Penmort Castle

Chapter Twenty-Seven Showdown, Part One

Vivianna’s scream filled the room and with it mingled other terrified noises, muted shrieks and urgent voices.

Then, moving as one, the crowd shifted, panicked, toward the door.

Except Abby, Jenny, Mrs. Truman and Kieran who all stood frozen staring at the scene in front of them.

And Nicola, Fenella, Suzanne and Honor who were gazing wide-eyed up at Vivianna.

And finally Alistair and Cash, both immobile, heads tipped back, Alistair’s mouth agape, Cash’s jaw set.

Then Vivianna moved.

She trailed the length of the mantel, her phantom arm out, melting through the vases and figurines it displayed. Some of them rocked, several fell crashing to the floor.

Then she picked up speed, whipping through the room in a ghostly frenzy, causing screams from the edges of the crowd who had not yet acquired escape. She shot through the light fixture hanging from the ceiling rose in the room’s centre. The fixture swayed alarmingly, the crystals jingled, dust drifting down.

After that, she darted forward, toward Cash.

Abby strangled back a scream and barely checked an urge to dash forward as Cash released his restraining hold on his uncle. He bent into him, covering his uncle’s body protectively as Vivianna descended and made a pass. Abby was so terrified, she didn’t process the fact that she saw Vivianna’s trailing skirts drifting over Cash’s body, like they were real, not through it, like they were ethereal.

Vivianna’s speed sent her through the fireplace and she disappeared.

Cash came up quickly, bringing Alistair with him. He whirled, sending Alistair flying several feet but he didn’t watch his uncle move.

His eyes immediately turned to Kieran.

“Get the women out of here,” he ordered.

“But Abby has to stay. She has to go up to the gallery.” Only Mrs. Truman would argue with a Cash Fraser who looked ready – no, more to the point he looked like he wanted to tear someone limb-from-limb.

“Kieran, get them the fuck out of here,” Cash repeated, his glance going back to the fireplace, his addition of the f-word boding bad tidings.

“Abby has to stay!” Mrs. Truman shouted.

Cash’s torso twisted and he shouted back, “She’s on the ground floor! She’s not fucking climbing steps when that thing is loose.”

Kieran was on the move, hustling Abby and Jenny toward the door and they moved with him quickly as Fenella and Honor guided a stunned Nicola in their direction.

Suzanne didn’t move. “I’ll stay with –”

Cash cut her off with one word, “Go.”

She looked at him. “Cash, I can help.”

He leaned into her and roared, “Move!”

At that, as anyone would, Suzanne moved.

They were closing in on the exit when Vivianna reappeared, forming in front of them rapidly, her spiteful eyes on Alistair. Then they swung to Abby and her gaze was so poisonous the entire assemblage skidded to a halt upon viewing its venom.

Then without hesitation she zoomed toward Abby. Fenella let out a choked scream and before Abby could take even one step back, Vivianna swept low to the floor, her body swirling around Abby’s ankles and then up.

Abby stood frozen, not because she wanted to, but because she was stuck and even though she told her legs to move, for some supernatural reason, they didn’t.

Before terror could fill her all of a sudden an arm hooked at her waist. She was jerked back and then half-dragged, half-walked backward. Cash’s arm was about her, his body tight against hers.

Vivianna stopped her swirl and hovered, eyes narrowed on Cash and Abby.

Or more accurately, Cash’s arm held protectively around Abby’s body.

Then she opened her mouth and screamed, the sound far louder and far, far, far more terrifying.

“Stop it! Stop it! Stop it!” Fenella shrieked, hands to her ears then she pointed one finger at Vivianna who had turned to her and Fenella screeched, “Why don’t you leave them alone? Why can’t you just go away?”

Vivianna’s scream stilled and she aimed a twisted smile at Fenella before she darted toward her. Abby saw Fenella’s body brace but Vivianna sifted right through her and then she turned, curling around the room.

