The Haunting of Alcott Manor, page 18
part #1 of Alcott Manor Series
He positioned himself on the floor next to her, and she wondered what his history was. She knew how difficult it could be to get rid of those old wounds and find a way forward.
“Gemma?”
“Hmm?”
“Where did you go?”
“Oh. I was thinking.” She wondered if he would open up to her after he had been fairly closed off about his past. She decided to open her proverbial kimono first. Maybe he would follow. “It’s so hard to get to the place where emotional wounds are completely healed."
He brushed at a patch of dust that the trunk had stamped on the leg of his black pants. "I guess Benjamin is proof of that. Even after a hundred years' time, he's never found a way to move on from the betrayal and the injustice. Apparently, time does not heal all wounds.”
“No. It really doesn’t.” She agreed with him in a tone of hard-earned confidence and remembered some advice she had received a while ago. Advice she had worked to implement but didn’t always achieve successfully. “In my own case, it was quite a while after Preston left to be with his young mistress that my therapist finally said I needed to accept what happened if I really wanted to get over it.”
“Accept.” He said the word as if it were foreign, as if he questioned the therapist’s wisdom, and as if he had another form of resolution in mind.
“Mmm.” She knew how unappealing the idea sounded.
“Wouldn't be my first instinct. But how did that work for you?” His expression was a little wise, and she knew the advice was hollow to him.
"Well, it wasn't my first instinct, either. I'll put it that way. There were plenty of times when the idea of strangling him with my bare hands was a far more appealing option than accepting. Though I think I'm finally getting the value of it.”
He pressed his lips to hers in a kiss, and, after a while, she caught herself in a momentary daydream, envisioning a life with Henry.
When they finally parted, he asked, “How would acceptance possibly help you? Seems more like giving up to me.”
“Well. She said that we are never angrier with someone than when they aren't being who we want them to be. But people are who they are. Ultimately, they choose to be who they want to be, not who we want them to be. So, I may have wanted my ex to be a man of integrity. Ultimately, he just wasn’t.”
“I should think accepting that would leave you bitter.”
“I’ve spent some time there, as well. I think her point was that acceptance leads to forgiveness and then letting go. In fact, I think the best definition of forgiveness I’ve heard is that it’s the acceptance that a person or an event couldn't have been any other way.”
He tipped his chin up, apparently chewing on the idea.
“I’m not completely there with it all the time, either. But it's true in the sense that they make choices and so do we, and it adds up to a tipping point at some stage that can’t be stopped. Anyway, I think of it in terms of redecorating.”
“Redecorating?”
“So, maybe I really wanted a straight-back chair for a particular spot in a room I’m working on, and instead, I mistakenly got an ottoman. I can rant and rage that the ottoman is a pathetic excuse for a chair—you know, no back support and not functional and so on. Or I can just accept that the ottoman isn't what I want and go get a good chair.” She laughed and he joined her, apparently amused by her example.
It was a good release to laugh, especially around a topic that had been so painful.
In the quiet that followed, a tumbling of deadlines, obligations, and haunting hurdles weighed heavily on her heart. She closed her eyes for a long blink. He needed to know what she had discovered today. She had told him that lightening the land where Anna had died would be a huge clearing. And it was. Yet with Alcott Manor, that effort amounted to an eyedropper-sized bailing from this flooding ship.
“By the way, I cleared the area where Anna died.”
“Oh? How did that go?”
“I expected it to have more of a significant effect on the house, but it didn't clear as much as I thought it would. I think Benjamin is still here.” She flipped her hands so they were palms up and folded them into fists. “So, that means I’ve got to find something more substantial to clear. Something profound that will shift the energetic history of this house, and right now, I don't know what that is." She remembered the way the shadows shifted in the dark passageway and the moan that chilled her soul.
She would clear that if she knew what the hell it was. She could sense betrayal and suffering, the desire for retribution. A need for justice. It felt like a river of Benjamin’s evil flowing through the veins of the house.
Henry's eyes focused on hers, his stare deep, intense, and brooding. “Gemma, the manor was built in 1832. It's lived several incarnations over the years, many of them tragic, and as I suggested when you arrived, may be beyond your clearing work.” He let the last end of his sentence dangle out there as if he expected an objection, and Gemma met him head-on.
“Henry, I can clear the negative effects of anything. Anything. We can still search for the note, but if you would help me understand what has happened in the various rooms of the house, that may give us a more immediate result. I can turn this place into an environment where Benjamin won't want to be. He'll leave. I—”
“Gemma.”
“I can do the guest room if you’ll accompany me there in the morning. Beyond that, I need to know where else to go in the house—”
“Gemma.” He said her name more softly this time, and rather than fueling her contention, it stopped her.
“The only way Benjamin will leave is if we find Anna's suicide note.”
Her knee-jerk reaction was to think his proposed remedy was right up there with pigs flying, and she preferred her tried and true methods. Even though it might have been the best option, and the preferred one, the chances were still too slim for her to admit that he could be right.
