Chapter Ten
Selena stared at the note in her hands, a chill running through her.
Who had left this on her bed, and when? She glanced around her bedchamber. No one else was there. She yanked open the doors to the room’s only possible hiding place, the tall, mahogany wardrobe. To her relief, inside she found only clothes.
Her heart pounded as Selena read the note again.
Stop looking.
It could only mean one thing. Someone knew she was looking for the money. Someone who wanted her to give up the search. Who? And why?
Her hands quivered with rising dread as she reread the second statement.
Or you’ll be next to die.
Only one person had died recently at Darkmoor Park: Jack Clarke. Was this note a threat? Did someone intend to kill her if she continued searching for the cash that Mr. Clarke had hidden?
Another horrifying thought swiftly followed.
Both she and Dr. Scott had wondered, initially, if Mr. Clarke’s death had really been an accident.
She’d had an unnerving dream in which her sisters had insisted that it was not.
Selena had dismissed that notion as unlikely for a variety of reasons, but what if they were right?
What if someone had pushed Mr. Clarke down those stairs?
Selena’s stomach clenched. Had the person who’d sent this threatening note … murdered Mr. Clarke?
She needed to speak to Dr. Scott without delay. Gripping the note, Selena dashed out of her room towards the south hall. She had nearly reached Dr. Scott’s room when he burst out of his own door and they almost collided.
His eyes were wild, and his voice was low and filled with agitation. “I found this on my bed.” Furtively, he showed her a note that looked to be identical to hers in size and shape.
“I got one, too,” she said quietly. They exchanged notes. The handwriting style and wording on his note were identical to hers.
“Good lord.” Dr. Scott’s face drained of color. “We have to talk,” he whispered urgently. “But not here.”
Selena glanced back towards the north hall.
The other guests were presumably in their rooms, getting dressed for dinner, but they could emerge at any moment.
To her dismay, there was the sudden sound of approaching footsteps on the main staircase.
Alarmed, Selena grabbed Dr. Scott’s hand, yanked open the nearest door, drew him inside, and shut the door behind them.
It was pitch black inside. Not a speck of light.
“Where are we?” Dr. Scott’s low voice pierced the darkness.
“The linen closet,” Selena whispered. The enclosed space was just large enough for two people to stand within.
“What are we doing in the linen closet?”
Selena sensed the warmness of Dr. Scott’s body a mere foot away from hers. “It was the closest unoccupied room.”
“It’s not a room. It’s a closet.” Although he kept his voice to a murmur, it rang with annoyance. “Do you have any idea what could happen if we are found together inside a closet?”
“Sorry. I didn’t think. I just reacted. It’s what my sisters and brother and I did as children, when we were up to something of which my father disapproved.”
“You hid in a closet?”
“It worked every time.”
From the hall beyond, the sound of footsteps grew louder. “Shhh!” he hushed.
Two people were talking just outside the linen closet door. Selena recognized their voices.
“I expressly told you that the doctor was staying in the south hall,” Mrs. Middleton was saying, “and that you must clean his room as well.”
“I’m sorry. I forgot.” Gladys sounded frightened. “I had so many rooms to clean today.”
As Selena and the doctor stood in the silent darkness, his cologne enveloped her senses. Sandalwood. A hint of citrus and lavender. It rattled her brain.
“See to it that it doesn’t happen again,” Mrs. Middleton said.
“Yes, ma’am.”
There was a knock, Mrs. Middleton calling out Dr. Scott’s name, and then the sound of a door opening and receding footsteps.
“We could have gone into the small parlor at the head of the stairs,” he murmured, his voice not quite as even as before.
Selena’s heart thudded so loudly in her ears, she feared they might burst. “We wouldn’t have made it in time. We would have been seen.”
“And if we were? So what?” He took an uneven breath. “We were just talking in the hallway.”
His nearness was so overpowering, she had difficulty formulating a reply. “I suppose so.” She felt ridiculous now. There had been no need to hide.
