She did a slow pirouette, mainly because she couldn’t help herself.
“Colin,” she breathed, “it’s love–”
She didn’t finish.
And she didn’t finish because she saw Royce.
In a portrait, hanging on the wall in the Great Hall at Lacybourne.
She took two steps toward it, her hand flying to her mouth.
“Royce,” she whispered as she gazed in shock at the portrait.
She vaguely heard Colin ask, “What did you say?” in a tone that was far more Colin than Royce.
But she wasn’t listening.
It was Royce, stunningly handsome even though he looked fierce, even angry. He was standing in front of a shining black horse with a wild mane, a horse Sibyl knew very well because she’d ridden on his back. She felt her heart squeeze in a mixture of horror and delight.
“My goddess,” she stared, “My goddess, Colin, it’s…” but she stopped again because as she was about to turn to Colin, her eyes fell on the other portrait, the one beside Royce’s.
She gasped and took two steps back.
It was then that thunder rumbled and, seconds later, lightning split the sky.
“Sibyl,” Colin was saying but she interrupted him and took another step away from what she saw.
“That’s…” she raised her arm and pointed a trembling finger at the portrait. A picture that showed exactly what Sibyl saw in her mirror every morning, except with dark hair. It even had Mallory and Bran in it. “That’s me!” she cried and swung confused eyes to Colin who, she saw, was watching her closely. “Why do you have a portrait of me in your house? How? Why?”
“Do you know Royce Morgan?” Colin asked and she heard a thread of accusation in his tone.
“Why do you have a painting of me in your house?” she returned, her voice rising with hysteria. Then she processed what he said, her stomach clenched and she breathed, “Royce Morgan?”
“Yes.” He glanced swiftly at the portraits and then back to Sibyl. “Royce Morgan and his wife, Beatrice, born Beatrice Godwin.”
She felt as if she’d been struck, all her breath went out of her in a whoosh.
Beatrice Godwin.
She stumbled back another step, throwing her arm out for something to steady her and catching one of the ancient chairs around the ancient dining room table that was known to her because she had sat there and eaten a meal.
A meal that happened in her dreams which took place in ancient times when the table was new.
“Beatrice Godwin?” When Sibyl spoke her voice was loud and it was shrill.
Sibyl felt rather than saw someone come into the room but she didn’t turn to see who it was.
“Beatrice and Royce Morgan,” Colin explained tersely. “He was the owner of Lacybourne and they were married for a few hours. On their way home to Lacybourne after their wedding, they were murdered.”
“Oh my goddess. Oh my goddess,” Sibyl was blathering, her hand clutched the chair like a lifeline. “Oh my goddess! He… he looks like you! And… and, she… she looks like… me!” Sibyl shouted her last.
It was then Sibyl remembered her father talking about the lovers who never got the chance to live at Lacybourne because they’d been killed. She hadn’t listened to much of what he said but she remembered the story was famous, a tragic, romantic tale of true love lost.
What had her father said?
“Oh my goddess,” she whispered.
They’d had their throats slit. Just like in her dream.
Without thinking, hysteria filling her, she turned to run, to escape, to get far away from Lacybourne and Royce and Beatrice, Colin and her dreams and what this meant to her.
She’d asked Royce, when he was Colin, who Beatrice was and he’d said it then.
She’s you.
She’d manage to run two steps when she was grabbed at the waist by Colin. He swung her effortlessly around to face him.
“Do you know Royce Morgan?” Colin asked, hanging on to his temper, but, she could tell distractedly, just barely. He was staring at her with narrowed, angry eyes.
“Colin, don’t!” Mrs. Byrne cried from somewhere in the room.
“Of course I do! I see him every night in my dreams,” Sibyl yelled in his face, struggling against his arm. “Every night. But they aren’t dreams, they… they’re memories!” she cried frantically. “I’m Beatrice in my dreams.”
It was then, Sibyl felt her face pale.
Oh dear goddess, she might even be Beatrice in reality.
Royce had said, You called me Colin when you were her. I thought she was attempting to vex me.
“Oh my goddess. Oh my goddess.” Sibyl was back to chanting.
“Sibyl, calm down,” Colin commanded and her eyes flew to his. They were no longer irate, they were concerned. His hands were no longer grasping her bitingly but had gentled.
That’s when she became irate.
“Calm down? Calm down? Are you mad? You have a portrait of a dead medieval woman in your house. A woman who had her throat slit. A woman that looks exactly like me, I even think she is me in a way and…”
She stopped and her body went utterly still.
He had a portrait in his house that looked like her. A portrait that likely had hung there for hundreds of years.
She stared at him and then her eyes cut to Mrs. Byrne.
Lightning split the sky.
Mrs. Byrne had been working at Lacybourne for years.
Her eyes cut back to Colin.
“You knew!” she cried and heard others entering the room but she couldn’t think about anything else because thoughts, memories, visions, snippets of dreams, her first meeting with Mrs. Byrne (who was very keen to have Sibyl come to the house), her first meeting with Colin and his maniacal behaviour all came crashing into her brain and she understood, she finally understood. “You knew I looked like her and you knew you looked like him.” Her eyes went back to Mrs. Byrne. “You both knew and you never said a word.”
