In Love by Christmas: A Paranormal Romance

by Nathan, Sandy

  “Fulton, everyone.” When he got them gathered round, he asked, “Why are you here?”

  Fulton answered for all of them, “We were terribly afraid of Lady Arabella coming to harm. Everyone came to the polo match hoping to keep them from carrying her off. It was our only chance.” The staff nodded agreement.

  “Good. You’re all hired again.” He pointed at a young woman. “You’re Lady Arabella’s maid.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  “Take Arabella upstairs and get her out of her wet clothes. We’ll need her in a bit, but she should get warm.”

  He gave ‘Bella a little hug, “Go on, now. You’re shivering.” To the rest of them. “That goes for the rest of you too. Get dried off and cleaned up. Then get ready to work.

  “Fulton. I’m sure Dashiell was planning a victory banquet. We’ll eat it. No one can leave tonight.” A gust of wind rocked the building. A loud crack followed by a crash indicated that trees were falling along the drive.

  “Yes, sir.”

  The powwow was on in Lord Ballentyne’s library. Ballentyne sat in his big wing chair, eyes bulging, cheeks going in and out like a blow-fish. “Jolly show, today, I’ll tell you! Dash and his boys can really play.” He scowled when Leroy walked in.

  “What is he doing here? Arrest him! He assaulted my daughter. Dash told me all about it.”

  “No, he told me all about it and I told you about it,” said Her Grace. “Terrible thing. I could almost see it the way Dash described it. Forced himself on her brutally.”

  “I never touched Arabella!” Leroy cried. “That’s a lie.”

  “Yes, it is a lie,” Arabella said, slipping into the room. “Nothing but lies in this place. Leroy never touched me, but I lived in terror of Dashiell Pontichury and his men day and night.”

  “As well you might, Lady Arabella,” an odd-looking little man with a bald head held a bowler hat in his hands. “We’re with Interpol.” He turned to Lord Ballentyne and his wife. “We suspect Dashiell Pontichury of murdering his previous three wives.”

  “Oh, Dash wouldn’t do that. He’s never been married.” The puffer fish’s cheeks bulged and shrank. Bulged, deflated.

  “Dash has never been married. He wouldn’t hurt a fly,” said Her Grace. “Let’s stop this dismal talk. It’s bad enough that the rain cancelled the polo match. Why don’t we have a little drink? Cheer us up.

  “Does anyone tango? I absolutely love it! Dash has transformed my life! We’re going to Spain with him tomorrow!” Her eyes bulged. A fleck of saliva escaped her mouth, shooting past the shocking pink, smeared lipstick on her mouth. “A little tango, and then some din-din? Fulton? Where is that man?”

  A mousy woman in a rumpled tweed suit came forward, gesturing for the others to be quiet. “Let me handle this. I’m from National Health.” She knelt by Her Grace. “Are you aware that the polo match ended when Dashiell Pontechury’s horses were exposed as robots and he and his men as monsters?”

  “That’s impossible. Monsters aren’t real. The rain. The match was called off. Peter …” Lord Peter Ballentyne kept opening and closing his mouth.

  “You don’t know what happened?” said National Health quietly. “Where were you sitting?”

  “In the front row of the gallery, with everyone. Everything is quite straightforward; we’re going to Spain tomorrow. Dash saved us.” Her Grace craned her neck, looking for approval.

  The guy with the bowler hat stepped forward, “Lord Ballentyne and Your Grace, Dashiell Pondichury, under a number of aliases, is suspected of the murder of three of his spouses and their families, as well as the unlawful appropriation of their assets. The situations involved wealthy families with income shortfalls but substantial assets who were lured by him into thinking he could save them. He married their daughters, as a condition of the financial assistance, and then they all disappeared.

  “What do you think of that?” The woman from National Health stepped back, searching the faces of the two older people.

  “It’s impossible. Dash showed us pictures of his vineyards, his castle. Of his friend’s castle. We’re going there,” His Lordship blinked and shook his head, denying everything. “They were very real, I assure you. Dash is the ninth Duke of Lancature.”

