another celebration the next evening after dinner when the
manuscript was on its way to London. I went with Fraser
to select the wines for the meal. I must have been in the
cellar when you were looking for me.”
“Who would have known that?” she asked, wondering
if this was the clue to point to the man behind the hideous
mask. Then she wondered if she really wanted to know
the truth.
“Anyone in the house. Darcy, you shouldn’t have gone
alone.”
“I know that, but I feared for your father.” She shivered.
“That beast was there with his voice like a snake’s. They
forced some drink down my throat. Nothing is clear after
that.”
“Who has been so bold?” He frowned. “Someone
should have seen them. The servants are aware of
everything that goes on here.”
Darcy laughed harshly. “Don’t you think I’ve asked
myself that a thousand times while I was interred alive in
that place? Someone overheard our conversations when I
spoke to you of the lights I’d seen, because the doctor at
the asylum knew of what I had said.” She hesitated, then
whispered, “How long have I been gone?”
“Ten days.”
“Only ten days?” she whispered.
He drew her into his arms. “It seemed like a lifetime
while you weren’t with me. You must stay within
Rosewood Hall until the truth about these people in the
wood can be uncovered. Something is going on. This group
of people may be nothing more than smoke to conceal the
truth.”
“You believe me?” She gripped his arms.
A knock forestalled his answer. When she tensed, he
smiled and opened the door only far enough so he could
demand, “What is it?”
A maid’s voice said, “I’m bringing tea for Miss
Kincaid. It contains her medicine. Dr. Hastings wants her
to drink it before she goes to bed.”
Darcy whispered, “No, I shan’t drink it.”
Simon smiled swiftly before turning up several of the
lights and opening the door. He took the tray and said,
“Bring another pot for me.”
“Yes, Dr. Simon.”
Closing the door, he set the tray on the table in front
of the sofa. Darcy sat, and her wrapper rose to reveal the
red marks on her ankle. She tugged it back down. He cursed
and drew up her sleeve to reveal the stains of other bruises,
then tilted her face which she had kept cloaked in shadows.
“Which one hit you? I shall—”
She grasped his hand. “Help me close that horrible
place. Please. No one should have to suffer what one does
within its walls.”
“Tomorrow we shall go there with the constable.”
“Thank you.”
He sat beside her, holding her arm. “Darcy, nobody in
Rosewood Hall will make you drink medicine you don’t
need.”
“Your father believes I need it.”
“I’ll speak to him of that in the morning.” He settled
back on the sofa and drew her unbruised cheek down to
his shoulder. “You’re safe now.”
“Am I?”
“They won’t hurt you again. I promise.”
His face jeweled through her unshed tears as she
whispered, “Thank you.”
“Just don’t believe I’d ever hurt you like that.”
“I didn’t want to believe it, but that place . . . I couldn’t
think clearly.” She sat up. “I must leave. I don’t want to
wait until morning.”
He scowled. “Leave Rosewood Hall? At this hour?”
“The train for London—”
“Doesn’t depart until midday tomorrow. Even if you
walk to the coaching inn and take the public coach to the
railway station, you’ll be waiting for hours before the train
leaves.”
“But I can’t stay here. They—He—The creature said
he wasn’t finished with me. I have to go. Now.”
“That’s not possible. In the morning, I will—” Again
a quiet rapping interrupted him. He went to collect the tea
tray he had requested and put it next to the other one.
Silently Simon picked up the teapot from the first tray
and walked to a window. He poured the tea out. Taking a
cup from the second tray, he filled it with tea from the
other pot. He handed it to her. Pouring himself a cup, he
sat beside her.
When she hesitated, he lifted his cup and took a hearty
swallow. “Tastes fine.”
She raised her cup to her lips. “You’re right. It tastes
all right.” She set the cup down. “If I’m going to
leave—”
He picked up her cup and handed it back to her. “You
look hollow with hunger, Darcy. Drink this, and I’ll order
some sandwiches sent up here.”
“No.” She put her hand on his arm. “Don’t go until
you promise me you’ll stay with me tonight—”
“Gladly.” He smiled.
“And you won’t keep me from leaving tomorrow.”
“In the morning, I will book passage for us to London.”
“Us?”
“It’s time I call on Caldwell to see if he can read my
writing.” He refilled his cup and drank again.
“The typed manuscript is here.”
“What?”
“I brought it up and hid it here because I feared for its
safety.”
“Why?”
