Elise put her hands over her belly. The butterfly feeling had intensified over the past two days. Had her baby quickened without her even realizing it? She supposed it was possible. She was about halfway through the pregnancy, by her estimation. Elise pressed her hands to her growing stomach, searching for signs of life. “Are you in there, little one?” she whispered. “I’ll keep you safe.”
Elise sank down onto a wooden settle and closed her eyes. The only way to keep her baby safe was to keep herself safe, and she had no way to do that. They’d been granted a reprieve this past month, but now it was over. The plague was among them, and Edward wasn’t about to do a damn thing to keep them from harm. She’d heard the thunder of hooves as he left the house, fleeing without even speaking to her.
Chapter 35
November 2013
Surrey, England
Quinn set aside the brooch and stared into the leaping flames in the grate. Her little chapel was frigid from October to April since it was built of stone and had no central heating, but the fireplace, which ingeniously faced both the living room and the bedroom, kept her cozy and warm. Quinn pulled a shawl closer about her shoulders and considered what she’d just seen. She’d learned about the Great Plague, of course, and had read the accounts of Samuel Pepys, who was the truest voice of his generation, in Quinn’s opinion. Images of plague-ridden London were familiar to her, but it was different seeing it through the eyes of someone who actually lived through it. Quinn could feel Elise’s fear and see the terror in the eyes of the servants. They’d believed themselves to be safe in Asher Hall, but no one was safe, not when an epidemic was raging just beyond the walls. Inhabitants of the house had to go out to buy supplies, and all it took for everyone to become infected was one person falling ill, as Janet had. Quinn felt a tearing pity at the thought of that frail, motherless girl who had little chance of survival. She was cared for by Lucy, but no amount of care would keep the disease from consuming her in the end. Few recovered.
Of course, in the seventeenth century no one knew how the pestilence actually spread, except that it traveled from person to person. People lived in close quarters with no running water or sanitation. Few washed their hands on a regular basis, and even fewer people bathed. Waste and muck covered the cobblestones, and open drains flowed down streets, the stinking contents splashing passersby as carriages and wagons drove by. Some of the greatest places of congestion were the city gates, where people and vehicles bottlenecked the archways and forced even closer interaction, allowing the disease to spread with greater efficiency. There were nearly seventy thousand deaths reported during the Great Plague, but historians believed that number was at least thirty thousand short of the real toll. Many of those who died hadn’t even been infected but were victims of quarantine, shut up in houses with plague victims for forty days with a guard posted outside to keep them from escaping. What a sad fate for someone who happened to be at the wrong place at the wrong time, Quinn thought with an inward sigh. And what a cruel world that forced people to resort to such extremes.
Perhaps the death toll might have been reduced had Londoners reported cases of plague to the authorities sooner, but fear of being quarantined forced many to keep an illness among them a secret. Quinn could understand Elise’s reluctance to alert the authorities only too well. She was nearly five months pregnant, and being shut up in Asher Hall would be a death sentence for both her and her baby. Quinn wiped away a tear that slid unbidden down her cheek. Elise was long gone, but she seemed so real, so alive. Quinn was torn between the need to find out what happened to her and an equally strong desire not to know. She was so caught up in her thoughts that she nearly jumped out of her skin when there was a knock on the door. Quinn loved her antique door knocker, but at times the loud knocking frightened her, the echo reverberating through the house, bouncing ominously off the stone walls and forcing a shiver of apprehension to run along her spine.
Quinn glanced out the window, hoping for a glimpse of her unexpected visitor. A powerful northern wind moved through the trees, and heavy rain came down in sheets, the thick clouds obscuring the moon and stars, and leaving the world in absolute darkness. Light from the window fell onto a sodden Gabe, and Quinn yanked open the door, a smile of welcome on her face.
“Let me in. It’s a deluge out here,” Gabe grumbled as he hurried inside, bringing a gust of wind and rain with him.
“You do own an umbrella, don’t you?” Quinn asked with a grin as she stepped aside to let him in.
“Yes, but I can never find one when I need it. Any chance of a cup of tea? I’m soaked,” he complained as he walked over to the fireplace, holding his hands out to the heat.
