Jenna's Eternal Lover

by Jeanne Savery

  Jenna’s Eternal Lover

  Jeanne Savery

  Blush sensuality level: This is a sweet romance (kisses only, no sexual content).

  Book 5 in The Ghost and Romance series.

  The late Lord Everston’s lover wanted to join him in eternal bliss from the moment he died. But instead of achieving her own happiness, Jenna was required to help his lordship’s heirs find theirs.

  Now Jacob, Sarah, Patrick and Roman have true love and it is Jenna’s time to join her deceased lover. It is also Christmas and all the families celebrate it together. Though grieving for Jenna, they still have reason to celebrate the season—the knowledge that true love can survive even death.

  Jenna’s Eternal Lover

  Jeanne Savery

  Chapter One

  Sarah went into the arms of her husband, tears threatening. “She’s failing, isn’t she?” They visited with Jenna immediately after arriving for Lady Mary’s Christmas house party but managed to reach their room before Sarah fell apart.

  “Hush, love.” Terrance’s arms tightened and he rocked her back and forth. His own eyes were overly moist.

  “But she is and it’s all my fault.”

  A rueful smile tipped Terrance’s lips even as a frown creased his brow. Quickly, before she might look up and see, he cleared his expression. Then he cleared his throat. When he was certain he wouldn’t laugh, he asked, “How can you think that?”

  Sarah glared. “It was my fault that awful man tied her so tightly she had to undergo the amputation of her foot when it went septic. If I hadn’t…hadn’t…”

  “Had not existed?” Terrance could no longer repress a smile although he avoided chuckling at his wife’s absurdity.

  “Yes. If I hadn’t existed, she’d not have gone to Brighton and she’d not have been with me that day playing the chaperone—as if I needed one at my age! Anyway, she’d not have been there when I was kidnapped and…”

  “And she would be the first to remind you that if it is anyone’s fault it was the late Lord Everston’s that, you went to Brighton in the first place and, in the second, that she followed.”

  Sarah shook her head. “No. He only meant good when he put me in his will.”

  “Then it must have been the fault of the heir to his title for wanting everything for himself. Mud was a very greedy man, Sarah, my love.”

  Sarah frowned. Her lower lip pushed the upper into a downward bow. Again she shook her head. “No. If we are to say he ordered my kidnapping, as we believe he did, Jenna would say it was the fault of the way the poor man was reared.”

  “So it was his father’s fault.”

  Sarah sighed. She was silent for a long moment. “Jenna would say we are not to place blame, would she not? She has forgiven everything and everyone. She would say we must too.”

  “Sarah, Sarah!” The chuckle surfaced and his expression begged his wife to see the humor in the style of their discussion if there was none in the topic.

  After a moment Sarah smiled a weak smile. “You would say I’m absurd?”

  “I would.” After a moment he sobered. “But speaking of forgiveness, she is right to say we must do so. To hold a grudge takes a great deal of energy which could be used in much more agreeable ways.” He caught her gaze and waggled his brows up and down in an attempt to change the paths of her thinking.

  “Perhaps.” Sarah ignored his exaggerated leer and was silent for another long moment. “But Terrance, if she hadn’t had to suffer that way, wouldn’t she still be well? Have the strength to recover and…and not…not…”

  “Not die?” he spoke the unspeakable for her. “My love, she recovered very well from the amputation. That was several years ago. You know she recovered.”

  “Then why…”

  “She is not so very old but she isn’t young and I think perhaps that collapse she suffered after his lordship died weakened her. Jenna would tell you she is tired. Very, very tired. Then too, she misses Lord Everston.”

  “But…”

  “But you don’t want her to die? You want her to remain with us, too tired to enjoy life, unable to get around and do the things she’s always enjoyed so much?”

  “She…wants to die.” It was not a question.

  “She wants to join the late Lord Everston and once again be with the great love of her life.”

  “Be with her ghostly lover. Forever and ever.”

  “For eternity,” said Terrance softly.

  Once again Sarah was silent. It went on so long that Terrance shifted his grip and held her so he could see her face. “Sarah?”

