From within the tangles of hair that streamed around her face and over her breasts, she stared wildly about the room. Aidan sat up and reached for her, but she lurched out of his arms. Then she seemed to bring him into focus.
“Aidan . . . ?”
He gathered her to him. “You were having a nightmare.”
“Oh, God, it was awful.” She leaned her cheek on his shoulder and raked her spiraling hair back from her face.
“Tell me,” he whispered. An ache gripped his throat as he wondered if he would ever be strong enough to let her go, to continue in a life without her that now seemed as empty and dismal as a winter’s famine. “It might help to dispel the images.”
“He came back,” she murmured against his shoulder. “He chased me with his dagger and cursed me. He said . . .” Frowning, she lifted her head.
He took her hands in his. “Yes?”
“He shouted at me in French, but I understood him. I should not have been able to, but I did, only . . . it wasn’t quite me.”
“What do you mean?”
“I was younger, a child. He demanded to know how I’d survived the fire, why I hadn’t died as my parents did. He said only a witch could have evaded the flames, and that witches must be made . . .” Tremors racked her body. Her fingers clutched at his hands. “Must be made to suffer and die.”
“Good God.” The thought of Laurel in such danger, of coming under the threat of so vile a fiend, filled him with an unspeakable, trembling rage, but one masked by the calm of a simple decision. He would commit murder before letting harm come to her.
He looked deep into her eyes. “Are you certain you aren’t confusing your dream with reality?”
Her expression adamant, she shook her head. “No. I remember distinctly that he said those awful things to me tonight—those very words. In French. I don’t understand how, but in my dream I came to understand him. He is someone from my past, and he abhors my very existence.”
Her certainty iced Aidan’s soul. Leaning back against the headboard, he drew her beside him and into the shelter of his arms. “I can protect you, but only if you tell me everything, Laurel.
Everything.
Can you do that? Can you trust me enough to finally tell me the truth about the woman in the yellow dress?”
The question seemed so simple, so straightforward, as though it would not derail every promise Laurel had made to Victoria. As though it would not strip her bare and lay her greatest vulnerabilities at Aidan’s feet.
Did he even realize how his fingers grazed back and forth across her bare breasts, showering her flesh with tingling goose bumps, or how the tip of his forefinger now circled her nipple with an inferred propriety that cut through all the layers of deception and rendered her defenseless to resist him?
Perhaps he did. Perhaps each seductive nuance served as a tactic of persuasion. Regardless, she owed him the truth, insofar as that truth did not put Victoria, and the monarchy, in jeopardy.
“My name is Laurel Sutherland,” she said, looking up at him to gauge his reaction. “There is no Mrs. Sanderson.”
He gave no outward sigh of reproach, but gently stated, “Then you have never been married.”
She shook her head. “I made that up in order to—”
“No,” he interrupted. “We’ll save that for now. Let us instead begin at the beginning.”
“But I don’t know the beginning.” As disapproval claimed his features, she hurried on. “I’m telling you the truth. I have no memories prior to my sixth year. That was when our home burned to the ground and my parents were killed. I only know what my uncle has told me about my early life.”
“Your uncle Edward raised you?” When she nodded, he smiled faintly. “You and those sisters who may or may not exist, depending on your mood?”
“I have three, all younger. Holly, Ivy, and Willow.”
His eyebrows went up. “I heard you speak of Holly and Ivy in your dream. You also mentioned a garden, which led me to believe you were speaking of running through the foliage.”
“We did run through the garden the day of the fire. Nurse brought me out through a tunnel that ran from the wine cellar out to the carriage house. Other servants brought my sisters out.”
“Then you do remember the fire?”
“Only vaguely, and only because it is part of a nightmare that has plagued me ever since.”
“Again this blending of dream and reality,” he mused. “Where were you living at the time? Surely your uncle would have told you that?”
“Yes. Peyton Manor was not far from here, actually. Twenty, perhaps thirty miles to the north. Near a town called Billington.”
“In the Cotswolds. Have you never gone back?”
