by Lynsay Sands
Jane's eyebrows rose. "Why?"
"Come see," he suggested and headed off.
Jane followed him back through the house, her curiosity replaced with confusion when he led her inside and directly to the walk-in closet.
"I somehow don't think these were meant for me," he announced as he opened the doors.
Jane stopped and stared at the women's clothing filling the hangers. "Mrs. Goodinov--"
"There's a picture of the Goodinovs on the dresser. Mrs. Goodinov is definitely not a size twelve. More a twenty-two," he added dryly. "Besides, everything still has the tags on it."
He took a slinky black dress out to show her, and Jane realized these must be the clothes B.L.I.S.S. had promised to supply. Although she had no idea how they'd managed to purchase all this and get it here in the hour between the phone call and when they'd arrived. Unless they hadn't needed to shop. She supposed it would be handy to keep warehouses of clothes around for such emergencies.
"There are underclothes in the dressers too," Abel said as he hung the dress back on its rod. "All women's clothes, all new. I think you're expected to sleep in here. There are probably clothes for Maggie and me in other rooms."
"Probably, but I can't leave Gran--"
"I could listen for her," Abel offered, taking Jane completely by surprise.
She shook her head. "No, she might need something you couldn't help her with."
"Then I could fetch you."
Jane rubbed her forehead as she considered the matter. There was a lot to consider. Not just Gran, but what they were expected to do here. Listen to and watch the Ensecksis. Were they supposed to watch them around the clock? Probably, she answered herself.
"Jane!" Gran's voice drew Jane from her thoughts. Leaving her dilemma for later, she hurried out of the room to find Maggie Spyrus in the great room at the foot of the stairs. A lovely brunette who looked to be in her early forties stood at her side. The brunette wore the standard yellow sundress, but Jane had to admit this one was actually attractive. A very pale, almost white yellow and designed along simple lines, the dress was soothing and breezy rather than painful to look at.
"This is Leigh Senchall, our neighbor until Beatrice and Arthur return and kick us out of their paradise," Gran announced lightly. Her comment elicited soft laughter from Leigh.
"It is a lovely house, isn't it?" The woman glanced about, then turned back and held out her hand as Jane walked down the steps to reach them. "Hello, Jane."
"Hello, Leigh." Jane shook the proffered hand, then gestured to Abel, who had followed. "This is my brother, Abel."
The two greeted each other; then Gran announced, "Leigh came to welcome us to the neighborhood. She brought a yummy-looking cinnamon coffee cake."
"Oh, that's sweet," Jane said in surprise, touched by the action. "Well, I suppose tea would be in order."
"Tea sounds lovely," Leigh agreed. "But only if you aren't too busy unpacking."
"Oh. All we have to unpack are our clothes, and most of that is done," Gran lied easily as Jane wheeled her toward the dining room.
Jane waved away Abel's offer of help and busied herself making tea and setting out plates, cups, and silverware as he, Leigh, and Gran settled around the large dining room table. Jane listened to the three talk, marveling over the smooth way her grandmother steered the conversation toward the Ensecksis.
"Oh, you won't have any problem there," Leigh was saying as Jane carried the tray of tea things out to the table moments later. "Lydia is very quiet. We hardly ever see her."
"Lydia?" Gran munnured. "That's a lovely name."
"Yes." Leigh smiled at Jane as she took her tea cup. "Lydia is..."
Jane paused and she and Maggje and Abel all waited breathlessly for the brunette's next words.
"Well, she's interesting," Leigh finished, looking uncomfortable. Then she added with more ease, "She's very pretty."
Recalling that Mr. Manetrue had claimed Lydia was a maneater, Jane suspected Leigh was merely being polite.
"Pretty, hm? Is she single?" Abel asked.
Jane glanced at him with surprise as she handed him his tea. If it weren't for the pulse ticking in his forehead, the mischievous grin on his face would have fooled her into thinking that he truly was on the make, Apparently, Leigh missed the pulse. She laughed good-naturedly and shook her head.
"Men," she said with mild exasperation. "Yes. She's single."
"There you go, Abel. Maybe I'll live long enough to see you married, after all," Gran teased, then smiled at Leigh. "I don't suppose there's a nice eligible bachelor around here for my Janie?"