  “I still think it was my fault,” she grumbled.

  This time he laughed aloud and, after a moment Sarah joined him.

  “I know,” she said, smiling ruefully. “I am not rational. I guess,” she finished on a sigh, “I’m as selfish in my way as poor Mud is in his. I don’t want to lose her.” Again tears threatened. “This is her last Christmas with us, isn’t it?”

  “I fear it is, Sarah,” he said, sobering. He held her close when she once again pressed against him, seeking comfort in his arms.

  * * * * *

  The next morning Lady Mary quietly opened the door to Jenna’s bedroom and peered around the edge.

  “Come in. I’m not sleeping,” said Jenna. Her voice had grown weaker day by day but then another day she would rally and sound much as she always did. Yesterday had begun as a good day but too much company had left her exhausted. She loved each and everyone who’d come to see her upon arriving for Lady Mary’s Christmas party and for no reason in the world would she have turned anyone away but now…

  Now she was tired and the day had barely begun.

  “We’ve been planning,” said Mary, approaching the bed where the dying woman lay back against pillows, her skin nearly as wan as the rounded drift of snow whitening her windowsill.

  “Planning?”

  “Our Christmas together. We mean to have it here.”

  “I know that. You sent out invitations over a month ago. Almost everyone has arrived, have they not?”

  “Here, I mean,” repeated Mary. When that got no response, she added, “In your room, Jenna.”

  Jenna frowned slightly. “The hall…”

  “Tradition is all very well, Jenna but there are times when it just isn’t right. We want you to be as much a part of Christmas as you can bear.”

  Jenna smiled a soft, sad smile and her eyes flicked off to the side. The smile brightened. “Perhaps…”

  “Stop that,” scolded Mary “You’ll get well. You have to. What about all those strange new flowers Rube planted just for you?” Mary, against all social custom had married a prince from a nomadic tribe with which she’d traveled on one of her eccentric journeys. Now, together, they explored the world. Rather, they had explored wherever fancy took them until, on their return the preceding June, it was obvious Jenna was no longer the active person she’d always been, no longer taking part in every local project, no longer particularly interested which was the most fearful difference of all. She needed them and they’d remained home. Mary eyed Jenna who appeared to have forgotten Rube’s work. “Those special plants? The ones he collected in Brazil? They’ll bloom in ways you’ve never imagined.”

  Jenna shook her head and sighed softly. “Mary…”

  Mary sighed but not softly. “I know, Jenna. You don’t really want to get well, do you? The two of you have waited so long.” Mary glanced around the room although she knew was unlikely to catch a glimpse of her father’s ghost. An unladylike grin crossed her ladyship’s face. “You’ll have to admit, it hasn’t been with a great deal of patience on my father’s part.”

  “We’ve missed…being together.” Jenna’s eyes drifted
toward the fireplace and she smiled at the spectral figure she and only she saw there.

  Jenna’s ghostly lover smiled back. There was a twinkle in his eyes. He blew a kiss toward the bed.

  Jenna laughed softly.

  Mary glanced that direction and sighed again. This time almost silently. “My father is here, then?”

  “Where else would he be?” asked Jenna, her smile broadening. “Oh Mary, I think it may finally be time. Our time.”

  Mary compressed her lips, a sad look in her eyes.

  “You are not to grieve,” scolded Jenna, noticing. There was a touch of concern behind the smile she smiled. “Be happy for us,” she ordered. “We’ll be together again. This time for all eternity. Don’t you want that for us?”

  Mary groaned softly. “The two of you will be together but we, left behind, will miss you.” She straightened her shoulders and shook off the dark mood. “That is not what I came to discuss. I wanted to warn you we’ll be in and out all day preparing. You can ignore us?”

  Jenna smiled again, this time her gaze darting toward the end of the bed. “We’ll ignore you,” she said. Once again her smile broadened. She laughed softly.

