The iron handle of the door creaked as it turned. He stepped lightly, not wanting to wake the others in the household. As if everyone else living under this roof did not already know the terrors he inflicted on his older sister.
Once in the room, Jean’s demeanor changed from a fifteen-year-old boy to a fierce and fiery man. He threw back the covers and Ophélie couldn’t help the timid glance back. Their eyes met, and he was no longer her brother. He could turn that persona off and on like a switch.
Tonight, as with every night, Jean was the man who would father her child.
Amelia awoke with such a start that she smacked her head into the headboard. Her eyes traveled the room, taking in the details of her surroundings, grounding her. She had taught many of her patients about the process of grounding—the skill that brought others from the peak of a bout of anxiety or mania by studying and fixing on their surroundings, one by one—but few knew how often she employed the technique herself.
The vivid sense of realness of her dream was unlike her usual ones. She was Ophélie. The only time she’d experienced anything like this was her visions of past lives as Cerridwen.
But this clearly wasn’t that, so what was it?
You’re stressed is all. Worried for Ophélie after you saw how her brother looks at her, and how Brigitte treated you both earlier. Your dreams often inform you of danger, and you know she’s at risk.
“Maybe,” Amelia whispered breathlessly. Jacob’s soft exhales continued uninterrupted, his chest rising and falling in the darkness. Outside, crickets chirped their satin song into the night air.
She started to lay her head back against the pillow when her ears caught a very unusual sound: the squealing cries of a newborn baby.
Amelia glanced over at Jacob, then toward the door, as if either might provide the answer. The crying continued, escalating in volume. No babies were at Ophélie, not since Brigitte’s children had grown. The only visitors on the property, the two of them and the de Blancheforts, were adults. She supposed one of the housemaids might have an infant, but with Brigitte’s foul temperament, she doubted the poor thing would be sleeping in the house for long.
She squinted against the moonlight, looking for the time on the tall clock in the corner. Half past three. With a defeated sigh, she accepted her sleep on this night had ended, not after that startling, vivid dream. And now this.
The cries faded to squeals before intensifying to a shocking shriek. Amelia’s gaze shot to her sleeping husband, who surely couldn’t have slept through that. How could anyone?
Perhaps it wasn’t her business… definitely, it wasn’t her business… but she couldn’t lie in bed for the next few hours wondering.
Her bare feet made no sound, but the cypress floorboards, still new in this time, creaked as they settled under her light steps.
Amelia winced, taking even more care with her movement. It was important she wake no one in her trek, though she could not say exactly why.
Once her eyes adjusted to the darkness and she had her bearings, she shifted focus to listening. The sound traveled… down. It definitely came from the third floor. But that level was reserved for the heir’s suites, and to venture into their private area was even more foolish than following a phantom sound in the night.
The baby shrieked again, followed by several pleasurable giggles. Amelia went completely still. Now she was sure what she’d heard had come from upstairs. She only needed to decide if she could live with the risk.
With a sharp draw of breath, Amelia ascended the staircase letting each foot hang midair before landing on the next step. With each tread, she listened, heart racing, to make sure no other sounds came from the third floor.
At the top of the staircase, Amelia paused, again taking in her surroundings and readjusting to the new setting. The moon spilled through a dormer window at the far end of the hall, lighting the Oriental carpet in a sinister fashion, the curls and floral designs spelling out what seemed inexplicably like a warning. A long row of her ancestor’s faces on the wall watched with knowing eyes. Thanks, universe. As if I really needed a sign this wasn’t my best idea.
Her stomach rumbled, a noise she was certain was even louder than the distressed baby and would undoubtedly wake the house. She regretted skipping dinner but couldn’t make herself sit in a room with both Victor and Brigitte after…
Focus!
Amelia held her breath on her way down the hall, following the cries. She slipped past the suites and drew closer to the window, frowning when she neared the end of the hall. Was the sound coming from outside?
With her last step, an enclave came into view on the left, hidden in the shadows. Ophélie was comprised of many oddly-shaped rooms, nooks, and crannies, but Amelia had never seen this one, not in all her years of visiting for family events, sleepovers, weddings, or funerals.
This was the spot, though. She was certain. A loud, but exceptionally clear wail came from right here. It could not be more than a few feet away. And now her empath senses picked up the final confirmation that the whine came from physical life, an emotion: fear.
She halted before the dark passage. It wasn’t deep; no more than a standard coat closet, and she swiveled her gaze, trying to discern the purpose of this small cutout space when something tickled her nose.
Amelia looked up. A band of braided twine fell from a hook on the ceiling, and at once it all came together. An attic. But not the main one. How did I never know, after all these years, that Ophélie had a second attic?
She reached for the twine when the soft patter of measured steps echoed behind her. Her heart leaped into the back of her throat as one hand poised in midair, froze in horror.
Someone had followed her.
XI
“It’s just me, Blanca,” Jacob whispered, sidling up behind her. He focused up at the attic entry with the same bewildered gaze his wife wore. “So you heard it, too?”
“The baby?” Amelia blinked slowly, in a daze, her eyes locked on the attic.
