Lacybourne Manor

  She nodded

  “Yes,” she breathed then she said it again as the pleasure he was giving her washed over her, crying it into his ear as she heard him topple over the edge with her. “Yes, Colin, I’m yours.”

  Then after they both came down and she felt Colin’s breath against her neck, the weight and warmth of his body on hers, him still planted deep inside her, knew she loved all of that too.

  * * * * *

  Later, when he’d pulled her to his side, his arm came around her like a steel band, she realised he didn’t tell her he loved her in return. He made love to her with a ferocity they’d never experienced but he hadn’t said the words.

  She wanted to slide away, to find some privacy on the other side of the bed because she felt certain his not saying it meant he didn’t feel it. As she was preparing to do so, Bran delicately walked up the length of them, zig zagging across their bodies, his little kitty feet remarkably weighty. The cat jumped to the small of her back and curled there, his warm, furry body keeping her imprisoned in Colin’s arm.

  And that was when the depth of Sibyl’s emotions and her lovemaking with Colin finally stole over her and she relaxed against him, letting sleep take her. She didn’t notice before she fell into slumber, Colin’s iron arm had not loosened.

  * * * * *

  Colin lay awake and stared at the dark ceiling, listening to Sibyl’s soft breathing.

  Having all of Sibyl now laid bare to him and the additional gift of her love drove all ideas of peace and rest out of his mind.

  Her love was by far the finest possession he owned.

  And someone was trying to kill her.

  He felt an insidious, hated sense of fear steal over him and realised that, above all else, he had to focus all of his considerable energy on making certain that didn’t happen.

  Or die trying.

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Magic Dust

  Colin glanced out the rear-view mirror and saw the familiar car following them.

  The car had slid out behind them when they left Lacybourne that morning, stayed with them after their brief visit for Scarlett to check Mrs. Byrne and continued behind them all the way to Heathrow.

  And now, coming back to Clevedon, it was still there.

  Colin could see the black hair and alabaster face behind the wheel.

  Tamara Adams.

  No, a clearly not very clever, in fact, enormously stupid Tamara Adams.

  Colin was relatively certain it was also the car that nearly ran them down outside the restaurant.

  He ground his teeth.

  Sibyl had been desolate upon seeing her father and sister moving through the security area at Heathrow but Mags had swiftly cheered her spirits with chatter on the way home and for this alone, Colin was grateful for Mags’s company. Even though Sibyl and her mother had an odd relationship that was based half on exasperation, half on adoration, Mags knew exactly how to manipulate her daughter’s feelings, giving her a needed uplift.

  Slowly, the BMW’s smooth ride and her interrupted sleep last night came over her and Sibyl fell asleep with her head against the window.

  This, Mags (as any good mother would) noticed immediately and all chatter stopped. For fifteen minutes, Mags was surprisingly silent.

  Then she asked quietly, “Who’s that following us? Do you know her?”

  Startled, Colin’s eyes shot to the rear-view mirror to take in her knowing face. Mags was free-spirited and flighty but, Colin realised, she was also no fool.

  “Yes,” he answered brusquely.

  “Spurned lover?” Mags guessed correctly.

  Colin nodded then found himself saying, “The one I was with when I met Sibyl.”

  She immediately returned, “The one who was there when you met Billie?”

  He nodded again marking, for future reference, how much Sibyl told her mother.

  “Oh dear,” Mags sighed. “Well,” she brightened, “at least we know who and why. Now you just need to stop her.” She paused and glanced out of the window and said distractedly but with such certainty Colin was momentarily stunned, “I have every faith.”

  Colin watched as she settled back into her seat contentedly.

  Half an hour later, he pulled into Lacybourne only to see his mother’s blue Audi.

  “What in bloody hell?” he muttered under his breath.

  The change in speed coming off the motorway and manoeuvring of roundabouts had caused Sibyl to awaken but all the while, she kept a still sleepy silence.

  Now she spoke.

  “Who’s that?” she asked, her voice husky with sleep.

  “My mother,” Colin answered impatiently.

