Uncovering You: The Complete Series (Mega Box Set) (119 page)

And yet…and yet, there it was: a tiny blip in the distance, like a cloaked ship in enemy waters. It’s gone now.

Or maybe it’s simply been hidden.

Either way—fuck. Either way I have to be on the watch out for it, should it reappear. I’m not so far gone or lost yet. I’ve not given up. Not yet.

That’s when I feel a presence somewhere behind me.

Slowly now, regally, I turn both shoulders to face whoever’s here.

It’s Jeremy, of course.

No—fuck! I curse myself. It’s Stonehart, dammit, and I can’t slip back into calling him by his first name.

Stonehart is there, watching me from a darkened corner, cocktail in one hand. Only his eyes are truly visible. They reflect the dim light. That reflection lets me know he is watching. The remainder of his body is cloaked in shadows.

“You’re up,” he says simply. No emotion enters his voice.

He brings his glass to his lips and takes a long sip.

“How long have you been there? How long was I out?”

“Long,” he says. One more sip. “But not long enough.”

He drains the glass, brings it down to his side, and then lets it slip through his fingers.

It hits the floor with a startling crash.

I gasp in surprise. My heart is racing. The only other sound I hear is the man’s slow, heavy breathing.

“Where are we?” I ask.

Stonehart laughs. “You don’t recognize this place?”

I cast a quick look out through the window, and see now why everything seems off: All the rooms in the Stonehart mansion face the ocean. This one has a view of the trees.

It’s enough to make me shiver again.

“This is Rose’s guesthouse,” Stonehart informs me. He inhales once and pushes away from the wall.

My breath catches when I see him.

He looks…well, ‘disheveled’ is probably putting it mildly. His suits are usually crisp and clean. This one is wrinkled and dirty. There are patches on the sleeves and front that make it look like he’s been rolling around in the sand.

His shoes—what the hell, one of them is even untied! His dark hair is a mess, pushed around in all directions like it’s been the victim of a hand run through it one too many times. There’s stubble on his cheeks and a heavier outline of a goatee where his facial hair grows faster.

He looks like a man who’s completely neglected himself for days and days on end.

Halfway to me, he misplaces a step and lunges violently to one side.

I freeze in sudden fear:

He’s been drinking.

Not only that, but he’s already drunk. I’ve never experienced the combination of Stonehart and alcohol. The potential for violence—for even more instability—makes me very, very scared.

“Why are we in Rose’s guesthouse?” I ask, after he straightens himself.

“Rose…” Stonehart licks his lips. He’s barely sober enough to stand. But the amazing thing is that his voice betrays none of the intoxication. If I closed my eyes and just listened to him speak, I’d have no way of telling he was under the influence. “…won’t be needing it anymore. Neither will Charles. They’ve both been relieved of their duties. This house—“ Stonehart gestures wildly around the room. “—now belongs entirely to you.”

“If this is to make up for—“

“No,” Stonehart shakes his head and cuts me off. “No, no, no, no. Nobody here is making up for anything. It was just…time.”

He wobbles again.

“You’re drunk,” I say. “I can smell the liquor on your breath. You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Oh, on the contrary, Miss Ryder, I am very much in control, and verifiably know every word that passes through these lips.” He stops, a foot away from me, and gazes down from his height. He sways. “How do you feel?” he asks.

“Oh, just jolly, you know. “ I sneer up at him, unable to hide my contempt. “My arm’s been broken and my body feels like a ragdoll that’s been thrown down the steps. But other than that, I’m just fine. No need for any concern. You can go and piss off now. Talk to me again when you’ve sobered up.” I start to cross my arms on instinct, then gasp at the shooting pain that comes from trying to move my left arm.

Damn. This is going to take some time to get used to.

Stonehart’s voice turns very low and dangerous. “I’m not sure that you are in a position to make such demands,” he says softly.

“Or what? You’ll break my other arm?” I laugh. “So much for loving me, huh, J—“

“I DID NOT MEAN TO HURT YOU!” he roars.

I shrink back, suddenly terrified.

He stops, takes a breath, and runs a hand through his hair. “I’m sorry,” he says. “I’m sorry. Sorry. I shouldn’t have yelled.”

“You’re apologizing for
that
?” I say. “Not any of the other half-dozen things you are guilty of?”

