31. Winnie

CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE

WINNIE

I head straight to my room and start throwing clothes in my suitcase. I’m so shaken that I don’t even roll my things back into their packing cubes. (They’re Clutter Queen branded – a project we did last year to sell from our online store to our growing social media followers. I designed them, found a company to make them, and spent a week packaging and shipping them out to our clients. Faye made one social media post and forgot to mention me.) I sweep my toiletries off the vanity into my hand and toss them into my bag, not even fitting them into their individual labelled compartments in my special travel case.

Despite the thick walls of the castle, I can hear Alaric and his mother yelling at each other. At the words “She’s not one of us,” fresh tears stream down my cheeks.

I’m still the dirty girl, the one who wasn’t good enough for her mother to love more than her stuff.

I pull out the new phone. It doesn’t have any of my contacts on it, but I know Claire’s number by heart. I punch in the number and have the phone halfway to my ear before I remember that I can’t talk to her or crash at her house.

Instead, I text my mother:

Winnie: Mum, it’s me. I dropped my phone in a fountain so I had to get a new number. My job’s over. I’m coming back to London. Can I stay with you? I’ll help with whatever you need to do for the council inspection.

I ball my hands into fists and shove them in my eyes, trying to force myself to stop crying.

And then I glance at my phone to check if Mum’s replied and notice the date and time.

It’s Wednesday, 6:22 PM.

I’m supposed to be going to the weekly meeting of the Nevermore Murder Club and Smutty Book Coven.

I don’t know any of the women that well. It’s too soon to say we’re friends, but right now all I want to do is be surrounded by their bubbly energy. I imagine Celeste plying me with delicious treats and Mina handing me a tea. I imagine telling them about Alaric’s mother showing up with his future wife, and him pretending that we’re engaged, and all the weird stuff that’s been going on. I imagine how they would listen and hug me and argue over exactly what I should do.

They would tell me to not be like the heroines of many of our favourite novels and rush off without letting Alaric explain. Arabella would announce in her posh voice that third-act breakups because of a misunderstanding are annoying as fuck, and Beth would try to sell me a love elixir and Isis would blame it all on Alaric’s supposed vampirism and…

I should give him a chance.

Even though my skin crawls with invisible bugs and I have the same desperate need to flee that I had when I lived with my mum, I decide it’s time to make Alaric tell me what’s going on in his own words. And if he can’t answer my questions or I still feel betrayed, then I can leave.

I’m not a prisoner in Count Dracula’s castle. I can leave.

I hunt around for an outfit that might stand up against Perdita and Callista. I toss all my clothes back out of my bags, throw on a wrap dress in a bright purple, relight the candles in my candelabra, shove my feet into a pair of patent leather ankle boots, and clomp downstairs.

As I pass by the arrow slits in the walls of the tower staircase, I see Callista and Perdita walking around the courtyard outside, their heads bent together in secret conversation, while the two young guys they brought with them walk a few steps behind them. I wish I could hear what they’re saying.

I check the sitting room and Alaric’s study. He’s not there. Nor is he in the ballroom. I contemplate heading up to his family chapel when I hear a squeaking noise coming from the drawing room where he keeps his potter’s wheel.

“Damn you, Alaric.” I don’t want to go in there and remember when he straddled the wheel behind me and I leaned back against his hard chest and…

Nope, not thinking about it. I’m going to be strong. I’m going to get answers .

I cross the cluttered hallway and peer through the crack in the door.

He’s bent over a wheel that’s not spinning, his strong hands digging into a ball of clay, moulding and shaping it to his will. His brow furrows in concentration and I freeze, transfixed by the sight of him utterly enraptured with his art.

Mirabelle darts between my legs and leaps onto his lap, scattering tools and tubs of glaze. Alaric reaches out and scoops her against his chest, his head lowering so she can nuzzle his chin. Their tenderness makes the butterflies in my belly dance, but I have to be strong. I can’t break my resolve just because he’s kissing the top of her little head?—

“Alaric.”

His head jerks up, his eyes reflecting the dancing candlelight. Mirabelle glares at me, as if confirming that I don’t belong as part of their family.

“Winnie.” His voice is clipped. “You are still here?”

“Shouldn’t I be here?” My harsh voice echoes from the vaulted ceiling.

Alaric winces, as if I’ve wounded him. “For your safety, you should flee. But I should have known that not even my mother would frighten you.”

He stands, placing Mirabelle gently onto the seat. He reaches me in two long strides, sweeping me into his arms, pressing us chest to chest so that my heart thumps against his. Every place where our bodies touch brings back flashes of our night together, of how good he made me feel.

