Whispers at Midnight (42 page)

“So it was jealousy and greed which cost
their lives?”

“So it seems. But before John Mott left his
son he instilled the same degree of hatred and vengeance in him.
For years John apparently hired people to spy on the couple and
send him reports. John never returned and in time Cecil concluded
he was dead, probably at Jubal’s hand. Cecil knew his father had
not gotten away with the ruby or the gold or he would have come
back. He spent years finding a way to have Wicklow. He knew Mother
had left the house to you and believed it would be easy to convince
you to sell. I am not certain now he had no hand in Mother’s and
Sarah’s death. He had proposed to Mother once and been refused. He
might have been in England at the time they died.”

Amanda shivered. “And then I thwarted his
plan.”

“Yes. So he tried to frighten you away. And
then, when he was no closer to getting what he wanted and it
appeared I would have a claim to Wicklow as well, he became
desperate—no, mad. There is truly no explanation but that he was
mad, just as John Mott must have been.”

“It is horrible what John Mott did to Evelyn
and Jubal. They were deeply in love.”

“And horrible what Cecil would have done to
you.” He paused. “You would be proud of Gardner,” he added. “He
broke into Cecil Baldwin’s office and uncovered the documents that
proved his guilt. It seems John Mott kept a journal and had a set
of plans to Wicklow. He left both with his son. They must have
fanned Cecil’s hatred all these years.”

Amanda dropped her eyes in shame. “I blamed
Gardner. He was so nervous and strange that last night here. I was
convinced he was guilty.”

Ryne laughed. “He was nervous. He had just
learned he was to be a father. He and Ariel are to be wed. You can
be glad you did not accept his proposal, my sweet. And don’t
forget, I warned you my brother was no more a gentleman than I. And
remember too that you blamed me before him. You thought me the
devil’s agent.”

She laughed. “I am not sure I was
wrong.”

“Careful, sweet,” he warned. “I may want to
prove you right.”

Amanda blushed even though they were
speaking below Gussie’s level of hearing. She quickly switched to
another topic.

“Why did Emma run and where is Trudy?” she
asked.

He smiled. “You must have guessed they were
working with Cecil. I had suspected them for some time. I think we
will find they were responsible for the disappearance of the
jewelry and many of the frightening things that happened to you.
The blood, putting the pillow over your face, attacking you in
Evelyn’s sitting room—there is a secret passage from there.” He
shook his head. “Cecil killed Ezra. He heard the parrot repeat
something he had said to Emma and feared the bird would give him
away. He was in the hall before you came and stepped out to knock
as if he were just arriving.”

“It is too horrible,” Amanda said sadly.

“Yes. And today Emma wanted to warn Cecil
that I knew about him. She let me ride away and then drugged you.
He was nearby, I believe.”

“In the graveyard,” she said quickly. “I saw
a man there digging.”

Ryne sighed. “I suppose he couldn’t wait
until things were quieted down to start searching for the ruby. We
caught him on the road. I have had a long talk with him while you
slept. The old fool.”

“But Trudy . . .” She frowned. “I suppose
you are going to tell me you courted Trudy because you were
suspicious of her.”

Ryne laughed heartily. “You do not doubt
that, do you, love? She did let slip, in fact, that she expected to
come into a fortune soon. I believe she hoped it would make her
more attractive to me.”

“She was such an innocent,” Amanda said
sadly. “She must have become frightened and run away when Emma
drugged me.”

Ryne scowled. “Trudy, my dear, donned a wig
and your riding habit and had Emma order your horse saddled after
you were locked away. Groom watched her ride off, thinking it was
you. Cecil would have claimed you had decided to go back to London
and leave Wicklow in his care. Eventually I suppose he would have
claimed to have bought the house from you.”

“Then it was Trudy who impersonated me in
Williamsburg and claimed the emeralds.” A melancholy frown furrowed
her brow. “I wonder if we will ever recover them.”

“There was no sign of them in Cecil’s house.
I think he must have sold them right away. He’d have done it for
spite. He had been taking valuables from Wicklow, the chess set
among them, and selling them since my mother died. But when I came
to stay after my lodge burned, he had to stop. He could have waited
a little while until I left, but when you came to stay his scheme
was ruined.” He took Amanda’s hand and held it gently. “I think at
first he only meant to frighten you into selling. But when Emma
learned you and I were to be wed, she decided something had to be
done immediately.”

“She acted quickly, to be sure. She must
have been listening when you proposed. She had it all planned when
I came in.” Amanda shook her head woodenly. “How wicked she
was.”

“And when I came back she told me you were
gone. Gave me a note from you saying it was all a mistake, that you
were going back to London.”

“You didn’t believe it,” she whispered,
bringing his hand to her lips and kissing it softly.

“I had talked to Gardner and the story he
told was not the same as you related to me. Besides that, I knew
you loved me.”

“I do, Ryne. I do. With all the love that is
in me.”

Later they would learn Trudy had returned to
Williamsburg and confessed her part in the crime. She could not,
she said, live with the thought of Amanda imprisoned in that dark
dungeon and she did not believe Cecil Baldwin’s promise that Amanda
would be let go once she had signed the deed to Wicklow over to
him. All three had been jailed in Williamsburg and would be held
there until their case came to trial. A long imprisonment
afterwards was a certainty.

The greatest shock, perhaps, would be
learning that Trudy was Cecil’s illegitimate daughter and had been
forced into her part in the scheme by the threatened loss of her
livelihood.

From his father’s records Cecil knew of the
secret rooms in the cellars at Wicklow and of a tunnel from the
river, one Amanda and Ryne had explored.

“I believe John Mott must have locked Evelyn
Wicklow in the cellar after he shot Jubal. He meant to come back
for her or he would not have left the ruby,” Amanda suggested to
Ryne.

