Linda Lael Miller Bundle (16 page)
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Authors: Linda Lael Miller
Mitch bore her mischief as long as he could, then, with gentle force, he pressed her to the bed. He lay beside her for a time, caressing her breasts, her stomach, her thighs and even the backs of her knees. And when he had set her afire, he began kissing all those same places.
Shay’s triumph became need; she twisted and tossed on the satin comforter that covered their marriage bed, she whimpered as he loved her, tasted her, tormented her.
Only when she pleaded did he take her.
Nine months and ten minutes later, as Mitch liked to say, Robert Mitchell Prescott was born.
I
t had been one hell of a fight; the rafters were still shaking.
Glumly, Mitch climbed the steps leading to the attic and opened the door. He flipped a switch and the huge room was bathed in light.
There were cobwebs everywhere and for a moment Mitch hesitated, then grew angry all over again.
It wasn’t as though he intended to do anything really dangerous, after all. He wouldn’t be tangling with Nazis or Klan members or hit men. This book was about racecar drivers, dammit!
He sat down on the top step, his chin in his hands. Okay, so he’d told Shay that he was through writing adventure books and now he was about to go back on his word, however indirectly. Hadn’t she told him herself that she’d love him even if he did that?
Mitch gave a long sigh. He loved Shay, needed her, depended on her in more ways than he dared to admit. And yet he’d just spent half an hour hollering at her, and she’d hollered back, with typical spirit.
Mitch was glad that Hank and the baby were with Alice that day. The uproar might have traumatized them both.
After a long time, he stood up and went into the attic.
Shay sat in one corner of the library sofa, her eyes puffy from crying, her throat raw. She couldn’t believe that she’d yelled those awful things at Mitch. He was her husband, the father of her son, and she loved him more than she had on her wedding day, more with every passing minute.
She hugged herself. She’d known that Mitch would eventually want to write again, once the scars on his spirit had had time to heal. She’d known it, even without being warned by both Alice and Ivan, Mitch’s agent.
Shay snatched a tissue from the box on her lap and blew her nose. Loudly. She supposed she should be grateful that Mitch was only planning to drive race-cars; knowing him, he might have parachuted into Central America or slipped past the Iron Curtain into some country where women wore frumpy scarves and men talked in Slavic grunts.
She rested her hands on her still-flat stomach, where a new baby was growing. She’d wanted to tell Mitch, use it to hold him to a quiet life of building condominiums with Todd Simmons, but that wouldn’t have been fair. She sniffled again and reached for another tissue.
If she insisted that Mitch stay, he would give in. Shay knew that. But he would be miserable and there would be more fights. Gradually the great love they shared would be worn away.
The telephone rang and, because it was Mrs. Carraway’s day off, Shay answered. The voice on the other end of the line was Garrett’s.
“Hi’ya, Amazon,” he said.
Shay burst into tears.
“What is it?” Garrett asked softly when the spate of grief was over.
Feeling like an absolute fool, Shay explained. The book about Rosamond had been published under Mitch’s real name, so that much of his career was no longer a secret.
Garrett waited until Shay had told him all her fears of seeing Mitch crash in a burning racecar on some faraway track and there was a gentle reprimand in his voice when he spoke. “If you wanted to go back to your catering business, you’d do it, wouldn’t you, even if it made Mitch mad?”
“That’s hardly the same thing! I made cheeseballs, Garrett. I didn’t race around some speedway, taking my life in my hands!”
“It
is
the same thing, Shay.”
Shay dabbed at her face with a wad of tissue. “I know, I know. But I love him, Garrett.”
“Enough to let him be himself?”
“Yes,” Shay answered after a long time. “But that doesn’t mean I have to like it.”
Garrett chuckled. “I guess I called at a bad time. I’ll get back to you later, sweetheart. Keep the faith.”
Shay might have protested, but for the strange bumping-and-thumping sound coming from the stairway. “If you were calling about this year’s camping trip, Hank is all for it.”
