Page 32 of The Burning Passion of a Fiery Lady
In the morning, it had been pandemonium. In horror, she had watched as they had carried his dead body into the house, not understanding. His head was covered in dried blood from a deep wound to his skull.
“Dear God,” she cried, still not believing it was true. “What happened?”
Amy had taken her aside. “He left the house last night,” she whispered, her face white. “I knew that he had taken his horse out riding, but I did not want to worry you …” The housekeeper had taken a deep breath. “The mail carrier found him, on the ground, this morning. His horse was wandering nearby. It appears that the horse threw him, and he hit his head on a rock, which killed him instantly.”
She had collapsed, then, keening, overcome with grief and horror. They had taken her to her room and tended her for two days. On the third day, she had roused herself, dressing in her widow’s weeds, to attend his funeral.
She had known it was all her fault. If she hadn’t argued with him that night, he would never have gone riding in the dark. Her guilt had been overwhelming; for the first six months, it had consumed her. But there had also been a small nugget of relief, buried deep inside her. Relief that she was finally free of her life with him, the life he had forced her to live.
She had felt guilty over that, too.
The enquiry into his death had been quick, over and done with in a day; the coroner had decreed that he had died from a head injury, sustained when being thrown from his horse. It had been cut and dried. No one had argued with the verdict. She had not even thought to do so.
But she had wondered, just the same. What had spooked such a steady horse as Blitzen? The night had been cold, but clear. There hadn’t been a thunderstorm, or anything else, to explain it.
She had assumed that she would never know. The horse could not speak to her. And the horse was the only witness to what had happened on that dark night on a hillside so many months ago.
***
Susannah pressed her face against the glass of the windowpane, still lost in contemplation. Still seeing Gilbert walking out of the dining room in anger. The very last time that she had ever seen him alive.
She sighed deeply, suddenly desperately needing to get out of the room.
Taking a shawl, she wandered the hallways of the estate, up and down, in a daze. Sometimes, she picked up objects, gazing at them intently. The Chinese Ming vase that had been a wedding gift. The crystal figurine that Gilbert had given her for her eighteenth birthday when he had still loved her.
The detritus of their lives together, permanently on display. It was like living in a haunted museum.
She stopped at his portrait on a wall above a French mahogany dresser. He had been thirty, at the time it had been painted. Still vibrant. Her eyes swept over his dark hair, those green eyes, his large girth. Gilbert had always been larger than life, almost overpowering a room when he entered it, filling it with his presence.
And then, overlaying the image of him was another. The image of him being carried into this house, lifeless. She could still see the dried blood on his head, that deep wound …
Leonard Green. His voice drifted into her mind, once again, almost whispering.
You have made me do terrible things for you … things I would never have dreamed of doing … I have done everything for you … I have damned my immortal soul … If it wasn’t for me, your husband would still be around, terrorising you.
What had Leonard Green done?
Her heart lurched sickeningly. The head wound. It could have happened by falling onto a rock. But … something else might have caused it, too.
Leonard. The man who was delusional with love for her, insisting that they were fated to be together. Had he done something so evil, so black, to fulfil it, that he feared for his very soul?
She kept gazing at the portrait of her husband, almost willing it to speak. To tell her what had happened to him on that dark night.
How far was Leonard Green willing to go in pursuit of his delusion? How far had he already gone? And how on earth could she ever find out?
Chapter 14
Susannah stirred in her sleep, whimpering.
She was dreaming of Gilbert.
He was back at The Willows, wandering the hallways. She could hear his footsteps, thundering through the house, as if a giant was crashing through it. She knew that he was following her as she ran through those same hallways. She knew that he was pursuing her, trying to find her, to tell her yet again what a deep disappointment she was.
“I know you are here!” His voice echoed through the house. “Show yourself!”
She crawled underneath a table, curling herself into a ball. He was almost upon her; she could sense him, close by. In horror, she gazed out from under the table, seeing his feet.
She didn’t want to do it, but it was as if something was compelling her. Her eyes travelled upwards, over his body, to his face.
