---

 

Ethan stood in the corner of the turret room, out of range of the candelabra Salvatore had carried up to light old Doc Bailey's way. Doc kept his head turned carefully from the man he knew was watching him. The old drunk knew well enough that he wouldn't go blind or crazy from looking at Ethan Winslowe. He'd been forced to face him enough times to know he'd survive. But like most people, he didn't look forward to the prospect and avoided it at all cost.

Which suited Ethan just fine, he thought with the faintest trace of humor. The fewer people who wanted to intrude on his privacy, on his physical space, the better.

Except for the woman who lay on that high bed, her breathing labored, her color, even in the candlelight, ghastly. She'd intruded, unannounced, unwelcome, and he was damned if he was going to let her go easily. Even in death.

"She's got pneumonia," Doc said, and it was lucky for him his voice wasn't slurred. "Expect we got it in time, but she ought to have a chest X-ray."

"She's staying here," Ethan said, and Bailey didn't turn in his direction. He wasn't a man to put up an argument. He'd made a desultory request for Ethan to leave when he'd examined his patient, but Ethan had flatly refused. He'd stood in his corner, watching, as the old man thumped her chest, listened to her heartbeat through the lacy peach-colored bra.

"Penicillin works best in cases like these. Problem is, I don't have the adult dose with me."

"I thought Sal warned you..."

"He did, he did." Bailey managed to sneak a sheepish glance in the general direction of Ethan's feet. "But I didn't have any on hand. Whole town's been going through the flu."

"Damn the whole town."

"I brought some kid's stuff. She'll have to drink half a bottle at a time, and it tastes like some sort of candy, but it should do the trick."

"It better, old man," Ethan said.

Bailey looked up for a moment, then veered his eyes away in shame and horror. "I haven't made a mistake in a longtime."

"No. I've made sure of that. But when you do, it's a real killer, isn't it?"

Bailey didn't say another word. With Salvatore's help, he tipped half a bottle of thick pink medicine down Meg's throat, then set her back against the pillows. She opened her eyes for a moment, trying to focus them, but she didn't look at the two men hovering over her bed. Instead, her gaze went directly to the figure standing tall in the shadows.

It was too dark to see his face from the bed; he'd made sure of that. And even if she could, she'd probably only remember as a fever-induced nightmare. She shut her eyes again, drifting off.

"She needs to get out of those wet clothes," Bailey announced then, keeping his head down. "And she's going to need some nursing. I could send someone out—"

"I'll take care of it." Ethan's voice was low and implacable, and Doc Bailey nodded nervously.

"Maybe later. I know someone—"

"I'll take care of it. Take the doctor home, Sal."

Bailey practically ran from the room without a backward glance at his patient. Ethan found himself half hoping the man would take a tumble down the twisting stone steps and break his miserable neck. Only the inconvenience of having to explain kept him from moving forward and giving the doctor a little push.

"You'll be all right?" Salvatore paused in the doorway.

Ethan glanced over at the woman on the bed. "We'll be fine."

"Ethan..."

He didn't take his gaze from Meg's pale, pale face. "Yes?"

There was a pause. "Nothing," said Sal. And a moment later, they were alone.

 

Meg couldn't remember when the fear and anger faded. Maybe when the pain in her chest got so bad she didn't have room for anything else. Maybe when the two men found her, the old, gentle one going for help, the younger, stronger one keeping her safe in the darkened turret.

Night shifted into day, the rainy shadows filling the room. Strong, deft hands were caring for her, sponging off her fevered body, smoothing away her sweat-drenched hair, pouring that sickly sweet medicine down her throat until she thought she'd gag. She'd tried to open her eyes, but the darkness in the room made focusing close to impossible. She knew he was there, sitting beside the bed, standing at the window, pacing the floor as she struggled for breath. She knew he was there and she was at peace.

She didn't wonder about the monster downstairs in the bowels of the poisonous old building. She didn't wonder about Salvatore or her father or her trip to Europe and freedom. For the time being, she was content to drift in a fevered haze, knowing that the dark stranger would watch over her.

There was a time, when the room darkened into a thick, smothering cocoon of blackness, when she knew she was going to die. It was a strange thought, to die in such an odd place, away from all who loved and cared for her. But she wasn't alone. Even through the all-encompassing darkness, she could see him, sitting by her bed, as insubstantial as a shadow, watching over her.

