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“If you say so.”
“No—ah. Sorry. Penny Dreadfuls were old stories—comics, really—”
“And you’d know, wouldn’t you?” Penny turns and leans against the wall, gazing up at me. And since when did I get so close? When I wasn’t paying attention, I must have prowled right up to her, so close that now she tips her chin up, defiant. So close that I can feel her heat. “They said in the kitchen you’re a big shot author. You just told me you wrote ten pages. So what’s your name?”
Shit.
What if she’s heard of me, and she hates my work?
Or what if she hasn’t heard of me and thinks I’m bragging over nothing?
Oh god, why did I ever start writing? Couldn’t I have been a teacher or a dentist or something normal like that? Something useful? People respect dentists; they know where they stand with them. Everyone has teeth.
Penny arches one eyebrow. The corridor is silent as she waits.
“Arthur Carstairs,” I rasp.
There’s a sharp intake of breath, and her second eyebrow joins the first. Penny wets her bottom lip, and it takes everything inside me not to stare at her mouth. Not to duck my head and taste her there.
She’s just so fucking perfect, with her smooth, olive skin and those freckles and her messy brown bun. Her rumpled maid’s dress that I just know she hates, and the sly, flirty way she keeps toying with the feather duster. Like she knows the effect she has on me.
But… am I going insane? Would she rather I left her alone? I’m more than a decade older, after all, and I’ve crowded her against this wall without an invitation.
Coughing gently, I step back. Is it just wishful thinking on my part, or does Penny look disappointed? She sags against the wall.
“The Arthur Carstairs,” Penny says after a beat. “Wow. I’ve, um. I’ve read all your books.”
I grin, my chest suddenly lighter. “All of them?”
Because people don’t do that with authors they hate, do they? Well actually, some readers definitely do, because I receive their long, disappointed emails—with their assurances that they’ll try the next one too. People are odd.
But Penny doesn’t seem like the type. Something tells me this girl is all about her passions, with very little time or interest for anything less.
She’s intoxicating. Does she realize that?
“Don’t be smug.” Penny flicks my chest with the feather duster, and my heart stops at the brush of sensation through my shirt. She leads me to the next gargoyle, the floorboards squeaking beneath our steps.
Everything in Hennigin Hall is so vocal. The pipes, the floorboards, the screaming faucets, the rattling windows. People talk about buildings ‘settling’ at night, but I swear this hotel tosses in its sleep.
“So is that why you came to stay here, Mr Carstairs? To be inspired?”
“Yes.”
“And you got bleeding wallpaper on your first night. Lucky.”
Despite her words, Penny doesn’t sound sarcastic. She sounds bitter—like she’d give anything to trade places. I tuck my hands in my pockets, regarding her steadily.
“You’re in the right place, working here. If you want a ghostly encounter, surely it’s just a matter of time.”
Penny grunts, and her shrug is jerky. This gargoyle doesn’t get tickled so much as swatted with the feather duster.
“Come to my room tonight.” The words burst out of me without permission, and when Penny goes still, heat creeps up my neck. Oh, well. No turning back. “Not for—you know. But because this way you might see something. And I can’t promise more bleeding wallpaper, obviously, but if you’re there at two thirty, perhaps there’s a chance—”
“Yes! Yes, please. Oh, wow. I never get to spend time here at night.” Penny beams up at me, gazing like I’m her hero. It’s… not unpleasant. Not unpleasant at all. In fact I wish I had more to offer her, but this is the best chance at a haunting that I can offer on such short notice. “I’ve been saving up to rent a room for a night, but they’re so expensive. The other staff think I’m mad for even bothering. But I won’t get in your way, Mr Carstairs, I swear.”
“It’s Arthur, please.”
“Arthur, then.” Pearly white teeth sink into her bottom lip, and we’re close again. When did we move so close? I’ve forgotten how to breathe. How to blink. The warmth from her body seeps through my shirt, and I can feel the gentle puffs of her breath against my throat.
