Lone Wolfe (24 page)

 
          
It
was too much. He
felt
too much. After
years, decades, of nurturing that numbing control, it was finally starting to
splinter. And Jacob didn’t know what to do without it.
How to
act.
How to be.
What to feel.

 
          
He
let out a long, shuddering sigh as he heard Mollie climb the front stairs. He
imagined he could still feel the warmth of her hand on his cheek, and every
impulse urged him to follow her up the stairs, to take her in his arms, to stay
there for ever.

 
          
This
was no longer about seduction or sex. He wasn’t dealing with the seemingly
simplistic matters of a physical transaction, or resisting it.

 
          
No,
now something far greater was at stake. It played havoc with his mind. It
wrecked his resolutions. It destroyed his self-control.
Love
.

 
          
He
was falling in love with Mollie Parker, with her warmth and kindness and
generosity of spirit, with her pansy-brown eyes and her tumble of auburn hair.
With everything about her, and it terrified him.

 
          
Jacob
spun away from the kitchen and the sights of his cake and his present. They
were too much as well, more than he’d ever had before. He’d learned long ago
not to expect presents, surprises,
kindnesses
of any
sort. He’d trained himself not to want them.

 
          
Yet
now his defences were crumbling. He felt it at night, when he fell asleep
deeply enough to dream. The old nightmare came for him nearly every night now,
and in it he was always worse than ever. He was a madman, a monster, and that
awful laughter was his. The sound echoed endlessly through him.

 
          
Every
time he woke up, sweating and shaking, he remembered the look of shock on
Mollie’s face when she’d seen him in the depths of that dream, and his
determination to tell her the truth about himself, of what had happened and how
he’d felt, to spill all his secrets, trickled coldly away.

 
          
He
couldn’t
.

 
          
And
yet still he wanted to. He was desperate to talk, to tell her everything in a
way he had never wanted or even envisaged before. It was crazy, the way the
words rose inside him, bubbled up so he could barely keep them in. Already he’d
told her more than he had shared with any other person.

 
          
And she isn’t walking away. She’s still with
you.
Caring for you.
Maybe even loving you …

 
          
Raking
his hands through his hair, Jacob headed out into the damp night. The grass was
wet with rain and the sky black and moonless above him. He walked and breathed
and tried to empty his mind of thoughts.

 
          
That
old trick didn’t work any more. The thoughts came anyway, memories rushing in
to fill the empty spaces of his heart and mind, and the strange and surprising
thing was they were
good
memories.
They were memories of Mollie.

 
          
Memories
of her seemed to fill the gardens and house; he could picture her bent over a
plant, hard at work. Curled up on a bench in the Children’s Garden, smiling
wryly at being caught dozing in the sun like a contented cat. Sloshing through
mud puddles in the boots he’d bought her. The memories were small, yet they
still made him smile.
Made him want.

 
          
He
wanted to let her know the truth. He craved the kind of exposure and honesty
he’d been running from for twenty years, and yet even so, it was terrifying.
Impossible.

 
          
If he told her.

 
          
What?
What would happen?

 
          
Would
she reject him, if he told her just what—and who—had made him leave?
Himself.
The horror of his own self had forced him away from
his family, before he hurt them. Before he became even more like his father.

 
          
And
even more terrifying, what if he hurt Mollie? What if the old demons claimed
him, and he hurt her just as he’d hurt Annabelle—or worse? That thought scared
him most of all. It made his eyes darken and he turned back to his father’s
study, the knowledge of who he was—who he would always be—hardening inside of
him.

 
          
THE
next few days Mollie worked outside, determined to finish the renovation of the
Rose Garden, although she could hardly call it that now that there were no
roses in it.

 
          
She
told herself she would tell Jacob she loved him, yet he’d been avoiding her
again, silent and foreboding, and her courage failed her. It was so hard to say
those words when you had no idea what the other person thought or felt, or
whether such a declaration would even be welcome. She never found the right
moment—or the courage.

 
          
The
moment came when Mollie wasn’t looking for it. She wasn’t even ready. She was
sweaty and tired from working in the garden, and came into the house for a
drink of water. Yet as she stood in the kitchen, the summer sunlight slanting
through the windows, she was conscious of a creeping sense of desolation; she
had only one more day of work on the garden, and then there would be no excuse
to stay.

 
          
She
let out a long, slow breath, half wondering—half believing—that it was for the
best. The weeks of Jacob’s solicitous silence had started to take their toll.
Maybe she loved him; maybe it didn’t matter.

 
          
Sighing,
Mollie gazed at the gardens in all their restored glory. She’d been so sure of
her love for Jacob just a few days ago, so serene in her certainty. Yet now she
felt the creeping of fear, like the most tenacious and poisonous weed, curling
its destructive tendrils around her hopes.
Her heart.
And she didn’t think she had the courage to tell Jacob anything.