“But now that we’re in here, we can’t very well leave until they do.”
“True.” Selena swallowed hard. “You said we had to talk,” she added. “We’re talking.”
A moment passed. “You realize this changes everything, don’t you?” he whispered.
“What does?” Selena responded. Was he referring to the fact that they were standing inches away from each other in a linen closet? Or to the possible ramifications of them being discovered there?
“The threatening notes.” There was a sharp edge to Dr. Scott’s whisper. “Someone has been watching us.”
Selena chastised herself to keep her mind on track. “Right. Right. Since when, I wonder?”
“I don’t know. But they must have been spying on us in the chapel. That door didn’t shut by the wind.”
Her eyes, Selena realized, must have been adjusting to the darkness because she could see his shadowy outline now, less than a foot away. She sensed frustration in his voice, tinged by some other emotion that she couldn’t define. “Someone wants that money as much as we do.”
“Apparently enough to kill us for it.”
Her insides tightened at the notion. She knew she should have been afraid, but her thoughts were scattering.
Although Dr. Scott’s figure was ghostly in the darkness, Selena could perceive his eyes boring into hers.
The heat from that gaze made her heart bang like a drum.
She lowered her glance and found herself looking at the outline of his lips.
She wanted to touch them. With her own lips. “What do we do now?”
“Now?” He paused. “Now, we must …” His voice trailed off. “Hang it all, Miss Taylor. I can’t think with you standing here so close to me.”
“Neither can I,” Selena admitted breathlessly.
“In truth, I haven’t been able to think straight since the moment we met.” His voice was hoarse and throaty as his hand came up and gently cupped her cheek. “All I want to do right now is take you in my arms and kiss you.”
“I wish you would,” Selena heard herself reply. She felt a heat take over her face. Had she really said that aloud?
He needed no further invitation. His arms wrapped around her and drew her to him until their two figures were pressed so tightly against each other that she could feel every hard line and plane of his body. And then he bent his head and pressed his mouth to hers.
Selena’s eyes closed as she melted into his kiss.
At first, it was gentle and questing, but it soon became more urgent.
His hand pressed against the back of her neck as his tongue danced with hers and then, softly and sweetly, delved into her mouth.
Selena gasped at this intimacy but welcomed it.
She had only been kissed this intently by one other man, the errant circus performer, but even his caresses had been nothing like this.
Dr. Scott’s kiss was so hot, it seemed to set every cell in Selena’s body afire and melt away every inhibition.
She leaned into his embrace, kissing him back with a fervor and a passion that matched his own.
Something deep and powerful seemed to take hold of her, a feeling she’d never known existed, a deep wanting to be with him in every way possible, to mingle her breath and being with his own here, now, and forever.
She heard him groan deep in his throat as his mouth left hers. He drew back a few inches as they both caught their breath.
“Selena.” His breath was a sweet exhalation against her face. “For two days, my mind has been full of nothing but you.”
It’s been the same for me with you, Selena wanted to reply. But she was so spellbound by what they had just experienced, she could barely form a thought, much less a word. To know that he’d been thinking of her, too—it made her feel weak in the knees.
His fingers traced her cheeks to the tip of her nose, finally coming to rest on her parted lips.
“You are lovely. And that was a lovely kiss.” He was still whispering, and she could see him smiling in the darkness.
“I kissed you because I couldn’t help myself.
But it shouldn’t have happened.” With a sigh, he let her go and took a step back.
“I was out of line. I hope you’ll forgive me for overstepping any sense of propriety. ”
“I played a part in this too,” Selena managed softly. “I wanted you to kiss me. And I kissed you back.”
“I’m flattered, truly.” His voice seemed to be tinged with regret as he added, “But you know as well as I do that we can never be in a situation like this again.”
