“Yes, occasionally, though it is not always this severe. Most of the time he simply wanders away from the house.”
He watched with a slow knowing smirk as realization settled over my features. The knowledge I had been holding back for so long betrayed my desperation for the truth.
“The night Agnes came to fetch you from the greenhouse, Hawthorne had escaped.”
“You are quite astute,” he said, staring into the fireplace momentarily, as though seeing a distant memory within the flames. “I should have known you would piece it together.”
I frowned, registering a meaning beneath those last words, but my mind refused to place it. I set it aside to examine later. “Does it have something to do with the vine you and your wife used to create him?”
His eyes narrowed slightly before one corner of his lips twitched. “Are you finally admitting that you read the journal?”
I hesitated, then nodded vaguely before he turned his attention back to his work, selecting another book from the pile.
“Hawthorne is little more than a plant living inside a human form. On occasion, the vine inside of him reacts to a need, just like any plant. He does not consciously decide todestroy things or wander. His vine was seeking a nutrient I had failed to provide.”
“And what nutrient is that?” I asked, tilting my head.
Dr. Ambrose leaned forward, pressing his palms flat against his desk, his amber eyes meeting mine. “That is the question, Miss Reed.”
“You do not know?”
He laughed, a short, humorless sound. “You read the journal. The research on the vine was incomplete before my wife insisted upon Hawthorne’s creation.” He looked up at me then, and the pointedness felt almost purposeful. “I told her we were not ready for such an experiment, but she refused to listen to me.”
The overwhelming urge to defend a woman I did not even know built heavy in my chest.
“You could have stopped it,” I replied, the burn of annoyance searing my tongue. “From what I gathered, you were complicit… enthusiastic even. You could have said no to her.”
He snorted, another cold laugh escaping him. When he spoke again, his tone dripped with the bitterness that sometimes accompanied grief. “I find it charming that you believe my wife ever listened to me. I assure you if she had, my life would be far less interesting.”
Before I even had time to consider a reply, Agnes swept into the room.
“The entry hall is clean,” she announced, then paused as she looked between us. Her gaze moved from my face to Dr. Ambrose’s and back again, clearly sensing the tension inthe air. “Forgive me. I did not mean to interrupt your conversation.”
Dr. Ambrose waved a hand. “It is quite alright, Agnes. Miss Reed was just leaving.” He offered me a brief look, then turned his full attention back to the housekeeper. “Will you take Hawthorne to the conservatory? His vine will need somewhere warm now that the greenhouse windows are compromised.”
Agnes’s mouth fell open, her eyes going wide as she looked at me, then back at Dr. Ambrose with obvious alarm.
“Do not worry. Miss Reed knows all about Hawthorne,” he said, shooting me a pointed look.
The silence that followed was thick and suffocating. Agnes stared at him like he had announced something far more shocking than my knowledge of their botanical construct. Then she collected herself with visible effort.
“Of course. I’ll see to it immediately.” She disappeared into the greenhouse without another word, her footsteps far too hasty.
I returned my gaze back to Dr. Ambrose, my mouth already full of questions I simply could not let go of, but he cut me off before I even had the chance to voice them.
“You should rest and eat,” he said, his focus on the books.
Dismissed once again.
The pattern was becoming familiar—moments of startling honesty followed by sudden withdrawal.
I stood there for a moment longer, debating whether to insist upon the answers I deserved after everything I hadwitnessed and helped clean, but exhaustion won out over curiosity. My hands ached. My fingers still tingled with that painful numbness.
I spun on my heels and left the room without another word, my footsteps echoing down the corridor. Behind me, I heard the soft sound of books being shelved, of order being restored one volume at a time.
And I wondered how many other secrets this house held, kept as neatly as his journals, out of reach to anyone who tried to look too closely.
I was goingto find out.
