Chapter Twenty-Six Wren #2
I took a step into the foyer, both mother and daughter beaming at me.
“Well, aren’t you just as stunning as Everett said,” Evelyn remarked. She looked at Everett knowingly, and he grunted in embarrassment, the tips of his ears reddening. “Don’t mess it up, boy.” I laughed when she gently smacked his side.
“Trying not to,” he murmured, avoiding my eyes.
“Go on, then,” Evelyn said, waving us ahead. “Don’t let us get in the way. But do call if you need anything!”
Everett nodded his thanks and once again took my hand.
“This way. The place can be a maze.” He led me beyond the breathtaking foyer and the double staircase, the rich wood carved with intricate gardenia blooms. The style of the home was open, showcasing the gilded furniture, cream accents, and expensive paintings.
A few portraits hung on the wall leading to the parlor, and I took in Arthur Sinclair’s and Everett’s portraits side by side.
In the painting, clearly made when he was a younger man, Arthur had severe, sharp features, his reddish-blond hair gleaming.
He didn’t smile, his lips thin and turned down at the sides.
Next to him rested a petite woman I suspected was the late Emily Sinclair.
Unlike her son, she had long chestnut hair and green eyes, but it was her smile that illuminated her features. Much like his.
“I’m sparing you from a tour,” Everett said. “Unless you’d like one, that is? I just thought you’d like to ride first. You have this look on your face that can only be remedied by one thing.”
I didn’t want a tour, he was right. I wished to be atop Mayberry, feeling the wind in my hair and allowing myself to float away into the sensation of flying. My heart leapt, skipping a beat as I looked Everett’s way. He truly did his best to understand me.
“Astute observation.” I squeezed his arm in encouragement as he brought us to a set of doors leading to a grand porch. In the distance, I spotted the stables, the echoing whinnies music to my ears.
What caught my attention was his garden.
Iridescent cerulean blooms mingled with gardenias, along with pastel pinks and warm, honeyed yellows.
They shimmered in the sun, each petal dazzling as if light were trapped inside.
It was a wild, untamed garden cut by a single path of stone steps that guided one to the stables… and I couldn’t peel myself away.
“It’s stunning,” I mustered, tempted to reach out and pluck a blue flower with a golden center. Specks of glittering dust dotted the middle, but the wind picked up the motes and dispersed them into the breeze.
Everett came up beside me. I’d drifted down the porch steps and to the first row of flowers as if lured by a spell.
“They were my mother’s gift,” he explained.
“Her gloves created these.” He gazed across the sea of magic, his sea-blue eyes glistening.
“My earliest memories are being out here with her, planting. She adored her flowers, spoke to them like children.” He laughed, a heartbreaking smile on his lips.
“Mother was patient, a trait I need to learn to channel more. She used to tell me that nothing of beauty is easily won. It takes time, and if you’re patient and take a step back, you might be fortunate enough to watch magic take shape before your eyes.
” Everett glanced at me, a mischievous glint in his eyes. “Just don’t blink.”
“She sounded wise,” I said gently, praying he wasn’t insinuating that he was trying to win me.
He merely nodded, his attention glued to her blooms, wonder softening the hard ridges of his face.
“Did you continue her work?” There were so many flowers.
I felt as if it would take decades to build such a scene stolen from a fairy tale.
“I’m the only one who uses her gift. Her gloves. She secretly gave them to me before she passed.” He studied his shoes. “I wish I had more time to get out here, though.”
I bit my lip in thought. Typically, when someone passed away, it was customary to bury them with their gift. I’d never heard someone admit that they used another’s magic.
“Come,” he said, shaking his head as if dispelling old memories. “I promised you a day of riding.”
Mayberry was just as fast as Everett claimed.
I clutched her silken black mane, her matching coat shimmering in the sun. Grinning from ear to ear, we stormed across wide meadows of wildflowers.
Everett drifted behind; his mare, a stunning chestnut thoroughbred, couldn’t keep up.
I lifted my hands in the air and shut my eyes.
My body flew, the world ceased to exist, and I relished the euphoric thrill shoving my heart into my stomach with each gallop.
This was freedom. Open spaces and clear skies.
Air that smelled of musky woods and earth.
And the mare beneath me that granted me the gift of flight.
I didn’t wish to slow, to open my eyes and ruin the illusion. Sitting up in the saddle—straddling the beast—I rose, silently daring myself to let go.
“Wren!”
A grumble worked up my throat as I forced my eyes open and peered behind me. Everett’s mare reared back on her hind legs, the panic in Everett’s blue eyes soon matching my own. With a curse, I slowed and yanked on the reins, spinning Mayberry around.
