Chapter 39
Gwen
The room they’d locked me inside must have been a steward’s office once, or a housekeeper’s room. A narrow wooden bed, a table with a scarred top, one ladder-backed chair, and a single window facing the sea. Plain as a monk’s cell, in a house that was anything but.
The sprawling red-brick estate rivaled Arthur’s family cottage.
It was certainly more ostentatious. On the march in, I’d glimpsed gilded paneling and crystal through one open door, a dining table long enough for twenty through another.
And they’d locked me in the one room with nothing in it worth looking at.
Who were these people?
Theo Hopkins’s office had been a small thing with books crammed into every crevice. Nothing had hinted at the wealth of the organization backing him. Or at least, I was pretty sure he was part of this, and they were behind him.
Mr. Big Hands had gripped my upper arm throughout the trip, hard enough to leave a ring of bruises.
He’d steered me from the boat, up a long set of wooden stairs to the top of a cliff, and into the estate.
We’d passed huge oil paintings, walked across an ancient red-and-gold rug, and climbed a cramped set of back stairs to this room, where they’d locked the door and left me.
I’d tried the door, but the lock held. Tried smashing the handle and picking the lock with a piece of metal I’d found in the closet.
Tried opening the window to jump out into the worsening rain, but it was stuck fast from what must have been three centuries of repainting.
The chair could have broken through the panes, but I’d stopped short because a twenty-foot fall might break my leg. Or worse.
Besides, glass shattering would alert them to my escape.
So I sank onto the end of the bed and squeezed my eyes shut. I forced my memory back to yesterday, to driving toward the ferry with Arthur. We’d shopped, showered, and we’d made love. I’d slept in his arms, and my life had felt surprisingly perfect for an instant, despite everything.
Now, I was a… what was I? Kidnap victim? Hostage? Leverage?
What was I going to do? My phone was gone, Arthur didn’t know where I was, and these men had been planning to kill me. The scheduled email had been the only thing that saved me.
The door was locked, the window wasn’t an option, and there was no other—
I opened my eyes. From the far side of the little room, I spotted a detail I’d missed when I was too close to the door.
Above the door, where the wall met the ceiling, a transom window sat. They were common in Victorian buildings, when huge estates like this divided rooms into smaller ones. They’d add a wall, cutting a large windowed room in two, and use the transom to let light into the hallway or next room.
It was ten feet up, but if I could climb that high, I might be able to see out. See what was going on.
I brought the chair to the door, but it wasn’t tall enough. I carried the table to the door an inch at a time to keep it from scraping the floor and lifted the chair on top of it. The climb up my ramshackle scaffold took three tries, and the tabletop shook like it wanted to toss me to the floor.
My fingertips found the edge of the transom, and I held my breath. If someone were in the hallway, there’d be enough light coming through this window that I’d cast a shadow. They’d know what I was doing.
If it were Rick or Big Hands, they’d charge through the door and probably tie me to the bed.
I shifted to the edge of the window. The chair wobbled underneath me, but my grip on the window frame kept me from falling.
No one. Empty hallway.
They’d genuinely locked me in and left.
Did they know I wouldn’t try the window? Or did they have some sort of security outside I wouldn’t be able to get past?
I stood taller for a view farther up and down the hallway.
My attention snagged on a flash of brass at the top of the window. A swivel lock. And at the bottom, hinges.
This window didn’t just let light through—it let air through, too. I could open it. It fought me before giving way, but the panel finally tipped open, held at an angle by a chain to allow nothing more than a draft.
Through the crack, sounds hit me. Chair legs scraping. The far-off clink of silverware. Laughter. Dinner was being served downstairs somewhere.
If I broke the flimsy chain, I could open the window all the way. But could I get out?
It would be a tight fit, Gwen. And hopefully you wouldn’t land on your head.
I strained, listening. Did they all eat together? Would the noise be enough to cover me hitting the floor?
Stop thinking and go!
When I stood up fully, the small window’s sill was above my waist. Going through feet first would have given me control and a safe landing on the other side, but I wasn’t high enough up for that. Which left me one option. Headfirst.
I snapped the chain and eased the window down out of the way.
I went through and got stuck at my breasts, squirmed free, and got stuck at my hips.
