by Cara Summers
“Look again.”
She stared at the portrait once more. Her gaze focused automatically on Eleanor first. “Odd. She’s so relaxed but her hands are tense on those books.” Nell felt her own fingers curl and grow tense again. “She’s the focus of the portrait, and other than the sapphires, they’re the closest thing to her. Why are they even there?”
“The illustrations in your book—could those be the books you found them in?” Reid asked.
“They could be. They’re in my mother’s room.” The image flashed into her mind of exactly what she’d seen when she’d been sitting on Reid’s shoulders in the gazebo. And she could have sworn that the glow on Eleanor’s face grew even brighter. Excitement bloomed inside Nell as she grabbed Reid’s hand and pulled him into the foyer. “She wasn’t just looking at the cliff face. She was looking right at that room.”
14
REID HAD TO hurry his pace to keep up with her. To his surprise she didn’t stop on the second floor where her own room was and instead climbed a third flight of stairs. At the top was a double set of doors carved in oak. Opening them, she brushed aside cobwebs, then led the way down a dim hallway.
“When my mother was alive, the nursery was on this floor and so was the master suite my parents used. When she died, my father declared the whole third floor of the castle off-limits. He locked up the library, too, because it had been her favorite room.”
The room she ushered Reid into was dim. Sunlight struggled with grime on the windows and barely illuminated the dust motes in its path. He took in the perfectly made bed, the robe that still lay across its foot. His heart twisted when he made out the tiny white crib tucked into a book-lined alcove in one wall.
“As far as I know, I’m the only one who’s visited this place since my mother died.”
“Your sisters never came up here?” A rumble of thunder had him striding to the windows that ran along two walls. Alba followed, her collar jingling. “It’s just a storm, girl,” he murmured as he patted her head. He knew that she couldn’t hear the thunder or his words but could feel the rumble effects. Still she jumped up and settled herself on the window seats that lined one wall of windows. On the other, sliding glass doors opened onto a balcony with a stunning view of the lake. From this height, he could clearly make out the hedge circling the old gazebo. Beyond that, a small group of people had gathered around Vi and Daryl in front of the stone arch. The wedding rehearsal was about to begin. Thunder rumbled again. He patted the dog’s head. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky.
“Adair and Piper said coming up here would make them too sad.”
Turning, he watched her run her hand along the railing of the tiny white crib. “How old were you when she died?” he asked.
“Six months. I don’t remember her at all. I must have been four or five when I realized Piper and Adair did, and I couldn’t. It made me feel left out, so that’s when I started sneaking up here. I suppose I was hoping something might trigger a memory. I even tried playing dress up in her clothes. Nothing worked.”
“But you kept coming back anyway.”
She smiled as she joined him at the windows. “It was forbidden. That held a great deal of appeal. And I found other things I liked to do. Like reading. My mother’s favorite room was the library, and I pretended the books on those shelves in the alcove were her favorites. I read them all. On rainy days, I used to sit on this window seat and write. Eleanor did some of her sketches right from this vantage point.”
“The sketchbooks. You found them in the alcove?”
“No. I found them in what I’ve always imagined was her secret cupboard. You’ve seen Angus’s secret cupboard in the main parlor.”
Nell moved to the stone fireplace that took up a great deal of the wall opposite the alcove. “It’s different than Angus’s. It’s built right into the side of the fireplace.”
Angus’s secret cupboard had fascinated Reid’s brothers and him when they were ten. Only it wasn’t a secret. According to Cam, Piper had made a show-and-tell video when she was in fifth grade that was available in the local library.
By the time he joined Nell, she had swung open one of the square flat stones on a central hinge just large enough to allow her to slide the sketchbooks out. Dropping to his knees, he ran his hand along the inside of the space. His best guess was that it was about two feet square. Smaller than Angus’s. Smooth stones lined the walls, and not one of them budged.
“If Eleanor’s necklace were in there, I would have found it when I discovered the sketchbooks.” Nell carried them to the window seat.
“Just checking. Why don’t we split these up?” As he sat beside her, there was an ominous roll of thunder. Alba inched close enough to make contact with his thigh. Sunlight still poured down on the gardens, but he could see a line of black clouds on the far side of the lake rolling forward like invading tanks. A car pulled into the drive and a young woman stepped out, followed by two older women. Reid recognized one of them as Edie. He noted that Daryl was talking with Sheriff Skinner. Thunder growled again and wind gusts disturbed the leaves in the garden.
“I hope that storm doesn’t interfere with the rehearsal,” Nell said as she passed him a book.
Reid began to turn the pages. Some of the drawings he recognized from Nell’s book. Other places captured in the sketches he remembered seeing the summer he was ten. “I’m noticing a pattern. Many of them are drawn from the vantage point of the gazebo. But Eleanor must have done others right on the scene. It’s almost as if she was using the drawings the way a photographer might use a camera—taking the wide angle shot and then zooming in.
“You’re right.” Nell pointed to the page she was studying. “Here’s the one of the castle and the cliffs. Then on the next page there’s one of the beach that had to have been drawn from that ledge in front of the cave. Then there are several of the interior sections of the cave. I’ll bet one of them was where Piper and Duncan discovered the earring. It’s almost as though she’s drawing a treasure map right to that earring with her sketches.”
