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“So you’re not a ghost?” she asked.

He understood. They’d all said he looked like Sean Thorpe. “Maybe I am. I steal food from Mrs. Aiken so she hates me. Sean and I share that. I’m not a horse person but my father and grandfather knew everything there was to know about the internal combustion engine. Maybe they balance out.”

She was smiling. “Anything else?”

“I like Puck and don’t like Mrs. Aiken.” He looked at her. “And I’ve been to the cemetery.” She didn’t seem to understand that last statement.

“You don’t sound like him.”

“Cursed with an American accent, but give me a few English pints and I might change. Especially if the barmaid is busty.”

She laughed. “You are like him.” Finally, she opened her eyes and looked at him. “Oh my!” she gasped at his shirtlessness.

“Sorry. I needed a cloth. It was either your shirt or mine.”

“We all have lapses in judgment,” she said.

When he caught her meaning, he laughed. He started to put his shirt back on but she took it from him.

“You’re bleeding.” She leaned across him and used the wet sleeve to dab at his forehead.

She was older than Jack, but damn, she was pretty. And her body seemed to be supple and firm. Since Kate had arrived in his life, there had been no other women. It had been a long, long time.

He put his hand over hers. “I’ll do it.” Her face was inches from his. Her eyes, her lips, her body were telling him that whatever he wanted was all right with her.

But Jack looked away and the moment was lost.

She leaned back against the tree. Their bodies were touching along one side. “You made me feel better.”

“Don’t see how,” Jack said. He was wiping at his forehead. The cut was superficial, no stitches needed, but it did hurt. “I scared you half to death. You hit the floor pretty hard.”

“I have a personal trainer who does worse to me. But it was a shock seeing him—you—again. He was always there. Nicky’s father piled masses of work onto his employees. Sean...” She broke off and seemed to calm herself. “Are you here with the woman? The older one?”

“I’m with Sara, yes.”

“And you want to know everything about us so she can put us in a book?”

Jack’s hair prickled at this disparagement of Sara. “She’s insatiably curious, true, but we’d like to know what happened.” He hoped she’d confide in him.

“Why is this place empty?” she asked.

“Isabella closes it for a month every year for repairs and cleaning.”

“I was hoping there’d be people here.” She took a breath. “My husband died three months ago.”

“I’m sorry,”

Jack said.

“Me too. He was a nice man. Not wildly exciting but he was...security. It’s not easy to go from being a married woman to a single one. I catch myself saying ‘My husband likes’ and ‘My husband wants.’ But now I’m back on the market.”

“So you’re looking for a new one?”

“More or less. I’ve never had a job and I have no interest in being a ‘career girl.’”

“Damn women’s lib!” Jack said.

She laughed. “You’re funny. Sean wasn’t amusing. But maybe he would have been. He hated all of us so much.”


Tags: Jude Deveraux Medlar Mystery Mystery