Cash took the opportunity and moved, half-carrying, half-dragging Abby, he sprinted toward the door but Vivianna zipped in front of them and they collided with her.

Abby and Cash flew backward like they’d hit a wall, bright white and red sparks bursting from Abby’s chest as they did so.

Vivianna reeled back as well but caught herself, ready this time for Abby’s protection, and made a mad dash back toward Abby and Cash. His arm curved tighter around her, his upper body leaned into hers, forcing her forward and to the side, preparing to shield her from impact but before he’d accomplished his task, in front of them the body of a straight, tall, immensely handsome, see-through man appeared.

When it did Vivianna’s face became startled and she tried to halt her progress but she slammed into him and his arms immediately went about her, imprisoning her in his grasp.

Abby, half bent, Cash’s chest pressing heavily into her back, her head turned to the action, stared in stunned disbelief at the ghost of Anthony Beaumaris, Cash’s father, standing before them, subduing a struggling Vivianna.

He turned, his eyes on Cash, and his mouth formed one word, a word heard shimmering through the air rather than emitting from his lips.

“Gallery.”

Then he and Vivianna disappeared.

Before Abby could even begin to process this Cash yanked her up then, with a hand at her wrist, whirled her around. His fingers still around her wrist, he pulled her arm out, bent double, released her wrist, his shoulder went into her belly and she was being lifted. Once he had her in place, he began running, her torso hanging over his back, her legs down his chest.

He sprinted past everyone through the hall. Even though she couldn’t see where they were going, when she saw they’d passed the stairs she knew he was heading to the front door.

“Cash, we have to go to the gallery,” Abby cried urgently, but her voice was halting as she rocked on his shoulder.

“No fucking way,” Cash growled back, stopping after he descended the stone steps of the entry to heave open the door but Abby started struggling, writhing on his shoulder.

“Cash, your father said take me to the gallery,” she shouted.

He’d taken two steps outside when he lost control of her squirming body. She slid for a second out-of-control down his arm before he caught her. His arm under her shoulder blades, the other rounding her thighs, he put her safely to her feet.

Then he grabbed her hand and started to move.

Abby planted her feet but her shoes skidded across the stone as he pulled.

He stopped, spinning around to look at her and clipped, “Abby!”

“Cash, no,” she cut him off as the others came dashing out of the house to surround them, “we have to go to the gallery.”

Cash ignored their audience and bit out, “We’re not going to the fucking gallery.”

“We have to finish this tonight!” Abby yelled desperately.

Why she cared anymore about the end of Vivianna, knowing she and Cash were through, was a mystery to her.

No, she had to admit, it wasn’t.

Jenny was right.

Abby was in love with Cash. She was in love with him and Penmort was his legacy. He wanted it and she wanted it for him. All of it. With none of it controlled by a ghosty she-bitch.

She didn’t have the chance to sort through the sad fact she was, indeed, in love with Cash Fraser, International Hot Guy, in love with him enough to risk her life, because he tugged briskly at her arm.

Abby stayed determinedly fixed.

“We’ll find another way,” he declared when she didn’t move.

“There is no other way,” she shot back.

He leaned into her and repeated on a shout, “We’ll find another fucking way!”

A different Scottish voice, this one disembodied, came from behind Cash. “Take her to the gallery.”

Cash turned and he, Abby and their entourage stared into the vacant dark.

“Angus?” Honor called softly.

“Take her to the gallery,” Angus’s voice, closer and softer now although he still didn’t appear, encouraged again. “Don’t worry, laddie, I’ve got your back.”

Cash stared in the direction of the voice, lips thin, jaw clenched and Abby held her breath.

Finally Cash growled, “Something happens to her –”

Angus’s voice cut him off. “I’ve got your back. More importantly, I’ve got hers.”

Cash closed his eyes and sucked breath into his nose. Then his eyes opened and they sliced to Abby. She watched a muscle leap in his cheek before he moved toward her.

“Let’s fucking do this,” he muttered, hand still in Abby’s, he led her back through the door but once they were inside, he stopped and looked back at Kieran. “Get them safe, off the castle grounds.”

