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His temples throbbed as he lifted the decanter. His hands shook as he poured, whiskey sloshing over his fingers. He sucked it off, the bite of the alcohol lying sharp on his tongue. Falling into a chair, he clutched the glass before him, rolling the smoky gold whiskey around and around. Unable to drink, though he shivered uncontrollably, his gut in knots.
His body craved a different temptation. A tall, voluptuous figure filling a gown to distracting perfection. A wild riot of red hair meant for a man to run his fingers through. And dark, velvety eyes hinting at secrets a man would want to tease from a pair of full, pouty lips.
He shook his head, cursing his folly. He’d spoken the vows, signed the license, but his marriage with Elisabeth was as much a sham as ever. And now that she knew his criminal past, there was less than a blizzard’s chance in the Sahara for the two of them. And that was a good thing. He’d only cause her grief. He excelled at hurting those closest to him.
But had he confessed his guilt in order to frighten her away, or had it been more a desperate bid to test the strength of her faith?
A question he couldn’t answer that only showed him how pathetic he’d become since returning to Ireland. The only thing he knew for certain: Lissa Fitzgerald couldn’t be trusted to do what any normal, sane, levelheaded female would do—run like hell. No, she analyzed, scrutinized, rearranged him into the hero of her wild imaginings.
He rose to toss the whiskey on the smoldering parlor fire, flames leaping high and bright in the grate, then dying back.
Shadows banished for the blink of an eye before crowding closer and thicker than ever.
seventeen
“Killer, where are you, you naughty animal?”
Elisabeth peeked in and out of rooms in her search for the dog. If she didn’t find him before Helena did, he’d be mincemeat. “I know you’re hiding somewhere. I saw that gnawed table leg in the drawing room. How could you?”
No sign of him yet, and she’d hunted through every room from the ground floor up. Only the attics left to explore. The temperature dropped as she climbed the stairs, a whisper of a breeze scented with a woody sweet tang like cedar or patchouli lifting her shawl about her shoulders. “Killer?”
She’d expected the barren mustiness of a servant’s garret. Instead, she stood in a long, slope-ceilinged chamber. North-facing windows along the back tossed clear afternoon sun in great puddles over a floor strewn with carpets and rugs like an Oriental bazaar. Furniture cluttered the far end of the room. Sofas and chairs, long buffet tables and delicate side tables—even a bed—stood crammed into a corner beneath the eaves, all as if someone’s entire house had been packed into a few square feet.
The rest of the space resembled an apothecary’s shop. Books stacked upon a desk. Others crammed willy-nilly into a tall case. Rows of tiny drawers lined one wall, neatly labeled, the contents alphabetized. Shelves containing jars of dried herbs, aromatic oils, spices, and scents. She picked one up, half expecting eye of newt or tongue of dog. Perhaps even a good dose or two of dragon venom.
Whale oil. Smelly, but hardly the stuff of witchcraft.
Replacing it upon the rack, she sighed.
It would take her hours to search the attic for one misbehaving mutt.
“Killer,” she hissed. “Come out this instant.”
She checked under tables and behind boxes. Even opened a wardrobe’s doors, finding an abandoned mouse’s nest and a few hungry moths, but nothing else. Rising from an investigation of the space beneath the bed, she felt the back of her neck prickle. A queer trill of nerves up her spine as if she were being watched.
Spinning around, she froze. No one was there. The chamber remained empty. Yet the feeling persisted. A strange watching presence lifted the hairs on her arms, prickling the back of her neck. She was picking her way back toward the stairwell when she caught movement from the corner of her eye. A flicker of gold. A drift of gray. She paused, and the movement stopped. She started, and it began again.
There behind that highboy. She laughed, her voice sounding shrill in the quiet room. Of course. A mirror.
The cheval glass stood apart from the rest of the furniture. A piece of cloth draped across its speckled surface. An old mirror, then, the silver backing coming away in spots. Woodland animals twined with flowers and leaves around the frame. Perfectly rendered in the dark, polished cherry.
Unable to help herself, she caressed each carved detail, drinking in the blunt, suspicious features of a badger, the long twitching nose of a fox, a kestrel’s wing outstretched as if it might catch the next updraft. Skimmed her fingers lightly over the curved petals and wide leaves of a king cup, the delicate grace of a wood anemone, a fern’s intricate fronds.
Her hand barely touched the glass when the mirror’s surface clouded, the light within dimming to obsidian, but for a slash of silver lightning.
She shouldn’t look. This was Other magic. Trouble in every sense of the word. Hadn’t it been proven to her over and over? But even as the thought burst in her, she pulled aside the cloth, letting it slither to the floor in a pile. The boil of storm-cloud black rippled over the mirror, the lightning charge off its surface prickling her skin.
“Elisabeth?”
A voice startled her heart into her throat.
Madame Arana stood wiping her hands upon a towel at the far end of the room, a door behind her open on some kind of storeroom or office. She wore a long snowy apron and a mobcap to cover her wispy white hair. “I thought I heard someone wandering about up here.”
Elisabeth fought to keep the giddiness from her voice. “I apologize, but Killer . . .”
The dog trotted around Madame Arana’s skirts to sit at her feet, his pink tongue hanging from the side of his mouth, wearing a wide doggie smile.
“He’s been keeping me company while I work.” She threw a critical gaze around the clutter. “You must excuse my lack of order. When I moved my household, I could not bear to part with my things. So many memories, you see. Some pieces I brought all the way from my homeland in Provence when I fled the troubles. Helena, she lets me store them for when I am homesick for the old days.” Her smile vanished, her mouth folding into a deep frown, her eyes scalpel-sharp. “But you don’t want to hear an old woman’s stories. You worry over young Douglas.” She laid aside the towel. “Has he yet to return, then?”