His mouth twists up in the beginning of a smile. “And how useful would an apology be for all those ‘other things,’ dear Lilly? The reason for this…” He gestures behind him, at the rows of empty bottles surrounding his seat.

Jesus, but I didn’t even see them before!

“—is because I’m afraid you and I have regressed horribly over the course of a single night. No one apology is going to do it.”

“So you’re drinking out of despair,” I say. “How very uncharacteristic of you,
Jeremy
.” I turn away. “Leave me alone. I don’t want to talk to you when you won’t remember half of what I say in the morning.”

“No,” he says.

A chill of fear runs through me. I do my best not to let it show.

“No?” I ask.

“No, Lilly, dammit. I’ve waited too long for you to wake up to be turned back now.”

“I have no desire to speak to you.”

“Your desires be damned!” he snaps. “Can’t you see what I was like? What do you
think
I’ve been doing all this time, other than waiting for you to wake?”

“How long has it been?” I ask.

“Two days.”

I frown.
Huh
. That actually doesn’t seem that bad. At least, not compared to what I was expecting.

“All right, Jeremy,” I say to him, turning back. “You want to talk? Let’s talk. But
I
get to ask the questions here, not you.”

“Fair enough,” he says. He settles in a new seat across from my bed. “What do you want to know?”

“Start with Rose,” I tell him. “Who is she?”

“You cut right to the chase,” he mutters.

“No evasions this time, Jeremy. I want the truth. I want it all. Who is Rose, what does she have to do with you, what does she have to do with your father? Why did Charles react the way he did when he saw them? What type of dirt do you have on Rose to make her your housekeeper for twenty years?” I pause to take a breath and continue,
”Why?
I know she is not the person you want to make her seem.”

“That’s quite a barrage of questions,” Stonehart muses.

“Answer them or get out. Your choice,” I say. “Unless you’re feeling informative, I have absolutely no inclination to speak to you right now.”

“Fine,” he says. “Fine, Lilly, that is fair enough.” He stands. “I’ll come back to you again in the morning.”

“Wait, what?” I stumble. “You’re
leaving
? You can’t just leave, Jeremy!”

“Watch me,” he says, sounding all the more like a bratty teenager.

It must be the drink.

“No! You said it yourself. You’ve waited so long.” I’m grasping at straws. But, this is a rare opportunity. For all the time I’ve known Stonehart, I’ve not once seen him drunk. Alcohol loosens everybody’s inhibitions, no matter who you are, or how well you might think you can hide it. If Jeremy leaves now, I’ll lose out on a glorious opportunity to learn things about him that might otherwise never come out.

Fuck!

Then I catch myself again, thinking of him as Jeremy instead of Stonehart. Dammit, I can’t do that. I can’t succumb to the feelings of safety and familiarity that his first name evokes. I’m not safe around him. The latest evidence is my arm.

But hell, it’s damn exhausting to keep thinking of him as two different people.

A light bulb turns on in my head.

Jeremy or Stonehart—what does it matter? There is only one of him.

Chastising myself for not sticking to the distinction nets me nothing. It’s a meaningless distraction. Let him be whomever he wants in my mind. His name matters not. It’s his actions that are important. They stem from the same place. They stem from the same man.

So I’ll call him whatever name comes naturally to me. Trying to decide whether to call him by his first or last name is the stupidest struggle in the world—especially if it’s ongoing. All I have to do is dissociate the sentimental symbolism that I’ve attached to either title, and reattach it to a single man. To the person watching me. Waiting for me to speak.

To the person who broke my arm.

“If you leave now,” I tell him, “You’ll have wasted all that time. And how often have you told me how you hate repeating yourself? Wasting time seems even worse.”

He stops to consider my words. Then he chuckles, and shakes his head. “You know me too well.”

The tension oozes out of me.

Safe, for now
. I have recovered my fumble.

He walks to retrieve an unopened bottle, however, before returning to his seat. He settles down and looks at me.

“So,” he says. “Rose.”

“Yes, Rose.”

His eyes scan the room. “Where do I even begin?”

“At the start?” I suggest.

“No.” He shakes his head. “We’ve done things that way already. It bores me. Instead, let’s play a game.”

“A
game
?” I ask, my voice portraying every bit of skepticism that I feel. “What sort of game?”

