His Wicked Charm Read online

  “I wondered if my father might have left me something,” Lilah said. “Not in his will, but perhaps a personal object.”

  “I’m not sure what you mean, miss.”

  “I thought you might know where he would have put something he wanted me to have.”

  Con added, “Or perhaps he wrote something down for Lilah.”

  “His notebook?” the valet asked. “He burned that, I remember. He wasn’t sleeping well there at the end. One night I brought him a cup of hot milk, hoping it would help him sleep, and he was standing at the fireplace, ripping pages from that little book and tossing them in the fire.” Seeing Lilah’s stricken expression, he added, “I’m sorry, miss. I should have realized that he was ill. But he’d been distressed for some months before that—he and Mr. Dearborn had had a disagreement, a falling-out of some sort, and I just thought his spirits were low because of that.”

  “A disagreement? About what?” Con asked. He felt as disappointed as Lilah looked. Why would Sir Virgil have burned that notebook? What had been in it?

  “I really couldn’t say, sir. But Mr. Dearborn looked like thunder when he left, and after that he never came to Barrow House.” Roberts added, “Please don’t fret about the notebook, Miss Lilah. I don’t think there was much in it that he hadn’t already put down in his letter to you.”

  “His letter? What letter?” Lilah stared.

  Roberts frowned. “Why, the one he left for you with Mr. Cunningham.”

  “His attorney? He left a letter to me with his attorney?”

  “Yes, miss.”

  “Are you certain that he gave this letter to Mr. Cunningham?” Con asked. This thing was becoming more of a tangle with everything they discovered, it seemed.

  “Yes, of course, sir. I was there when Mr. Cunningham came to the house with the will for him to sign. I brought their tea. Sir Virgil gave him the letter then, and Mr. Cunningham put it in his portfolio.”

  “But...I didn’t receive any letter from Mr. Cunningham,” Lilah protested. “Only the will.”

  “It wouldn’t have been at the time of his death, miss. I’m rather sure he told Mr. Cunningham the letter should go to you on your twenty-first birthday.”

  “That was last year.”

  “I’m sorry, miss,” he said helplessly.

  “It’s not your fault,” Lilah reassured him. “I just—” She turned to Con. “I don’t know what happened. Mr. Cunningham never sent me a letter on my birthday or any other time.”

  “We’ll have to have a visit with Mr. Cunningham,” Con said grimly.

  “Oh. Sir. Miss.” Roberts looked apologetic. “Mr. Cunningham’s no longer here. He retired last year to Bath.”

  “Of course he did.” Con went on, “Do you know what was in the letter?”

  The old man shook his head. “No. I think it must have been a very private matter. He told me nothing about it. Perhaps he had the feeling that he was going to die soon. Sir Virgil was always sensitive that way.”

  “Yes. Of course.” Lilah forced a smile.

  They stayed a few minutes longer, chatting with the man about more pleasant memories. But as soon as they were outside again, Lilah turned to Con. “Father did leave me a letter about the Sanctuary.” Despite the disappointment, there was a note of satisfaction in her voice.

  “It might have been a personal message of farewell, but my guess is he was worried about the Sanctuary,” Con said. “He and Dearborn had an argument over something. After that he was distressed. Then he wrote you a letter to give to you on your twenty-first birthday. Which would have given you ample time before this pact with the Sanctuary would have needed renewal.”

  “But why didn’t Mr. Cunningham give it to me?”

  “I don’t know. But we’ll find out. His records must still be around somewhere. Maybe he had a partner who continued the business.”

  “I think his son was with him.”

  “Very well. As soon as we get home, we’ll go to the village and find him. Maybe he was just careless and forgot to do it in the bustle of his retiring, as Roberts said. It could still be sitting there in his files.”

  However, their plans were interrupted when they rode into the courtyard at Barrow House and saw an unfamiliar carriage. “Good Lord, another visitor?” Con said in disgust. “Who now?”

