The Art of Inheriting Secrets(109)

“I’m even older than I thought I was,” I said.

She folded her hands in her lap. Nodded. “You will need to tell him, but I don’t think it will matter. He’s as arrogant as a lord.” She touched the bracelet on my wrist, Nandini’s bracelet. “Perhaps, in the light of things, it isn’t so important.”

I nodded. “Thank you for everything,” I said, dragging in a long breath. “There’s something I need to do.”

Samir and Harshad were waiting downstairs in the closed restaurant. “I’m so sorry about your sister and your mother,” I said.

“Thank you. I am sorry about your mother.”

I nodded, then realized the kitchen was entirely quiet. “Where is Pavi?”

“She closed the restaurant. I don’t know where she went.”

“Will you ask her to call me when she returns?” When he nodded, I turned to his son. “Samir, will you drive me home? I have some things I need to do.”

His expression was sober, and all the words of the morning filled the space between us. “Of course.”

In the car, he said, “We need to get you driving. If you stay, that is.”

I was buzzing with emotion and exhaustion. I could only nod and lean my head back. “I need things to just stop for a couple days. I’m so tired.”

“If you’re tired,” he said in a reasonable tone, “perhaps the best answer is to sleep.”

“Mmm.” I was half-asleep before we left the parking lot. When we reached the flat, he helped me inside. “Don’t do anything hard,” he said. “Just go to sleep.”

I nodded and staggered off into the new bedroom.

Enough.





Chapter Twenty-Five

It was morning when I awakened, dry mouthed and slightly dizzy with lack of eating, but as I hurried to the bathroom, I realized my head was clear. The fuzziness was just gone. I showered and washed my hair vigorously, then made myself a massive breakfast of eggs and bacon and toast and coffee made in a brand-new french press, with whole cream and real sugar. Just the way I liked it.

For all my righteous indignation, I couldn’t help looking over the offer from Alexander again, and it was truly substantial. It would be like winning the lottery. I’d never have to work again. I could buy a big house on the sea and take up painting and travel whenever I wished.

It wouldn’t be the worst life of all time.

On the other hand was the house. The estate. The lands and people. My mother had gone through a lot of trouble to get me out of here and then to get me back, and I still didn’t fully understand why. Why bring me back? Why not just let the old wreck fall into ruin?

It might have taken one more step in that direction with the fire. Before I could do anything else, I had to reckon with Rosemere, with whatever had happened last night, two weeks ago, decades, centuries ago. The only way to do that was to gather up the courage Samir had so accurately named missing and face the actual rooms. By myself.

Entry was blocked from the kitchen, though I peered at it through the window. Smoke stains made it difficult to see anything, but certainly there was damage to the ceilings and walls.

Rounding the house, I touched the stones that made the house glow, crunched over pine needles and leaves, releasing a fragrance of spice and decay. The windows of the first floor were above my head, and I looked up to see if they were fire damaged, but from this angle they appeared whole.

Until I came to the front. The main floor was fine, but the second floor windows gaped across the front, and the third floor windows were buckled too. I frowned. Had the room that burned before been the epicenter of the fire this time too? It had seemed, last night, to have been in the kitchen.

In the quiet, I shivered, thinking of that room.

A cat dashed out of the cover of shrubs and meowed. “Meow Meow,” I cried. “Are you okay?”

He looked fine, if a little grimier than usual, and when I bent down to pick him up, he let me, nestling his head on my shoulder and purring under my ear. “I’m so sorry. That must have been terrible. Were you very afraid?”

“Meow,” he said, hoarsely. I stroked his fur, long and staticky.

“Let’s get this over with,” I said, carrying him with me. His body felt like a shield, something protective, so when he leapt down as I approached the front door, I was disappointed. “Do you want to come with me?” I asked, opening the door.

He sat down, curled his tail around his feet.

The rain had stopped, I realized, and I looked back toward the village. It shimmered with distance, the thatched roofs cozy against a slate sky. Did I owe the village my allegiance? Did they really need the estate at all in the modern world?

The door stuck a bit, but when I pushed, it gave way, and I tumbled into the main hallway. The magnificent Elizabethan stairway. The wood had smears of soot, but it didn’t appear to be damaged, and I didn’t realize how I’d been holding my breath over that. The window, too, appeared to be undamaged.

When I peeked into the parlor, however, the damage was more apparent—the ceiling gaping, blackened supports hanging down. Too dangerous to navigate that direction, so I headed around the other side of the stairs and poked my head into the library, adjacent to the ballroom that had been so damaged by time and then the collapsing roof. Work had been focused here, and I could see the progress. It smelled of fresh lumber, and the floors had been cleared. New shelves waited for new books, or maybe old ones, and the old window seat was stripped, awaiting new wood and fabric. The little girl in me longed to take a book to that spot and look out toward the village—I could almost see a figure there against the glass.