“One in which the stakes are quite high,” Jeremy intones, swirling the golden liquor around in the bottle. “Have you ever gambled, Lilly?”

“No.”

“A shame. Winning at the table gives you a thrill unlike any other—especially because, in certain games, you know it’s nothing but luck.”

“I thought you didn’t believe in luck.”

“Chance, then,” he says. “Roulette is a game of chance. Don’t you know?”

And then—my eyes widen in absolute horror. Jeremy reaches into the inside of his jacket and pulls out an antique revolver.

He turns the weapon over in his hands. “I… inherited this… from my father,” he says softly. His fingers run over the barrel, the hammer. “He liked to show it to us when we were in trouble. Of course, it was mostly just me sitting there in his office, and never my siblings. But I remember one time…one time, he was in a particularly bitter mood. I’d just been framed by my older brother, Robert for something that I did not do. Or maybe I did do it, that doesn’t matter. I don’t remember. What I do remember, is this:

“I entered my father’s office. He was, as he always seemed back then, an impressive man. He would sit in his high-backed chair, larger than life behind his massive oak desk—the very one, did you know, that I now keep in my home office?

“Anyway. You’ve been on the other side of it. You know what it’s like. Now imagine that in the eyes of a ten-year-old child. A child who has nothing but fear for the man he’s about to face.”

Trust me, I think, I know that feeling better than you’ll ever understand.

“Now, imagine that same child coming into that room and discovering his mother there, huddled by the side of that desk, crying. Imagine the fear, the guilt, the anger. Imagine all that, rolled up into one little ball of hate in that child’s head.

“His mother does not look at him. She turns away, almost ashamed to be caught in a position like this by her youngest son.

“What would you do if you were that little boy? Would you run to her? Would you want to comfort her? Of course. But
could
you do it? No. Not with the other man present in the room.

“My father greeted me. ‘Ah, Jeremy,’ he said. ‘You’re just in time.’ I knew something was terribly wrong, much more than usual. I could feel it in the air.

“The doors closed behind me, making me jump. My father laughed. I hated showing fear before his eyes. But the sound had startled me, dammit!

“My mother looked at me then. ‘Jeremy,’ she said. Then she turned to my father. ‘Hugh. Please. Don’t. Not with him here. Not with—‘

“He silenced her by pulling a gun—this gun—from under his desk and aiming it at her head.

“He smiled at me. ‘Come here, Jeremy,’ he said softly. ‘Come here, my boy. I want to show you something.’

“So I walked, paralyzed by fear, almost in a trance, around the desk toward my father. My mother had stopped crying. She stared at Hugh with mascara staining her face.

“’Yes,’ my father beckoned me. ‘Yes, Jeremy, right here. Come closer. Tell me, have you ever held a weapon before?’

“I bit my tongue and shook my head, too afraid to speak lest I start crying.

“’Here,’ he said, putting an arm around my shoulder and pulling me closer. ‘Here. I’ll let you try now’. He placed the gun into my hand, his fingers still on the hilt,
still pointing it at my mother.

“He looked at me then. His eyes were wide and glossy with zeal. ‘Feels good. Doesn’t it? Makes you feel powerful, does it not? Like you can control people. Like you hold the key to life and death in the palm of your hand.’

“Of course, I was too terrified to speak.

“’Well?’ he demanded. ‘Answer me!’

“I shook my head, trembling, so afraid of what was going on.

“’GAH!’ My father spat. Without warning, he backhanded me across the face.

“I fell to the floor. My mother cried out. A shot was fired. I yelped, gasped, screamed, and scrambled as fast as I could back to my feet. I was expecting to see my mother dead, lying in a pool of her own blood, and such an inferno of rage was woken up within me…”

Jeremy chuckles. “Well, dear Lilly, even ten-year-olds have a bit of strength in them. I flew at my father, ready to attack him with everything I had. My mother’s voice stopped me in my tracks.

“’Jeremy, no! You’ll only make it worse!’

“I froze, dumbfounded that she was somehow still alive. My father had not aimed at her. He’d just fired the gun to show that it worked.

“In that second, I was struck down again, the metal connecting with my jaw with enough force to make me fly to the side.

“’Hugh! No! Stop it! Don’t hurt him!’ my mother screamed.