Lacybourne Manor

Chapter Twenty-Two Fear

Sibyl sat next to Marian’s hospital bed, leaning forward on the side of it, exhausted and stressed, she rested her forehead on her crossed arms.

The older woman lay sleeping now and, for the first time, Marian Byrne looked every one of her advanced years. She’d regained consciousness at the Centre, muttering strange, dire warnings about “dark souls” and vehemently lamenting “letting Granny Esmeralda down’. Sibyl and Bertie, witnessing her ranting, feared she’d sustained a terrible head injury as Scarlett carefully tended to her.

Marian had calmed by the time the paramedics arrived but Sibyl’s panic had increased when Colin hadn’t returned then escalated to sheer terror when she heard the police found his motionless body. Luckily (they thought), in their hunt for him, they discovered the tranquilliser dart that brought him low, a great deal of the tranquilliser still in the shaft. Sibyl did not consider this lucky at all, she was becoming far too acquainted with the awful effects of tranquilliser darts and couldn’t comprehend for the life of her why someone kept shooting beings she cared about with them.

In all the heartbreak and despair to which Sibyl’s professional life had forced her to bear witness, nothing affected her quite so profoundly as seeing her charismatic, powerful, rugged Colin taken, unconscious, into an ambulance. If Mags hadn’t been holding onto her whispering soothing words, Sibyl knew her body would have collapsed.

And she knew in that instant that she loved Colin.

She was in love with Colin and loved him with all her heart, through her blood, veins and muscles, down through to the marrow of her bones.

She’d finally found him, Colin was him. Her soulmate, the one she’d been waiting for, just plain hers.

There was no reason for it; he didn’t suit her, not in the slightest. He was autocratic, possessive, dictatorial and had far more money than one person with good conscience should. He was nothing like she expected her true love would be and somehow everything she wanted. She didn’t think it even had anything to do with reincarnated souls of dead lovers, they could have been entirely different people altogether and they would have found each other.

He wasn’t Royce but now Colin looked at her the same way as if she was the centre of his universe and nothing else existed or mattered beyond her.

Not to mention, he was a good man, he didn’t like to let on to that sweet, simple fact but he was.

So, there was nothing she could do. She let him into her heart or more to the point clicked him into the place that had been waiting for him since the day she was born.

And she thought he fit perfectly.

Colin had regained consciousness in Accident and Emergency not half an hour before, groggy for approximately five minutes, he shifted quickly to icy fury. Knowing with relief that he was going to be all right, Sibyl escaped to check on Mrs. Byrne and left Colin to talk privately to the police.

Sibyl had already given the police her account of the evening, of the two masked men who came stealthily into her office, demanding to know where Colin was and for her to take them to him. Neither Sibyl nor her attackers saw Mrs. Griffith who was waiting for her taxi while dozing on the couch, hidden by a precarious pile of Talent Show costumes and props. Sibyl had backed away, telling them Colin had already left and it was then they grabbed her. At that action, Mrs. Griffith rose, like the Eternal Wrath of the Pensioners, wielding her cane and making imperious demands. Moments later, Colin had burst into the room.

As she sat by Marian’s hospital bed, Sibyl struggled to sort through her rampaging thoughts of tranquilliser darts, knives, Mrs. Griffith avenging her and, most terrifyingly, Colin’s savage display of violence. He was like a Warrior God and she could easily transpose him on an ancient battlefield, swinging a broadsword with deadly intent rather than an old lady’s cane.

She could still hear the sickening crunch of bone mingled with splitting wood.

She shuddered at the memory.

She felt a light touch on her hair and her thoughts skittered away as she lifted her head to gaze into the faded, opened eyes of her friend.

“Will you call my daughter?” Marian asked weakly.

Sibyl nodded, her heart breaking at the feeble sound of Marian’s usually strong voice.

Then she took the number down on a scrap of paper from her purse.