He nodded. “You are likely right. Cecil
found his father’s bones in one of the tunnels. John must have died
of his wound while looking for the gold. And Evelyn—”

“Waited. Waited for someone to find
her.”

“And Cecil would have made history repeat.
But he would not have found the ruby. He did not know it was in the
room he meant to be your tomb.” Ryne swore. “Bloody fool! He’d
never have found the gold either. I don’t believe it was ever here.
It was probably spent long ago.”

She gazed at him thoughtfully. The sun was
rising over Wicklow and she watched the bright beads of light
filter in the window. Some power—Ryne, his love for her—had chased
the oppressive night out of Wicklow and she would never again be
frightened inside its walls. He was her guardian just as that
gigantic wooden statue had been Jubal Wicklow’s.

Suddenly she sat up in the bed. “There is
gold1” she cried. “There is! I know the place.”

Amanda donned a robe as quickly as possible
and led Ryne to the landing beside the Turkish King. Gussie
followed, protesting that Amanda had no business being out of
bed.

“You must watch it,” Amanda said, pointing
to the pattern of stars the sunlight made on the slate floor as it
spilled in through the grille pattern of the round windows.
“Scattered stars flee the sun. Behold the secret of the mystic
one,” she repeated the lines of the poem softly.

Gussie shook her head in bewilderment but
Ryne stood patiently with his arm around her, watching as the
spattered circles joined and climbed to shine brightly on the
king’s face.

“It is there, I think. Inside the head. He
is the guardian. Ezra knew,” she added sadly. “He must have told us
hundreds of times.”

“Really, Amanda. Come back to bed. You are
lightheaded to think . . .”

“No, Ryne,” she answered excitedly. “It is
here. I know it. Watch him. When the light strikes his eyes, press
them in.”

Ryne did as she said, mostly to humor her.
He was worried that the shock had affected her badly. When the
king’s head opened up and gold coins spilled out of a rotted bag,
he shouted his surprise. The hall was littered with gold, streaming
and glistening in the morning sun.

“How did you know?” he asked
incredulously.

“Something told me.”

“Something?”

“Someone. Jubal. He has been here all along
looking for Evelyn. Whispering her name and sometimes mine. He
tried to warn me.”

She went down the stairs with Ryne and
picked up a handful of the shiny coins. Somehow Amanda knew Jubal
would not mind her having them or the ruby, not now that he had
found his Evelyn again. She suspected too she would not hear the
whispers anymore.

***

The fragrant water in the marble bath lapped
at Amanda’s shoulders. She felt as if she were really in the lovely
mosaic garden pictured on the wall and was more tranquil and
peaceful than ever in her life.

But it was with a serious face that she
looked at Ryne. “I suppose you will not object to taking a rich
wife?”

Ryne laughed lustily. “Not if you do not
object to a rich husband.”

Amanda gave him a pained glance. “I thought
you had lost your money.”

He grinned. “I could match your fortune
twice over, my sweet.”

Amanda, her lips pouted, splashed a handful
of scented water on his chest.

“Liar. You told me you could not even afford
to let a room. I suppose Gardner has wealth too.”

“Enough that he would not have to weasel
trinkets from a poor little sprite.”

“But I heard him arguing over a debt he
could not pay,” she responded.

“The debt was that of a workman. He
interceded to protect the man,” Ryne told her and ended the last of
her worries.

She leaned lazily against the edge of the
marble tub and let the warm water cover her to her neck.

“Why did you tell me you had no money?”

He cupped her breasts and brought the
rose-crested peaks above the surface of the water as he gave her a
taunting look.

“You would not have let me stay at Wicklow
otherwise.”

“Oh, you!” she stammered. “I believe you are
a worse schemer than Cecil Baldwin.”

“And I believe, my lovely lass, that you
should let me give you another scrub. I would have sworn until last
night a woman could not wear so much dirt and still stand.”

“Do what you must,” she whispered as he
covered her with the perfumed lather of jasmine-scented soap.

Her body tingled with delight that gave way
to abandon as his caresses grew more and more intimate. She would
never tire of his touch or of the power he had to make her forget
anything beyond his nearness. She sighed and joined his play as he
bathed her with rapture, knowing and loving every satiny part of
her. And when they were both sated, she clung to him, still
enjoying the glow of their passion.

“Amanda,” he whispered, his lips making a
soft, warm ripple of air at her ear. “Will you do a special thing
for me?”

She sighed. What could she refuse him, this
man who had saved her from a horrible fate? This man who had taught
her the bliss of a lover’s touch and shown her the wondrous
dimensions of passion.

“Anything, love.” Her eyes shone like oceans
of green lit with starlight. She kissed his lips, his throat, her
hands sweeping in slow delight over his naked flesh.

“Come with me, love, to Greylock Chapel.” He
was on his feet, a sardonic grin spreading over his lips. “There is
a wedding we must attend.”

“Gardner’s?”

“No, love.” He pulled her to her feet, the
blue heat of his eyes savoring her soft curves and shimmering damp
skin. “Ours.”

Andrea Parnell is the award-winning author of
ten novels, short fiction and articles, with more than one million
copies of her books in print. Her works include Gothic, Western,
and other historical and contemporary romances. Several of her
books have been set in her home state of Georgia. Andrea has
received both the Maggie and Romantic Times Reviewer's Choice
awards for her writing, and is a member of Novelists, Inc. (NINC)
and past president of the Georgia Authors Network. She is fond of
cats, travel, overgrown gardens, and old houses with lots of
crooks, crannies, and interesting shadows. Please visit her website
at
AndreaParnell.com
.

Andrea at Smashwords:
http://www.smashwords.com/profile/view/AndreaParnell

Follow Andrea on Twitter:
@andreahparnell

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