The old man came, too, when the other was asleep. He seemed to drift through walls, ghostlike and ethereal. Between the two of them, it was surprising she'd survived this far. But there was nothing insubstantial about the dark stranger's hands on her body, holding her as she coughed and choked, pouring that sickly sweet medicine down her throat.

She lay in the bed, so hot she could scarcely bear it, her chest on fire, as she listened to the thunder and lightning outside the turret windows. She was neither awake nor asleep, and she could feel herself floating toward death. Except that she wasn't floating, she was being carried along by a rip tide that she fought against, struggled  against,  kicking at  the covers that  were smothering her, kicking at the thickness of the air that couldn't penetrate her lungs.

She felt her body being scooped up, and for a moment, she fought, afraid that death had come to claim her.

"Be still," his voice hissed in her ear, and she knew she was safe. It was her caretaker, her savior, holding her trembling body high against his hard chest as he carried her to the casement window.

He kicked it open, and for a brief moment, she wondered whether he planned to throw her out onto the slate terrace far below. No, he wouldn't do that. He'd jump with her, she thought hazily.

The cool rain whipped through the open window, bedewing her face, the chilly breeze was like needles, icing its way into her body. But it was reaching her lungs, desperately needed breath, and she gulped it in greedily.

Another streak of lightning sliced the darkness in front of her and she looked up at the man holding her as he was illuminated for one brief moment, and he looked like a phantom from hell. In that short flash, she saw only one side of his face, and that was possessed of a beauty that was positively unearthly, a fallen angel gone to rule in hell. He seemed to have no other half to his face at all.

And then the room was pitch dark, the wet wind from the open window guttering the candles that had provided the only illumination. She was alone in the darkness with a monster, and she should have been screaming and struggling in panic.

It took all her limited strength, but she lifted her hand, touching the loose white shirt he wore, clinging to it as she sank her head back against his shoulder. That small gesture of trust, of acceptance, was all she could make, but it was enough. She could feel the faint lessening of the tension that wired his body.

He managed to drag a chair over to the window, sinking into it as he tucked her in his lap. "You need another dose of this stuff," he said in his low, beautiful voice, a seductive voice to match the seductive beauty of his half face. He tipped the thick medicine down her throat and she swallowed obediently, leaning back against him.

"Tastes like bubble gum," she croaked, and he bent his head closer. He had long, silky hair, and it brushed against her mouth.

"What did you say?" he asked, his low voice urgent.

"I said the medicine tastes like bubble gum," she repeated patiently, every word a painful struggle, one she was determined to make.

"I've never tasted bubble gum," the dark stranger murmured. "What does it taste like?"

She could no longer see anything but his vague outline in the darkness, feel the strength of him beneath her weak body. "Try it," she suggested, meaning the bottle of medicine.

He could see her clearly in the blackness, she knew that. His eyes were accustomed to the darkness, and he could see every nuance of expression. "I think I will," he said softly. And he put his mouth on hers.

If she'd expected anything at all, it was a light, paternal feathering of her lips. But she hadn't expected it, and his mouth didn't brush hers. It covered hers, opening her soft, dry lips against his as he kissed her with a leisurely thoroughness, as if he had the whole night, the whole of his life, to learn her mouth.

The burning in her chest was fading, replaced by a burning lower, in the pit of her stomach, a crazy longing that was as ridiculous as this entire situation. Common sense didn't help. She was being seduced by the night, by the man, by her own sickness, and if she had an ounce of strength, she would have kissed him back.

He lifted his head, inches away from hers, and she could have sworn he was smiling. "That's what bubble gum tastes like?"

She couldn't answer. She wanted him to kiss her again. She was so hot—she wanted him to strip off her clothes and lay her down on that high, soft bed. She wanted him to lie beside her. He was so strong, so invincible that not even the darkness troubled him. But she couldn't tell him that. She could do nothing but lean against him, pressing her face against the soft white shirt and the bone and muscle beneath it.

"You're going to live," he said, his voice fierce. "You're not going to leave me. I'm not going to let you go."

She'd heard those words before, and knew that somehow Ethan Winslowe was holding her. Ethan Winslowe had kissed her. Ethan Winslowe was keeping her alive. "I'm going to live," she agreed, her voice no more than a thread of sound, as an unutterable weariness began to wash away the last remnants of consciousness. "I'm not going to leave you," she whispered. And then the darkness closed in completely, as she gave in.