  His question was answered when they entered the house and heard voices coming from down the hall—including one very familiar man’s tone. “Alex!”

  Con strode down the hallway, Lilah hurrying after him. They found Alex and Sabrina sitting in the drawing room, having tea with Aunt Vesta. Alex was already on his feet and crossing the room when Con stepped through the doorway.

  “Con!” Alex laughed. “What the devil have you gotten into now?”

  The two men laughed, clasping hands and clapping each other on the arm in masculine greeting, before abandoning dignity and hugging each other.

  “Sabrina! Alex!” Lilah swept into the room after Con, holding out her arms to embrace her friend.

  Laughing and chattering, the four of them exchanged excited greetings.

  Aunt Vesta, with unaccustomed tact, took her farewell of the group and went upstairs, leaving the two couples alone.

  “What are you doing here?” Con asked Alex. “You’re supposed to be in America.”

  “We were,” Alex replied. “But then, well...” He shrugged.

  “You knew Con needed help?” Lilah suggested.

  “Just a minute,” Con protested. “I don’t need help.”

  “I knew Con was...something. Not in danger, or I’d have cabled a warning. But something strong.”

  “Sit down and have another cup of tea, and I’ll tell you all about it,” Con said.

  The telling of it lasted through several cups of tea and cakes, as well. When Con finished describing their most recent discoveries and fruitless searches, there was a long moment of silence. Then Alex said, “Honestly, Con, I cannot leave you alone for a moment, can I?”

  Con laughed. “Oh, I can manage to get into scrapes with or without you. And I had Lilah here to tether me.” He looked over at Lilah, and out of the corner of his eye, he could see his twin’s suddenly sharpened gaze going from Con to Lilah and back.

  But Alex said only, “So you have to find this place by Midsummer Day? That’s only a week away.”

  “Unfortunately, we’re well aware of that. But now that you two are here, we can speed up the search.”

  “Then I guess you’d better show us this book.” Alex set aside his cup and stood up.

  Con led them to the Clock Room, taking the longer route so that Alex could see the rest of the old wing. His brother’s reaction to the Great Hall was everything Con could have hoped for. If possible, Alex’s eyes grew even brighter when they stepped out of the stairwell into the silent gallery.

  “Wonderful Elizabethan glass.” Alex stopped and peered through a window. “Is that a maze?”

  “Yes, it’s overgrown but a good pattern. I’ll take you out there tomorrow. Then there are the dungeons.”

  “The dungeons?” Delight lit up Alex’s face, mirroring Con’s.

  Sabrina, with a roll of her eyes to Lilah, linked her arm through her husband’s and propelled him forward. “I always thought this gallery was so eerie.” Sabrina gave a delicate shiver at the memory. When they stopped outside the tower room, she said, “But I don’t remember this room.”

  “We never went in here,” Lilah told her. “I don’t think my governess ever let us get this far.”

  Con opened the door and stepped aside, his eyes on his twin’s face. Alex entered the room after Sabrina and stopped, staring all around him in amazement.

  “Good Lord. Look at all those clocks.” He frowned. “It’s like that dream you—” He stopped, turning to Con in dawning realization.

  �
��It’s exactly like it,” Con confirmed. “I recognized it the instant I walked in.”

  “Exactly like what?” Sabrina asked, puzzled. “What dream?”

  “A nightmare Con kept having before our wedding.” Alex glanced over at Con. “A room with curved walls—I should have thought of a tower.”

  “What a thing to dream about,” Sabrina said. Her eyes turned to the steps across the room leading downward. “What’s downstairs? More collections?”

  “No, the rest is only stairs leading down to the outside door,” Lilah answered. “There aren’t entrances into the house on the other floors.”

  Con snorted. “There isn’t even a landing at the next floor down, only the stairs going around and around. It’s enough to make one dizzy.”

  “Like a lighthouse.” Alex went down a few steps to look around, then trotted back up. “Lilah, your home is a treasure trove.”

