Chapter 16
Sixteen
Arriving at Bottoms House, Owen had just handed his hat to Brunswick when Ethan and Xenia came into the entry hall.
“Welcome home, brother,” Ethan said. “We were not expecting you until tomorrow.”
“I concluded my business earlier than expected,” he replied.
He’d wrapped things up as efficiently as possible so that he could return to Finn.
He had missed her—even dreamt of her. In general, he didn’t like dreams—too many of them contained blood-soaked memories—but since Finn, he’d had a few that were alluringly erotic.
While he couldn’t recall the exact content (more the pity), this morning he’d awoken to an insistent cockstand and the scent of Finn and roses.
He couldn’t wait to see her. Maybe they could have their rendezvous tonight…
“It is good that you are back early,” Xenia said. “I have a feeling Seraphina could use some help. She has had a busy morning—”
“Hold up.” Owen couldn’t suppress his excitement. “Seraphina is here?”
“Yes,” Xenia said. “She returned yesterday—said she needed to gather more impressions before the séance.”
“She and her assistants have been all over the manor,” Ethan said. “Like flies on a carcass.”
Xenia winced. “Couldn’t you employ a more pleasant metaphor, darling?”
“Like a stinging nettle’s rash over skin?” Ethan suggested.
Leaving the two to their banter, Owen went in search of Finn. In the drawing room, he found Caleb, who was under the watch of James and Evie. The lad was crouching and running what appeared to be a wooden stick over the floorboards.
After exchanging greetings, Owen had to ask, “What is the purpose of that stick?”
“It is a spirit rod,” Caleb said loftily. “It senses spiritual vibrations.”
Owen raised his brows. “Have you collected any?”
“All I’ve seen him collect is dust from beneath the furniture,” James said under his breath.
“Now, darling.” Evie tapped his arm. “I am certain Caleb is gathering useful information.”
“Her ladyship is correct,” Caleb said. “As the seer’s assistants, we must determine the focal point of the spiritual miasma in the manor. In that hallowed space, Madame Seraphina will hold the séance.”
Like Finn, the lad had an answer for everything.
“I shall leave you to it.” Casually, Owen added, “Does anyone know where Seraphina is?”
“The library, I believe,” Evie said.
He found her there with Gigi and Grantley, standing next to a row of dark green shelves. Finn’s smile of genuine welcome stirred him; he wished they were alone so he could give her a proper kiss hello.
“How did your meeting with Sir Joseph Paxton go?” Gigi asked.
“Well enough.” With effort, he tore his gaze away from Finn. “We met with the patron, who liked my designs.”
Gigi squealed, and Finn’s smile widened.
Grantley extended a hand. “Congratulations, old boy. What sort of project is it?”
“The patron is renovating his guest house and the surrounding gardens. I had the idea of adding a rose arbor and a walking path to the nearby woods.”
“How splendid,” Gigi exclaimed.
“Felicitations,” Finn said.
Owen wanted to kiss the delicious curve of her mouth.
“Thank you. Now enough about me. How is the impression gathering going?”
The question snuffed the warmth from Finn’s eyes. Worry pinched her curving brows before she smoothed her expression.
“Quite well,” she said.
“I thought you were going to wait until my return?”
“For expediency’s sake, I decided to collect more information prior to the sitting.”
“Ah. Have you found anything important?”
“Madame was just demonstrating how a medium works,” Grantley said. “Apparently, spirits, like naughty children, leave fingerprints wherever they go. If she touches those same objects, she can, ahem, sense them.”
The duke’s dry tone conveyed what he thought of Finn’s endeavor. While Owen had to agree that it sounded shifty, he saw the urgency in Finn’s expression. He knew in his gut that she wasn’t playing a game—that something important was at stake for her.
Did it have to do with money? Was she trying to rob his family—steal goods from Bottoms House?
Desperation he could understand, but he couldn’t allow her to harm his family.
However, she’d promised she bore them no ill will.
And while she took some economies, neither she nor her assistants appeared to be in dire straits.
If she were, he wished she would come to him rather than deceive him.
Such a basic level of trust would be necessary if they were to explore the possibility of a relationship.
For him, the time apart had cemented his desire to do so, but he wasn’t sure how she felt. Or what she was up to. She had shown him her scars…but even that could be an act of manipulation rather than intimacy. God, he hoped not. He wanted her—wanted to trust her. Badly.
Yet he had to reserve his judgment. For now, he would continue to play along. Once he understood what Finn was after, he would have his answer about their future as well.