“Gabe, what are you doing here?” Quinn asked as she filled the kettle and took out mugs and some chocolate biscuits. They were a bit stale, but they’d have to do since there was nothing else she could offer him. She’d need to go into the village tomorrow to stock up on some provisions.
“I didn’t like the way we left things the last time we spoke,” he replied without looking at her, his eyes fixated on the fire. Quinn noted the rigid set of his shoulders and the way his feet were splayed, as if to achieve greater balance. Gabe wasn’t sure of his welcome and was bracing himself for rejection.
“You could have called, you know,” Quinn joked. Her heart leaped with joy at the sight of Gabe on her doorstep, but his unexpected arrival also put her on guard. Their relationship had morphed into something completely unexpected over the past few weeks, and she was no longer sure of the rules. The safety buffer of significant others had been removed, leaving them to face whatever it was that had hovered in the air between them for the past eight years.
“I could have, but I wanted to speak to you in person. Would you prefer that I leave?” he asked, watching her intently over his shoulder. He tried to keep his expression neutral, but Quinn could see the tiny flame of fear in his eyes before he extinguished it, shrugging in pretend indifference.
“Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous. Take off your jacket; you’re dripping water on the floor.”
“Sorry,” Gabe muttered as he shrugged off his wet jacket, hung it on a coatrack by the door, then came back and sat down on the sofa, somewhat more at ease.
Quinn handed Gabe a mug of tea, and he took a sip, sighing gratefully. “Much better now.”
Quinn perched on the armrest, keeping a safe distance from Gabe as she sipped her own tea. His intensity unnerved her, and she knew that this visit was going to be very different from the ones before. She wished she could forestall the conversation that was coming, but she supposed it would still take place sooner rather than later, and she wasn’t at all sure how she wanted it to go.
Gabe sipped his tea silently for a few minutes, but his gaze never left Quinn’s face. It’s as if he were searching for clues. Quinn tried to look as nonchalant as possible as she waited for him to begin, but her stomach clenched with anxiety. She wasn’t ready to have this confrontation.
“How was your day with Rhys?” Gabe finally asked. He tried to sound casual, but there was a bitterness in his voice that he was unable to hide.
“It was fine. We found what we were looking for.” Quinn paused, debating whether to tell Gabe the truth. “He knows, Gabe.”
“Knows what?”
“That I see Elise.”
“You told him?” Gabe exclaimed, nearly spilling his tea.
“Yes, I did. I’m not sure why I did it, but it just seemed natural. He wasn’t as surprised as I might have expected. He was fascinated, really.”
“I bet he was,” Gabe growled, his eyes flashing with anger.
“Gabe, what’s your problem with Rhys? I thought you liked him.”
Gabe’s head shot up, his eyes boring into her as if she’d just slapped him. “Are you bloody serious?” he choked out, instinctively leaning forward toward Quinn in agitation. He seemed really rattled. She shouldn’t have asked the question, but it just popped out and now she had to know.
&nbs
p; “Quinn, I like Rhys, but it’s your liking him that I’m concerned about.”
“Why?” Quinn goaded him. “Why does my liking him bother you?”
“Because you are smitten with him, and the feeling seems to be mutual.”
Gabe set down his cup and sprang to his feet, unable to remain immobile any longer. He paced in front of the fireplace for a moment before rounding on Quinn, who was watching him over the rim of her mug. “Quinn, I broke things off with Eve as soon as I heard that you and Luke had split up. I wanted my chance. I’ve loved you since the day you tripped over that boulder and fell into my arms at the dig. I wanted to ask you out right there and then, but I hesitated, afraid that my behavior would appear unprofessional. That moment of hesitation cost me dearly. By the end of the dig, you were with Luke, and the rest, as they say, is history. Quinn, I’m not going to let another chance slip away. I want us to be together, and I’ll be damned if I let Rhys Morgan swoop in and take you away from me.”
“He can’t take me away from you because I’m not yours,” Quinn spat out. “I don’t belong to anyone. Not even to the man I thought I loved for eight years. Did you know, Gabe? Did you know that he left me for someone else?”
