Page 17 of A Courtesan Countess Worth the Scandal
Chapter Seven
Lightning splintered the inky black of night, while thunder boomed in the distance, shaking the very ground that Liam rode upon. A torrential downpour lashed at his face like icy claws as he raced along the dark hills, heading for the beacon of sanctuary in the near distance… the glowing lights of home.
Why is my heart palpitating? Why do I feel so unnerved?
Keswick Manor was the seat of his childhood memories, and the bliss of his first wedded weeks, yet he felt as though he were riding toward his execution. It did not make a jot of sense, but he could not urge his mount to stop its gallop. He had tried, to no avail, throughout the undulating countryside. Every time he pulled on the reins to try and slow the horse to a halt, the creature merely sped up, until they were charging at a breakneck pace.
Finally, the sodden grass that threatened to pitch his horse forward at any moment, making him grip the saddle tighter with his thighs, gave way to crushed gravel. There, outside the entrance to his house, the horse came to a seemingly independent stop.
“What am I doing here?” Liam muttered. “I have done this before. I have seen all this.”
Nevertheless, some unknown impulse prompted him to swing down off the saddle and march up to the front door. He burst through it like a man possessed, sloshing water onto the parquet floor of the entrance hall as he strode toward the staircase.
Taking the steps two at a time, he paused on the landing as a strange sound drifted in his direction… an odd wail that might have been the howling wind. And yet, as it rippled through the hallway a second time, he realized it was not coming from outside.
“Have you come back to me, mon chéri?” That familiarly painful voice wrapped around him like a serpent, slithering into his ears.
Startled, he whipped around in a circle, trying to spot the voice’s origin in the gloom of the Manor. She could not be here in this hallway. There was no way he was hearing what he thought he was hearing, when he was so many miles, and so many years away from that moment in time.
“Why did you leave me, mon chéri?” The voice spiraled around him in a tangible whirlwind, prickling at his flesh. “Have you come back to save me, Husband? Have you come to rescue your terrible wife?” A sharp cackle cut right through him.
“This is not real,” he told himself. “You are not real!”
Down the hallway, a door flew open, and blood-red rose petals fluttered out.
You are dreaming, Liam. This is all in your imagination. You had too much brandy and this is the result.
Deep down in the recesses of his logic, he knew that was true. For one, the door to his wife’s bedchamber opened inward, and she had always abhorred roses of any color. Still, the sound of her chilling voice seemed so very real in his ears, and the racing of his heart felt identical to the way it had been five years ago, when he had walked this very hall.
“Wake up,” he demanded.
“I am awake, mon chéri,” Élodie’s voice echoed back. “I have been waiting for you. I do not sleep… I only wait for you to return to me.”
Against his will, he began to move forward, putting one foot in front of the other. Putting out his hands, he tried to grapple for the wall, or a table, or anything that would prevent him from reaching that door. But the hallway that had seemed so narrow had somehow widened, taking everything that might have saved him out of his reach.
And so, he had no choice but to keep walking toward those fluttering rose petals, and whatever lay through the open door of his wife’s old bedchamber.
“I hear you, Husband,” she cooed, as hazy pink light spilled out from the doorway ahead. “I knew you would not leave me. How could you? You did not leave me in France, when I was so lost and alone. You will not leave me now.”
“You were different then,” he said quietly. “You were sweet, and gentle, and loyal. You loved me, then… but you changed. You made me leave you.”
Another explosion of bitter laughter attacked his eardrums. “I was always what I am. You thought you could change me. You thought you could mold me into your obedient wife. I was not the one who altered. I never changed.”
Was that true?
He tried to recall that halcyon summer in France, when he had first set eyes upon Élodie, but it was as if there was a barrier in his mind, preventing him from gaining access to those memories.
“You sought me,” she continued, taunting him, “because I was damaged. You wanted to be my hero, but you became my captor. You did not want me to be free. How could you know that you had chosen poorly? What example of love did you have?”
Liam balled his hands into fists. “Do not speak of it.”
“Of what?” Élodie snickered. “Of your Father and Mother who hated one another, and hated you more for being half of both of them? How could you know of love, when that was all you had seen? In the end, you walked the same path as your Father.”
“I said, stop!” Liam barked.
“But I am not your Mother,” she carried on regardless. “Your Mother abandoned your Father for her lover. I did not intend to leave you for all those men. I still wanted to be your wife.Youwere the one who left me. Tell me, did you do it so you would not die of the heartache, like your Father did? Or did you do it to punish me, the way you wanted your Mother to be punished?”
Liam tried to cover his ears with his hands, but his body would not cooperate. All the while, he drew closer to his wife’s bedchamber door.