“Maybe.”
She had a verifiable gift that worked. It could change a home's identity. It would change lives. She couldn't give up.
She pushed her fingers along her forehead, dread and disappointment tangling with one another in her heart. “But these mysteries in the manor's story—” She thought of Anna’s lover and Lizzie Mae, the daughter Benjamin thought was his. Once again, she thought of the secret passageway and the mysterious, grim energy that lived there. “They seem so extreme and far reaching. If we can decipher them, maybe I could strike at the heart of the problem. You know these stories, don't you?”
“There have been too many events in the manor.” Henry grazed her arm with his hand, and she knew he wasn't onboard. “Too many. And apparently, I don't know all of them. Besides, that just isn’t a good idea. The house, as you've seen, is unpredictable. Let’s search the furniture tomorrow. Carefully. Early. We’ve never looked at those pieces for her suicide note. You may have landed on to something there.”
“Henry, a clearing isn't going to upset anything. It's only going to lessen the negativity that’s embedded—”
“You don't know that. This house claims people, Gemma. It sucks them into its world and they never leave. How do you know that your work wouldn’t open up a connection that would draw you in?” He waved toward the main part of the house and his eyes flared with heat.
She offered a confident smile that ultimately melted into a doubtful one. The manor was a mystery to her, and the truth was that she didn't know how her clearing work would affect these trapped memories. Or her. She thought of the scores of spirits she could feel but not see, spirits who loomed in the walls, spirits who might want her to join their party.
Still, she wasn't willing to give up. She couldn’t. “It hasn’t hurt me so far.”
“We’re much closer to the anniversary of Anna’s death now. The house is becoming a different animal altogether.”
That was it. Her frustrations spilled over and ruined all her diplomacy. “Henry, you have got to agree to a plan B when it comes to getting rid of him, because the chances of finding that suicide note are nil!”
The muscles bulged on the sides of his jaw once and then again. He leaned forward with a stare so intense it might have etched glass. She expected him to say no and then up and leave the room. Or maybe fire her.
“I’m pushing back on your plan because I don't want anything to happen to you, Gemma.” His words washed over her in tidal force, knocking her guard down with it.
Several moments passed, moments where the quiet in the room was like glue that held their gazes on one another, until she finally said, “Oh.”
He paced back and forth several times. “So, whatever this alternate plan turns out to be, it will have to be a safe option for you.”
She nodded, stunned, her spirits secretly flying higher than she was comfortable with. She hoped that this was the opening of another door between them and that they were moving toward the future with him she'd just been dreaming of. She hoped he felt the same way she did and that he wasn’t just protective of her well-being because he was a good human.
“All right. Well. We’ll find the right plan B.” Her thoughts spun. The problem of getting Benjamin to go home remained.
“You said that the Cardills built the house—are there any stories about how that process went? Seems like the feud between the Cardills and the Alcotts goes back a long way.”
"Nothing that I remember.” He leaned back onto his hands, giving her time, giving her space, letting things settle.
She ran her thumb over her knuckles several times. "Are there any books in the manor on its history?"
“There used to be some scrapbooks and other books dedicated to the history of the manor, but they've long since disappeared.”
She nodded, the wheels in her head still turning, working toward a solution. “Maybe they were kept with the furniture in that museum you mentioned?”
His pacing stuttered for a step, then he resumed. “No. I don't think so.”
“I need some accounting of the bigger events that took place here. A diary would have been ideal.”
“I don't think it would have made a difference. It's too much water under the bridge for this place.”
She sincerely disagreed, and she was pretty sure the grimace that pulled her lips communicated that. “Well, then it’s too bad Benjamin can't be subjected to therapy.” Her sarcasm was breaking holes in her steady demeanor like water bursting through a dam.
“Acceptance being the key part of this healing process.”
“Yeah.” It had to be some sort of a cosmic joke that she, Henry, and Benjamin were stuck at this house together. They could start the Lack of Acceptance Club where the motto would be: Fighting to Enforce a Better Reality.
“I don’t think it would do him any good."
“Of course not. You know, Henry, eventually, we all get there, and Benjamin will, too. Whether we find the note or I'm able to effectively clear enough negative imprints for his attachments to release, ultimately, acceptance is what will move him forward in life—or death, as his case may be.”
His stare was hard, and she wondered if he questioned how emotional healing occurred or just if it could happen for Benjamin. “So, you think he will find some sort of peace?”
She nodded. “We need to figure out how to help that along sooner rather than later.”
Henry’s eyes scanned the walls of the room that used to be Anna's favorite. He nodded every now and then and seemed to entertain what she had just said. “This idea seems counterintuitive to me. When things go so terribly wrong and people you care about act so badly, acceptance seems weak. Like it might make you a doormat." His eyes took on a faraway look.
“I understand that.” And she did. God, she did. “There were countless times when I wanted to show my ex-husband just how bad his choices were. But, that's rather an endless pursuit. The goal is to get beyond it. Start living again.”