Reid turned to look at her, once again all admiration at the quick way her mind worked. “Did you ever tell anyone about these drawings or show them to anyone?”
“No. When I was trying to convince my editor and publishers to use the drawings, I showed them enlarged photos. I never told anyone about the secret cupboard, either.”
“Not even your sisters?”
“Especially not my sisters. I told my publisher and the marketing people that I’d found them in the library. Sometimes I felt guilty about not telling Piper and Adair. But by the time I had found them, I’d begun to think of this place as mine—a secret I shared only with my mother and Eleanor. Don’t you have secrets you’ve kept from your brothers?”
He smiled. “I treasure each and every one of them.” Setting aside the book, he rose and walked over to the fireplace. Kneeling down, he pushed the stone back into place. The mechanism worked smoothly. Even when he ran his hands over it, he felt nothing that indicated that there was a secret cupboard behind it.
“It’s constructed very well. Assuming that Eleanor hid the sketchbooks here, I still wonder why no one ever found them or why this secret cupboard didn’t become part of the family history the way Angus’s did. How did you discover the way to work that stone?”
“Totally by accident. There was a huge rainstorm that day just like the one that seems to be blowing in now. We lost electricity for a few minutes. During one flash of lightning, I noticed a glint along this side of the fireplace. When the lights came back on, I investigated. The stone swung open quite easily, and there they were.”
Thunder clapped overhead, and wind howled its way past the windows. Alba pressed closer to her. For a while Nell watched Reid try to find the way to open the stone and was surprised that he couldn’t.
“I’ll show you.” Nell joined him and slipped just the tips of her fingers between two of the stones. The stone swung open again.
“Let me
try.” Once he closed the stone, he did try, but the size of his fingers prevented him from getting any traction. “It seems to require a woman’s touch,” he murmured.
The ringing of his cell was nearly drowned out by another clap of thunder overhead.
Reid held the phone so Nell could hear. “Change of plans,” Daryl said. “Vi’s bringing the wedding rehearsal inside to the ballroom. Skinner will make sure the rest of the castle is blocked off, but his job will be easier if you and Nell join us. That way we can all multitask.”
“Agreed.” He ended the call and the instant he studied Nell’s eyes, he saw mirrored in them exactly what he was feeling—disappointment and frustration.
“I need to keep looking through the sketches. The answer is in them somewhere.”
“I think so, too.” There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that Eleanor was somehow going to guide Nell to the necklace. “We’ll come back just as soon as we can. And we’ll come back together, Nell. Promise?”
“Promise. Let me put the sketchbooks back.”
Once she did, he signaled the dog, and they left the room.
* * *
“YOUR AUNT VI’S a genius,” Sheriff Skinner said.
“Yes.” Nell had always known that, but the quick way Vi had improvised to go forward with the wedding rehearsal in the ballroom confirmed it in spades. Nell could only hope that the rest of the rehearsal would go as swiftly. She needed to get back to those sketchbooks.
There were twenty or so people in the ballroom. They’d all pitched in to line up folding chairs into a makeshift aisle. Now they were standing in small groups laughing and chatting—totally ignoring the storm that raged outside. Daryl had shut Alba away in the kitchen because she’d started growling and barking when the wedding party had descended on the castle.
At the far end of the room, Vi stood in a huddle with the bride and groom and the minister. Nearby, Nell spotted Edie with a concerned look on her face as she gave James Orbison a pat on his arm. The young journalist was maximizing on the chaos produced by the sudden change of venue to speak to as many guests as he could.
Reid and Daryl stood nearby the line of French doors that opened onto a long terrace with a view of the lake. Rain pounded against the windowpanes, and lightning crisscrossed the sky. A pretty young flute player began to play softly—Beethoven’s “Ode to Joy” as Edie and the groom’s father, Benjy Grimshaw, joined Reid and Daryl. From this distance, Nell could see that Edie was making the introductions. The conversation was brief, but when the couple walked away, both Daryl and Reid reached immediately for their cell phones.
Turning to Sheriff Skinner, Nell asked, “Do you know what Benjy Grimshaw discovered about the gun the shooter used?”
“One of his blog followers in England is all but positive that the bullets were manufactured there,” Skinner said. “He claims he has a rifle in his pawn shop that uses that particular caliber. The weapon is a favorite with upper-class Brits who love to hunt.”
“Gwendolen could have access to that kind of bullet. She might even own that kind of gun. But it’s not proof.”
“No,” Skinner agreed. “But the evidence is piling up.”
Not fast enough, Nell thought. Thunder continued to rumble as Reid and Daryl talked into their cells, gathering that needed evidence. Frustration that she had thought she’d quelled rose up again. Not because Daryl and Reid were leaving her out. Their splitting off made perfect sense. As long as there was an unplanned event going on in the castle, they had to focus on security. For everyone.
The source of her frustration was more personal. Oh, she wanted to tell herself that it was because she was so close to finding the necklace, and she wanted Reid’s perspective on the sketches. He would see things that she couldn’t. The last thing she’d expected was that they made a good team. They were so different. But somehow they fit. Perfectly.