I try to step away, but he pulls me closer, smothering me in his winter scent, and I lose the battle with my will.

Alaric grips my chin with his strong, cool fingers, angling me towards him. “My wife…”

He kisses me, slow and languid, taking his time as if he is savouring a fine wine, trying to commit every corner and angle of me to memory.

I emerge breathless, not wanting it to end. “You don’t have to pretend, Alaric. Your mother is outside.”

“She has eyes and ears everywhere in this castle,” he whispers, gripping my chin with his strong, cool fingers. “Besides, this kiss isn’t for her.”

It doesn’t feel like it’s for show, the way he deepens the kiss until he’s drinking in my soul. He is like a wild god, otherworldly and chaotic and dangerous .

In a moment of clarity, I tear myself from him again. I back against a pillar, breathing hard. I came down here for answers, because I didn’t want to leave without giving him a chance to explain. But one touch from him and I’m under his spell.

What is wrong with me?

I hold out a hand, warning him not to come closer. “Alaric, you’re engaged.”

He shakes his head. “Perdita is my mother’s choice. She cannot force me to marry.”

“You don’t believe that. Otherwise you wouldn’t have pretended I was yours.” I swallow. “It was fun to pretend with Patrick and Claire. But this isn’t fun. I’ve been cheated on before. I can’t bear to do that to another woman. And I can’t…I can’t be anyone’s second choice. But you didn’t come after me…”

“I’m sorry that I did not follow you. There are things I must tell you, but I was not in a state to do so after my mother…” He makes a face that’s a mirror image of a face I often make around my mother. “So I came here to work on a sculpture. But don’t worry. I’ll clean everything up.”

“I’m not worried about the mess!” I glare at him. “You said you can explain everything. So explain. Tell me that everything between us isn’t an act. Tell me your pretty words weren’t lies. Or I’m walking out that door right now.”

“I’ve never lied to you, Winnie, but I have deceived. It’s the curse I must bear, the only way I have survived.” Alaric’s eyes flicker with a pain so intense that witnessing it steals my breath. But it’s gone in a moment, replaced with his usual stony expression – his jaw squared, his eyes cold black holes, his lips set in a firm, cruel line. “Reginald warned me to tell you the truth, but I was too selfish and too smitten with you to see that he was right. I led you to believe that we are the same, but we exist in two different worlds?—”

The dust fills my throat. Tears burn the corners of my eyes. So that’s it, then? After all his pretty words, he’s going to marry the princess and forget all about me.

I try not to think about the words too smitten with you.

Because they mean nothing.

He and I are nothing.

I thought we had a connection, but I’m not part of his world. I’m still the broken, dirty girl who no one wants.

The butterflies in my stomach curl up and die, their beautiful wings turning to dust that stings the back of my throat.

“I’m leaving.” I hear the words, but they don’t sound as if they’re coming from my mouth. “My things are packed. I’ll stay in the village for tonight’s book club, and then I’ll go back to London. You don’t have to worry about me anymore. I’ll send my business partner, Faye, to finish the last rooms.”

“You shouldn’t go into the village while the murderer is still on the loose. Stay in the castle. I will keep you safe.”

That’s it. That’s all he gives me. This command delivered by that cruel, stone mouth.

How can he ask me that? How can he expect me to stay in the tower and watch him and his new fiancée dance in this very ballroom?

“I’m not yours to worry about.” My heart, too, turns to dust. I’ll never be able to scrub away this pain. “I have my knife.”

I reach into my tote bag. My hand brushes the blade of the knife he gave me, slicing a long cut down my finger.

“Winnie, you misunderstand me.” He lunges towards me, his voice frantic. “I thought we couldn’t be together, that the laws of my people forbid it, and for good reason. I thought that my hunger for you could hurt you in more ways than one. But it’s not true . We can be together. All I want is for you to be mine?—”

“Ow.” I snap my hand out, holding my finger up to inspect the cut. “That hurt?—”

I don’t know how he crosses the room so fast. Alaric slams into me. My back hits the pillar with a crack that makes my teeth rattle.

Alaric pins my wrist above my head, his nails digging into my flesh. His body presses against mine again, caging me in. My other hand still holds the heavy candelabra, but he’s trapped my arm so I can’t swing it. I shake it, raining drops of wax on his black silk shirt, but he doesn’t seem to notice.

He trembles, biting his lip as his face twists with violent, animalistic need .

This would be fucking hot if it weren’t for the look in his eyes.

