Chapter 23

Twenty-Three

THE BEDROOM

I sensed a kerfuffle and opened my eyes to see Rebecca and Harriett moving through Ian’s bedroom.

With my suitcases.

I got up on an elbow, wincing a bit due to a twinge in my temple.

“You woke her up,” Rebecca said under her breath.

“Sorry, Daphne,” Harriett said to me.

“That’s okay,” I mumbled.

“We’ll just get on with this,” Rebecca replied.

And then they disappeared into Ian’s bathroom, and, my guess, beyond, where his closet probably was (I hadn’t snooped, but I was clearly going to need to change that this morning).

I turned my head when I saw movement out of the corners of my eyes and watched Ian striding to me.

He was ready to face the day. Jeans. An oatmeal T-shirt. An army-green, shawl-collar, cable-knit cardigan.

Scrumptious.

“So it appears we’re not talking this morning and you’ve made the decision I’m moving to your suite,” I remarked.

He grinned.

Then he reached to grasp me around my ribs and hauled me toward him.

My body collided with his, and I had no choice but to hold on to his shoulders as I dangled in his grip. And then I had to do it because his mouth came down on mine.

I had no thoughts of morning-breath kisses when his tongue swept inside, and I became aware that he’d been holding out on me the night before.

This kiss was hungry, no…greedy, demanding and commanding, and I was powerless to do anything but wrap my arms around his neck and give all he required.

And he required everything.

He lifted his head, and it took a couple of seconds, but eventually my eyes fluttered open.

“Good morning,” he murmured, those throaty two words rasping in a delightful way over my skin.

“Morning,” I replied.

He sat me in bed, sitting there with me, my hip to his, pressed tight, our arms still wound around each other.

“How are you feeling this morning?” he asked.

“Better,” I didn’t lie.

His gaze lifted to my temple. “Your head?”

“It’s okay.”

“They’re here mostly so you have your things to get ready and not have to go back to the Rose Room,” he explained. “And now, fast, give me five reasons that will convince me I should allow you to stay at Duncroft.”

As good as his kiss was, it wore off quickly on the word “allow.”

“Allow?”

“I said fast, Daphne. If you don’t convince me, I’m bundling you in my car in your pajamas and driving you to London myself. Jack or Sam can drive your car down.”

I studied him and realized he was dead serious.

Okay, last night had freaked me, but it seemed it had freaked Ian more.

“Reason one for you to stay,” I began. “You need to talk to your dad.”

It wasn’t my place to say, but that didn’t negate the fact it was plainly past time for those two to have a sit-down and iron things out.

I wasn’t going to get into the whole Lou thing. I hadn’t had time to think on it, but I wasn’t sure I’d ever tell him, and that sucked. I didn’t want to keep anything from him. It felt like a lie, holding that secret.

But the truth was, I didn’t want to do it, mostly because I didn’t want him to think badly of Lou. Though, I had to admit, I also didn’t want him to have more fodder to think badly of his father.

That said, he might already know. He told me he kept an eye on his dad and brother. It wasn’t something he was going to pipe up about either.

“I know you don’t get along,” I continued. “But you’re both adults, something big is about to happen, and you need to hammer out the details so he knows his place in this house is secure. I suspect it’ll help both your parents to be less on edge.”

That and the fact Lou was gone, but again, I wasn’t going to get into that now (or ever?).

“That’s one,” Ian rumbled.

“Two is, if I leave, Lou will want to know why. And I don’t want her to know about last night. It’ll upset her.”

I could tell that was a good one with his tone when he said, “That’s two.”

“Three is, Portia and I had a moment last night. If she’s staying, I feel I should stay with her. She’s justifiably angry at Daniel. She’s upset about Lou. Yes, it’s in her way and it’s not a good way, but she is. And I think, if we had a breakthrough last night, I should push my advantage. Maybe now I can talk some sense into her, give a little, tell her I’ll convince the trustees to give her enough money to cover her expenses, say for a month, until she finds a job. And maybe attempt to counsel her on finding her true calling in life. Something she enjoys. Something she’ll stick with so we don’t have to go through this again.”

“All right. I don’t quite agree that you should give in when it comes to teaching Portia a lesson, but you know her better than me. And she was openly upset about what happened to you last night and stepped in like any sister should. So that’s three,” he said when I stopped speaking.

“Four is, I’m curious about this village everyone keeps on about. I want to see it.”

“It’s weak, but yes, that’s four.”

I felt my lips curl up but carried on. “Five, call me crazy, but I like Duncroft. One can say things sure aren’t boring here.”

I could see the flare in his eyes, sharing how much he liked that I liked his ancestral home, regardless of all that had been happening.

I wasn’t going there with us right then, but the bigger truth in that was I liked getting to know Ian while we were there.

He’d become Duncroft for me. A beautiful, strong, endlessly interesting fortress where I felt safe.

He was right. All the shit was just shit, but it was happening to me.

That said, I didn’t feel unsafe here.

Not exactly true, there were times, obviously, when I’d been petrified.

But then, he was right there, and I had the exact opposite feeling.

I hadn’t had time to think on this either, but it was even more.

I was beginning to get the sensation that something else was happening. It was like the house was communicating to me, with my tours, meanderings, my dreams, and most especially Ian’s stories and the time I spent with him while he was telling them (and besides).

And what the house had to say, it was necessary for me to hear, and I couldn’t hear it if I wasn’t there.

It was weird (it was all weird), but I felt, deep down, I was supposed to be here. That it wasn’t yet time to leave.

