CHAPTER 16
Robert had ridden for hours. He’d gone to the cottage, but finding no sign of Jillian there, he had returned to the house, hoping against hope that she would be back. When he didn’t find her, he was ready to head out again, but he decided to accost Douglas and Daniel first, in case they could help in any way.
“She’s out there somewhere, and I don’t know where.”
“She’s an excellent rider, and she knows this terrain. She’s going to be all right,” Douglas said firmly, but Robert could tell he wasn’t sure himself.
Theo walked in from the kitchen. “I’ll go with you, Robert,” he said. “Maybe I can think of a few places to look that might not occur to you.”
“Great, thanks.”
“Griff’s coming, too. He’s gone down to the barn to get our horses,” Theo said, pulling on a pair of gloves.
He left, and Robert stared from Daniel to Douglas. “Douglas, you were afraid of something happening to Jillian, afraid someone in this family was behind it. You don’t want that to be true, and neither do I. But you are worth a small fortune, and that can bring out the worst in people. You and Daniel have been fighting for weeks. What’s going on?”
They were going to answer him, by God. In the past hour, the fear he had been feeling had doubled, tripled. He hadn’t wanted to come here, to this house. At first it had been just gut instinct, but then he’d thought about the book. Morwenna had refused to leave her home because of her father. Jillian had insisted on coming here because of her grandfather. It was frighteningly similar.
As he’d ridden in search of her, he had hoped the ghost of Milo Anderson would appear to lead him in the right direction, which he knew was totally insane.
But all he had now was that insanity. He had to use it.
“The argument has nothing to do with Jillian,” Daniel said heatedly.
“What was it about?” Robert persisted.
“My sex life. Are you happy?”
Robert stared at Daniel, frowning.
“I’m not pleased with his choices,” Douglas said.
“And I’m not pleased that he thinks he has a right to pass judgment on my choices,” Daniel said flatly.
“There was rat poison in your desk,” Robert charged him.
Daniel’s frown seemed sincere. “In my desk? I got rid of all of it when you told me about the cat.”
“It was there.”
Before Daniel could respond, Griff burst into the room. “There’s a fire.”
“Where?” Douglas exploded.
Robert could barely breathe. “Where?” he repeated, terror filling him. Fire. She had dreamed of fire, had awakened screaming with terror. Fire…
“Where?” he thundered.
“I think it’s the cottage. If we—”
He was out of the house before Griff could finish speaking. He’d taken Igloo that day; he leapt back on him now. Griff reached his side, along with Theo, who was shouting that his horse was gone. “Go, go both of you! I’ll catch up. Who the hell has Cream?” he muttered. “Go!”
Robert needed no encouragement.
He had never ridden so hard in his life. Desperate as he was, he became aware of each slight sound, each nuance of scent. The day was cold, crisp. The sky was blue. His horse’s hooves made thunder, striking upon the ground. Distant thunder, muffled by the thick blanket of snow. The cold seeped into him, though he was sweating with fear.
His horse’s hooves seemed to beat out words. We will not make it. We will not make it.
He knew, suddenly, that history could repeat itself.
He knew that he had ridden through the snow before and failed. Now he had a second chance to save her. And if he failed again…? His heart was sick, and he was afraid.
“Robert, you’ll kill yourself, and we’ll never get to her!” Griff called to him.
“We’re almost there! The cottage is just ahead.”
“Oh Lord!” Griff shouted. “The flames…”
Robert gritted his teeth. He had to believe. But in what? Miracles? That he could ride into the fire and save her? He would. By God, he would.
* * *
With the fire racing up the stairs, she’d had no choice but to retreat—once she’d realized that she would die if she didn’t stop panicking. At first she had felt rooted to the spot, but now she hurried to the rear of the studio, then rushed into the bathroom to soak a towel to put over her face to filter out the smoke. Then she’d looked out into the night. It would be a long fall, but she would land in the snow. She wouldn’t let herself think about the rocks below the snow, cold and hard. Anything had to be better than the flames.
She could feel the flames, though they were not touching her. She knew the feel of fire.
She refused to know it again.
She opened the window, then realized with a moan that the storm window was up. As she searched desperately for something with which to break it, she could feel the floor growing hotter beneath her feet. She was suddenly terrified that it would collapse, dropping her into the fire.
He would come. He would not fail her again. She had to believe in the power of this second chance.
“Jillian!”
The voice was coming from outside. She rushed back to the window.
Robert was there, with Griff racing up behind him.
Robert was gesturing for her to get away from the window. She saw him dismount and pick up a dark object, large enough that it had not yet been fully covered by the snow. He drew his arm back, and she moved quickly away from the window.
