Total pages in book: 116
Estimated words: 109777 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 549(@200wpm)___ 439(@250wpm)___ 366(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 109777 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 549(@200wpm)___ 439(@250wpm)___ 366(@300wpm)
I got out and looked up, taking in the general state of neglect creeping over the house. It wasn’t just the ivy. The bushes and flowerbeds were overgrown. The courtyard was a mess. It should have been a neat checkerboard of granite squares intersected by strips of perfectly-trimmed green grass. Instead, the grass was long and infested with weeds, almost completely obscuring the stone.
If the front of the house was this bad, I was a little afraid to see the formal gardens in the back. The woods loomed over the courtyard, cutting off the morning sun, the trees far closer to the house than I remembered.
I edged nearer to Griffen as we stood in front of the manor door, waiting to see if anyone would answer our ring. So far, nothing. The house sat silent. Abandoned. Griffen rang again. I heard nothing.
“I think the bell is broken,” I said, reaching forward to close my fingers around the heavy iron handle. I stumbled, unprepared, as the door moved, shifting inwards just enough to tell me the door wasn’t locked. I pushed harder, to no avail.
Stepping aside at Griffen’s nudge, I watched as he tried the handle like I had, then, finding it unmoving, set his shoulder against the solid wood and shoved.
The heavy wood budged a half-inch. Definitely not locked, just very stuck. Griffen stepped back and scanned the full height of the door, eyes narrowing as if the door was an opponent he intended to vanquish.
Seeing the resolve in his eyes, I took another step back, murmuring, “Don’t hurt yourself.”
Griffen backed up, then launched himself at the door, turning at the last moment to force his shoulder to take the brunt of the impact.
The door shuddered, giving another half inch. Jaw gritted, Griffen reached up to rub his shoulder. Not the one he’d used as a battering ram, the other shoulder. The one I’d noticed him rolling now and then. Odd. Eyeing the door again, sizing it up, he fisted his hands at his side and kicked hard with one long leg.
I’d have to remember to stay on Griffen’s good side. His booted foot slammed into the heavy door right beside the handle, the sheer force of his kick shoving the door clear of the frame. Somehow, Griffen managed to keep his balance, shoving his hands into his pockets as he waited for the house to give up its secrets. With a groaning creak of protest, the tall, iron-strapped door swung open, revealing the entry hall of Heartstone Manor inch by inch.
The stale odor of dust hit me first. Heartstone’s entry hall was palatial. Two stories high, big enough to fit my apartment a few times over, it was paneled in dark-stained oak from floor to ceiling, an elaborate crystal chandelier hanging in the center.
Straight ahead, a wide staircase rose one flight before it divided, the second set of stairs leading up to the right and left giving access to both the rooms on the second floor and those in the east and west wings of the house. The carpet on the stairs was gray with dust.
Everything was gray with dust.
Heartstone had always smelled of lemons and beeswax, of the flowers Miss Martha set out daily in crystal vases all over the house. Through the French doors at the far end of the entry hall, I glimpsed the formal gardens beyond. All was gray and dead.
Even in winter, the gardens had been beautiful. Not now. Nothing here was beautiful, the artful design of the house disguised by what had to be years of neglect.
Griffen summed it up. “What the fuck happened here?”
Chapter Thirteen
Hope
I could only shake my head, fending off the disorienting sense that I’d stumbled into an alternate universe. Prentice murdered. Ford in jail. Marrying Griffen. Heartstone a ghost. It was all a bad dream and I couldn’t find my way out.
“I thought Sterling and Brax were living here,” Griffen said, taking in every detail of the neglected foyer.
“So did I. Brax has a place in Asheville since he does so much business over there. Maybe that’s where he’s been staying,” I offered.
“So, Sterling’s been here alone?”
Neither of us liked that idea. Sterling was gorgeous, and reckless, and so very damaged. The idea of her on her own in this shell of a home, as abandoned as the manor itself—it didn’t bear thinking about. She could be a brat and she wasn’t the nicest person I knew, but she deserved more than this. Even a palace wasn’t much of a home when you were utterly alone.
“Maybe she’s been staying with Quinn,” I said, hoping that was the case.
Griffen only grunted in response, venturing deeper into the shadowed interior of the house. I pressed the light switches cleverly hidden by paneling, relieved when the chandelier came to life. Half the bulbs were dead and the crystal droplets were dull with dust, but it was light. I’d take what I could get.