“I want to know why.”
Serena lowered her eyes and swallowed. “I’m in love with another man, Marc.”
“Who?” the demand was belligerent.
“Justin O’Neill.”
“O’Neill!” Marc shouted incredulously. “I don’t believe you! You barely know the man—”
“I do know him,” Serena interrupted very quietly.
Suddenly Marc was kneeling before her, his eyes dark and earnest. “You may think you know him, honey, but you don’t. It’s impossible! Look, Serena, I can see where he interests you—he’s like Einstein and Tarzan all rolled into one. But you can’t trust a man like that, Serena. He probably has a girl in every state. He’s probably been saying all kinds of things to you, Serena, but mark my words, honey, he’s a man with one object in mind. You’re a beautiful woman, Serena, and you’re mature enough to know it. What he wants to do is get you in bed.”
“Oh, Marc,” Serena wailed, gritting her teeth with the frustration of making him understand. “I’ve already been in bed with him.”
“What?”
He turned red with fury, and then white. And then his anger spewed from him. “You little bitch! You keep me at a ten-foot distance with your lily-white morality and then you hop into the sack with Mr. Virility without a qualm! O’Neill looked like a better time, eh?”
“No, Marc, you don’t understand—”
“You’re damned right, I don’t understand, you …”
He proceeded to label her a number of names, each less complimentary than the other. For a second Serena sat white-faced, shrinking back from the abuse which she felt part her due. Then she could take no more.
“Marc—”
“Where, Serena, where?” At her refusal to answer, the anger in his features drew into a snarl. “While I was running around trusting you and believing you belonged on a pedestal, you were kissing me good-bye and jumping into his bed in your own room! A room you kept me out of. …”
He kept going. Serena had expected the reaction from him; she knew how hurt he was. But she hadn’t expected his words to wound her as they were doing. Her headache compounded as he spoke. Each of the crude epithets he labeled upon her seemed in essence to be true. She had wanted to speak with him so rationally, to try to make Marc understand without bursting into tears which would appear ludicrous, but suddenly the tears were just streaming down her face. Guilt tore away at her. Justin … Marc … the diary. It was suddenly all too much. …
She stood, placing a hand before her as if she could ward off the lash of Marc’s tongue.
“Stop it, Marc, please … stop it. …”
To her surprise, he went silent, staring at her.
“Serena?” She was chalk-white. He took a step toward her.
Inadvertently, Serena took a step backwards. Her foot hit the rock and she lost her balance and then stumbled against it, slamming the side of her face against it. Physical pain overrode that in her heart.
“Serena!” Marc was kneeling beside her, taking her into his arms, studying her face. “Oh, Jesus. Oh, Serena … I’m sorry … I’m so sorry … I didn’t mean what I said, oh my God, look what you’ve done. …”
Her head was reeling, but she heard the tears in his voice. “It’s … I’m okay, Marc.” His concern suddenly hurt more than anything.
“You’re not okay. …”
Well, she wasn’t okay; the entire side of her head throbbed, and she could taste blood in her mouth, but what could she say to a spurned suitor who was crying beside her?
“It was all my fault—”
“It wasn’t your fault!”
“We’ve got to get back to the house, honey—sorry, Serena. Your cheek is swelling terribly, and my God, I think you’re going to have a black eye. We’ve got to get some ice. Maybe I should take you to the hospital. Oh, God, am I sorry. It’s just that I was jealous of O’Neill from the first time I saw him, I guess. … I didn’t mean to upset you, oh, God, you’re hurt and it’s my fault. …”
Marc kept trailing on, helping her to her feet, but suddenly she was struck with a fear more terrible than the haunting terror that had struck her last night.
O’Neill. Justin … he was due back any time. Dear God, when Justin saw her face, he would be ready to commit murder. He knew she planned on talking to Marc, and would never believe that what had happened had been an accident. And pitting Justin against Marc, it would be murder.
