Don’t love anyone outside of kin and coven.
She just broke one of her rules with Cynthia. But when the woman leaned forward to ask her question, hazel eyes as mysterious as a dark forest, vanilla and honeysuckle pouring from her like some kind of love spell, Helena lost all sense.
A forbidden memory of the last time she trusted an outsider flashed in her mind.
Helena was running from her home, running from her mother as blood dripped down her arm. Her sweet, gentle mother had become something else. Something terrifying and twisted. Helena stumbled on the uneven dirt path as she pumped her little legs harder. Aunt Rowan’s was a fifteen-minute walk from their cottage in the woods; surely she could run there in five. But when she got there, Aunt Rowan was gone.
‘The village… she must have been called to the village.’
She pulled the water from the air and rushed forward on a wave of power made even more potent by her fear. She nearly crashed into Old Mrs Campbell. Her eyes widened at the sight of a girl running on a river of water that disappeared like mist in a moment. She caught Helena before she could fall.
‘Yer bleedin’, lass. What the devil is wrong?’
In her sheer panic, she told Mrs Campbell everything, and in the telling, destroyed her entire world.
‘You’ve gone pale, Miss Blair. Are you well?’
Helena blinked, dispelling the forbidden memory. She forced a brittle smile, ignoring the concern in Cynthia’s gaze. The last thing she needed was pity from a woman facing the possibility of a hangman’s noose. ‘I’m perfectly fine. It’s you who should be worried. If you’re keeping any secrets, your thoughts will betray you, Lady Burrows.’
Cynthia’s eyebrows winged up. Helena saw the flutter of her pulse beat madly against the delicate skin just under her jaw. Concern was quickly replaced by the flash of challenge in Cynthia’s eyes, more green than brown today. ‘What secrets am I thinking now, Miss Blair?’
Uncle Lachlan shifted, the creaking of his chair reminding Helena that she wasn’t alone with Cynthia. Once again, the entire world had disappeared until it was just the two of them. What dark magic was at play that Helena would forget everything except Cynthia’s soft voice and sharp questions? Questions that Helena could not answer. Because she had no clue what thoughts ran riot in Cynthia’s mind.
Damn her for testing me!
Before she embarrassed herself by admitting the truth, she pivoted to the attack. ‘You never returned the locket. It’s evidence in the case. We’ll need it back.’
‘You never asked me to return it.’ Cynthia slipped her hand in a fold of her skirt, pulling free the damning jewellery. She let it dangle from her fingers, the rubies glinting in the sunlight. ‘I lied to you yesterday.’
Impossible!
Alarm winged through Helena. She always knew when someone lied. Until now. ‘You are admitting that you didn’t tell us the truth?’
‘I’m admitting that I didn’t know the truth, and thus inadvertently misled you.’
‘Miss Burrows, you’ll pardon my bluntness, but what the hell are ye on abou’? Lying to the Superintendent of Scotland Yard hardly bodes well for ye in a murder case.’
‘Not when my lie implicated me in his murder, and the truth will help to set me free.’ Cynthia’s triumphant smile cracked something hard and cold around Helena’s chest.
She pressed the edge of the locket, and it sprang open. Inside were two miniature portraits.
Helena leaned closer. Hamlet, who was curled next to her side, cocked his head in interest.
‘This is not my necklace.’ Cynthia offered the evidence to Helena. ‘At least, not any more.’
Snatching it from her hand, she squinted at the two faces within. ‘That is your husband.’ Helena brushed her thumb over a miniature of Lord Hubert.
‘Yes, but the woman opposite is most certainly not me.’
Superintendent MacDougal stood, strode across the room on powerful legs, and took the necklace from his niece. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘When he gave me that locket, more than ten years ago, my face was opposite his.’
Uncle Lachlan’s dark-brown eyes sharpened. ‘He gave your locket to someone else. Do you recognise this woman?’
Cynthia’s smile faltered. ‘No. I don’t. I suppose it could be any number of his mistresses. I’m no idiot. I know my husband philandered with all manner of women. Perhaps this lady caught his particular fancy. Or mayhap the trinket meant as little to him as I did. It’s hard to say.’
Anger rose in Helena like a rogue wave. How dare he treat his wife with such callous disregard? To take a gift he’d given her in their courtship to a mistress was wilfully cruel. She might not like Cynthia, but no woman deserved to be humiliated by her husband in such a manner.
