Whispers at Midnight

Praise for WHISPERS AT MIDNIGHT:

“The perfect blend of anticipation and
apprehension . . . seductive tale by a superb writer of romantic
suspense.”

—
Romantic Times

“Takes romance, mystery and intrigue and
weaves them into a good story.”

—
Rendezvous

Also by Andrea Parnell from Trove Books

DARK
SPLENDOR

“This is an entertaining blend of eerie
shadows and romantic interludes. An excellent gothic romance.”

—
Publishers Weekly

“A beautifully written, lyrical—almost poetic
in the narrative—book! . . . If you appreciate a great story and
the true beauty of words that are put together the way they should
be, you will love DARK SPLENDOR.

—
Rendezvous

“The grand Gothic Romance could never be
better represented than in DARK SPLENDOR.”

—
Affaire de Coeur

“A tantalizing blend of suspense and
sensuality, with all the thrills and chills that lovers of the
Gothic enjoy.”

—
Romantic Times Rave Reviews

Delilah’s Flame*

Wild Glory*

My Only Desire*

Devil Moon*

Small Town Secrets*

*coming soon

Whispers at Midnight

Copyright © 1987, 2011 by Andrea Parnell. All
rights reserved

Published 2011 by Trove Books

TroveBooks.com

Smashwords edition 1.1, May 2011

Smashwords Edition, License Notes

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of this author.

Publisher’s Note

This book is a work of fiction. Names,
characters, places, and incidents either are the product of the
author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance
to actual persons, living or dead, events, or locales is entirely
coincidental.

A previous print edition was published by
NAL/Signet in 1987.

Cover by Frauke Spanuth, Croco Designs
www.crocodesigns.com

To my children,

Dan and Kyla.

And to my sister Genia

for all the help

and all the shared hope.

One moment in annihilation’s waste,

One moment, of the well of life to taste—

The stars are setting and the caravan

Starts for the dawn of nothing— oh, make
haste!

—The Rubáiyát

of Omar Khayyám, XXXVIII

Virginia

July 1730

THE NIGHT WAS hot and still. More so than any
Evelyn Wicklow could ever remember. She held tightly to her
husband’s arm, so that her steps would not falter and reveal the
tug of fear at her heart. Not a sound rose up in the cloying heat,
not the chirp of a cricket, not the song of a bird. It seemed both
time and the movement of the elements had come to a halt as an omen
of the evil she sensed.

“He’s a heartless man, Jubal,” her lovely,
sad voice petitioned Jubal Wicklow. “If only there were another
way.” Her soft gray eyes, rimmed with worry, pleaded silently with
him. At sunrise Jubal would fight a duel on the riverbank near
Wicklow House. Knowing he had been one of the best shots in England
failed to ease Evelyn’s mind, for deep in her soul she already knew
the outcome of this senseless contest.

A dark wave of apprehension swept through
her as hazy images clouded her thoughts. Her head ached violently,
yet her hands clung lovingly to those of her husband. Since
childhood she had borne the peculiar gift of foretelling the
future. Evelyn had often thought that ability was more of a burden
than an advantage. Sometimes, as now, when the vision involved
those to whom she was closest, what would happen could only be
viewed through a deep, murky mist and not clearly enough to see
one’s way. And yet she had read disaster in the dark warning clouds
long before she knew John Mott had come to Virginia.

“Aye, but there will be no reasoning with
John,” Jubal Wicklow responded calmly as he clasped Evelyn’s hands
between his own. “Four years at sea with the man and I learned to
know him well.” He did not try to make light of her words; instead
he marked the depth of anguish in her voice and eyes. She was so
lovely to him, with her fair hair and eyes which at times were as
luminous and mysterious as silver moonlight. He never tired of
looking at her, his Evelyn, the sweetest treasure a man could ever
possess.

Jubal Wicklow smiled reassuringly. As
always, Evelyn aroused his protective instinct. He did not ask what
she saw. He knew the effort would only heighten her pain. He
understood his wife’s power and the toll it required of her
delicate body. For even though she possessed great spiritual
strength, she was as fragile and beautiful as an orchid. Above all
things in life, he swore to himself, he loved Evelyn and their
young daughter, Elise. Nay, more than that, he loved nothing or no
one else on earth.

Evelyn lifted her pretty chin. “I prayed,
Jubal, you could settle this debt with John Mott without
bloodshed.” Still, she did not believe prayers could help and would
send Elise to a trusted friend in Williamsburg.

Jubal led his wife into the newly finished
maze of hedges, her single request for the grounds of Wicklow.

“Bloody bastard,” he said, and nodded.
“Begging your pardon, my love, but it boils my blood that he should
come here making his challenge after a full decade. As for the debt
he claims, there is but what he invents. John holds no right to the
gold or the ruby. The full bounty we took on our last voyage we
divided before returning to England. I take no blame that John
Mott’s share rests on the ocean floor. He sailed into weather no
sane man would have faced.” Jubal halted his steps at a turn in the
hedges and glanced about until his puzzlement brought the wanted
smile from Evelyn. She pointed out the correct path. “The blighter
lost his crew to the last man,” he said. “It should be enough he
has his life.”

“It is more than gold and jewels he has come
for,” Evelyn said softly. She had not thought John would follow
them to the colonies. With an ocean and the passage of time between
them it seemed that her dreadful destiny with the man could be
overcome.

