapped, "Why did you search our library?"