Out of Sight

by Rebecca Duval

  Isla opened her eyes and found Ryder’s blue eyes looking down at her in the dark. The last thing she remembered was sitting in front of the fire in the study, with her hands clasped around a steaming mug.

  “Sorry, it’s only me. Ethan didn’t want you to be uncomfortable sleeping in the chair.”

  Isla realised she was being carried up the stairs. “I can walk,” she mumbled.

  “Don’t sweat it. We’re nearly there now.”

  Ryder placed her gently down on Ethan’s bed and dragged the crimson coverlet up over her. “You need anything?”

  “Ethan?” Isla murmured sleepily. “Is he-”

  “He’s fine, Isla. They both are. Talking it out in the study.”

  “Oh.” Isla bit her lip.

  “You should go back to sleep.”

  Isla waited for Ryder to leave before unzipping her torn dress, and throwing it onto the chair beside the window. The sheets beneath her were cold, and the room dark. Isla shivered. There was no way she could go back to sleep now. But she did.

  *

  When Isla opened her eyes again, the pale dawn light was filtering through the leaded windows. She was still alone, tangled in the sheets, now warmed from her body. She rolled over, and her heart leapt into her mouth. In the high-backed wooden chair beside the bed, sat Ethan.

  He was facing the window, but at the sound of her sudden intake of breath, he turned, ripples of grey light passing over his features. His eyes were smudged with purple shadows, his nose cut across the bridge, and a bruise was already blooming across his jaw, like a deep, five o'clock shadow. He’d changed out of his blood-soaked tuxedo, into ripped black jeans, and a black t-shirt. His golden eyes passed over her, as though he couldn’t quite place her.

  Isla shuffled onto her elbows. “Ethan?”

  His roving gaze came to a standstill. “Did I wake you?”

  “I don’t think so. What are you doing?”

  “Thinking.”

  “What time is it? Have you slept?” Isla blinked a few times, trying to adjust to the strange light creeping across the walls, as the winter sun rose over the castle.

  “I dinnae ken. And no. I didnae want to disturb you.” He ran one hand through his hair. It was loose now, falling around his face in tangles.

  “You’re not disturbing me. Come here.” Isla stretched a hand out towards him, her fingertips catching his.

  Ethan moved to the bed but perched on the edge of the mattress as though he might flee at any minute.

  Isla shuffled upright, pushing the pillows up behind her back. Up close she could see the full extent of his injuries. A new map of violence laid over the old. Her chest ached. She traced a finger along Ethan’s jaw, and he closed his eyes.

  “Does it hurt?”

  He shook his head, but his expression contradicted him. He looked like a man in severe pain. He hadn’t even defended himself against his brother’s blows. Why hadn’t he fought back?

  “Why did he do it?” Isla whispered.

  Ethan inhaled. His eyes found hers, and even though Isla knew he couldn’t see her, she held his gaze, waiting for whatever it was he was about to say.

  “He found out about the gun.”

  Isla frowned. “The gun? But, I don’t understand. Why…”

  “He doesnae trust me with it,” Ethan said softly.

  Isla’s head spun. Why would Connor care if Ethan owned a gun? “He doesn’t think, I mean...he’s your brother, surely he must know you’d never-”

  “Never what?” Ethan cocked his head.

  Isla swallowed. “Hurt someone.” The memory of staring down the shotgun barrels, as she lay sprawled at the bottom of the tower staircase sprang into her mind.

  Silence. Ethan turned his head away. Just when Isla though he wasn’t going to answer, he spoke. “It isnae other people he’s worried about.”

  “So, then why- oh my god.” Isla’s hand flew to her mouth as she grasped the true meaning behind Ethan’s words. That’s what Ryder had meant when he’d defended his decision to Ethan in the garden last night.

  ‘I didn’t know what you might do…’ Ryder’s words rang in Isla’s ears. “But...why would he think…” Isla couldn’t finish the sentence, and her question hung in the air between them, unasked, unanswered.

  She wanted him to say that of course it wasn’t true, that the thought had never crossed his mind, that he would never...but then Ethan turned back to face her, and Isla knew instantly from his expression that he couldn’t tell her that, because it would be a lie.

