Page 76 of Once Upon a Midnight Dreary
She clasped her hands in her lap to keep them from shaking.
Footsteps in the hall made her spine stiffen.Then his voice—low, familiar.“Victoria?”
“In here,” she managed.
He appeared in the doorway, the candlelight behind him throwing his face into shadow.For a moment, he didn’t move, as if crossing the threshold itself took all his strength.
“I came to apologize,” he said at last.His voice was rough, as though the words cost him dearly.
Her brows knit.“For what?”
He shifted, gaze darting briefly toward the closed book on the desk before returning to her.“For…before.”Guilt flickered across his face, sharp and raw, before he stepped inside.
He meant before in the dining room.When he practically confessed his feelings for her and then left her there bereft in a sea of her own emotions.Emotions that were on the brink of spiraling.Emotions she somehow managed to rein in before she cracked.
Uncertainty swept through her as she peered at him from her chair.He lingered in the doorway, the flickering candlelight catching the sharp edges of his features.
“Before?”
He pursed his lips, then ran a hand through his hair.“For wanting what I should not.”
“Gabriel,” she said, slowly, quietly.“My feelings for you have certainly changed since I arrived here.I sense the same from you.But if you’re not ready, that’s perfectly fine, too.I’m not leaving this house.”
He shifted then, clearly relieved.Before he replied, she forged on.
“This is, after all,myhouse, now.Not Lenore’s.It’s time for me to take it back.”
Gabriel’s brows winged upward as he walked deeper into the room.“You found something?”
She motioned to the book.“I think this the book from the…” Her breath hitched.She swallowed hard.“…the room.”
He walked to the desk, pausing at the side and leaned down to look at the hefty tome.When he did, she caught the scent of him.That earthy, smokey scent mingling with cedar and old leather.
“Where did this come from?”he asked.“Itisthe book from the room.”
“I’m not sure.It was on the shelf over there.”She pointed to the bookshelf.“As if it was waiting for one of us to find it.”
She flipped a few pages.The same strange symbols and writing were on each page.But when she got to the middle of the book, she halted.A folded piece of parchment was in the center as though the owner left it there and forgot about it.She glanced up at him.His gaze met hers and they exchanged the same look of curiosity.
With a shaking hand, she picked it up and unfolded it.Instantly, she recognized her father’s handwriting.Her gut clenched into a tight knot as she read it.
The widow’s spirit clings because her grief was not buried with her body.She seeks what was taken from her.To sever her hold, the knife must be anointed with living blood, spilled upon the altar.Three times the banishing chant must be spoken, and the flames must not go out.Should the flame die, the soul of the speaker will be forfeit.This I have learned too late.
“What is it?”he asked.
She handed it to him.Gabriel’s eyes scanned the paper once, twice.As if reading it again and again would change the words.A muscle ticked in his jaw as he lowered the page with a shaking hand.
“No,” he said.
“It’s the only way.”
He crushed the note in his fist, his knuckles leeching of color.“Don’t you understand what this means?It’s a trap.Your father must have realized it and wrote the note too late.He saw what it required.”
“I know what it requires.”She sounded far more calm than she felt.
“Blood.”His gaze locked on hers, sharp with desperation.“Yourblood.It wants you bound to her in exchange.If the flame dies—if anything goes wrong—it will claim you.Do you understand?You won’t be released.You’ll be trapped here.Just like her.”
“What she wants doesn’t matter anymore,” she snapped, her voice stern and hard.“I will not allow her to continue to control me.Or you.”
