Chapter Sixty-Two
Ethan
Ethan was going to kill... someone. The killer, obviously. And maybe Eleanor for getting them both into this mess. Or Maggie.
He was definitely going to kill Maggie, he decided, because in his tired, frozen, freaked-out brain it was the only way to
keep her safe and wasn’t that very serial killer of him? With a side of toxic masculinity? So he just shook his head and reached
back for her hand.
She’d spent five years being not quite real to him. More idea than flesh and blood but now he knew the way she felt and tasted
and sounded. He was never going to forget her sighs and gasps and moans. They were burned into his soul at that point. He
couldn’t forget them if he tried. And he had absolutely no intention of trying.
So he kept her hand tight in his as they traversed tunnels and ladders and passageways until they finally reached the dark,
empty halls of the house. Someone must have banked the fires, but the coals glowed orange as they slipped into the library
and closed the doors behind them and, reluctantly, Ethan let Maggie pull out of his grasp.
“Okay, so what is the game plan? Exactly?” he asked as she slipped through the dim light toward the shelves and ran one finger
down the row of Eleanor’s backlist, stopping when she came to—
“ A Deadly Shade of Night. ” When Ethan saw the cover, he remembered— “That was my mother’s favorite.”
It was strange, thinking about his mom. In Ethan’s family, it was like she never existed—like Ethan and his brothers had sprouted
out of Zeus’s head, fully formed. But they hadn’t. Once upon a time, there had been a woman in his world. She’d made cookies
from the dough you bought at the grocery store and she’d known all the words to every song ever sung by Dolly Parton and she’d
loved Eleanor Ashley.
“Then you should do the honors.”
The book felt too small in his hands, a physical reminder that he wasn’t the little boy who had been left behind anymore—he
was a man. And the only thing that mattered was the woman beside him. “What am I looking for exactly?”
“There may not be anything,” Maggie admitted. “But Eleanor hid a piece of mistletoe in the last one, so... I don’t know.
Something stuck in the pages or highlighted passages or...”
They must have seen it at the same time because Ethan stopped flipping and Maggie stopped talking and they both stared down
at the copyright page—at the numbers circled in a row. Too few digits to be coordinates or a phone number; too many to be
a date or a time.
“Is it just me, or does that look like...”
“A combination?” Maggie guessed, and for a long time, they stood there, thoughts and theories flying like the snow until—
“We have to find the safe,” he said.
She nodded. “We have to find the safe.”
Maggie’s cheeks were pink and her eyes were bright. She looked flushed with endorphins and energy and the high that comes
when things start making sense. But then, just that quickly, her smile faded. “But the safe could be anywhere!” she whined.
“The duke and duchess have been looking for it for days! It could be... Wait. Where are you...”
She must have missed the rattling of the doorknob, the low hum of the voices in the hall, because she made a small squeaking
sound as Ethan half carried her toward the spiral staircase that led to the library’s second story.
They had just reached the shadows of the upper deck when the library door opened and Kitty entered the room.
Or at least Ethan thought it must be Kitty. She was carrying a veritable mountain of boxes and presents and what looked like
most of a whole bicycle. Rupert was tagging along behind her, carrying an old-fashioned lantern and one lone wheel.
“Rupert,” Kitty called through the pile of presents in her arms. “Help.”
“Help with what?” said the man holding approximately one-tenth of one present.
“We have to put the gifts under the tree.”
His answer was to grumble about having to do everything himself as he took two presents from the top of the pile and dropped
them near the windows. “There.” He took the rest of the bicycle parts from Kitty and laid them beside the fireplace.
“We have to assemble it.”
“Why?” he shot back.
“Because it’s Christmas! And RJ didn’t ask Santa for bicycle parts . He asked for a bicycle. And don’t forget the train set.”
“I am not setting up that blasted train set!”
“But—”
“Santa came, Kitty. He dropped off toys. He’s a busy man and no one expects him to stick around for assembly. That’s what
servants are for. Besides, how are we going to get the blasted thing home if we had to disassemble it to get it here in the
first place?”
They couldn’t make out Kitty’s answer because Rupert was already ushering her out the door.
And then Maggie and Ethan were alone. And together.
It was actually quite nice on the second floor with the heat rising from the still-glowing fire downstairs. It might have
been romantic if it hadn’t been for all the almost dying. They could have stayed there all night, her head on his shoulder,
alternating between talking and laughing and making out like teenagers. It would have been the best Christmas ever. But then
Ethan looked at the woman beside him, and a little voice said it already is .
They only needed one thing, and they were so, so close to finding it.
“Okay. The safe.” Maggie studied the book that lay between them with a focus that could only be described as unrelenting,
and Ethan knew he wanted to spend the rest of his life losing board games to this woman. “I think we should rule out all the
usual places—behind paintings and mirrors—stuff like that. Because the duke and dukette—”
“Duchess.” This time he was the one doing the correcting.
“—would have looked there already, and...”
She trailed off, and Ethan watched her gaze go a little hazy as she looked out over the library beneath them. They’d been
in that room a dozen times. It was the heart of the house. The place someone like Eleanor—someone like them —would have felt most at home.
But Ethan had never really seen it until he looked at it in the dark. Until he watched Maggie’s finger start to move—to point.
He had never—not once—given a second thought to the rug on the floor below. He remembered the corner being turned up that
first night and Maggie almost tripping—the way she’d fallen into his arms. But he had never paid attention to the pattern
of green leaves and purple flowers that looked like—
“Nightshade.” Her voice sounded like victory.
It’s a miracle neither of them fell in their race down the spiral stairs, but a few seconds later they were standing beside
the overturned rug, looking down at the library floor—the old wooden planks and new state-of-the-art safe.
“So do you want to do the honors or should I?” Maggie wiggled the book with the code for good measure, but Ethan didn’t reach
for it. He couldn’t do anything but look at her. It wasn’t the dash down the stairs that had his heart racing—not the clues
or the mystery or the chase. It was her—it had always been her.
“Just so you know, whatever’s in there... it doesn’t change anything.”
“What do you mean?”
“I mean...” He inched toward her, closer and closer. And closer. “Nothing in there matters more than you.”
“Oh.” She tucked her hair behind her ear and bit back a smile. “So, what you’re saying is, I’m what you want for Christmas?”
She was turning red. She was trying to tease.
“No.” Oh. “You’re what I want for always.” He kissed her—slow and sweet and sure. Then he dropped to the floor and reached for the
safe. “Now read me off those numbers.”