The Fall of Shane MacKade (The MacKade Brothers 4)

But he realized abruptly that he had, and that for a few moments he hadn’t cared that he had. In fact, he’d been hotly thrilled that he could. That was new for him, and shaming.

“I didn’t mean to. It got out of hand.” Frustrated, he dragged his unsteady fingers through his hair. “Hell, I got out of hand.”

“Maybe you’d better keep your distance until you can handle yourself.”

“Yeah, maybe I’d better.”

Because he’d been expecting an argument, Rafe’s brows drew together. He noted now that Shane was just about as pale as Rebecca had been. “You okay?”

“I don’t know.” Baffled, Shane shook his head. “She’s the damnedest woman,” he muttered. “The damnedest woman.”

Chapter 5

As she was a meticulous woman, it took Rebecca hours to set her equipment to her specifications. There were sensors, cameras, recorders, computers, monitors. Cassie had been able to give her one of the larger suites for a couple of days, and she tried to be grateful for it. Yet it was confining not to be able to set up a camera or two on the first floor.

She doubted any of the other guests would welcome one in the rooms they slept in.

Still, she had space, and the thrill of occupying what had been Charles Barlow’s room. The windows afforded a lovely view of the sloping front lawn, the late-summer flowers, the wild tiger lilies lining the edge of the road, and the town itself. She imagined the master of the house would have enjoyed looking out, studying the rooftops and chimneys of the houses and shops, the quiet stream of traffic.

Everything she’d read about Charles Barlow indicated that he had been the kind of man who would consider it his right, even his duty, to look down on lesser men.

She wished she could feel him here, his power, even his cruelty. But there was nothing but a charming set of rooms, crowded now with the technology she’d brought with her.

It was frustrating. She was positive every one of the MacKades had experienced something in this house, had been touched by what lingered there. Why couldn’t she?

Her hope was that science would aid her, as it always had. She’d purchased the very best equipment suited to a one-person operation, and shrugged off the expense. Some women, she mused, bought shoes or jewelry. She bought machines.

All right, perhaps she was buying more in the shoes-and-jewelry line these days. Money had never been a problem, and didn’t look to be one in the foreseeable future. In any case, she was entitled to her hobby, Rebecca told herself as she dipped her hands in her pockets. She was entitled to the new life, the new persona she was carving out.

A great many of her colleagues thought she had gone mad when word got out on what she planned to spend her free time studying. Her parents would be deeply annoyed—if she ever drew up the courage to face them with her new interest. But she wasn’t going to let that matter.

She wanted to explore. Needed to. If she had to go back to being the boring, predictable, utterly tedious Dr. Knight, she would go mad.

Yet she’d learned a valuable lesson the night before. She wasn’t quite ready to handle certain aspects of her new life. She’d been cocky, entirely too self-assured, and Shane MacKade had knocked the chip from her shoulder and crushed it to splinters. Lord knew why she’d thought she could deal with sex.

All he’d had to do was catch her off guard once, and she’d turned into a trembling, mindless mess. She’d spent some time being furious with him for causing it—after she got over being terrified. But she was too analytical to blame him for long. She had put on the mask of confidence, had even tried her hand at flirtation. It was hardly his fault that he’d believed the image and responded to it.

She would simply have to be more careful in the future, and rethink her plan to stay at the farm. The man was entirely too physical, too attractive. Too everything. Especially for a woman who had barely begun to explore her own sexuality.

Yes, she would be very careful, and she wouldn’t dwell on those sharp and intense needs he’d stirred up in her—the way his mouth had felt on hers, the way his hands had moved over her bare skin. What it had felt like to be touched that way, by that man. So intimately. So naturally.

She let out a long, shaky breath and closed her eyes.

No, she wouldn’t dwell on that. She was going to enjoy herself, start her paper on Antietam, make plans for the book she intended to write. And, if perseverance counted for anything, find her ghosts.

Moving to her computer, she sat and booted up.

I’m settled in the MacKade Inn now, in what were Charles Barlow’s rooms during the Civil War period. There are other guests, and I’ll be interested to hear if they had any experiences during the night. For the moment, all is quiet. I’m told that people often hear doors slamming, or the sound of weeping, even the report of a gun. These phenomena happen not only at night, but also during the daylight hours.

Regan has experienced them, and Rafe. There are also reports of the scent of roses. This particular experience is most common. I find this interesting as the olfactory sense is the strongest.

In my brief meeting with Savannah MacKade, I learned that she has often felt a presence in this house, and the woods that border the land. I gather that both she and Jared are similarly drawn to the woods where the two corporals met and fought.

It’s fascinating to me that people find each other this way.

Cassie and Devin MacKade are another example. In this case, they lived in the same small town all of their lives. Cassie married someone else and had two children, and from what I can glean, a truly horrific marriage. Still, she and Devin found each other, and from this outsider’s perspective, seem as though they’ve been together always.

Both Cassie and Devin have stories to tell about the inn, and their experiences here. I’ll have to go into them in depth in my official n