“There was nothing to go back to.” An ache of loss spread across her heart—for her home, her parents, and the part of herself she had lost that day. “There would only be the foundation and the charred remains of the outbuildings.”
He must have heard the sorrow in her voice, for he held her closer and pressed his lips to her hair. “It is time, then.”
Despite the heat of his body against hers, an unnamed dread blew coldly at her nape. “Time for what?”
“To return. Perhaps your past holds the key to the danger in your present. I propose that we set out first thing in the morning.”
The prospect terrified her. Returning to her home meant facing her nightmares, meant facing death.
For the first time, it struck her that Uncle Edward’s reticence through the years might have been due to more than his sorrow over losing his sister. Perhaps he had believed there were things in the past that Laurel and her sisters were better off not knowing.
Safer
not knowing.
As of tonight, she could no longer afford the luxury of ignorance. If a threat had reemerged from her past, her sisters might be in danger as well.
She pulled up straighter. “You are right. This is something I must do. But can you make time for such a journey? I realize there are vital matters keeping you in Bath, and—”
“I believe vital matters brought us
both
to Bath,” he interrupted. “And soon enough, you and I shall come to terms with those matters.”
However quietly spoken, the commanding force of that pronouncement wrapped itself around her. Aidan knew she had been lying to him, yet tonight he had gallantly set aside all questions that didn’t pertain to the immediate danger she faced. Eventually, however, he would demand more . . . as would she, for he surely kept as many secrets as she did.
Her duty dictated that she safeguard those secrets, though her heart decreed otherwise. But what of Aidan’s heart? Would he be forthcoming with her, or would honesty be a one-sided affair between them?
The answers must wait. Wondering where her clothing had fallen, she began to disentangle her legs from the bedclothes.
Aidan’s arms held her still. “Where do you think you’re going?”
“Back to Abbey Green.” At his puzzled frown she explained, “I cannot stay here all night. Already your servants must be abuzz about the woman their master has secreted away in his bedchamber.”
He pressed his lips to hers, his kiss punctuated by soft laughter. “Laurel, I have only one servant here, my man, Phelps, who attends to all my needs. I can assure you, I have never known a more discreet soul.”
“Oh . . . in that case . . .” She relaxed into his arms, the nudging doubts and even Victoria’s admonitions dissolving into the heat of their joined bodies as they stretched out, pulled the covers over them, and made slow, languorous love until sleep claimed them both.
Just as she drifted off, she felt Aidan’s lips at her cheek and heard the words
I love you
.
S
he didn’t know whether he had spoken them, or whether she had, or whether they had been merely part of the dream that enveloped her.
Chapter 20
T
hey set out from the Royal Crescent soon after dawn, driving the cabriolet out through the service entrance at the rear of the property to avoid supplying Aidan’s neighbors with the seeds of gossip.
By midmorning they arrived at the outskirts of Billington, some twenty-five miles northeast of Bath. Laurel had always considered the countryside surrounding Thorn Grove lovely, but the fairy-tale perfection of these rolling fields bordered by limestone walls and lush wood-lands, sweeping valleys, and sudden, breathtaking hills dazzled her.
The villages they passed, built of the same creamy stone as Bath, held similar charm. Yet just as when she had peered out from the proposed site of the Summit Pavilion, she discovered along the neat, winding roads nothing that struck a chord of remembrance. Nothing recognizable stirred in the breezes sifting across the meadows; no scents triggered any deep- rooted childhood memories.
How could she have lived here for the first six years of her life and remember nothing about it?
In Billington, Aidan pulled the cabriolet up beside a tidy coaching inn, freshly whitewashed and thatched. Vibrant flowers lined the path and spilled from window boxes. The signpost bore the image of a bright red fox, and the front door stood open to the brisk morning sunshine.
Entering a cleanly swept public room, they chose seats at a table by a window overlooking a rushing stream. The proprietor brought spiced ale for Aidan, mulled wine for Laurel. She regarded the man’s thinning hair and weathered complexion and estimated his age to be some forty-odd years. Old enough, perhaps, to remember a grand estate and the fire that had destroyed it.
