Authors: Alison Stuart
Paul frowned. “If Cecilia heard her go past, she could have followed her down the stairs and–”
“Paul. Cecilia is our vengeful spirit who didn’t want the truth revealed. She heard Suzanna go past.” Helen’s hand went to her wrist. “Did she try to stop her? In the struggle did Suzanna fall down the stairs or was she pushed?” She frowned. “I would like to give her the benefit of the doubt, but I think the evidence points to her pushing Suzanna down the stairs.”
“Do you remember if any of her bones were broken?”
Helen frowned. “She had a broken femur but I put that down to her falling off the ladder and then not being able to climb back up again.”
Paul’s lips tightened. “What if Suzanna fell down the stairs and broke her leg. As she lay on the floor, Cecilia picked up the poker from the fireplace and finished off her troublesome daughter-in-law with one quick blow to the head.”
Helen’s brow creased. “Oh Paul, how awful but it makes sense. Then all she had to do was dispose of the body down the hole and go to Suzanna’s bedchamber, pack her bag with what she thought an absconding wife would take with her and throw the valise down after her. She closed the wall up and went back to bed with no one being any the wiser. Only she missed the diary.”
“Cecilia may have had her suspicions about Suzanna and Stephenson for some time,” Paul observed. “Remember, she says in a letter that ‘there have been rumors’ about her daughter-in-law.”
“More than that. She’d disapproved of the marriage to Robert from the first. Suzanna’s flighty behavior only confirmed her worst fears. And Robert? Poor Robert who loved her? Did Cecilia think that by getting rid of Suzanna all would be well with her son?”
“I am sure she did,” Paul said. “But she didn’t understand what Robert had been through in Spain, the things he had seen, what he had suffered.”
Helen continued. “She didn’t understand and wouldn’t even try. Robert had come back from the Spanish Peninsula every bit as shell shocked as any soldier from the Great War.”
“And then to believe he had been abandoned by his wife, little wonder he took his own life,” Paul concluded.
“So Cecilia lost her son after all,” Helen said. “How sad.”
Paul refilled his glass and joined Helen beside the fire, taking the seat across from her. They sat in silence staring at the dancing flames and the glowing coals. Helen’s thoughts were of Paul and Charlie and how little difference there had been between their experiences and that long distant war that had sent the wounded and damaged Robert Morrow back home.
The clock on the mantelpiece chimed the hour jerking her out of her reverie. “Look at the time. I should go to bed.”
As she stood, he rose from his chair and took a step to her, putting a hand on her arm. “Don’t go, Helen. Stay with me tonight.”
Chapter 29
Paul saw the conflicting emotions in her face as she looked up at him:
Tony, propriety, respectability, reputation...
He didn’t care about any of those things any more. He knew only one thing, he loved Helen and unless he had completely misread her, she loved him too.
He gently tightened his grip on her arm and pulled her to him. “I’m tired of doing the right thing,” he said. “Helen, I know I’m not Charlie, but...”
“No.” Her eyes widened and she placed her hands on either side of his face, forcing him to look into her eyes. “And I wouldn’t want you to be. I love you for who you are, Paul Morrow.”
The word lay between them. Such a simple word–love–and yet responsible for so much unhappiness in this house alone.
The gray eyes brimmed with tears as she said, “I love you. I have loved you for a long time and I want to stay with you tonight. When I’m in your arms, I feel like I have come home to the place I belong.”
He put his arms around her and bent his head to kiss her, gentle at first, testing her resolve. They had kissed before but always stolen, guilty, desperate gestures of an unacknowledged affection. Now her body responded, melting against him as his hands rose to her shoulders, running down her arms. So slender, so delicate and yet he could feel the strength that came from a life lived in the Australian bush.
He pushed back the sleeves of her cardigan, kissing the inside of her wrists. Helen threw back her head as his lips moved to her throat, finding the soft hollow at the base of her throat. He lifted her in his arms, ignoring the grumbling from his shoulder and carried her into the bedroom.
He lay her down on the bed and turned out the light, leaving only the soft glow from the fire in the sitting room, illuminating the bed in a soft, golden light. She slipped her arms around his neck bringing his face down to hers and they kissed again.
The physical desire for her threatened to overwhelm him but he wanted so much more from this moment then just carnal gratification. He wanted this woman, body and soul. His hand brushed her chest and she caught it, placing it on her breast. Even through the layers of shirt, shift and brassiere, he could feel her nipple, hard and erect.
He groaned and she pulled off her cardigan, fumbling with the buttons of her blouse. He lowered his mouth to her nipple, his tongue circled the areola as his spare hand navigated her skirt, finding the top of her stocking. When he touched the bare flesh of her inner thigh, she threw her head back, grinding her hips against him, her fingers tearing at his shirt buttons and belt. In a complicated burlesque, they divested each other of their clothing, pausing after each layer fell away to explore what had been hidden.
Even in the dim light, her slight but hard body delighted him, her breasts surprisingly full against her slender chest. He kissed each one in turn, teasing the nipples with his tongue as she arched against him. He slid his hand between her legs, determined to share his pleasure with her, and saw her eyes open as he entered her, sliding inside her as if she had been waiting for him all her life.
They moved together in perfect unison, Helen’s fingernails raking his back. She cried out as he brought them both to climax. He gathered her closer in his arms, determined not to pull away from her, marveling at how two people could become one.
He felt her fingers in his hair as she turned his face to her and even in the dim light he could see the wonder in her face. He sighed and fell away from her, drawing her into him, curling himself around her. They slept for a little while, waking in the dark hours of the night to take each other again. This time the urgency had passed and they could allow a languid, sensuous lovemaking.