  Her stomach churned horribly, and she tasted bile. Isla had sensed danger at Rosehill from the moment she’d arrived, but she’d assumed she was the one at risk. Not Ethan, and not from himself.

  Isla blinked back tears. “But...why?” she choked out.

  “Briony.”

  It was the first time Ethan had spoken her name, but Isla didn’t think he’d even noticed. She wasn’t sure that he even remembered Isla was in the room. He’d travelled back into his past, and she couldn’t follow, she could only watch as it tore him apart all over again.

  No. Isla scrambled over the bed, and wrapped her arms around his torso from behind, laying her head against his back. It was like trying to comfort a statue, but she refused to let go, to leave him alone in his misery.

  Eventually, he spoke. “When I came out of hospital, I didnae want to live. My parents couldnae understand it. As far as they were concerned, I was lucky to be alive. But Connor knew the truth. I dinnae ken how. But one day he took me for a walk, and he made me promise.”

  “What?” Isla asked.

  Ethan jolted, as though he’d just remembered she was there. “To live,” he said simply. “It was the hardest promise I’ve ever made, and it doesnae seem to get any easier. It’s not the darkness behind my eyes that scares me, Isla, it’s the darkness in my mind. Being blind, I’ve adjusted to. I’m not saying it was easy, but I did it. But waking up every day, knowing that she isn’t and that it’s my fault. How am I supposed to adapt to that?”

  Isla didn’t have an answer. “Is that why you have the gun?” her voice trembled.

  Ethan shook his head. “I found it when I moved in here. I’d never get a licence, but there it was. I should have handed it in, but I’m a blind guy, living alone in a derelict castle. I thought it would be a deterrent if anyone ever broke in...but I cannae honestly say that I havenae thought about using it.” He dropped his head.

  “Oh, Ethan.” Tears burned the backs of Isla’s eyes, but she held them at bay.

  “It’s why-” Ethan began, but broke off.

  “Go on,” Isla whispered.

  Ethan sighed and lifted his head. “It’s why you’re here, Isla. Why I arranged the valuation and clearing of Rosehill. I didnae know how much longer I could bear it, and I didnae want to leave it for my brother to deal with, on top of everything else.”

  She’d been right, all those weeks ago. Ethan MacRae was getting his affairs in order, just not in the way she’d imagined.

  Isla felt like crying, and shouting, and maybe punching Ethan herself, and then probably crying some more. But even in her state of shock and fatigue, and heartache, she knew it wouldn’t help. She didn’t know what would help, but she knew what wouldn’t hurt, and that was a start.

  Isla brought Ethan’s hand to her mouth and brushed her lips across the inky-blue bruises of his knuckles. Ethan inhaled sharply.

  “Come to bed Ethan.”

  Finally, he turned to her, his expression pained. “Isla-”

  “I can’t pretend to understand what you’re going through, but I know that staying awake all night, going over, and over things in your head, won’t help anyone.”

  “But...after everything I’ve told you, everything that’s happened tonight…” Ethan shook his head, clearly bewildered.

  Realisation dawned on Isla. “You thought I’d feel differently about you?”

  “Aye,” Ethan’s voice cracked.

  “Then Connor mu
st have hit you harder than I thought.” She tugged at his hands gently, and Ethan let her pull him towards her.

  “But-”

  Isla pressed a finger to his lips. Her mind was a swirling vortex of unasked questions, and unknown answers, her heart felt bruised, and unshed tears pricked at the backs of her eyes, but she wouldn’t let them fall now. She lay down beside Ethan, tucking her head against his chest. His heart thudded beneath her cheek.

  “I’m not going anywhere, Ethan,” she murmured against the soft fabric of his t-shirt. “If you’re waiting for me to run, you can stop.”

  Ethan’s body sagged beneath her, as the tension flooded from him, and his arms came around her, as though he’d been holding back, but couldn’t anymore.

  “Now, sleep,” she commanded, closing her own eyes against the morning sun.

  *

  Ethan didn’t sleep. He lay awake, holding Isla in his arms, as his mind replayed every detail of the ball, and their dance, and the fight, over and over.

