Selina busied herself slicing bread and pouring water from a pitcher on the table between them.
“We had a new arrival today,” she answered as she sat across from Agnes. “A man and his boy.”
Something in her tone must have alerted Agnes to her state of mind, for the older woman lifted her head from her bowl to stare at Selina.
“And you sensed something.”
It wasn’t a question. Agnes knew as much about Selina’s gift as she knew herself.
“The child. He needs help. Something is holding onto him. Not letting him be free.”
“And the man?”
Selina felt that odd, unsettling feeling again as Agnes mentioned the handsome stranger.
“My concern is for the boy,” she answered softly.
There was a comfortable silence as they ate. It was only when Selina stood to clear the table that Agnes spoke again.
As Selina reached down to pick up the old lady’s bowl, her hand gripped Selina’s wrist in a surprisingly strong grasp.
“Be careful, child,” Agnes whispered.
A sudden lump formed in Selina’s throat, though she could not have said why.
She nodded once, and Agnes’s grip loosened. But Selina still felt a strange, unknown grip around her heart long after Agnes had let her go.
Chapter 2
“Look, Papa. Look!”
Philip felt an unfamiliar grin stretch across his face, the muscles feeling stiff and unused.
But he dutifully bent down to study Timothy’s find.
“A crab,” he exclaimed, giving the creature all due attention.
His eyes burned from lack of sleep and his body felt as though it were weighed down with anvils.
But Timothy, at least, seemed well rested and full of energy.
The nightmares had still come. They always came. But thankfully, the sea air had ensured that Timothy slept for longer this morning when exhaustion had finally won out.
Philip was glad of it, for it meant that Timothy had the abundant energy a seven-year-old boy should have.
And he was definitely using it this morning.
Philip laughed as Timothy jumped to his feet, clearly tired of the crab already, and ran at break-neck speed to the rocks that Philip himself had climbed as a boy.
“Be careful, Timmy.” He called the warning he knew his son wouldn’t heed.
“Timothy,” he called again, infusing his tone with severity.
This time, his son looked back at him and nodded, even as his face broke out in a mischievous grin.
Philip felt like he’d been punched in the gut.
The weak autumn sun glinted off Timmy’s sandy hair, and his light brown eyes sparkled.
He looked happy.
He looked like his mother.
Timothy scampered to the rocks and began to climb. Within seconds, he’d disappeared over the other side.
And Philip remained where he was. Frozen to the spot.
He’d always known that Timothy favoured Charlotte in colouring, of course. A blind man would have seen the similarities between the two from the time Timmy had been born.
But every once in a while, it still took him by surprise.
That smile. That smile had been all Charlotte. And it had been so long since Philip had seen it. On either of their faces.
Charlotte’s smile had been lost along with so many other things when she’d become ill past the point of his help or anyone else’s.
And Timothy’s had been missing since the day he’d seen his mother’s body fall from that window.
Philip winced as memory after memory battered him.
The crash of the surf, the howl of the autumn wind – it all faded to nothingness as he was swept into the past.
The screams of first his son and then the servants.
The panic and chaos.
The image of her lying there still. So still.
It haunted him and worse, it haunted his poor, innocent boy.
A sudden cry of “Papa” rent the air, galvanising Philip into action.
“Timothy,” he cried, the name torn from his lips as he darted toward the rocks.
How could he have been so damned stupid, standing there lost in his memories while his boy was in danger?
Philip clambered over the rocks, his eyes raking the other side to find his son.
There!
Philip’s heart pounded with relief as he homed in on the glint of golden-blonde in the sunshine.
Closing his eyes in relief, he opened them again and once more felt a punch to the gut.
This time, however, it wasn’t because of a memory of the past.
Kneeling in front of Timothy, dark sinful hair cascading down her back, was the woman from the woods.
Selina’s heart twisted as she watched a lone tear trickle down the face of the young boy.
“Whisht,” she crooned softly as she reached out to examine the cut on his knee.