It’s as if Alaric – caustic, passionate, kind Alaric – has fled his body, leaving behind a demon who has only one desire.

To feed .

“Alaric,” I breathe. “You’re hurting me.”

His head jerks to the side, those eyes devouring me with predatory intent, as his mouth opens wide, his lips curling back to reveal long, pointed incisors sliding down from the roof of his mouth.

No human has teeth like that.

I’m frozen with terror as he leans in close, his tongue flicking out. He licks the blood from my fingers. His whole body shudders with pleasure, and a low hiss escapes him.

He buries his head into my shoulder, those vicious teeth poised an inch from the bare skin of my neck.

“Winnie,” he whispers, his voice strained. “ Run .”

“I—”

With a cry like the howl of the wind through the valley, Alaric tears himself from me.

“Run!”

He hurls himself across the room, upsetting bags of clay and brushes as he thrashes and claws at his own skin.

I run.

I run down the hall, wild with fear. I turn down a hallway and am immediately lost. I fling myself around corners, desperate to escape the monster behind me. I throw myself at a random door, which buckles under my weight but then swings back, resisting my desire to crash through it. A heavy chain clangs against my arm.

The dining room.

Not knowing what I’m doing but perceiving if I don’t put some kind of wall between us, that monster is going to devour me, I yank the chain. It falls into my hands. The padlock was so old that it had rusted through, and I’d managed to break it free. The doors spring open.

“Run, Winnie,” Alaric calls behind me. “Don’t go in there!”

I go in there.

It takes me a moment for my eyes to adjust to the dim light. I slam the door, shove the wooden board through the metal bars to lock it, and thrust the candelabra in front of me. Fear rises inside me as I take in the room.

A banquet table large enough for twenty groans beneath the weight of stuff . I choke back the trauma of towering objects and surge forward, gabbing the nearest thing – a statue of a warrior on a horse. It’s heavy, so I lift it in my free hand, thinking it might be better than the candelabra as a weapon.

But I freeze as I notice the warrior’s face.

It’s Alaric.

I’d recognise those sharp cheekbones, that strong jaw, the imperious features, and that long, wavy hair swept back in the wind anywhere.

Did Alaric make a statue of himself? But it’s covered in tarnish and looks like a medieval bronze?—

Behind me, the door bangs. Alaric yells again, “Winnie, you have to leave. I don’t know how much longer I can?—”

His words dissolve into inhuman cries. I hear his mother’s voice, soothing him.

I can’t help myself. My heart hammers in my chest. I should be running for the door, but I’m drawn deeper into the room. I hold up the candelabra to several paintings stacked against the sideboard. I flip through them. Each one is a portrait from a different era, in a different style.

They’re all of Alaric.

Alaric in various suits of armour, or wearing majestic cloaks, or riding horses, or looking brooding in a dark forest. Alaric with swords of every shape and size. Alaric as St. Sebastian, tied naked to a stake, his body pierced with arrows. Alaric peering from the tower window while a mob approaches carrying flaming torches, his face twisted in pain. Woodcuts of Alaric as a demon dancing upon piles of skulls or drinking the blood of tortured men from a goblet.

There’s even one of Alaric and Mirabelle – the wild god and his familiar.

These are the portraits removed from the walls in the castle. All those gaps in the walls were because Alaric didn’t want me to see these.

They hid it all in here so I wouldn’t figure it out, so I wouldn’t know that Alaric has lived at Black Crag for centuries .

So much blood. So much death.

I spin on my heels, and the light captures a tapestry hanging from the wall. It’s another scene of a battle in the valley with the castle in the background, only this time, Alaric sits astride his horse in the centre, his sword raised over his head, his face twisted in fury and two long, sharp fangs poking from his mouth, dripping with blood.

A suit of armour stands in front of the tapestry. I touch the bicep, remembering the gap in the row of armour in the Stabby Chic room. Even as my mind screams at me to run, I draw my fingers over the embossed steel. My breath fails me.

It’s Alaric’s armour. I recognise the curve of his bicep, his trim waist, the sinewy muscles of his legs. The suit is dented all over, and the metal crumpled beneath the armpit, where the arm meets the shoulder. Rust stains radiate across the suit from his sword hand. The blood of his enemies that he never washed away.

He killed people in this.

My vision swims. I stagger for the door, but I’m losing my grip on the candelabra and my sense. I have to get out of her.

Above me, Alaric roars, his cries shaking the castle stones.

It’s true. It’s all true.

My boss. My client. The guy I’ve been falling for all these weeks…is a monster .