Echoes in Stone (36 page)

A sudden pool of light bloomed there, glimmering on the hem of a woman’s red dress. A lullaby drifted eerily out of the shadows. She carried something in her arms.

Jessa’s heart slammed into her throat, stopping her breath. Familiar gold curls cascaded over the woman’s shoulder, floating in some stray draft.

“Holly?”

Jessa ran.

47.

…none of you warned me how fragile she was…

“YOU DID A fine job of putting a supper together.” Dash glanced up from his plate to Winston and Mrs. Penrose, hovering by the sideboard. “Please. Won’t you both join us?”

Marguerite, arrayed in a wholly inappropriate—and unflattering—gown of shimmering amber silk, gasped.

“You’re inviting your servants to join us at the table?”

Dash flicked his gaze to Luther, seated beside Marguerite.

The man lowered his eyes, coughing into his serviette. Dash could’ve sworn it sounded more like a stifled laugh.

“Is not Mr. Brackmann, here, your majordomo? I was given to understand from Jessa—”

“Lord Tremayne. Luther is much more than my majordomo. He’s been with me all my life and is one whom I consider a friend. Just as Mr. Coffman is a dear and valued friend.” The ostrich plume in Marguerite’s saffron turban shuddered with her outrage.

“Just as I consider Winston and Mrs. Penrose to be my friends,” Dash said. “Besides, Winston is my cousin.” With a wave of his hand, he indicated the pair should join them at the table.

Winston didn’t hesitate, but flung himself into a chair next to Jessa’s affronted mother, clearly enjoying discomfiting Marguerite. Mrs. Penrose hesitated, then sat next to Jessa’s honorary uncle.

“There are so few of us in the house tonight, it makes no sense to stand on formality,” Dash said. Indeed, the house hadn’t been this meagerly populated since the early days of his poverty, after the deaths of his parents.

Most of the staff had left this afternoon with the wagon taking poor Melwyn to her final rest. They wouldn’t return until the following evening, after the girl’s funeral. Luther had shown a surprising talent in the kitchen, joining Mrs. Penrose in putting together a light supper for them all. He’d also lent a hand in preparing rooms for the unexpected trio.

Dash had requested that Holly’s nursemaid, Gwenna, stay behind, along with another young housemaid. Together they watched over his daughter. He’d instructed them not to let Holly out of their sight and to keep the nursery doors locked. Between the two of them, they should be able to safeguard one four-year-old girl. A few footmen remained to roam the halls and generally keep watch as well.

Yet, something nagged at him, made him restless. Uneasy. Some miasma permeated the air, tensing his shoulders, setting up a throbbing in his cheek. He rubbed the scar absently.

Marguerite subsided in her fussing and returned to nibbling her dinner, intent on ignoring the presence of his servants. They ate in silence until a rolling boom of thunder rattled the windows.

Dash glanced up at Luther. “How was Jessa when you left her?”

The older man’s eyes bored into his. He placed his fork carefully on his plate before answering. “She’d calmed somewhat. She said she wanted to spend the evening with Holly, rather than join us. Marguerite and Mr. Coffman and I will join them for a while after supper. After all, Marguerite is the child’s grandmother. She hasn’t seen Holly since she was a baby.”

“I also haven’t seen Jessa for a while,” Marguerite said. “That girl has a great deal of explaining to do. I had no idea she’d run off here to the wilds until just a few days ago.” She glared at Luther. “It seems she and Luther find it acceptable to conspire against my wishes. To keep secrets from me. Me. Her own mother.” Marguerite tossed her head, working herself up for more drama.

“It seems to me, Marguerite, you are adept at keeping secrets yourself,” Dash said. “And at misplacing daughters.”

The collective gasp in the room seemed to suck up all the available air. A silver utensil clattered on a china plate. Coffman choked on a piece of venison, his cough loud.

Marguerite’s face turned a mottled purple, then drained of all color. The flush rising on her overexposed freckled chest clashed with the strands of pale pearls rattling with her quick breaths.