  Mary, glanced around, hoping for a glimpse of her father’s ghost but she’d not see him, knew she’d not see him. She never saw him. She shrugged and departed. It was getting on for five years since her father’s death and she’d become accustomed to the fact that, in some fashion, he was still here, playing a role in all their lives. Her socially unacceptably eccentric travels meant she had lived with and studied many different peoples. Her curiosity made her delve into their customs, beliefs and superstitions and her interest in healing encouraged her to learn all she could from their wise ones about their medicines and methods. All of that helped her accept the truth of her father’s continued existence in the here and now.

  Such acceptance had been harder for others.

  Some refused to believe at all.

  * * * * *

  As promised, Jenna’s large bedroom was the scene of much coming and going. Greens were carried in and every conceivable nook and cranny decorated with Christmas finery. A lovely hand-carved wooden crèche Mary bought years previously in a small market hidden down a back street in Napoli was set out on a side table. An evergreen tree, a European custom, which Lady Mary and Prince Rube had enjoyed while trapped by heavy snows in Hanover one harsh winter, was placed between the tall windows overlooking the back gardens and decorated, the white candles in their special holders awaiting a light on Christmas day.

  Finally, steadied by his wife, Rube stood on a chair and hung a kissing ball from the ceiling just beyond the foot of Jenna’s bed. He stepped down and moved the chair. “That,” he said looking up, “is an English custom I like very well indeed.” Mary’s foreign-born husband grasped her hand and pulled her under the mistletoe covered ball. He kissed her lustily before reaching up to pluck a white berry from among the small round leaves.

  Jenna clapped softly, grinning at their antics. She glanced at her lover and found he too grinned. Their gazes met and linked…a certain heat traveling between them.

  Unfortunately, as things were, that was all that could be between them. They’d discovered soon after Melton Tomlinson, Lord Everston, died that whenever he got too near, a painful cold came with him. They hadn’t touched since his death, something both missed and longed to experience once again.

  Rube put his arm around his wife’s shoulders and brought the two of them to Jenna’s side. “In all the years we’ve been married we’ve never told you how much we thank you,” he said softly.

  “Thank me?” asked Jenna. “For what do you have to thank me?”

  Rube smiled down at his much shorter wife and smiled, the light of love giving his eyes a special glint. He leaned a bit and kissed the haphazardly arranged pile of hair topping her head before once again meeting Jenna’s gaze. “We might never have had the courage to go against not only your society’s mores but the prejudices held by my family. We might have gone along forever apart, pretending we merely admired and appreciated each other’s good points. Instead, with your aid…”

  Jenna interrupted. “You mean the aid of my ghostly love,” she said.

  Rube grinned. “No I don’t, Jenna. He’d not have been here if it were not for you. Without you, he’d not have put his finger into the pie which is our lives. And without the stirring of that finger, then we’d not have wed. We thank you.”

  “It was my father’s coming to Rube’s brother in his dreams that allowed that proud man to give his permission,” said Mary. “But as Rube says, Father would not have been available to do so were you not keeping him hanging around.”

  Jenna turned her head from side-to-side against the pillow. Then she glanced to the side where the late Lord Everston stood. He grinned at her. She has you with that one, Jenna my dearest love. So be a good girl and say you were happy to help and then you rest. I’ve a feeling you’ll get little enough of that in the next few days.

  Jenna smiled a rueful smile and turned back. “Mel says I’m to say I was happy to help.”

  And that you need to rest. There was an order in the tone of that.

  Jenna sighed. “He also says I’m to rest.” She grimaced. “As if soon enough I’ll not have plenty of that.”

  Oh no you won’t! I’ve plans and they do not include merely resting.

  A faint blush slid up Jenna’s white cheeks at the ghostly insinuation but her eyes sparkled with anticipation.

  Lady Mary tipped her head, staring at the sudden uprush of color into Jenna’s cheeks. She wondered how her father had embarrassed Jenna but she also knew it was true Jenna needed rest so didn’t pursue the question. “We’ll leave you now. But there will, I’m afraid, be more coming and going before we’re done.” She gestured around the decorated room and then tugged on Rube’s arm. With soft goodbyes, the two left Jenna alone.

