Chapter Twenty
Chapter
Twenty
“I think I’ve fallen in love with Britannia Lovell.”
My feet had barely hit the bottom step of the staircase before Leo grabbed my arm and half dragged me out through the back of the house and into the walled kitchen garden, where we’re now hidden from sight behind the giant rhubarb.
“Bloody hell, Leo.” I sigh, trying to hide my exasperation. “Can you even hear how ridiculous that sounds?”
He’s pacing in front of me, three steps left, three steps right, coating his mirror-shiny black leather boots in a fine mist of dust.
“Says the woman who is clearly getting it on with Fletcher Gunn, of all people.”
Here we go again. “How is that even remotely the same thing?”
He stops pacing to eyeball me as if I’ve asked a stupid question. “He’s just as inappropriate for you as she is for me.”
“How, Leo? How is someone who is similar in age, single, and breathing equally as unsuitable as someone who is one hundred and twenty-five, married with a violent lover, and dead?”
He looks down his nose at me. “You’ve got about as much chance of going the distance with him as I have with her.”
That hit home. “Meaning what?”
“Meaning we all know that Fletcher Gunn is a man-whore who only wants you this week because you’re playing some bizarre game of house. And getting heavily into character, if this morning’s ridiculous choice of sleepwear is anything to judge by.”
A man-whore? I don’t think we do all know that, actually. In truth, I don’t know the first thing about Fletch’s romantic history. Because I’m feeling catty about Leo’s wisecrack, I fire a round of bullets right back at him.
“It was Britannia’s nightdress, not mine, if you must know. She asked me to wear it because she wanted to see it again. I think it might have been from her wedding night.”
He takes the bullet right between his dark, searching eyes. I don’t feel especially proud of telling him that he caught his ex-lover wearing his dead crush’s nightie. It’s all kind of screwed up, isn’t it? I’m just sick to death of his judgmental attitude where my romantic life is concerned.
“I have to say this, Leo,” I say hotly. “You kind of lost the right to comment on my love life when you dumped me, okay? What I choose to do, or not do, with Fletcher Gunn, or with anyone else for that matter, has absolutely nothing to do with you. Have you got that?”
He scowls and shrugs his shoulders. “It was just friendly advice. Take it or leave it.”
“I’ll leave it, thank you very much.” I cross my arms over my Rugrats-emblazoned chest and glare at him.
“Now, if I’m not very much mistaken, we’re lurking behind this bush because of problems in your love life, not mine.
What the hell do you want me to do about the fact you think you’re in love with a ghost? ”
He passes both of his hands over his shiny hair and shakes his head, an out-of-character loss of composure for him.
“I don’t know what to do.”
I pause to think. “Well, I don’t see as you can actually do anything, Leo. I’m sorry to be blunt, but Britannia’s dead. There’s no coming back from that.”
“Don’t you think I know that? But I had her blood on my hands, Melody, her actual blood. You saw it with your own eyes, didn’t you?”
He’s not messing around here. He’s borderline emo at the best of times, but right now he’s more like borderline breakdown.
I nod and try to look tactful. “I did, and we both know how incredibly rare that is. I’m not saying that you haven’t forged an unusual connection with her because it’s obvious you have but, Leo…it can’t lead to anything. You do understand that, right?”
Unfortunately, Leo looks as if he doesn’t agree. His brow draws down heavily over his eyes, stubborn and brooding.
“She’s trying to achieve contact.”
“And she might manage it, briefly, in a day, or a week, or a year. Is that what you want? To watch her die daily on the off chance that she’ll achieve temporary physical form so you can get it on like rabbits in springtime?
Because that’s a whole lot of ifs, buts, and maybes to stake your future happiness on.
And what happens afterward, if it ever actually happens at all?
You’ll feel worse and then become one of her unlikely trio of suitors, except you’re even more stupid than they are because you’re actually alive and breathing and wasting your life. ”
He’s staring at me now. Or glaring at me, because the truth has obviously hurt. “Of course that isn’t what I want. God, I don’t know what I want, okay? I thought you’d understand.” He shakes his head. “As someone who’s loved and lost, I expected more empathy from you.”
Hang on. Is he telling me that I should be a more sympathetic ear about his heartache because he made my heart ache? His smugness knows no bounds, and even worse, I don’t think he’s aware of the irony.
“Well, I don’t understand,” I say shortly.