“See here, Tremayne.” Uncle Stan’s face flushed, his jowls quivering. “I must insist—”

“No, Mr. Coffman,
I
must insist,” Dash said. He sipped his wine, staring in turn at each of his unwelcome guests. “I must insist on knowing why not one of you thought it relevant to tell me about my late wife’s upbringing. Why none of you warned me how fragile she was. Why none of you cared enough about her well-being to ever visit her.”

Dash slammed his glass to the table and rose. He leaned forward, glaring at them. “And why did none of you do more to protect her? For all you knew of me, I could’ve been the same kind of animal as her father.”

Marguerite’s sharp cry drew his attention.

“Yes, madam, I know about her father. Now, when it’s far too late. Were you so very anxious to have her off your hands? To foist your broken child on any unsuspecting man, so long as you no longer had to look at her? To see your guilt in her eyes?”

Winston jumped up, catching his arm. “Dash, there’s no need for this. Lily… Lily was—”

Dash shook off his grasp.

Marguerite leaned on Luther’s shoulder, weeping into her napkin, while he absently patted her shoulder.

Luther met Dash’s eyes, but the look held a surprising lack of ire. Instead, Dash read sympathy in the older man’s eyes. Not for Jessa’s gaudy mother, but for him.

For some reason, that look—combined with Marguerite’s tears—only added fuel to the fire already simmering in Dash’s gut. Those tears, so like Lily’s. Crocodile tears. Meant to rouse him to sympathy or drive him to submission. Useless.

“Was it not enough to sacrifice one daughter to me?” Dash rocked back on his heels. “You had to send Jessa to take Lily’s place? To steal Lily’s daughter from me? To further torment me? Did you intend her to steal my very heart from me?”

His heart. It slammed in his chest, driving the blood in rushing torrents through his veins. Just as it pounded when Jessa lay beneath him while he drove himself into her soft body. Somewhere along the way his heart had indeed been stolen. A golden-haired, emerald-eyed witch held it in her small hands.

He cast one more look at the people sitting around his table staring back at him with a peculiar mix of expressions.

The tic in Stan’s cheek, and the flat, grim line of his mouth gave away a fury held in check only by the iron will of his military training.

Luther, his eyes sad, as if sorry for Dash.

Marguerite.

Mother of both mad Lily, and maddening Jessa. Her tears had run in ugly rivulets through the rouge and powder on her cheeks. Lines bracketed her drooping mouth and creased her forehead, but there was a glimpse of something else. Some lost beauty. If life had been kinder… if she’d made different choices….

She raised her chin, returning his look, but there was no animosity, no heat in her gaze. Only resignation showed in her eyes. And guilt.

Winston still stood, arrested in mid motion, his hands held out in silent appeal to Dash. His face twisted into an expression of anguish, a tormented grief.

Dash furrowed his brow, puzzled at his manservant’s expression. Did Winston really feel so sorry for him?

Chills coursed through Dash when he turned to Mrs. Penrose, catching the look on her face. She alone was not looking at her furious master, but stared instead out the dining room window. He followed her terrified gaze.

The east tower was visible, though it should not be, through the night and the rain. He could only see it because of the light shining from a high window.

A light where there should be none.

The alarm bells in Dash’s head renewed their clanging. Louder.

Winston turned. Stared out the window. Mrs. Penrose jumped to her feet, her hand over her mouth, smothering an involuntary cry.

The three remaining diners fell silent, staring in puzzlement at the standing trio.

“Lily! Oh my God, what have you done?” With an anguished cry, Winston spun and raced from the room.

THE SILENCE IN the dining room, left in Winston’s wake, lasted mere seconds. Marguerite leapt to her feet. Mottled color flushed her cheeks. Her hand clutched the rope of pearls laying on her bosom, shaking. Anger raced across her face. And fear.

“Lily?” She rounded on Dash. “Is everyone on your staff quite mad? What on earth did Winston mean?” She pointed in fury at the door through which he’s disappeared. “He spoke as if—as if—” Her chest rose and fell, as if she didn’t have the breath, or the courage, to finish the sentence.