I hung like a sheet over a laundry line, staring down a seven- or eight-foot drop to a broken neck.
My toes searched and failed to find a foothold.
I braced both hands on the sill and twisted until one hip came free.
That gave me room to work a knee through.
Be quiet!
With my knee hooked over the edge, I pushed my shoulders up and pivoted. My other leg scraped through. For a second, I hung with one leg out, the other hooked on the other side of the wall.
You can do this.
I unhooked my foot, and my whole body swung like a pendulum. I wasn’t strong enough to fight the momentum and hit the floor. Pain radiated up my spine, and I bit back a yelp.
No shouts. No sound of running. Just the far-away sounds of supper.
The corridor stretched in both directions, with closed doors on either side and sconces on the walls, most of them unlit. To my left, the staircase I’d come up. To my right, the hallway turned a corner toward what I guessed was another wing.
Go left. Down the stairs. Find a door.
But go where? The boat ride from Tintagel had taken at least forty minutes through fog so thick I couldn’t see the coastline. I could be anywhere in Cornwall. Soon, it would be dark outside, and I’d be on the run on a property full of men who knew every inch of it.
I turned left anyway. Down was better than up. Closer to a door or an open window was the smarter option.
The back staircase was narrow and dark, its treads sagging in the middle.
I kept to the edge, hoping the stairs would creak less.
On the ground floor, a long hallway led to the rear door they’d brought me in through, but I’d have to pass the mouths of other hallways.
Every corner was a chance for them to find me.
Upstairs, all of the rooms had closed doors. Down here, two doors stood open ahead of me. I crept down the hallway, listening to the distant sounds of supper and for movement in the rooms along my route.
But then footsteps.
Coming from an offshoot hallway closer to the exit.
My heart leaped into my throat.
Someone was coming closer—two someones, talking about food.
The nearest door was to my left, set back slightly in the paneled wall. I pressed myself to the wall outside of it, took a deep breath, and peeked inside. Empty. A study or office. I slipped inside, eased the door nearly shut, leaving a crack so the latch wouldn’t click.
I listened from behind the door. The voices grew louder. Keep walking. Please, keep walking.
The voices came closer. “I should check on the girl.”
“What do they think she’s going to do?” asked the other voice. “Break down the bloody door?”
“You saw her try to jump out of the boat.” The first one sounded like Big Hands. “Maybe she’ll jump out the window, break her neck, and save us all the headache.”
The men continued past the study, and I let out the quietest breath I could. My pulse raced so fast my hands shook.
Move, Gwen. Now, before they come back.
I turned to check the room I’d ducked into, and my breath caught.
Dark walnut paneling lined two walls, carved into deep rectangular frames.
Bookshelves covered the other two, and the ceiling had been painted with a classical battle scene.
But against the far wall, near the tall, barred stained-glass windows, sat an ornate desk with a small green lamp.
And the sword case.
My feet moved before my brain reminded them we were supposed to be escaping. I took three steps toward it before pulling myself back. The sword wouldn’t help me. The sword was why I was here, but it wasn’t going to get me out.
You should leave. Right now. Through that door, across the hall, out into the property, and run before someone realizes you’re gone.
But the spread of documents, maps, and folders across the desk drew me forward. They were stacked like someone had been working recently and would be coming back. Did any of them explain the inscriptions, the symbol, or why Dr. Hopkins was chasing people from Tintagel?
One minute. Just one minute.
I went to the desk.
Maps first. Topographical maps of the Cornwall coast, with three red circles and annotations in a cramped script I couldn’t read fast enough. I moved them aside.
Folders lay beneath the maps. I opened the top one.
Inside, correspondence on heavy paper. Some typed, some handwritten in a formal, old-fashioned hand.
Those letters used code words like “the Seat,” “the Passage,” and “the Warden.” One referenced “continued stewardship of the site at,” but the next word was lost in a tangle of flourishes.
What I would have given to have my phone or my camera.
Another discussed “the necessity of redirecting academic inquiry” and bore a familiar name in the address: Dr. Theodore Hopkins.
Get out, Gwen. Go now.
I squeezed my eyes shut. I wanted to read it all. But lingering over it was foolish. I had a chance to escape and had to go.