 

Ethan didn't bother trying to relight the candles after he set Megan's frail body down on the bed. He didn't need them to see her, and the wind would just blow them out. He stood over her, watching carefully. Her skin was cooler now, her temperature dropping. It had dropped before, and risen higher again, but somehow he knew that this time it was finally on its way down for good. She'd passed the crisis. Despite everything, she was going to make it.

I'm not going to leave you, she'd said. Words spoken in fever, in sickness, in gratitude. She hadn't known what she was saying. And she most certainly hadn't known to whom, to what, she was saying them. She hadn't known he had every intention of holding her to that promise.

No one had ever said that to him before. He'd never wanted it, not since he'd been seven years old and finally accepted his mother's unwillingness to look at his face.

But he wanted it this time. Wanted it so much, with such a fierce possessiveness that nothing was going to stop him. Nothing was going to take Meg Carey away from him.

Ethan wondered for one brief moment whether he'd finally gone over the edge. Whether the lifetime of isolation had finally turned him into the madman the townspeople believed him to be. One look at a woman and he was ready to risk his safety, privacy, everything, just to keep her with him.

He didn't know her, had scarcely talked with her. While pretty enough, she was no ravishing beauty to obsess him so. And yet, he could hardly force himself to leave her side. And the thought of her leaving his house at all was a torment he couldn't have imagined.

His obsession made no sense, but it existed. He needed her, more than he'd ever needed anyone, and he wasn't about to be noble or self-sacrificing. He needed her, he wanted her and he was going to have her. And no one and nothing was going to get her away from him until he was ready to release her.

He heard Sal's heavy approach. He knew the disapproval that was radiating from his old friend, and he told himself he should care, should try to explain. But how could he explain when he didn't even understand it himself?

"How's she doing?" Sal asked, coming up beside the bed and staring down in the darkness at the pale figure lying there.

Sal's night vision wasn't nearly as good as Ethan's, but even so, Ethan leaned over and flipped the sheet over her lightly-dressed body. He didn't want anyone else looking at her, even in total darkness. "She's better," he said. "I think her fever's finally coming down."

"Ethan..."

"Don't ask it, Sally. Don't even hint it."

"Do you know what you're doing?" his friend asked finally. "Do you know everything you're risking?"

"Yes."

"Then there's nothing more to be said."

"Nothing more," Ethan agreed, staring down at Meg's faintly parted lips. They were slightly bruised looking from his kiss. He hadn't realized he'd kissed her that hard. "Do me a favor, Sal," he said in a meditative voice.

"Anything."

"Get me some bubble gum."

 

Meg didn't know how much later she finally awakened. Hours or days or weeks. Sometime during the darkness, the men had left her, the old man who guarded her, the younger man who wanted her. When she finally awoke, the turret room was flooded with sunlight and she was alone. Or so she thought.

"You're looking better," a woman's voice said, and the sound was so unexpected that Meg could do nothing but stare. The woman who approached the bed was middle-aged, a plump, pretty woman with a maternal air about her that radiated comfort. "Doc Bailey thought you might be surfacing about now, but it seemed to take forever. How are you feeling?"

Meg didn't say a word for a moment, considering first her chest, where the tight burning had faded to a dull ache, then her aching joints and terrible headache. "Ghastly," she said finally in her croaking voice. "I must begetting better."

The woman grinned. "That's the ticket. Let me ring Salvatore and he'll bring you some broth. Doc said you could try to get some food down, if you felt like it."

"Who are you?"

The woman whirled around. "Didn't I introduce myself? My name's Ruth Wilkins. I've been brought in to nurse you back to health."

"Where is he?"

"Who?"

"The man who was here?"

For a moment, Ruth's face creased in confusion. "Doc Bailey? Salvatore?"

"No. Him." Meg didn't know whether she was imagining the wary expression on Ruth's face.

"You don't mean Mr. Winslowe, do you?" Ruth asked carefully. "He wouldn't come up here."

Meg shook her head, more as an effort to clear it than as a negation. "I don't mean him. I mean the dark man."

Ruth's expression closed off completely. "Must have been a fever dream, dearie. The only people who've been here are Salvatore and Doc Bailey, and Doc's only been here twice. No one else lives here. I'm just a day worker myself, brought in to help take care of you         "

"What about the old man?"