The glass shattered inward. She leapt back as shards smashed around her. The object he had thrown rolled toward her, but she paid no attention. Robert was here!
Fire suddenly roared, breaking up through the floor. She rushed to the window.
Below her, the porch was being consumed in flames. Robert had remounted and sat on his horse just beyond the flames, staring at her. She realized that what he had thrown had been an old cannon ball. Milo had found several on the property and had kept them stacked outside. A cannonball that could still explode.
“Go.” The word was a whisper. And then she felt herself being shoved past the flames to the window.
Milo!
Below her, Robert was urging his terrified horse up to the edge of the burning porch. “Miracles!” he shouted. “You jump!”
Robert and the horse were almost directly below her; flames shooting everywhere around them. Around her.
Licking at her heels.
Nearly touching her flesh.
“Jump!” he yelled to her.
And she jumped….
She seemed to fall forever. In slow motion, she fell through time, the flames below her, but beyond them, so close, Robert. The man she loved. Loved in this life—and the last.
She landed in his arms, an inferno raging around them; cutting off all escape. Was that how it would end this time? The two of them burning together? But Robert looked into her eyes, features grim and dark with soot.
“Close your eyes,” he commanded. “Hold your breath.”
He slammed his heels into Igloo’s flanks. The horse shrieked, balked, reared.
And then Igloo leapt forward into the fire. Through the fire. He ran past the heat and into the cold, a world of snow and ice. Cold air wrapped around them, and her flesh was not burned. She seemed to hear nothing as they ran, no hooves upon the ground; they simply raced upon air, through the silence of a white world of snow, through time eternal….
Then sound returned, and she heard Igloo’s hooves hit the ground. Robert reined him in, and they turned, heading back to where Griff still waited.
They watched the house explode, the fire seeming to reach the sky.
It didn’t matter.
It wasn’t touching them.
Daniel and Theo had nearly reached the cottage, riding double on old Blossom, when they started back. Douglas was frantic, Daniel said. Then he looked closely at her and insisted that they had to get back to the house and call a doctor. She was probably suffering from smoke inhalation, he said when he heard her cough.
Sitting on Igloo, held close in Robert’s arms, she assured Daniel that she was fine, but she could tell that he didn’t believe her.
Back at the house, Douglas was standing at the door. His knees crumpled when he saw her; she ran to hold him up. Amelia hugged her, Henry cried, and Agatha rushed around with warm blankets and pots of tea.
It was some time before Griff said, “Just how the hell did the fire get started?”
“I don’t know, but we’ll find out,” Douglas said with rough determination. “But for now, clean up and get some warm clothes on before I lose one of you to pneumonia.”
Soot, the cold, none of it mattered. In her bedroom, Jillian did nothing but hold Robert for what seemed like hours. Then they showered, and finally they made love. They said little, too afraid to speak.
“Was that a miracle?” he asked her at last.
“Your lovemaking?” she teased. “Well, you were very good. Exceptional, actually. But a miracle…?”
“Jillian…”
“It’s a miracle. It’s all a miracle,” she whispered.
* * *
After their lovemaking, Robert dressed and went down to join the others, while Jillian opted for a bubble bath.
Eileen and Gary were in the living room with Douglas, Daniel, Theo, Griff and Robert. Jasper McClean, the sheriff, had come and gone, telling them they would have to wait for the ashes to cool before the investigators could even begin to find out what had caused the blaze.
“You folks were mighty lucky,” he had told them. “A cottage like that, with no fire escape…Well, it’s gone now. But Douglas, don’t you worry. We’ll get to the bottom of it.”
Now, when it was just family, they knew it was time to get to the truth.
“Did someone start it on purpose?” Eileen asked incredulously.
“I think so,” Robert said. “I think someone rode out there and purposely set the place on fire—knowing that Jillian was inside.”
“Not me—I don’t even like to ride,” Eileen said.
“I was here arguing with you,” Daniel reminded him curtly.
“You were at the stables, Griff.”
Griff stood defensively, hands on his hips. “Yeah, right. I can see where you’re going. Because of that book. Reliving history, that’s what you two think.”
“What are you talking about?” Douglas asked.
Robert shook his head, staring at Griff.
“I’m the bad guy, right—because I’m related, and I’m always joking with Jillian about marriage? So that makes me Sir Walter?”
“You tell me,” Robert said.
“Hell, no!”
“Don’t look at me,” Theo charged.
“Well, who was out today?” Robert demanded.
