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She should stay and wait for Jackson, but she could not. She had to move. Chrysanthemums were blooming all inside, and she had to let them out.

Twenty

The rain pelted Jackson unceasingly, and he cursed as he jumped from his horse and ran into the manor. He slipped out of his soaked and dripping greatcoat. “Mrs. Whitlock!”

The call echoed, the housekeeper appeared promptly, and Jackson handed off the coat.

“This needs to be cleaned, I think.” He grimaced. “I worry I’ve ruined it.”

She clucked her tongue, holding it away from her skirts. “I’ll take care of it.”

“Is my uncle in the study?” He ran fingers through his hair from forehead to neck and felt cold water sluice down his shoulders and back.

“He is, but I think you should change first, Mr. Cavendish.”

He smiled. “Perhaps you’re right.” He clutched the satchel to his side, wet, too, but less so. Hopefully the manuscript inside its folio had survived the ordeal entirely dry. He should have stayed at Mr. Stewart’s until the rain let up, but the man had kicked him out for suggesting Tudor castles had no superior benefits to castles from other ages. Jackson hadn’t said it because he thought it true. He just liked poking the man, and he’d asked too many questions about Gwendolyn.

Gwendolyn who had been silent as the grave last night after their return from the shore, prize in hand.

He shook his head, sent droplets flying, and put a foot on the first step.

“Mr. Cavendish.”

“Yes?”

Mrs. Whitlock stood behind him, uncharacteristic worry on her features, her fingers fidgeting with her skirts. “I wished to apologize.”

He leaned against the banister, the cold seeping into his bones only partially from this odd omen. “I cannot imagine you’ve done anything necessitating an apology.”

“I spoke with Miss Smith this morning. And I made some implications she perhaps took as insult. I did not think myself wrong, and I let my curiosity best me.”

“What did you say?”

“Only that I knew where I remembered her face from. The papers. Six years ago. I wouldn’t have remembered, it was so long ago, but it had been so sad, and—”

“And you suggested she was the girl? From the paper?”

Mrs. Whitlock nodded.

Jove. No good. Had Mrs. Whitlock been right?

“Where is she?” he demanded.

“She left. An hour or so ago, right before the rain started.”

He strode for the door, shoving the satchel toward the housekeeper. “Give this to my uncle please.” He was going to find Gwendolyn, and see if she’d let him… what?

No coherent goal, no coherent thought. Just the knowledge she was hurting and the instinct to roar to her side.

Without a greatcoat, the rain soaked him quickly enough. Thunder shook the earth and the gray sky flashed bright. Where had she gone? Where did she have to go? He ran to the gardens—empty but for barren branches and brown grass. The greenhouse. He slammed through the door—empty as well. Had she gone up to her room? He looked up at the house, the square of her room’s window dark. Not there, either. She had no other place to escape to. Had she left, then? Well and truly left?

What a ruin his life would be if that were true.

He’d run after her. He’d not let up. Not yet.

He ran to the stables and had a fresh horse saddled. He could not be sure what words and actions had made it happen. Thoughts had no weight or shape anymore. He jumped into the saddle and took off down the drive. The mud kicked up behind him, and he kept his eyes riveted to the drive. Where would he go? Wherever she was. To London? She’d revealed so much of her past this last week. And so little. He still knew nothing. Nothing that would help find her. The old castle rose before him on the side of the road, jagged and eerie looking in the merciless storm. Thunder, another flash of lightning outlining the sharp-toothed edges of the building with… with smoke spiraling out the chimney?

He tugged the reins, bringing the horse to a stop. Could she be here? He swung to the ground and stormed into the castle. Light flickered from the old banquet hall, and he strode through the soaring arch that had long ago held wide wooden doors and stopped.