That teeny bit of information appeared to make sense to him, and she saw a light ignite behind his eyes. “My former wife had been struggling emotionally for some time. We'd been to doctors. None of them ever really figured out how to help her. The few that made progress with her eventually threw their hands in the air because she wouldn't follow their instructions.
“They'd tell her not to do something, or to absolutely do something, and she'd do the opposite. To this day, I don't know if that was more a result of her selfish nature or the effects of whatever illness it was that she battled.
"I turned my life inside out trying to help her. Literally, I gave up everything for her.” Henry shook his head and stared at the floor. "Then I found out she had been having an affair with this man we both knew. I told her she was being a fool, that he was just using her to get close to my money."
His eyes shone with quiet rage. “As you might imagine, that went over like a lead balloon. She argued that he loved her in all the ways that I didn't. She was wrong, of course. He didn't love her, and that played out soon enough.” Henry smiled, but the sadness was still evident in his eyes.
She placed her hand on his and understood now why the knowledge of Anna’s affair tripped a hot wire with him. "I'm so sorry."
"Well, it's no worse than what you went through. It seems you may be right. Your ex-husband, my former wife—there was no changing them.” He leaned back and chuckled. "Acceptance." His earlier intensity relaxed into a smile that said he finally saw something that had been hidden from him before. “I think I get it.”
The token of insight dropped for her, too, and she could almost hear the copper of the coin drop into the bottom of her own personal well. For the first time, she was able to think of Preston without a jab to the soft places in her heart. “I think I'm getting it, also. It’s very freeing.”
He lifted her hand and kissed it. A slow, mischievous smile spread across his face as though they shared a secret. “Let's do something special tonight. To celebrate.”
She bit her lip. “I try never to celebrate before the ball is across the finish line. Or, the touchdown line. Whatever it is. I’d rather have the judge’s signature on the approval papers first.”
“I feel better than I have in a long time. This acceptance thing has real merit. You’re moving forward. I'm moving forward. Hell, I think Benjamin will, too. We're even going to make the deadline—I can feel it.” Henry kissed her fully on the lips, the playful kind of kiss that said his lips were familiar with hers now.
A twinge in her stomach reminded her that, although he was perfect, she still didn't quite know him. Not really.
“I have to review some paperwork and inspect some final repairs in the library.”
“Okay, take care of that. I’ll meet you back here in twenty.” He disappeared out the door.
Chapter 22
With Henry gone and the sun still fairly high in the sky, Gemma went to the library to inspect the bookshelf repairs. She also hoped he was wrong and that she might find some books on the history of Alcott Manor, specifically, about how the house was built.
She’d understood Henry’s point about being cautious, but she believed in her abilities and what they could do. Since the Cardills had built the manor, she felt certain something would be amiss there. The apple never fell far from the tree, and Asher was rotten to the core.
She opened every drawer, lifted every cushion, and turned every chair in search of the note Anna may have written. She also examined all the titles on the shelves but didn't find any scrapbooks or historical works documenting the development of the manor.
Tom and the other workers had placed a makeshift back in the bookcase to cover the hole that Benjamin had ripped open. The new shelves were fashioned out of leftover wood that was slightly thinner than the rest. The edges weren't rounded as the others were, and the ebony stain they used scented the room. But these repairs would do for now.
Henry was right that she wouldn’t find any reference materials that would help her understand the energy in the house. When she passed the office, she took a few minutes to review the paperwork on her desk, and she eyed the main staircase. At least the restoration was falling into place. She agreed with Henry. They just might make this deadline.
Her wow-I-did-it smile was beginning to flicker at the corners of her mouth. But she wouldn't let it beam just yet. Not until the job was done and the judge was satisfied. Then they would wrap up the remaining elements in stage two of the restoration.
On her way to the winter garden, she searched the furniture in several more rooms but found nothing of any value. When she returned to the winter garden, she found candlelight around the room, an antique white dress laid across an armless wicker chair, and shoes placed on the floor beneath it.
An envelope was left on the dress with her name on it, and a pair of jeweled hair combs had been placed beside it. She’d never seen her name written so elegantly before, at least on something that wasn’t a wedding invitation. The capital G filled two-thirds of the length of the envelope, and the rest of her name flowed beyond it in an evenly mannered script.
Dearest Gemma,
It seemed only fitting that we dress in the presentation to which the house was originally accustomed since you are leading its restoration to success.
I shall be waiting for you in the main foyer at six.
Most truly yours,
Henry
"Most truly yours," she repeated. In spite of her need to be cautious with him, she believed he meant it and that he was most truly hers. She pressed the beautifully scripted note to her chest, then picked up the dress. It looked as though it had jumped right from an 1880s photograph.
The gold details covered the bottom third, and its exquisite design flowed up and down and undulated around tiny stars that dotted the entire dress and the brocade that decorated the bodice.
She looked at the label inside the dress: Jeanne Hallée, Paris, France. Her eyebrows climbed to her hairline—he was a well-known French designer from the 1880s. This dress was vintage.
