A Scot to the Heart (Desperately Seeking Duke #2) - Caroline Linden Page 0,65
and tormenting him, and Drew cursed at himself as he nearly fell headfirst down the dark stairs in his distraction.
“All in readiness,” he said when he rejoined her, having propped open the door with a stray bit of wood and got himself under better control.
Her face was pale and eager in the lamplight. “For Winnie’s sake, be terrifying.”
He led the way, clanking the chain and dragging his footsteps along the floor. Ilsa followed, dragging the padlock and periodically banging it on the floor. “We should moan,” she whispered at one point, and Drew had to stop and collect himself for a moment, until she let out a wail that sounded not like the passionate utterance his fevered brain had conjured, but more like a banshee foretelling death and suffering.
“That was you, aye?” he whispered over his shoulder.
“Of course! Who else?”
“I took a moment’s fright that we’d unleashed the spirits of the house in truth.”
She choked on a giggle, which made him smile, and then the two of them could barely carry out their spectral prank for laughing so hard.
Drew paused when he heard a door slam. It was impossible to hear voices over the keening breeze, but he tossed aside the chains and caught Ilsa’s hand, tugging her toward the stairs. At the last moment he blew out the lamp, and they huddled behind an armoire under Holland covers.
“Surely ’tis naught but a stray animal,” came Felix Duncan’s voice, along with the glow of a lamp. A moment later his head and shoulders appeared at the top of the stairs, and he took a sweeping look around. “I see nothing,” he reported over his shoulder.
“Go up, man, be bold,” cried another voice—Adam Monteith, who pushed past Duncan to jog up the stairs and pose there, fists on hips, feet spread. “Show yourself, foul spirits,” he boomed.
Beside him Ilsa was shaking with silent laughter. Unthinking, Drew put an arm around her, grinning, and then stilled as she pressed closer to his side.
Mam, I think I’m falling in love with her, he thought.
“Let me see!” Winnie hurried up, Bella close on her heels. They clutched each other but peered around eagerly. “Was anyone murdered up here? Is that why the ghost is in the attics?”
“No, you goose, spirits obviously need space to do their haunting,” was Bella’s retort.
To Drew’s surprise, his mother and Agnes appeared next. His sister looked skeptical, and his mother wore an expression that made him think she knew exactly what had gone on and found it amusing against her will. Looking distinctly grumpy and still half-asleep, Alex Kincaid brought up the rear, holding another lamp aloft.
“I see nothing,” said Duncan again. He yawned behind one hand. “No headless Highland chieftain, no lady who threw herself from the battlements in heartbreak. Not even the spirit of a badger who got trapped in the—Argh!”
As he spoke, Drew had silently tugged one of the Holland covers down over himself. Eyes shining with glee, Ilsa had pressed back into the shadows while Drew stepped forward, hunched over with his arms upraised. Everyone else was facing the opposite way, so when he lurched toward them and let out a long, low moan, it caused a moment of pandemonium.
Winnie and Bella gave earsplitting screams and scurried behind Monteith, who had quite lost his cocky expression. Kincaid cursed at full volume, now wide-awake. And Duncan jumped backward, almost dropping his lamp but still managing to throw out an arm to shield Agnes as she shot behind him and pressed against his back.
Only Louisa didn’t move, just stared him down with her arms folded and a knowing quirk to her brow. “Very amusing, Andrew.”
With a grimace, he cast off the sheet. “It was meant to be terrifying, Mother.”
His sisters erupted with outraged squawks. Bella flew at him and pummeled his arm. “What on earth, Drew?”
Laughing, he fended her off. “Ow! Stop, lass. You wished to see a ghost—”
“A real one,” cried Winnie with a stamp of her foot. “Not you!”
“We could make him a real one,” suggested Kincaid dryly. “For rousing us all from warm beds to shiver in the attics.”
“Tip him right out this window. He’ll make a ghostly wail as he plummets to the ground, for certain.” Monteith peered out the window before closing it.
“And you helped him, Ilsa?” asked Agnes. Interestingly, she had jerked away from Duncan and now stood on the opposite end of the group, her face pink even in the dim light of the lamps.