  Jenna, after another admonition from her lover, closed her eyes and drifted into one of the easy sleeps that came to her so often now.

  Later that afternoon, Jenna’s niece, the daughter of her much younger sister and the late Lord Everston’s younger son, poked her head in through the door. “Aunt Jenna?” she said softly.

  Jenna looked that way and lifted just her hand. “Verity. You’ve arrived.” She smiled a welcome.

  “We’re all here now,” she said. “Every one of us and the children too.” She bit her lip, a frown marring her brow. “I fear you’ll find us too much.”

  Lord Everston’s diaphanous form stood nearer Jenna. I hopped up to the nursery for a moment, my love. A fine brood our well-matched couples have produced. Ah, Jenna-lover, we did well did we not? he asked but only Jenna heard him and Jenna ignored him.

  “All have come?” she asked Verity, her eyes on her niece. “Even my lord’s heir?” asked Jenna when the young matron reached her bedside.

  And two more babes on the way, the late Lord Everston added.

  Startled by that bit of new information, Jenna turned to stare at his diaphanous form. “Really?” she asked.

  “Well, not all of us if you include him,” Verity answered, thinking Jenna was speaking to her rather than to the phantom lover Verity had never seen. “Mud’s wife invited guests for the holiday before Aunt Mary’s invitation arrived so they sent regrets.” The young woman pretended to feel sorrow but Jenna wasn’t fooled. Verity grinned. “Yes, I know I shouldn’t feel the way I do and I also know that he’s improved beyond all recognition, thanks to her. But he will never be my favorite person.”

  “No, but he must be forgiven,” scolded Jenna. “There were reasons for his behavior. Mel’s brother was a very bad father to him. As you know. All that nonsense when he first inherited the title should be put behind us, must be forgotten.”

  “I know, Aunt Jenna and I’ll try.” Verity looked sober for a moment, thinking of the chaos the heir to the title had caused before he too, found true love and, for the first time in his life, discovered
contentment. Then she brightened, a happier thought pushing the others from her head. “Could you bear to have the children come here for their supper just before their bedtime?”

  “I would love to have them come,” said Jenna. “They are such darlings and I see them all too rarely.” She moved her hand nearer her lover who now sat on the side of her bed. He moved his a little toward hers. Just when she felt the chill they stopped moving. They stared at each other and sighed. “Not long now,” she mouthed.

  No. Not long, Jenna mine and we’ll be together again.

  “You spoke to him,” said Verity who was watching. “To Grandfather.” Although she’d tried to hide it she knew there was a hint of accusation in her voice. A bit warily, she sent a glance toward where she thought her grandfather’s ghost might be but of course she didn’t see him. “He’s here?”

  Jenna turned back at her niece. “Yes, I spoke to him and, yes, he is. And why does everyone ask that when they know he is never far from me? Not for long anyway,” Jenna’s tone held just the faintest note of irritation. She was tired. She wished they’d go away and leave her alone with Mel. She looked at him and then around the room at those still straightening a bow here, a candle there. She hid a yawn.

  “We’re tiring you,” exclaimed her niece. “Everyone,” she said, raising her voice. “We should go. Especially we should go if we mean to allow the children to visit at their supper time. Aunt Jenna needs a rest before such an onslaught.”

  Lord Everston pouted, frowning fiercely in Lady Mary’s direction. His daughter was explaining the crèche to Roman who had never seen one. Lady Mary, her head snapping around at Verity’s words and after a glance at Jenna, adopted a rueful look. She began shooing everyone out. His spectral lordship watched the handful of people scattered around the room depart.

  My granddaughter is more thoughtful than my daughter, he growled. It never crossed Mary’s mind you needed rest, he said once they were all gone.

  “Don’t scold, Mel,” said Jenna, a coaxing note in her voice. “Your daughter has accepted that I’m seeing my last days in this aspect. Verity has not. She thinks I’ll get well again. Mary wishes I might do so but understands that I am more than ready to join you.”