B008AZB1XW EBOK (3 page)

Simon’s chest tightened. Of course, she’d understand. “I thought you wanted to see it.”

“I did and I have. But when your favorite place in all of glorious Grey Hall is a musty old hole in the ground; that tells me all I need to know about it.”

“So many ghosts here,” Simon said.

“Maybe it’s time to put them to rest?”

“Yes,” he said and felt a weight begin to lift. He pulled Elizabeth toward him and held on. Had it been so simple all along? Had all he needed to do was to let go? Or was all he needed was something else to hold on to?

~~~

Elizabeth rolled over and felt something poke her cheek. She reached up a still half-asleep hand and rubbed the side of her face. Nothing was there. She opened her eyes and it took her a moment to remember where she was. Little lace curtains fluttered in the breeze through the slightly opened window. She pushed herself up onto her elbow and felt the prickling again. A small feather had escaped from her down pillow. She pulled it out the rest of the way and blew it off her finger. It joined the dust motes as they danced in a shaft of sunlight.

Sebastian’s house — Rosewood Cottage.

Yesterday, they’d left Grey Hall and traveled to Hastings. Simon had even spoken with Aunt Victoria before they left. He described it as a very tentative truce, which could mean anything, but it was a step.

Elizabeth stretched and worked out the kinks in her neck. The iron and brass bed gave a protesting creak as she got up. After she dressed, she found the bath just down the hall, splashed cold water on her face and set off to find him.

The house was big, by her standards if not Cross standards, but it felt familiar. She found her way downstairs. A few of the steps of the old wooden staircase squeaked under her feet. Fading, 1930s wallpaper with a small flower motif lined the walls of the hall and an old oriental runner showed the way along the corridor.

“In here,” came Simon’s voice from down the hall.

Elizabeth found a room with a door slightly ajar and pushed it open the rest of the way. Inside was the absolute, perfect study. The walls were dark wood, but there was plenty of light. An oversized window sat behind a heavy teak desk and tufted leather chair. Brass lamps, bronze statues and rich leather made the room feel warm and solid. The oriental rugs were well worn with tread paths where Sebastian must have paced hour upon hour.

Sitting behind the desk, looking much as she’d imagined Sebastian had at his age, Simon looked up at her from a thick old ledger. “Good morning,” he said with a smile. He stood, came around the desk and kissed her. “Sleep well?”

“I did,” she said and squinted up at him. “You’re in a suspiciously good mood.”

“It’s this place, I think. It always makes me feel whole again. Even though not every memory here is a good one, this is home.”

She knew he was talking about the night his grandfather died. It had been the first secret he’d shared with her, her first glimpse beyond the armor. The pain from his grandfather’s death would never be gone, but it didn’t define him anymore.

Simon slipped his arms around her waist. “That and the company I keep. And this,” he said, stepping away and waving expansively. “This is part of what I’ve wanted to show you.”

It was hard to imagine Simon as a little boy in Grey Hall. It was hard to imagine any little boy in Grey Hall. Sebastian’s home was another story entirely. Even though it hadn’t been lived in for years, it still echoed with life.

“I used to spend nearly all my time here.” Simon pointed to a small secretary’s desk and chair off to one side. “ That was mine. We’d work here together. He’d give me some sort of task. I doubt I was any real help at all, but he always made me feel part of it. Essential.”

Elizabeth had never met Sebastian Cross. Even when they’d both been in 1929 New York, she’d been otherwise occupied as a prisoner on King’s yacht. She couldn’t imagine how difficult all of it must have been for Simon. She pushed away the memory.

She could see the emotion in his eyes as he nodded and cleared his throat. “Now,” he said in control again. “Knowing you, you’re in desperate need of coffee.”

“That I am.”

“The service was supposed to have brought a few basic supplies to the house. Let’s see if they did. Kitchen’s just down this hall.”

After a quick breakfast, Simon showed her around the estate. It was something out of a fairy tale. An arched entrance with a huge old wrought iron gate led into the most charming courtyard she’d ever seen. The gravel road gave way to a circular cobblestone drive lined with box hedges and wild rose bushes. A small group of outbuildings with thatched roofs cozied up to the larger main house and its ivy covered brick walls. Flowerbeds and deep green hedges led to the short path to the front door.