Daniel exhaled. “Oh my God. Where is Jillian now?”
“Taking a bath,” Robert said.
“Get up there with her,” Daniel insisted. “Until we know what really happened, you can’t leave her alone.”
* * *
She was relaxing, eyes closed, in the bubbles, when she heard the noise. She looked up, thinking Robert had come back.
It wasn’t Robert.
“What are you doing here?” she asked, more confused than angry.
“Daniel deserves that business. He’s the oldest male, and he’s worked for it. He’s put his life into it.”
“The business will go to all of us. Not that that has anything to do with you.” She sank lower in the tub, hiding beneath her camouflage of bubbles. “Look, I appreciate what you do for Daniel, I know he values your help. You—”
She broke off, frowning, as she stared at Gracie.
“You told me to go to the cottage!”
“But you got out,” Gracie shot back. “Daniel would never do anything to discredit you. Everyone adores you. You’re even in the commercials. You outshine him every day, in every way you can. He loves you too much to see what you’re doing to him. But he loves me, too. I know it. He needs me. So I went to him. I have my talents, you know. Talents outside the office. Daniel doesn’t even realize yet just how talented I am. You just haven’t been watching, paying attention. You could have found out so much, but you were only worried that your assistant, your friend, might have been having an affair with Daniel. I was worried, too. But all Connie was doing that night in Connecticut was telling him that she loved her husband, and that she hoped she and Daniel would always be the best of friends. I know, because I was listening. And now you have to notice me.”
“Gracie, get out,” she said wearily. Then her breath caught when she saw Gracie produce a gun. She stiffened in the midst of her bubbles, so much suddenly so clear.
“Gracie!”
The door burst open. Robert was there.
“She’s got a gun!” Jillian shouted.
Robert made a flying leap.
Gracie fired.
* * *
“A miracle,” Sister Catherine told Jillian on Christmas Day, shaking her head in disbelief.
“A miracle,” Jillian echoed. “Can you imagine what a clever woman she was? She killed the cat, then hid the poison in Daniel’s desk, knowing I would never seriously suspect him of anything, even if the poison were found and somehow connected to Jeeves’s death. She figured I would go riding, and even that I would insist on Robert taking Crystal again, so she rigged the saddle. She knew where the shoot was going to be in Florida, so she hired a couple of local college kids to weaken the branch. They thought it was for a movie stunt. The sledding accident was more like grasping at straws, but she planned that, as well. It was a long shot that might have worked. Anyone is welcome to use any of the cars in the garage, so Gracie drove down the road and ran into the fence herself. When we were all fooling around, she managed to see to it that I was the one heading toward the break in the fence. She couldn’t be sure that a car would speed by, but I might have been seriously hurt or killed anyway. And then there was the fire,” Jillian finished softly.
“Which Robert saved you from…but what about the bullet?”
“Robert hit Gracie’s arm, ruining her aim. The bullet hit the tub, ricocheted, then hit Gracie. They say she’ll be fine, though, so she can stand trial.”
Connie came running out of the dining room then, smiling. “The bird is on the table. Time for Christmas dinner.”
“Sister,” Jillian said, “we’d all love it if you would say grace. I have to warn you, though. We usually all put in a few words, a thank-you from each family member for what the year has brought. It’s a tradition. But it would be wonderful if you would begin for us.”
A few minutes later, Sister Catherine did just that. “Thank you, Lord, for the food that we are about to eat. Thank you for gathering us together here today. Thank you for second chances—”
“Thank you for this Christmas,” Jillian said, interrupting first, and far earlier than she had intended.
“Thank you for our daughter,” Eileen said softly, smiling down at the little hand wrapped in hers. Sister Catherine had brought Jenny, who had taken to Eileen and Gary immediately. The adoption would not take long.
“Thank you, God, for my family,” Douglas said. “And,” he added with a wink, “my new almost-blushing bride.”
“Thanks for watching out for my cousin,” Griff said gruffly.
“Thanks for protecting us all from harm,” Daniel said, feeling guilty for not realizing the depth—and danger—of Gracie’s obsession with him.
“Thanks for the really great girl I know you’re going to find for me this year,” Theo said. He smiled at Sister Catherine. “You sure you’re wedded to the Church?”
“I’m afraid so. However, if I weren’t…” She gave him a teasing grin.
Jillian spoke again. “Thank you,” she said, looking heavenward. “And thank you, Milo, wherever you are. I don’t think you’ll be coming back now. And, God, thank you so much for Robert. For my life. For our lives. Thank you very, very much—”
“For miracles,” Robert said.
And then he kissed her.
* * * * *