She wanted to tell him the truth, but she could not
accuse the vicar when Reverend Fairfield had been the
key to her freedom from the asylum. “Does it matter? It’s
safe in my dressing room.” She stood. Her stomach
grumbled with the demand for food, so she drained the
cup and set it back on the tray. “I’ll get it for you.”
“No.” He put his cup next to hers and drew her back
down to sit before gathering her into his arms. “Forget the
manuscript.”
“Forget it?”
“Right now, I don’t want to think of anything but you,
mahbjb.”
She breathed in his masculine scent as his mouth
slanted across hers. For a moment, fury clamped around
her, as she thought of the hours they had lost. Hours that
could have been filled with this luscious passion. Like the
vicar’s glance at Simon’s manuscript, which she must have
misconstrued, it no longer mattered.
Her fingers stroked up his chest. When they reached
the top of his unbuttoned shirt and slipped beneath it to
curve over his shoulders, he tightened his embrace. Then
he pulled back as he yawned.
Chuckling, she stood and held out her hand. “I think
I’ll take that as a hint it’s time for us to go to bed. We have
a long trip in the morning and much pleasure to catch up
on tonight.”
“That’s an excellent idea,” he replied.
When she swayed against him, he turned her to face
him. Lifting her hands to clasp at his nape, she smiled. “I
thought it was one of my better ones.” She stifled a yawn
and laughed. “Now see what you have started.”
/> “I haven’t started much of anything yet, but I plan
to.” Sweeping her up into his arms, he carried her into the
bedroom. As she turned down the gaslights, he shouldered
aside the draperies. A fresh breeze billowed into the room
when he raised the window slightly as she had asked him
to do each night. Then he closed the draperies to leave
them in a cocoon where no one could intrude.
Putting one knee on the mattress, he leaned across the
bed. He laughed as she tugged him down atop her. He
undid the buttons on her wrapper, and his eager fingers
swept along her filmy nightgown.
“I thought you were angry at me,” he whispered.
She quivered as he teased her ear. “I was.”
“Yet you chose this nightgown, knowing it would bring
only one thought into my head.”
He did not give her a chance to explain it had been
waiting for her. He kissed her and kissed her and kissed
her until she quivered beneath him. When she yawned
again, he leaned back on the pillows and drew her against
him. With her head cradled on his shoulder, she stared up
at the ceiling. His soft, slow breaths marked the moment
when he fell asleep.
She waited for sleep to come to her. She had expected,
after long nights of fearing what waited beyond the
darkness, she would fall into a deep sleep first. As she
gazed at the spot where her guardian light always appeared,
she saw it was again joined by the soft clouds. She frowned,
although the motion took almost all her draining energy.
The clouds were so faint she might not have seen them if
she was not looking closely.
Maybe they were weakening because she and Simon
were leaving Rosewood Hall, and they could not travel
along. Maybe . . . More than once, she thought of sitting
up and looking at them more closely. Each time the thought
failed to goad her into action. She simply rested her head
against his shoulder. They would rest now. Later . . . With
her head against him, she closed her eyes and drifted away
on the dream of him.
***
In the light of the single gas lamp left burning by the
bed, a cloaked figure slipped through the door with the
ease of someone well familiar with the room.
“Simon? Darcy?”
The two lying close together on the bed, his arms
cradling her, did not move.
With a pleased chuckle, the cloaked man raised one
of Darcy’s arms, then the other, drawing off her wrapper
to leave her draped only in translucent fabric. He lifted
her up to sit, and her head fell forward, her chin resting on
her chest just above the Thoth pendant. He tried not to
stare at her firm breasts, for she was not for him. She had
had her chance, but it was too late.
He pulled a knife from beneath his cloak and sliced
through her long hair, leaving it curling on her shoulders
at a length more appropriate for an ancient Egyptian queen.
With a laugh, he tossed the shorn hair atop Simon’s face.
He lifted Darcy from the bed.
With her head lolling against his chest, he stretched to
blow out the flame in the gaslight. The soft whisper of the
open gas valve remained an audible warning. Her limbs
drooped around him, but she would wake and face her
fate. Her lover would not be so lucky.
“Sleep forever in death,” he murmured.
He skulked out of the room with his prize. The door
shut behind him with a barely discernible click, leaving
Simon entombed with the gas seeping out of the open line.
Seventeen
Darcy tried to find her way past the unseen line
between dreams and waking. The terror within her refused
to release her as she opened her eyes . . . to darkness. For
as long as it took for her to draw in a frantic breath, she
thought time had collapsed and she was back in the asylum
on the hill. She had not escaped. Hastings’ coming to
arrange her release had been just a dream. Falling asleep
in Simon’s arms was no more than a fantasy.
