SHANNON

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“I hope this expedition is more fruitful than my calla lily idea,” I said when Trace and I arrived at Cheltenham Manor two days later. “A million flower shops in Temptation and New Dyer and no one’s ordered any since September.”

Trace was staring out of his window. He’d been pensive since I’d picked him up at the garage half an hour ago. “You try Main Street Flowers in Willow’s Corner?” he asked, distractedly.

“Yes, and Tori Mills was especially rude. She has the biggest mouth in West Virginia, yet she’s got the gall to lecture me about customer confidentiality?”

“Leave it to me. I’ll—” Slack-jawed, he stopped mid-word once the estate mounted above the treetops. Sheltered behind acres of evergreens and dogwoods, it looked like an old southern belle who’d lost her beauty—the sort who donned the same faded cotillion gown of her youth whenever company called.

My heart pounded when the Volvo coasted to a stop on the gravelly square. I loosened my death grip on the steering wheel and gaped at the heap of ivy and moss-covered brick. There’d been a few caretakers over the years, but the place eventually fell into disrepair. Without a word, Trace climbed out, came around and opened my door. How could he be so fearless when I was anything but? I wasn’t ready. I needed time—to prepare, to think. Just a few more minutes to—

Trace extended a hand. “Come on,” he said, as if reading my mind. “Twelve years is time enough.”

There was an intimacy between us, a strengthening of trust, and I knew right then that I’d be okay as long as he was nearby. I took his hand and followed his lead up the path to the carriage house. The sound of our footsteps filled the hush. Bushes guarded the walkway on either side. Willow branches dripped from above. Dead weeds sprouted through the cobblestone cracks beneath us. It was just as I remembered, but then again, it was not. Scents I hadn’t smelled in ages came trickling back, but they’d changed somehow.

I’d expected to feel something more than…numbness. Yes, numbness. This place had given me many nightmares over the years, but now? It was just an old estate with untended land—an imposter who’d been unmasked.

Relief made me breathe a little easier, yet when we reached the path’s end, I felt as steady as a paper doll in the wind. There it was, Mother’s death house, looking just as dark and ominous as before.

Trace gripped my shoulders, ducking down so we were eye level. “No going back now. All right?”

I swallowed, gave an uneasy nod, my mind screaming just the opposite. But after he laced our hands together again, strength leached from him to me, and I was comforted.

As we ventured around the side of a cottage-style guesthouse, I concentrated on nothing else but the rock-steady hand holding mine.

Trace let my hand go to trot to the center of the driveway and the feeling lingered. His energy level seemed to increase with each step. “I got here about ten or so.” He looked around. “I snuck through there.” He pointed at some boxwoods, strode ten feet and pointed again. “Here’s where I found the spade.”

I watched him in awe. Watched how everything he’d had bottled up, spilled out. He was reliving it all, but instead of crushing him, this visit appeared to free him somehow.

His gaze darted in one direction after another as he spoke. “I grabbed it thinking the gardener had dropped it by mistake.”

I came up next to him. “It was clean?”

He nodded, clasped my hand and led me over a bowed bridge overlooking a small, man-made pond. The carriage house lay just beyond it. Once there, I gave him the keys and after he’d fiddled with the lock, the brass-studded door thundered open like a giant who’d been startled awake from a long nap.

I stared into the musty darkness as the doorknob thumped the wall. I didn’t move when he ventured inside, opening shades and blinds, testing doors. The sun, muted as it was, meshed with the light spilling from a hole in the roof.

A sense of detachment settled over me as I crept past the threshold and ambled around, taking it all in. A splintered wooden table. A stack of water-damaged oil paintings. Rusty tools strewn across the floor. Spider webs and mounds of dust. I could hardly contain my relief, it was so acute.

There was nothing to fear, nothing at all, nothing until….

I stepped on that floorboard.

The familiar squeak hit me like a sledgehammer. Age and time had given the sound strength. Intensity. Everything blurred, and tears filled my eyes, falling with blinding speed. Now I remembered the sight of Mother lying in a pool of blood, her dead eyes staring up at nothing. Now I remembered how I’d felt—the realization that I was an orphan. No father, no mother, a child’s worst nightmare. I gasped when my back smacked a wall. It felt like I was teetering on a ledge, and I was terrified of falling.

Trace immediately snatched me into his sheltering arms.

“The s-squeak,” I sobbed. “It squeaked when I f-fell to m-my knees—b-by Mother’s b-body. F-first sound. It s-squeaked.”

“Hey…hey. Breathe, Shannon. Breathe.”

“This is why I…couldn’t…come here. On my own. Too afraid.” I keened. “I’m a coward.”

“No, you’re not.”

“Y-yes, I am. The w-worst kind. That’s why I never went…to her grave. That’s why I never came back here. I was s-scared. Deep down I suspected something wasn’t right in my head…with all…all the memories. So I avoided anything that would…challenge what I believed—M-mother, oh, Mother.”

“Shhh.” He tenderly lifted my hair from my face. “Hey. I wouldn’t even be here if not for all your pushing and badgering. You’re the brave one,” he whispered kissing me as I sobbed. “And I admire the hell out of you.” He hugged me close. “Go on now. Cry all you want. I’m not going anywhere.”

My knees gave and I sank to the floor, taking him with me. Twelve years of grief flooded my heart. Years of pain denied. The child I’d vanquished was back, had never left, and now that little girl wanted her due.

Trace cradled me in his lap and murmured words of comfort. Once more, he told me how much he admired and respected me, and that I wasn’t alone. He swept my hair aside, kissed a tear away, and sipped at the next one. Each healing touch stirred something hidden, until I responded in kind, and in a flash, the mood shifted. He dragged his lips over my eyes, and lower still, to kiss the tip of my nose, all the while whispering assurances. How could desire come alive here, in this crypt of death? But it had, and want him, I did.

Feelings we’d tried to bury clawed to the surface. Breaths tangled, and lips fused in an untamed rhapsody. This wasn’t the childish lip banging I’d given him years ago—in this very room—when I’d surprised him while he was sleeping. This kiss was deep, dark, and carnal.

His fingertips drifted over my face, imprisoning me while his hungry mouth moved over mine. The kiss wasn’t gentle. It was wild and seasoned with tears and pain. He fisted my hair, ate at my lips, ripped his mouth away on a gasp, then came back. And I was right there with him, matching his passion.

But our kisses ended all too soon when Trace drew back. We stared in bemused silence, battling for breath, neither of us comprehending what had just happened. Outside, the building groaned against the gentle lash of the wind. Inside, tension vibrated like a plucked wire.

I swept my gaze over him as his Adam’s apple dipped and climbed. His lips were as swollen as mine felt. That I’d lost control with him again, in here of all places, confused me even more. What the hell was I doing?

Gasping for air, Trace knelt before me, his eyes searching my face. “Listen up, ‘cause I don’t want you to miss a word of this.” He pressed his forehead to mine and stroked my cheeks with his thumbs. “Doc says that the best way to kill a monster is to embrace it, and then create new memories. In your case, the monster’s right here, and we’ve just stared it down.”