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entirely to his liking, he felt as if he had been given a small and perfectly chosen gift. He strode over to the bed and stroked the old man’s hair—a liberty he took only because his father was barely sensate.
    “Never mind, sir,” he said gently. “I’ll make them go away.”
    He marched from the room, not bothering to close the door, and took the quicker, narrower route down the servants’ staircase, nearly colliding with a chambermaid encumbered with a pile of fresh linens in his haste. He didn’t know why he was in such a lather to confront a person who made him feel as if he might not exist, a madwoman walking about the countryside in a state of undress. At the back of his mind was the thought that she might need his help. Help that only he could give her. An illogical thought, considering he had helped absolutely no one in many years, least of all himself. He had told his father he would make her go away. He wondered if he would be able—or would even want—to do so.
    At the bottom of the stairs, he nearly collided with yet another of the several dozen servants who cluttered up the back stairs of Stonecross—a footman, in this case. He scowled at the young man, who looked suitably cowed by the direct eye contact. “What are you about, Danby?” he demanded. “Do you not know that there is a person at the front door, carrying her own luggage up the walk? I could see her clearly from my father’s window.”
    The footman stared, his impeccable livery pulled slightly askew in his effort to avoid crashing into his master. “No, sir, there can’t be! I was only just out there meself. Are you sure it weren’t me you saw?”
    “It most certainly was not,” Alaric said firmly. “I distinctly saw a young woman coming up the walk with several heavy valises. I cannot believe that the members of my staff would be so remiss as to ignore a guest’s arrival.”
    The young man stared at him in open disbelief. “No, sir, I would never do such a thing,” he protested. “Honest. There is no one outside.”
    Alaric strode toward the door, grasping the handle just as he heard the sound of a key fumbling its way into the keyhole. He frowned. What the devil was happening? No one but the upper members of his staff possessed keys to Stonecross. Alaric himself didn’t have a key to the front door. And why would it be locked in broad daylight?
    “Allow me, sir,” Danby said humbly, gaze averted as he attempted to open the door for Alaric, who shrugged him off impatiently, tugging at the door. It felt as if it had been soldered shut. The brass handle twisted in his hand, as though someone was attempting to open it from the other side, each of them thwarting the other’s efforts.
    “Just wait a blasted moment!” he muttered, muscling the handle as it shuddered, nearly tearing out of his grasp. Whoever she was, she had a firm grip, despite her willowy shape.
    Finally, the door gave way, whooshing inwards as though a wind had pushed it open. Alaric used the momentum to fling it wide, preparing for his encounter with the unannounced, and very peculiar, guest. The mottled October light meandered across the threshold into the dark foyer, barely illumining the polished marble floor beneath his feet.
    Alaric immediately began rambling, as he usually did when confronted with a stranger. “Good morning. Please allow my footman to take your things. I am afraid we weren’t expecting guests quite so soon—” he said cordially.
    To no one.
    There was no one there, as Danby had said. The front step was quite abandoned. Fallen leaves strewed the scrubbed stone, and there were no fresh wheel marks disturbing the gravel drive. No one had pulled a carriage up to the house in several days, other than deliverymen, who drove their carts around the back. Alaric stared, baffled.
    “Danby,” he said. “I swear to God there was a very strange young woman standing not two feet from this spot a few moments ago. What is more, I heard the