In fact, just last week they’d printed a photo of Prentice and Elle wandering down the sidewalk two villages over, having a date night, the kids at Fiona’s sister Morag’s house. They were illuminated by a streetlamp, Prentice’s arm was wrapped around Elle’s shoulders and both hers were wrapped around his stomach. Her front was pressed to his side, he had his head tipped down to look at her, she had hers tipped back to look at him, she’d said something to make him chuckle and she was laughing with him.
The caption read, It’s Wedding Bells for Isabella and Prentice! And in a little square at the bottom right corner of the photo was a blown up shot of her hand wearing Prentice’s ring and that had its own caption of, And her hunky architect is not messing around!
As annoying as it was, she had to admit she loved that photo. They looked happy mainly because they were.
But that was two villages over; the shot had been taken after they had dinner and were walking back to Prentice’s SUV so it was after nine at night. There was practically no way Hattie would just happen to be in that village (with a camera), which was smaller by half than Prentice’s which meant it was tiny. They had a takeaway Chinese, the Italian restaurant she and Pren went to and a news agent. There was no reason for Hattie to be there.
This meant Hattie Fennick was stalking Elle, Prentice and the kids!
Hattie Fennick was stalking them and getting paid to expose snippets of their lives and steal photos of their memories and sell their privacy to the world.
As this knowledge burned into her brain, Elle lifted her hands and curled her fingers on the steering wheel in an effort to stop herself from opening her door and marching straight to Hattie, yanking that camera from her neck, smashing it on the ground and giving Hattie a piece of her mind.
It would not do to throw a temper tantrum in front of all the kids at Sally and Jace’s school and the parents there to pick them up.
No, she thought as her narrowed, angry eyes stayed focused on Hattie, she’d pick her time and it would be the right time.
The bed in the guest suite was smaller than the one in their room and the one they would be purchasing.
But it was cozy and comfortable.
They were good. The furniture could wait another day to be ordered, Elle decided as Hattie lifted the camera to her eye and Elle knew that Sally and/or Jason was headed her way.
Yes, she thought, glaring at Hattie taking photos of her children, the furniture could wait.
* * * * *
Fiona
“Is everything okay, Elly Belly?” Fiona heard her daughter ask, her small hand held by Bella’s as Bella walked her into the dance studio.
Fiona thought her wee lass looked adorable in her baby pink tights and leotard, even with that big coat over it, scarf wrapped around her neck, wooly hat pulled over her ears, feet encased in warm boots (she would put on her ballet slippers in the studio).
Bella didn’t take any chances with the cold, Fiona was pleased to see.
But Fiona, for once, wasn’t thinking about her sweet Sally.
Her focus was Bella who Sally couldn’t help but notice was angry, walking stiffly, face set. Hell, anyone would notice it; that was how angry Bella was, she wasn’t even shielding Sally from it.
Bella’s thoughts were elsewhere, it was plain to see and Fiona knew where they were.
Fiona had seen Bella notice Hattie Fennick and she’d seen Bella’s reaction.
And Fiona wasn’t ready.
She had not realized her magic. She’d spent hours practicing, hours at her tent calling to the Colonel Sanders Messenger Man in hopes he’d materialize and give her some clue.
He hadn’t and she was no closer to finding her magic so she could use it when the time came.
And Fiona feared the time was coming now.
Christmas had come and gone and all was well, joyful, happy – even including a visit from Laurent Evangelista (who was an even bigger tosser than Fiona reckoned he was and she reckoned he was a pretty big tosser). Bella had barely reacted to his appearance. She dealt with it and moved on, no clenching of the fists, no nothing.
Fiona was proud of her.
Prentice, Fiona noted, was prouder.
But there was no word from Bella’s father. No mishaps roasting the turkey. The television didn’t explode when Prentice and Mikey installed the PlayStation.
The only danger, Fiona reckoned, was Hattie Fennick.
And Fiona knew, just looking at Bella’s face, that Bella intended to do something about it.
