Dark Obsession

by Allison Chase

  She had followed him, stood so close her scent floated dizzily through his head.

  ‘‘I think he jumped. Jumped because he’d got himself into trouble he couldn’t get out of, and because I refused to be of any help.’’

  He raised his face to her all-too-trusting one and willed himself to say what had haunted him for nearly a year. ‘‘Tom committed suicide because of me, Nora. Because when he bankrupted the estate, I told him he was a worthless failure. That he’d disgraced the entire family, shamed the Clarington name and failed his son. And so he went out to the cliffs that very day and repaid his debts with the only thing he had left— his life.’’

  ‘‘Surely you can’t know that for certain.’’

  He nodded miserably. ‘‘I believe I found evidence today that Tom had resorted to extreme measures to recoup the funds and property he’d lost. He’d become desperate, and I . . .’’

  ‘‘No, Gray. It can’t have been your fault. You can’t be responsible for another man’s actions, not even your brother’s.’’ Her hand came down on his shoulder, light, tender, filled with infinite compassion.

  He couldn’t endure such undeserved trust; it set off a fury inside him. Not at her, but at her damned propensity to believe the best of him despite the facts. He leapt to his feet.

  ‘‘Don’t patronize me, Nora. You’ve no idea what you’re talking about.’’

  ‘‘Oh, but—’’

  ‘‘No! This is who I am. This is your husband.’’ Turning back to the bed, he grabbed the bedclothes in both hands and with a howl of frustration dragged them from the mattress and flung them to the floor. Pillows flew, sending a lamp on the bedside table crashing to the floor.

  Nora bit back a cry of dismay. He whirled on her, backing her across the room. ‘‘See me for what I am and don’t talk to me about what you do not understand. It doesn’t matter if these hands pushed him or not.’’

  He held them up as if to wrap them around a neck, sending her lurching out of reach. ‘‘It doesn’t matter whether or not I wished him dead that day. The result is the same. I drove Tom over the edge. I’m the reason he’s dead and all that’s left of the Clarington name is a shadow of a boy who won’t speak.’’

  ‘‘Jonny can be helped. . . .’’

  ‘‘Not here. No one can be helped in this house.’’ Advancing on her again, he trapped her against his writing desk. He framed her face in his hands, feeling the heat of her fear in his palms. ‘‘You know it too. You feel it. The very walls are closing in on us, strangling us with their history of death and obsession. This house is haunted by its past, and your only chance is to get away. Take Jonny and go somewhere you’ll both be safe.’’

  ‘‘Only if you come with us.’’

  He released her with a sharp laugh. ‘‘Oh, no. I belong here. Here with my brother.’’

  ‘‘Do you see him?’’ At her whispered query his heart went still. The blood drained from his head as she continued, ‘‘Does your brother’s spirit appear to you?’’

  ‘‘What are you talking about?’’ But the tremor in his voice belied his show of ignorance.

  ‘‘You just said it. This house . . . is haunted.’’

  ‘‘I only meant—’’

  ‘‘Gray, I’ve seen a woman, late at night. . . .’’ She wrinkled her brow as if disbelieving her own words.

  ‘‘What woman?’’

  ‘‘I don’t know. She’s appeared to me several times now, always wanting me to do something, go somewhere, find . . . something.’’

  ‘‘You’ve been dreaming.’’ Yes, he wanted her to be imagining things. . . . Couldn’t bear the notion that his demons might be haunting Nora as well.

  She shook her head. ‘‘I’ve told myself that, but this last time she seemed entirely real, and I know I was awake. She always wears a lavender dress and speaks in a lovely musical accent—’’

  ‘‘Charlotte.’’ The name grated from his throat.

  ‘‘Who?’’

  ‘‘Never mind. You have to leave, Nora. For your own safety.’’

  At long last he knew the truth—his ghosts were real and he wasn’t insane. But this could prove infinitely worse. If Tom’s ghost haunted him, there would be justice, retribution. But if so, it must be his alone to bear. He would not see Nora or Jonny hurt by whatever price he must pay for Tom’s death. That much he swore. ‘‘Leave now or so help me . . .’’

  ‘‘I won’t run away. You need me—’’

  ‘‘Damn it, Nora, why won’t you listen to me?’’ He grasped the nearest thing within reach, the clock on the desk, and hurled it against the far wall. Shattering glass, splintering wood and the brass workings showered the floor.