"Actually..." Leigh paused, looking surprised. "Do you know, Lydia's brother is visiting her right now and he's single." She turned to Jane. "He's very handsome, Jane. And so sexy. He has dark hair and a killer smile."
"Hmm." She smiled. "He sounds perfect. I hope I get to meet him while we're here."
"Yes, that would be--Oh!" Leigh sat up straight. "You can! Tonight!"
"Tonight?" Jane and Maggie and Abel echoed.
Leigh nodded. "Yes. I'm having a little neighborhood pre-Thanksgiving get together tonight. I wanted to have it next week, but the Johnsons are going away and..." She waved her hand vaguely. "Anyway, you three really should come. You could meet everyone. And Lydia and Dirk are both coming."
"That sounds lovely!" Gran beamed at their neighbor, obviously pleased.
"Yes, it should be nice," Leigh agreed. "Cocktails and a buffet dinner. Semidressy." She glanced down at her watch and made a face. "Speaking of which, I still have a couple of things to pick up. I'm having the food catered, but there are loads of other things to do. I suppose I should head home." She got to her feet and moved to the front door. "Come any time after six."
"We'll look forward to it," Gran said as Jane saw her out.
Jane returned to the dining room a moment later to see that Gran had pulled a pad of paper and a pen from her purse and was making a list.
"What's that for?" She asked, dropping back into her seat.
"I'm making a list of what we'll need to be prepared for tonight," Maggie Spyrus announced, then glanced up to survey her granddaughter critically. "The first thing is that you should sleep."
"Sleep?" Jane echoed. It seemed almost a foreign word at this point.
"Yes. You have bags under your eyes, Janie, dear. You'll never catch Dirk Ensecksi's attention that way."
"And I thought my name was bad," Abel said. Jane ignored him. "Why do I want Dirk Ensecksi's attention, again?"
"To milk all the information out of him you can manage," her gran answered. "Which is point number two. After you've taken your nap, I intend to teach you how to be a woman."
"I thought I was born a woman," Jane muttered.
"Anyone can be born one," Gran sniffed. "I intend to teach you how to be a Spyrus woman. Tonight you will be a femme fatale."
Jane choked back the snort that wanted to escape her nose. A femme fatale? The closest she had ever come or would ever get to being a femme fatale was nearly blowing Dick's head off with her Mini-Missile-Launching Vibrator. She just wasn't the type.
Chapter Ten
"Shopping?" Jane gaped at her grandmother. She'd just woken from her "nap." Actually, she hadn't woken on her own. Gran had come in and nudged her, saying something about shopping. "We don't need to go shopping, Gran. B.L.I.S.S. sent clothes."
"Yes. I know, dear," Maggie Spyrus said patiently. "That's what I just said. I thought I'd have to wake you up to go shopping, but Abel found the clothes B.L.I.S.S. left so we were able to let you sleep longer. But it's almost five o'clock now. You have to get up and get ready for tonight."
"Five o'clock," Jane echoed. She'd lain down at a little after eleven, got almost six hours of sleep. She almost felt human again.
"Come on. Up and at 'em. We have to get you ready."
Nodding, Jane pushed the sheets and comforter aside, then sat up on the side of the bed. She'd slept in the room she'd first chosen, wearing on
ly a T-shirt and underwear. She could have searched the master suite for a nightgown, but it had seemed too much effort.
"Abel and I picked out a dress for you to wear," Gran announced, petting Tinkle as the dog stirred in her lap. "It's hanging on the back of the bathroom door, so you can just shower and dress. I'll fix your hair after."
"How did you and Abel pick out a dress?" Jane asked as she grabbed for the jeans she'd been wearing earlier. She started to pull them on. "All the clothes are in the master suite."
"Abel helped."
"Oh," Jane said, then paused to eye her gran sharply. "You didn't pick the underwear I should wear, too, did you?" She found herself flushing at the idea of Edie's brother carrying handfuls of lacy underthings to examine and choose from.
"No." Gran frowned. "I didn't think of that."
"Thank God!" Jane finished doing up her jeans, then moved off to the master suite. "I'll go get some before I take that shower."