Jacob nodded, then leaned his head back to concentrate on noises above. “It really does sound like it’s coming from up there, doesn’t it?”
“But why would they put a baby in the attic? Who would do that?”
“Ritual sacrifice?” Jacob suggested with a sleepy shrug. He was only half-kidding.
“I wouldn’t put it above Brigitte,” Amelia muttered. She hadn’t looked at him, still fixated on the attic door. The baby’s cries had grown louder as if sensing help was on the way. Jacob mused now, as he had on the slow walk upstairs, how no one but the two of them had stirred. “We have to go up there.”
“Uhh.”
“Jacob!”
“I don’t disagree with you, it’s just…” She was right. If a baby was in that attic, they couldn’t leave it there. But this was not their house or even their year.
“I know.” Amelia answered the remainder of his unsaid entreaty with a measured nod. She again glanced above them. “But we have to anyway.”
“This seems to be a recurring pattern in our adventures together,” Jacob said. He offered a forced smile only slightly more enthusiastic than he felt inside.
“Maybe that should tell us something,” Amelia whispered under her breath, so quiet Jacob couldn’t tell if she wanted him to hear or not. His heart dropped at how easily she found them said.
“Amelia…”
“I need your help, Donnelly,” she shot back, teeth gritted as she began to tug on the twine. She struggled to balance her force between getting it open and not opening it so fast it smacked her in the face.
“Right.” Jacob reached up to brace the attic door when it dropped, gesturing for her to pull harder. The heavy oak hit his palms with a burst of force, and he was knocked back, stumbling several steps in the process. Amelia had firmly grabbed his shoulders, righting him. The ladder plummeted to its full length with a powerful thump.
Any question over the source of the keening cries was eliminated with the door open.
The crying was no longer muffled but crystal clear, with the precision of being in the immediate vicinity.
“I’ll go first,” she offered, brushing her hands over his nightshirt to repel the heavy layer of dust that collapsed over him.
“Overruled,” he replied and eased her aside with a gentle nudge. She huffed at him, but there wasn’t a chance he would let her go first ever again when potential danger lurked. He’d live with the consequences of her running away for the rest of his life.
“Be careful,” she called after him in hushed tones. He felt her hands steadying the rungs from the bottom, and was relieved she hadn’t followed. “Who the hell knows what’s up there.”
“I believe I possess the answer to your question.”
The sudden appearance of Brigitte caused Jacob to slip and fall back onto the floor with a painful thud. Amelia cried out, at him, at the intruder, at both.
Brigitte towered over Jacob, no small feat with her diminutive figure. She cast an imposing shadow as she regarded him with open, unmasked hostility.
Jacob used the rungs of the ladder to pull himself up and out of the compromised position. “We didn’t mean to wake you,” he said, and immediately realized how ridiculous this sounded. A quick glance in Amelia’s direction confirmed to him she was equally unsettled.
“You cannot wake one who does not sleep,” Brigitte replied in an odd, offhand way. Her eyes narrowed again. “Yet you have no qualms about sneaking about in my house like a common thief.”
“That wasn’t our intention at all,” Amelia explained quickly, stepping forward. “We heard the sound of a… well, this is going to sound insane, I suppose…”
“On with it,” Brigitte demanded, squaring her stance.
“We heard a baby crying,” Jacob finished. He buried his hands in his hair, an old nervous habit, then pulled them out again, considering she might somehow enjoy his disconcertment. Amidst the awkward silence that followed, he realized why Amelia had fumbled through her explanation.
The child’s cries had stopped altogether the moment Brigitte appeared.
“What you’re suggesting does indeed ring of insanity. We have no babies at Ophélie,” Brigitte confirmed. “The property is simply haunted.” Her dark hair spilled over the front of her white gown, which had an unbuttoned gap at the breasts, displaying them in full. The exposure, instead of putting her at a disadvantage, instead had the effect of a calculated power play. “You have no business stealing around my home, in places I have not authorized you to be. My husband may be enamored by your titles and the prestige you bring from the other end of the world, but I have no such predilections and cannot recommend you make such a blunder again while you remain under our roof.”
“It won’t happen again,” Jacob and Amelia replied in near unison.
“You’re right, Lord Donnelly,” Brigitte said. Her eyes were granite daggers. “It will not.”
Jacob slipped his hand through Amelia’s in a signal of harmony. A shield, perhaps their only defense from this strangely hostile woman. To his pleasure—and he hated to admit it, but also surprise—Amelia squeezed his hand.
Together, they smiled at their host. Together, they choked down their fear. Together, they walked past Brigitte and steeled themselves against her threats.
“That wasn’t a haunting,” Jacob whispered against the back of Amelia’s head. His arms wrapped around her hips from behind, ignoring how she stiffened at his touch once they were again alone.
“I know.”
“She knows it too,” he decided, realizing the truth of this as he recalled her threats, both voiced and implied. “What is she hiding? I don’t understand why there would be a baby in the attic to begin with, but if there was, how did it get to that?”
“With her, take your pick of reasons.” Amelia settled into her pillow with a yawn. “You didn’t see how she treated me over tea this afternoon. I would be more surprised to see her do something kind.”