  “The dukedom of Lancature doesn’t exist. Dashiell Pondichury, also known as Evan Niell, Nylan Jones-Schmitt and a few other aliases, owns nothing. His friend,” said the fellow from Interpol, “is a major industrialist, Enzo Donatore. He currently owns the properties of Pontichury’s missing wives’ families. He obtained them through legal, but suspicious means. Donatore is being investigated for a number of international crimes, which I cannot discuss.”

  “He is also being scrutinized by MI15, domestic intelligence, which I represent,” a tall, thin fellow way in the back bowed. “I can’t say what’s being investigated, just that you’re in deep and muddy water, Your Lordship and Your Grace.

  “The word ‘treason’ has often been used with respect to Dashiell and his associates. Including you. MI16, international counterterrorism, suspects that you’ve been laundering money for illegal enterprises globally. Flows of cash leave your accounts and go to various countries. You’re an intelligent man; you should have seen the impropriety of this.”

  His Lordship sputtered, “No. Those transfers were perfectly legal. Dash said so. Just setting up the financial arrangements …”

  “Your daughter would have been murdered if you had gone to Spain. Murdered, but brutalized first.” A good-looking, middle-aged man in a black suit almost shouted. “She came to my firm in utmost distress, terrified for her life. We were able to save her assets. But her life would have been forfeited if we didn’t protect her from you. Don’t you understand that?

  “We did protect her, calling in interested agencies,” he waved his hand, indicating the crowd in the room. “I am Lucien Craig, Queens’ Counsel, of Freinheim, Tarne, Craig, et. al., representing Lady Arabella.”

  “Solicitors and barristers, cabbages and kings,” Arabella’s mother waived her index finger, grinning foolishly.

  “Her Grace is intoxicated,” Leroy said. “Dashiell hooked her on something. Look at her.”

  The woman from National Health pulled a pen-light out and peered Arabella’s mother’s eyes. “Her pupils are pinpoints.”

  “She wasn’t like this,” Arabella’s eyes misted. “Mama has had problems at times, but not like this.”

  “Oh, you’re such a piker, ‘Bella. No fun at all.” Her Grace looked around the room as though in the middle of a party. “I’m not inebriated. I just feel good. Is that a crime?”

  His Lordship sat silently, puffing, not appearing to understand anything. “Dash saved us. He paid our bills and taxes. He saved the Manor. We gave him mortgages; that’s only fair, but at very low interest rates. Our solicitor said it was a great idea.”

  “Where is your solicitor now? I represent Lady Arabella. My colleagues and I are here to assure her rights. Where’s your boy?”

  “Don’t know. Suppose he couldn’t make the polo match with the rain. Pelting down, isn’t it?” The lights flickered. The rain lashed the windows of the old mansion. “Who would come out on a night like this?”

  “We’ll need to do more thorough clinical interviews, but as far as I am concerned, neither of them is mentally competent,” the National Health lady said.

  Arabella made a little bleat, but Leroy touched her arm and soothed her.

  “Since they are not mentally competent, they cannot enter enforceable contracts, including the mortgages they signed on their properties.” That was Arabella’s lawyer. “Have those mortgages been registered to Dashiell Pontechury?”

  Someone else answered. “I’m from the Royal Bank of England, Sensitive Investigations Unit. We found the documents in Pontechury’s safe deposit box at the bank in the village. They have not been registered in any name but that yours, Lord Ballentyne, though they do bear His Lordship’s signature. Cagey bastard, … excuse me, ladies. Das
hiell was so lazy and sure of himself, he thought he could let them lie around and not even move them to a more secure bank.”

  “So we still have the estates and the Manor?” Arabella looked delighted.

  “No. Not quite. I’m from the National Trust,” a dour gentleman spoke for the first time.

  “And I’m from Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs,” said another. “The taxes on these properties are in arrears. You’ll have to pay them or forfeit the estates. They’d make great additions to the public …”

  “My firm represents Lady Arabella. We cannot discuss this further. Lady Arabella needs informed counsel. I suggest that we meet with members of HMRC after a study of the matter.”