“We’ll go with you,” Nicola, clearly having recovered from her shock and morphing straight into Mom Mode, offered.

“No,” Cash replied shortly and turned back but he was thwarted again.“Well, I’m going,” Mrs. Truman proclaimed, Cash came around again and he and Abby watched as the older woman stomped toward them on her granny pumps.

“You’re not coming with us,” Cash stated firmly.

“I am,” Mrs. Truman retorted, halting and glaring up at Cash.

“No, you are not,” Cash returned.

She planted her hands on her hips and snapped, “Yes I am, Cash Fraser. You can’t tell me what to do. I don’t care how tall you are!”

Abby felt then quelled the crazed desire to laugh out loud.

“I’m coming too,” Jenny put in, coming to stand by Mrs. Truman.

“And me,” Fenella moved forward as well.

“Me too,” Honor joined the group.

“I am too,” Suzanne announced, not joining the group but striding confidently forward, she rounded Cash and Abby and went straight to and up the stairs.

“Fucking hell,” Cash muttered and his eyes moved to his uncle. “Can you do one thing for your wife and get her to safety?”

But alas, at Cash’s query, Alistair Beaumaris proved he was the Jerk to End All Jerks.

“You’ll not be in my house, doing whatever-it-is-you’re-going-to-do, without me in it,” Alistair announced and stomped forward too, skirting a now even angrier Cash and heading toward the stairs.

Nicola gracefully linked arms with Kieran as if they were about to embark on a moonlit stroll, not battle a she-bitch-from-hell and moved forward. “Well, it looks like we’re all going.”

“Jesus,” Kieran mumbled, pained eyes on Cash and everyone shoved in the door, moving around Cash and Abby and climbing the stairs.

Cash looked down at Abby and remarked dryly, “You’re racking up quite a debt, darling, because I think, somehow, you owe me for this too.”

Abby bit her lip and shrugged but this time Cash did not laugh, chuckle, smile or even grin. He glared at her so ferociously she gulped at his scorching look and then he led her toward the stairs.

However behind them a disembodied male chortle could be heard and Abby knew Cash definitely heard it.

She knew this because his hand squeezed hers painfully tight and he muttered, “You definitely fucking owe me.”

Abby didn’t have time to worry about Cash’s dire statement.

She had stairs to climb.

She held her breath through the first set of stairs then she let it go on the landing only to hold it again on the second.

It wasn’t until they hit the gallery that she allowed herself to relax.

Not relax relax, as in, putting your feet up with a book and a nice, big glass of pinot noir at the end of a trying day. But just kind of relax, as in making it up a stairwell made dangerous by a phantom yet the real battle still yawned ahead of you.

The gallery was ablaze with lights and everyone was there when they entered.

“Maybe I should go get some champagne,” Honor offered.

“Nobody fucking leaves this room,” Cash returned immediately, dropping Abby’s hand and cutting a scowl throughout the group.

Honor’s brows went up and her eyes slid to Abby.

Abby gave her a grimace of solidarity but shrewdly decided against speaking.

“Well I, for one, think this is very interesting,” Suzanne remarked from across the room.

She was standing, arms crossed under her breasts, the cleavage bared by her fuchsia gown that had a daring V which went nearly to her navel became all the more pronounced with her stance. She had a foot out and a hip jutted and her eyes were aimed at Alistair.

“Suzanne, please,” Nicola begged, “now is not a good time.”

“Of course you’re right, Mum,” Suzanne agreed. “Though, I will say, I do hope Anthony Beaumaris hangs around after Vivianna is gone. I would just love to hear what he has to say.”

“Shut your goddamned mouth,” Alistair snapped.

“Make me,” she snapped back and Alistair made as if to move but Cash’s voice cracked through the room like a whiplash.

“You take one step closer to her, Alistair, I’ll throw you out the fucking window myself.”

Alistair’s body froze but his hate filled eyes shot to Cash.

