When the Spirit Is Willing

by Margaret Chittenden

  "Lapsang souchong," Sly said approvingly after one sip of tea.

  Laura was surprised he recognized it. Given his reputation, she'd have thought his knowledge would have extended to liquor rather than tea.

  "I'm by way of being an informed and astute judge in such matters," he stated. "Didn't Carter tell you I'm a magnificent cook?"

  They were seated on armchairs in the living room, a tea tray on a small table between them.

  "He did mention something about polenta." Laura smiled. "I'm not a bad cook myself. It's one of my favorite ways to unwind."

  He beamed at her. "Carter, now, he's hopeless in the kitchen. He has TV dinners in his freezer." He made that sound like the crime of the century. Laura wouldn't have a TV dinner in the house herself, and it seemed rather sad that Carter should sometimes have to depend on them.

  "Not that he's home to eat much," Sly went on after casting a quick glance at her face. "Never saw such a boy for parties. Nothing against parties myself, of course. Kincaid men have always been gregarious creatures. But Carter takes the prize." He shook his head rather sorrowfully, but smiled after glancing at Laura's face again. "You'd think he'd get tired of going out on the town night after night," he continued.

  Laura could feel her jaw getting tight, though she was trying very hard not to show any particular reaction. "There's no reason Carter shouldn't go to parties if that's what he wants to do," she said. "After all, he is a carefree bachelor."

  Sly looked dubious. "That's all very well, but he's not a kid anymore. And it really is time he stopped flitting from flower to flower, like some kind of amorous bee. I've lost count of the women he's gone out with just since I've been visiting." Setting down his teacup, he looked apologetically at Laura. "Scratch that from the record, please," he said solemnly. "I was forgetting that you, well, that you and Carter…"

  "Carter and I don't have a personal relationship," Laura said firmly.

  Sly sighed. "Well, that relieves my mind considerably, Laura. I've been worried that a classy… a nice young woman like you might get your feelings hurt." Sitting up very straight, he looked her in the eye. "Kincaid men can-not be trusted," he said flatly. "And I speak as one who is a member of the clan. We're infected with some kind of blight that makes us unable to settle for one woman. We're throwbacks, every last one of us—roués, rakes, rogues-dissolute and debauched."

  He held up a hand, palm outward, as though she'd been about to argue with him. "I know, I know, Carter's father and grandfather broke the mold. They did marry. But as I told Priscilla—"

  "You've discussed this with Priscilla?" Laura interrupted.

  He looked a little sheepish. "She thinks you and Carter should become… involved. Perhaps you are unaware of this?"

  Laura laughed shortly. "I know all about it. Priscilla is a very forthright ghost. I've told her it's not going to happen, but you may have noticed she's inclined to be stubborn."

  He looked relieved. Why? Smiling, he lifted his teacup in a minitoast. "I should have known you were much too sensible to be taken in by the Kincaid charm," he said. His eyes were very blue.

  She hadn't been all that sensible. She had allowed, and even encouraged, Carter to kiss her. It had been the most soul-stirring, heart-jolting, toe-curling kiss in the history of the universe. For some unknown reason, the fact that Sly Kincaid thought of her as sensible made her damn mad. What right did he have to call her sensible?

  She was being ridiculous. "You were talking about Carter's father and grandfather," she reminded him.

  "Ah, yes, the two Williams." He set down his teacup and leaned back. "William the elder was one of my favorite relatives. Always took grand care of me when I was in town. In spite of Miriam, his wife." He shook his head. "Spouses can really ruin things for everyone, Laura." He sighed.

  "William the elder was not always faithful to Carter's grandmother," he continued sorrowfully.

  He noted that Laura's mouth, which was actually a rather fine mouth, had tightened again. So he was evidently on the right track. "A strong woman, Miriam, but not a cold one—no excuse there." He sighed. "William just wasn't constitutionally able to resist other women. His son was very like him—charming man—randy teenager, had a bit of a roving eye after he was married. If he hadn't been killed, then probably, sooner rather than later…" His voice trailed away. "As for Carter—well, Carter's a chip off the old block, too. The apple doesn't fall far from the tree."

