Her best what she left unspecified. She would worry about the pesky problem of how to help Ned and Vanessa in bed later. As for right now…
Rosebud felt excitement sizzle through her veins. Ned is coming. Tonight. She glanced at the cuckoo clock over Miss Arlotta’s desk. Five-fifteen. Less than four hours, and Ned would be here.
She had been waiting for this moment ever since she’d laid eyes on him. Ned. The spitting image of her beloved, that rascal Edmund.
Once he was here, she didn’t know whether she should kick him or kiss him. She had spent the better part of a month debating exactly that. Which was why she hadn’t bothered to come up with a plan for Vanessa.
She was much more interested in Ned. Who was he? Would he be anything like his great-grandfather? And what was he doing engaged to a witch like Vanessa?
She itched to find out.
“I don’t know why you’re still up here. Your bride is already checking in,” Miss Arlotta noted, making a shooing motion with one ghostly hand. “Day late and a dollar short before you even start. Rosebud, I swear, you’re gonna be the death of me yet.”
Rosebud refrained from pointing out that Miss Arlotta was already dead. Jittery with nerves over the idea of seeing Ned later—and having to deal with the odious Vanessa first—she murmured, “I’m going, I’m going.”
But as she flashed down to the lobby, she heard Miss Arlotta’s unamused voice in her ear. “Don’t even think about botchin’ this one, Rosebud. I’m keepin’ my eye on you.”
“Don’t worry,” she responded sweetly. “I’ll be on my best behavior.”
“That’s what I’m afraid of.”
Luckily for Rosebud, the hotel was packed to the gills, so she knew it wouldn’t be as easy as all that for Miss A to monitor her, especially when the other girls were providing such good cover with their own assignments. Mimi had been complaining since yesterday about a frightened virgin of a bride who kept locking herself in the bathroom, while Glory wanted everyone to drop everything and check out her groom, because she said he had the smallest equipment she’d ever seen and it was going to be impossible to strike any sparks with that tiny thing to work with. Every time she started to describe her groom and his “Wee Willie Winkie,” she dissolved into giggles, which got Desdemoaner going with the honking snort she called a laugh.
That meant there were two ghost harlots rolling around the attic, wheezing with laughter, while Mimi swore in French and stamped her tiny foot and demanded help with her fraidy-cat bride. Not to mention Flo and the usual whines about her constricted corset and the snooty Countess offering unwanted opinions on the side while everybody told her to tend to her own assignment.
With all that, Miss Arlotta had her hands full, and Rosebud felt very comfortable that whatever tricks she got up to with Ned’s bride would go unnoticed. Hadn’t she always been the smartest Fallen Maiden around? Wasn’t it a dead certainty she could outfox Miss A and the others long enough to have a little fun with…
Uh-oh. Rosebud skittered to a stop at the bottom of the main staircase, a few feet from the front desk.
Ned. Here. Now. Early. She wasn’t ready. And yet…
She’d been waiting so long. As she saw Ned standing there in the lobby, Rosebud’s mouth went dry and her knees went weak. She felt stirrings in places that hadn’t been stirred in 109 years. Wide-eyed, immobile, she clasped both hands hard against the front of her corset, forgetting to breathe for just a second.
He looked amazing. No suit today, just a soft, form-fitting dark sweater and black trousers. He had his hands jammed in his pants pockets, lounging there as if he didn’t have a care in the world.
She wanted to touch him. She wanted to press her lips against his. What would it feel like for him if she did? Would one little ghostly kiss trigger anything in him? And how much trouble would she get into if she tried it?
No sign of the other girls or Miss Arlotta. No one to see if she…
Out of nowhere, he turned, narrowing his gaze, staring right at the spot where she lingered by the bottom of the stairs. And then he smiled, white teeth flashing between perfect lips, as if he sensed her presence. As if he wanted her presence.
No wonder he was a lawyer. Juries probably melted every time he smiled at them and he never lost a case.
My stars. That was potent stuff. She was a ghost, but still she began to melt from the inside out. Why did he have to be so handsome? The fascinating blue eyes, the enchanting smile, those marvelous lips…
There was a reason she had so easily lost her virtue back in 1895. And she was looking at him.
“Damn you, Ned Mulgrew,” she whispered.
“That’s weird.” He glanced around the bustling lobby. “I could swear somebody just cursed at me. Damn you, Ned Mulgrew. That’s what I heard. But who would say that?”
“Hmm? What?” Distracted with the check-in process, as well as keeping an eye on the bellman who was carting all fifteen pieces of her matching Louis Vuitton luggage, Vanessa gave her fiancé a glance. “Ned? Did you say something?”
“Nothing important.” He leaned over to kiss her on the cheek, moving in closer behind her at the front desk, angling an arm around her in a cozy gesture. Rosebud decided right then and there that kicking him was definitely smarter than kissing him. One minute he was sending come-hither smiles at her across time and space, and the next he was cuddling with the odious Vanessa. Swine.
Maybe he was as greedy and insincere as his ancestor, and he was fleecing Vanessa for every dime of her trust fund. Rosebud hoped so. But it didn’t look like it from here. Okay, so his smile didn’t quite reach his eyes when he looked at Vanessa. And his features seemed a bit strained. Still…
He was planning to marry the twit, wasn’t he?
Rosebud crossed her arms over her chest, debating whether to drop a chandelier on both their heads. Nah. Miss Arlotta would know who did it. But it was tempting.
She flitted up the stairway to get herself a little farther away from temptation, perching her frilly bloomers on the smooth mahogany banister about halfway up, where she could still eavesdrop. All she needed to do was find out what room they were in, and she could go on ahead, leaving them to their pathetic canoodling at the desk. Then she would ponder a plan of action, and decide whether it would involve pushing them together…
She smiled. Or pulling them apart. That spinning bed thing had worked nicely on the last couple she didn’t like.
“You’re in the Lady Godiva Suite,” the front desk clerk said pleasantly. He pushed a folio across the desk toward Ned for his signature. “That’s our best honeymoon suite. I have you down for four nights.”
Pulling the paper over her way, Vanessa scrawled her name on it. Then she leaned over and nabbed the brass key out of the clerk’s hand. “It’s five nights.”
“Five? I’ll have to check on that. Let me just get another key for Mr. Mulgrew,” the clerk murmured, turning back to the wide expanse of cubbyholes where the keys were kept.
“No.” Vanessa’s lips pressed into a thin scarlet line of displeasure. “He doesn’t need a key. The suite is for me.”
She wasn’t planning to share the honeymoon suite with her fiancé? Now that was interesting. Ned. Lady Godiva Suite. Both dark and delicious. Honestly, how could anyone think about those two items and not want to put them together? Immediately.
“There is a separate reservation for my fiancé,” the bride-to-be continued, starting to sound a little testy. “For a separate room.”
Well, maybe she was a virgin and she wanted to stay one till her wedding night. Rosebud gave her the onceover. “If she’s a virgin,