  Nora’s cry echoed through the room, in his ears. He saw the color leach from her face in the instant before her hands shot up in front of her to shield her from . . . from him. He started to reach for her, halting when her eyes widened around a feral kind of fright rimmed with dawning comprehension, with dismay. They stood immobile, panting, for several seconds. Then she did as he’d earlier hoped—she whirled and disappeared into the secret passageway.

  Hearing her panicked tread creaking along the wooden floor above, his heart broke at the same time relief surged through him. Perhaps now fear of him would send her to safety.

  He pressed both hands to his head, squeezing, trying to crush the memories, the pain, and the knowledge that in marrying Nora he had come agonizingly close to touching happiness again, only to have it pulled beyond reach forever.

  Nora stumbled over the high threshold back into her room, catching herself against the side of the angled wardrobe. Hot tears rolled down her cheeks but she dashed them away. Knuckles blanched, fingers trembling, she pressed a fist to her stomach and choked back a sob. Her breath came in violent bursts. Chills racked her, brought on only partly by the dampness clinging to her dress, transferred there from Grayson’s clothing when he’d kissed her.

  Grayson. He was surely mad. Not because he was seeing ghosts, for if that branded him insane then she must wear the same label. No, that his tormentors were real she didn’t doubt. But the violence that torment unleashed in him . . .

  She shivered. The man at the National Gallery . . . that night at the inn in Devon . . . just yesterday when he’d viewed his portrait . . . each occasion had been shaped by uncontrollable impulses, fierce and powerful . . . frightening.

  Yet even now, her lips burned from his bruising kisses, and her body ached with the desire to return to him, take him in her arms and heal him. Heal all that was wrong in this house and all that had gone awry between them. She yearned for the Grayson of their wedding night—a man she wasn’t sure existed anymore, or ever existed outside of her dreams and hopes. This volatile stranger who had taken his place . . . was this the true Grayson?

  Releasing her grip on the wardrobe, she about-faced and whisked the passage door closed. Then, heart throbbing in her throat, she darted around the huge piece of furniture, flattened both palms on the painted doors and shoved with all her weight. The thing swung on its pivot, coming to rest in its proper place inches from the wall.

  Nora stepped back. She shoved loose hairs from her face and regarded the arrangement. Not good enough.

  An idea sent her hurrying out to the corridor, passing the door to Grayson’s room at a run. At the top of the stairs she paused, half breathless, searching the hall below. A footman was crossing from the dining hall to the drawing room. Nora called down to him.

  ‘‘Please send Mr. Gibbs up to my room immediately,’’ she said. ‘‘And tell him to bring a hammer, hooks and wire.’’

  ‘‘My lady . . . ?’’

  ‘‘You heard me. Hammer, hooks and wire. Immediately.’’

  Some ten minutes later she again stood beside the wardrobe, hammer in hand. Holding the end of a hook against the wall, she swung the hammer with all her strength. She missed, knocking a dent the size of a shilling into the plaster. The impact jarred her arm from wrist to shoulder
. The hammer clunked to the floor.

  ‘‘Devil take it,’’ she murmured. But no wonder. With her shaking hands, she was in no condition to be handling tools.

  Behind her, she could hear Mr. Gibbs’s bafflement in the shuffling of his feet, the clearing of his throat. ‘‘Perhaps I may be of assistance, madam.’’

  Scowling at the cavity she’d created in the wall, she bent to pick up the hammer. Without a word, she held it out to the steward and stepped aside.

  Gibbs unbuttoned his frock coat and took his position. After pounding the first hook home, he turned to her with a quizzical look.

  ‘‘Perhaps my lady would care to explain the rest of the task?’’

  ‘‘I wish another hook set into the panel.’’

  ‘‘Into the wallpaper, madam?’’

  ‘‘Yes.’’ She showed him where. ‘‘And then the two hooks tightly connected by the wire.’’

  ‘‘I see. Very good, madam.’’

  Of course it was evident he didn’t see at all, that her strange request puzzled him no end. Apparently the man had no inkling of what lay beyond the wall.

  Now that her initial fright had passed, she realized that to some extent Grayson’s violent handling of his bedclothes and clock had been intentional, meant to frighten her away for her own good. Hadn’t he told her he wanted her somewhere safe?

