a fact of life, but it had never occurred to her that other forms of the dead might exist here as well.
“Seamus is my nephew. He found you,” Rose said, her serene composure returning. “It is a long story . . . hours in the telling, but I can swear that neither one of us has ever even seen Julian, much less done his bidding.”
Philip wavered, watching the ghost. He did not seem stunned by this revelation. He looked back at Rose. “Who made you?” His voice was not so threatening.
She drew herself up to full height. “Edward Claymore.”
Eleisha grabbed the back of a couch, her head spinning. “Edward? No, that isn’t . . . He would have told me.”
Regret colored Rose’s pale face. “Oh, my dear, I did not mean for any of this to spill out on the floor tonight. I did not expect . . . I was not prepared to . . .” She trailed off.
Then Wade finally said something. “You don’t have to talk at all.” He appeared to still be recovering from the sight of Seamus.
Philip glanced over at Wade. “Too soon.”
“No,” Wade answered. “I don’t think you’ll trust her until you’ve seen her past.”
Rose was watching them both in cautious puzzlement. “My past?”
“Whatever they want, don’t do it. We don’t need them,” Seamus said. “Any of them.”
Eleisha was shaken by Rose’s claim about Edward. It couldn’t be true, but why would Rose lie?
“What are you suggesting?” Rose asked Wade.
Eleisha agreed with Philip that it was much too soon to expose Rose to telepathy, but she also agreed with Wade that this standoff would not end until some foundation of mutual trust was established—and she had to know about Edward. He could not have kept such a great secret, not from her. Could he?
She reached out and grasped Rose’s hand. “Come and sit on the carpet with us. If you think back, all the way back, and then begin remembering your own life, we’ll be able to see your memories. No, don’t be scared! It’s all right. Just sit here.” She drew Rose over to an open space in the center of the room. “Philip, come sit down. Wade, can you act as her guide?”
“Rose, no!” Seamus shouted.
She held her free hand up to silence him and sank down beside Eleisha, her eyes searching Eleisha’s face. “You can see my memories?”
“If you drop any mental barriers and think back, remember what happened, we can all see them. After that, Wade can keep your memories linear. But . . . it can be painful, like reliving it as it happened. Are you willing to try?”
Rose offered one slow nod.
Wade dropped down on the floor, cross-legged, and then Philip finally joined them, glancing a few times at Seamus. But Philip’s expression was curious and intense, and he seemed to be losing his conviction that Rose was working for Julian.
“Just think back,” Eleisha said softly, “as far as you can.”
Carefully, she reached out with her thoughts and connected to Rose’s mind, finding access easier than she expected. Then the room dimmed, and that was the last conscious act she remembered for several hours.
chapter 5
Rose
Rose de Spenser had always been considered a strange child: big-eyed and serious and old beyond her years.
Perhaps it was because her mother died giving birth to her.
Perhaps it was because her great-great-great-grandfather had been French—and everyone knew the French were mad.
Perhaps it was because she stepped into the role of housekeeper for her father and brother by the time she was seven.
But whatever the reason, most people agreed that Rose was odd.
She was born in Loam Village, just south of Inverness, Scotland, in 1790, but were it not for the fact that Mary, Queen of Scots had become a young widow all the way back in 1560, it’s quite possible Rose would have been born—with a different face—on French soil . . . or never been born at all.
Queen Mary had been living in France for most of her life when her husband, Francis, suddenly died, and having no more use for her, the French royals sent her back to Scotland in 1561, along with a large retinue of servants and stewards.
When Rose was a child, her brother, Gregor, had sometimes mused that their migrating ancestor had been one of the noble envoys accompanying the queen, but her father insisted this was not the case. Although little else was known about Alain de Spenser, he had been only a minor wardrobe steward in