And now.
Wait! Fiona shouted at her as she floated by Bella and her daughter’s side. Wait until later! Talk to Prentice! Tell him about it tonight! Don’t go on your own!
Bella gave no indication that she’d heard Fiona as she walked toward the doors, pushing them open and lying to Sally, “I’m fine, sweetie. Just have something on my mind.”
“Okay,” Sally said softly, disbelief and worry clear in her tone.
Bella! Don’t! Fiona didn’t give up and kept shouting. She’s dangerous! Just wait, wait and talk to Prentice. He’s your knight in shining armor. He’s made to keep you safe. Don’t do something stupid!
Again, Bella gave no indication she heard her ghostly friend as she forced a smile at the instructor then helped Sally take off her winter things and put on her slippers.
Then she bent and kissed the top of Sally’s, her hand lifting slightly to curl around Sally’s soft cheek and Sally tipped her head back to look at Bella.
“I’ll be back in an hour, honey,” Bella said softly.
Sally nodded. “Okay, Elly Belly.”
Hearing her nickname, Bella didn’t have to force her farewell smile for Sally.
Then she dropped her hand, nodded at the instructor and a couple of the parents as she headed back out to her 4x4, Fiona so close to her side, Bella shivered at the cold caused by Fiona’s spectral body and not the deep chill in the air.
Bella, listen to me, Fiona begged, wrapping her ghostly hands around Bella’s arm causing her to shiver again. Please, please, at least call Prentice.
Bella bleeped the locks to her Rover, yanked open the door angrily and climbed inside.
Then she whispered, “No. I’m going to take care of this once and for all.”
Bella! Fiona shouted but Bella shook her head.
“No,” she kept whispering, “no one interferes with my happily ever after but they really don’t interfere with Prentice’s or the kids’.”
Fiona closed her eyes.
Bella switched on the ignition.
Bloody hell! Fiona yelled, glaring at Bella’s stubborn profile.
Then she made a mistake.
She dematerialized and materialized at Prentice’s office to try her hand at yelling at him in order to get through.
Leaving Bella alone.
She should never have left Bella alone.
* * * * *
Prentice
Prentice was at his drafting board at the office, sifting through phone messages Alice had left for him, thinking he’d need to have a look at the building where his offices were housed because, that afternoon, a chill had slid through them so arctic, it was uncomfortable. He’d never felt it before and they were experiencing a severe cold snap so he reckoned the heating wasn’t up to the task.
However, strangely, the chill subsided as suddenly as it came. Prentice still made a mental note to look into it.
These thoughts were in his head when his mobile rang.
He looked down at it, seeing a number come up on the display rather than a name. His head tilted to the side, he picked it up, engaged and put it to his ear.
“Cameron,” he greeted.
“Prentice?” a female’s voice asked.
“Aye,” he answered.
“Hello, this is Lydia, Jason’s guitar teacher.”
Prentice’s body started to tighten as his mind went alert, wondering why she’d be calling him considering Elle dealt with the children’s instruc
tors. Elle found them, she checked their references and she hired them. Except for telling Prentice about them and him meeting them briefly, since their lessons happened while he was at the office, he had little to do with them.
“Yes?” he prompted.
“Well, I’ve been calling Bella but she isn’t answering and she hasn’t picked up Jason from his lesson. She’s over a half an hour late and she’s never late. I’ve got another student coming in soon and I was wondering if wires were crossed? Perhaps you were supposed to pick up Jason?”
Prentice gut tightened along with his body but it did it harder, sharper, making him feel instantly sick.
“No, I –” he started to say but his phone vibrated in his hand, he took it from his ear quickly, glanced at it, saw he had an incoming call and he put it back to his ear and said, “Just a minute, another call is coming through. Maybe that’s Elle. I’ll be right back.” Then he took the phone from his ear again, hit the button to engage and put it back. “Cameron.”