  “A treasure trove of oddity,” Lilah said wryly. “You may explore it all you wish.” She glanced from him to Sabrina. “You are going to stay with us for a while, I hope.”

  “We’re opening up Carmoor again,” Sabrina replied. “Alex and I would like to try living here. I loved it when I was a child. We brought a few servants with us to get it in order, and we’ll hire the rest of the staff here.”

  “That will take days. You must stay here with us in the meantime. We can all look for the Sanctuary. It will be great fun. Won’t it, Con?”

  “Of course.” Con wondered if Lilah was aware of the natural way she had turned toward him, the inclusion of him in issuing the invitation. “That’s settled. Let’s look at the book.”

  He pulled the book from the cabinet and handed it to Alex and Sabrina. Sabrina shook her head in amazement. “This is so unbelievable. I hardly know what to make of it.”

  “You could find nothing about the location of the tunnel?” Alex asked. “How did Sir Ambrose find it?”

  “By reading one of our ancestors’ journal. Unfortunately, he didn’t explain it further, and the journal is more or less illegible now.”

  “What are these designs on the cover?” Sabrina asked, tracing the symbols with her forefinger. “They’re lovely.”

  “They’re triskeles. Sir Ambrose had an obsession with threes. The spirals, we’ve read, mean eternity or perhaps an endless rebirth. It was an important symbol to him. One can find them as decorations all over.”

  “Yes, and I’ve examined every one of them,” Con added. “I can’t help but think they’re involved somehow, given Sir Ambrose’s affection for them. But I’ve pushed and prodded and twisted every blasted one I could find, and I haven’t been able to find one that opens anything.”

  “Alex,” Lilah said suddenly. “I just had a thought. Perhaps you could—I mean, do you feel anything from it?”

  Alex shook his head, rubbing his hand over the leather front. “Excitement, anticipation, but that’s recent, probably you and Con. I can tell it’s been in Con’s hands.” He shrugged and handed the book to Sabrina. “I can try it with this old journal, but the older something is, the harder it is to read.”

  They were all quiet for a moment, contemplating their lack of discovery. Sabrina, once again gliding her fingertips across the gilt symbols, said, “You know...this is probably silly, but if you’re looking for spirals, what about the one we’re standing on?” She nodded toward the steps leading down into the circular staircase.

  “My God,” Con breathed. “Do you suppose? Hidden in plain sight.”

  Almost as one, they hurried to the staircase and started down the stairs. “The most likely place would be in the floor at the foot of the stairs, don’t you think?” Con asked. “A trapdoor into either the tunnel itself or another staircase?”

  Alex agreed, but still all of them scanned the walls of the tower as they descended. When they reached the bottom floor, they went over it even more thoroughly, but they found nothing.

  Lilah sighed in frustration, wiping the dust from her hands. “This seems like such a perfect place.”

  “Let me check something.” Alex ran back up the stairs. Lilah turned questioning eyes to Con, who only shrugged. It wasn’t long until they heard the clatter of Alex’s steps descending. “I think I may have it.” He popped out the courtyard door, and in a moment came back in.

  “Alex, what the devil are you doing?”

  “I know the likeliest place for it.” Alex’s eyes were shining, his words rapid. “The door into the tower from the gallery is set in the corridor wall. But then you take a step or two into the room before the curved walls start. That space between the straight corridor and the round tower is a sort of very short hall or a very deep door frame. But here—” he gestured behind him “—the walls are perfectly round, no doorway. On the outside, you can see that the square space between the house and the tower is bricked in all the way up and down.”

  Con’s eyes lit up. “Creating a perfect shaft in which to hide a closet. Or stairs.”

  He rushed to the wall where a door into the house should have been and skimmed his fingers over the rough stone. “There’s a crack.” He ran his fingers up the wall, following until it turned and started in a horizontal line. “It’s a door.”

  “Now we just need to figure out how to open it.” Two feet over, Alex was tracing the line downward on the opposite side. “I can barely get my fingernail into it.”