  Laura was biting her lower lip. He was really making headway now, although he wasn't quite sure whether to play it as if he admired Carter and the two Williams for their womanizing or sympathized with the women who cared for them. In the end, it was probably best to stay neutral. Just state the facts and let Laura draw her own conclusions.

  "What it boils down to is that Kincaid men should never marry," he said solemnly. "I actually came close to it myself once, but I knew I couldn't be trusted to walk the straight and narrow path, so I nobly sacrificed my love for the lady in question and spared her future pain."

  "You jilted her?"

  Sly shuddered slightly. That was the exact word the lady in question had used. He wouldn't have thought a modern young woman had such a word in her vocabulary. "Of course, I'm a reformed character now," he explained. "But we're speaking of my misspent youth here. Marriage would never have worked for me then."

  "How do you know if you didn't try it?" Laura said shortly. What was Sly up to? she wondered. He'd mixed enough metaphors to confuse the issue, but what he was doing shone through quite clearly: he was trying to turn her off Carter. Why?

  CHAPTER TEN

  Once again, the pretty young librarian showed them into the small back room and left them alone.

  "I guess we're lucky nobody else is doing any research right now," Laura said awkwardly, as Carter dug out the 1891 newspapers.

  He glanced at her sideways. "Uh-huh."

  She frowned at him. He seemed to be simmering with a sort of low-key excitement this afternoon. Once in a while he'd look at her and smile, as if he knew something she didn't.

  She wasn't surprised at her awkwardness—Sly's minilecture on the notorious history of the Kincaid men had amused her, but had also reinforced her determination not to have anything to do with Carter Kincaid. Yet the minute Carter had called her she'd agreed to meet him. And she wasn't sure her motivation was all that pure. Sure, after watching Priscilla obviously avoiding entering the master bedroom, she'd become even more curious about her past, but that shouldn't have made her heart leap around like a grasshopper when she'd heard Carter's voice on the phone.

  She wondered what was going on in Carter's mind. A horrible thought struck her. "Did Sly say anything to you about me?" she asked abruptly.

  His eyebrows rose into their usual puckish slant. "Only that he'd come visiting and you had given him tea." He smiled. "He told me he'd met Priscilla. Said it was a real hoot to become acquainted with a ghost. Priscilla is his ideal woman, he says. She's built the way a woman should be, she has a great sense of humor and she's not looking for a husband."

  Laura squinted sideways at him. She was pretty sure Carter hadn't intended that last as a pointed comment directed at her; she'd made her feelings about any involvement crystal clear. But she suspected Sly might have had an ulterior motive in saying it.

  "Oh, yes," Carter continued. "He did say something else. He said you were a sensible woman, and obviously a devoted mother."

  "Which is very complimentary, if rather dull sounding," Laura murmured. "So why am I convinced dear old Sly is trying to stab me in the back?"

  Carter's expressive black brows slanted upward again. She shook her head. "Here we go," she said, nodding at the screen. "What is Prissilla doing now?" the headline of Molly's Meanderings read, with Priscilla's name misspelled as usual.

  What Priscilla was doing was complaining—at a charity benefit concert—about Randall's latest mistress, one Thomasina Raven. "A whore," Priscilla had called her publicly.

  Thomasi
na's husband, a sawmill owner, had not taken kindly to this description. Nor had Thomasina, who had slapped "Prissilla" for what Molly called her "singular lack of discretion."

  "You'll notice there's no denial that Thomasina is randy Randall's mistress," Laura fumed. "The sin isn't Randall's, or even Thomasina's, but Priscilla's for her so-called lack of discretion."

  She turned more pages, discovering several more mentions of Priscilla and Randall and the Raven woman, followed by a gleeful column devoted to "Prissilla's" sudden interest in a certain red-bearded ship's captain who was a decade younger than Randall. Redbeard showed up in several more stories, then in early 1892 was displaced by "an extravagantly dressed gentleman with the manners and accent of an English Lord." The stranger turned out to be from New York rather than London. His name was Peter Cranston and he had started buying up land in a local area populated only by black bears and timber wolves.