  That meant he cared. . . . Perhaps . . . even loved her. A lump rose in her throat at the memory of his hollow expression and his haunted eyes as he’d told her to go, to get out. She took courage in believing he hadn’t meant it, not deep down.

  His explosive behavior alarmed her, and yes, she would take pains to ensure Jonny’s and her safety, but she had no intention of leaving Blackheath Grange or Grayson. On the contrary, she was more determined than ever to stay and get to the bottom of what had happened months ago, as well as what was happening now.

  ‘‘Will that be all, madam?’’

  She blinked, roused from her ruminations. Gibbs stood waiting, hammer in hand.

  ‘‘Perhaps my lady wishes me to pound hooks elsewhere?’’ His wandering gaze lighted on her dressing table, headboard and nightstand.

  His eyes sparked with astonishment when she said, ‘‘Yes, one more. Into the wardrobe, just here.’’ She pointed to the back corner of the piece. If Grayson somehow managed to dislodge the hook in the sliding door, she could still prevent him from moving the armoire aside. ‘‘I want it wired to the wall, tightly.’’

  ‘‘I . . . uh . . . yes, my lady.’’

  He had just finished when a shadow fell across the threshold.

  ‘‘What is all this racket? Gibbs, what in heaven’s name are you doing? Oh, Lady Lowell, I didn’t see you there.’’

  Mrs. Dorn’s black-clad figure stood framed in the doorway like an elongated spider suspended in its web. Her pinched features traveled over Nora, slid back to Gibbs, and to the hammer dangling at his side. Her pale gaze flitted over the room . . . and stopped.

  Glaring at the wire stretching from the wardrobe to the wall, she crossed the threshold as gingerly as a black widow stalking its prey.

  Oh, not now, Nora thought. After everything else, she didn’t need a confrontation with Mrs. Dorn, and what business was it of the housekeeper’s anyway?

  Apparently the woman thought it very much her business. A decidedly shocking shade of red flooded her face. Her mouth opened to emit a series of gasping stutters. Nora braced for worse, but after mouthing words that might have been inestimable, destruction and abominable, the woman stomped out.

  Nora nodded to Gibbs. ‘‘That went better than expected.’’

  Moments after the steward left, she tested her improvised lock by tugging on the wardrobe. It didn’t budge, nor could the sliding panel be opened.

  A knock sounded at her open door. Kat’s dark eyes regarded Nora solemnly. ‘‘You asked me to report any developments with his little lordship.’’

  Nora clasped the maid’s hand as she would a familiar friend and drew her into the room. ‘‘What is it, Kat?’’

  ‘‘It’s about his speaking, ma’am. He does, you see.’’

  The shock of the revelation prompted Nora to shush the other young woman and glance out into the hallway. Satisfied there was no one to press an ear to the door, she closed it and led Kat to the chairs beneath the window.

  ‘‘He’s spoken to you?’’ she whispered, quite overcome with the conviction that for now, no one else must know the child was talking.

  ‘‘He didn’t talk to me, not actually, ma’am.’’ Hands folded primly in her lap, Kat perched stiffly in her chair, clearly uncomfortable with sitting like a guest rather than standing like a servant. ‘‘It was in his sleep. He tossed and fretted half the night.’’

  Nora leaned forward eagerly. ‘‘What did he say?’’

  A ridge formed above the maid’s nose. ‘‘I couldn’t make much out. You know how folks mumble in their dreams. But I do believe I heard him mention your husband by name, and perhaps his father. And I quite plainly heard him say ‘Don’t.’ ’’

  ‘‘Don’t,’’ Nora repeated. She sat back in her seat, a cold misgiving prickling the hairs on her arms. Could Jonny be reliving the night his father died? Could his plea of ‘‘don’t’’ have been aimed at a father intent on suicide? At a murderer?

  At Grayson?

  ‘‘Can you recall anything else he said?’’

  ‘‘There was something.’’ Kat paused, frowning again in concentration. ‘‘I thought I heard him say ‘Uncle had.’ ’’

  ‘‘Uncle had what?’’ Nora wondered aloud, wincing at the answers that pinched her throat. Pushed his brother over a cliff? Driven him to take his own life?

