She didn't want to contemplate the alternatives if she couldn't.

Chapter 6.

Michael Fellini stood in the middle of a medieval castle and fought to keep the smile off his face. So it had been a miracle to score the gig at Juilliard. This promised to be a thousand times better-if he could just arrange things to suit himself. At least General McKinnon was gone for the day-probably back to the inn to lie in wait for him. Well, she would just have to be disappointed a little longer. He had business here.

He folded his arms over his chest and took a moment to relish the feeling of being in the director's spot. It wasn't that he didn't like to act. The applause, the accolades, the fawning-it was all highly enjoyable and unquestionably merited. But to act meant to be at the mercy of a director who, for whatever reason, always seemed to think he was in charge.

Michael didn't like others to be in charge.

He wanted to be in charge himself.

The university setting was fine as well, he supposed, if one had the temperament for it. He'd enjoyed possessing the power to ruin careers and destroy egos. In fact, he did as much of that as possible, but unfortunately, there was so little notoriety in it.

He began to pace. Broadway was another option for him, but he knew that even had he landed a plum role there, he would have been a large fish in a rather larger pond. And still taking orders from someone else.

Of course, he could have taken the plunge and gone off on his own, but that would have required taking risks, temporarily lowering his standard of living, and quite possibly losing tables at the best restaurants he'd learned to call his own. No, far better to simply stride right into a ready-made situation.

Such as this present situation.

He looked around. He spread his arms out wide just because he could. Here, yes, here, he could be the king of his own castle. Shakespeare had had the Globe; Fellini would have Thorpewold.

He paused and frowned in his most thoughtful manner.

Thorpewold...

Yes, that would definitely have to go. When he was lord of the manor, he would choose a different name.

Of course, getting the castle away from Victoria's brother was going to be tricky, but Michael wasn't going to worry about it. That's what his barracuda agent was for. He would concentrate on his art.

And the first item of business in working on that art was getting control of his current production. It would be, he thought smugly, a piece of cake. Victoria was too starstruck to do anything but give him what he wanted. And once he took over the production and turned it into the fabulous masterwork he knew it would be, Thomas McKinnon would see that his sister was not only starstruck, she was a lousy director. He would gladly accept Michael's offer to take over the castle and make it into a money-making proposition.

It beat the hell out of listening to drama students butcher soliloquies all day long.

A breath of cold air blew suddenly down his neck.

Michael whirled around in surprise but saw nothing.

Was the bloody place haunted?

He lifted one eyebrow and contemplated that. It could work in his favor, of course.

Then again, it could continue to give him the willies as it was presently doing. He shivered, shook off the

feeling of unease, then strode toward the gates, doing his best not to break into a run. The feeling of being watched subsided once he walked through the gates. Fortunately. He didn't really go in for creepy. Once the castle was his, he would call in the exterminators. Of course, that would require funds and he was somehow perennially short of those. He walked down the path and considered what might be the best way to start his nest egg. Selling off a few antiques from his room down at the inn? The furniture was too big to lift, of course, but there were several other things that would fit quite nicely into his suitcase. He paused and looked back at the castle. He couldn't help a smile of triumph. He tossed his script up into the air in a joyous celebration of his own splendidness, then continued down the path to the road. It was going to be a fabulous summer. He could just feel it.

Chapter 7.

Connor stood at the end of the path leading up to the inn and wondered if he had lost his mind. There he was, on the verge of going inside and asking a favor of a MacLeod. It was a favor he needed in order to take advantage of an offer made by a McKinnon-a McKinnon, it should be noted, that he had vowed to kill not a day earlier.

He almost turned around and strode back to the castle, but a bellow from within the Boar's Head Inn caught his attention. It was followed by another raised voice. Connor couldn't help but be intrigued. Never one to pass on at least observing a good skirmish, he made his way with alacrity into the entryway.

Aye, there was a bit of a squabble going on, but unfortunately it did not involve swords.

Mrs. Pruitt stood clutching her feather duster like a weapon and glaring at a man who could only be one of Victoria's players. He was full of very large gestures and quite loud complaints. Connor had seen him the day before in the keep, striding about as if he owned the bloody place.

He'd shadowed him for a time until the rabbit had scampered for the gates.

Coward.

It wasn't in his nature to detest another so quickly. He generally gave others as many chances as possible, allowed for the faults that he himself was rarely vexed by, took into consideration that those of weaker stuff might not be equal to the tasks he took on without thought. All in all, it generally took him at least a fortnight to truly begin to loathe another human being.

That mortal standing there complaining about his chamber was obviously going to be the exception.

The man ceased with his shouting at the innkeeper only because he apparently caught sight of himself in the mirror. Connor leaped out of his way as the man came over to peer at himself in the glass, rearrange his hair, then return to take up the battle again with Mrs. Pruitt.

Connor couldn't help a peep in the looking glass as well. After all, it was one of the reasons he had come to the inn, not having a looking glass of his own up at the keep. How else could he determine if Victoria McKinnon's assessment of his face was accurate or not?