  "General Nelson Miles had been asking for money for military protection on Puget Sound a couple of years earlier," Carter muttered. "It's possible Mr. Cranston had some inside knowledge of where fortifications might be built. It's also possible Priscilla was told about it by her husband—he was a money man, remember, and one of the town's leading citizens. Priscilla may have passed on the information to Peter…"

  "It's equally possible Peter got the information from somewhere else," Laura said heatedly. "Just because Priscilla was…interested in the man doesn't mean she was some kind of spy." She smiled wryly when Carter shot her a quizzical glance. "I just don't feel right reading all these sleazy innuendos about Priscilla when she's not here to defend herself."

  Carter put his hand over hers where it lay on the desk. "Your eyes glint when you get mad, did you know that?"

  His hand dwarfed hers. She had an almost uncontrollable urge to turn her hand over and clasp his. Almost uncontrollable. "You mean I'm beautiful when I'm angry?" she asked with dramatic emphasis, slipping her hand free at the same time.

  "Exactly."

  She shook her head at him. "You're forgetting I'm inured to charm. We're here to read Priscilla's life history. That's what you said you wanted to do when you called me."

  "It was a ruse. I didn't think you'd agree to dinner."

  "Oh."

  Whenever she was around Carter she had breathing problems.

  "I was nervous about seeing you," he went on. "I wasn't sure I could behave myself the way you want me to, but then I decided I was being a coward and I should plunge in and take up the challenge."

  "I suppose cowardice isn't proper behavior for Kincaid men?"

  He grinned. "Au contraire, as Priscilla would say. It's very typical behavior for a Kincaid where a woman is concerned."

  Laura sighed. "Carter, surely you don't share your uncle's view that I'm out to get you. I thought I'd made it clear that I've no desire to get involved with you."

  "My uncle? What's Sly got to do with anything?"

  Laura glanced over her shoulder, making sure they were alone. To solve the baby-sitting problem, Carter had suggested they bring Sly and Jessica to the library with them. It had seemed an ideal solution to Laura. The older man and the little girl were now safely ensconced in the children's part of the library with a pile of books.

  Laura wasn't sure how much to tell Carter about the conversation she'd had with Sly the previous day. She didn't want to cause trouble between them. On the other hand, Carter had a right to know what Sly had said. "Sly wasn't too keen on the idea of coming along, was he?" she said, delaying the explanation.

  Carter looked thoughtful. "I don't think Sly's reluctant to be with Jessica," he said slowly. "The old boy thinks she's a great kid. And you may have noticed that once we got here, he seemed perfectly happy to scrunch himself into one of those undersize chairs in the kiddy section." He sighed. "The problem is that he doesn't want to go out of the house."

  Laura looked at him, feeling alarmed. "Someone is following him, then. I wondered when he showed up on a cloudy day with sunglasses on and that silly cowboy hat pulled down over his eyes."

  "The only reason that hat looks silly is that it's too big for Sly," Carter protested. "It's my hat. Once in a while my friends host a party with a Western theme."

  Her mouth tightened. She reacted every time he mentioned the word "party." He could probably change that reaction with a well-placed explanation, but there was something ornery inside him that wouldn't allow him to do that. "Sly was almost on the floor of the Jeep when I drove him to the library," he complained, instead. "He kept pretending he was looking for something. I tried to get an explanation out of him, but he can look so unbelievably innocent. Blue eyes always do look more innocent than any others."

  "Have you seen the black car again?" Laura asked.

  Carter shook his head.

  "What if it's some underworld thug? If Sly has gambling debts, as you suspect, I don't want Jessica exposed…"

  She began to get up, but Carter put his hand on her arm and she subsided. "I suppose they'd hardly come after him in a public library. But why on earth is he so nervous all the time? When he came over yesterday, he shot inside the house the minute I opened the door and flattened himself against the wall as if he were expecting a hail of bullets to explode through the window."

  Carter frowned. "You didn't tell me that."