“They say you’re going to be all right,” she assured Marian after she’d taken her daughter’s telephone number. “You’ll need to stay here a day or two –”

“It’s the dark soul,” Marian broke in fervently, her eyes growing bright with intensity. “They want to keep you and Colin apart, Sibyl you must listen to me, believe me.”

Her words were fierce, frightened and Sibyl nodded her head even though she didn’t know what the older lady meant.

“Sibyl, you must –” Marian went on.

“Marian, please rest now,” Sibyl interrupted her gently. “Don’t get excited, we’ll talk later.”

“It’s crucial that you know –”

Sibyl squeezed Marian’s hand. “I promise I’ll come back tomorrow. You can tell me all about it then and I’ll listen.”

Mrs. Byrne closed her eyes and there was pain in her expression that had nothing to do with the blow to her head. When she opened them, she nodded.

“Please, my dear, take the utmost care,” she whispered.

“I will.”

Sibyl went to the front of the hospital and stood outside to make the awful call to Marian’s daughter, Angie.

After Angie expressed her shock and horror, she asked, “What did you say your name was again?”

“Sibyl Godwin.”

“Oh my God,” Angie breathed then rushed on, “I’ll leave right away.”

Understanding that likely Marian’s daughter knew the whole story of Royce and Beatrice and even Sibyl and Colin, Sibyl didn’t react to her urgency and quietly ended the call with a promise to meet Angie the next day.

She walked to the A&E and found Colin her family, and a variety of police officers standing in the middle of the bustling department. Colin seemed to be tearing into one of the officers but she could tell it was in his supremely-controlled, still-very-frightening way by how he held his body and the fact that he wasn’t shouting the roof down.

Sibyl noted absently that Colin, surprisingly, was suffering no visible ill-effects to the dart, indeed he seemed fully awake, alert, emanating his usual power with his face a mask of rage.

Then he saw her approaching and he turned blazing eyes on her. “Where the bloody hell have you been?” he barked, his voice cracking like a whip.

She jumped at his tone. “I went to see Mrs. Byrne.”

“Don’t you fucking leave without telling someone where you’re going and taking someone with you, do you understand me?” he demanded angrily.

“Colin,” she murmured soothingly, shaken by his tone and his words.

He was not to be soothed. She knew this when he thundered, “Do you understand me?”

She nodded mutely. She had left without saying anything to anyone; it just hadn’t crossed her mind. Realising he was worried rather than truly angry with her, she sidled up to his side in an additional effort to soothe him. Gently, she pushed under his arm and slid both of hers around his middle. Without hesitation, he lifted his arm to rest tightly around her shoulders and she felt the tension ease slowly out of him.

“I’m sorry, it was thoughtless,” she told him quietly when she’d lifted her head to gaze at him. “I just had to see Mrs. Byrne. I promise, babe, I won’t do it again.”

She saw her family watching this, all with identical expressions of relief mixed and wisely they did not utter a word.

“We’re going home,” Colin announced and didn’t allow her family or the police to protest. He simply guided her out the door with his arm still around her shoulders, one of hers around his waist.

Bertie had driven the BMW to the hospital and, without argument Colin allowed Bertie to slide in the driver’s seat. Colin courteously helped Mags (and for once, at this gallant show, she didn’t utter a feminist quibble) in the front and Sibyl sat between Scarlett and Colin in the back.

“Albert, take us to Brightrose, everyone will pack a bag, we’ll get the animals and we’re all going to Lacybourne,” Colin ordered.

No one made a sound and, as it wasn’t a suggestion that invited discourse, Bertie did as he was told.

Her family was set to leave from Heathrow on Sunday, two days… Sibyl glanced unseeing in the darkness at her watch and suspected it was now only one day away. She hadn’t even approached the topic of this latest misadventure with Colin to her family and she didn’t relish the idea. They knew about Mallory and the vandalism at Brightrose but everyone thought that was relatively harmless.

