I ignored the faint nudging at my mind.
"There's a bloke there wot wants ye," Jem said, glowering at me. I was starting to get used to his perpetual sulk, figuring it was just part and parcel of a teenage male, even ghostly teenage males. I nodded at him, then took a closer look at his face.
"Whatever have you done to your eyebrow? It can't be… You didn't… Is it pierced? Why did you do that? More important, how did you do that?"
He slouched aggressively at me.
"And what happened to your powdered wig? Didn't you have a powdered wig? I know you had a powdered wig!"
He sneered.
Someone behind me nudged my mind again.
"Esme, is it possible for you to change your appearance if you desire?"
She sat with ladylike elegance in the leather chair behind Christian's desk. "Why, yes, dear, of course we can. Anytime."
"But… but…" I looked from her ratty slippers to her nightgown and bathrobe. "But if you can change your clothes and such…"
She smiled. "There will come a time in your life when you learn to value comfort over fashion. Although I hope for Christian's sake that time doesn't come anytime soon. You're comfortable enough now."
I cleared my throat and looked away, feeling a bit of a blush burn my cheeks. We'd had a terrible time getting Esme from Christian's room once she decided that it was her matchmaking efforts that had made the difference in our relationship. Christian had to decline her offer of lovemaking advice three times before we finally convinced her to go haunt his study, the room I now stood in.
The ghost behind me nudged me again. I gritted my teeth and ignored it.
"Okay, so the rule is that you must stay here in this room, and no investigating anywhere else in the house. Christian will be up once it's dark, and I'll be gone until then, so you're just going to have to amuse yourselves as best you can until then. Need I remind you—Alis, would you please stop trying to knock over Christian's vase! I doubt if you can summon the psychic energy necessary to have a physical impact on it, and all that arm waving is a bit distracting. Where was I?"
Behind me, a book flew off the bookshelf and hit the desk. Esme looked at it with interest.
"Um… oh, yes. Need I remind you that if anyone misbehaves—"
A second book flew off the shelf.
"—the punishment will be the keepers. Since I've heard from you all that you don't like being bound to a bobble and stuffed in my pocket, I trust you'll all behave so I won't have to take that action."
A red rose materialized out of the air and fell to my feet.
"Oh, my, how romantic!" Esme said as the cat limped over to sniff it.
"Wot're we supposed t'do then, while yer off? Just sit 'ere an' watch fold loony bat at them big fancy bits?"
I stepped over the rose and picked up the remote control to the television hidden in an oak armoire. "I'll turn the TV on, but low. You can watch it, or stare out the window, or pick your toes for all I care, just as long as you do it in this room."
Jem dropped his habitual sullenness long enough to stare in openmouthed surprise at the TV. "Wot's it?"
"It's a television. Oh, I don't have time to explain it to you. Esme, you've seen one, yes?"
"Heavens, yes. The maid who used to do my room turned it on every day. Mr. Woogums and I became quite the devotees of Coronation Street."
Two more roses materialized and fluttered down at my feet, accompanied by a big push at my mind. "Good, you can explain what a TV is to Jem. Alis, what is your problem?"
"She was a housekeeper, dear."
"So?"
"For a man who owned a sizable china collection. He insisted that she be the only one who attend to his things, since they were so valuable. It's only natural that she should hate the sight of objets d'art."
"Hmmm." I watched her for a moment. "You don't think she could focus enough to actually do any damage?" Ghosts, when focused, can sometimes rally enough psychic energy to interact in our world in a physical manner, as demonstrated by the roses that were appearing with regularity at my feet. I knew Christian's vase and a nearby delicate bust of a Greek goddess that had also attracted Alis's attention must be valuable, and hated to think of her inadvertently destroying them.
Esme tore her eyes from the TV and looked thoughtful. "I doubt it, although the gentleman who's trying to get your attention certainly could."
At her words, the jade green-and-blue vase lifted up three inches off its plinth and tilted at a rakish angle.
"Put that down!" I snarled, reaching in my pocket for my chalk and ash. "Carefully, or I won't Summon you!"
The vase settled down with a soft murmur of antique china on highly polished wood.