“Beautiful,” she said.

“There’s quite a bit more to see. And there’s something I’d like to show you.”

She nodded and he disappeared inside one of the outbuildings. A few moments later she heard a car engine and one of the large barnlike doors flipped open. Simon revved the engine and pulled out into the sunlight. It was the most adorable vintage sports car she’d ever seen — a small silver coupe with large open-mouth grill. An Aston Martin DB5 from the early sixties. Elizabeth whistled in appreciation.

Simon grinned at her from behind the wheel looking more than a little Cary Grantish. “Well, come on.”

With a grin to match his, Elizabeth hurried around to the passenger side and slid onto the leather seat, and they drove off down the road. They meandered down winding country lanes, until they crossed an old rutted path with a small cottage at the end. Simon stopped the car.

“That was my great aunt’s. She and grandfather were very close. She lived there until she was killed.”

“What happened?”

“The Blitz. She joined the Women’s Voluntary Service during the war and was killed in a bombing raid in London. He always regretted being overseas at the time and helped fund a small war museum in town in her memory. I think someone comes in to keep the forest from overrunning, but he kept it just as she left it.”

They drove for a few more minutes before Simon pulled into a small gravel parking lot near the cliffs above the sea. The early afternoon sun was warm against her skin and she could just barely smell a hint of the ocean on the breeze.

Simon walked her to a group of rocks near the edge of a seaside cliff. Small bits of greenery forced their way out of the rough sandstone and the English Channel stretched beyond the rocky beach below as far as the eye could see. Somewhere in the distance, through the haze, was France, but she couldn’t see it.

“Not too close. The rocks give way easily.”

Elizabeth didn’t have to be told twice. She’d had her fill of rocky cliffs in San Francisco. Simon leaned back against a group of large white rocks.

“I used to come here often as a boy. Most of it’s a public park now, but then it was my private playground,” he added with a smile. “From here everything seemed possible. I could be anything. Anyone.”

“Who did you want to be?”

“A pirate.”

The image of little Simon with a striped black and white shirt, red bandana tied over his head and makeshift eye-patch made her smile.

“There used to be quite a few pirates off the coast here.”

“Seriously?”

“In the eighteenth century these waters would have been filled with privateers and buccaneers smuggling God knows what.”

If she squinted just so, she could just see the tips of tall masts and white sails in the distant whitecaps.

Simon came up behind her and wrapped one arm around her. She leaned back into him.

“Hastings has quite a bit of interesting history. There,” Simon said, pointing down the coast, “are the remnants of Hastings Castle built by William of Normandy. And the castle was built on Roman ruins that predate that by another thousand years.”

“And I thought the Alamo was old.” Elizabeth turned around to face him. “Can we see it? The castle, I mean.”

“There’s not much left, I’m afraid. Only a few ruins have survived. Several wars, years of neglect and Nazi bombing raids destroyed most of it.”

“I’d still like to see it.”

Simon nodded. “The past is part of the reason I brought you here. But it’s not the only reason.”

“You said there was something you wanted to show me.”

He pushed himself away from the rocks and fidgeted for a moment. It was strange to see him nervous and unsure. “This,” he said. “This is where I come from. This is who I am. Grey Hall, Hastings, all of it. I wanted you to know what’s come before so you could decide,” he said meeting her eyes, “if you want to be part of what comes next.”

Elizabeth’s heart stuttered and she felt her pulse race.

“I brought you to this place because, here, I can believe anything’s possible. I could even believe a woman like you would want to spend her life with a man like me. Elizabeth—”

Chapter Three

“Oy! This way!” A man wearing plaid tan and white shorts, and long black socks emerged from the bushes. It was all Elizabeth could do not to strangle him. “Get a move on, we ain’t got all day.”

The man was soon joined by a plump and panting woman in a loud floral dress and two sullen children who would forever be remembered as the Moment Killers. “You’re the one that wanted to see the bloomin’ ocean. Get an eyeful ‘cause it’s the last time I’m taking you sorry lot anywhere.”