  The heat, the chatter, the music, Isla’s body against his, the fight with his parents, an echo of every other conversation they’d had in the last five years, his lungs burning as he gasped for breath, the scent of roses on Isla’s lips, then the crack of Connor’s fist against his nose, and the trickle of blood down his throat…

  Isla stirred in his arms, and he held her tighter. She was still here. Despite it all.

  ‘I’m not going anywhere.’ Her words echoed in Ethan’s mind, and it was an exquisite kind of agony, to know both that she meant them sincerely, but that they were built on lies. Even now, as she slept soundly against his chest, she knew only half-truths, and he’d barely been able to bring himself to tell her those. Still, she hadn’t recoiled from him in disgust, or fled into the night...but she would if she ever found out.

  Ethan listened to the gentle inhale and exhale of Isla’s breath, and tried to match it with his own. She would find out. If living in Rosehill had taught him anything, it was that it was only a matter of time before secrets surfaced.

  Ethan pressed his nose against Isla’s hair, breathing in the scent of her, and squeezed his eyes shut, pretending that this could last, that the swirling darkness he lived in was temporary, and not the consequence of the last time he’d let someone into his heart.

  Thirty Seven

  Isla was alone when she woke up. The light in Ethan’s room was a strange silver-grey, and she had no idea how long she’d slept, or what time it was. The sheet beside her was already cold. Had Ethan slept at all? Or had he only waited for her to fall asleep, before creeping away?

  Isla felt a flutter of anxiety at the thought of him alone in the empty castle with his thoughts after the events of last night. She swung her legs out of the bed, just as the bedroom door creaked open.

  Ethan stood in the doorway, in his long coat, and dirty boots. His cheeks were pink, and his hair damp. His face a portrait of violence. In one hand he held his cane, and in the other, a single red rose.

  Isla got to her feet, and Ethan turned towards her.

  “Is that for me?”

  “Aye.” He held the rose out. As Isla took it an image sprang into her mind, of decaying roses at the foot of a tree, and at that moment she knew: Ethan had put them there, for Briony. But not this one. Isla turned it over in her hand, feeling the thorns scratch against her palm.

  “I cannae promise you anything, Isla.”

  She looked up into his scarred, injured face. “I haven’t asked you to.”

  Ethan leant his cane against the wall and kicked the door closed with the heel of his boot. Then he was lifting her, his cold hands raising goosebumps across her bare skin, as he carried her towards the bed.

  Isla fell back against the mattress, and Ethan lowered himself on top of her, his damp hair brushing her skin as he rained kisses over her body. If this was all that Ethan had to offer, she would take it, promises or no promises.

  *

  The ballroom looked like a crime scene in the light of day, and Connor, skulking between the tables littered with empty glasses, and discarded napkins, looked like a criminal. His shoulders hunched, and his expression guilty. He brushed a deflated balloon out of his way and caught sight of Isla hovering in the doorway. The expression of guilt deepened.

  “Isla. I didnae see you there.”

  Connor somehow looked both far younger, and much older than he had last night. Unlike Isla, he wasn’t wearing his outfit from last night, but a t-shirt and jeans, that she guessed he’d borrowed from Ethan. The clothing knocked a few years off his age, but his expression added a decade on. He looked like someone carrying the weight of the world on his shoulders.

  “Need any help?” Isla asked, side-stepping a sticky puddle on the floor, that she hoped was champagne.

  He looked surprised at her offer. “No. Thank you for asking, but the event staff will be here soon, to clear it all away. I just wanted to-” he cut off abruptly, shaking his head. “I’m sorry, Isla. I cannae stand here, and make small talk after last night. I’m sure you must think I’m a monster, and you’re right. But you have to know, I love my brother, and-”

  “Ethan told me,” Isla cut him off.

  Connor’s eyebrows shot up. “He...told you what our fight was about?”

  “It’s only a fight if the other person retaliates,” Isla said pointedly.

  Connor winced. “So, then...you know?”

  Isla nodded, and Connor let out a long, slow breath. “Everything?” His green eyes met hers.

  “I know about Briony if that’s what you mean.”