Garrett promised to call again and hung up.
“Shay?”
She turned on the sofa to see Mitch leaning against one side of the library doorway. Despite his attempt at nonchalance, he looked wan and haggard and Shay felt a painful tightening in her heart. But fear for him made her voice cool. “Yes?”
“I won’t go if it’s that important to you. I’ll write a novel or something.”
Shay felt all broken and raw inside. “You’ll only be racing for two or three weeks, won’t you? Actually driving the cars, I mean?”
She thought she saw hope leap in the depths of his dark, dark eyes. “Three weeks at the most,” he promised hoarsely.
“I’ll hate every minute of it. I love you, Mitch.”
He disappeared around the corner, came back in a moment dragging a very large and very dusty cardboard rainbow. A shower of glued-on glitter fell from the colorful arch as Mitch pulled it across the room and propped it against his desk.
“I think this is one of those rainy days we talked about,” he said.
Shay felt tears sting her eyes. It was late July and the sun was shining, but Mitch was right. She held out her arms to him and he came to her, drawing her close, burying his face in the warm curve of her neck.
“I love you,” he said.
Shay tangled the fingers of one hand in his hair. It was dusty from his foraging expedition in the attic. “And I love you. Too much to keep you here if that’s not what you want.”
“You could go with me.” His hand was working its way under her sweater, cupping one breast, not to give passion but to take comfort.
“Of course I’ll go.”
Mitch lifted his face from her neck, let his forehead rest against hers. His fingers continued to caress her breast, after dislodging her bra. “Thank you,” he said.
“I’d better get at least a dedication out of this,” Shay warned. “I don’t exactly enjoy standing around racetracks with my heart stuffed into my sinuses, you know.”
Mitch had found her nipple and his fingers shaped it gently. “My other books were dedicated to you. Why would this one be different?”
Shay was kneeling on the sofa now, her forehead still touching Mitch’s. He had dedicated her mother’s book to her, and the one about Alan Roget, too. She couldn’t for the life of her remember what he’d said in those dedications, though. She groaned softly with the pleasure he could so easily arouse in her. “Is this the part where we work out a treaty?”
Mitch chuckled. “Yes.” Deftly, he unfastened the catch of her bra, freeing her breasts, catching first one and then the other in the warm, teasing strength of his hand. With his other hand, he caressed her.
“Clearly, sir,” she managed to say. “It isn’t a treaty you want, but a full surrender.”
He lifted her sweater high enough to bare one of her breasts and bent to take a tantalizing nip at its throbbing peak. “How astute you are,” he muttered, his breath warm against her flesh.
Shay trembled. They were, after all, in the library. It was the middle of the day and anyone could walk in. “Mitch,” she protested. “Alice—the kids—”
Mitch circled her nipple with the tip of his tongue, then got up to close and lock the library doors.
Linda Lael Miller
HAPTER
1
E
lisabeth McCartney’s flagging spirits lifted a little as she turned past the battered rural mailbox and saw the house again.
The white Victorian structure stood at the end of a long gravel driveway, flanked by apple trees in riotous pink-white blossom. A veranda stretched around the front and along one side, and wild rose bushes, budding scarlet and yellow, clambered up a trellis on the western wall.
Stopping her small station wagon in front of the garage, Elisabeth sighed and let her tired aquamarine eyes wander over the porch, with its sagging floor and peeling paint. Less than two years before, Aunt Verity would have been standing on the step, waiting with smiles and hugs. And Elisabeth’s favorite cousin, Rue, would have vaulted over the porch railing to greet her.
Elisabeth’s eyes brimmed with involuntary tears. Aunt Verity was dead now, and Rue was God only knew where, probably risking life and limb for some red-hot news story. The divorce from Ian, final for just a month, was a trauma Elisabeth was going to have to get through on her own.