It wasn’t time for Ian and for me.

“Then the girls are unpacking you,” he gave in. “Because you know the deal.”

“Ian,” I said softly. “It isn’t like I’m not that girl. I’m that girl. Proudly that girl. I go after what I want. But we haven’t even had a date.”

“This will be rectified when I take you to the village this afternoon, and then we’ll have dinner at the Italian place. They have four restaurants. That one, an Indian place, Chinese takeaway, and a chippie. And I’m not standing on a street corner eating a battered sausage for our first date.”

I loved battered sausages, but no. That wouldn’t do for a first date with Ian Alcott.

Still, I said, “I think you know what I mean.”

“You’ve been here with me the last two nights.”

“With extenuating circumstances.”

“Right, love, I don’t get this. Because I’m a man. But I understand the way of it is that women have been trained to consider these things as a matter of course and be cautious about them. But let me educate you about where I’m at. You hold the power, all of it, when it comes to intimacy. If you’re not ready, I won’t push you. When you’re ready, I’ll be waiting. I want you here because I want you safe. I want you here because I like being with you. I want you here because you feel good beside me in my bed. I’ve also made it clear I want to be inside you. But I’ll be inside you here when you decide it’s time. Only when you decide it’s time. Now, will you please move into my suite?”

“Yes,” I whispered.

His relief was so great, I wondered why I protested it.

I wondered that more when he kissed my nose as a reward for giving him what he wanted.

He then said, “I called the hospital. They were processing Lou’s release. They transferred me to her room, and she told me she and her parents are going to have breakfast then make their way here. She thinks they’ll be here around ten thirty, eleven. If you want to be ready to see her and not go down in your fetching nightclothes, you best be rousing.”

I looked to the clock.

It was just after nine.

I looked back to Ian.

“You think my pajamas are fetching?”

I was in a racerback tank, bralette under it to keep the girls under control, and a pair of loose shorts with a deep edge of lace, all this in a blush pink.

It wasn’t exciting. It was comfortable.

“It’s damned sexy when a sexy woman knows she doesn’t have to try to be just that.”

Interesting.

He reached to pull the bell cord. “Again, they know to bring up breakfast for you if I ring. I’ll leave you to get ready.”

He gave me another kiss, this one on my lips, a quick one, but still sweet.

He was up and moving toward the door when I called, “Ian?”

He stopped and turned back, raising his brows.

“I took a meander up on the gallery when I was talking to Lou’s mum.”

“Yes?” he asked.

“What’s the story about Joan, the other tenth Countess Alcott?”

His expression shifted, I didn’t like the shift, and I liked it less when he said, “Not for now, darling, okay?”

“Now I need to know,” I told him.

“It might be best we lay off ghost stories for a while.”

Terrific.

“I’m now in here with you,” I reminded him, throwing a hand out to indicate his room. “Safe. Right?”

He sighed and crossed his arms over his ridiculously attractive cardigan and even more attractive broad chest.

“She was David’s first wife. And she was a beast.”

Oh boy.

And…David had another wife?

How on earth did I miss that in my research?

Though, I supposed with a thousand years of history in that house and Dorothy Clifton hogging the limelight, I’d miss things.

“A beast?” I queried.

“Hideous to staff. Authoritarian. Stuck-up. In other words, a total bitch.”

“Did he divorce her?”

Ian hesitated, but caught my expression and said, “No.”

“So what happened to her?”

“She was found hanging in the buttery.”

I blinked. Slowly.

Then I asked, “She killed herself?”

“That was what it was ruled. A suicide.”

I stared hard at him. “I sense there’s more to this story.”

Another sigh from Ian and, “It was known by everyone she was not the kind of person to suffer suicidal ideation. She was the queen of her castle and loved that role, flaunted it, lorded over the house, the village, even her social set, because of her beauty, wealth, her position in society and this house. She also wasn’t the kind of person to ever be caught belowstairs. That was beneath her in more ways than locationally. If she were to do what it was ruled she did, she wouldn’t have chosen the buttery to do it in.”

“So someone killed her?”

He shook his head, but said, “That’s the gossip. The staff hated her. Everyone in the village hated her. Her supposed friends were not friends because they hated her too. And by then, David had fallen in love with Virginia.”

And then I remembered.

1922.

The end of Joan’s tenure was the same year as the beginning of Virginia’s.

David hadn’t even waited a year to replace his first wife.

“Are there more happy stories about Earls and Countesses Alcott?” I asked, maybe a little desperately.

“My grandfather worshipped my grandmother. I’ve heard stories, and it was much the same with my great-grandfather and great-grandmother. Then there’s the story of Earl Walter Alcott, who was rumored to have a part-time hobby as a pirate and was the one who significantly augmented the wealth of Duncroft, likely from his efforts at illegally acquiring booty, and his lady wife Anne, who he loved so deeply, he ordered his body be buried in her coffin when he passed a year after she did.”

If that didn’t scream gothic romance, nothing did.

“Well…shoo.”

Ian smiled.

Then he asked, “Are you going to get ready for Lou?”

“Yes.”

He lifted his chin at me, a gesture I’d never seen him make. It wasn’t a jerk or brusque movement. It was tender, affectionate, intimate, and I liked it a whole lot.

“See you when you’re ready,” he murmured.

“Okay, honey,” I replied.

He left.

I got out of bed to see if the girls had unpacked my toothbrush.

But in my head, all I could think was David Alcott might have had a habit of killing the no-longer-needed women in his life.

And he didn’t mind taking care of that particular business in his own home.