  “What’s she doing here?” The sweet sound of sleep was quickly leaving her voice and suspicion was edging in.

  “I, um, might have called her,” Mags said hesitantly from the back.

  Colin again swore under his breath.

  Sibyl’s head snapped around to scowl at her mother.

  “Why on the goddess’s green earth would you do a fool thing like that?” she cried, her sleepy voice a distant memory.

  Colin parked in the garage as mother and daughter squared off.

  “Colin was shot with a tranquilliser dart!” Mags defended herself. “She’s his mother. I thought she had the right to know!”

  “Don’t you think Colin should be the judge of that?” Sibyl returned angrily and if she hadn’t been so adorably peeved on his behalf, he might have kissed her for defending him.

  Before Sibyl’s temper could explode in a car that was much too small for the force of it, Colin broke in, “It’s done. There’s no sense arguing about it now.”

  Colin felt a bit more of Bertie’s lifetime of pain when both pairs of angry eyes moved to him and both women’s mouths opened to blast him with their wrath when he smoothly continued, “If anyone has the right to be upset it’s me and I’m not so that’s the end of it.”

  Both mouths snapped shut and Mags’s face instantly settled happily while Sibyl’s suffused with mutiny.

  “We’ll talk about this later,” she warned her mother as she alighted from the car.

  “Okay,” Mags agreed, unaffected by the threat and walked to the house.

  Colin surreptitiously glanced down the lane, didn’t see any sign of Tamara or her car and he put his hand in the back pocket of his jeans to grab his mobile.

  Sibyl stopped, waiting for him to walk to the house with her.

  “Go in, sweetheart, I need to make a call,” he directed her gently. “Tell Mum I’ll be in in a few minutes.”

  She looked at him closely then turned and, with no small amount of absorption, he watched her generous hips sway as she walked to the house.

  Then he called Robert Fitzwilliam.

  “Look into Tamara Adams. She’s been following us the entire day, all the way to Heathrow and back,” Colin ordered.

  “Got it. You still need Rick tomorrow?” Robert asked about the bodyguard Colin had engaged to watch Sibyl and now her mother and, much more recently, his mother.

  “Yes,” Colin answered.

  “Fine, he’ll be at your house at seven.”

  Colin flipped his mobile shut, not looking forward to the upcoming conversation with Sibyl about her future bodyguard.

  With resignation, Colin went in to greet his mother.

  * * * * *

  Sibyl sat next to Colin in Mrs. Byrne’s magic room.

  Across from them, Mrs. Byrne, who was still not her usual, vital self, was moving around carefully as if her body was a fragile thing. Still, she was muttering chants as she clinked and clacked amongst a plethora of vials, shakers, mortars and pestles, and other extraordinary flotsam and jetsam of witch paraphernalia she kept in her magic room. A room, done up in plums and roses, tassels and velvets, shelves and spindly tables carrying strange and fascinating objects, it looked like a set right out of a movie.

  Phoebe, who had come into the story late and was still processing it, sat silent
ly across the room, staring stupefied at Marian’s activity.

  Angie, Mrs. Byrne’s daughter, was assisting her mother as if they did this kind of thing every day.

  Mags was sitting next to Phoebe barely able to hold herself still, alight with glee.

  Sibyl slid a cautious glance toward Colin who was not happy at all. He was obviously dubious and it was just as obvious he wished to be somewhere else. He was sitting with one ankle casually resting on his other knee, slouched arrogantly and one of his arms was lying across the back of Sibyl’s chair.

  Regardless of his nonchalant position, he seemed wired, ready to pounce.

  Since returning from Heathrow, Sibyl noticed that something had changed in him. He seemed impatient and energetic, like a big cat prowling back and forth in front of its cage in a zoo, desperate to get out.

  Sibyl thought, looking at him, that perhaps it hadn’t been wise to push this magical protection spell thing that afternoon. He hadn’t wanted to come and now that he was there, it was blindingly obvious he very much didn’t want to be.

  However, Sibyl had a plan. In fact, she had two plans and she needed to talk to Marian about them because she needed the older woman’s help.