With a sniffle, she squared her shoulders and drew a deep breath to bolster her courage. She reached for her purse and got out of the car, pulling her suitcase after her. Elisabeth had gladly let Ian keep their ultramodern plastic-and-smoked-glass furniture. Her books, tapes and other personal belongings would be delivered later by a moving company.
She slung her purse strap over her shoulder and proceeded toward the porch, the high grass brushing against the knees of her white jeans as she passed. At the door, with its inset of colorful stained glass, Elisabeth put down the suitcase and fumbled through her purse for the set of keys the real-estate agent had given her when she stopped in Pine River.
The lock was old and recalcitrant, but it turned, and Elisabeth opened the door and walked into the familiar entryway, lugging her suitcase with her.
There were those who believed this house was haunted—it had been the stuff of legend in and around Pine River for a hundred years—but for Elisabeth, it was a friendly place. It had been her haven since the summer she was fifteen, when her mother had died suddenly and her grieving, overwhelmed father had sent her here to stay with his somewhat eccentric widowed sister-in-law, Verity.
Inside, she leaned back against the sturdy door, remembering. Rue’s wealthy parents had been divorced that same year, and Elisabeth’s cousin had joined the fold. Verity Claridge, who told fabulous stories of ghosts and magic and people traveling back and forth between one century and another, had taken both girls in and simply loved them.
Elisabeth bit her lower lip and hoisted her slender frame away from the door. It was too much to hope, she thought with a beleaguered smile, that Aunt Verity might still be wandering these spacious rooms.
With a sigh, she hung her shoulder bag over the newel post at the base of the stairway and hoisted the suitcase. At the top of the stairs were three bedrooms, all on the right-hand side of the hallway. Elisabeth paused, looking curiously at the single door on the left-hand side and touched the doorknob.
Beyond that panel of wood was a ten-foot drop to the sun-porch roof. The sealed door had always fascinated both her and Rue, perhaps because Verity had told them such convincing stories about the world that lay on the other side of it.
Elisabeth smiled and shook her head, making her chin-length blond curls bounce around her face. “You may be gone, Auntie,” she said softly, “but your fanciful influence lives on.”
With that, Elisabeth opened the door on the opposite side of the hallway and stepped into the master suite that had always been Verity’s. Although the rest of the house was badly in need of cleaning, the real-estate agent had sent a cleaning crew over in anticipation of Elisabeth’s arrival to prepare the kitchen and one bedroom.
The big four-poster had been uncovered and polished, made up with the familiar crocheted ecru spread and pillow shams, and the scent of lemon furniture polish filled the air. Elisabeth laid the suitcase on the blue-velvet upholstered bench at the foot of the bed and tucked her hands into the back pockets of her jeans as she looked around the room.
The giant mahogany armoire stood between two floor-to-ceiling windows covered by billowing curtains of Nottingham lace, waiting to receive the few clothes Elisabeth had brought with her. A pair of Queen Anne chairs, upholstered in rich blue velvet, sat facing the little brick fireplace, and a chaise longue covered in cream-colored brocade graced the opposite wall. There was also a desk—Verity had called it a secretary—and a vanity table with a seat needle-pointed with pale roses.
Pushing her tousled tresses back from her face with both hands, Elisabeth went to the vanity and perched on the bench. A lump filled her throat as she recalled sitting here while Verity styled her hair for a summer dance.
With a hand that trembled slightly, Elisabeth opened the ivory-inlaid jewel box. Verity’s favorite antique necklace, given to her by a friend, lay within.
Elisabeth frowned.
Odd,
she reflected. She’d thought Rue had taken the delicate filigree necklace, since she was the one who loved jewelry. Verity’s modest estate—the house, furnishings, a few bangles and a small trust fund—had been left to Elisabeth and Rue in equal shares, and then the cousins had made divisions of their own.
Carefully, Elisabeth opened the catch and draped the necklace around her neck. She smiled sadly, recalling Verity’s assertions that the pendant possessed some magical power.