Elizabeth looked from them back up to Simon willing him to continue. Her head suddenly felt swimmy. He’d been this close, inches away from what she was pretty sure might have been a proposal. She wanted to tell him to ignore them, but the moment was obviously gone. Simon closed his eyes and sighed heavily.

“Simon?” she started, but he shook his head.

“Would you like to see the town?” he asked quietly.

“Pick up your feet!” the mother yelled to her children who were still dawdling behind. She smiled at Simon and Elizabeth. “Beautiful day, innit?”

The father trooped past with a grunt and mumbled, “Mornin’.”

Elizabeth smiled through clenched teeth at the invaders. When she turned back, Simon had already started toward the path to the car. All she could do was follow.

The drive into town was quiet. She tried to lose herself in the beautiful scenery, but holy heck, Simon had nearly proposed. She thought briefly about asking him herself. It wasn’t as though she hadn’t thought about it a thousand times. But Simon was old fashioned and more than that, deep down, she was too. Not that he would have said no if she’d bucked tradition, but she knew that he wanted to be the one, that he needed to be the one, to ask.

The town of Hastings looked and felt wonderfully old, despite a few signs of modern life. Most of the buildings had that wonderful aged patina to their stone facades. The roads were a mixture of brick and cobblestone. If the streets had been empty and a little signage removed, she could have been in Hastings of fifty or even a hundred or more years ago. For the most part, the shops were exactly what you’d find in any tourist center — a mixture of high-priced fashion and home goods and kitschy souvenirs. On their way back toward the town center Simon pointed out a small museum across the street.

“That’s what I was telling you about earlier. Grandfather helped fund that as a memorial to Aunt Sybil.”

A sweet little old woman greeted them at the door and accepted their donation. The Women in War museum was a small thing, only two rooms, but Elizabeth had always loved local museums. There was a heart and soul that went into them that the larger ones often lacked.

Posters and photographs covered the walls — pictures of women serving tea from mobile canteens or knitting their way to victory. Simon immediately gravitated to a small photograph and plaque that read simply, “In loving memory of Sybil Cross.”

Elizabeth had expected Great Aunt Sybil to look like a great aunt, but she didn’t. The woman in the photograph couldn’t have been much older than Elizabeth. She wore her WVS uniform. Her pin curl hair peeked out from the brim of her cap with the same sort of playfulness she had in her smile. She looked like the sort of woman Elizabeth could have been friends with.

“There’s a special hospital exhibit here just for the rest of the week,” the woman at the desk said before going back to her book. “You can see it in the back room, if you’d like.”

“Thank you,” Simon said. He and Elizabeth lingered at Sybil’s portrait for a few minutes before moving into the back room.

There were newspaper articles, photographs and even a mannequin wearing a period nurse’s uniform. Sections were devoted to the Civil Nursing Reserve, St. Andrew’s Ambulance Association and the Women’s Voluntary Services. Original reports typed on faded yellow paper told the stories of evacuees brought into the hospitals only to be bombed out again.

Various ringed binders were scattered across the counter with even more photographs. Elizabeth flipped through one. Images of the blitz looked like scenes from a movie. Even though she’d seen massive destruction up close and personal thanks to the 1906 San Francisco earthquake, sometimes it still felt like a dream. Something once removed. The war wasn’t fiction though, and every one of the people in the photographs had been real. They’d been standing in those spots just as surely as she was standing in Hastings. She flipped through a few more pages. Newspaper stories of civilian casualties and the difficulties the hospitals endured during the bombing raids. Moving operating theaters to basements and burying radium to keep from contaminating everything with lethal doses of radiation if a bomb should strike. Patients were moved from floor to floor and hospital to hospital trying to stay one step ahead of the Nazi bombs.

In one series of photographs an injured man was being helped into a bed at a new ward at Guy’s Hospital in London. The caption read, “Some men lose more than their homes. For some, their identities are stolen by shell shock induced amnesia.” The photographer captured a close-up of the man’s face. Elizabeth’s hands trembled.

“Oh my god,” Elizabeth said. “Simon!”

She could barely believe what she was seeing.