Belmary House Book One (4 page)

“I’m terribly sorry about him,” Ashford said, feeling sick. He made it a point not to learn anything about his own future, and tried to give his antecedents a wide berth, but he almost wanted to find out what went wrong with this bastard. “I can’t help but feel responsible.”

“Nonsense,” the cook said. “Every family tree has a crooked branch here and there.”

He smiled and continued poring over his notebook, exclaiming with relief when he finally found a way. Now if it only worked. It wasn’t a good feeling to suddenly be unable to trust something he’d counted on for years, but there was nothing for it but to continue on in the only way he knew. Or risk going mad like Wodge.

“Looks like I’ll have to lean on your hospitality for one night, then I shall be off.”

He glowed at the cook’s assurance that it was no trouble and her wishes that he could stay much longer, all the while worried about why Wodge would approach the house so boldly, and the fact that because of that scoundrel, he didn’t know with certainty when he might end up the next time he stepped into the portal.

Tilly sat ramrod straight in her Regency era dress and smoothed her skirt daintily, as she imagined a girl from that time might have. She’d had the time of her life going on a Jane Austen walking tour with one of the researchers, who’d been kind enough to lend her this gown. Dexter looked up from his work and rubbed his eyes, smiling at her.

“It’s fun, right?”

She stood up and curtsied, for about the seventh time that day. She loved the dress, the way it made her feel so feminine and kept her posture in line. She was going to Harrod’s and stock up on corsets at the first opportunity. Her days of loose camisoles and sports bras were over now that she knew the glory of the corset.

“Yes,” she said, falling back into the chair again. “The tour was fun, too. You should dress up in one of your outfits and we can go on another one tomorrow, maybe Charles Dickens era this time?”

“Sounds lovely, freak.” He looked back down at what he’d been working on and the amused smile slid off his face. “I can’t see what in hell the differences are,” he said. “My boss is an art specialist and she’ll no doubt pick them out straight away, but I was hoping to impress her.”

Tilly popped back up and looked at the painting. “What are you trying to find?”

He pointed at a painting with a bright light trained on it, then at a photo that lay beside it. “This painting was in a museum for several years before coming back here in 1979, and supposedly the owner at that time quietly sold it, and this one’s a fake. If someone else really owns the original they’re not admitting it. This photo is from the museum, and if this one’s a fake there should be minute differences.”

She cracked her knuckles showily and leaned over the painting, nudging him out of her way with her hip.

“Stand back,” she said, perusing the painting, then the photo. She laughed and pointed. “More black right here, this star is further to the left. I bet I could find more if you give me a few minutes to really study it.”

He looked, rubbed his eyes some more and shook his head. “Bloody hell, but that’s amazing. I’ve been looking at it for an hour.”

She shrugged. “It’s kind of my job to find differences,” she said, then slumped, at least as much as she could with her corset on. “Or, it was my job before I got sacked.”

“Goodness, Til. You weren’t sacked, you were put on administrative leave. You’re essentially on vacation, drama queen.”

“Oh, they only did that out of respect to dad’s memory. I think it’s pretty much expected I won’t darken their door again.”

“Then they’re stupid,” he said forcefully, ever loyal. “Aren’t there mob killings all the time in the states? You’ll do better next time.”

“Shut up,” she wailed, fresh shame washing over her as she recalled her screw up.

The stress of finally being responsible for something big had cracked her, she supposed. At least she hadn’t flubbed things so severely that the murderer got set free, but it had come close, everyone scrambling to find fresh evidence that hadn’t been tainted by her incompetence.

“Sorry, just trying to cheer you up,” Dex said. “So, you picked out those differences so fast from comparing fingerprints all day?”

The way he described her ex-job at the Santa Balda Police Department made it sound fairly bleak and uninteresting, which she had to admit it was plenty of times. She hadn’t been able to follow in her late father’s footsteps as a cop, so had become a forensic fingerprint analyst in an attempt to make him proud. She frowned, for the first time feeling oddly relieved to be free of it all. It caused a stab of guilt so strong, she coughed.

“Well, I am an artist as well,” she reminded him. “I did the witness sketches too, since we’re such a small precinct.”

“Ah, yeah, how could I forget,” he mused. “You drew all my favorite comic book characters for my room that one summer. I still have them, you know.”

“As you should. Maybe I’ll sit out on the Thames and draw caricatures for a living.”

“Or you could help me here,” he said eagerly. “We suspect that the Lord Ashford from the seventies was a bit of a con artist, and that a lot of the important pictures here might actually be fakes.”

“How many Lord Ashfords were there?” she asked, glad to be useful, and settling down in Dex’s spot at the work table.

“Loads,” he said, the look of a long story coming over his face. “This particular family title lasted a lot longer than many of them, and goes way back—”

The alarm beep alerting them someone had come in from the back cut him off and he darted to a row of gilt mirrors to check his hair.

“Oh, that’ll probably be Miss Saito, my boss.” He checked his teeth and tucked his t-shirt into his jeans, then pulled it out again.

She’d never seen him so flustered, and when Miss Saito walked into the room, she understood why in an instant. His boss was a petite woman with supermodel beauty. Her long glossy black hair nearly blinded Tilly when she passed by the well-lit work area and her luminous pale skin made her want to buy every available scrub and use them immediately. Her large almond eyes were serious as she greeted them, and her impeccable skirt and crisp blouse made Tilly feel like a crazy person in her previously beloved Regency gown.

Dex stumbled as he hurried forward to introduce her. “This is my American cousin, Tilly Jacobs,” he said, giving Tilly a quick wink from behind Miss Saito. “She’s a forensic specialist who’s helping me out with the forgeries.”

“Are you taking the piss because you have the same last names?” she said, narrowing her eyes first at Dex, then at Tilly.