  "I forgot, probably because of all the stuff he came up with afterward."

  "I'm going to have to talk to him again, insist he come clean…" His glance sharpened. "All what stuff?"

  "When we were having tea, he started talking about you. Not in a complimentary way. I got the impression he was doing his best to make me dislike you. He said all the Kincaid men were rakes, roués, rogues, corrupt—no, not corrupt— debauched. And dissolute. This included your grandfather, he claimed, as well as Sly himself before he became the shining example of a man that he is today. Your father would have been just as much a scoundrel if he had lived long enough. The Kincaid men, according to your uncle, are wretched specimens who make any woman unlucky enough to care for them absolutely miserable."

  She had thought Carter would be angry. Instead he looked sheepish. "Oh," he said, and squirmed slightly in his seat.

  "You mean it's true?"

  "Some of it," he admitted. "I've never heard anything against my father, but some of my uncles and Grandfather—well, I told you he was a bit of a ladies' man. Judging by past incidents Grandmother brought up when they fought, he'd gone way beyond flirting from time to time."

  He frowned. "The question that really interests me is, what possible motive could Sly have for telling you all that?"

  "I wondered that myself. He laid a lot of mixed metaphors on me with a very large trowel."

  "More like a bloody spade," Carter grumbled. "What exactly did he say about me?"

  She avoided his gaze. "You eat TV dinners. You flit from woman to woman—so many since he came to visit that he's lost count." She darted a quick glance at his face, which was becoming thunderous. "To sum up, you are the apple that did not fall far from the tree."

  "You believed all this nonsense?"

  "I'm not sure. He was very convincing, but it did seem like overkill."

  He took hold of her hands and looked at her so earnestly that this time she had to meet his gaze. "I've had several quite…meaningful relationships with women in my life. It's true they didn't turn into marriages. I'll admit I'm totally prejudiced against the married state. I have no desire to spend sixty years quarreling with a mate the way my grandparents did. But I do not flit. And I have never been less than honest with a woman." His face darkened again. "What else did Sly have to say?"

  "That was about it. Oh, wait, he did add that you take the Kincaid prize for party animal of the century—which some of us have already made note of."

  For a moment, he stared at her, then a sudden burst of laughter wiped all the thunder from his face. "That sly old fox," he said, still chuckling. "He sure is well named. He knows damn well what those parties are
for. Why on earth would he imply…"

  "That's what I wondered," Laura admitted. "It was obvious he was trying to make you appear less than noble. And it was brought about because Priscilla told him of her plan for us."

  "Did she, now?"

  His eyes were still alight with laughter, which made him wonderfully attractive. So much so, Laura wasn't sure she could let him hold her hands much longer.

  Freeing herself and turning back to the newspapers, she said sternly, "Obviously, Sly didn't approve of Priscilla's plot any more than you or I did."

  "Oh, I approved of part of it until you talked me out of it," Carter said with an air of innocence.

  She wasn't going to question that statement. Sighing, she started leafing slowly through the plastic sheathed newspapers again. "Look at this!" she exclaimed, just as Carter was going to pursue the conversation. "Here's a man who supposedly died of a broken heart. A young and promising attorney, it says. The woman he loved left him for another and he began to have trouble with his eyes. Despite all treatment he grew no better, but continued to fail slowly from week to week."

  She blew air through her pursed lips. "It says that when he died he was in perfect health, so the physician who attended him asserted he must have died of a broken heart. More likely an incompetent physician. Why would anybody believe such rubbish?"

  "I believe it," Carter said, giving her his wicked smile. "If you keep holding me at arm's length I may die of a broken heart myself."

  "We were going to have a business relationship only," she reminded him.

  "I have such a rotten memory," he complained.

  She didn't answer. "That's two for and three against," he murmured as she went on scanning pages.

  She looked at him blankly.

  His grin reminded her of Sly's. "Priscilla and I for. You, Jessica and Sly against."

  "Which means you're outnumbered," she said tartly.

  His dark eyes glinted. "But I have a ghost on my side. And Kincaid men do love a challenge."