This was not harmless at all and everyone knew it.

They all trooped into Brightrose, made swift work of packing while Sibyl saw to her own and sorted out her pets. Scarlett loaded Mallory in the MG and followed the BMW to Lacybourne.

Exhausted, bidding goodnight to everyone, Bertie and Mags made their bed in one of the six bedrooms with sheets Sibyl uncovered in a linen closet while Sibyl helped her sister with her bed.

“You okay, Billie?” Scarlett enquired softly as they went about their task.

Sibyl shook her head, as usual, she wasn’t going to lie to her sister. “I was held at knifepoint, Scarlett, and someone shot my boyfriend with a tranquilliser dart.” She lifted her head and her eyes hit her sister before she finished, “I’m scared out of my mind.”

Scarlett twitched the coverlet into place, rounded the bed, took Sibyl in her arms and gave her a fierce hug.

“I think Colin would die before he’d let anyone put a scratch on you,” Scarlett whispered in her ear.

Sibyl shuddered.

“That’s what I’m afraid of,” she admitted with a force of feeling and a terrible premonition that she had to keep under complete control or it would overwhelm her.

Scarlett’s embrace tightened. Her sister knew about the dream, everyone knew about the dream. They also knew that Sibyl had visions like this before, visions that came true. Scarlett was likely just as terrified as her sister but too proud, and too protective, to show it.

Sibyl kissed Scarlett’s cheek and went to find Colin.

He was standing in his bedroom, staring out the window holding a cut, crystal tumbler that contained something that was the colour of his beautiful eyes. Mallory lay at his feet and Bran was already curled contentedly at the foot of the bed.

When she entered, he glanced at her, put the tumbler to his lips, threw back the entire contents of the glass and set it down on dresser.

With his long-legged strides, he approached her and without a word, he tugged on the belt that kept her wraparound dress in place. It immediately loosened and fell apart at the front. The look on his face was carefully controlled and try as she might she couldn’t read a single thought on it.

“Colin, we need to talk,” she whispered carefully.

His hands went to her shoulders, slid the dress off her shoulders and it fell in a pool at her feet.

“We need to go to bed,” he contradicted, his fingers finding the clasp at the back of her bra and freed it with an astonishing deftness. This he slid it off her shoulders and dropped to the floor too.

“Colin –”

“Sibyl,” he interrupted her and slid his hands into her hair on either side of her face, holding her head tilted up to peer at him, “I’m exhausted, we’ll talk tomorrow.”

He released her abruptly and turned away, his hands going to the buttons of his midnight blue shirt. She flipped off her shoes, walked to one of his dressers, pulled open a drawer and snatched out one of his t-shirts.

And she didn’t give up.

“We need to let it out, talk about it, we shouldn’t bottle it in. It isn’t healthy.” She tugged his shirt over her head, pulled her hair free of the collar and turned to him, her eyes on his back.

He yanked the shirt off his broad shoulders, keeping his back to her. “We’ll talk about it tomorrow.”

“Colin!” she protested, her composure slipping. “I’m scared half out of my wits! I have to talk about it. Someone held a knife to my throat and we both know what that means.”

He turned to her slowly and when she saw the look in his eyes, she pulled in her breath and held it. He looked primitive, even elemental and very, very frightening.

“Nothing’s going to happen to you.” He enunciated every word carefully, nearly brutally. She opened her mouth and before a single sound came out, he repeated, more forcefully than before (if it could be credited), “Nothing’s going to happen to you.”

“What if something happens to you?” she cried. “They wanted you, not me. They asked for you!”

“I’ll handle it.” He divested himself of the rest of his clothes while Sibyl stood in his bedroom and stared. When he was done, standing there in his naked glory, he commanded, “Darling, get in bed.”

“Who are those people?” she demanded, he may be done talking but she damned well wasn’t.

“Get in bed, Sibyl, we’ll talk about it tomorrow.”