“Marc!” She exclaimed suddenly. “Please—do me a big favor. Just leave. I’ll get some ice, I’ll take care of myself, I promise.”
Marc looked at her knowingly. “Serena, you’re afraid that O’Neill is going to show up and think something worse happened. I’m not leaving. Not when you need help. I’ll talk to him. I’m not a coward, Serena.”
“Oh, Marc, I know that, but please! Marc, I want to let the entire thing become an incident that never happened. I’ll—I’ll drive out to the Cape for a day and see Tom. I want to see Tom, really, everything has been such a mess. … Oh, Marc, please, I very much want us to stay friends—I know what I’m doing, really.”
“Oh, Serena, don’t be so nice to me after the terrible things I said. This was my fault,” he protested miserably.
“It wasn’t your fault! I tripped. And God, Marc, I understand what you said … how you feel … the whole thing has been … unbelievable. But, please, Marc, forgive me, and let us all be friends. You’re writing a book. You have to finish that book. We all have to be able to stay friends!”
“I can’t run out when you’re hurt—”
“Marc, please! Do it for me. I—I don’t want to see Justin. I feel too terrible about everything. I want to see Tom. I’ll be fine. Please, go!”
He stared at her with abject misery lacing his eyes, then leaned to gently touch her swollen cheek with his lips. “I’m going, Serena,” he said quietly. Then he turned away from the alcove. Serena listened as his footsteps crunched through the trees.
Then she breathed a long sigh of relief and waited to hear his car start up. She was desperately longing for an aspirin. Between her self-induced hangover and the ringing in her head, she was beginning to wonder if she wouldn’t rather be shot than anything else.
Finally she moved from the rock and slipped quietly across the lawn and into the house. Without realizing it, she studiously avoided the portrait of Eleanora as she silently trod her way up the stairs and into her own room, locking her door behind her. She gazed into the mirror above the dresser and drew back at what she saw.
The entire left side of her face appeared larger than the right. Dried blood drew a macabre line down her chin. As Marc had noted, the area around her eye was turning an ugly blue.
“Damn,” she moaned, “how on earth did I manage that?”
She walked into the bathroom and took two aspirin and tried to bathe her face with a washcloth. Nothing was going to help. She would be lucky if the swelling went down by the morning. But at least by then she could think of some kind of excuse.
And she knew she had to have an excuse. There would be no way that Justin would believe what had really happened. She was so afraid he would act first and listen later, and the thought of Justin retaliating was more than chilling.
She was going to have to go to Tom’s and stay a few days.
Susan would be ready to kill her, but Sue would just have to handle Monday and Tuesday by herself. “I’ll be back by Wednesday morning, Sue, I promise!” she whispered, turning from her reflection. Back in her bedroom she threw a few things into an overnight bag. She hoped Tom hadn’t planned a romantic weekend, because she was going to have to ruin it. It would be good for her to see her brother anyway. She could tell him all about Justin and see if he thought she had gone insane. And she could tell him about the diary, and he would make her laugh at the coincidences in life.
Justin was going to be furious to find her gone, but then he had stayed away a night, so he might as well learn it would be an equal partnership. He
might want to strangle her, but it would be far better than his wanting to strangle Marc.
Serena opened the door to her room to shout her plans down to Martha, then ducked back into the room in panic as she heard Justin’s voice. Dear God, he was back ahead of schedule.
Serena leaned against her closed door and drew the bolt. Damn! Her gaze flew across the room to the panel, and she gripped her purse and bag and impulsively stuffed the diary and papers into the bag. Then she hit the panel with an experienced hand.
But she was carrying too much. In her attempt to reclose the panel, she jammed it. “Damn!” she muttered, throwing her weight against it. It slid into place, but she heard something snap. “How on earth did I ever let things become such a mess!” she moaned. She had forgotten a flashlight, and with the panel closed, she couldn’t see a thing. “I’m going to have lights put in first thing I get back,” she muttered, slipping her purse and bag over her shoulder so that she could feel the walls. She knew the steps well, so going down was not a tremendous difficulty.