Seeing Gabe’s expression told her everything she needed to know, and she felt fury well up inside her. She wanted to hurt Luke, but Luke was gone and Gabe was right there, ready to take the punishment.
“How could you?” she cried. “You call yourself my friend. You say that you care about me, but you stood by and allowed me to be lied to and humiliated, and you said nothing.”
“I didn’t want to be the one to hurt you,” Gabe replied, desperate for understanding. “It wasn’t my place, Quinn, and I thought he’d be man enough to tell you the truth himself.”
“But he wasn’t, and I spent the past few months agonizing over what I’d done wrong and why Luke just walked out on me without so much as a word of explanation. You could have spared me that hurt, but you kept silent and watched me suffer. I had to hear it from Monica Fielding, of all people.”
“Monica told you?” Gabe asked, clearly surprised. He never quite understood the depth of Monica’s animosity toward Quinn, having never been a target of her displeasure himself.
Quinn nodded. She couldn’t recall the conversation with Monica without feeling physically ill. She’d stopped by the institute over the weekend to collect some papers from her office and thought she’d check out The Diary of Samuel Pepys from the institute library. She’d read it before, of course, but thought that it might be helpful in painting a more comprehensive picture of life during the plague for Rhys. Quinn was just coming out of her office when she saw Monica Fielding striding down the corridor, a stack of papers under her arm.
“Quinn,” she exclaimed, her mouth stretching into her customary sneer. They had been friends once, a very long time ago, but professional jealousy got in the way of that, and Monica had never forgiven Quinn for outshining her in archeological circles. Unlike Quinn, Monica was a born gladiator—everything became a fight to the death rather than just friendly competition. Quinn’s recent success was just another nail in the coffin for Monica, who’d failed to publish anything noteworthy in several years.
“Monica,” Quinn countered. “What are you doing here on a Saturday?” Monica was the last person Quinn wanted to talk to at the moment, but it seemed rude to just push past her, so she resigned herself to chatting for a few minutes.
“I have a ton of papers to mark, and I simply can’t concentrate at home. Mark can’t go for five whole minutes without distracting me in some way, pleasant ways though they might be,” she said with a smug smile, reminding Quinn that she was happily married. “Sorry to hear about you and Luke,” Monica went on hurriedly, seeing that Quinn had no desire to continue the conversation. “I do hope you’re all right, darling. Must have been quite a shock after all these years to find yourself single again.”
“I’m fine. Really,” Quinn replied. It seemed nothing stayed private for long.
“And so you should be. It’ll never last between them, you mark my words. He’ll come crawling back,” Monica said, putting on a false show of support, her eyes searching Quinn’s to see if she knew about the affair. “Although she’s a fetching little thing, I’ll give her that, even for an American. Father as rich as Croesus. Owns a string of car dealerships on the East Coast.”
Quinn felt a wave of nausea as Monica’s words sank in. Monica was the proverbial snake in the grass, but she was a historian and had great respect for facts. She wouldn’t stoop to inventing an affair, not even for the momentary satisfaction of wounding Quinn. If she said that Luke left Quinn for another woman, then she knew so for certain, and that meant that everyone else at the institute knew as well.
“You did know, didn’t you?” Monica inquired with a sad smile. “I do hope I haven’t let the cat out of the bag, but Luke had been squiring that little hussy around town for months. He wasn’t exactly what’d you call discreet. I figured someone must have told you by now.” She meant Gabe, and Quinn felt as if she might be actually be sick. Had Gabe known? Quinn couldn’t imagine that Monica wouldn’t have mentioned it to Gabe in passing even if he hadn’t. Monica was delighting in this. Quinn might be better known in academic circles, but her personal life was in shambles, and Monica was thrilled.
“If there’s anything you need, don’t hesitate. Nothing raises the sprits like a night out with friends. Us girls need to stick together,” Monica purred.
“Yes, thank you, Monica. A night out with friends would be just the thing. I’ll call a few and see if they’re available,” Quinn replied and walked away, leaving Monica smiling stupidly.
