“How is that possible?” he asked, hardly daring to believe.
“I found another passage in this diary,” Tarron said softly. His tone reached through to Alistar, and he waited. “Some crap about Forrest and Lady Caroline.”
“It’s hardly crap,” Alistar said. “What does it say?”
Tarron read, “The twenty-first of October 1868. I stood in the copse of trees today. Forrest and his wife were sharing a picnic. I could smell the baked pheasant from where I stood. Empty dishes littered their pallet. Forrest was stretched out, his head on Lady Caroline’s lap. My heart ached with both envy and sorrow. I looked about for Rube. It’s difficult to hide a rambunctious five-year-old, but he was nowhere about that I could see. Lady Caroline was stroking the hair from Forrest’s forehead, brushing her soft, uncalloused fingers against his temples, over his jaw, his lips. He spoke quietly, yet the trees carried his words on the breeze. ‘We’ve broken the curse, haven’t we, Sabina? I feel it. Do you feel it, Sabina?’ Lady Caroline’s hand stopped. Her gaze lifted, piercing me in the trees where I stood. ‘Yes, my darling. We’ve broken the curse.’ Her fingers resumed their rhythmic strokes, though her eyes never looked away from me. ‘Yes. The curse is broken. I feel it, my darling.’ Then, I ran. I vow, Forrest, I shall learn what is required to break the curse. If not for you, then for your son, for your descendants.”
Tarron paused, then resumed. “The twenty-third of October 1868. The village talk was all agog yesterday. Forrest Spears, the seventh Earl of Griston, was committed to Bedlam.The rest is blurred by water stains,” he said. “This is the most depressing thing I’ve ever read in my life. I prefer romance novels.”
Alistar’s heart pounded as Sabina’s words tripped through him. He attempted an off-the-cuff response that seemed to fall years short. “The happily ever after?”
“Of course. Which none of your paintings seem to exhibit.”
He let out a long, slow breath and ran a hand through his hair. “Right. My paintings.”
“What the hellwasthat blob of black?”
“I don’t know. When I have a vision, I usually have to paint with the lights out.”
Tarron leaned forward to pick up a glass of water and drank. “Wow. You don’t evenseewhat you’re painting?”
“No.”
“That’s just weird.” He set the glass down.
“I suppose.” Alistar rubbed his palm over his chest.
“Why?”
“They’re violent.”
“But if the visions have to do with Peyton, which makes no sense, wouldn’t it make sense to look—”
Alistar cut him off, fury roaring through him. “Obviously, declaring my love to Peyton didn’t break the curse.” He managed to clench his teeth and not rip the other man’s head off. But it did take effort.
“Didn’t break—you declared your love for Peyton?”
“Yes, and she reciprocated. We… er… consummated the occasion.”
Tarron stopped. His mouth hung open. “She told you she loved you? Oh. My. God. This is big, Griston. Huge. And you consummated—”
Alistar scowled at him. “It wasn’t like either one of us were virgins.”
“No. I suppose not.” He glanced back down at the open journal. “Sounds to me like it has something to do with true love and, I don’t know—sex, maybe?”
“I’m not going to discuss” —Alistar waved out a hand—“that. Not with you.”
Tarron shot him a mischievous grin. “No? Fine.” Tarron picked up Alistar’s list and studied it. “We just have to fill in some of the missing words.”
Alistar grunted.
“This is why I write romance.”
“You mean read—”
“Well, yes, it’s why I read romance. But it’s also why I write romance. Now let me concentrate.”
If Alistar wasn’t already destined for insanity, Tarron’s mumbling would send him straight over the fence.
