“Wherein horrors of the past come to light.”

Crecy followed Gabriel as he led her around the house, and as much as she had been desperate to see it, as enraptured as she was to familiarise herself with his home, nothing could take her attention from the way his thumb was stroking her hand.

It was such a tender, loving gesture that emotion settled in her throat, making it hard to speak to him. So she didn’t, sensing that he preferred quiet, in any case. Somehow, she thought that he had taken a big leap today in allowing her to eat with him, and she was anxious about pushing him too far, too fast.

Though she had sensed from the outset that he was a man who needed to be in control, she had not realised to what extent this control had turned around and begun to control him. She had read articles about the mind and its workings before; some had seemed reasonable, others utter twaddle, but she felt sure his need to control and check must stem from the horrors of his childhood.

The desire to question him about it was tangible, but she did not relish the thought of upsetting him, especially as she had no intention of leaving without being kissed. As it happened, however, the subject raised itself.

“What’s down there?” she asked, as he hurried her past a corridor they had not investigated on the first floor.

He paused, and she noticed his eyes did not stray in that direction.

“Those were my parent’s rooms,” he said, tugging her on, but Crecy dug her heels in.

“I should like to see them, please,” she said, sounding a little stubborn, but she was intrigued to see if she could gain any deeper understanding of the son from what his parents had left behind.

“You want to see the scene of the crime, you mean?” he said, his tone accusing, eyes narrowed with suspicion. He dropped her hand, his posture changing as he became tense and wound tight before her eyes. “Is that why you came?”

Crecy stared at him in horror before rushing forward and taking his hands in hers. “Oh, Gabriel, no. I’m so sorry … I … I didn’t know. I swear I didn’t.”

He scowled at her, suspicion still lurking in the blue of his eyes, though he didn’t withdraw his hands. “You didn’t know they killed themselves?” he retorted, sneering at the idea.

“Yes, I knew that, of course,” she said, keeping her tone even and soothing, moving closer still and stroking his hands in the same manner he had done with her. “But I don’t know the circumstances or … where it happened. I would never have asked if I’d known, honestly, I wouldn’t. We needn’t go in if you find it upsetting.”

He was still for a moment, and she got the feeling he was fighting some kind of battle as he turned his head to look down the corridor.

“Why not,” he said, a tone to his voice that she could not like as she looked up and saw a muscle leaping in his jaw. He walked forwards suddenly, keeping hold of one of her hands and grasping one of the door handles, wrenching it open.

It was dark inside. A musty, unused smell filled Crecy’s nose and she shivered at the cold. This room had been dark for a long time. To her surprise, Gabriel let go of her hand and moved forward, snatching at the curtains and pulling them open with a savage air. Light flooded the room, suddenly too bright after the darkness, illuminating a large bedroom, decorated with a pretty, feminine hand.

Crecy looked around, fighting the urge to sneeze as the dust kicked up by the curtains tickled her nose. Gabriel was standing by the windows, staring outside, his large hands braced on the sill, shoulders hunched. Crecy looked around and caught her breath at the portrait that hung on one wall. A lovely woman with jet black hair stared down at her. She looked rather frail, ethereal, almost, with a delicate heart-shaped face, but such a familiar slant to her dark blue eyes that Crecy suppressed a shiver. She looked sad, too, rather desperate, in fact, something about her expression that the painter had perhaps not realised he’d captured, or else he’d have changed it.

“I found her here.”

Crecy jumped a little, the oppressive atmosphere of the room working on her nerves in such a way that Gabriel’s voice startled her.

“She was in her bath,” he continued, the words so matter of fact that the hairs on the back of her neck lifted. “I’d never seen so much blood.”

Crecy swallowed, moving back to him and sliding her hand into his. She said nothing, not wanting to give him words that would seem meaningless. Instead, she waited for him to speak again, if he wanted to.

“My father had been away on business. That was unusual, as he rarely left her alone. She took the opportunity to have an affair with Lord Winterbourne,” he said, his eyes never leaving the view outside of the window, though she felt he was seeing something else entirely. “Edward’s father.”

Crecy suppressed a gasp as so many things she’d wondered suddenly became a lot clearer. She leaned into him, holding his hand within both of hers now.

“What was your father like?” she asked, and he snorted.

“He professed to love my mother, beyond anything she could possibly comprehend, beyond reason. He seemed to think of himself as some great, romantic hero.” He fell quiet and she waited, watching the rise and fall of his chest. “It took me a long time to understand that it wasn’t love at all, it was control. He would not allow her to leave the house, not allow her to have visitors, friends. He was too jealous of anyone spending time with her. She was completely isolated.”

Crecy looked up at his face, seeing no emotion there, but sensing the turmoil raging behind the façade.

“And then you arrived,” she said, guessing that this would have been a strain upon an obviously difficult relationship.

He tightened his hold on her hand and she wondered if he knew he’d done it, as his expression did not change.