“We’ll bloody well talk about it now!” she yelled, letting her temper get the better of her. She’d had enough; she’d had a knife at her throat and seen his seemingly lifeless body loaded into an ambulance. She couldn’t just go to sleep, not with her mind racing as it was. “Who are those people, were they the ones who hurt Marian?”

He closed the distance in two quick strides, hooked her around the waist and swung her up in his arms then stalked to the bed and threw her on it. Mallory lumbered to his feet at this unprecedented flurry of action at such a late hour and Bran flew off the bed.

“Colin, don’t manhandle me!” she snapped.

He stood by the bed and scowled at her, the muscles in his body visibly taut, she could see the ones in his upper arms bunching reflexively as he clenched his fists.

“Sibyl, I’ve been shot by a fucking tranquilliser dart, watched, powerless, while someone held you at knifepoint, you disappeared for what seemed an endless period of time at the hospital and I didn’t know where the hell you were. I’m bloody tired, I don’t know what the fuck is going on and, right now, can’t do anything about it. Talking is not going to help. It’s late, I need sleep, you need sleep, so for Christ’s sake, be quiet and stop arguing with me.”

She realised then he was just as frightened as she was but too damned much of a man to admit it and her heart, as was Sibyl’s wont, went out to him. She got up on her knees, walking on them across the top of the bed until she reached him, wrapped her arms around him, pressed in close and rested her cheek on his chest.

Then she said softly into his chest, “Okay.”

And at her soft word, Sibyl felt his anger drift out of him and his arms wrap around her tight.

“You’re the most annoying woman alive,” he mumbled this familiar refrain into the hair at the top of her head but there was affection in his tone that obliterated any sting to his words.

“Come to bed,” she beckoned.

He did and they did nothing but sleep, nestled together, her back to his front. The warmth of his body and protective arm he wrapped around her comforted her and she surprisingly found herself giving into her exhaustion and drifting to sleep almost the moment they settled.

Sibyl woke too early, feeling like she hadn’t slept. She was lethargic, headachy and most definitely cranky. And that was before she opened her eyes and saw she was alone in Colin’s gigantic bed.

Colin never left her in bed without an embrace, a kiss, a caress or some loving gesture.

Never.

Fear coursed through her and she catapulted from the bed and ran to the bathroom looking for him. He wasn’t there and she noticed both Mallory and Bran were gone as well.

Panic seized her and she flew from the room, down the hall. Visions of blood and knives and broken canes stampeded through her brain.

She still had not had her tour of Lacybourne, she and Colin always too busy with other things, but she was becoming familiar with it all the same. She ran down the stairs to the Great Hall, her glance sliding past Beatrice and Royce on her way down.

He wasn’t in the Great Hall either.

Watery light was coming through the windows and the day was grey with drizzle. She searched the library, frantically paused in the dining room and then heard a deep man’s voice in the study.

She threw open the door and burst in.

Colin was standing behind the desk talking on the phone wearing faded jeans and a maroon, long-sleeved t-shirt that hugged the muscles of his chest and stomach tightly. His dark hair was still damp from a shower and he looked refreshed and nonchalant and, she vaguely noted, unbearably sexy.

Mallory was lying flat out in front of his desk and Bran was picking a trail delicately across the scattered papers on the top.

Colin’s head shot up at her entry.

Mallory’s body jerked, he glanced over his doggie shoulder at her, gave her a soft welcoming “woof” and then settled contentedly back into to his usual morning-after-a-night’s-sleep nap.

Bran rested his bottom on a bunch of papers and blinked at her with a twitch of his tail.

“You scared me half to death!” Her voice was sharp and frenzied and she glowered at Colin.

“I’ll call you back,” he muttered into the phone and pressed a button to disconnect without saying good-bye.

“You scared me half to death,” she repeated when he’d tossed the cordless on his desk.

“I –” he began.