Ruth's expression of uneasiness grew even more marked. "There are no old men around here."

"There's a gardener. At least, I think he was..."

"Don't talk about it," Ruth said firmly, shoving a thermometer into Meg's mouth. "It was just a fever dream. Trust me, there are no young dark men, no old men wandering around in the garden. Just Winslowe and Salvatore. Now you just lie back and rest, let the thermometer do its work, and I'll find you something to put in your stomach. It's been five days since you've eaten anything."

The thermometer dropped from Meg's mouth, rolled off the bed and shattered on the stone floor. "Five days? I've been sick for five days? What's the date?"

"Thursday, April 28. Why?"

Her plane had left for Europe three days ago, left without her. "No reason," Meg mumbled.

"Well," Ruth said briskly, "you've had a close call, make no mistake about that. You're lucky, that's what. The nearest hospital's over ninety miles away, and it's not much of a facility to begin with. You were better off here, where you could be properly looked after."

"Were you looking after me?" Meg asked, sinking back against the pillows. She already knew the answer. This woman hadn't been bustling around her darkened room, filling it with energy and bright chatter.

To her credit the woman didn't lie. "Only recently, as you've begun to come out of it. Let me get you your medicine, and then I'll see about some food." She produced a bottle of bright pink medicine, poured half of it into a glass and handed it to Meg. "Drink it all down, dearie. This stuff may taste like candy, but it saved your life."

"Bubble gum," Meg whispered.

"Beg pardon?"

"It tastes like bubble gum." She remembered now, remembered his mouth on hers, tasting the medicine. Remembered his hands on her body, holding her when she shook from chills, soothing her when she was burning up. "When you come back, you can answer some questions."

Ruth paused at the door. "I don't think so."

"Why not?"

"Because I don't really know anything. I don't know why you're here or how long you'll be staying."

"I don't want to know about me. I want to know about him."

"No one talks about Ethan Winslowe."

"Why not?"

Ruth looked nonplussed for a moment. "We simply don't. Most people are too afraid of what he might do if he heard they were gossiping about him."

"You aren't most people. You aren't afraid of him," Meg said with sudden shrewdness.

"Then let's just say he has little enough in this life. The one thing that matters to him is his privacy, and I'm going to leave him that."

"I'll be glad to leave him his privacy, too. I just want to get out of here. Go home." It was an almost automatic plea. Why did it suddenly feel like a betrayal on her part? Why was she no longer certain that was what she wanted?

It didn't matter, since Ruth Wilkins was clearly not going to help her escape. "There's nothing I can do to help you. I'm sorry. Can't you just be patient? He's not going to hurt you, you know."

"You don't even know why I'm here. Why he's keeping me a prisoner." Meg had hoped to shock Ruth, but apparently nothing Ethan Winslowe did could shock her.

"He must have his reasons. I trust him enough to not interfere."

"You know him that well? I thought he kept out of the way of townspeople."

A pale pink stained Ruth's plump cheeks. "I knew him that well," she said. And disappeared down the turret stairs.

Meg sat very still, listening to the sound of Ruth's footsteps disappearing on the stone stairs. The burning was back, but this was another, insane kind of burning.

It was repulsion, she told herself. The thought of plump, motherly Ruth making love with.. .no, having sex with the monster that dwelled below was stomach turning. He'd hinted that it would be, that it would take a talented, sophisticated woman to deal with someone in his condition. So why was her horror at the very idea tinged with curiosity and something that absolutely couldn't, wouldn't be jealousy?

And why did she persist in thinking Ethan was a monster? The people in town clearly thought so. Winslowe himself had told her that was what he was. But was he? She'd always considered herself a compassionate person. If the man below was hideously deformed, it could hardly be his fault. He'd spent his life hiding away from society, it was no wonder he'd grown dangerously antisocial. Why should she condemn him so heartlessly?

Because he was trying to destroy her father. Because he was holding her prisoner in his strange mansion. Because he was a mocking, dangerous creature who clearly meant her harm.

He wasn't a monster because of his physical challenges. He was a monster because of the darkness of his soul.

And suddenly she remembered the dark man who'd held her and rocked her and soothed her and kissed her.

God help her, there was no way the two men could be one. Was there?