The Perfect Bride (9 page)

And then it happened.

An instant later, the pillow disappeared. Cool, fresh air wafted over her face.

She sucked in a breath with a loud, ragged gasp that filled her ears. Her lungs were so
tight she could barely get any of that precious air into them. Jerking upright, she breathed in again, and again. Even as she did it, she peered into the darkness, willing her vision to clear, so she could see who—

The light. She needed the light.

Lunging for the bedside table, she fumbled for the lamp, her fingertips searching the darkness as desperately as her eyes did. Finally, thankfully,
her fingers made contact with the knob. She gave it a furious twist, automatically jerking her head from side to side as a pale pool of light flared to life, revealing the room, and—

She froze, her heart in her throat, shock rocketing through her.

There was no one there.

She gaped in disbelief, jerking her head to take in the room, seeking out every inch of the space. The result
was the same.

The room was empty, as peaceful and undisturbed as it had been when she’d gone to bed, the door firmly closed.

She was alone.

No.
She almost shook her head in denial. It wasn’t possible. Whoever it was had to be hiding, maybe waiting for her to lower her guard so they could burst out and attack again.

The thought instantly spurred her into motion. She shoved the
covers aside and jumped to her feet. Scanning the space for the nearest possible weapon, she spotted a fireplace poker on a stand next to the hearth. She raced for it, fully expecting to be intercepted at any moment. When she finally had it in hand, she gripped it in front of her with both fists and considered the room, looking for anyplace someone could be hiding.

Her gaze fell on the bathroom
door.

The bathroom.

The door was slightly ajar. Had she left it like that? She didn’t remember. The attacker could be in there, might not have been able to shut the door.

She wasted no time second-guessing herself. Crossing to the door in two strides, she raised the poker in her arms, drew back her leg and kicked the door in.

It flew inward with a bang, crashing against the
inside wall. She waited for a cry of surprise, of someone lurching out of the way, for any hint someone was in there.

Nothing.

Inching forward, she reached in carefully with one hand and flipped on the light.

The room was empty.

The discovery only stoked the agitation burning in her gut, her chest tightening until it felt as though she was running out of air again. It wasn’t
possible. The intruder had to be here somewhere. Unless they’d somehow managed to get out the door...

Turning on her heel, she marched over to the entrance to the suite.

The door was still locked.

She really was alone.

But she hadn’t been. It didn’t matter that she didn’t see anyone now. She knew it, certainty pounding through her veins as hard as the adrenaline still filling
her body.

Someone had been in the room with her, attacked her in her sleep and escaped before she could turn on the light. She didn’t know how, but somehow they’d managed to do it, vanishing into thin air.

Almost, she thought as a whisper of unease crawled along her skin, like a ghost.

Except it hadn’t been a ghost, she told herself firmly. Whoever it was had been very real.

She looked around the vast suite, the room no longer seeming remotely safe. She had a momentary impulse to leave, but that didn’t exactly seem like a better choice. If the intruder was no longer inside, he—or she—was somewhere out there now.

She considered her options. There seemed to be only one.

Climbing back into bed, Jillian pushed the pillows up against the headboard and propped
herself up against them. There wasn’t much chance she was going to get any more sleep tonight, not with the uncertainty of what had just happened clouding her brain, not with the remembered terror of those moments still thrumming through her.

Laying the fireplace poker across her lap, she sat there, eyes still searching the room for the intruder she knew had been there, and waited desperately
for morning to come.

Chapter Eight

Someone had tried to kill her.

Jillian had plenty of time to consider what had happened to her through the darkest hours of the night before dawn finally broke. And of all the conclusions she’d reached, that one loomed the largest.

Someone had tried to kill her.

She knew it in her bones. She remembered the feeling of the weight of the pillow against
her face, the shape of the arms beneath her fingers, too vividly not to know they’d been real.

The thought ran over and over again in her head, and every time it sent a fresh jolt of anger through her. It was all she could do not to glance around the dining room table at the others seated over breakfast, hoping to catch a glimpse of a guilty expression or someone looking back at her too intently,
or avoiding her gaze too deliberately.

But she didn’t expect anyone to do anything that obvious. More important, she wasn’t going to let them think they’d spooked her, or that she even suspected what had happened wasn’t just a dream. They might wonder why she didn’t try to leave if she thought she’d been attacked, and she wasn’t going anywhere.

Because now there wasn’t a doubt in her
mind that what happened to Courtney had been no accident.

She’d been murdered.

Jillian’s stomach clenched with certainty, nearly rejecting the few bites of breakfast she’d choked down. She didn’t know why the attacker had targeted her. Was it because they knew who she was, why she was here, and figured she had to be stopped from asking questions? Or had they come after her for the same
reason they’d come after Courtney, something to do with brides in this place? Either way, it couldn’t be a coincidence that the first bride to come to Sutton Hall had died a mysterious death and the second was attacked in the middle of the night. The events had to be connected. And the most reasonable conclusion was that Courtney had met with foul play, exactly as Jillian had figured.

