“Stop what?”
“That.”
She sashays closer, blocking him in. That scent. This tiny space, and she’s blocking him in.
Thwump, thwump.
Steady now.
Bang!
Something strikes his back.“Stop!”He spins, electrified. He thrusts her out of his way, her softness registering as he shoves past. She blinks up at him from the floor, beside the table of oil paints she knocked down. He hurt her. His blood pounds. Sweat cools his skin.
It was nothing. Nothing.
No, it’s something.
He’s made it something. Because he’s a fool. A broken fool.
Her red lips form an O.
“I-I-I…” William rakes a shaky hand through his hair. It’s greasy. A bit knotted. He can smell his own unwashed skin. “I-I’m sorry.” Hot and cold flashes spike through him, and the room isn’t cooperating. It’s tipping.
He bolts out the door, the sea air instantly cooling him. He stands a block away gasping for breath, hands on his knees.Everything tingles. Then he does what he always must when the darkness encroaches.
He runs.
Down the narrow, cobbled streets, out of town and through the hills, his ever-crooked gait shoots pain up his left side, and he leans into it. He pushes himself, punishing his body by sprinting the distance in a fraction of the usual time.
He’s not healed. Not even close. The battle has lodged in his soul, filling the cracks and swelling them. It goes around with him, even into small, rural art colonies. He’s left France, but France hasn’t left him, and like the shrapnel buried in his shoulder, it’s part of him.
He stumbles into the cottage and nearly throws the portrait into the fireplace, but Merryn’s gaze tunnels into him, imploring him to finish her story—to forget about his brokenness and attend to hers.
He lays his head on the table, panting. Memories are the bane of his existence. He doesn’t merely recall—he relives. William shoves the flashing images away with force, but they will not go. His brain clings to them. They are glass shards that cut his clenched fists.
Chapter 8
Merryn, 1913
Thetruthissharpand jagged. I don’t wish to know who I was. I only wish to become who I am now—AJ Winthrop’s wife. As we near the train station, Henry Gould’s tension has leaked onto me and I cannot keep still. Some people are always a bit edgy, looking for peace as if it’s a destination just around the next corner. I’m one of them—especially when faced with the mystery of who I am. It’s too much a threat to what I love most.
“We don’t have to do this, if you don’t wish it,” says AJ in my ear.
“Don’t be re…re…” Words twist and splice in my head. “Re…”
“Dundant?”
“Ridiculous.” I grasp my bag. “I’ll manage.”
We climb from the Packard near the platform and AJ pulls out my carpet bag and a worn valise. Did he stow it in theautomobile before we left? This sort of careful planning doesn’t seem like AJ.
Henry Gould bids us a grim farewell, and a tiny bubble of warning bursts inside, but the Packard is gone before I can pinpoint the cause.
“Don’t worry, I packed your words.” AJ smiles proudly, rocking back on his heels.
I shoot a glance at the carpet bag perched on my toes. Surely he cannot mean my silly pastime. But indeed, I dig out my jar of words. “How did you find these?”
“It’s my right and my curse as a husband to be nosy.” He winks. “I rather enjoyed packing your—ahem—garments.”