 
          
She
could, at least, tell him the garden was almost done. That, Mollie hoped, might
give her a sense of how he felt about her leaving. Yet even that thought was
nerve-racking; what if he greeted the news with calm disinterest, a careless
shrug? How could she tell him she loved him
then?
How could she tell him she loved him at all?

 
          
Sighing
again, Mollie went in search of Jacob in the place he spent most of his time,
his father’s study.

 
          
She
could tell the room was empty before she even entered in. The door was ajar and
a breeze blew in from the open window, ruffling the scattered papers on the
desk. Mollie knew she shouldn’t enter; this was Jacob’s private space, his
sanctum. Yet the remnant of her own memories forced her inside, to stand in the
centre of the hated room and remind herself that it was just a room, in a
house, and it held no power over her or even over Jacob. She could smell the
clean scent of cut grass from the window, and it banished the memory of stale
smoke and an excess of alcohol.

 
          
She
wondered if the memories could be banished for Jacob. Coming back to Wolfe
Manor had made him a slave to them, and she felt his bonds more keenly than
ever. Would he ever be free? Could she help him be free?

 
          
Could
her love?

 
          
A
breeze ruffled the drapes once again and a few pages blew off the desk.
Automatically Mollie stooped to retrieve them, and then stilled as she saw the
words on the page.

 
          
Dear Annabelle. Today is your sixteenth
birthday
.

 
          
Mollie
knew she should stop reading. These were letters, old letters, letters that had
never been sent. And even though common courtesy—not to mention common
sense—told her to put these pages back on the desk unread, a deeper instinct
made her keep reading.

 
          
I wonder what you are doing, and I hope you
are able to celebrate. I hope you have cause to celebrate, for not a day goes
by when I don’t think of you, and pray that you are safe and loved. I left
because I loved you, but I know you can’t understand that now…
.

 
          
Tears
stung Mollie’s eyes. A lump formed in her throat. She kept reading.

 
          
I don’t expect you to understand it, or even
forgive. But I want you to know that I am thinking of you, and imagining your
big butterscotch cake, with sixteen pink candles to blow out. Make a wish
.

 
          
Your loving brother, Jacob

 
          
Mollie
turned to the desk. A stack of papers lay on it, and she knew instinctively
what they were. Letters to Jacob’s family, letters he had never sent. How many
had he written over the years? By the size of the stack, she guessed dozens.
Maybe hundreds.
She placed Annabelle’s letter back on top,
wanting to read the others yet knowing she had no right. Reading one letter
might be forgiven, but reading them all was not.

 
          
Yet
she longed to, for she knew these letters were Jacob’s heart. He may have left,
for whatever reason he felt so necessary, but his heart hadn’t. His heart had
remained with his family, and it made her love him all the more.

 
          
‘What
are you doing?’

 
          
Mollie
froze. Jacob stood in the doorway, his face dark with suspicion and rising
fury.

 
          
‘Jacob,’
she said weakly, and he strode into the room.

 
          
‘May
I help you with something?’ he asked with cold politeness, and then his gaze
went to his desk, and the pile of his letters. The very air in the room seemed
to shiver, freeze. Jacob went utterly still, and Mollie knew he hadn’t realised
he’d left the letters out until that very second.

 
          
That awful second.

 
          
His
gaze, dark and pitiless, swung back to her. ‘Did you have a good look?’ he
asked, as if it was a question of nominal interest. His eyes were blacker than
Mollie had ever seen.

 
          
‘I—I’m
sorry. The papers blew off the desk and I went to replace them.’ She swallowed,
knowing a full confession was required. ‘I read your letter to Annabelle. I’m
sorry. I know it was private, but it was beautiful, Jacob—’

 
          
‘You
shouldn’t have.’ He stalked over to the desk and swept the letters into a
folder.

 
          
‘Why
did you never send it—them? If Annabelle could read that letter, she would—’

 
          
‘She
would what?’ He swung around, suddenly dangerous. ‘She would forgive me?’

 
          
‘No,
no,’ Mollie said quickly. ‘Just … understand. More.’

 
          
Jacob
said nothing for a moment. ‘Well, I’ve already spoken to her,’ he said finally,
his voice still cool.
‘Several times.
As a matter of
fact, she’s returning here next week.
With her husband.’

 
          
‘Her husband?’
Mollie repeated incredulously.

 
          
‘Yes,
his name is Stefano, and she met him in Spain.’ Mollie just blinked. She’d
known from her friend’s emails that she was doing a photography shoot in Spain,
but
married?
She hadn’t checked her
email in ages, and she wondered if Annabelle had written her. She would have to
write and offer her congratulations.

 
          
‘It
seems as if all of my siblings have found their happily ever after,’ Jacob
continued in that same cold voice. ‘I’ve talked to them all, you know. We’ve
made our peace with one another. If you think I’m still suffering with guilt
over
that
, you’re quite wrong.’
Mollie opened her mouth to speak—to demand what it was that enslaved him
now—but Jacob rode over her with his words. ‘It’s really very sweet. At least I
know they’ll be taken care of when I leave.’