She quickly interrupted him by slamming the door behind her and whirling back around. “I woke up and you were gone, Mallory was gone, Bran was gone, everyone was gone!” she shouted.

“Calm down, sweetheart,” Colin said gently, completely calm himself and, in the face of it, she went from irrational to insane.

“Don’t tell me to calm down! You never leave me in bed without –”

She stopped abruptly and lifted her hands to the sides of her hair, shifting the heavy masses away from her face and holding them up.

“I thought something happened to you.” This came out as an accusation and after she voiced it, Sibyl glared at him as if it was entirely his fault.

“I didn’t want to wake you,” Colin explained.

“Well, I’d rather you wake me than have the living daylights frightened out of me first thing in the goddess-damned morning,” she snapped.

His gaze dropped lazily to her thighs and she looked down, realising her hands in her hair brought the t-shirt up to show a hint of the lacy, lilac underwear her sister had cajoled her into buying.

She dropped her arms instantly.

“Come here.” Now his voice was pure silk, his eyes were warm and her bones showed signs of beginning to melt.

Regardless of all that, it was still morning and she was still very grumpy.

“No. My head’s pounding and I’m in a very bad mood.”

He gave her one of his lazy smiles while noting, “You’re always in a bad mood in the morning.”

“Stop being all teasing and sweet. I’m telling you, I’m not in the mood,” she warned.

“Am I being teasing and sweet?” he asked, while, she noted, being teasing and sweet.

In answer, she growled.

“Sibyl, come here,” he ordered.

“Why?” she shot back.

“So I can help with your mood,” he tempted, his eyes, if possible, growing warmer.

“How are you going to do that?” she queried warily, even as she moved forward. She didn’t allow him to answer because she knew by the look in his eye what the answer was. She tried to change the subject. “And who were you talking to on the phone?”

“A private investigator.” Colin arms stole around her when she arrived within reaching distance and she lifted her hands to rest on his upper arms.

At her wide-eyed look at his statement, he continued, “I’ve engaged him to put a team together to find the men from last night.”

“The police –” she started.

“I want them first,” Colin stated, the warmth in his eyes gone in a flash, they were glittering like shards of ice.

“Colin.”

“Quiet Sibyl, we’re not discussing this. I’m handling it. You’re not to interfere.”

This was not what Sibyl wished to hear at the best of times but certainly not in the morning.

Therefore her eyes narrowed dangerously. “I beg your pardon?”

“They held a knife to your throat,” he reminded her curtly, clearly not used to explaining himself and only doing so because he knew she’d rocket to the moon on the fuel of her anger if he didn’t.

“You can’t circumvent justice,” Sibyl pointed out impatiently. “The police will deal with them.”

“The police can have them after I’m done with them.”

Her eyes widened before she asked, “What do you mean to do?”

“It’s none of your concern.”

Sibyl stiffened to the approximate pliability of a two by four.

“Excuse me?” she whispered angrily. “But my rich and powerful boyfriend is threatening vigilante justice and it’s none of my concern? I beg to differ.”

His hands tightened on her waist and the ice shards in his eyes polarised. “One of them stood in front of me and held a knife to your throat while I was powerless to do a thing. He touched you, and no one touches you, no one but me. He yanked your goddamned hair, the most beautiful hair I’ve seen in my life, using it to cause you pain.” He was using his low, even voice and she knew he was very close to losing control.

Sibyl also knew every minute, every sound, every word, everything he saw and experienced last night was seared into his memory. She knew it at his words. And last night for brief moments in time, Colin Morgan had been powerless. Men like Colin were not used to being powerless and it dawned on Sibyl, belatedly, that he did not like it.

At all.

He continued, “I’m going to find them, have a chat with them to express how unhappy the events of last night made me and then I’ll turn them over to the proper authorities.”

“You won’t hurt them?” Sibyl asked quietly, hoping the lowering of her tone would soothe him.

It didn’t.