Tilly laughed. They looked nothing alike, and no one ever believed they were related at first. She shook Miss Saito’s hand vigorously, delighted that Dex clearly had a crush on his boss. Her first objective was of course to make sure they ended up together, but barring that, she now had an endless well for teasing him.

“Our dads were brothers,” she explained. “They actually looked a lot alike, but Dex’s dad married an Egyptian beauty queen, which is why he’s so exotically handsome.” She grinned at her cousin’s murderous look. “My dad ran away to America and married a plain old midwestern farm girl which explains me. It’s very nice to meet you, Miss Saito.”

Miss Saito rolled her eyes. “Please, call me Emma. I’ve been telling Dexter the same thing for weeks.”

Dex looked as if he’d poke a needle in his eye before being able to take such liberties as say her first name, and Tilly took pity on him and decided to dial back her efforts to embarrass him. He showed her Tilly’s findings and Emma nodded approvingly, studying the painting herself and also announcing it a fake.

“I’m actually surprised to find anyone here so late,” she said, glancing at her gold wristwatch.

“Oh, that’s Dexter,” Tilly said. “He’s so dedicated. He works late every night.”

Rather than look impressed, Emma looked irritated and fiddled with her watch before sitting down.

“What brings you at this time?” Dex asked.

Emma’s cool expression twitched for a moment before she smiled stiffly. She looked at her watch yet again before sighing. “Just checking in. How are we on the schedule?”

“Exactly on schedule,” he said hurriedly, a clear lie. “Probably ahead of schedule, actually.”

“Good. The contractors are breathing down our necks.”

“We won’t fail,” Dex said, motioning for Tilly to get to work looking over the remaining paintings, and the desperate look in his eyes at wanting to impress Emma made her comply without fuss.

Poor guy had it bad, and as she studied the paintings she kept a surreptitious eye on their interactions. Dex was the kindest person she knew, and even though he was her cousin, she also considered him a straight up hottie. He was ridiculously good at his job, and passionate about it to boot, unlike her, who just did her job out of duty to her father’s memory.

However, the glamorous Emma Saito seemed completely oblivious to all his amazing qualities. And he kept making such awkward jokes as he continued working, it almost caused Tilly physical pain to see her growing ever more irritated by him.

She identified that four of the five paintings were indeed forgeries, and as Emma came over to double check, she decided to explore the house so she wouldn’t have to witness Dex’s crash and burn anymore.

“Where are you going?” Emma snapped, looking at her watch again. “I mean, the upper floors aren’t really safe, and since you’re not officially on the payroll, there might be insurance issues if you got hurt.” Her face fell into a tortured look that Tilly didn’t understand. “And of course, I don’t want you to get hurt.” She smiled nervously. “Perhaps we should all call it a night.”

“I’m right in the middle of this,” Dex said without looking up. “Give me twenty more minutes, then maybe we can grab a bite?”

Emma looked like she would explode, but nodded for him to carry on working.

“Oh, well, I’ll just hang around down here until you’re done, then.” The strange tension was too much and Tilly escaped before Emma could say more.

She wandered around the front rooms, tinkling away at a piano until her curiosity overcame her. Dex had laughed his fool head off when she’d sworn up and down that the man she’d seen the night before had been the same as the man in the miniature portrait. He’d poured her another drink and taken her to a club where she got good and snockered, even danced with a stranger, and she’d forgot about it until the Jane Austen walking tour.

The guide had worn clothes so similar to the man upstairs, she’d started obsessing about him again, describing him to the researcher she’d gone with and asking if anyone who worked at Belmary House fit that description. The girl snorted and said she wished. Except for Dexter, who was her supervisor and made her nervous, none of the other researchers were particularly attractive. And when they’d arrived back at the house, Tilly met everyone on the team, and none of them even came close to being similar, so she couldn’t blame it on being tipsy or tired.

She’d determined as soon as Dex was engrossed in something to the point he forgot about her, she was going to find evidence of the ghost. She’d get in the news, do a bunch of talk shows, and finally know for sure that there was life after death. Except now she’d been expressly told to stay downstairs. Well, sod that. She banged out a resoundingly sour note on the piano and projected herself toward the stairs before she lost her nerve.

Hoisting her skirts, she tiptoed up the wide front staircase, and made her way to the back hallway where she’d seen him the night before. As she tried to control her rapidly beating heart, she rounded a corner and almost split her corset from the gasp that escaped. Standing right outside the bedroom doorway was the man, or the ghost, tapping his toe and scowling down the dark hallway at her.

She stopped in her tracks, unsure if she was seeing things or if she’d gone mad. She’d been under a lot of stress the last week, what with getting fired and fleeing the country, maybe she was inventing supernatural apparitions to distract herself. She was embarrassed that she’d create an imaginary ghost who was so good looking, instead of a wise old grandmotherly type who might give her some life advice.

“It’s about time,” he said. “Please, do hurry.”

She was being invited to follow him, but where?
Think
, she told herself, but of course no thoughts came. She’d seen a vast variety of horror movies over the years and didn’t know if she should go into the light or not. What kind of idiot followed a ghost? But once again she was overcome with curiosity, unable to resist the lure of answers to the afterlife.

As she took a tentative step toward him, she half expected him to disappear in a poof of dust, but instead he merely went into the bedroom. Not about to let him disappear again, she raced after him, bursting through the door to see him standing by the chest of drawers, arms crossed and an impatient look plastered on his face. She paused, confused.

“We have less than thirty seconds. Please.” His face changed from fearsome glower to desperate pleading before he backed into the corner, holding out his hand to her.

Before she could decide what to do, he strode forward and gripped her wrist in a very strong, definitely corporeal way, dragging her toward the corner.

“You’re real,” she said, stumbling into him in her shock.