Except that when she got to the bottom, the lower panel refused to give. Frowning, she set her paraphernalia down at her feet. Very carefully she ran her hands over the boards.
Something simply wasn’t giving.
She was more puzzled than frightened at first; the staircase had been used by the family through the entire four centuries during which the house had stood. The original Hawk had built a sturdy home; Serena had repaired the roof, and plastered and painted, but the Golden Hawk had never needed much else. It was unthinkable to her that the panel shouldn’t slide quietly as always.
Minutes later she was sweating profusely; the hands that stupidly continued to run over the boards were clammy. This is ridiculous, she thought. In a second it will give, I will be standing in the secret entry, and then I will be outside in the breeze.
But the panel didn’t give.
A creeping chill of fear raced up Serena’s spine, but she ignored it. She would just go back up to her bedroom.
But the memory of the snap she had heard stayed with her as she groped her way back up. And even as she touched the upper level paneling, she knew it wasn’t going to give.
She sank down to the top step, feeling the darkness seem to sink into her. Don’t panic, Serena, don’t panic.
Be deliberate. Careful. Study the situation.
She turned and began pounding on the boards, until she tired herself into control.
“That,” she mocked her sore hands aloud, “was not calm and deliberate. …”
Because I’m not calm.
I am calm. I am calm. Whispering the words, she tried the paneling again. And again. And again. And then walked down the steps to the first-level panel. And she tried there, again and again.
And then pitched her head back and screamed.
“Help! Oh, please help! Help! Help! Help!” She kept screaming until her voice went hoarse. Surely someone would realize soon that she wasn’t around. They would start looking for her.
She leaned her head against the wood and slid to the floor. Wait, and then start screaming again.
But she wouldn’t be heard. The insulation in the old house was as sturdy as its base. Eleanora must have screamed and screamed and screamed.
“Oh, my God!” Serena wailed. She leapt to her feet again and pounded against the boards and screamed at the same time.
This was it. Right here. This was where John Hawk had locked his adulterous young wife to die. Almost four hundred years ago another woman’s screams had rent the air.
“No!” Serena shrieked, throwing her weight against the panel again. “Noooo!!!” Something seemed to snap within her just as surely as the paneling had done.
“I am not Eleanora Hawk, and I am not going to die in this stupid staircase! I am Serena, Serena Loren!”
But a voice seemed to mock her back. You are a Hawk; you were born a Hawk.
He came to me today.
As the darkness crouched around her and her screams died to leave only still, stagnant silence, she buried her face in her hands. “Oh, God.” It felt as if the dark staircase embraced her tighter and tighter, as if the staircase had become a living malevolent force itself.
Eleanora had died here.
And now she was going to die again, perhaps so that her spirit could fly free.
“I’m not going to die,” Serena whimpered aloud. “They will find me.”
But as she sat there, the similarities became all too clear. The darkness preyed upon her mind.
He came to me today. He is built more sturdy than any ship. I went to the pond. … his eyes touch upon me like fire. … I could not deny him. … He has come to the Golden Hawk. …
The words repeated themselves over and over, louder and louder, until she clapped her hands to her ears, certain that she could hear the bitter shrieking laughter of Eleanora Hawk.
Serena slammed her weight against the paneling one more time. “Let me out! Let me out! Let me out! For God’s sake, let me out!” Her screams became whimpers, her whimpers, sobs. And then the staircase was silent as she fell to the floor in a dead faint.
Things had gone badly since he left. The trip to Boston had been to track down papers belonging to Increase and Cotton Mather through a Professor Boswick. Boswick had cordially met him at the Prudential Building, only to shake his head and tell him the references he sought were in New York City, catalogued to a small, government library. He had said his thank-yous and good-byes to the nice old professor and sat debating his next move. He needed the references, but he longed to be with Serena.