“Here’s what I think. You’ve fallen for the oldest trick in the book.
One flick of her long eyelashes and Britannia has you right where she wants you on her hook, wriggling like a fish at her beck and call.
Has it not even occurred to you that she might be doing all of this to try to put you off your job? ”
It strikes me then that she might be trying to befriend me for the exact same reason. I don’t think so somehow though; I think she’s genuinely lonely. She’s gregarious and severely company deprived; I’m the first living female she’s had to talk to since she died.
But then…isn’t Leo the first real man she’s had to talk to too?
Maybe she isn’t the cunning manipulator I’ve just made her out to be.
Perhaps she’s just sparking off us and is as bowled over by our company as we are by her vibrant presence.
God, I’m even confusing myself, which is of no help to either Leo or the case.
“I don’t think I can extinguish her. She’s so beautiful,” he says, downcast.
“Is that what you needed to tell me? That you can’t do your job?”
He snags a flower off a honeysuckle trailing over the garden wall and picks the creamy petals off one by one, unwilling to admit defeat in such bald terms.
“I just need your help more than I expected to.”
I read between the lines and know that what he actually means is he can’t do this job, but he still wants to flounce about on TV and be paid for his efforts while I do all the actual work.
“Just go and do whatever you do with your TV people,” I say with a sigh. “Leave me to have a think.”
Marina and Artie walk in through the front door as I come back in from behind the giant rhubarb.
“Has it really been less than a day since you were last here?” I say, hugging Marina like she’s a ship’s mast in a monumental storm. “It feels more like a week and we’ve got so much still to do.”
She extricates herself delicately from my clutches after a couple of moments and then shoots a filthy look at one of the TV crew who tries to drag an extension lead across the flagstones beneath her spike heels.
“Damage my shoes, I’ll damage your camera,” she snarls, and he pushes his glasses nervously up his nose and scurries away.
Artie watches the exchange almost fondly; he knows Marina well enough by now to know that that was actually quite polite by her standards.
“I might just go and look in on Lestat,” he says, nodding toward the kitchen.
“He’s not there. My mum took him back to Chapelwick last night.”
He looks utterly crestfallen, and I don’t think it’s because he’s missing his furry amigo.
“I could kill for a coffee though,” Marina says, pretending to splutter because her throat is so dry.
“Me too, come to think of it,” I say hoarsely.
He brightens instantly. “On the case. Two coffees coming up.”
“What’s the betting he’ll come back with lipstick on his collar?” Marina murmurs as we watch him walk away.
“I hope not, for his sake. His mother would have a turn.”
I don’t think either of us realistically expect Artie to engage in a kitchen table clinch with Hells Bells. He’s more likely to send her a handwritten note asking to fill her dance card at the ball on Saturday.
“Long night?” Marina says, patting me on the back because I’ve just lunged in for a second quick hug.
It’s just that she’s living and breathing and not trying to screw me or double-cross me, so she’s becoming something of a rarity around these parts.
I go to tell her about last night, but there’s people milling around, and then Fletch himself jogs down the staircase and joins us.
I can smell his shower gel, citrus and fresh mornings, and his hair is still slightly damp and towel tousled.
If Marina is surprised to find him here she doesn’t show it. She just watches us keenly, probably trying to assert whether I took her unwise sex advice.
“I need to go back to Chapelwick for a while this morning,” I say, turning to Fletch. “We’ll probably be back on-site after lunch. And it’s nonwork related, so before you ask, no, you don’t need to shadow me.”
This is a lie, but I don’t care. If he shadows me at home he will no doubt come into contact with my family, and that won’t end well for anyone involved. There would be restraining orders.
“I should head into work this morning anyway,” he says, distracted by the TV crew turning the main reception hall into their makeshift TV studio. “I might just go and grab some coffee first though.”
He nods curtly and takes his leave, leaning away from Marina this time when she sniffs him again. We watch him until he disappears out of view toward the kitchen; I do hope Hells Bells and Artie are decent.
“He exudes a manly scent,” Marina says, lifting a knowing eyebrow in my direction. “Like a big fox on the prowl at night.”
“You mean like he’s been sniffing around people’s dustbins?”
“Like he’s had his nose stuck where he has no business sticking it,” she says. “So…did he?”
“Did he what?”
“Stick his nose somewhere he shouldn’t?”
“Is that some sort of Sicilian mating ritual?” I say snarkily, and she laughs it right off.