“Dear –” Mrs. Byrne began placatingly.
Sibyl cut her off. “You knew! I even told you about my dreams and you knew!” Sibyl shouted at Marian. “Why didn’t you say anything to me?” Her head swung back to Colin who was close, very close, holding her against the warmth of his body and staring at her, a muscle working in his jaw but this time, not with anger. “Why didn’t you say anything to me?”
“I thought you were –” Colin started to say but with a forceful jerk she pulled out of his arms and quickly took several steps away from him, putting needed space between them.
Because the dawning light finally rose in her dim brain and it all made startlingly clear, hideous sense.
“I know what you thought. I know exactly what you thought. You thought I knew who she was.” Sibyl’s hand flew to point at the portrait of Beatrice. “And that I was after the family silver. That’s what you thought!” She screamed these words, her fury completely out-of-control, her voice ringing in the hall. She held tightly to her rage, if she didn’t, she would likely curl up and die.
This was not a dream. This was magic but it wasn’t the light airy-fairy kind. This was dark and ugly and she wanted no part of murdered, star-crossed lovers, the male half of which reincarnated into a misanthropic beast.
Colin started toward her as Mrs. Byrne called out, “Sibyl, you must listen.”
Sibyl didn’t respond, she was watching Colin.
“Don’t come near me! Don’t you even touch me!” she warned but Colin didn’t stop, indeed not only didn’t he stop but he was coming at her with grave purpose. “You wanted to punish me?” she asked acidly. “Well you did! You got my family here to make a fool of me, to humiliate me and you made me your… omph!”
She didn’t finish because she had his shoulder in her belly and then she was being lifted. Her breath was knocked out of her as he threw her over his shoulder and carried her toward the stairs.
She recovered quickly and struggled, shouting, “Let me
down!”
He didn’t stop and he didn’t let her down.
She lifted her head, her hair falling away from her face and as he carried her up the stairs, she saw her family and his family, watching their ascent in fascinated, horrified silence.
But no one came to her aid.
Chapter Eighteen
Real Life Magic
Colin put her down in his bedroom and the minute her feet touched the floor, Sibyl started to run toward the door.
He grabbed her by hooking an arm about her waist and yanking her back against his body. She crashed against the length of him and he wasted no time. He reached out, leaning into her, his upper body pushing her torso forward, and he slammed the door.
“Sibyl, five minutes. Listen to me,” he demanded, his mouth at her ear.
“No!” she shouted and struggled, tearing at his hand at her waist. Her mind was whirling, her head was spinning. No one down there helped her, not even her family. They all knew before she did, that was what they were so damned cheerful about. That was why they were all acting so strange.
She felt, at any moment, she was either going to cry, scream the house down or be sick.
Or all three at the same time.
He caught one wrist and twirled her out then used her arm to jerk her forward. She slammed against his hard body while he twisted her arm carefully behind her back. Her other hand came up to push against his chest but he grabbed that too and it joined the one behind her back.
She was pressed full-frontal against his body and completely powerless.
This, of course, made her angrier.
She tipped her head back, her hair flying everywhere. “Let go of me!” she yelled in his face.
He shook her, a gentle but rough gesture that caused her no pain but further angered her all the same.
“Listen to me!” he commanded, his voice an urgent rumble.
“No!” she repeated. “You have nothing to say that I want to hear.”
“I dreamed of you, the night before I met you.”
She became instantly still.
Perhaps that was something she was willing to hear.
“What?”
“I dreamed of who I thought was Beatrice, but she had your hair. It was you. I was making love to you and then you were torn from my arms and I was held back as someone slit your throat.”
Her mouth dropped open and she gaped at him, completely at a loss for words.
What on the goddess’s green earth was going on?
She’d dreamed of him too. The same exact dream. Except it was his throat that was slit.
“Does that dream sound familiar?” he asked, watching her closely.
She blinked and shut her mouth so fast, her teeth clacked together.
Damn, she always got caught in her lies.
“Sibyl, I know you were lying about your nightmare that night. You’re the worst liar I’ve ever met.”
She stayed silent, not ready to let go of her rage and instantly deciding she did not want to hear anymore of this latest revelation. Really, how much could a girl take?
“You’ve had the same dream, haven’t you?” Her eyes went to the door with visions of escape dancing in her head but he shook her again. “Haven’t you?”
“It doesn’t mean anything,” she told the floor to her side.
His hands released hers but he didn’t let her go. His arms tightened around her, holding her to him even as her hands went to his chest and tried to force him away. She didn’t lift her eyes above his throat as she pushed with all her strength.
All this work was to no avail. He didn’t shift an inch.
“Stop struggling and talk to me,” he demanded.
Her eyes lifted to his and she obliged, “You made me your whore.”
He flinched as if she’d struck him and he seemed, for a moment, genuinely to be in pain. And she felt, to her surprise and annoyance (for a moment), upset for him.
“You were never my whore,” he murmured gruffly, his eyes drilling into hers.
“I felt like it,” she informed him with complete honesty, still trying to pull away.
His arms tightened. “I’m sorry for that but I never thought of you that way.”