“I should never have invited you to this house,” he clipped.

“No, you shouldn’t have,” Cash concurred then Abby’s tense body went solid when he spoke his next words. “I’ll not make the same mistake.”

“I wouldn’t step foot in your home even if you paid me,” Alistair returned.

“You did five minutes ago,” Cash retorted, Abby’s breath caught and the air in the room went still as everyone’s eyes riveted on Cash.

Alistair’s face paled, his lips parted in shock but he quickly recovered and slid into bluster. “What are you on about?”

“I’m on about the lien I have on Penmort,” Cash informed him. “The one I purchased two months ago from a very grateful bank who hadn’t been receiving payments for six months. Nor, I expect, did they want to foreclose and be saddled with a castle they would likely never be able to unload. I don’t share that reluctance, I’m foreclosing now.”

“I knew this would be interesting,” Suzanne commented happily.

At the same time Fenella muttered, “Oh my.”

And at the same time Honor let out an amused chuckle.

Alistair ignored their onlookers, he only had eyes for Cash.

“You can’t be serious,” he breathed.

“Deadly,” Cash shot back.

Alistair’s hands fisted at his sides as his face grew red and he declared, “I’ll pay you.”

“You don’t have the money to pay me,” Cash reminded him.

Alistair leaned forward. “Then I’ll start selling. The Wedgewood collection alone –”

Cash’s body went visibly tight before he clipped out, “You sell one piece of my legacy, I’ll see you in court, day in and day out, until the only thing you have left is the clothes on your fucking back.”

Abby, already close to Cash, got closer and her fingers curled around his.

His hand gave hers a light squeeze right before Alistair grinned and scoffed, “Your legacy? That’s damned funny. Penmort has never been held outside the legitimate line.”

“That isn’t exactly true,” Honor put in airily and everyone looked to her as she continued, talking like she was a history teacher and they were her class. “In 1697, Edward Beaumaris, never married, died without a legitimate heir. However, being somewhat of a rake, he had five illegitimate children, three boys and two girls. The first born boy, Randall, assumed the Beaumaris name and took over as master of the castle.”

“Edward Beaumaris obviously didn’t have a brother,” Alistair retorted.

“Actually, he had four,” Honor returned, a font of ready knowledge about the Beaumaris family.

Clearly, Abby thought, over the last twenty-five years Honor had spent a good deal of time in the library.

Nicola let out a soft laugh, Alistair’s gaze cut to her and his voice was hideous when he hissed, “Shut your bloody mouth.”

At that Cash dropped Abby’s hand and in three long strides he was in Alistair’s space. Alistair, taken unawares, belatedly shuffled back but Cash kept advancing until he had his uncle pinned against the wall.

Once there Cash leaned threateningly closer but didn’t touch the older man.

“Your days of malice toward the Fitzhugh women are over, starting now. I hear you’ve even looked at one of them funny, tomorrow or twenty years in the future, I swear to Christ you’ll wish you were never fucking born. Do you get my meaning?”

“Back off,” Alistair demanded but his voice held a betraying tremor.

Cash didn’t move instead he repeated, “I asked, do you get my meaning?”

“Frankly, I’ll be thrilled if I never see them again,” Alistair snapped, his voice and words ugly.

“I’m sure they feel the same,” Cash replied, stepped back and then moved away from Alistair, his eyes going to Nicola. “You and your daughters are free to stay at Penmort for as long as you wish.”

“You’re not taking Penmort!” Alistair shouted and Cash stopped on his way back to Abby and turned to his uncle.

“I am,” Cash announced, “tomorrow, I’ve got six people coming to the castle to do an inventory. You’ve got a week to find other accommodation, gather together your clothes and other personal belongings, none of which will have any attachment to the history this building, and you’re getting the fuck out.”

Abby wanted to clap her hands, jump up and down and shout, “Hurrah!” but Alistair wasn’t finished.