Once she had been betrothed to John, a
prosperous sea captain and a widower with a young child. As a girl
of seventeen she might have been enthralled with the handsome Mott
and even delighted in accepting the marriage her parents arranged.
But there was always something about the man that his smooth words
and elegant manners could not overcome. He frightened her.

A fortnight before the date of the wedding,
John Mott introduced her to a seafaring companion, the exuberant
and red-haired Jubal Wicklow. One week later Evelyn and Jubal
eloped and in so doing made a fierce enemy of John Mott. Having
seen in her vision what John meant to do, Evelyn convinced Jubal
that they should leave immediately for the colonies. A month
following their departure, John wed another young woman.

For once Evelyn believed the visions had
been wrong. John had forgotten them. But now, on the tenth
anniversary of her marriage to Jubal Wicklow, a duel would be
fought. She did not enjoy seeing John Mott’s face so plainly in her
mind. Indeed she could not shut it out as she prayed that once
again what was destined would be postponed.

Jubal Wicklow embraced her. “You must not
worry, love. No harm will come to me. Not to any of us. I promise
you.”

“Jubal, my darling,” she whispered, wishing
she could be reassured. “If it should, you must remember this: we
will find one another again. That I can promise you.” Her soft,
liquid eyes gazed deeply into his and then she kissed him long and
lovingly. “For time, my darling, is only a moment after death.” Her
voice softened. “I will wait for you, Jubal.”

Hours later Evelyn sat quietly in the master
bedchamber, having sent for young Jedaiah Long, the stable boy, to
take Elise to the house in Williamsburg. She wore the ruby necklace
Jubal had fastened around her neck. Heart-shaped, the deep pink
stone bore an intricately carved peacock in the center. John had
wanted the stone but accepted grudgingly that Jubal found it first.
Called the Heart of Happiness, the ruby was stolen from the
treasure stores of a Persian shah and was valued at many times the
rest of her husband’s wealth.

The jewel, Jubal’s wedding gift to her, had
been their enchantment, the symbol of their happiness. At sunrise
Evelyn held the glowing ruby against her breast, knowing that
through all time its beauty would remain to attest the love she had
shared with her husband. She did not go to the window to watch what
would happen by the river. There was no need. She could see it all
in the shadowy depths of her mind. She could hear the voices.

“John Mott, the devil take you!” Jubal
Wicklow shouted.

“Not before he welcomes a thief, man.” The
early morning fog spewed up from the river and wrapped around his
legs.

“You have no claim to the gold or the
jewel.”

“I claim it all. And Evelyn,” John answered.
“You stole her from me.”

“Are you a madman? You have a wife.”

“Dead a year ago. Now I’ve come for what is
rightfully mine—Evelyn.”

No more words were spoken. As the rising sun
appeared and spread crimson rays across the James River, the men
paced apart and turned. Evelyn felt an eerie shiver run along her
spine as the first shot was fired.

Jubal Wicklow staggered back as the bullet
tore through his side. He was wounded but not downed. Razed with
pain, he aimed his pistol and fired. His shot struck John Mott in
the chest, knocking him to the ground.

Weak from his own injury, Jubal muttered a
curse and turned away. He was glad the deed was done and anxious to
get back to Evelyn. He did not have the chance to wonder that John
Mott was still alive. If he had, he might have realized his aim was
less true due to his injury. But before Jubal Wicklow had walked
ten paces, the other man slid a hidden pistol from his pocket and
fired a shot at the back of his enemy. Jubal Wicklow crumpled to
the ground.

John pulled loose his cravat and packed the
silk cloth against the hole in his chest. Minutes later he found
Evelyn in her sitting room, hands folded and eyes closed, her face
blanched white as paper. With Jubal dead and her heart broken she
no longer cared what would happen.

“Now, my love,” John told her as he drew her
from the chair, “you see that no man cheats John Mott—and
lives.”

Evelyn neither spoke nor offered resistance
as he led her down the stone stairs to the cellars where he was
certain Jubal Wicklow had hidden the gold.

John Mott gloated and felt a sudden surge of
overpowering excitement despite his pain. He had the ruby and he
had Evelyn. He wanted the gold as badly. In ten years he had not
rested knowing Jubal Wicklow had taken what was his. After his
second wife died—a pity he had needed to help her along in that—he
determined to reclaim Evelyn and to take all Jubal Wicklow
owned.

John moaned as he reached the bottom of the
stairs. His wound throbbed and his head was growing dizzy, his
thoughts wandering. But the bleeding had stopped and he was
determined to search the cellars. Somewhat weakly, he leaned his
weight against the heavy stone door of a secret cellar room and
pushed it open. Gently he thrust Evelyn inside.

“You’ll keep here, my love, until I’ve found
the gold.” Evelyn did not answer but he did not mind. Soon she
would welcome him into her arms.

For hours John wandered the black, cavernous
rooms and tunnels beneath Wicklow, making his search. Increasingly
he felt a strange lightness in his body but was drawn on by his
mania and the belief that with the next step he would find the
gold.

With his guttering torch John stumbled along
in a stupor into the last of the tunnels. Behind him a stone door
ground shut. Eyes dulled, feet dragging in the dirt, John was not
really conscious of dropping his torch or of sliding to the floor,
just as he had not been conscious that the hours of exertion had
opened his wound and that for a long time blood had dripped down
his arm and off his fingers.