The door was closed when Jane reached it. She pushed it open and stepped inside, then paused at the sight that met her eyes. Abel had moved the boxes of equipment here before Jane had lain down. She'd known he would nose through them, but she wasn't prepared to find him knee-deep in spying paraphernalia. The entire contents of her boxes appeared to be spread out on the floor around him, and he stood by the open door facing the Ensecksis' house, headphones on and a shotgun microphone in hand. He scowled impatiently and fiddled with the knobs on the side. The sight was terribly adorable to Jane.
She stood there, just looking at him, until she spotted Tinkle slipping past her into the room. Startled out of her in action, Jane immediately bent to grab for the dog but was too late; the Yorkie had spotted Mr. Tibbs sleeping on the bed and rushed forward out of reach.
Edie's cat had a finely honed survival instinct. His eyes opened, zeroed in on the approaching Yorkie, and he was immediately up and running.
Releasing a growl, Tinkle was after him at once, but Mr. Tibbs led her a merry chase. The two pets raced across the bed, leaped one after the other to the couch, streaked to one chair, then the other. Circling the room, they rushed past Jane in a blur, then reached Abel. That's when the real excitement started.
Tinkle's and Mr. Tibbs's sudden mad rush around his feet was what made Abel finally aware of the trouble erupting. He gave a startled gasp and jerked his microphone up in an attempt to get its long wire out of the way. It was a good try, but a little late. Tinkle was already traipsing through the cord, getting it tangled around her little paws. Abel began to dance around in a circle, attempting to avoid being snared too, but couldn't move as quickly as the cat or dog circling him. He was well and truly entangled by the time Mr. Tibbs gave up his evasive tactic and broke away.
Tinkle, who had stayed right on the cat's tail the whole time, now snapped her teeth closed on that tail. The pair disappeared under the bed, trailing the disengaged microphone cord behind them.
"Argh!"
Abel's cry drew Jane's attention as she approached the opposite side of the bed, prepared to put an end to the circus act. She glanced back just in time to see him tumble onto his butt on the floor.
Wincing, Jane turned back to the bed, but neither Mr. Tibbs nor Tinkle reappeared. There was a brief spate of growling and hissing; then came a yelp. Seconds later, Tinkle charged out and flew from the room. It seemed Mr. Tibbs had handled the matter.
"Well," Abel said, "I guess that takes care of that problem."
Jane glanced up, amusement twisting her lips. Edie's brother sat on the floor, tangled in wire, the bent microphone in hand and his headphones askew.
"Sorry," she apologized. "I didn't know Tinkle followed me. I thought she was still with Gran."
Abel shrugged and got to his feet, began untangling wires.
"So...did you hear anything interesting?" she asked brightly.
Abel grimaced. "Birds chirping, squirrels chattering, and deer stomping about."
"Deer? Really?"
"Yeah." He grinned. "A whole herd of them came up the hill," he said with an enthusiasm that quickly faded. "But I didn't hear a peep from our neighbors. I don't think this stupid thing works," he added, glaring at the shotgun mike.
"No. It wouldn't," Jane agreed. "We need the parabolic microphone' and definitely the wall-contact microphone for this job."
"Parabolic? That's the one that looks like a satellite dish," Abel said with interest. He gave up on the tangled wire to sort through the mess on the floor.
"Yes." Jane took it from him when he found it. "We'll set this up on the hill once it turns dark." She frowned. "We'll have to think of some way to camouflage it."
Abel nodded. "What's the wall-contact microphone?"
"Exactly what it sounds like," Jane said easily. "A highly sensitive amplifier. You can hear conversations through thirty centimeters of solid concrete with it."
"But you have to attach it to the wall?"
"Everything has its drawbacks." Jane shrugged. "That's why we'll have to wait for night to set it up. We'll do it after the party."
"Ah, yes, the party," he murmured, not sounding very eager.
Reminded of her purpose in coming into this room, Jane moved toward the dresser on the other side of the bed. "I was just going to fetch some clothes."
"Your gran and I already picked out--"
"Yes, I know." Jane cut him off, a blush rising on her face. "But I need some other stuff."
"Ah." Jane could hear the amusement in his voice as she opened the top drawer to reveal rows of neatly stacked underthings. Then he said, "I was going to pick some for you and put them with the dress, but I didn't think you'd appreciate it."
