you, Count Volta. Both for your hospitality and for returning the lost pages of the Salus Totus to the world. I will be sure to accord your contribution due recognition in my report.’
He gave a slight bow, formal and brief. ‘Goodnight, Dr Hunter.’
She was halfway to the door when he called her, and she turned uncertainly, unable to prevent or understand the tiny bubble of hope that came with his call. ‘Yes?’
‘Take the dress when you go,’ he said. ‘I have no use for it.’
She knew she shouldn’t be disappointed. He’d made it clear he was angry with her. But she would take the dress. She doubted she would ever have cause to wear it, but she would treasure it for ever. ‘Thank you. I meant to ask—wherever did it come from?’
His eyes looked back at her, bleak and soulless. ‘It was my fiancée’s.’
She was leaving. He sat at the empty table, a hint of her perfume the only remaining trace of her.
She was leaving.
Somehow he’d made it through the dinner, forcing food into a body already shutting down.
She was leaving. And, beyond locking her in a turret room or throwing her into the caves below the castle, he had no choice but to let her go.
He’d always intended to let her go.
She did not belong here.
She did not belong to him.
But, God, he had not planned on losing her so soon.
The blackness was there, lurking in the fringes of his mind, bubbling away like boiling mud and fouling the air with stinking gases. It was there and mocking him for letting her go, ready to claim him again. He’d thought there was a chance of.
He searched helplessly to latch onto what he was looking for. He didn’t know.
Only that he had come to recognise she offered a chance of something—a chance to reclaim what he’d once had, a chance to reconnect to a world of light instead of dark. He wanted to at least taste that light.
And after a decade of burying himself away in the dark he’d seen that light in her expression and lusted after it for himself.
Just a taste.
Was that too much to ask?
Clearly too much. And so he’d pulled back before she could further cut him loose. He’d withdrawn into his dark state to preserve what little of himself there was left.
He’d hurt her in the process.
He’d seen her stricken face when he’d told her about the dress. He’d sensed the trembling under her pale skin before she’d fled in a flurry of blue silk on a wavering goodnight.
Why had he told her that?
Payback? Because she’d teased him with the taste of something he’d long given up on, only to deprive him of it when he’d been lured under her spell? Because she’d reminded him of his failure with the village woman he’d sent packing because he wanted her instead?
Or maybe just because he’d finally become that monster he’d always been made out to be?
Because that dress had been made to be worn, and even if Adele had ever deigned to select it from her extensive wardrobe it would never have looked half as good as it had tonight on Dr Grace Hunter.
Why hadn’t he told her that instead?
He knew why.
Because she was leaving tomorrow.
CHAPTER EIGHT
SHE should have thought to bring something to wrap around herself. She was almost frozen by the time she returned to her room. And it wasn’t just the storm outside and the wind that wailed a mournful song outside that turned her skin to goosebumps. It was the dreadfulness of dinner and the anticlimax of it all. She was chilled from the inside out.
She was leaving tomorrow. She should feel relieved.
And yet instead she felt this massive let-down.
Hormones, she told herself, or the sudden lack of them. The post-adrenaline rush. Nothing more scientific than that.
But still …
She unzipped the dress and let it slide from her body, letting it pool on the floor at her feet.
His fiancée’s dress.
She shivered anew. God, what that had done to her. A dress chosen by the woman he had loved. The woman who had died that night along with so many others all those years long ago. Why had he wanted her to wear it?
She collapsed onto the bed and buried her face in her hands while the wind outside howled her distress.
She took a deep breath to steady herself. It was okay. She was leaving in the morning. Everything would be fine in the morning.
Like an automaton she packed her belongings to the sounds of a storm that mirrored her mood perfectly—every clap of thunder cheered, every burst of rain celebrated. The packing took nowhere near long enough for the storm. Her tools she’d already cleaned and packed. The pages were secure in acid-free packaging, padded to protect them from bumps during transit. There was nothing for it but to sleep and pray the storm had blown itself out by morning.
And the dress? She left it on a hanger in the dressing room before she slipped between the covers and settled her head into the pillows. It was a beautiful gown, there was no doubt—more exotic, more expensive than anything she had ever seen before or could ever afford—and she’d felt a million dollars inside its silken drapes. But it wasn’t hers.
It would never be truly hers.
It was dark when she awoke, disorientated and confused after another fitful sleep and wondering again what had roused her. At first she thought it must be just that the wind had dropped and the rain had ceased, the lull leaving everything suddenly almost unnaturally quiet.
Until she heard it. The sound wound almost hauntingly through the night air until it was carried away with the next gust of wind.
She sat up. Definitely notes from a piano. Maybe she hadn’t imagined it last night after all.
Between gusts of wind she caught more snatches, the notes melancholy and slightly off-beat, increasing in parts. Bewitching.
She snapped on her light, relieved the power was still on, saw that it was two in the morning and listened, wondering where it was coming from. The music had moved to a more comforting melody, undulating and lyrical, soft and warm, except there were gaps and she hated that she kept missing bits—hated that they were carried away on the wind. Then rain splattered against her windows, drowning out the sound entirely.
Intrigued, she slid from between the covers, drawing on her robe. If she opened her door just a little she might hear more over the weather.
The door snicked open and light spilled into the shadow- filled passageway. She listened. It was coming from somewhere downstairs. The rain intensified, thunder rumbled overhead and the poignant notes were lost again. She took a step towards the stairs, and then another, barefoot and silent in the darkened hallway.
She reached the top of the stairs and peered down into the inky depths. The music was hauntingly beautiful and yet so utterly, utterly wretched. And she felt compelled to hear more.
She looked around the darkened empty hall, nervous and excited at the same time. Nobody would see her, and if they did surely there was no crime in listening? Still, she took the steps gingerly, the haunting notes luring her further and further down. It was coming from the ballroom that, from the impression she’d gained in her brief time here, seemed to take up one half of the massive frontage of the castle.
With no light to guide her, with the music leading her feet, she silently descended the