“You did that first night,” she corrected him.
“All right, I never thought of you that way after that first night,” he conceded through gritted teeth.
She knew that. Rationally, logically, looking back at all that transpired between them. She wasn’t exactly hip to how paid sexual partners were treated but she doubted their men took them out to dinner and on jaunts to National Trust properties on the weekend.
She knew all of this but she wasn’t rational or logical at that moment.
Far from it.
“Then how did you feel about me the night you threatened to fuck me on my dining room table?” she pushed, her voice was nasty.
Now she was out of line, he threatened it but he didn’t do it.
He didn’t apologise for threatening it but he still didn’t do it.
She wasn’t going to feel badly about being out of line. He’d been lying to her for weeks.
She told herself that but what he said next made her feel like an absolute heel.
“I’d been away from you for days. I wanted to see you and you weren’t home. So, I suppose what I felt was that I missed you.” he clipped, his patience with her beginning to wear and it was showing.
At his words, she stopped pressing against his chest to get away.
“You missed me?” she breathed, her eyes rounded in surprise.
He just stared at her and she (wisely) let it go.
Then she rushed on. “Why didn’t you tell me about the portraits? And, why did you offer me fifty thousand pounds to sleep with me? I mean, who does that? And –”
“Why did you take it?” he cut in and, at his turning of the tables, she clapped her mouth shut.
It was her turn to stare at him.
Unlike her, however, he actually intended to get an answer.
“Would you care to answer me?” This was voiced as a request however it was anything but.
Sibyl mentally kicked herself for again, after the many times in the past, not learning her lesson. How she managed to get herself in these tricky situations, she did not know. She had two degrees, got straight A’s, graduated with honours, she kept her home tidy, managed to take care of her pets, hold down a job, keep a business, pay her bills, but her life was (always) an absolute mess.
She decided to remain silent. She figured it was her best option at that point.
“Christ, for someone as beautiful and warm-hearted as you, you’re truly the most annoying woman I know,” Colin ground out, looking over her head rather than at her.
She was now staring at him in wonder.
She’d kind of heard the word “annoying’ but she was stuck on “beautiful’ and “warm-hearted” so she didn’t fully process the “annoying’ bit.
It was then that there was a knock on the door.
“Come in,” Sibyl called automatically.
“Go away,” Colin barked at the same time.
Of course, since it was the sisters, they listened to Sibyl and opened the door.
Looking over her shoulder, Sibyl watched Claire and Scarlett walk in, Claire watching them with her heart in her eyes, Scarlett’s eyes were scrutinising.
“We came to see if you were all right. That was quite a scene down there and we were a bit worried,” Claire announced, walking fully into the room, her gaze swinging worriedly from Colin to Sibyl.
“I came in a medical capacity. After carrying Sibyl up the stairs, I thought you might need me to check if you’d sustained a hernia,” Scarlett drily informed Colin.
At that, Sibyl’s head snapped back around to look to Colin. “Would you like to amend your comment about the most annoying woman you know?” she quipped angrily.
His arms loosened around her as one corner of his lips twitched tellingly. Sibyl
stepped away from him, breaking the hold of his arms and gave him a look that told him she did not think her sister, or any of this, was amusing.
“I’m fine, he’s fine, we’re fine, everything’s fine,” Sibyl curtly assured Claire who was still looking as if one, the other, or the both of them was about to spontaneously combust and she didn’t want to be in the way of flying body parts.
“We were hoping to have a private conversation,” Colin said pointedly then glanced at the door.
Scarlett ignored the glance, walked toward the fireplace and turned one of the comfortable armchairs there around to face the room. As she did, she noted, “You clearly wanted to have a private conversation, but as you carried my sister to your bedroom like a Neanderthal, it is somewhat debatable if she wanted a private conversation with you.” Then she sat, crossed her legs and groaned. “These damn shoes are killing me.”
“Scarlett –” Sibyl started, her voice edged with warning.
“You must know, it isn’t easy for him,” Claire burst out.
Everyone’s eyes turned to Claire who was standing, her arms straight down at her sides, her hands clenched in fists. She was upset about something and Sibyl thought for a moment she was angry at Scarlett (deservedly so), but her eyes were directed at Sibyl.
“Who?” Sibyl asked, thinking maybe she was confused. It wouldn’t be surprising if she was confused, considering her whole world had been turned on its head. However, Sibyl could not imagine Claire was referring to Colin. Everything seemed easy for Colin.
“Colin,” Claire answered and Sibyl’s eyes widened.
Sibyl looked at her sister and Scarlett shrugged and turned her attention to Claire.
“It’s just that every woman he meets –” Claire began but Colin interrupted.
“Claire, I don’t think –”
“Wants her pound of flesh,” Claire finished stubbornly, looking at Colin with a rebellious gleam in her eye.
“Pound of flesh?” Sibyl echoed.
“Yes. Her pound of flesh,” Claire repeated.
“Claire,” Colin said again, this time his voice held a warning.
“Really, Colin, I’m not entirely certain what all this intrigue was about tonight but we went along with it. Though, it’s obvious something isn’t right with the pair of you,” Claire retorted.