  She’d been thinking about it in an effort not to think about her confession of love last night and the fact that it was not returned.

  Sibyl believed this was all more than lucky coincidence. That it all fit together. That there was magic and mayhem in the air and Sibyl had to find a way to stop it.

  As crazy as it all seemed, Sibyl believed Mrs. Byrne.

  Colin could hire dozens of private investigators if he wanted to but Sibyl was going to investigate the magical side.

  “Now!” Mrs. Byrne announced happily, turning toward Sibyl and Colin and taking Sibyl from her thoughts. Phoebe jumped nervously as Mags leaned forward in excitement. “I started this weeks ago, so it’s been fermenting nicely,” Mrs. Byrne explained. “I’ve added a few of my own, personal touches and left it to marinade this morning. It should do the trick.”

  She sounded like she was talking about a recipe for chicken.

  “She’s very good,” Angie stated proudly, her eyes on her mother.

  Mrs. Byrne moved forward with a glass vial in one hand that had a powder in it that looked like cinnamon, a common kitchen strainer in the other.

  Marian moved directly toward Colin.

  “This won’t hurt a bit,” she assured and lifted the vial and strainer over his head.

  “What,” his voice was low and even and very, very frightening but not nearly as frightening as the hard, cold look on his face, a look and tone that froze Marian’s hands in mid air, “do you think you’re going to do with that?”

  “Why, pour it over your head,” Marian explained as if it was the most normal thing in the world.

  He lithely slid out of his chair, out from under the strainer and towered over her. “I think not.”

  Marian’s face set resolutely. “My dear man –”

  “Do me!” Sibyl interjected, finding herself in the role of peacemaker. If she didn’t step in, by the look on his face, Colin was likely to explode. “You can do me first, I don’t mind.”

  Marian turned to Sibyl. “The most potent effects of the charm come in the first few sprinkles,” Marian explained, “and Colin –”

  “By all means, shower away on Sibyl, especially if they are the most potent,” Colin cut in. He’d crossed his arms on his chest and now, instead of looking furious, he looked amused.

  Sibyl made a face at him which caused him, to her great distress, to let out a sharp bark of laughter.

  Marian sagely ignored him and muttered to Sibyl, “This won’t take even a minute, dear.”

  And then she lifted the strainer over Sibyl’s head and poured the cinnamon concoction in and Sibyl waited to be dusted with its rusty, brown contents.

  Instead, to her utter amazement, the minute the brown powder sifted through the strainer, it sparkled and glittered brightly, raining down on her like fairy dust, disappearing altogether the minute it touched her hair, her skin, her clothes.

  “Oh… my… goddess,” Mags breathed.

  Phoebe’s mouth gaped open and stayed that way.

  Colin’s eyes narrowed.

  “That’ll do.” Marian swiftly pulled the strainer and vial way.

  “You see!” Sibyl, feeling hope for the first time, a witness to obvious magic (with pixie dust and all!), she shot out of her chair with excitement. “Oh Colin, this might possibly work!”

  “Of course it’ll work,” Angie grumbled.

  Colin did not appear, in any way, shape or form, to be convinced.

  “I fail to see –” he began but she ran to him, flattening her palms against his abdomen, she leaned into him.

  “Please do it, for me?” she begged, looking beseechingly into his doubting eyes.

  He stared at her a moment and then, to her delight, gave in, though not at all gracefully.

  And he did this by muttering, “For Christ’s sake,” before he sat down to get his sprinkling.

  When all was done, Colin announced, “I need to make a few calls, I’ll be out front.” And he marched out of the magic room, the very picture of affronted male dignity and, if possible, Sibyl’s love for him deepened.

  Oblivious to all of this, Angie chimed in happily, “Time for a cuppa,” and she herded a still stunned Phoebe and an excitedly chattering Mags into the kitchen.

  Sibyl hung back with Mrs. Byrne who was cleaning her magical implements.

  “Mrs. Byrne. You’ve done so much and at great personal cost –” Sibyl charged right in to begin work on her plan, time was of the essence.

