Once Upon a Tower

A couple of hours later she heard laughter and looked out her window. They were walking down the path, all three of them. And Susannah was holding the earl’s hand, bobbing beside him like a very small cork.

In the end, she had no need to inquire about happiness. Layla’s face was shining—and so was Lord Gilchrist’s.

“He is sorry,” Layla whispered, while Edie’s father was showing Susannah the strings to pluck out a children’s song, Frère Jacques, and teaching the little girl to sing it. “I said I was sorry, and that I hadn’t meant to flirt with other men. And that he was the only man I’d ever loved, and ever would love. And he . . .”

Edie stopped her with a kiss. “That’s between the two of you, darling.”

Layla pulled her into her arms. “You are my best and wisest friend.”

They went back to the castle after a bit, all four of them. On the way up the path, Susannah pulled Layla ahead, and Edie’s father said, very quietly, “I’m so sorry, my dear. I made a terrible choice when I accepted Kinross’s offer.”

Edie’s eyes filled with tears. “No, you didn’t. I love him.”

He shook his head. “You are coming home, and I shall have this marriage dissolved if I have to speak to the king himself. I shall speak to the king himself. And I fancy that he will respect my wishes.”

“You must rest after the journey,” Edie said, not managing to squash the errant hope that Gowan might still come, that she might see him once more.

“I can rest in the carriage,” her father replied. “It’s time to go home, Edie.”

And though it made her heartsick, she nodded. It was foolish to be shut up in a tower, barricaded against the husband who didn’t bother to knock on the door.

After an early supper, she returned to the tower and locked the door against a man who never came, pulling herself up the stairs with a sense of leaden exhaustion. Layla and her father were blindingly happy. Clearly, they had talked—really talked. What’s more, Edie had the distinct feeling that Susannah would bind them together like glue. Layla’s restlessness was gone, and her eyes were luminescent with happiness.

The rain beat against her windows like an unanswered voice, so finally she opened them to the cool air and crawled into her bed. It was only eight o’clock, but she fell asleep listening to the call of the river as it rushed to the sea.

Thirty-nine

Gowan rode into the stables around nine in the evening and dismounted, throwing the reins to a sleepy stable boy. He entered the castle through the kitchens so he wouldn’t be seen by any footmen, who would certainly inform Bardolph.

The great oven fires were banked for the night, and no one stirred except the kitchen cat, whose slitted eyes gleamed yellow from the hearth. Gowan grabbed a lamp and lit it, then went up the servants’ stairs and along the corridor. Not to his bedchamber: to hers.

He pushed open the door to find the room perfectly dark. The curtains were drawn, and the fireplace cold. The entire room was cold, far too cold. And it was empty. It even smelled empty, as if no one had inhabited it for a long time. He put the lamp on the mantel, noting indifferently that his hand was shaking. A sickening fear bloomed in his gut. He stood for one terrible moment as he realized what he was seeing.

She was gone. The bed was stripped and the room was empty.

There was only one object left in the chamber: the book of poetry. His soul roared with pain and his stomach churned as if he might vomit. He walked over, picked up that damned volume, and slipped it into his pocket.

Still, he had calculated the days since Bardolph’s dispatch arrived in the Highlands. He should have been able to catch her before she left for England. But she hadn’t left this room mere hours ago. There was dust on the hearth. She’d been gone for days.

He strode from the room, his face rigidly set. When he reached the ground floor, two footmen sprang from their chairs, alarm written on their faces.

“When did the duchess leave?” he demanded, his voice growling out of him in its new, angry cadence.

One gaped; the other said, “Leave, Your Grace, leave?”

They were idiots.

“When did she leave for England?” His voice rose to a bellow. “When did my wife leave me?”

Edie dreamed that the tumbling roar of the Glaschorrie River summoned her. The impossibility of it woke her: the river couldn’t be calling her by name. But even awake, she heard her name again. She went to the window and leaned out. Night had fallen, and although it was spitting a bit, the rain had let up considerably. Gowan stood below her, surrounded by darkness.

She opened her mouth, but no words came out.

“The door is locked!” he shouted up at her. “Can you come down and let me in?”

Edie pulled herself together. She had prepared herself for this moment; she knew what to say. “I will not talk to you in the middle of the night, Gowan,” she called down. “Go to bed and we can talk in the morning, before I leave.”

“Edie. You cannot— You cannot mean to leave me.” He didn’t shout the sentence, but she heard every word clearly. So it was going to be like that. He didn’t care to speak to her until he thought his possession was slipping from his grip. Bardolph’s message must have convinced him to come.

“Good night, Gowan.”

“You were planning to return to England without even speaking to me?” The disbelief in his voice would have made her laugh, if she didn’t feel like crying.

“We could have spoken any time in the past two weeks, had you chosen to return.”

“I was coming back; you knew that. I thought . . . I thought we might talk, Edie. Really talk.”

“Well,” Edie said, disappointment pinning her to the ground like a lead weight, “the next time you want to talk to your wife, Gowan, you’ll have to give her more than an hour at dinner and a visit whenever you can spare the time from your estates. That would be your next wife.”

“I don’t want another wife!”

Of course, she couldn’t flee in the morning without speaking to him. A marriage, even as brief and turbulent a marriage as theirs, had to be respected. “We will speak in the morning. I’m sure my father will agree to delay our trip back to London for another day.”

“You cannot leave me!” His voice cut like a knife through the sound of the river.

Edie forced her icy, wet fingers to uncurl from the windowsill. “It’s over, Gowan. I am leaving.” She closed the window. And latched it.

Gowan stared up at the tower. She had refused. His whole body ached from the beating he had taken, riding for hours, being thrown off, landing in the ditch. His horse had fled, and he’d walked for an hour before reaching a village where he could get his ribs bound up and buy another mount—for approximately three times what the beast was worth. Then he’d ridden for another five hours, ribs be damned.

But Edie had locked the door, and then the window. A minute later he stalked back into the castle, shaking water from his cloak like a dog. He was on his way up the stairs, when he walked straight into Layla. She stopped short, her mouth falling open.

“Good evening,” he said, a streak of humiliation going down his backbone. This woman knew—

The thought died at the look in her eyes. “You!” she said, stabbing him in the chest with her finger. “I want to talk to you.”