“He hated me from the outset. He started hitting her. He was jealous, you see, jealous that she loved me better than him.” His throat worked for a moment before he looked down at her. “She did love me,” he said, the words sounding almost defiant.

“Of course she did,” she said, fighting the urge to weep for him, sensing that he didn’t want that from her, that he would revile her pity. “How could she not? I bet you were a gorgeous little boy.”

He snorted, shaking his head. “I hated her for a long time for what she did, for leaving me, but … but now I understand. She just couldn’t take any more.”

There was something in his words that sent a shiver of foreboding thrilling down her spine, and she clutched at his hand. “You’re not alone, Gabriel, not like she was.”

“She wasn’t alone, either,” he countered. “She had me.”

He let go of her hand, moving to pull the curtains back into place, twitching them until they were even, before leaving the room and closing the door behind them. They moved to the next door and Gabriel hesitated, his hand reached out and dropped again before it touched the handle.

“Let’s go somewhere else,” she said, but he shook his head, stubborn now.

The door swung open without the faintest squeal of protest from the hinges, and this time Crecy hurried ahead of him, throwing open the curtains and allowing the daylight to chase away the worst of the ghosts, except it didn’t work. She could see them still, lingering in Gabriel’s eyes.

“Father found out about her and Winterbourne, of course,” he said, lingering in the doorway. There was a portrait of his father in this room, and she felt he stayed where he could not see it. He was obviously a big man, like Gabriel himself, and that cruel set to his mouth was familiar, but his eyes were not Gabriel’s and his hair was a sandy blond.

“You favour your mother,” she said, looking away from a man whom she had hated on principle, but now loathed for good reason.

“Not as much as you might like to think.” His eyes glittered, as though daring her to think of him as a good man, a man in need of love or understanding. He believed himself to be every bit the monster his father had been, that much was abundantly clear. But was he? She knew he had done some terrible things, but was that truly him? Was that the only man he could be, or could he change, if only someone would give him the chance to be something else?

Crecy looked around her, the dark walls aggressive, somehow, as if something of the room’s former occupant still lingered. Well, she had come to Longwold, desperate to see a ghost, but she’d found them here instead at Damerel, and they were anything but silent. Their voices still stretched out across the decades to torment their only son. Well, she’d see about that.

“What happened then?” she asked, turning back to Gabriel. “When he found out?”

Gabriel shrugged, though she felt he was anything but nonchalant as he answered.

“He brought her back. I … I remember her screams as he dragged her upstairs by her hair. He just went … mad,” he said, meeting her eyes. “There is no other word for it, I think. He raged and wept and screamed, he beat her so badly that I thought …” He stopped as the words grew ragged, and then cleared his throat. “I tried to stop him, but … I think he must have knocked me unconscious. It seems that when he’d had enough of beating her, he returned to Longwold to confront Winterbourne, and the man called him out.” Gabriel laughed, though it was full of bitterness. “I think that rather shocked him, that her lover should object to him beating his own wife to within an inch of her life. He didn’t understand it, saw her only as property. He owned her.” Crecy heard the revulsion behind the words and knew, knew she was right to trust him. No matter what happened after this, no matter how long it took, she would fight for him. “Father agreed to meet him, at dawn, but when he got home, mother was dead, she’d cut her own wrists.”

“And you found her?”

Gabriel nodded. “When I came to, I remember … everything was so very quiet. I was afraid of it, and then I saw the room, her room, it was such a mess from father’s rage. He had destroyed everything, everything scattered around, broken …” She sensed his agitation growing as he remembered the scene and ran back to him, holding his hand within both of hers. “I remember thinking that ... that if I could only put everything back as it was …” He choked, the sound turning to callous laugh as he pulled his hand away from hers. He moved into the room, never looking at the wall that bore his father’s image, and closed the curtains, his movements quick and precise, before turning and leaving the room. She ran out ahead of him, the sound of the door slamming shut echoing around the still house.

How did he live like this? Alone in this big, empty mausoleum? Even Longwold, though it was bigger and grander still, seemed to have more life, more warmth to it than this place. It felt as though Damerel had never seen the sun before.

He stalked back through the house, hurrying down the stairs, and she realised the tour was over, he would reveal nothing else, not now, not today. In all honesty, Crecy felt relief at that. Everything he had told her had horrified her and made her heart ache for the little boy that had lived through it. Good God, was it any wonder his outlook on life was so … so dark?

“You should go,” he said, as he reached the bottom of the stairs, walking away from her and into his study without a backwards glance. “Piper will have your horse brought around.”

Piper appeared at this moment, sympathy in his eyes as he regarded her, looking a little lost in the vast hallway as Gabriel slammed his study door shut.

“I’ll fetch your belongings, Miss Holbrook,” Piper said, moving to turn away.

“No,” Crecy replied, her tone determined as she walked to the study door. “I’m not leaving yet.”

She squared her shoulders and ignored the panic in the butler’s voice as he exclaimed from behind her.

“Miss Holbrook! I really shouldn’t …”

But Crecy had already gone through the door and closed it behind her.