  Con ran his eyes over the wall, then thought to look up. Above him, attached to the bottom of the stairs, was a single narrow wooden slat. The sharp thrill of discovery ran through him. He tugged on one end, and it moved beneath his hand. He pulled harder, and a third of the bar slid up to stop at a forty-five-degree angle.

  Grasping the other end of the bar, he pushed that portion of the slat upward until the two ends touched, forming a triangle with the stationary middle section below. There was a distinct thud, and a section of the wall eased open.

  Alex gripped the edge and pulled. The small door was heavy but well balanced, and it swung out easily. All four of them crowded in, staring down at the small staircase twisting downward.

  “The secret passage.”

  CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE

  LILAH STOOD, TRANSFIXED. Power flooded up, twining around and through her so that she almost vibrated with it. It tugged at her viscerally, and she moved toward the open door.

  “We’ll need a lantern for that,” Alex said.

  “Two,” Con answered. He turned and saw Lilah, and his face whitened. “Lilah! Are you all right?” He hooked an arm around her waist, stopping her movement.

  When Con’s arm wrapped around Lilah, pulling her against his side, much of the massive rush of energy flowed out of her into Con. She could see by his raised eyebrows that he, too, felt the sweep of power.

  “What is it?” Alex asked, watching them closely. “What’s happening?”

  “I’m not sure.” Con’s voice was a trifle breathless. “Lilah can sense it. She feels the force of whatever’s down there.” He gazed into her face. “Better?”

  Lilah nodded. “Yes. At first it was almost unbearably strong, but you took away some of it.” She offered a shaky smile. “I think I’ll be able to control it now.”

  “I’ll be right here with you.” Con linked his hand with hers.

  Lilah straightened her shoulders and turned to Sabrina. “Can you feel it?”

  Sabrina nodded. “There’s this little low...” She wriggled her fingers, searching for the right words. “Hum. Only it’s inside me.”

  They looked toward Alex, who shrugged. “I don’t feel a damn thing except confused.”

  “I think Lilah and Sabrina sense it because of their family bond with the Sanctuary,” Con offered. “All I got from Lilah was a surge of strength and a sharper focus. She makes me better.”

  Alex laughed. “I’m sure that’s true.”

  Con grimac
ed at him. “What I mean is, her ability heightens mine, but I don’t feel the connection to the Source the way the ladies do.” He looked back at Lilah. “Are you able to explore further?”

  “Of course. Surely you don’t think I’m going to stop at this point.”

  “No.” Con grinned. He glanced over at Alex.

  “I’ll get the lanterns.” Alex loped off across the courtyard.

  The tumult inside Lilah had settled down—though she wasn’t about to test it by letting go of Con’s hand just yet. She turned toward Sabrina. “Are you all right?”

  Sabrina nodded. “Yes. It was unsettling at first, but I’m growing accustomed to it now. What are we to do with this thing? I’m not in favor of donning robes and chanting incantations every few months.”

  “Nor am I. I also don’t like the idea of living here with that pulling at me all the time. Yet if what Mr. Dearborn says is true, we must renew the bond to keep this power from ruining everything.”

  The door opened, and Alex entered, carrying two lanterns. “Your butler thought I was mad, wanting a lantern in the daylight—and two of them, at that.”

  Con shrugged. “He’s already convinced of my insanity.” They lit the lanterns and turned to the open entrance. Con started to step onto the first step, but Lilah put a restraining hand on his arm. “No. I should go first. I can scarcely believe I’m saying this, but the Sanctuary seems to recognize me.”

  Con frowned. “We don’t know what’s down there. What if the stairs collapse?”

  “The same things apply to you.”

  “Lilah’s right,” Sabrina said. “She’s the Holcutt, the owner of the land under which it sits. And, as the descendent of another of the Blessed, I should go after her.”

  The twins looked at one another, clearly uncomfortable with that idea, but as they scrambled to come up with a good argument, Lilah settled it by picking up the other lantern and starting down the stairs.