She’d confide in Monica when hell froze over, and maybe not even then. Quinn strode down the corridor and out the front door, forgetting her plan to stop by the library. She needed to get out of the building and away from Monica, whose eyes bored into Quinn’s back as she walked away. Quinn had pushed the feelings of hurt and betrayal to the back of her mind, unable to cope with the knowledge that Luke had not only left her but had been carrying on behind her back for months. And now all that hurt came pouring out, having found its mark in Gabe.
“I was waiting for the right time,” Gabe exclaimed, his gaze pleading with her as he ran a hand through his hair, making it stand on end.
“And you think this is it?” Quinn cried as unbidden tears spilled down her cheeks.
Quinn sank down on the sofa and picked up a cushion, holding it against her body as if protecting herself from an attack. She wanted to run and hide in a place where she felt safe and knew whom she could trust. She thought she’d trusted Gabe, but he lied to her just as Luke had and was now using her pain to serve his own ends. Quinn’s hurt bubbled over, startling Gabe with the intensity of her anger.
“Get out, Gabe,” she exclaimed. “Just leave. I can’t deal with this right now. You might have loved me all this time, but that didn’t stop you from being with other women. Did you tell them you loved them? Did you make promises to them just as Luke made promises to me? I gave him my love and my trust, and he threw them back in my face. How do I know that you won’t do the same once you’ve tired of me? And then I will lose not only my closest friend but possibly the job I love, because working with you after that might prove impossible,” Quinn cried.
“Is that what you really think of me?” Gabe asked, his voice dangerously low. “You think that once I’ve shagged you I’ll get sick of you and move on? You think you’ll just be another notch on my belt?”
“I don’t know what I think. I thought I loved Luke. I thought he was going to propose to me when I returned from Jerusalem. More the fool me, because he clearly never planned his future around me. I also believed that you were my friend, but you clearly had an agenda of your own all along, and now that Luke’s out of the picture, you expect me to fall into your arms and fulfill whatever fantasy you’ve created of us being together. Don’t you dare put this kind of pressure on me,” Qui
nn exclaimed as she threw aside the cushion and leaped off the sofa, staring down a stunned Gabe. “I don’t owe you my love, and I’m a big girl. I can decide whom I want to be with, and if that happens to be Rhys, who incidentally has shown no interest in me, then it will be Rhys. Now, I’ll say goodnight.”
Gabe opened his mouth to reply, but nothing came out. He looked so stricken that Quinn wished the floor would open up and swallow her whole. She hadn’t meant to hurt him, but she could see that she had wounded him deeply. He’d bared his soul to her, and she threw it on the floor and stomped on it.
“Gabe, I’m sorry,” she muttered.
“It’s fine. I’ll see myself out. Thank you for your honesty, Quinn. I won’t be troubling you again.”
“Gabe!” she cried, but Gabe had already grabbed his jacket off the hook and strode out the door into the rain, slamming the door behind him with soul-crushing finality.
What had she done? She hadn’t wanted to lose him, and now she lost him anyway. He would no longer be her friend, and that realization sliced through her like a knife. Not having Gabe in her life was one of the worst things she could imagine. Quinn grabbed her mobile and dialed Gabe, but he didn’t pick up. She heard his calm, authoritative voice as he asked her to leave a message. She disconnected the call. What she had to say couldn’t be said in a voicemail message. She wanted to speak to him in person, but Gabe needed time to cool down.
Quinn sank back down onto the sofa. She rarely cried, preferring to ignore her feelings of hurt, but hot tears poured down her face as the enormity of what she’d done finally sank in.
Chapter 36
Gabe revved the engine and tore out of the parking spot, eager to put as much distance between himself and Quinn as possible. The rain had let up a bit, for which he was grateful—he was in no mood to drive like an old lady. His Jag had the capability to chew up the miles, and at a time like this, he craved the release of speed. He’d been brutally rejected twice in as many weeks and felt as if he’d been drawn, quartered, and left to die of shock as he watched his entrails burn just before his heart was finally cut out. Gabe chuckled mirthlessly. Even when heartbroken, he thought like a historian, and only Quinn would see the irony in that. But Quinn didn’t want him around.
The Lovers Page 22