Paul rolled over and switched on the bedside light. He propped himself up on an elbow and looked down at her. She reached up and touched his face and he turned his head so her fingers rested on his mouth. He held them there, kissing each one in turn.
“I should go to my own bed,” Helen said in a drowsy voice. “Annie will notice if it’s not been slept in.”
“To hell with Annie and everyone else,” Paul said, his gaze not leaving Helen’s face. “Stay with me, Helen.”
She closed her eyes and he saw a tear slide from beneath her lashes. “Paul, this is all wrong. I’m betrothed to another man.”
“But you’re not in love with him.”
“No,” she conceded. “But I don’t want to hurt him.”
He slid his hand behind her neck, pulling her down beside him, cradling her head in his shoulder. “If you marry him, Helen, you will cause him far more pain.”
“What do you mean?”
“You’re not happy now and as the years go by, your unhappiness will make him unhappy and you will end up hating each other.”
“You seem very sure.”
“I am,” he said. “I’ve seen it before.”
She turned her head away to hide the tears that had begun to seep from beneath her eyes.
“And if I break the engagement, what then, Paul? Will you be there?”
His lips brushed her hair. “Always,” he whispered. “I love you, Helen. I want you with me forever. You’re my soul mate, my healer. I can’t let you go now.”
She turned to look at him,
“I thought I had found my soul mate in Charlie,” she said, “but I have been gifted another chance. I can’t leave you, Paul.”
* * * *
In the first gray light of dawn, Helen lay awake remembering, turning every moment of the previous night over like a precious jewel to be cherished. Nothing outside the four walls of this room mattered and for the first time in years, a happiness and contentment she thought she would never experience again, swathed her. She smiled and turned over to look at the man who slept beside her.
Sensing her movement, Paul murmured in his sleep and rolled over on to his back with a sigh. She turned on her side, watching him. Sleep robbed his face of the angles and lines of a hard life, and she could see, for a fleeting moment, the innocence and hope of youth in the gentle curve of his lips.
He had thrown back the covers, baring his chest to the chill of the morning and for the first time she could see the damage to his left shoulder, forever marring the strong rower’s chest and shoulders. There were other scars, one on his right arm and another across his ribs, but nothing like the twisted, knotted legacy of that day in 1917.
“Not pretty is it?”
She started and glanced up at his face. He watched her with hazy, amused eyes.
“No,” she admitted.
“That’s what happens when four inches of shrapnel lodges in your shoulder. It’s something of a miracle that I am still alive, let alone retain some use of my arm.” He flexed the fingers of his left hand. “I was fortunate to have excellent doctors.”
She threw back the bed covers revealing the whole length of his body still strong and lean-muscled despite the damage. With tentative fingers, she reached out and touched each of the scars in turn, the legacy of war. He lay without moving beneath her and her gaze held his, willing him to trust her.
“It’s who I am, Helen,” he said.
“I know and I love you for every mark on your body.”
He raised his left hand to touch her face.
“You carry scars too, Helen,” he said, “but they are here–” his hand rested on her chest, “–in your heart. That’s what the war has done to us all, a generation of permanently scarred people.”
She laid her hand over his, pressing it to her heart. “I love you so much it hurts.”
His lips curved in a smile. “And I love you, Helen...Morrow.”
“Do you suppose?” Helen took a deep shuddering breath. “Do you suppose Charlie would mind–about us?”
Paul took her in his arms and she laid her head on his chest.
“Do you believe in ghosts, Mrs. Morrow?”
Helen laughed. “I have, as you well know, every reason to be open-minded on that subject. Why?”
He stroked her hair. “Because I think there has been a fourth spirit involved in our recent melee.”
Helen sat bolt upright and looked down at him. “Who?”
“Charlie,” he said frowning. “No, not Charlie but more his presence, watching over all of us...protecting us and, bringing us together.”
“Paul, that’s ridiculous.”
“The dog, Reuben,” Paul said. “Whenever we saw or heard Reuben, it was always in that context.” He saw the disbelief in her face and smiled. “You forget, Helen, I’m half Irish. My mother brought me up with tales of the other worlds and a succession of ayahs in Malaya filled my head with tales of bomohs and strange spirits of the jungles.”
“No, I believe you,” she said, remembering the black and white spaniel standing on the path to the church, its feathery tail waving. It had seemed so real and yet had proved as much an illusion as the specters of Suzanna and Robert. She thought of Charlie’s last note to her. “
I love you my darling girl, always, and whatever is in my power to keep you and the baby safe and well, I will do.”
Had he kept that promise?
“After everything we’ve been through,” she said. “I’m not going to doubt you.”
She lowered her head and kissed him gently, just a small, butterfly kiss. His eyes closed and she felt his body relax beneath her touch. Without a word, she straddled him, leaning down and kissing his face, his neck, running her fingers through the dark hair of his chest, tracing a line from the notch at the base of his throat, down the long, lean body.
Rhythmically they moved together, taking their time, allowing themselves to forget the rain that spattered on the windows and the cares of the world that lay beyond the door.
Spent, Helen subsided into Paul’s arms and they slept again, a deep dreamless sleep that was only disturbed by a knock on the door of the outer room, followed by a rattling of the door handle.
“Christ!” Paul sat up, pushing his hair out of his eyes. “It’s Sarah.”
He swung his legs out of bed, hastily fastening a dressing gown around himself as he strode out into the sitting room.
Helen buried herself in the bedclothes. She heard Paul’s voice and Sarah’s response and he padded back into the bedroom, bearing a tray with tea, two cups and the morning mail.
She sat up and pulled the sheet up over her naked chest. “Oh God, Paul what are we going to do?”
He smiled down at her and handed her a cup. “Seeing as she has gone to all the trouble to provide two cups, we’re going to have a cup of tea.”