There
was another connection as well. Someone had managed to get into her locked room without detection. The police said one of the reasons it seemed clear Courtney must have fallen was because the door to her room had been locked. Adam had told them he’d unlocked the door when she hadn’t responded to any summons that morning, found the room empty and the balcony doors open. Jillian had had her doubts
about the story, but now she had to wonder if it was true. She knew firsthand that a locked door wasn’t enough to keep someone out in Sutton Hall, or to prevent a vicious attack. Was that what happened to Courtney?

If they’d used a key to get in, she would have heard them relocking it, even if she hadn’t heard the door shut. There was only one other explanation she could think of for how
someone had managed to get in and out of the locked room.

There had to be another, hidden entrance of some kind.

She’d done a cursory search for it that morning, but had come up empty. Which hadn’t killed her conviction that it had to be there.

Preparing her words carefully, she raised her head to look at Grace. “So, Grace, I was wondering about something. When I think of an old
mansion like this, I always think of secret passageways and hidden doors, stuff like that. Does Sutton Hall have any of those?”

At the other side of the table, Grace went very still, her mouth thinning in a tight smile. “I’m afraid not. Those types of things are only found in fiction, or if not, the builders of Sutton Hall weren’t nearly so creative.”

She was lying. Even if Jillian wasn’t
positive the passages had to exist, the woman’s body language gave her away. She was trying to remain casual, all while her neck and shoulders had tensed just enough to indicate she wasn’t.

“Secret passageways?” Adam asked.

Jillian slowly turned her head to look at him, trying to forget how he’d looked in her dream last night. He watched her through narrowed eyes, his skepticism clear.

She shrugged lightly. “You have to admit, it’s something most people would be curious about. Can’t blame me for asking.”

He raised a brow, as if to ask,
Can’t I?

She simply smiled back at him, taking a perverse enjoyment from the way his expression darkened in response, as though he suspected she was up to something. No surprise there.

Then, as she stared at that coolly considering
face, another thought occurred to her, killing that momentary pleasure.

Could he be the one who’d attacked her?

No,
a voice in the back of her mind replied, rejecting the idea immediately. As soon as she did, she had to question her reaction. Did she really think it hadn’t been him, or did she just not want to believe it?

As she took in that dark steady gaze and felt a nervous flutter
deep in her belly in response, she had to admit she didn’t know.

“You’re right, of course,” Meredith interjected into the silence, her voice tight. “It would be a great marketing gimmick if this place came complete with secret passages. Maybe we should look and see if we can find any.”

Me first.
“Maybe,” Jillian agreed.

Even as she said it, she shot a glance at Grace. The woman’s
head remained bowed, her attention on her plate, but Jillian didn’t miss the way her lips thinned into a tense, unhappy line, or how she seemed to have paled.

Grace didn’t like the idea at all.

Jillian’s certainty only grew, and she had to resist the urge to smile. She was right.

Now she just had to prove it.

* * *

C
LAIMING
SHE
HAD
an upset stomach, Jillian headed back
to her room right after breakfast. As soon as she reached it, she began to consider where the hidden door could be. The attacker had managed to get out of the room between the time when she’d fought them off and when she’d turned on the lamp, so the entrance had to be relatively close to the bed, near enough that they could duck back through it and shut it again quickly. She eyed the wall next to
the bed, figuring it had to be somewhere along there.

She didn’t immediately spot anything out of the ordinary. It appeared to be nothing more than a plain wall. But of course a secret passageway would hardly be secret if it was obvious where the entrance was.

Stepping forward, she pressed her ear to the wall and began tapping along it, listening carefully for an echoing sound that could
indicate the presence of an empty space on the other side. She made it all the way from the corner nearest the door to the edge of the bed, but didn’t hear a thing. The wall sounded completely solid.

That didn’t necessarily mean anything, she thought resolutely. The wall still might be thick enough to muffle the sound.

If there was some kind of door in the wall, there had to be a way
to open it, assuming it wasn’t only from the other side. Hoping that wasn’t the case, she reached forward and pressed her fingers along the wallpaper, searching for any kind of button or latch, or even an indentation in the wall that would indicate the outline of a door.

She slowly, painstakingly began to go over the wall, starting at the top and working her way all along it, then dropping
a little lower and making her way back.

She’d done several passes and was in the middle of the wall, her fingers at about shoulder level, when she finally felt something. It was so faint her fingertips nearly passed over it. Some vague instinct made her stop and retrace it, to confirm she hadn’t imagined it.

It was a rectangular outline, roughly the size of an electrical outlet cover,
though she didn’t think that was what it was. It didn’t protrude from the wall at all, but seemed to be part of the wall itself, as though carved into it. Touching the shape gingerly, she tried to figure out why it was there and what it could be. She didn’t doubt that it had to be something, noticing that it perfectly aligned with the pattern on the wallpaper, which formed a rectangular shape right
on top of it. It didn’t stand out from the rest of the pattern, but if someone knew the rectangle was there, that spot on the pattern would offer a clear indication where to find it.