  If either were true, she knew there could be no saving her husband, neither from the accountability nor the guilt. She refused to allow that possibility.

  ‘‘Was there anything else, Kat? Think. Anything at all?’’

  Kat shook her head. ‘‘The rest was gibberish. But it does prove one thing beyond a doubt. Our young earl can talk.’’

  ‘‘Yes, but he chooses not to.’’

  A disturbing thought struck her. Mrs. Dorn had adamantly disapproved of Kat sleeping in Jonny’s room. Perhaps he had spoken in his sleep previously. And perhaps Mrs. Dorn had heard him and learned something she did not wish Nora—or anyone else—to know.

  She remembered meeting Jonny for the first time, and how he had seemed so dependent on Mrs. Dorn whenever Nora asked him a question. Could the housekeeper be enforcing Jonny’s silence?

  ‘‘I believe it’s more than the trauma of his father’s death that has silenced him,’’ she said. ‘‘He’s terrified of something—or someone—and his fears prevent him speaking. I must find a way to break the silence.’’

  ‘‘Begging your pardon, ma’am, but if you ask me, you already have the answer. Your paints and all. Whenever there was a to-do in your parents’ house, I always knew I could find you behind your easel.’’

  ‘‘I’ve tried art with Jonny, but canvas and sketch books are too limiting.’’

  Kat flashed a shrewd grin. ‘‘I’ve an idea if you care to hear it, ma’am.’’

  ‘‘I’ll try anything.’’

  ‘‘There are plenty of plain white bedclothes up in the servant’s linen room. I’d wager we could nip one on the sly with dismal Dorn none the wiser. We can stretch it across the floor of your studio and give our little earl the biggest canvas anyone ever saw.’’

  ‘‘Brilliant!’’ Nora practically leapt out of her chair. ‘‘Oh, but Kat, let me do the pilfering. I wouldn’t want you to get into trouble.’’

  ‘‘That dried up old raven doesn’t frighten me, ma’am.’’

  Nora couldn’t help a fleeting smile. ‘‘She does me. Kat, I want you to stay with Jonny when I can’t be with him. Become his shadow and do not let him out of your sight.’’

  ‘‘Don’t fret, ma’am. They don’t call me Kat for nothing. My eyes are keen and my ears shar
p. That child won’t so much as wink, nor will anyone wink at him, without my knowing about it and reporting directly back to you.’’

  ‘‘Thank you, Kat. I knew I could count on you.’’

  Chapter 17

  "A beach patrol, sir?"

  "Yes. Twenty-four hours a day," Grayson explained to his steward the next morning. He’d spent another restless night wondering if he should go to Nora and apologize, reassure her he wasn’t insane.

  But he’d already told her the truth, that he believed he’d pushed his brother to his death, and if living with that weren’t enough to drive a man to insanity, he didn’t know what would. So what reassurances could he offer his wife?

  He and his steward stood in his father’s old study, a room rarely used by either him or Tom due to the memories the room evoked. Even now, the lingering hint of pipe tobacco made his stomach clench around unsettling memories, for it was typically here that he and his brother had been taken to task by their father for their boyhood transgressions.

  More often than not, it had been Tom bearing the brunt of their father’s displeasure. I’ll teach you to be a man, Thomas. I’ll show you what it means to be the heir to the Earl of Clarington. . . .

  Grayson squared his jaw and silently cursed the portrait hanging above the mantel, an oil depiction of his father sitting between his two young sons. Alexander Lowell’s painted expression exactly mirrored the one ingrained in Grayson’s memory: stern, arrogant, uncompromising.

  But having chosen this room because he knew they would not likely be interrupted here, he turned his attention back to his immediate concerns. ‘‘Break the surveillance into shifts,’’ he told his steward. ‘‘I want both the headland and the inlet under constant observation, day and night.’’

  Gibbs nodded his compliance, if not his understanding. ‘‘I will have dependable men posted by this afternoon. But if I may ask, sir, what are these fellows to be on the lookout for?’’

  ‘‘Trespassers. Either stealing in on foot or by boat. If anyone approaches the beach, I want to know about it immediately.’’

  ‘‘Of course, sir.’’ If the conversation startled or otherwise unsettled Gibbs in any way, his unruffled exterior gave no hint. ‘‘Shall I notify the magistrate in Falmouth?’’