  Leroy smiled. Arabella’s lawyer was on the ball. Maybe Will Duane did have the best lawyers in the world.

  Thunder shook the house, volleying first on one side of the mansion and then the other. The lights flickered again.

  “We need to wrap this up while we still have light,” Leroy said.

  “I need to have some papers signed, Lord Ballentyne and Your Grace,” the National Health lady moved forward toward the old couple. She had a folder of forms, already filled out. “We’re going to put you in a hospital for evaluation. That will determine your mental competence officially. If you are incompetent, then the mortgages you signed are invalid.”

  “Do we have to give the money back? I spent some of it,” said the old “Lord Blowfish.”

  “Yes, you will.”

  “Then we’re not signing anything and we’re not going anywhere. Where’s Dash? We need to talk to him.” He crossed his arms in an expression of defiance.

  “If you are mentally competent, Lord Ballentyne,” said Arabella’s solicitor, “then the Crown will raise more criminal charges against you than you can imagine, plus the issue of human trafficking.” The lawyer and everyone in the room glared at the old man.

  “Human trafficking?”

  “Yes, the condition of Dashiell Pontichury’s giving you the mortgages was your daughter, was it not?”

  “Yes, of course. He wanted her as part of the package. How’s that …?”

  “Ask those missing women and their families. I’d sign the papers and go for a nice rest, Your Lordship.”

  “Do you think I should set a formal table for the people from Interpol and the others, Mr. Watches?” Fulton asked Leroy.

  “No. I’d make it easy for them. Just five or six pieces of silver. Make up rooms for everyone too. Trees are down on the road. No one will leave tonight.”

  38

  Different than Anyone Imagined

  Dinner was a little different than the aristocratic, formal banquet Dashiell Pondichury had planned to celebrate his victory. The rough Scots and Irish polo players sat at the grand banquet table, thrilled to see the tables turned, quite literally. Lady Arabella, Leroy, and more representatives of Her Majesty’s various investigative and enforcement agencies than most people knew existed completed the company in the dining room.

  Peter Faxmore, Lord of Ballentyne, and his wife, Her Grace Violetta, the Duchess of Raddenbery and Cloudfill, sat in the morning room, eating at the breakfast table, surrounded by people from National Health. Their son Allie joined them. He had made the mistake of trying to bite the woman in the rumpled suit.

  Leroy sat at the head of the “grown-ups table” in his tailcoat and white tie. Why not? The table resembled the runway for a small jet, if one could be set with blazing candelabras, flowers, and sterling silver. The staff served the grand dinner Dash’s culinary crew had been working on for days. Leroy blessed the food, getting rid of any demonic residue.

  Fulton had seated him at the head of the table, with Arabella to his right. The arrangement caused Leroy great discomfort. He had once liked His Lordship and Her Grace. He had no desire to usurp their places. He could repair them partially, but given that their staying out of jail depended upon their dementia, he thought the Ancestors would forgive him passing up a healing this one time.

  He knew his silverware and glasses, and how to make polite conversation better than anyone but the Ballentyne family, but etiquette wasn’t the problem at this get-together. It was Arabella and his clothes. He had heard that men who had been in battle often wanted sex desperately. They raped women because of their overwhelming desire. Leroy had been embattled all day. He would never rape, but his skin screamed for her touch. His lips throbbed and fingers pulsed. He wanted her to rip off his clothing and do the same to her.

  Something had become very clear to him: whatever he once had thought was going to happen with Cass was off. The world had tilted.

  Arabella leaned toward him, her pretty face and tinted lips smiling. She was sad, but the soft silk dress she wore rippled and revealed. But never revealed too much. She was a lady.

  Everyone accepted Leroy at the head of the table and family. His unfortunate skin color was forgiven, or unnoticed.

  “I’ve never seen it rain like this. Like it’s been holding off for months.” The group kept looking out the windows at the downpour. The wind was blowing so hard that the rain flew sideways. The shutters shook and the ceiling moaned. Lightning flickered and the thunder seemed as though it was coming from inside the house. Dashiell had hired a quartet to play after dinner, one that specialized in tangos. That was out. No one was in the mood.