But she was not there, for she could not hear the moans
of the other inmates. She was lying on a thin blanket instead
of stone. The floor was cool beneath her outstretched feet,
but she was not in the closet cell which she had feared she
would never escape.
Then where was she?
Water dripping.
The stench of waste thick in the air.
Pain.
She groaned as she moved. The sound echoed strangely
around her. Putting her hand against her forehead, she
stifled another moan of pain. Cramps erupted in her
stomach. She drew up her knees and cradled her aching
head against them. Her stomach roiled as she gulped in
mouthfuls of the fetid air. She thought of Meskhenet’s story
and the corpses of the poisoned attendants. Had they felt
like this? Slowly her stomach calmed, and she pushed aside
the tendrils of panic.
Raising her head, she moaned. It was dark. So very
dark. And in the darkness . . .
“Help me!” she shrieked. “Simon, where are you? Help
me!”
“Meskhenet.”
The voice was no more than a breath. Had she even
heard it, or had it been the echo of her scream tricking
her?
“Help me!” she cried again, hiding her face in her
hands.
“Meskhenet.”
Darcy’s fingers shook as she lowered them from her
face and opened her eyes. She stared at a pinpoint of light
only a few feet away. It could be just a trick created by her
own eyes . . . or was it her special light?
“Is it you?” she asked, rising to her knees so she could
flee if . . . She almost laughed as hysteria clamped icy
fingers once again around her throat. Flee? To where? She
had no idea where she was, and she could see nothing but
that small spot of light.
“Meskhenet.” The voice remained a breathy whisper,
but the spot of light widened.
“Who are you? How do you know Meskhenet’s
name?”
Light exploded around Darcy. As she cowered back,
trying to protect her eyes, a gentle hand brushed against
her hair as lightly as a zephyr. Slowly she raised her head.
Where the point of light had been was now a woman
draped in a glow that stripped all color from her face and
clothing. Her hair, which should have been ebony, was
bleached to a dim shadow that nearly concealed the dozens
of small braids falling onto her shoulders. When she raised
one hand toward Darcy, the light flowed along her fingers.
Darcy lifted her own hand. She inched her fingers
forward toward the woman’s.
“Meskhenet.” The woman’s lips did not move, but the
voice came from her direction.
Their fingers touched. That light became a bolt of
lightning that seared through Darcy. With a cry, she tried
to pull her hand away from the woman’s.
“Meskhenet, do not fear me.” This t
ime, the woman’s
lips formed each word. As her fingers closed around
Darcy’s, the fearsome electrical pulse eased. The light
around the woman diminished, bringing her features to a
normal color, but enough luminescence remained for Darcy
to see.
“Why are you calling me Meskhenet?” she asked the
woman.
“It is your name. What else would I call you?”
She shook her head. “My name is Darcy Kincaid.
Meskhenet is a character in an old story Jaddeh told me
when I was a child.”
“You know what is true. You may have forgotten, but
the truth seeks you, Meskhenet.” The woman put her other
hand over Darcy’s.
Again that shock raced through Darcy, but, as she
stared at the woman, memories flooded out of her head.
Not her memories, but those of another lifetime. Scenes
of a pampered life in the Pharaoh’s palace.
Not just the sights, but sounds of wind rustling through
palm fronds and the aroma of sweet blossoms and baking
bread. Voices, laughing and someone singing, filled her
ears. She slowly turned her head and saw the Nile flowing
just beyond a low garden wall. Even as she watched, a flat
barge was rowed against the current. The day’s heat, borne
on a sultry wind, raised sweat on her brow and dripped
down her back.
She yanked her hand out of the woman’s and shook
her head. Was she becoming as mad as they had tried to
convince her she was?
Cool, soft hands framed her face, lifting it so she
looked directly into the woman’s eyes. Not believing her
own words, but unable to deny the truth, she whispered,
“Ahwere?”
“You do remember, Meskhenet. I am your sister
Ahwere.” She smiled. “To be more accurate, I am Ahwere’s
ka, the part of her that is eternal.”
“But it’s only a story Jaddeh told me. Meskhenet and
Ahwere are part of tale to entertain a child.”
“Your grandmother in this time told you the story to
help you recall the truth of the life you once had. She was
sent by Thoth to direct you to the truth when you once
again walked along the waters of the Nile. Then you were
taken away, and Thoth could not reach you again.”
Darcy put her hand over the pendant. “Why would
Thoth want to reach me?”
“What do you remember, dear sister?”
Ferguson, J. A. - Call Back Yesterday.txt Page 29
