Lacybourne Manor

  She was pulling food out of the fridge and cupboards to make dinner, just to have something to do while Colin considered her next torment. She might as well be fortified enough to suffer it.

  Bran came through the cat door, looked at his bowl of food which was full of biscuits, his expression showing his distaste for this repast and looked at her. His meaning was clear.

  “You aren’t getting any more wet food, you had some this morning,” she snapped at her cat.

  Bran regarded her haughtily for a moment then, although cats couldn’t shrug, still it seemed Bran did so and then trotted out of the kitchen.

  “Greedy little minx,” Sibyl muttered under her breath as she slammed a pot on the stove. “He’d weigh two stone if I didn’t dole out food like a prison warden.” She knew she sounded like a lunatic, muttering to herself, but she also didn’t care.

  A movement at the doorway caught her eye and her head jerked up to see Colin leaning against the doorjamb watching her.

  “What now?” Her words where sharp.

  “Sibyl, a warning,” Colin replied softly. “You’ve had a reprieve, you should be careful with it.”

  “Meaning?” she retorted.

  “Meaning, if I were you, I wouldn’t push me,” he replied.

  “No, I mean the reprieve,” she prompted.

  “I promised not to take you on the table; I won’t take you on the table. That’s what I mean,” he explained.

  Instantly, her eyes locked with his, Sibyl felt something in her shift.

  It was slight and if she wasn’t in a heightened emotional state, she might have missed it.

  But she knew he wasn’t giving her this reprieve because of a promise; he was doing it because he was a decent person. He had a temper that could rival hers (even best hers most of the time) but having the thought of doing something cruel, and voicing the thought, was nothing at all to doing the thought.

  If he had done what he said he was going to do, she would never have forgiven him.

  And he knew that so he didn’t do what he said he was going to do so that would never stand between them.

  Relief flooded through her but she carefully tucked it, and her thoughts, away.

  Instead, she asked, “Do you want some dinner?”

  She was not going to thank him for not “taking” her on the table but offering him dinner was the closest she would get.

  “Will it be vegetarian?” he asked mildly.

  “Of course.”

  “Then we’ll go out,” he decided.

  * * * * *

  Colin did punish her, although not by having sex with her on her father’s table.

  He excruciatingly slowly made her climax with his hands and mouth while he watched and, through it all, he refused to allow her to touch him, kiss him or turn to him nor did he slide inside her, no matter how much she begged.

  It was magnificent.

  And after, when she’d whispered not-at-all-convincingly, “I think I hate you,” then he’d taken her, her fully sensitized body so raw and open she’d actually cried out the second time she came and he feared she drew blood when she bit him on the shoulder.

  That had been beyond magnificent.

  Earlier, he’d been so furious with not being able to contact her, he couldn’t think of anything else. In fact, for a week without her when he was in London, he couldn’t think of anything but her. The minute the train came into Yatton, he drove directly to the cottage, not even stopping at Lacybourne. He didn’t intend to wait another moment to have her in his arms.

  He was even dreaming of her, except he knew he was Royce and she was Beatrice, dark hair and medieval clothing. She called him Royce in the dreams and she stared at him with all the love in the world in her eyes. He had them every night and they were most vivid dreams he’d ever had.

  But she had not been at the cottage when he arrived and was not answering her phone.

  Colin was not used to not having what he wanted the moment he wanted it. And he didn’t like that at all.

  He also didn’t like that he seemed to have an insatiable desire not only for her body, but for her company but she much preferred to be somewhere else, even after days apart. He’d always been pursued, chased, seducing only when that game needed to be played. He was a target, a trophy, all the woman of his experience grasping and sucking everything they could from him. Not once had Colin met a woman who had her own life, her own interests or anything outside her pursuit of him. He had never been in this position and found he contradictorily loathed it and admired it.

  Then she’d shouted at him about her “girls” and something shifted in him through her speech.