"Ah, no. But thanks," she said. She heard him chuckle. Jane was too embarrassed to examine the contents of this drawer too closely with Abel there, so she grabbed up the first thing to hand, glanced to see that it was the right size, and started to close the drawer.
"Er...you might want to wear black," Abel commented, letting her know that he was indeed watching. "The dress we picked is black."
"Oh." Jane tossed back the lavender set of underwear she'd grabbed and snatched up a black set instead. She avoided his eyes as she left the room.
Jane was in and out of the shower quickly. She dried off, tossed her used towel aside, and picked up her underwear. It was lacy and sexy, not her usual style. She generally preferred comfy plain cotton underthings. But Jane doubted there would be any comfy plain cotton anything supplied by B.L.I.S.S. That wasn't their style.
She put on the bra and panties, then paused to examine herself in the mirror. If she just looked at her body, it was like looking at someone else. The bra was one of those push-up ones. But Jane didn't need pushing up to make her look full-breasted. She grimaced at the sight of all that rounded flesh spilling out of the black lace and poked at first one cup, then the other with discomfort, but it didn't deflate or make her look any smaller.
Jane had been self-conscious about her breasts since she turned twelve and the boys started to notice and tease her. It had all been downhill from there. Boys had tried to grope her, middle-aged men had started hitting on her, and every male she met had started talking to her chest rather than her face. In grade eight, while Jane was giving a speech in class, Tommy Simpson had shot a spitball at her, right down her top. That had been the end of Jane's public-speaking career.
Each such encounter had made her more self-conscious, more introverted. She might have grown out of it, but then she'd hit the dating age. Her first boyfriend had been Jerry Jordan. He'd asked her to a school dance. Jane had been excited and eager, happily overlooking his unfortunate freckles until his best friend had informed her Jerry was only taking her because she had a big chest and was therefore easy.
Jane had stormed up to Jerry, punched him right in the nose, then bawled him out. But once she'd reached home and the safety of her room, she'd cried. After that, she'd become even more withdrawn, turning her attention to books and her schoolwork and ignoring any boys who showed inte
rest in her. Or trying to. There had been the occasional male persistent enough to ignore her turndowns, who continued asking her out until she gave up refusing them out of sheer exasperation. But those relationships hadn't had much of a chance.
"Janie?"
Jane pulled the selected dress off its hanger on the back of the door, dragged it over her head, then tugged it into place. Then she opened the door.
"Abel said you forgot stockings."
Jane stared at the black silk her grandmother held out. Yes, she'd forgotten them. Abel hadn't. She took the bits of wispy material, noting as she did that there was a black garter belt included. He thought of everything, it seemed.
"That dress is perfect." Gran rolled into the bathroom as Jane sat on the side of the tub to don the stockings.
"Where's Tinkle?" Jane asked. The beastly dog liked to nip and scratch at her legs when she put on nylons, causing huge runs before she'd even got any use of them.
"I don't know. She followed you to the other end of the house when you went to fetch your underthings, but she didn't come back. She must be exploring."
The dog was more likely hiding from Mr. Tibbs, Jane thought. That cheered her.
"You should really put the garter on first, dear." Jane paused with one stocking halfway up and stood up to pull on the garter belt. Then she sat again and returned to the stockings.
"There." She finished and stood to brush the skirt of the black dress back into place.
"Perfect," Gran pronounced.
Jane glanced at herself in the mirror. She wasn't sure if perfect was the word, but she sure was something in this dress. See-through black lace made up the long sleeves and most of the back of the dress, and dipped all the way down to the top of her bra before the solid back underslip started. Now she understood why Abel had suggested the black lace underthings. If she bent over, reached up, or generally moved in this dress, her bra would show in the front. As would the top of her panties in the back, she realized as she turned to check. The see-through lace dipped quite low back there.
Lavender peeking out would have looked ridiculous. The black looked rather sexy, she thought until she saw her face and damp hair. The dress was B.L.I.S.S., but from the neck up she was the same old Jane. Her shoulders slumped. She looked like techno-geek Jane Spyrus in a sexy dress. Definitely not femme-fatale material.