“Are you asking for mercy for a man who put a knife to your throat and has you wound up so tight you fly through the house in a panic when I do something innocent and absolutely normal, like leave you alone in bed?” he demanded in exasperation.

Putting it that way, she had to admit, it sounded rather silly.

She decided she better stop talking.

He sighed an enormously patient sigh before saying, “I promise I won’t hurt them…” She began to smile, “unduly.” Her smile turned to a frown.

“You frighten me when you’re like this,” she told him and his face shifted but he did not relent.

“I’m trying to make it so you’ll never be frightened again,” Colin explained.

“But –”

He cut her off to inform her, “I’m going to do this, Sibyl, whether you like it or not, so I suggest you accept it because it’s going to happen.”

She blinked at his words and his tone then muttered, “You’re ruthless.”

At her comment, he leaned closer and his hands slid over her bottom and then suddenly down to grasp the backs of her thighs, lifting her up. She gave a shocked gasp and had to clamp her thighs around his hips and hastily grab his shoulders for support as he carried her to the desk.

“Yes,” he agreed amiably, all his mood gone, “I am.”

He settled her bottom on the desk and Bran scattered. Colin kept himself determinedly positioned between her legs as he tilted her chin up with one hand and his other hand drew lazy circle on the top of her thigh.

“Now, what shall I do about your morning mood?” he asked conversationally, gently rubbing his thumb across her lower lip.

“I take it we’re done talking,” she guessed.

“Oh, we’re definitely done talking,” he stated, his voice sexy low and she knew what that meant and she also knew, acutely how it made her belly feel.

“My family –” she started to say but his lips took hers in a slow, soft, mind-numbing kiss.

When he was done, against her lips he murmured, “For a daughter born of Mags, you’re amazingly prissy.”

Her eyes flared. “I am not prissy.”

“Prove it,” he dared on a whisper.

“You aren’t going to goad me into –”

He moved into her and she was forced to lean back, resting her hands behind her on his desk as his hands slid inside the t-shirt and up the skin of her back, sending shivers through her against her will and he quieted her by kissing her. This was not soft or slow but hard and demanding and she couldn’t help but respond.

So she did.

Many minutes later, her breath coming fast, her hands buried in his hair, his lips at her neck, her body throbbing, his hands spread her legs further apart and his fingers expertly delved inside her panties.

Her head rolled back.

And there was a knock on the door.

Her head snapped up.

“Breakfast in five minutes,” Scarlett called jovially through the door.

Sibyl made a trapped noise that, mid-way out of her throat, changed to a loud moan as Colin’s finger slid inside her just as his thumb hit her in a very good spot.

“Colin,” she whispered, caught between mortification and desire, his head came up and he looked at her.

“Hurry up, darling, breakfast is nearly ready.” He grinned wickedly but his eyes were dark and his voice was husky.

“Aren’t you going to –?”

“I’m going to watch.”

“But –”

“I like to watch. You’re beautiful always but you’re fucking breathtaking when you come.”

She couldn’t help it, she melted at his words and his thumb, still at the right spot, starting pressing and rolling in circles as his finger inside moved out and was joined, delightfully when it returned, with another one. At their skilful manoeuvring, the throbs turned to jolts and she bucked against his hand as the incredible heat shot through her.

“That’s it, sweetheart,” he encouraged when he knew she was close, his deep voice beyond husky straight to throaty, the sound of it undid her, her neck arched back again, she pulled in a ragged breath and let go.

Still in the throes of her resplendent climax, he slid her off the desk and sat in his chair, pulling her into his lap so her legs were over the arm of the chair. Then with his hand cupping the back of her head, Colin buried her face in his neck and she clutched his shoulders as he held her trembling body and stroked the soft skin at the side of her breast with the other.

“You’re ruthless,” Sibyl whispered again when she had the strength to speak and anyone could tell she didn’t really care.

“Yes,” Colin agreed roughly, “I am.”