He nodded. “Pray tell, Seraphina. What is the next part of your plan?”
Relief swept through Finn that Owen wasn’t going to stand in her way. Since receiving Carver’s threat, she’d been consumed by fear. She had only a week to find the treasure—or Iris would pay the price.
In the past, when she’d been afraid, she’d had Iris to turn to. When she felt she couldn’t breathe and the world was bleeding her will to go on, she and Iris would sit together. Iris would be in a chair, Finn on the floor, her head in Iris’s lap.
Iris would stroke her hair and say, “Rest your head awhile, and an answer will come. One always does, Finicky.”
Under Iris’s gentle ministrations, Finn would relax and a solution would emerge.
But now she didn’t have Iris. The closest thing she could come up with was brushing her own hair. She’d done stroke after stroke, until the excuse for returning to Bottoms House came to her.
It had worked, allowing her and the Hawks to get back into the manor yesterday.
They’d searched every nook and cranny…but they’d found nothing.
Last night, she’d collapsed into bed—but instead of resting, she’d been plagued by dreams. She couldn’t remember them in their entirety, just the smell of crushed roses, splatters of red, and the glow of green eyes…
“You look tired, Finn.”
Snapping out of her reverie, she saw Owen regarding her with concern. They stood together in the maze of bookshelves. Gigi and her husband remained in the sitting area, and Finn could hear them flirting.
She tried to sound light. “You didn’t pick up any town polish in London. Don’t you know that no lady likes to be told she isn’t looking her best?”
“You’ll always be beautiful. Right now, you are beautiful and tired. Tell me why.”
He had a way of melting her defenses.
“I haven’t been sleeping well,” she admitted. “I…I have been having dreams.”
“About what?”
“I’m not certain.” She bit her lip, then everything poured out in a rush. “One took place in the rose garden. It felt like I was there—I don’t mean a few days ago, but…before. When the garden was new, and the roses were young. I was there with my lover.”
“Your lover.” Owen’s tone was dry. “If you don’t mind my asking, who was this cove?”
“I don’t know—and there is no need to get jealous over it,” she said with an amused huff. “I am not sure it was even me in the dream. The woman could have been…someone else.”
“Rose?”
She nodded slowly.
He didn’t blink. “Tell me more.”
Relief swamped her, and she wished she’d told him earlier about the woman she’d seen by the stream.
It would fit her role of a seer, after all.
Yet she knew why she hadn’t. It was one thing to make up visions as part of her scheme and another to share experiences that felt real and eerie and…
personal. She hadn’t been in control of the latter, and she didn’t like how that made her feel.
Mad, perhaps. Vulnerable, definitely.
“You can trust me, Finn.”
He cupped her cheek, and she shivered at his warm, callused touch.
“In the dream, he and I were making love,” she said. “I was looking up at him—at the roses hovering all around us.”
“Did he pleasure you the way I did?”
Crikey. The smolder in Owen’s gaze weakened her knees. She leaned against the shelves for support, and he braced his arm above her head, caging her with his rangy length. With anyone else, she would have felt trapped.
With Owen, she felt…safe.
“Did he kiss you, Finn?” he murmured.
“Yes.”
“In all the places you like best, the ones that make you moan?”
The hunger in his eyes made her heart race, her palms dampening against the book spines. Arousal flooded her, her lungs so tight she had to push out the next word.
“Yes.”
“Did he claim your sweet pussy, push his cock deep inside the way I am going to?”
He swooped down, taking her mouth and muffling her moan of excitement. The world fell away, and there was only him and her and the devastating passion between them. She raked her fingers through his hair as they ravaged one another’s mouths, their hunger made feral by the days apart.
When he pressed her against the shelves, her nipples throbbed against his hard chest. She felt the wild beat of her blood beneath her skin and the aching emptiness between her legs.
She reached down to touch him—to feel that hard, vital length she wanted inside her.
He growled against her lips as she stroked the thick, wool-covered ridge.
Before him, she had never wanted to belong to any man, but now she yearned to be his—and to claim him in return.
You are mine, and I am yours.
She didn’t want to be apart from him ever again. They were stronger together, and she should never have let him face danger alone…
“Go,” she heard him say. “Go hide now.”
Startled, she pulled back—and was staring into different eyes.
Through different eyes.
“Go and hide where I showed you,” he said. “You know how to get in.”
“I can’t leave you.” A sob caught in her throat. “I’m scared…scared of the darkness.”
“Don’t be afraid, my love. Darkness can be a sanctuary.”