I drew a circle, hurried through the wards, spoke the words, and pushed away the annoyance of having to Summon a pesky, pushy ghost when I needed to be leaving. I had a difficult enough time dragging myself from Christian's arms after only a couple of hours of sleep; I didn't want to be here when he awoke and noticed my absence.
As I sneezed and got to my feet the air shimmered and collected itself, darkening into the figure of a swarthy man with dark, curly hair, a short, pointed beard, glittering blue eyes, an Elizabethan ruff, a scarlet-and-gold doublet, and what surely must have been a greatly exaggerated codpiece. I grounded the spirit and gathered up my coat.
"Mi amor! My beautiful one! You 'ave at last succumbed to my charms and you draw me forth!" His voice was a pleasant tenor with a heavy Spanish accent. I pegged him for one of the Spanish courtiers who hung around Elizabeth's court before the armada took a drubbing.
"What's your name?" I asked as I shoved my arms into my coat.
He kissed his hand to me. "I am Antonio de Gutierrez, Count de Seville and your most 'umble servant."
He made a deep, flourish-laden bow.
"You have ten seconds to explain why you insisted I Summon you."
"Mi corazón," he said, his hand over his heart, his eyes filled with amorous longing. "You 'ave only to ask, and I will attend. I saw you in the arms of that peon, that Dark One, and I knew you were meant for me. You are a Summoner! You have the same fire in your 'eart as I 'ave in mine. Who else could 'ave brought me forth from the dark and dismal existence I 'ave suffered these many centuries?"
I shook a small, squat candle at him. "Look here, no one—I repeat, no one—is allowed to watch when Christian and I… er… when we're alone together. Everyone got that?"
Esme nodded. Jem floated in a cross-legged position about six inches away from the TV. Alis started screaming at a small ceramic cat that sat in one of the bookcases. Mr. Woogums licked his private parts.
"Good. Now, as for you…" I turned back to Antonio. He flung himself toward the door and struck a seductive pose before it. "I don't have the time to stay and hear your story, or figure out what it is you need to move on, so this is going to have to be quick. Either you agree to stay right here, in this room, without stepping spectral foot from it, or I'll bind you to this candle."
He stared at the candle. It had herbs mixed into the wax, and had a pleasing scent reminiscent of frankincense. "You could not find something a bit more masculine? A bit more dashing?"
"No. It's either the candle or stay in this room without leaving. The choice is yours."
He made a pretty pout, which quickly turned into a full-frontal leer. "I will agree to your demands, my fiery one, but it is only because I live to please you."
"You're dead," I pointed out as I grabbed my purse. "All right, everyone, be good. I'll be back as soon as I can. And remember the bobbles! The first one of you who steps out of line will be bobbled for a whole week!"
Esme gasped and put a hand to her cheek. Alis and Jem ignored me. Antonio upped the wattage in his leer and waggled his eyebrows in a manner I was sure he felt was breathtakingly provocative.
"Mi corazón, would you not care to 'ave a little discussion with me in a private little room I know of? It would not take long, perhaps 'alf an 'our or so. You will take off your clothes, and I will take off my clothes, and then we will—"
"No! Now stay here and behave."
He gave me a look that had he been alive would have melted steel. "You do not know what you will be missing, but me, I will be patient. Soon you will be mine! Soon you will look at me and demand I pleasure you as I 'ave pleasured so many other women." He stopped suddenly, muttering something under his breath. "Women that meant nothing to me, nothing at all. I cannot even remember them, so dazzling is your beauty."
I shooed him away from the door with an exasperated sigh. He posed next to the Greek bust, stacking his hands on top of it and resting his chin on his hands, donning an expression that would have been irresistible had he been living.
"Oh, for heaven's… Antonio, you're dead. I'm alive. Even if I wanted to, and I can tell you that Christian is more than enough man for any woman, there is no way I can be yours. The sooner you get that idea through your head, the happier we'll both be. So stop giving me those seductive little looks and put your codpiece on ice. I've got more important things to do than to beat off a five-hundred-year-old Romeo."
"Antonio, not Romeo," he said mournfully, looking at me with wounded puppy-dog eyes.