“I pay on the notes, you’ve got no –”

“You fight me, I’ll drag your ass into court and demand a DNA test,” Cash returned and Alistair’s mottled face became confused.

“A DNA test?” he asked.

Cash for some reason didn’t utter an immediate retort.

Abby watched as his jaw grew tight and he stared at his uncle a moment before he replied, “You don’t want to continue this conversation with an audience.”

Alistair, proving once again he wasn’t exactly the sharpest tack in the box, queried snidely, “Are you insinuating I’m not a Beaumaris?”

“Trust me, Alistair, you want to back down,” Cash advised.

“How bloody dare you make that accusation! Of all the bloody cheek, you,” he jeered, “claiming I’m not a blood Beaumaris.”

“Look around you,” Cash stated, indicating the portraits with a jerk of his head, all the pictures of the past masters of the castle sharing a strong resemblance with Cash. His voice had grown quiet when he continued, “Now look at me. What do you see?”

Alistair didn’t take his eyes off Cash. “I see a bloody upstart is what I see.”

“Back down,” Cash warned.

Alistair wasn’t smart enough to catch Cash’s hint. “Do what you will. I’ll see you in court.”

Cash shrugged and turned back around, moving toward Abby again while saying, “So be it.”

Alistair’s gaze swept the room and he snapped, “I don’t believe this. In my own home –”

“It isn’t your home, Alistair. After Richard Beaumaris died, it stopped being your home,” Honor told him and Alistair’s eyes shot to her but he was smart enough, after his last crack to Nicola and Cash’s reaction, to clamp his mouth shut. Honor carried on. “Cash is being nice, I don’t know why, he’s got no reason to be, but he is. I, however, don’t feel like being nice after you manhandled my mother in front of an audience.”

Cash had made it to Abby and his arm curved around her shoulders, curling her front to his side even as his eyes were on Honor.

Softly, he murmured, “Honor, don’t.”

But Honor kept going and announced flatly, “Your mother was raped by a gardener. You’re the product of that rape.”

As if struck, Alistair reeled back several paces at her words.

Nicola whispered, “Oh my God.”

Suzanne watched Alistair, a startled look on her face but it shifted quickly and triumphantly to a satisfied smirk.

Honor was relentless. “She wrote all about it in her diaries. I found them and Cash has them now. They’re evidence enough but if you push him and he demands a DNA test, the whole world will know you for what you are.”

“I kind of hope he does,” Mrs. Truman muttered loudly to Kieran and Abby pressed her lips together to stop from smiling.

Instead she turned to the older woman and whispered, “Mrs. Truman, please.”

Mrs. Truman widened her eyes in faux innocence and asked, “What? Everyone can see he’s not a very nice man,” then she declared as a finale, “comeuppance.”

Abby heard Jenny’s half-amused, half-embarrassed giggle and opened her mouth to speak but Alistair got there before her.

“I fail to see,” he started quietly, “what’s funny about my mother being raped.”

“Nothing,” Mrs. Truman returned tartly. “I’m sure everyone in this room agrees it’s very sad about your poor mother. Tragic. What’s more tragic is that you carried on your father’s legacy of cruelty rather than fighting whatever wicked impulse you have that makes you behave the way you behave and, instead, being a good husband and father to a widowed family as it is abundantly clear you have not been.” She leaned forward at the hips and declared, “You reap, good man, what you sow.”

“That’ll be enough, Mrs. Truman,” Cash murmured firmly.

Mrs. Truman looked at Kieran and announced, “I was done anyway.”

Finally everyone fell silent and Abby watched as Alistair visibly battled with his new knowledge and she almost, but not quite, felt sorry for him.

Cash’s fingers squeezed her shoulder. Her eyes moved from Alistair and her head tilted back to look at Cash.

“Are you okay?” he asked softly.

“Yes,” she lied. “Are you?”

He ignored her question, his fingers tensed again at her shoulder and his voice still soft, he warned, “Don’t lie to me Abby.”