“You are my sanctuary,” she whispered. “I cannot lose you.”
“Don’t come out until I tell you it is safe.” He kissed her. “Trust me, my darling Rose. Go—go now.”
“Finn? Is something amiss?”
Concerned, Owen touched her shoulder, staring at her frozen expression. A moment ago, they’d been locked in a passionate kiss when she’d suddenly pushed him away. Now she seemed to be staring into the distance—but when he followed her gaze, he saw nothing worthy of attention.
Was I too intense? Did I frighten her? Hurt her?
“If I did anything wrong—” he began.
She walked off as if he had not spoken.
Frowning, he set off after her. “Finn, please tell me what is going on.”
She increased her pace, muttering, “Have to go.”
Christ, I must have done something to make her run from me.
His gut clenched; the notion of hurting someone he cared about made him feel sick.
In the past, he would have avoided this feeling at all costs.
He would shut himself in his room—or try to numb his self-revulsion with spirits or meaningless sex.
He could leave this very instant and bury himself in work since he’d given up those other vices.
He looked at Finn’s rigid, retreating back…and chased after her.
“At least tell me what I’ve done.”
He caught up to her in the sitting area. Gigi and Grantley had risen, and he was aware that they were watching the unfolding drama, but he couldn’t give up.
“Finn.” He caught her arm, turning her to face him. “What’s the matter?”
“Have to run. To hide. He’s coming.”
Her eyes were glassy, her cheeks pale. Worried for a different reason now, he touched her forehead; she didn’t feel feverish but rather clammy and cold.
“Who is coming?” he asked. “Perhaps you’d better sit—”
“No! No time. Have to hide—promised.”
Helplessly, he watched as she paced in agitated steps.
Suddenly, she stopped—and dashed toward the empty fireplace.
When she went to her hands and knees, feeling the inside of the brick grate, stunned awareness forked through him.
He shot a look at Gigi and saw she shared his reaction.
Finn could only be searching for one thing: the hidden mechanism that Xenia had discovered during a vision of Rose.
Owen didn’t know whether to be relieved or terrified that Finn’s strange behavior wasn’t because of him but because of a…a ghost.
He crouched next to her. “Finn, what are you looking for?”
“A place to hide.”
She looked so scared that he wanted to fold her into his arms. But he didn’t dare.
“Thomas showed me.” She turned back to her task, muttering, “Have to find it…”
“What is going on?”
This came from Xenia, who’d just entered the library with Ethan.
“I think she’s having a vision,” Owen said. “She’s trying to find a place to hide.”
Xenia’s mouth formed an “O”; even Ethan raised his brows.
Then there was a click, and Owen knew Finn had pressed upon the brick that activated the hidden mechanism.
The panel of the firebox swung open like a door, and without hesitation, Finn crawled through.
Owen followed her. Before Ethan had purchased Bottoms House, the secret room had been used by the Corrigans to hide their stolen loot.
Xenia had discovered it during her visions because Rose had apparently hidden here while her lover fought their enemy… and lost.
Owen did not like confined spaces, and he had to bend his head to avoid hitting the low ceiling. Yet he forgot his discomfort when he saw Finn curled up in a corner. Circling her knees with her arms, she’d buried her head and was weeping.
He sat next to her and tentatively put an arm around her trembling shoulders.
“Why are you crying, love?” he asked.
“He’s dead,” she sobbed. “Because of me.”
“Who’s dead?” he asked.
But he already knew.
“My Thomas. My good and honorable Thomas.”
Panic seized him as he saw how different Finn looked.
Even though her features were the same, that teary, mournful expression was not hers.
Was it…was it Rose’s? What did the spirit want—and how could he get Finn back?
If he had to guess, Rose wanted comforting.
But how did one console a ghost? He thought about some of his own ghosts—his fellow soldiers who’d perished on that bloody march—and what he had learned to tell himself over the years.
“What’s done is done,” he said gruffly. “There is nothing more you can do.”
“I should have been braver.” Her voice quavered. “Even though he told me to hide, I should have stayed by his side.”
“Even if you had, the result might still be the same. You cannot blame yourself for surviving.”
God, how many times had he said these exact words to himself?
She raised her eyes to his, and his breath caught. The brown had bled from her irises, leaving them a haunting, vibrant green.
“You are a good man like my Thomas. Take care of her.”
Her smile was warm, almost maternal, before she swooned.
Even as he gathered her in his arms, shouting for help, remorse slammed into him.
Bloody hell. Finn was telling the truth. She is a medium—and can channel spirits.