Just then, the telephone rang, startling her even though the agent at the real-estate office had told her service had been connected and had given her the new number.
“Hello?” she said into the receiver of the French phone sitting on the vanity table.
“So you made it in one piece.” The voice belonged to Janet Finch, one of Elisabeth’s closest friends. She and Janet had taught together at Hillsdale Elementary School in nearby Seattle.
Elisabeth sagged a little as she gazed into the mirror. The necklace looked incongruous with her Seahawks sweatshirt. “You make it sound like I crawled here through a barrage of bullets,” she replied. “I’m all right, Janet. Really.”
Janet sighed. “Divorce is painful, even if it was your own idea,” she insisted quietly. “I just think it would have been better if you’d stayed in Seattle, where your friends are. I mean, who do you know in that town now that your aunt is gone and Rue is off in South Africa or Eastern Europe or wherever she is?”
Through the windows, Elisabeth could see the neighbor’s orchard. It was only too true that most of her friends had long since moved away from Pine River and her life had been in Seattle from the moment she’d married Ian. “I know myself,” she answered. “And the Buzbee sisters.”
Despite her obvious concerns, Janet laughed. Like Elisabeth, she was barely thirty, but she could be a real curmudgeon at times. “The Buzbee sisters? I don’t think you’ve told me about them.”
Elisabeth smiled. “Of course, I have. They live across the road. They’re spinsters, but they’re also card-carrying adventurers. According to Aunt Verity, they’ve been all over the world—they even did a joint hitch in the Peace Corps.”
“Fascinating,” Janet said, but Elisabeth couldn’t tell whether she meant it or not.
“When you come down to visit, I’ll introduce you,” Elisabeth promised, barely stifling a yawn. Lately, she’d tired easily; the emotional stresses and strains of the past year were catching up with her.
“If that’s an invitation, I’m grabbing it,” Janet said quickly. “I’ll be down on Friday night to spend the weekend helping you settle in.”
Elisabeth smiled, looking around the perfectly furnished room. There wasn’t going to be a tremendous amount of “settling in” to do. And although she wanted to see Janet, she would have preferred to spend that first weekend alone, sorting through her thoughts and absorbing the special ambiance of Aunt Verity’s house. “I’ll make spaghetti and meatballs,” she said, resigned. “Call me when you get to Pine River and I’ll give you directions.”
“I don’t need directions,” Janet pointed out reasonably. “You were married in that house, in case you’ve forgotten, and I was there.” Her voice took on a teasing note. “You remember. Rue and I and two of your friends from college were all dressed alike, in floaty pink dresses and picture hats, and your cousin said it was a shame we couldn’t sing harmony.”
Elisabeth chuckled and closed her eyes. How she missed Rue, with her quick, lethal wit. She drew a deep breath, let it out, and made an effort to sound cheerful so Janet wouldn’t worry about her any more than she already did. “I’ll be looking for you on Friday, in time for dinner,” Elisabeth said. And then, after quick good-byes, she hung up.
With a sigh of relief, Elisabeth crossed the room to the enormous bed, kicked off her sneakers and stretched out, her hands cupped behind her head. Looking up at the intricately crocheted canopy, she felt a sense of warm well-being wash over her.
She would make a list and shop for groceries later, she promised herself. Right now she needed to rest her eyes for a few moments.
She must have drifted off, because when the music awakened her, the spill of sunlight across the hooked rug beside the bed had receded and there was a slight chill in the air.
Music.
Elisabeth’s heart surged into her throat as she sat up and looked around. There was no radio or TV in the room, and yet the distant, fairylike notes of a piano still teased her ears, accompanied by a child’s voice.
“Twinkle, twinkle, little star
how I wonder what you are….”
Awkwardly, Elisabeth scrambled off the bed to pursue the sound, but it ceased when she reached the hallway.
All the same, she hurried downstairs.