Without thinking about it, she pushed in on it.

A large section of the wall abruptly swung toward her the slightest bit, like a door suddenly ajar.

Which was exactly what it was, she realized. The protruding
section of wall was roughly the size and shape of a regular door, only lacking a standard doorknob. It had released with near silence. It was so quiet she wasn’t surprised she hadn’t heard it last night over the pounding of her heart and her desperate breathing.

Rising to stand, she ran her fingers along the open edge in amazement. She’d looked at exactly that spot and hadn’t noticed anything.
She never would have known it was there. Even the spot she’d pushed was completely ingrained in the wall, making it utterly unnoticeable unless someone was specifically looking for it or knew where to find it.

Reaching out eagerly, she grabbed the edge in two hands and pulled it open. It moved easily. When she’d managed to create an opening several feet wide she stopped and looked inside.

Another wall lay directly in front of her, and in it was the outline of a rectangular shape. Another door. The next room over was the one in the southeast tower on this floor.

She looked over to see a thin set of stairs leading upward on her left, continuing downward on her right. A staircase, she thought, wonder bubbling through her. The passageway was a staircase between the tower and
the rooms next to it.

For a moment she could only stand there and take it in, amazement spiraling through her. It was exactly what she’d expected. But believing it had to be there was different from seeing an actual hidden passageway in an old mansion in the flesh.

There didn’t appear to be any lights that she could see, maybe not surprising since the manor—and the passages—had been
built before the days of electricity. While the rest of the mansion had been upgraded, it didn’t appear anyone had bothered with these.

More thankful than ever that she’d brought her flashlight, she grabbed it and stepped into the passageway. There was no time to waste. She wanted to confirm where it led, and see if there was any way to tell who’d been in here last.

Moving forward, Jillian
shined the flashlight around the inside of the passage. The tunnel was maybe eight feet high and three feet wide, much thinner than a typical hallway, but big enough that an average-sized person could walk down it easily. The walls were plain and unpainted. The floors were made of stone, and on them—

She froze, aiming the flashlight on the ground and looking closer. They appeared to be covered
with a layer of dust, noticeable only because it had been disturbed by—

Footprints. There were footprints in the dust.

The passages had been used recently.

Proof,
she thought, triumph racing through her.

Jillian hesitated for a moment, suddenly unsure whether she wanted to disturb the evidence that someone had been here. But this might be her only chance to explore. She couldn’t
waste it.

Resolutely, she turned left and started up the steps.

The stairwell wound upward, no doubt following the tower. She could see only a few feet in front of her at a time, the wall constantly curving before her. Jillian imagined a servant navigating these passages over a hundred years ago, a candle in hand, with only the flickering flame to light the cold stone walls. Or maybe
the Suttons themselves, creeping about in the walls of their own mansion, for who-only-knew what purpose....

The stairs came to an abrupt end at a short landing. Based on the height of the ceiling above her, Jillian assumed she’d reached the top of the tower.

Again there were the outlines of two doors on either side of her. The one on the left had to lead into the bedroom directly above
hers. And the one on the right—

The bedroom at the top of this tower.

Spotting a lever next to the door, Jillian automatically reached for it. She hesitated briefly, wondering about the possibility that someone was in the room on the other side. It didn’t seem likely. As far as she knew it wasn’t occupied, and what were the chances someone would be cleaning it right now?

She pulled
the lever.

The door unlatched. A thrill of excitement racing through her, she put her shoulder to it and began pushing it in. It only took a few inches for Jillian to see exactly what she’d expected.

It wasn’t exactly the same as the room in the other tower where Courtney had stayed, but the layout was nearly identical, only reversed. And if there was a hidden passageway in this tower,
Jillian had no doubt there was one in the other, most likely in all of them.

This was it, she thought, anger and certainty hardening into a tight knot in the pit of her stomach. This was how somebody had gotten to Courtney. She probably hadn’t even seen them coming. They’d come in through the passageway unannounced, managed to get her to the balcony and then—

Jillian swallowed hard at
the images that played out in her head.

The only remaining mystery was whether she’d been dead before she’d gone off the balcony—or after.

Wincing at the thought, Jillian turned away from the scene. She didn’t want to think about that now.

She would love to go back to the other tower to confirm it, but she didn’t know if Adam still had the sensor in place. She couldn’t have him
catching her there, couldn’t let him know she was aware of the hidden stairs. There was far more she needed to explore.

Grabbing the latch on the inside of the wall-door, she yanked it hard and pulled it shut. All right. So she knew the tower bedroom and her own were both accessible from the tunnel. Now to see where else it led.

As she made her way back down the stairs to the second
floor, she remembered that Meredith was the one who’d put Courtney in the tower bedroom and Jillian in the room she was in. Just another coincidence, or had Meredith known exactly what she was doing to give someone—herself?—access to her guests?

Jillian thought back to Meredith’s reaction at breakfast. She hadn’t given any indication she knew about the passages, but then, Jillian had mostly
been paying attention to Grace’s reactions.