She sighed and replied, “Okay, well, I was just attacked again by a ghosty she-bitch, so of course I’m a little –”

Cash cut her off. “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

Abby blinked at him, confused. “What are you talking about?”

“I’m talking about walking into the hall earlier and seeing you looking like your whole world had come to an end.”

Abby felt her heart start racing and she kicked herself for being, yet again, so very, annoyingly, transparent.

She searched her brain for a plausible story.

Luckily she didn’t have to search far. “Cash, someone made an attempt on your life today but I got in the way. Tonight we’re at war with a ghost. You’ve just thrown your uncle out of his home. This is all going to wear on me.”

He pushed in at the same time his arm tightened around her shoulders bringing her even closer.

When they were front-to-front, his hand lifted to her neck and he accused quietly, “You’re lying again.”

“I am not.”

“You are.”

“Am not!”

“When I came back to the hall, you weren’t where I left you. You were standing with Jenny in an out-of-the-way place. The kind of place you’d engage in a private conversation,” Cash informed her and Abby wished he wasn’t so damned clever because at times it was pretty annoying. Then he pressed, “What did she say?”

“We were getting ready for the toast,” Abby lied again.

Cash’s mouth grew tight before he demanded, “Stop lying.”

“Cash.”

“Abby.”

They held a brief staring contest before Abby looked away and muttered, “I’m not talking about this now.”

Cash’s arm gave her a shake and as he intended, her gaze went back to his.

His hand at her neck moved to cup her jaw. “I hope to God whatever she told you, you’re smart enough to come to me before you jump to any ridiculous conclusions.”

“Cash –” Abby began but he cut her off.

His brogue was rough and dangerous when he finished. “Because, darling, if you don’t and you go off half-cocked, it’s going to piss me right, the fuck, off.”

All right then.

Abby scratched a chat with Cash on her mental to-do list.

After she helped take down a centuries old spirit from beyond the grave that was.

She decided to give up. “Can we just focus on the matter at hand?”

“We can, after you promise you’ll be in bed with me at the night’s end,” Cash returned and Abby’s body gave a small jerk.

“Of course,” she whispered and watched as the intensity faded from his eyes before she went on, “if I’m not in a hospital bed wearing a full body cast, that is.” And she watched as the intensity shot right back.

“This isn’t funny,” he clipped.

“I wasn’t joking,” she replied.

His eyes rolled to the ceiling, his hand dropped from her jaw and he muttered, “Fucking hell.”

Abby got up on tiptoes, put her hand on his shoulder, his gaze came back to her and she advised softly, “You really shouldn’t say the f-word so much.”

“Darling,” he retorted, “you really should learn not to be cute when I’m annoyed.”

She dropped back on her heels saying, “I’ll make a note of that.”

His other arm slid around her. “I think that’s smart.”

“Um, sorry to interrupt your, um, whatever,” Cash and Abby’s heads turned to see Fenella at their side, “but, Abby, don’t you think you should do something?”

Cash released his firm hold on her, not entirely but enough for her to move a modest distance away but his arm along her shoulders kept her at his side.

“Pardon?” she asked Fenella.

“You know, something,” she urged, “to upset Vivianna.”

Cash tensed and Abby queried, “Like what?”

“I don’t know,” Fenella answered. “Last time, you nearly touched Anthony Beaumaris’s portrait. I don’t think she wanted you to do that. Maybe –”

“Snog Cash,” Suzanne all of a sudden was there.

Abby’s eyes moved to Suzanne and she breathed, “What?”

Suzanne looked at Cash then to Abby and repeated, “Snog Cash.” When they just stared at her Suzanne went on. “Listen, she thinks of the Beaumaris heirs as hers and she thinks, in some twisted way, she’s looking after them. Even so she doesn’t appear before them unless they’re in harm’s way, which isn’t often.” Her gaze went back to Cash and she commented, “You’re a healthy lot, don’t put up with much either, never did.”

“How do you know this?” Honor asked. Abby hadn’t noticed her getting close but she saw now that Honor was studying her sister, unable to hide her curiosity.