  Her eyes were furious; blazing with an intensity he’d never seen the like on her or anyone. Even though she refused to allow him into that part of her life, had been for days keeping him at arm’s length, carefully guarding anything personal, he knew those girls, whoever they were, were so important to her she’d likely lay down her life for them.

  Or throw fifty thousand pounds at them.

  He knew from her expression this afternoon that the money was gone and he also knew, most likely, she hadn’t spent it on herself.

  It was time to find out just who the hell Sibyl Godwin was.

  Robert Fitzwilliam was due to make a report in a week.

  Colin was going to give him until Tuesday.

  Chapter Twelve

  Potion

  Marian Byrne slid behind the wheel of her car and told her windshield, “Sometimes, it’s good to be old.”

  The windshield, as with many of the inanimate objects Marian found herself talking to since her husband Arthur died, didn’t answer back.

  She started the car, put it into gear and thought about the last hour of her life.

  No one questioned an old lady wandering around the office, no one said word one when she walked through, giving a breezy wave to the security guard, and headed (slowly) up the three flights of stairs to Colin Morgan’s office.

  When his harried secretary ran into the kitchen to make Colin a cup of coffee, Marian was waiting, sitting at the table and knitting. Although she didn’t knit and didn’t know what she was doing, no one really noticed anything but masses of yarn and the clicking of the needles. Knitting was what stereotypical old ladies did and, since Marian was in disguise, she felt it was a good prop.

  She was right; the secretary barely reacted when Marian spoke.

  “Would you like me to make that for you, dear?” she’d offered in her kindliest, old lady voice.

  She knew it was Colin’s secretary, Mandy. She’d been paying close attention to a lot of things about Colin Morgan’s Bristol offices since she began her stakeout some time ago. Colin worked later than everyone, his secretary left the building a quarter of an hour before him every night.

  The Mandy’s startled eyes came to Marian.

  “Who are you?” she asked.

  “Oh, I’m Neil’s mother. Come for a visit,” Marian lied.

  She knew a Neil worked there, on that very floor. She had sat next to him at lunch one day in the busy café down the street. There were no other tables and she was “forced” to ask him to share his table with a tired, old, talkative lady who just needed a cuppa and a rest of her weary feet. Being a polite young man, he’d agreed. He’d also (somewhat magically, Marian had to admit) talked a great deal about the comings and goings at the office and how a girl he liked, the boss’s secretary, was too tired to go out to drinks after work because her boss always worked her later than anyone else.

  “I’m making coffee for Mr. Morgan, he’s kind of picky about his coffee,” Mandy explained, breaking into Marian’s thoughts.

  Marian had no doubt Colin Morgan was picky about his coffee.

  Marian thought the young secretary looked like she had a great many other things she would prefer to be doing rather than making coffee.

  “I think I can handle coffee, dear. How does he take it?”

  The girl hesitated only
briefly before her expression changed and then she looked thrilled to have one less task. With vows of gratitude, she gave Marian instructions and left.

  And then Marian carefully made the coffee, not wanting Mandy to get into trouble and definitely needing Colin to drink it. When she was finished, she surreptitiously took the vial from her old lady handbag (she didn’t normally carry such an unfashionable handbag but she was undercover). She tipped the concoction in the drink and stirred. Colin liked his coffee strong; a splash of milk, no sugar, the potion wouldn’t change the taste one bit (she hoped).

  Mandy rushed back in and Marian handed her the steaming mug and was flashed a grateful smile.

  Then Marian made good her escape, again without anyone even looking at her.

  Now, wending her way through the hated Bristol traffic, Marian went through the ingredients of the potion in her mind.

  It would take awhile to work; hopefully he would be back to Sibyl by the time it happened.

  Of course, it could start working earlier, or later, or do something entirely different than it was supposed to. She liked to call it her “volatile cocktail”. Marian thought that was amusing and she vastly preferred to be amused than to be consumed with worry about all the appalling things which could go wrong with her cocktail. This was very advanced magic and could backfire easily.