  Leroy went to his room, but not to rest. He couldn’t leave Arabella and her tattered family like it was. He pulled out his case with the crosses and menorah, buffalo skull and painting of the great eagle, the brilliant line that marked the divide between life and death.

  Arranging the holy objects where he could see them, Leroy sat cross-legged on the floor before the fireplace and lit his pipe, raising it high and low and to the four directions. Leroy slipped into the world of Power.

  “Ballentyne family—Peter and Violetta, Arabella and Allie—come to me, here.” They came, as spirits detached from their bodies. They sat cross-legged around him, looking as they always did, except see-through. “You have been through a great trial and need healing. You have been in contact with a demon and damaged.

  “Peter and Violetta, I allow you to understand the errors you have made. You will feel them. I do not heal you.” He smiled. “Mostly because, if I healed you, you’d go to jail. You need to be as crazy as you are now. You will have to find your way out of the maze the way ordinary people do. But know that you will be whole when you have righted yourselves. Young Allie, I remove the taint of the demon from you. I free you to make your own choices and go your way in peace.

  “Peter and Violetta, you commanded great wealth and wasted it on things that didn’t matter. You had power and gave it to a false god. You put Arabella and Allie’s lives and souls in danger, and your own.

  “You have been stupid, and you will pay for it. I absolve you nothing. I take your personal power, Peter and Violetta. You have no more power. Young Allie, I take your power until you show me you deserve it.

  “Arabella, you are the only one strong enough to see the demon as he was. You were the only one brave and smart enough to fight and save yourself and what you had. Arabella, I heal you of fear and damage. I give you all the spiritual power of your family and ancestors back to the dawn of days. You will use that power for good for yourself and all of the world.”

  He sat with them a while and told them to leave.

  Leroy knew he wouldn’t sleep that night. The day swam in his mind. Monsters and mechanical horses. Laurie’s brave horse killed. Every kind of cop in the world. Lord Ballentyne and his wife totally nuts. What now?

  What about Arabella? What about Cass?

  Was Cass in his life at all? Since he’d left for Scotland to get ready for the polo game, he’d left two messages on Will Duane’s phone. Will’s phone was the highest tech ever made and backed up many times. He knew his message wasn’t lost. Two months before, Leroy left his first message. He’d said, “I’m going to Scotland for a couple of months to train a polo team. You’ve
got my number if you need me. How’s Cass?” Not too friendly, but complete.

  Will had screamed at him in a way that no one ever had. Time passed. He sent him another message, reflecting other feelings, which were closer to forgiveness. “We’re playing Lord Ballentyne’s team in an exhibition match right before Christmas. If you’d like to come, let me know. They’ll make up a suite for you. How’s Cass?”

  No answer. Will must have seen that afternoon’s TV coverage where Dashiell Pondichury turned into a demon and ran off the field with his robot horses. The broadcasts from every major station had covered the world. That would wake up anyone. Will had not called. Leroy’s phone was a monster portable phone with a satellite antenna. He could use it anywhere in the world.

  The relationship was dead.

  What did he owe Will, aside from the cost of the extravagant trip? He’d looked into Cass’s tormented eyes for seconds and held her unconscious body for a few hours in an ambulance. Was she still alive? She zoomed in on his dreams like a banshee-in-distress, but was she even alive? No one had told him.

  Could she be healed? Will had maintained that she couldn’t, which was why Leroy couldn’t see her. Made no sense, but maybe it did. Maybe Cass hadn’t gotten any better. Maybe she was a raving maniac ready to jump into the first addiction she could find? Did he want her if she was incurable?

  No.

  He wanted his father’s advice. That rascal was taking the Will Duane route. They’d played phone tag for a few weeks, and then Leroy gave up.

  “Grandfather?” he prayed. “Could you pay me a little visit like in that hotel in Paris? I need help.” He didn’t think the shaman would come; everyone else deserted him.

  His Grandfather obliged. Leroy could see his shadowy outline in front of the fireplace in front of his bed.