Page 79 of Megan's Mate
The figures started to blur in front of her eyes. She forced herself to close them, to sit back and relax until her mind was clear again. Then she opened them again and read.
Bianca haunts me. I have no peace. All that was hers must be put away, sold, destroyed. Do spirits walk? It is nonsense, a lie. But I see her eyes, staring at me as she fell. Green as her emeralds. I will leave her a token to satisfy her. And that will be the end of it. Tonight I will sleep.
Breathless, Megan read on. The directions were very simple, very precise. For a man going mad with the enormity of his own actions, Fergus Calhoun had retained his conciseness.
Tucking the paper in her pocket, Megan hurried out. She didn’t consider alerting the Calhouns. Something was driving her to finish this herself. She found what she needed in the renovation area in the family wing. Hefting a crowbar, a chisel, a tape measure, she climbed the winding iron steps to Bianca’s tower.
She had been here before, knew that Bianca had stood by the windows and watched the cliffs for Christian. That she had wept here, dreamed here, died here.
The Calhouns had made it charming again, with plump, colorful pillows on the window seat, delicate tables and china vases. A velvet chaise, a crystal lamp.
Bianca would have been pleased.
Megan closed the heavy door at her back. Using the tape measure, she followed Fergus’s directions. Six feet in from the door, eight from the north wall.
Without a thought to the destruction she was about to cause, Megan rolled up the softly faded floral carpet, then shoved the chisel between the slats of wood.
It was hard, backbreaking work. The wood was old, but thick and strong. Someone had polished it to a fine gleam. She pried and pulled, stopping only to flex her straining muscles and, when the light began to fail, to switch on the lamps.
The first board gave with a protesting screech. If she’d been fanciful, she might have thought it sounded like a woman. Sweat dripped down her sides, and she cursed herself for forgetting a flashlight. Refusing to think of spiders, or worse, she thrust her hand into the gap.
She thought she felt the edge of something, but no matter how she stretched and strained, she couldn’t get a grip. Grimly resigned, she set to work on the next board.
Swearing at splinters and her own untried muscles, she fought it loose. With a grunt, she tossed the board aside, and panting, she stretched out on her stomach to grope into the hole.
Her fingertip rang against metal. She nearly wept. The handle almost slipped out of her sweaty hand, but she pulled the box up and free, and set it on her lap.
It was no more than a foot long, a foot wide and a few pounds in weight, and it was grimy from the years it had spent in the darkness. Almost tenderly, she brushed away the worst of the dust. Her fingers hovered at the latch, itching to release it, then dropped away.
It wasn’t hers to open.
“I don’t know where she could be.” Amanda strode back into the parlor, tossing up her hands. “She’s not in her office, or her room.”
“She was fussing in a closet when I saw her last.” Colleen tipped back her glass. “She’s a grown woman. Might be taking a walk.”
“Yes, but...” Suzanna trailed off with a glance at Kevin. There was no point in worrying the child, she reminded herself. Just because Megan was never late, that was no reason to assume something was wrong. “Maybe she’s in the garden.” She smiled and handed the baby to Holt. “I can go look.”
“I’ll do it.” Nathaniel stood up. He didn’t really believe Megan had forgotten their date for dinner and gone walking in the garden, but looking was better than worrying. “If she comes in while I’m gone—” But then he heard her footsteps and glanced toward the doorway.
Her hair was wild, her eyes were wide. Her face and clothes were smeared with dirt. And she was smiling, brilliantly. “I’m sorry I’m late.”
“Megan, what on earth?” Dumbfounded, Sloan stared at her. “You look like you’ve been crawling in a ditch.”
“Not quite.” She laughed and pushed a hand through her disordered hair. “I got a little involved, lost track of the time. Sloan, I borrowed some of your tools. They’re in the tower.”
“In the—”
But she was crossing the room, her eyes on Colleen. She knelt at the old woman’s feet, set the box in her lap. “I found something that belongs to you.”
Colleen scowled down at the box, but her heart was thrumming in her ears. “Why would you think it belongs to me?”
Gently Megan took Colleen’s hand, laid it on the dusty metal. “He hid it under the floor of the tower, her tower, after she died.” Her quiet voice silenced the room like a bomb. “He said she haunted him.” Megan pulled the transcribed code out of her pocket, set it on top of the box.
“I can’t read it,” Colleen said impatiently.
“I’ll read it for you.” But when Megan took the sheet again, Colleen grabbed her wrist.
“Wait. Have Coco come in. I want her here.”