  It was a huge risk but Marian felt it was a risk she had to take.

  Hopefully, the coffee made it to Colin. She’d hate to think what would happen if some other person drank it. Someone with, perhaps, a rather unsavoury past life who might go on a killing spree and would genuinely not remember it.

  Never mind, Marian thought, these were the risks one took when in pursuit of facilitating true love.

  Then Marian resolutely set these thoughts aside and hummed to herself the rest of the way home.

  * * * * *

  Sibyl was working in her laboratory in the Summer House in her back garden.

  Janis Joplin was blaring from the radio and Sibyl was singing with Janis about Bobby McGee. It was six o’clock and the days were much longer since daylight savings time began. They were also back to being unseasonably warm. The cold, grey spell had started the day Colin went away but it cleared the evening he returned. The sun was shining day after day, the tulips were out, the trees were budding, the hyacinths had opened and life was good on this green earth.

  Well, mostly.

  Colin would soon be at her house, arriving sometime between seven thirty and eight, the way he was nearly every night except the weekends. The weekends, he stayed with her almost all the time (the weekend before, most of this spent in bed). This past weekend, he went into the office for several hours on Sunday.

  But on Saturday, he took her to Durham Park. When they arrived at the ticket counter, Sibyl was shocked to find he was not a National Trust member and therefore forced him to buy a membership on the spot (she did this by attempting to buy one for him, which he refused to accept). This he did with ill-grace and then muted anger when she announced to The National Trust volunteer that he was the owner of Lacybourne.

  “Imagine!” she’d fumed. “He owns a National Trust property and he isn’t a member! It’s a crime!”

  The volunteer had agreed wholeheartedly and gratefully accepted Colin’s money.

  Colin had punished her for this episode by kissing her, quite thoroughly (to shut her up, he said), in front of a busload of pensioners who looked on with avid curiosity. When Colin was done, a couple of them even clapped.

  He later took her out for the most delicious dinner she’d ever had at a French restaurant in Bath. The owner was French and, upon hearing Sibyl’s pronunciation of her order, came forward from behind the bar and, in French, asked if she spoke his language. Sibyl forgot herself for a moment, told him she did and they had a hilarious five minute conversation (somewhat stilted, as she was out of practice but he was very patient) about the episode at Durham Park.

  When the owner clapped Colin on the back, shook his hand and left, Colin turned speculative eyes to her. She immediately regretted losing herself in the conversation.

  “Sorry, it’s been so long since I’ve practised, I was all over the place. I… um, speak French by the way,” she informed him, feeling somehow exposed at letting her guard slip and wishing she’d kept her mouth shut.

  “I gathered,” he replied drily but said nothing else on the subject.

  They spent a great deal of time together but in all that time he never once took her to Lacybourne. And for this she was glad for it meant he, too, was guarding himself from her.

  She needed that.

  Something had changed between them, something shifted, something dangerous to the health of her heart.

  That morning after her breakfast with Marian, even though it was her day off, Sibyl had taken a trip in to the Council Estate to visit Meg and because Kyle was bringing back the minibus. The volunteers and oldies had all been elated and everyone signed up to ride the new bus. Kyle was finishing the driver’s course and Jem’s art group were going to use it for some outings. It was the talk of the estate. The bus would be in action in a week and Sibyl was thrilled.

  In order to have a visit and share this news, Sibyl took some food to Meg who was not doing very well, finding recovery difficult.

  “Oh don’t look that way,” Meg admonished softly when Sibyl’s face filled with worry. “I’m old, Billie, and I’m not in pain. I’m resigned to the former and happy for the latter.”

  Sibyl knew that Meg was lying. She could see the deeper lines of pain that had formed around her friend’s mouth but she didn’t say anything.

