Page 3 of The Forgotten
“I’ll be sure to let you know if there’s anything to tell,” Quinn replied. She had no desire to have this conversation in front of other people. Rhys took the hint and changed the subject.
“Could this have been a plague pit?” he asked as he handed Quinn a cup of tea. She accepted gratefully and stopped to consider while she took a sip of the scalding liquid that instantly warmed her. It was hard to tell how old the remains were just by looking, but they didn’t strike her as plague victims. The first wave of the plague swept through England in 1348, brought on trade ships from Europe by afflicted sailors and rats that contaminated the grain. The effect of the plague had been devastating, and townspeople all over England went from burying their dead properly to just dumping their bodies into mass graves and covering them with lye, but these graves did not fit that pattern. Quinn had never seen bodies buried face down. The plague victims, although not properly laid out or buried in coffins, were always buried face up and laid out side by side or atop the other bodies if there were too many. These two burials seemed deliberate and malicious.
“No, Rhys, I really don’t think these two were plague victims,” she said, confirming Rhys’s suspicions and making him a happy man. He didn’t want plague victims; he wanted foul play and a story he could dramatize to his heart’s content.
The second grave was much like the first. There was nothing. Whatever fabric might have gone into the earth with the body had completely rotted away, and there were no metal objects that had survived. Quinn dismissed the students, who were more than happy to be done with the gruesome task, and took one last look before giving the OK to fill in the grave. She was about to climb out when she noticed a tiny sliver of black peeking out of the soil. Quinn reached for a brush and swept aside bits of earth, not using the trowel for fear of damaging whatever was underneath. The object proved to be a cracked bit of leather. Quinn carefully dug around it until she unearthed a disintegrating thong decorated with an iron cross. The metal was brown and flaky with rust, but surprisingly still intact. It must have stayed protected from the moisture in the ground somehow, perhaps having gotten trapped in the folds of the shroud, if there had been one. Quinn carefully bagged the cross. This was her only link to the past, and she would study it carefully once she was on her own.
The remains were labeled and sent off to Dr. Colin Scott, pathologist and bone expert, who would hopefully have some preliminary results for them in a few days’ time. The students went about filling in the graves, setting the cemetery to rights, and writing up notes about the excavation. Rhys returned to London with his people, deeply satisfied with the footage and ready to start planning the next phase of the project. He even had Quinn conduct an in-depth interview with the elderly lady whose dog found a femur. She’d been terribly flustered at first but then, having been seduced by the camera and the bright lights, went on and on, eager to tell her story.
Quinn tore her gaze away from the leaping flames in the hearth and reached for the plastic bag containing the cross. She’d meant to study it earlier, but something inside her protested loudly at the thought of gazing into the past of its owner. Gabe bent over Quinn, kissed the top of her head, and gently removed the bag from her hand. “Not now, love,” he said, sensing her apprehension. “Not now.”
Quinn had to admit that she was only too happy to set the trinket aside. She wasn’t ready. Not yet. The last case had left her feeling horrified and depressed. The brutal death of Elise, Lady Asher, and her lover, James Coleman, which Quinn had witnessed firsthand, had been worse than anything she’d ever experienced, and she fervently wished, as she had many times in the past, that she wasn’t possessed of her strange gift of seeing into the past.
Gabe threw another log on the fire and took a seat, beckoning for Quinn to come and sit on his lap. He wrapped his arms around her, making her feel a little less anxious, and moved his lips along the column of her neck. A pleasant shiver ran down Quinn’s spine, helping her to put the remains and the artifact from her mind. They would return home tomorrow morning, and her research would begin in earnest, but for tonight, she wanted nothing more than to spend a few peaceful hours with her gorgeous fiancé and to forget all about the past.
Quinn leaned against Gabe as he slid his hands beneath her jersey, cupping her breasts. She eagerly surrendered to his touch, enjoying the sensations that began to course through her body as he pulled off her top and began to kiss her breasts. She felt Gabe’s arousal against her thigh and her body instantly responded to his desire.
“Come to bed,” Quinn murmured as she slid off Gabe’s lap and pulled him toward the antique four-poster.
THREE
Quinn wrapped a scarf about her neck, grabbed her purse, and followed Gabe out the door into the frigid January morning. At least the sun was out, which was something, given the weather they’d had over the past few days. It had been dreary and cold, the damp seeping into the bones, and the chill radiating from the inside out. Gabe would drop her off at the mortuary on his way to the office, and they would meet up later at Gabe’s flat.
“Did you take your mobile?” Quinn asked, amused by Gabe’s absentmindedness. A week without his phone nearly undid him, despite the fact that she had hers and there was a telephone in their room at the inn.
“Got it,” Gabe replied, patting his pocket. “I’ve had a dozen missed calls from Scotland and a message from an attorney in Edinburgh. He said it’s urgent that I return his call.”
“Do you know anyone in Edinburgh?” Quinn asked as she settled into the Jag and turned up the heat.
Gabe shrugged. “I know a few other academics but no one who’d call me on my mobile. They would contact me through the institute or via email. I can’t imagine what this is about. I’ll ring him when I get to the office. Perhaps he has the wrong Gabriel Russell.”
“Well, I’ve had a message from Sylvia,” Quinn confessed, noting Gabe’s askance look. “She said that Jude is just about finished with his tour and should be back in London in a few weeks. She’d like to have me round for dinner so that I can finally meet the boys.”
“You don’t seem pleased,” Gabe remarked as he swung the car out of the drive.
“I’ve dreamed of having siblings since I was a little girl, but siblings have things in common, having grown up in the same household. Even if they are as different as night and day, they still share childhood experiences and memories. Logan and Jude never even heard of me until about a month ago. They’re strangers to me, as I am to them. I’m a little nervous about meeting them. They might resent my intrusion into their lives.”
“I’m sure they’ll love you,” Gabe said, giving her hand a squeeze.
“But what if I don’t love them? What if we have nothing in common and sit there in awkward silence? That’s worse than having no siblings at all.”
“Quinn, no family is perfect, and few siblings have the close, uncomplicated relationship that you envision. There’s always resentment, rivalry, long-festering hurts, and ongoing arguments.”
“How would you know? You’re an only child,” Quinn chuckled.
“But my mum is one of five. Not a single family gathering goes by without someone exhuming the past and rehashing their grievances ad nauseam. I think my mum and Aunt Janice enjoy bickering. It’s the bedrock of their relationship.”
“Do her brothers join in?” Quinn asked, curious about the family dynamic.
“They have their own established pattern, but they goad each other just as much as their sisters.”
“Will you come with me to meet my brothers?” Quinn asked, feeling slightly more optimistic.
“Of course. I’m curious to meet them myself. Will you be inviting the Wyatts to our wedding?”
“Oh Lord, I haven’t thought of that. I can’t imagine that Mum and Dad would feel comfortable knowing that Sylvia would be there.”
“So, you’ve finally told them?” Gabe asked. Quinn had picked up the phone a dozen times to call her parents to tell them about finding her birth mother, but every time she set the phone back down, unprepared for the conversation that was to follow. She’d known it would hurt her parents, and she’d wished to spare them the pain, despite knowing that at some point she’d finally have to tell them the truth, especially since they would be coming for the wedding. It had been easy to hold off, since her parents had retired to Spain a few years ago and were happily living in Marbella, but Quinn couldn’t stall forever.
