The Perfect Bride - By Kerry Connor Page 0,51

face in the way Meredith had drawn it.

“Is this what you wanted to show me in the ballroom?”

Meredith started, her head shooting up. At the same time, her pencil slipped, scrawling a jagged line across the page. Jillian instantly felt a pang of regret at the sight of that dark, errant line marring the image. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to startle you.”

Meredith looked down at the drawing, and Jillian saw her wince as she took it in. The line could be erased, but it would take part of the image with it. It would take some work to put it back the way it had been, if she even could.

“No, it’s all right,” Meredith said. “I tend to get lost in my head when I’m working on something. I should have heard you come in. But, yes, I wanted to show you a few ideas I had and I thought these might make it easier to visualize what I had in mind when you saw the ballroom. And then I forgot one I particularly liked and had to go back for it and...” She fluttered a hand helplessly.

And I fell down the stairs, Jillian finished for her. So it hadn’t just been a ploy by Grace or Meredith to get her up there. Meredith had had a perfectly reasonable explanation, or at least an excuse for one.

If it was true, then Meredith likely wouldn’t have been in the west wing when Jillian was pushed. She would have been in the east wing, where the bedrooms were. Jillian thought back to the moments after she’d fallen, when she’d come to a stop on the landing where the staircase split in two and seen Meredith at the top of the stairs. She’d thought Meredith had been at the top of the stairs to the west wing, where the person who’d pushed her would have been standing. Was it possible she’d gotten turned around in the fall and been looking up at the top of the stairs to the east wing instead without realizing it? It would also explain why Meredith hadn’t seen who pushed her, if she hadn’t done it herself.

Jillian tried to remember what the rest of the scene had looked like, where the railing had been—on the right or the left?—but she couldn’t bring the image into focus. She’d been so dazed after the fall, the only thing she’d seen clearly was Meredith.

Not quite ready to dismiss her suspicions entirely, Jillian sank into the chair to Meredith’s right. “You’re really good,” she noted, nodding toward the drawing.

Meredith automatically shook her head. “I don’t know about that.”

“Well, I do, and I’m not just saying that. You have a lot of talent.”

Quickly moving to cover the drawing with a blank sheet of paper, Meredith smiled thinly. “Thank you.”

“Have you done any drawing professionally, or considered exploring it?”

Meredith shook her head harder, more adamant this time. “Oh, no. I couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

The question seemed to pull her up short. “Um, my hand,” Meredith said weakly. Jillian glanced down, finally noticing the woman was flexing her fingers. “I...broke it. The bones didn’t heal quite right and it still hurts, especially when I try writing with it.”

“But you can still draw?”

Meredith grimaced. “No, it hurts to draw for too long, but I can’t seem to stop. No matter how much it hurts, I just have to keep doing it.” She laughed faintly. “I’m pretty sure that’s the definition of stupidity.”

“Or passion,” Jillian suggested. “It’s in your bones so much you can’t let it go.”

“I guess that’s a nicer way to think of it,” Meredith said, a wistful note in the words. With a sigh, she flexed her hand again, drawing her fingers into her palm and slowly straightening them. Even as she did it, Jillian noticed it took her some effort to do so and the motion wasn’t smooth.

Curious, Jillian automatically reached out to take Meredith’s hand without thinking.

Meredith immediately flinched, jerking back with a force that threatened to knock her chair out from under her. Jillian froze. Meredith’s whole body was tense, her eyes wide with fear, as though she was being attacked.

“I—I’m sorry,” Meredith said, swallowing deeply. She placed her hands flat on the tabletop, and Jillian could see her arms still shook slightly. “You startled me.”

And Jillian immediately understood, all the pieces clicking into place. Meredith’s skittishness. The way she always held herself defensively. Adam’s protectiveness toward his sister. It wasn’t just about a wedding business or the fact that a mysterious