  Now, in her laboratory, Sibyl was pouring some perfumed salts into wide, fat glass jars, affixing their black lids and labelling them with a white label with “Wicked Apothecary” (her brand name, chosen by her Dad) in bold, emerald-coloured, calligraphy script. The label had the picture of a black cat with its back arched and its bushy tail straight up (chosen by her Mom). She wrote the scent of the salts on the jar in her handwriting (a personal touch) this batch was ylang ylang and lavender.

  Throughout doing this, Sibyl was singing with Janis, now about a Mercedes Benz, when, with no warning and for no reason, the CD stopped right before the door to the Summer House crashed open.

  She whirled around to stare.

  Colin was there.

  Except, with one look at him, she knew it wasn’t Colin, even though it was.

  She studied him and felt a shimmer of fear run up her spine, alongside it an evocative thrill.

  She knew in an instant, looking at his face, into his eyes, that it was Colin but it was also someone else entirely.

  And because of this peculiarity, and the familiar look in his eyes she couldn’t quite place, she braced.

  “What are you wearing?” he barked and Sibyl jumped at his fierce tone.

  He didn’t even sound like Colin, yet he did.

  She was wearing a white, lacy, gypsy camisole with wide straps edged in lace and a pair of her oldest jeans that had a rip in the knee and a tear just below the right cheek of her bottom. Her feet were bare and her hair was screwed up in a clip.

  Her hands went immediately to the clip and tore it out of her hair. His eyes followed the action as her hair came down in a tumble around her face and shoulders.

  And it was then, he roared (yes, roared) “What have you done to your hair?” and he did this as his eyes narrowed dangerously so Sibyl jumped again.

  “Colin?” she asked in a timid voice.

  He was across the short space to her in one angry stride, pulling her to him with his hands closing around her upper arms so painfully she cried out. He ignored her and crushed her to his body.

  “Why do you use this name when you’re with me?” His voice was full of warning and his eyes were hard. “I no longer find it amusing.”

  His hands were biting into her flesh and she stared at him, filled with terror.

  She’d looked into those eyes before, she k
new those eyes.

  “Royce?” she ventured.

  At the sound of her uncertainty, he pushed her slightly away and shook her roughly. So roughly that her teeth clattered together and her head snapped back.

  She grabbed onto his upper arms to steady herself but as quickly as he shook her, he stopped. He seemed to notice where he was and she watched as he stared around the room. He took in her jars and bottles, the essential oils neatly labelled and stacked on shelves. The vats of ingredients carefully lined up on the floor. The huge mixing bowls and paddles she used. The rolls of stickers with which she labelled her products.

  “What is this? You’re at the witch’s cottage. Are you a witch? Have you bewitched me?” he rapped out these questions in quick succession, his voice low and even. The same voice Colin used when he was very angry but controlling it with an effort of will.

  “Royce, you’re –”

  She stopped speaking when she saw that something was changing in him. It changed his eyes, his face, even the line of his frame. It was something even more otherworldly than before.

  Then, suddenly, his hands gentled, his eyes warmed and they roved over her face. They did this as if he hadn’t seen her in years. Indeed, as if he hadn’t seen her in centuries.

  As if she was the most precious creature in the entire universe.

  Her stomach did a somersault.

  Then he lifted one hand to her hair. Capturing a tendril at the side of her face, he twirled it in his fingers tenderly.

  “Oh Beatrice,” he murmured, his voice thick and throaty but she knew he was not speaking to her, he was talking to someone else. Someone who wasn’t there. And his voice so filled with pain that Sibyl felt a lump form in the base of her throat. “I gave you my hair.”

  She had no idea what he was talking about but, at the tender ache in his voice, the pain stark in his eyes, she felt compelled to lay her hand on his cheek. “Royce?”

  His gaze slowly shifted to hers.

  “You’re so like her.” His voice was now soft, his eyes unbelievably warm. “So like her.” He cupped her face worshipfully in his hands, making her knees go week. “But not her.”