“We are searching for a property hereabouts,” she told the man. “Peyton Manor. The house is gone, burned to the ground nearly twenty years ago. Have you heard of it?”
“Peyton Manor?” He stroked the grizzled hair on his chin. “Don’t strike a bell, ma’am.”
“It would have been between here and Chedford, I believe. The owners were called Sutherland,” she added, hoping to jog his memory. “They most certainly would have patronized Billington’s shops, as well as employed some of the villagers at the manor.”
“Sutherland. A common enough name, I expect.” The barkeep shook his head. “Still, I can’t think of any abandoned properties nearby, nor fires that destroyed ’em, and I’ve owned the Crimson Fox for nigh on thirty years.”
“Does this look at all familiar?” Aidan held out the signet ring for the man to see.
“No, sir.” He sauntered into the kitchen, leaving Laurel and Aidan alone.
“Perhaps my parents conducted their business in Chedford,” she reasoned, “rather than here in Billington.”
Aidan dropped the ring into his coat pocket, then reached across the table and placed his hand over hers. “The house may be gone, but the property won’t have walked away. Someone is bound to remember.”
“Perhaps, but I wonder if anyone will be able to shed light on why a Frenchman would have any connection with my family.” Laurel blew into her wine, waiting for the steam to settle before sampling the fruity beverage. Both spicy and sweet, it tickled her tongue and warmed her on its way down.
“Did your father fight in the wars?” he asked.
“Yes, but that would not explain how the attacker recognized me. Or why he seemed so familiar.”
Aidan’s hand tightened around hers, and very gently he asked, “Is there any reason to suspect that your parents’ deaths were anything but accidental?”
She jolted, nearly spilling her wine. Though she had had a similar thought last night, hearing it spoken so plainly undermined her fragile composure. Setting the goblet down, she drew a breath and forced herself to consider the worst of possibilities.
“Uncle Edward never once wavered in his story. He said the inspectors believed the fire started with a popping ember in the drawing room.”
“Could someone have deliberately set the fire?”
Chills shimmied up her spine.
The barkeep returned with wooden trenchers of stewed mutton and hunks of coarse brown bread. They ate quietly, their hands occasionally touching, their gazes meeting across the table. Aidan’s presence steadied her, made her feel safe, and yet . . . she felt the presence of an evil specter hovering close by, an unknown entity from her past that was capable of committing acts of unspeakable wickedness.
She feared for her sisters, for herself, and, yes, by association, for Aidan. But she also knew that danger would not frighten him away.
A half hour later, they climbed back into the cabriolet. After stopping to question a handful of Billington’s villagers, they continued north. The valleys deepened; the hills became more sheer. In the bend of a river, a watermill churned the currents into a rushing music that echoed across the pastures surrounding a farmhouse and outbuildings. They hailed the farmer, who met them at the gate.
“Peyton Manor? Tween here and Chedford? Can’t say as I’ve ever heard of such a place.”
Laurel recounted the directions Uncle Edward had once described.
The man removed his straw hat and passed a sleeve across his brow. “Sounds like the way to Greys Abbey. Not much more’n a pile of stones, the abbey. Very ancient. I can’t remember any estate that ever sat near it.”
He called to his wife, who had just then exited the barn with a tiny brown lamb in her arms. Her husband explained Laurel’s quest. Aidan showed them both the ring.
Like her husband, the woman shook her head. “Chedford . . . you’re sure, ma’am? Not farther north, perhaps?”
Laurel combed her fingers through the fleecy warmth of the lamb’s coat, then tickled the adorable creature beneath its chin. It gave a weak little bleat and nuzzled her finger. “I’m not sure of anything anymore,” she said.
They thanked the couple and drove on. Holding the reins in one hand, Aidan reached an arm around her shoulders and pulled her close. “We’ll find your answers. I promise you.”
She did not remark that such promises as often as not went unfulfilled.
The day wore on. As the slanting sun stretched golden rays across the rippling landscape, jagged stone walls rose up before them. Tumbling shrubberies and tangles of hawthorn surrounded the roofless structure.