He frowned at himself, stroked his chin, then reached up and brushed the hair from his eyes.

"That won't improve things."

Connor turned toward that voice with his sword half drawn. Ambrose, who had just materialized next to him, held up his hands in surrender and smiled.

"I think there is more entertainment here for us than swordplay."

"Think you?" Connor asked archly. But he resheathed his sword and found himself, surprisingly, standing in what could only be termed companionable silence with Ambrose MacLeod.

By the saints, what indignity would befall him next? A pleasant conversation with a McKinnon?

"Michael Fellini," Ambrose said, gesturing to the sniveling mortal assaulting Mrs. Pruitt with his complaints. "Victoria's star actor."

"So I assumed," Connor said. "He is quite a womanly sort."

"Aye, quite," Ambrose agreed.

As Connor continued to watch Michael Fellini, he was hard pressed to suppress an intense desire to draw his sword and clout the man into insensibility. It would have spared them all a great deal of irritation.

"The room is haunted!" Fellini screeched.

"I told you," Mrs. Pruitt said darkly. " 'Tis not a room we normally let out."

"I can see why!"

Connor looked at Ambrose to find him wearing a faintly amused smile. "Are you responsible for this?"he asked. "I might be," Ambrose admitted modestly. "It is my bedchamber he speaks of, after all." "Hmmm," Connor said, faintly impressed. "I approve of your choice of victims."

"I doubt Victoria will."

Fellini's complaints increased in volume until Connor wondered if he would become senseless from lack of air or simply keel over from the memory of his terror the night before.

Unfortunately for that potential bit of enjoyment, Fellini's diatribe was interrupted by the hasty arrival of one Victoria McKinnon. She came flying down the stairs in what Connor could only assume were her nightclothes, her fiery hair streaming along behind her, her face full of concern.

He was somehow quite relieved he was leaning against something.

"She is magnificent, isn't she?" Ambrose murmured.

Connor had to take a deep breath. "She screams quite well. For a McKinnon."

Ambrose chuckled. "I suppose that's true. But look at the way she commands all around her. Now,

there's a wench for a man with the courage to tame her."

Connor grunted. That man certainly would not be Michael Fellini. The lout couldn't manage to get

himself past a harmless bit of sport from a womanly MacLeod; how would he ever tame that spirited Victoria McKinnon? "Michael, what's wrong?" Victoria asked breathlessly. "My room is haunted!" Michael bellowed. "Haunted?" Victoria echoed. "Why, that seems sooo unlikely!" Connor found himself the recipient of a very pointed glare Victoria managed to slide his way without Fellini paying attention. "I wouldn't have bothered with the wretch," Connor announced to anyone who would listen. Victoria shot him another look of warning before she turned back to Fellini. "What makes you think your room was haunted?" she asked.

"Something blew down the back of my neck while I was practicing my lines in front of the mirror," Michael complained. "I'm certain it was a ghost." "You know, I've heard the inn is drafty," Victoria said soothingly. "Not that drafty."

"I'll look into it," Victoria assured him.

"You'd better," Fellini warned.

And with that, he turned and left both Victoria and Mrs. Pruitt standing in the middle of the entry way.

He sailed up the stairs and out of sight.

"I tried to warn him," Mrs. Pruitt said darkly, "but did he listen?" She paused. "Perhaps I should wait outside the chamber tonight. Who knows what I might see?"

She departed with all alacrity to points unknown. Connor opened his mouth to comment on the whole

ridiculous affair, but was interrupted by Victoria turning and glaring at him.

By the saints, she had a look about her that rendered him almost speechless.

If he'd been prone to speechlessness, which he most certainly was not.

"What?" he demanded.

Victoria strode over, a vision of fury. "We had a bargain," she spat.

Connor drew himself up. "I haven't broken it." And he hadn't. Not entirely. He forced himself to

overlook his own bit of breath-blowing up at the keep the afternoon before.

Victoria turned her wrath on Ambrose. "Was it you?"

Ambrose nodded remorsefully. "Aye, granddaughter, it was."

"How could you?" she exclaimed. "He's the star of the show!"

Ambrose bowed his head. "I beg pardon. I was in my chamber briefly to gather a few items I might need

for the duration. I fear I might have brushed past him whilst looking for something atop the dresser. And

a body must breathe, mustn't he?"

Victoria started to say something else, then checked herself. She sighed. "Actually, I'm the one who should apologize. He has stolen your room, after all."

"He has," Ambrose agreed cheerfully. "But I know what he means to you and your play, so I will leave him be."

Victoria smiled at him, then turned a frown on Connor. "And you? Why are you here?"

What was he supposed to say? That he'd come to look in the polished glass and see if she had described him aright? He'd never been called handsome before and he wasn't sure he believed it. Damn Michael Fellini for having ruined his opportunity to really learn the truth of it.