Luther used his cane to push himself to his feet, pulling Marguerite into his arms. She looked up at him. Grief won out over all other emotions. She shook her head in denial of Winston’s words, crying once more. “Luther, what did he mean?”

“I don’t know, pet.” Luther glared over Marguerite’s shoulder to Dash. “It appears you have some explaining to do yourself, Tremayne. Keeping secrets of your own, are you? What the hell is going on here?”

“I’d like to know that myself.” Dash scrubbed the scar on his face with a shaking hand. Rage—and something else—had him seeing black spots swimming before his eyes. He returned Luther’s glare. Pity, and disgust, at Marguerite’s overwrought display burned like acid in his belly. “I don’t know what the hell Winston was talking about,” he said. “Whatever you’re thinking, you’re wrong. Lily is dead. I watched her die that night. I smelled—I heard—”

Memories of that night swamped him. The scent of burning flesh that left him retching into the scrub brush. The roar of the fire. The screams of the trapped horse. And worse, dear God, far worse. The breath sawed in his lungs with the pain of a jagged blade.

“I heard Lily die that night. I stood there—I watched her die. I listened—the screams, dear God, the—” The half-sob of grief, of frustration in his voice infuriated him. “I couldn’t save her. I was too late. Just like—just like with my mother. Too late.” He gave a wry, half-choked laugh. “It seems I am always too late to save the women I love. And so they die.”

“She was mad, Captain.” Mrs. Penrose stood, her hands clutched at her waist, her chin thrust up. “Far beyond any help. Far beyond any saving. And he—” Her lower lip trembled, tears coursing down her face.

Dash seized his housekeeper by the shoulders. Red, unreasoning rage poured like lava through his veins. “Stop that caterwauling this instant! What do you know about this? I demand you tell me right now. What the blue blazes are you talking about?” A crack of lightning punctuated the command.

Mrs. Penrose tried to twist away from his grip, but he gave her no quarter. He couldn’t afford to. Ice water poured into his blood. It burned as much as the roaring fires of his anger. Fury turned into something else.

Fear. It tasted coppery in his mouth. Like blood.

“She says she feels safe there. Calls it her fortress. She says it’s the only place the child can be protected.”

The child. Holly. Dash waited no longer. He raced for the stairs, praying with all his heart he would not be too late.

Again.

48.

Poor Lily…

JESSA STOOD IN the center of the room, barely daring to breath. The wrong word—the wrong move—and there would be nothing she could do to save any of them.

For the past thirty minutes she’d been in this same position, waiting for an opening, looking for an opportunity to attack. Escape. But not without Holly.

The woman prowling the room, muttering to herself, had stayed between her and the child, who lay sprawled like an abandoned rag doll on a pallet on the far side of the round tower room. From where she stood, Jessa couldn’t tell if the little girl bore any injuries. Or worse. Holly hadn’t moved in all those long minutes.

Lily’s movements were jerky, almost clumsy, but a bright awareness gleamed in her green eyes. She never paused in her tasks. Never took her eyes off Jessa for even an instant.

Jessa tried again to get through to her half-sister.

“Lily, please. I don’t know what you’re doing, but if you tell me, I’ll be glad to help you.”

“He’s afraid of mirrors, you know. Won’t go into a room with a mirror.” A brief grin contorted Lily’s face. “That’s why we’re safe here. He won’t come here.” She sniffed, inelegantly wiping her nose with the back of her hand.

The smell of oil from dozens of lamps permeated the room. Lily had been stumbling from one to the other, filling them, turning the wicks up high. Oil from her hasty movements splashed in puddles on the floor, and stained the front of her crimson satin dress. The same dress she’d worn in the painting.

Jessa breathed through her mouth, trying to avoid the fumes, but the stench already had her half-dizzy and nauseated. “Lily, you’ve misunderstood him, I’m sure. Dash wants only to help you, to—”