Suzanne looked at Honor and shrugged. “She talks to me.”

“Talks to you?” Fenella squeaked.

“Yes,” Suzanne answered, “ever since I was eight years old. We’d moved in, we were here a few months, Alistair said something nasty, it was the first time he did. I remember it like yesterday. I was crying in my room. She came and talked to me.”

Abby, Cash, Fenella and Honor were all staring at her.

Finally Honor spoke. “You think you might have wanted to mention this to us? You know, sometime in the last twenty-five years,” she ended on a near shout.

“At first I thought you all would think I was crazy,” Suzanne returned, blithely ignoring her sister’s raised voice. “Then, even when I knew you saw her too, I kept it to myself.”

“Why?” Fenella asked.

Something shifted across her face, something that looked like pain, before she hid it.

“I just did,” she answered and her eyes went back to Abby. “She’s exposed herself now in front of Cash so I’d guess she won’t hesitate to do it again. She probably knows you’ve set a trap. She also probably figures she’ll win. She always has. You aren’t the first one to try to get rid of her, you know.” Abby didn’t know but didn’t say anything as Suzanne kept talking. “I don’t know what Anthony is up to but if she’s given him the slip, to draw her out you’ll have to make a claim to what she considers hers.”

“She’s been holding my hand or in my arms all night,” Cash reminded her.

“Obviously, that isn’t enough.” She grinned wickedly but it wasn’t her usual unpleasant wickedness, this grin was actually kind of endearing and, Abby thought distractedly, she should do it more often. “You’ll have to go for the gusto.”

“It’s my understanding she can be anywhere, hear anything,” Cash replied. “She’s probably listening to you right now.”

Suzanne shook her head. “No. Over the years I’ve learned to sense her. She’s not here.”

“So how is she going to know Abby’s kissing me?” Cash enquired.

“You, if you’re in this house, she’s tuned into. Completely,” Suzanne replied softly, her words freaking Abby out but not as much as her next words would do. “Not what you’re saying, not what you’re doing, what you’re feeling.”

“Oh my,” Fenella breathed.

Before her mind kicked in, Abby turned to Cash in embarrassed horror and muttered, “Oh my Lord, Cash, if that’s true, we shouldn’t have had sex on the desk in the study. She probably watched or at least she felt. Bloody hell, I hadn’t thought of that.”

Slowly, Cash’s head turned to the side, his chin dipped down, his eyes locked with Abby’s and for the first time since he left to talk to James, his mouth formed a delicious grin.

“Oh my,” Fenella breathed again.

“You had sex on Alistair’s desk!” Honor hooted loudly and everyone in the room turned to look at them as Abby felt the heat come up in her cheeks and she mentally kicked herself for being stupid, stupid, stupid. “That’s hilarious!” Honor shouted.

Abby ducked her head, praying for a miracle (or a little, teensy bit of Angus’s mojo) that would make her a real invisible woman.

When this unsurprisingly didn’t happen, she turned into Cash’s body and buried her face in his chest begging, “Please, kill me.”

Cash’s arms went around her as Abby heard Mrs. Truman yell, “Abigail Butler, what did I tell you about hanky panky? And on a desk! My goodness, your grandmother is probably spinning in her grave.”

Abby tilted her head back, looked up at Cash and whispered, “Are you going to kill me? If you are, now’s a good time.”

His face descended, his captivating grin firmly in place and against her lips, he murmured, “No, darling, I’m not going to kill you.”

“Damn,” she whispered right before his mouth took hers in a kiss.

It wasn’t a brush-on-the-lips kiss.

It was an open-mouths, tongues-engaged, knees-weakening, stomach-dipping, body-melting kiss. Abby leaned into Cash, his head slanted, deepening the already-deep kiss and she felt his arms tighten around her as her hands slid up his arms, along his shoulders, one gliding up his neck and into his hair.

She absorbed his low groan, a delectable tremor shuddering through her moments before they heard the spine-chilling scream.