“Hi, Prentice, this is Gemma, Sally’s ballet instructor. Listen, the lesson just ended but all the other kids are gone and Bella isn’t here as usual to pick up –”
Prentice was no longer listening. He was out of his chair and moving to the hook and his coat.
“Someone will be there soon,” he told Gemma then didn’t wait for a response, he went back to Lydia, told her the same thing then disconnected from her too.
Then he grabbed his coat and shrugged it on at the same time calling his mother to ask her to pick up the kids and he swiftly walked out of his offices without a word to Alice or anyone.
Then he got in his Rover and drove just as swiftly home.
* * * * *
Elle
“That’s what I get,” Nigel Fennick muttered. “That’s all I get, day and night, day and bloody, fucking night.”
Elle’s head lolled on the backseat of Nigel Fennick’s car, blinking away the fuzzy feeling in her head as she felt cold sting, sharp and piercing, at her wrists.
Something, or it felt like someone, an invisible someone, was picking at the ropes binding her wrists.
That was bizarre, impossible but she couldn’t think of that. She had to focus on clearing her head after she’d knocked boldly and imperiously on Nigel and Hattie Fennick’s front door, Nigel opened it and she’d furiously demanded a word with Hattie. Nigel stared at her a moment, sighed deeply, invited her in and she walked into the living room only to stop, watch Nigel turn to her and then watch his face studying her. Then, as she watched, it twisted with something ugly and unbelievably frightening. She tensed in preparation for flight but before she could react, he’d picked up a vase and conked her on the side of the head with it.
Yes, conked her on the side of the head!
She’d blacked out instantly and woke up in the backseat of his car, wrists and ankles bound and a gag tied around her mouth, something or someone working at her bounds and Nigel ranting from behind the wheel as he was driving.
“Prentice this. Bella that. Sally and Jason this, that and the other. My God! She has a husband! She has a son! Does she pay a mind to us? No!” he ended on a shout and Elle closed her eyes, her heart beating wildly, fear saturating her entire body.
He’d gone mad.
Or Hattie had driven him to it.
This wasn’t how it was supposed to happen. At the end of the fairytale, the heroine gets to live in her castle and enjoy her happily ever after.
Okay, so Elle could put up with trolls making an appearance every now and then. And the handsome hero could be annoying but he was always beautiful and loving even when he was being annoying.
The heroine wasn’t supposed to end up in the backseat of a car, bound, her head pounding, terrified and the wicked witch actually being a wicked construction worker at the end of his rope with his catty, awful, miserable wife and taking it out on the heroine!
Elle had enough wicked in her life. It was now her happily ever after.
Didn’t he know?
“She makes money from those photos and we need a new boiler,” Nigel raged on. “Does she buy a boiler? No… she… does… not. She goes to Edinburgh and gets her hair done and it cost two hundred bloody pounds! She buys a membership to the gym, pays some bloke to work with her and she goes there every evening. She doesn’t make dinner for her family; she gets in her car and goes to the bloody gym!”
Elle hadn’t noticed Hattie got her hair done or that she’d lost any weight.
Then again, she tried not to notice Hattie at all.
“And I know why,” Nigel seethed, bringing Elle’s attention back to him. “She thinks she can catch his eye. She lies in bed beside me and pretends he’s there lying beside her. Do you know? Do you know how it feels to lie beside your wife every night for over a decade and know she doesn’t want you at her side? Do you know how that feels? Do you know?” he ended on a screech and Elle winced.
Elle didn’t know and she didn’t think that would feel very good but it wasn’t worth conking someone on the head, binding them and throwing them in the backseat to drive around while ranting.
“Well, I’m done,” he raved. “I am bloody, fucking done. She wants Prentice Cameron; I’ll give her a clear shot.”
The cold at her wrists vanished but Elle barely noticed as her body went rock-solid with terror at his words.