The small parlor, where Aunt Verity’s spinet was kept, was empty, and the piano itself was hidden beneath a large canvas dust cover. Feeling a headache begin to pulse beneath her right temple, Elisabeth checked the big, old-fashioned radio in the large parlor and the portable TV set on the kitchen counter.
Neither was on.
She shoved her hands through her already-mussed hair. Maybe her friends were right to be concerned. Maybe the divorce was affecting her more deeply than she’d ever guessed.
The thing to do, she decided after a five-minute struggle to regain her composure, was to get her purse and drive into Pine River for groceries. Since she’d left her shoes behind, she started up the rear stairway.
An instant after Elisabeth reached the second floor, the piano music sounded clearly again, thunderous and discordant. She froze, her fingers closed around Aunt Verity’s pendant.
“I don’t want to practice anymore,” a child’s voice said petulantly. “It’s sunny out, and Vera and I are having a picnic by the creek.”
Elisabeth closed her eyes, battling to retain her equilibrium. The voice, like the music, was coming from the other side of the door Aunt Verity had told so many stories about.
As jarring as the experience was, Elisabeth had no sense of evil. It was her own mental state she feared, not the ghosts that supposedly populated this old house. Perhaps in her case, the result of a broken dream had been a broken mind.
She walked slowly along the highway, gripped the doorknob and rattled it fiercely. The effort to open the door was hopeless, since the passage had been sealed long ago, but Elisabeth didn’t let up. “Who’s there?” she cried.
She wasn’t crazy. Someone, somewhere, was playing a cruel joke on her.
Finally exhausted, she released her desperate hold on the knob, and asked again plaintively, “Please. Who’s there?”
“Just us, dear,” said a sweet feminine voice from the top of the main stairway. The music had died away to an echo that Elisabeth thought probably existed only in her mind.
She turned, a wan smile on her face, to see the Buzbee sisters, Cecily and Roberta, standing nearby.
Roberta, the taller and more outgoing of the two, was holding a covered baking dish and frowning. “Are you quite all right, Elisabeth?” she asked.
Cecily was watching Elisabeth with enormous blue eyes. “That door led to the old part of the house,” she said. “The section that was burned away in 1892.”
Elisabeth felt foolish, having been caught trying to open a door to nowhere. She managed another smile and said, “Miss Cecily, Miss Roberta—it’s so good to see you.”
“We’ve brought Cecily’s beef casserole,” Roberta said, practical as ever. “Sister and I thought you wouldn’t want to cook, this being your first night in the house.”
“Thank you,” Elisabeth said shakily. “Would you like some coffee? I think there might be a jar of instant in one of the cupboards….”
“We wouldn’t
think
of intruding,” said Miss Cecily.
Elisabeth led the way toward the rear stairway, hoping her gait seemed steady to the elderly women behind her. “You wouldn’t be intruding,” she insisted. “It’s a delight to see you, and it was so thoughtful of you to bring the casserole.”
From the size of the dish, Elisabeth figured she’d be able to live on the offering for a week. The prospective monotony of eating the same thing over and over didn’t trouble her; her appetite was small these days, and what she ate didn’t matter.
In the kitchen, Elisabeth found a jar of coffee, probably left behind by Rue, who liked to hole up in the house every once in a while when she was working on a big story. While water was heating in a copper kettle on the stove, Elisabeth sat at the old oak table in the breakfast nook, talking with the Buzbee sisters.
She neatly skirted the subject of her divorce, and the sisters were too well-mannered to pursue it. The conversation centered on the sisters’ delight at seeing the old house occupied again. Through all of it, the child’s voice and the music drifted in Elisabeth’s mind, like wisps of a half-forgotten dream.
Twinkle, twinkle…
Trista Fortner’s small, slender fingers paused on the piano keys. Somewhere upstairs, a door rattled hard on its hinges. “Who’s there?” a feminine voice called over the tremendous racket.
Trista got up from the piano bench, smoothed her freshly ironed poplin pinafore and scrambled up the front stairs and along the hallway.