Everett’s horse whinnied, doing her best to unseat him. He gripped her tight with his muscled thighs, but he was no match for her strength and determination to be free. Something must’ve spooked her.
In horror, I watched as he fell backward, slipping from his saddle and dropping onto his back. The horse took off, dashing away from her rider and into the woods.
“Everett!” I screamed, angling close before hopping off Mayberry. “Are you all right?”
He groaned at the question, attempting to push himself into a seated position. I crouched down and braced him, my hand wrapping around his thick biceps. He had a dazed look, his gaze unfocused as he stared straight ahead, his usually impeccable hair falling across his eyes.
“I-I’m fine,” he murmured, shaking himself. I watched the column of his throat as he swallowed hard, his attention drifting to where his horse had bolted.
“Let’s get you up,” I said, trying to haul him by the arm. “We can take—”
Everett froze midway to standing, his focus locked on something ahead.
I followed his line of sight, all the way to—
His glasses. The ones the Fates had gifted him.
They now lay broken and shattered feet away, likely having fallen from his jacket pocket and then having been trampled upon.
Gifts from the Fates didn’t break.
They didn’t shatter. Bend. Fracture.
Everett slid from my grasp, his legs unsteady as he darted for the ruined glasses. “They’re all right,” he said quickly, as if I hadn’t borne witness to their destruction. “I’ll clean them up when we get back. Just a little dirt. Nothing to worry about.”
His ramblings didn’t help his case.
“Everett,” I began, but he held up a hand, stopping me.
“I told you they’re fine.”
“But they’re not.” I snagged Mayberry’s reins and quickened my pace as Everett took off in the direction of his estate. “They were broken, and we both know a gift from the Fates can’t be broken.”
So what were they? What was he hiding?
Everett whirled on me so quickly I stumbled. The expression on his face was one of fear mixed with a tinge of rage. My breath caught; I felt hesitant around him for the very first time. I’d never seen him look at me this way.
“You don’t know anything, Wren,” he snapped, his tone icy. “You don’t know what you saw.”
Like hell I didn’t.
“I don’t need you to tell me what I did or didn’t see,” I returned, proud that my voice held steady. “You’re hiding something. It’s obvious. And the fact that you’re so defensive tells me—”
“Tells you what?” he countered, his shoulders straightening and making him appear larger than life. The grimace painting his features marred his handsomeness, destroying the gentle quality I’d seen moments before.
“Everett, you don’t need to be upset. I won’t tell anyone.” It was a whisper, and not because I was frightened. I understood exactly how he felt. But to pretend…
Because that was what he’d done. Those glasses were fake. He’d worn them with feigned pride, allowing society to believe him blessed.
He just wanted to be accepted. I could understand that. But his anger twisted my gut, a prickly feeling causing me to shiver.
Everett paused to run a rough hand through his mussed hair and shut his eyes. The curse that fell from his lips was coarse, as were the four after it.
“I’ve always been good with numbers,” he said so quietly that the wind nearly stole the words. “Then my birthday came and my father…Oh, my father wasn’t pleased, but he didn’t look surprised, either.”
Everett turned, giving me his profile. From this angle, his nose reminded me of Damien’s; regal, with a slight bump in the middle, like he’d gotten into a fight. Maybe Everett’s time at the rowdy southern pub hadn’t been his first.
Everett took in a deep breath. “Lord Sinclair never loses,” he muttered. “He expects his son to be no different. Which was why I found it odd that he didn’t seethe or scream. He barely even looked at me. That was, until weeks later, when he employed other methods to defuse his anger.”
I flinched. Did Lord Arthur Sinclair physically hurt his son?
By the way Everett shriveled in on himself, his shoulders now hunching, I suspected as much, and while I didn’t know the duke personally, powerful men had a tendency to harm when they lost control.
That harm, though, frequently happened behind closed doors.
I placed my hand on Everett’s shoulder, my fingers slightly trembling. He winced, but he didn’t move away. “You have my word. I won’t speak of it. Ever.”
I swore he leaned back against me, his muscles relaxing while he welcomed the gentle hand on him. The urge to embrace him beckoned, but it didn’t feel right.
“Thank you” was all he said. He gazed over the meadow, his back to me, the wind whipping at us as it whistled in our ears. Time seemed to stop, to freeze, as he all but admitted he didn’t have a gift. That like Lizzy and Adrian—and me—he, too, had been deprived of magic.
Did that put Everett on the list of suspects? Was he capable of stealing my gift for himself and putting on this act of courtship? I wanted to believe him innocent, but…most people looked out for themselves.
I eyed the house, far off in the distance. Maybe I should meet Arthur Sinclair myself.