Serena had to talk to Marc.
And it was going to be a painful experience; she might be just as happy not to see him that night.
And then, while he had been deliberating between logic and libido, Denise had made an appearance.
He had tried to be polite, but when graciousness failed, he had been brutally honest—deciding then and there that Serena would be having her own problems.
He escaped Denise quickly and called the Golden Hawk and headed back for New York. Through all his work, through the long, long night, he had realized more and more how deeply he loved her. He had known she was beautiful, he had known she compelled and enticed him as no other woman, but last night he had learned that they were irrevocably bound and she had become completely his. His streak of possessiveness was astounding, but it didn’t matter because he was, in turn, possessed.
I love you, Serena, he thought as he lay alone, dreaming. I wonder if you can ever realize how deeply I love you.
In the middle of the night he got up and called his daughter. His ex-wife was less than thrilled with the phone call, but at his insistence, she had awakened their daughter.
“Jenny, I’m going to get married.”
“Are you okay, Dad?” Jenny had asked softly. “I mean, you’re not drunk or anything?”
“I resent that, young lady! No, I am not drunk. I have simply met the most wonderful … witch! I want you to come to the wedding.”
“Dad! You’re serious!”
“Of course I am.”
“When?”
Justin thought for a minute. Then he smiled slowly. He hadn’t exactly discussed any of it with Serena yet. “Next Saturday. Think you can make it?”
Jennifer laughed delightedly. “I can’t believe it, Dad! I didn’t believe anyone would ever snare you again! But of course. I wouldn’t miss your wedding for the world. I’ll call the airlines and arrange a flight first thing in the morning. Mom won’t mind. She’s going on some kind of a cruise.”
He gave Jenny the number to the Golden Hawk. “Arrange your flight into Boston. I’ll pick you up there.”
And this morning, he had driven back like the wind. And now he felt wonderful—he would see her.
No one was in the hallway. He was so glad to be back that he smiled a greeting to Eleanora before calling a loud “Hello!”
Martha hurried in from the kitchen, drying her hands on a dish towel
. “Dr. O’Neill! How was your trip?”
“Just fine, Martha, thanks. Where’s Serena?” Justin wondered if he sounded as anxious as he felt.
“Oh, she must be out with Marc somewhere. That girl! Wouldn’t eat a thing for breakfast. Just asked him to go for a walk with her. Then the car drives off, and she didn’t say a thing to me.” Martha frowned for a minute. “That’s not like Serena,” she added quietly. “Not like her at all. She’s so responsible about letting me know what she’s doing. But then she did look terribly drawn this morning.”
“How long has she been gone?”
“Oh, not fifteen minutes.”
Justin clenched his teeth against pent-up frustration. Maybe she hadn’t seen Talbot last night—maybe this was the first chance she’d had to talk to him.
Maybe she had decided she wasn’t in love. Maybe she was going to discover that she did care for Marc Talbot, the man she had known so much longer.
No! His nails dug into his callused palms. She was his, she was settling their future, and he was just going to have to wait.
“Won’t you have some breakfast, Dr. O’Neill?”
“No, thanks, Martha.”
He bolted up the stairs and reappeared a few minutes later in tank top, sneakers, and shorts.
If he had to wait, he was going to run. Work off some of the nervous tension gripping him.
Martha met him in the hall again. “I’ll break the time rules and have some nice hot cakes when you get back.” Martha’s statement was really a query. “Maybe Serena will be back by then. It’s not like her …”
“Sounds fine, Martha,” Justin agreed, giving her a smile.
He stretched on the porch, then started running down the path. He kept his pace fast, and he kept running.
Every footstep was a heartbeat. Come back, Serena, I need you, I can’t stand the waiting, I love you. I believe in us. I want to marry you. I believe in … magic.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
HE RAN SIX MILES, bathed, and ate Martha’s breakfast, and started getting really nervous. Where the hell was she? How could she be gone so long?
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