He stood not fifty feet away from her, and yet she missed him.
How in the world had it come to that? What had become of her goal to operate independently? How had she gotten to the point where she wanted to be with him all the time? She hated to think of herself as that...immersed.
She studied his frame in the window, the darkness of the storm at his back. The toughness and the strength in his face and his body offered such an appealing contrast to the kindness she’d always known was there. A kaleidoscope of images flashed through her mind. His face as it had looked on the day their parents had married and again when she’d first seen him talking to the policeman at the door of Piper’s apartment. The expression in his eyes when he’d walked through the door to her room last night, and finally what she’d seen in his eyes after he’d held her in the main parlor only hours ago.
Her heart took a long bounce. There was a story in the way he looked at her, but she’d avoided thinking about it. Afraid that she might be seeing in his eyes what she wanted to see—the narrative of her own developing feelings and not his. Images always told stories, but love was blind. Her heart bounced again, and fear bubbled up.
The slow crescendo in the sound of a flute had the guests quieting, and Nell’s attention switched to Vi as she led the bride, her father and two other young women to the end of the makeshift aisle. The groom-to-be and another man stood to the left of the minister. While the music played softly, Vi orchestrated the seating of the groom’s parents and then the bride’s. Two young men were quietly capturing each moment on their cell phones.
Something flickered at the edge of her mind, then faded before she could grasp it.
Focus, she told herself. Find the necklace, and then you’ll figure out what to do about Reid Sutherland.
* * *
REID PUNCHED HIS contact button for Cam. Calculating the time difference, he figured that his brother and Adair were meeting with the housekeeper’s mother right now, and depending on where the woman lived, cell reception could be tricky.
A few minutes ago, he and Daryl had discovered they’d been told a lie. Not a major one, but it was enough to put his senses on full alert. Daryl was checking it out. But Reid had an urgent question for his brother. His gaze swept the room. As the flute player segued into the wedding march, Vi gently urged the first bridesmaid up the aisle.
“Problem or favor?” Cam asked in his ear.
“Both. What have you found out about the sapphires?”
“A word to the wise—housekeepers and servants know everything. Delia Dunsmore is ninety-four years old, but her mind still works like a steel trap. Mom’s in love with her, and A.D. wants to paint her.”
Reid suppressed the urge to tell his brother to hurry up. He knew from experience doing that would only have the opposite effect. Instead, he checked the room once again. Everyone was accounted for. Security was tight. Skinner was still at Nell’s side. Reminding himself of those things only increased the urgency he felt in his gut. Time was running out.
“Is that the wedding march I hear in the background? You’re not getting hitched to Nell, are you?” Cam asked.
Ignoring the question, Reid took a risk. “Could you give me the Reader’s Digest version? Was this Delia able to recall anything about how the Campbells gained possession of the sapphires?”
“They were a betrothal gift from Eleanor’s groom-to-be, one Alistair MacGregor. He’d been invited to the castle and had fallen in love with Eleanor on sight. On the night of the ball celebrating their engagement, he gave them to her and insisted she wear them. Evidently, his family had been staunch supporters of the queen, and the sapphires had been a gift to his great-great-grandfather from Mary Stuart herself. According to Delia, the marriage would have brought money and land to help the Campbells over a rough patch.”
Reid recalled Nell’s dream. “So she was wearing them on the night of the big betrothal ball, and that was the same night she ran off with Angus.”
“Correct. Technically, it could be argued that she had a right to take the jewels with her.”
“I wonder if Eleanor would make t
hat argument. Or her betrothed. If those sapphires were mine, and the woman I loved ran off with them and another man, I wouldn’t take that generous a view. Why wasn’t more of a stink raised?”
“Alistair MacGregor hanged himself. One of the servants discovered him on the morning after the party. According to Delia it was all hushed up. Guests at the betrothal bash were told that the bride and groom had decided to elope and move immediately to his isolated estate in northern Scotland. Since Alistair was an only child and the last of his line, no one from that side offered a different version. Scandal avoided. Delia says that for months the Campbell family waited for Eleanor to return. If she had, they probably would have hidden her away in a nunnery and kept the jewels.”
“Who inherited on the MacGregor side?” Reid asked. “Seems to me that part of the family might think they have a claim, especially if there’s no written record to support the story that the sapphires were a gift to Eleanor.”
“We’re all going to work on that. But if there was a written record, that might have been what Castle MacPherson’s nocturnal visitor was looking for in the library.”
“And it may be the reason why a fire came close to destroying the library at the Campbell estate,” Reid pointed out. “That’s why I called. I need to know if anyone visited the Campbell estate six to eight months ago. Nell and I both think that the fire in the library is related to what’s going on now.”
“Hold on,” Cam said. “I can ask the housekeeper right now.”
While he waited, Reid glanced around the ballroom again. The second bridesmaid was halfway up the aisle. Sheriff Skinner still stood at Nell’s side. Everyone else was focused on the progress of the rehearsal. Nothing he saw triggered an alarm. Still, a sense of urgency rolled through him, and he willed Cam to hurry.