  “No cost at all, dear, it’s my pleasure, it’s my destiny.” Although still not fully back to herself, Mrs. Byrne was obviously in her element, enjoying every second of this.

  Sibyl approached her and watched her working. “I need to ask you a favour.”

  Marian threw her a smile and immediately replied, “Anything.”

  Sibyl smiled back at her.

  Then she asked, “If you can bring Royce forward, could you send me back?”

  Marian’s hands stopped what they were doing and she turned to Sibyl with questioning eyes. “Of course, dear, it’s very basic magic, though a costly endeavour in time and energy but why would you want to do that?”

  Sibyl quickly explained, “I’ve been waiting to have another dream memory but I haven’t had one in ages. I think now, if I went back, maybe he would recall me or I could get him to listen to me. If I go back, I can tell him what’s going to happen and he can be prepared for it, fight it, keep himself and Beatrice alive and…”

  She trailed off when Mrs. Byrne turned back to her task while shaking her head.

  “No, no. As much as I’d like to, you don’t mess with time. Never.” She paused thoughtfully, as if considering it. Then shook her head again, sadly and finished, “Ever.”

  “But Marian, don’t you see? If we stop the curse before it starts –”

  Marian set down the strainer which had been cleaned with some clear fluid in an oddly shaped, cork-topped bottle and she turned to Sibyl. “Sibyl, as lovely as it would be to allow their love to blossom and grow, if we change time and Royce and Beatrice lived, then the whole world could change. It could be good or it could be bad. We don’t know; we’d have no way of ever knowing. It could be that you or Colin or the both of you would never exist. Or me. Or my children. Or Japan could fall into the ocean. Anything could happen.”

  “It couldn’t be that bad and if –”

  Marian put her hand out to touch Sibyl’s cheek.

  “No,” she said in a quiet voice, trying to soften the blow of her refusal.

  Sibyl closed her eyes.

  So much for Plan A, now she had to try Plan B.

  “Okay, I have another idea.”

  “I’m all ears,” Marian informed her and then went to sit down in a plush, worn, plum-coloured, velvet chair with a doily han
ging on the back of it. Sibyl took a seat beside her, took a deep breath, pinned her hopes on her words and plunged ahead.

  “You can give me the potion you gave Colin and give some to him. But more this time, so that Royce and Beatrice could come forward for long enough to consummate their love using our bodies.”

  Marian’s eyes widened and she pulled in a swift breath. Sibyl found this encouraging and she forged ahead.

  “The time before, it didn’t last long so it would have to last long enough for them to have time to, um… do it. They’d know each other immediately, I know it. Even though the time has changed, the place has changed and our hair has changed. I know they’d recognise each other. We could…” She stopped because she making up the entirety of the plan as she went along then she hit on it. “Write them a note! Tell them what to do. Then they could stop the curse and give Colin and me time, without this hanging over our heads, to…”

  Again, she trailed to a stop when Mrs. Byrne shook her head.

  “Sibyl, my dear, that is a very volatile potion. Anything could go wrong with that. I took a grave risk the last time and was very lucky with the outcome. And, it cannot be taken in large doses under any circumstances. It could catastrophic.”

  “But why?” Sibyl cried. She needed either Plan A or Plan B because Plan C was unthinkable.

  Plan C meant that in order to save Colin, she’d have to leave him. It was all about them being together, Marian had told them that and she knew it was true in her heart. The minute she left, he’d be safe again.

  “One of the souls could get stuck, forever, in the present, leaving either you or Colin in some horrible limbo for eternity. Obviously, I either hit it right or Colin has no other incarnations but you could have. What if I brought forward someone else, something else? A bee, for example. A samurai. No, it doesn’t bear contemplating.” Looking at Sibyl’s dejected expression she leaned forward and patted her hand. “I’m sorry, my dear. They are clever ideas but you’re just going to have to tell him you love him.”

  She smiled at Sibyl with knowing eyes and Sibyl’s heart sank.

  “I already did,” Sibyl whispered.

  Marian’s face glowed. “Well done! And?”