“But for Prentice Cameron, he’ll experience again what it’s like no’ to have the woman he loves at his side,” Nigel maniacally vowed and Elle started panting behind her gag just as the icy feeling came back to her wrists. “The body’s there for me but it isn’t. He’ll know that feeling, I’ll bloody well make it so, he’ll know. He’ll bloody fucking know what it’s like to be alone.”
The ties binding her wrists came undone and almost immediately the cold could be felt at her ankles.
“They’ll never find you,” Nigel muttered. “They’ll never, ever find you. They’ll think you ran away again. They’ll all think you left him again. They’ll never know.”
Elle circled her hands to work out the pins and needles and tried to steady her breathing, letting the cold she knew was her ally work her ankles without moving and making it more difficult. As the cold worked her ankles, she concentrated on getting her thoughts in order. She tried not to think about how stupid she’d been, not telling anyone where she was going. She’d called Fern to reschedule but she hadn’t explained why.
And now the kids were surely done with their lessons and waiting for her to pick them up. Waiting and worried.
And Prentice…
She closed her eyes tight, the car came to a halt and her eyes shot open.
It was late, dark, so dark she knew they were well out of town. They had nothing but the moonlight. She had dark, she still had bound ankles, she didn’t know where she was.
The only thing she knew was she had to get away. She had to get back to her happily ever after.
She had to.
She heard Nigel exit the car and she rolled to her back, lifting her hands to pull the gag from her mouth, the wintry workings at her ankles seemed to get more frantic and the ropes were loosened but not undone when Nigel pulled open the door at her head.
She could delay no further.
Before he could lean in, Elle lifted up, scooted on her behind toward the other door then turned on the seat and did her best to kick out with her bound feet.
It worked. Nigel wasn’t prepared, she hit him in the chest and he went back, slamming his head on the doorframe with a pained grunt as he went.
Elle twisted her torso and fumbled with the door handle.
It’s locked! She heard the disembodied shout in a feminine voice with a Scottish accent, a voice that was vaguely familiar but that familiarity was deep in her memory banks.
She couldn’t focus on hearing voices, even familiar ones, because she had to get out.
Then she heard the door lock disengage but it wasn’t her that pressed the button.
What was hap
pening?
She didn’t ask, she just went back to the handle and opened the door, pushing herself out and, without full use of her lower extremities, falling to a hip. She rolled to her bottom and scooted quickly away from the car, stopped and both the frosty touch as well as her hands went to the bounds at her feet.
“You stupid bitch!” She heard Nigel shout as she kicked her feet free of the ropes, rolled and got to her hands and knees. “Stupid bitch!” he shrieked as she lifted up on the fly, already running. “Don’t you run away from me!” he yelled.
Elle ran faster.
No! No’ that way! That’s the cliff! Go to the road! The voice came back, urgent, scared and Elle switched directions instantly. Good! The road!
Elle ran and as she did she wondered why she still wore high-heeled boots when she lived in the wilds of the Scottish Highlands with a job as a happy homemaker. Happy homemakers didn’t wear high-heeled boots.
Or, at least, if she made it through this night, she was never going to do wear them again.
She heard him pounding after her and she ran faster, as fast as she could but in those heels she couldn’t run fast enough.
He grasped the back of her jacket and she cried out as her limbs kept moving forward but her torso jerked back. He pulled her to him then clamped his arms around her and jerked her around, marching her back where they came.
“No!” she cried, struggling violently, tearing at his hands with her fingernails, dragging her feet, bucking her body, slamming her head backwards in hopes of connecting. “Help me!” Elle screamed. “Somebody help me!”
“No help out here for you, lass. And when I’m done, I’ll no’ hear Hattie raving about Isabella Austin Evangelista. No more. No more,” Nigel whispered crazily in her ear as he forced her through the darkness and that was all she could see, a vast sea of darkness and she knew where he was taking her. She couldn’t see it but she knew it.
There was nothing beyond that darkness.
Nothing but cliff at the bottom of which was to be Elle’s watery grave of sea.
Knowing that, she kicked back, arched her body and shrieked, “Somebody help me!”