He was right, and Selena did know it. If she were caught in such a compromising position, Dr. Scott would have to marry her, or she’d be ruined. Although, after that kiss, the prospect of marrying him didn’t seem like such a bad idea at the moment.
Selena instantly chastised herself for the thought.
They barely knew each other. That kiss had just been an expression of mutual physical attraction and desire, with no substance behind it.
If she ever were to marry, she wanted substance.
And she wanted love. A man she could admire and trust forever, who would love and admire and trust her in return.
“Understood,” Selena replied.
From the hall beyond came the sound of a door opening and closing, a few more words being exchanged by Mrs. Middleton and Gladys, and footsteps treading past. At length, the footsteps faded away.
Selena exhaled a long breath. “Now what, Doctor?”
“Now, we have to get out of here and talk about those notes.”
They stood still in the darkness and listened.
All Selena could hear was her heartbeat, which still pounded in her ears. “I don’t hear anyone in the hall,” she whispered.
“Neither do I. Where can we go that is completely aboveboard, where it’s unlikely that anyone will overhear us?”
“My study,” Selena replied. “It’s on the ground floor near the schoolrooms.”
“I remember. Why don’t you leave first? I’ll wait here a minute just in case.”
“Let’s change our clothes before we go downstairs. That way, in case we’re seen in my study, I can say I was just … showing you some of my students’ essays on the way to dinner.”
“That works for me.”
Selena had the strongest impulse to lean forward and kiss him again. She averted her gaze, afraid that if she kept looking at him, she would follow through on that desire. “I’ll see you there in fifteen minutes.”
She quietly opened the closet door, blinking as the brighter light of the corridor assaulted her vision.
To her relief, the hallway was empty. She returned to her chamber and leaned back against the door, pausing to wrap her arms around herself.
The memory of Dr. Scott’s scorching kiss was still so fresh in her mind, she didn’t want to let it go.
And yet she must. She had to get dressed for dinner before meeting him again downstairs.
Selena quickly put on her new Christmas gown, which she’d had made based on a French fashion plate.
The bright-red velvet was the shade of a cardinal’s wing, and its short sleeves were gathered at the sides and embellished by gold, diamond-shaped buttons.
A narrow trim of gold gimp braid ran vertically at the front of the gathered bodice and decorated the edge of the neckline, which dipped in a slight V, and a gold, satin ribbon cinched in the frock at the waist.
Using the method she had learned in girlhood, Selena dressed herself, reaching behind to fasten the last two buttons and tie the gold ribbon at her back into a bow.
She took a quick glance in her cheval glass to make sure she was orderly.
Oh, her hair! Her blonde tresses were pinned up as they had been all day, in a simple braided bun at the back—not as fancy as she would have liked for Christmas dinner, and not as tidy, either, after the doctor’s kisses—but there was no time to restyle it.
And oh, her cheeks! They were quite pink. In fact, her entire face was flushed. Would anyone be able to tell that she had just been thoroughly and wondrously kissed by Dr. Scott? She hoped not.
She grabbed a gold-toned pashmina shawl from a dresser drawer, which Diana’s husband, Captain Fallbrook, had kindly brought back for her from one of his sea voyages.
Although this was a formal dinner, she decided not to bring gloves.
She wasn’t leaving the house, she’d have to take them off while dining in any case, and they wouldn’t be needed during the parlor games.
Thinking about her upcoming meeting with Dr. Scott, she fetched her new red velvet handbag and stowed the threatening note inside. Something told her that she might have need of it tonight. After slipping the cord around her wrist, she dashed from the room and down the stairs.
A few minutes later, Selena was at her desk in her study.
She lit two lamps. Since the room wasn’t expected to be occupied today, there was no fire.
Despite the chill in the air, she sank down in her chair and took a minute to breathe in the sense of tranquility that always enveloped her when she entered this cozy space.
She heard approaching footsteps. Her pulse leapt. Any second now, Dr. Scott would appear. She could hardly wait.