“I forgot you had tea with her. I had an interesting meeting with Charles today as well, and I think, maybe even earned his respect. I feel better about us being here, anyway. Less worried they might kick us out for fraud. How did tea go?”
“I can’t imagine it any worse than it was,” Amelia replied. The words were muffled into the pillow. “She had her mind made up about me before ever saying a word.”
“We should share information and compare notes, too.” He brushed a stray band of hair off the side of her face. “We didn’t really see each other all day.”
“Tomorrow,” she said. “We need to at least try to get some sleep.”
A polite brush-off, but one, nonetheless. Jacob didn’t understand how going back in time had pulled him further from his wife than he had ever been. He sighed. “Okay, Blanca. But if we hear that sound again, we need to do something.”
“I know.”
“Maybe you could ask Ophélie about it tomorrow?”
“Yeah. Maybe.”
Exhausted confusion kept him from saying more. He could continue to voice the questions, but Amelia had the same ones, and neither of them possessed any answers.
“I love you, Blanca,” he sang into her ear, moments later, but she was either asleep by then or pretending to be.
DAY
THREE
XII
“Have you met them, Papa? What did you think?”
Charles perched upon the library ladder, concentration creasing his brows and the sides of his mouth. His fingers ran along the spines of a row of books with a gentle mumble. Ophélie could see this without looking at him. She knew when her father was on a mission.
At the sound of her voice, some of the tension left him. “Yes, ma petit. I passed part of yesterday afternoon with Lord Donnelly, and he seems a charming fellow, if different from the gentlemen we know along the river. I have not had the pleasure of more than a brief introduction with the lady, but I understand you have taken her under your wing?”
“Yes, Papa,” Ophélie answered proudly. She bowed in reverence. Her hands rested atop one another, in front of her, eager to show him her strong comportment. “She is a most kindred spirit.”
“I’m pleased you have a companion, even if it is temporary,” her father said. Charles pulled a crimson leather-bound tome from the second to top shelf and blew the dust off the top, examining it. “I’m very proud of you for being such a gracious hostess. It comes very natural to you, as it did your grandmother.” He replaced the book. “You’ll make a fine plantation mistress.”
“That is my greatest desire,” she said, shifting. Ophélie didn’t know the right approach for what she was about to say next, or how it might affect her relationship with her father. “Maman… she seems angry with me, though.”
“Whatever for?”
“You see, she has not been… well… she has not been…”
“On with it, ma petit. There’s nothing to be gained by taking a longer route to the point.”
Ophélie nodded. “She has not been very kind to our guests… in particular, Lady Donnelly. And she seems angry with me for taking on the role that should have been hers.”
Charles stiffened. “I see. And why do you believe this to be so?”
“Her behavior toward Lady Donnelly reminds me of how she comports herself around Hector.” She spit the words out quickly as if needing to be rid of them. It was blasphemy to infer her mother would treat a treasured guest with the same bland disdain as she treated their slaves, and Ophélie had never seen her mother treat anyone of her social equal the way she’d treated the lady the day before in the parlor.
Ophélie could also never share her own desire to free all the slaves if given the reins.
Her father descended the ladder and slowly approached. His hands came down on her shoulders. “You know your maman’s moods are not like most.” He pulled his mouth into a tight line. “But you mustn’t speak of your mother in such ways. It isn’t proper for a young lady on the eve of her own household to manage.�
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“Of course, Papa.” She struggled to balance the shame in her feelings and her need to express them.
Charles planted a kiss on the top of her head. Affectionate, but dismissive. As he turned to complete the task at hand, she caught the darkness pass through his eyes.
“Papa, is something troubling you?”
He continued to face away. “As the master of land and law, I am always beset with one trouble or another,” he said carefully, each word seeming to be a deliberate choice. “They are not troubles for you, ma petit. Even when you are a mistress yourself, I would see you as innocent and preserved as the bisque dolls lining your shelf. That is the role of a husband and father, to take on all the world’s troubles so the women can remain unspoiled.”
This was not an answer at all, and Ophélie knew it. “I cannot help but worry about you, Papa. You are the dearest to me in all the world.”
Charles sagged at her words and returned to her at once, pulling her into his arms with a fierce squeeze. “As you are to me, ma petit. But your papa is a strong man. A force, if you will allow me that indulgence. I built our life here from nothing, and if the world ended tomorrow, I would construct us another. There is no trouble I cannot weather, child.” He loosened his grip and, with his thumb, lifted her chin. Charles gifted a soft, brief kiss on his daughter’s lips, such tenderness as he had not done since she was much younger. “You, also, must continue to rise above the pain and hurt of the world around us. Let it go, Ophélie. There is no gain in dwelling on circumstances we cannot change.”
Ophélie swallowed back a sob. If only he knew.
“And you must trust I know what troubles you most, ma petit, and am doing everything within my power to see you free of this pain.”
Her father’s words haunted her all morning, and into the afternoon. They lingered over the picnic with Lady Donnelly like an unspoken promise.
The Secrets Amongst the Cypress Page 9