She decided to consider walking-the-dog time as thinking time. The catering project had some challenges. The packages, the à la cartes, all the images, the pricing. And she wanted it appealing but streamlined so potential clients wouldn’t have to wade through everything.
By the time she shut down for the day, she’d rejected two designs before settling on one that hit appealing and streamlined.
And because Yoda paused by the damn hidden door every time she went up or down, she opened it.
“You want to see, we’ll go see. I’m supposed to work out anyway.”
He did a lot of wandering, and occasionally stopped, wagged at nothing. At least nothing she could see.
He seemed entertained by the poor excuse for a workout she managed before she just wanted out.
This time, as she passed the bells, she heard one ring.
“The Gold Room. Which one is that? I think that’s on the third floor. It’s closed off.”
She steeled her spine.
“We’re going up.”
She picked Yoda up as much for comfort as to spare his little legs the steps. She wasn’t sure of the room, but she’d start where she had a blurry picture of a large room papered in deep gold. One of the important suites, she thought she recalled.
When they reached the third floor, she set Yoda down.
“It’s cold up here. Colder than it was before.” She opened doors one at a time. Draped furniture, floral wallpaper or creamy panels.
And as she reached for the knob of the door at the end of the long hall, Yoda growled.
She looked down to see him standing stiff-legged, his teeth bared.
“I won’t let them hurt you. Or it.”
Though her stomach clenched, her heart pounded, she pushed open the door. She swore the air flowed like ice. The drapery over the furniture shook with it. At the threshold, Yoda barked like a mad thing.
“It’s my house.” She scooped him up. “It’s our house.”
But because the dog trembled—or she did—she shut the door again.
“It’s all right.” As she walked away, she kissed Yoda’s head. “Everything’s all right. Let’s go downstairs. You can have a treat.”
He didn’t manage a howl, but more of a whine. Still, she took it as a good sign.
In the kitchen, all the chairs at the small table lay on their backs on the floor.
“Somebody’s trying to scare us, but they won’t.”
She put Yoda down, righted the chairs.
Then rewarded the dog with a treat, and herself with a glass of wine.
* * *
The dog brought comfort, a sweet little warm body to share her space. After their last-round walk, she decided to skip Poole family history for a night, and went back to her novel with Yoda curled in his own bed by the fire.
And slipped into sleep with the book sliding out of her hands.
Did she dream?
She stood in front of the mirror, the mirror from her father’s dreams. The predators framing the glass seemed to snap and snarl.
But rather than her own reflection, she saw a room beyond, shadowy movements, as if the glass was a window and not a mirror at all.
The shadows began to shift, and the light grew brighter.
Firelight, candlelight illuminated a bedroom.
Hers?
Not the same bed, no, and the walls were covered with full-blown flowers with pink-tipped petals over a field of the palest gold. But she recognized the room she’d claimed in the manor as her own.
A woman lay on the bed, obviously in labor. Though Sonya had never seen a live birth, what she saw through the glass was unmistakable.
Two women attended her—midwives?—one bathing her face, the other kneeling between her legs.
And through the glass, Sonya heard voices, cries, muted at first, then growing louder and more distinct.
Not now, Sonya thought, through the glass wasn’t now. The woman who stood at the head of the bed wore some sort of cap on her head, a long gray dress with a kind of apron over it. And she could see the button-type boots on the woman who knelt on the bed.
A dream, it had to be a dream, she thought as she lifted a hand to the glass.
And passed through it like she would a doorway.
They took no notice of her, the three women, as all their focus and energy centered on the work of bringing life into the world.
“The babe’s coming! You must push! Draw up your strength, Mrs. Poole, and push!”
The woman in bed braced on her elbows. Her face a mask of exhausted pain as she bore down. Her scream, so primal, so fierce, lanced through Sonya’s bones.
“There’s the head, and a bonny one. One more push, dearie. One more now.”
As the mother sobbed, the midwife turned the baby, drawing its shoulders free so the rest of him slid into her hands.
“You’ve a son, Mrs. Poole. A fine lad. Here we are, here we are now,” the midwife said as she used a cloth to clean the newborn’s face.
He let out a whimper, then followed it up with an insulted cry that had Sonya clutching her hands to her heart.
So beautiful. She hadn’t known it could be so beautiful.
“I want him. I want my son.”
The new mother, her long, dark hair matted with sweat, held out her arms. And as she wept, she laughed, and took the baby into her arms.
“He’s Owen. I have a son. Ah, God! Take him, take him. The pain!”
“Take the young master, Ava. There’s another yet to come. Don’t push yet, dearie. Do the panting now, pant while I see to this.”
“God help me.”
So the beauty became pain with the midwife dripping sweat, and the mother begging it to stop.
So much blood. Should there be so much blood?
Sonya knew what she dreamed now. Marianne Poole, the third bride.
The daughter—Jane, Sonya remembered—was born in blood, her mewling cries like sorrow as her mother lay dying.
“I have to stop the bleeding. Fetch more towels. Fetch the master.”
But it wouldn’t stop, and as it flooded the sheets, Marianne lay pale as death. “Jane. My daughter is Jane. Owen David, Jane Elizabeth. My children.”
Sonya’s breath caught when Marianne’s eyes, glazed with shock, met hers across the room. “My children. You come from them.”
He burst into the room, a man with her father’s eyes, her father’s build, in a loose white shirt and black trousers. He rushed to the bed, took his wife’s limp hand in both of his.
“Marianne, my love. I’m here.”
“We have a son. We have a daughter.”
“They need their mother. Stay for them.” He pressed his lips to her hand. “Stay for me.”
“I’ll stay for them. I’ll stay for you. I’ll just … rest now,” she said, and slipped away.
He wept, her hand clutched in his.
While the sobs racked him, the woman in black came in. She walked to the other side of the bed and took the ring from the dead woman’s finger.
“No!” Sonya stepped forward to stop her. “You can’t do that.”
With madness and power in her eyes, Hester Dobbs said, “I can. I have. I will.” She slipped the ring on her finger where another two glinted in the candlelight. “Do you think you can stop me? Stop what I forged in fire and blood? You’re the ghost here.”
Furious, Sonya lunged forward.
And woke standing by her own bed with the dog whining at her feet.
Shaken, she sat on the side of the bed, then gathered the dog up to comfort them both.
“It’s okay. I had a bad dream. Just a bad dream.”