  Connor looked at her for a long minute, as though he was trying to decide something, then he turned away. Isla followed his gaze out through the terrace doors. The unlit lanterns lining the terrace wall glinted beneath the silver sky. In the distance, tree branches stretched, and swayed at the whim of the wind, rushing across the grounds.

  “Ethan thought he lost everything that night. I hoped that in time, I could help him see that he hadn’t. I shouldna’ve done what I did last night. But the thought of losing him-” Connor’s voice cracked.

  They went on staring out at the terrace.

  Connor spoke, his voice level again. “None of us knew about him and Briony...not until afterwards, anyway.”

  How was that possible, when Ethan said they’d been in love? Isla frowned and turned to him. “But how…”

  “Afternoon.”

  Isla jumped at the sound of Ethan’s voice, and Connor spun round, his face falling at the sight of his brother’s injuries. Ethan’s bruises looked worse in the morning light, his eyes partially swollen beneath his scars.

  “Jesus,” Connor moaned. “Ma is going to kill me.”

  “Not if I do it first.” Ethan navigated his way across the ballroom with his cane, and Connor looked visibly nervous.

  “Ethan, I-”

  “Dinnae fash,” Ethan said gruffly. “I wasnae going to win any beauty contests even before you saw fit to rearrange my face. But I’m sending you the dry-cleaning bill.”

  Was that a joke?

  Connor looked as stunned as Isla felt. “Aye...right..”

  “Why are you still hanging about here, anyway? Nothing better to do?”

  Connor blinked a few times. “Actually, I do. I’m making an unannounced site visit in Portobello this afternoon. We’ve been having a bit of trouble with the project out there.”

  “Someone was talking about that last night,” Isla blurted. Both brothers turned to her. “I wasn’t eavesdropping or anything, I just overheard.”

  “I dinnae care if you were,” Connor said. “What did you hear?”

  “Well, they said MacRae and Sons is in trouble,” she said quietly, avoiding Connor’s eyes. “Or at least, that it would be if the project fell through.”

  “Is that true?” Ethan’s voice was low. He tilted his head towards Connor.

  “It willnae fall through,” Connor said.

  Ethan raised one scarred eyebrow. “It is, then.�
��

  “It’s under control,” Connor said, but Isla could see the worry in his expression.

  “Do you want me to come with you?” Ethan asked.

  Connor’s jaw slackened, and both he, and Isla, gaped at Ethan. “I cannae ask you to do that.”

  “Good thing I offered then,” Ethan said.

  “Are you serious?” Connor looked at Isla as though it were a joke, and she was in on it. She gave a small half-shrug to show she was as surprised as he was at the idea.

  “Aye. I dinnae exactly love the idea, don’t get me wrong, but it sounds like you need the help.”

  “I do,” Connor said quietly. “Thank you, brother.”

  “I should be getting home.” Isla started to move away, but Ethan caught her by the wrist. For a split second Isla flashed back to the night before, in the cloakroom, when that other hand, in its cold, leather glove had grabbed her, but then it was gone. This was Ethan. For a moment Isla thought he might kiss her, right there in front of his brother, but he only ran his thumb across the back of her hand.

  “Drive safe.”

  At the door, Isla glanced back over her shoulder, but already the brothers were deep in conversation, silhouetted against the terrace doors, among the debris of the night before.

  *

  Parsons & Co never opened on a Sunday, so Isla was surprised to find Tim in the backroom, papers spread across the desk in front of him.

  To be fair, Tim looked as surprised as she was when she stepped through the door. She could see him taking in her appearance- her torn gown, and wild hair, the shadows beneath her eyes. He pressed his mouth into a thin line of disapproval. “Good night?”

  “Yes,” Isla lied. She set her bag down on the table.

  Tim grunted and turned back to his paperwork.

  “What are you doing here, anyway?”

  “Accounts,” he muttered without looking up.

  Isla frowned. “On a Sunday?”

  “Well with only two of us working the shop these past few weeks, I haven’t had time.” He still didn’t look up, and Isla knew he was trying to make her feel guilty, and irritatingly, he was succeeding.

  “Tim, I’m sorry that things have been so hectic without me, but you know if it was the other way round, and you were out on a job, it would be left to me.”