“He tailed you into the airport and heard where you planned to go when you bought your ticket,” Lucien said from behind her. “He didn’t have his passport with him, though, so he couldn’t follow you. He wasn’t expecting to have to leave the country so quickly, given what Ian had told him,” Lucien explained when Francesca gave him a perplexed glance over her shoulder.
“Idiot,” Ian said succinctly, looking extremely annoyed. He narrowed his stare on her, watching her from beneath a lowered brow. “Who told you I was here?”
“Gerard,” she said.
His jaw stiffened. “Gerard? How did—”
“He said he overheard you two talking.”
His lip curled every so slightly in an expression of . . . what, she couldn’t quite say.
“Ian? What is it?”
“Nothing,” Ian replied through a tight mouth. “Francesca, I don’t want you here.”
She dropped her arms and straightened her spine. “I’m not leaving. Not unless you come with me.”
He looked mad enough to bite through a chain-link fence. She stood her ground, but something in his blue eyes made it difficult to do.
“You’re here now. Come inside. It’s freezing in this foyer,” Lucien added from behind her, and she knew he was trying to give Ian time to cool down and see reason. Ian made a savage, furious sound in his throat and stalked out of the foyer ahead of them without another word.
“I had to come,” she whispered to Lucien desperately. “It’s crazy, him being here of all places. Is it true Ian has bought this place?”
“He owns it, yes,” Lucien said succinctly, his tight mouth telling her he shared in her disquietude. “Are you going to come in? We were just sitting down to eat in the parlor. It’s one of the only livable rooms in the house . . . one of the only warm ones as well,” he added drolly.
“When did you get here?” she asked Lucien as they walked.
“Late last night, at around the same time as Ian.”
She followed him into a firelit, shadowed room filled with heavy, ornate furniture covered in dingy, once-luxurious fabrics. An unpleasant odor of dampness and mold seemed to pervade the entire place. Ian sat on a deep couch facing the gigantic fireplace, eating a plate of food mechanically without acknowledging her arrival in the room.
“Are you hungry, Francesca?” Lucien asked politely. “It’s just chicken, potatoes, and fruit, but we’ve got plenty of it.”
“Yes, please,” Francesca replied, realizing for the first time how hollow her stomach felt. She hadn’t eaten all day. When Ian still refused to speak or look at her after Lucien left the room, she sighed and fell onto the couch next to him. The heat from the fire felt good. A wave of exhaustion hit her.
“Are you just going to ignore me?” she asked tiredly after a moment.
His whiskered jaw hardened. He swallowed and shoved his plate onto the coffee table before him. “How can I possibly ignore you when you’ve shown up here uninvited?” he said, anger simmering in his deep voice. “I don’t want you staying here, Francesca. This place is . . . tainted. Poison. I don’t believe in ghosts, but if I were ever to think a place was haunted, I’d think it was Aurore. It’s not a place where I want you to be.”
“Well it’s not a place where I want you to be, either. Come with me, and we’ll both be happy.” Her flash of indignation faded almost as fast as it came. She peered around the shadowed room, making out the dark, depressing paintings of pale-skinned, hollow-eyed people and the massive, hulking furniture, some of which was covered in stained sheets. She could almost feel the dust and mold accumulating in her lungs as she breathed. “What an awful place.”
Ian’s irritated grunt seemed to say, Didn’t I tell you? He leaned back on the couch, his profile rigid. Francesca wanted to demand that he tell her what specifically he was looking for on Trevor Gaines’s property, but was worried he’d get up and refuse to speak to her further. Knowing him as well as she did, she understood that the majority of his anger at her presence came from helplessness. And perhaps shame at her seeing this dark part of his past.
As she was quickly learning, his shame wasn’t logical. But that didn’t mean he could shake it just because she wanted it.
Eager to change the topic that would sidestep his discomfort and fury, she landed on the disconcerting vision she’d seen as she drove onto the property.
“I can well believe you’d imagine this place is haunted. You won’t believe what I saw just now in the woods,” she said as Lucien walked into the room carrying a plate of food and a glass. “Thank you,” she said gratefully as Lucien placed her dinner in front of her on the table.
“What?” Ian asked, turning toward her slightly, his brows knitted together.
“Half a man disappearing into the ground,” Francesca replied matter-of-factly, picking up her plate and settling it in her lap. She took a bite. The chicken was moist and flavorful. “This is good. Did you get it in town?”
“Forget about the food,” Ian said impatiently, peering at her. “What do you mean, half a man?” Lucien, too, was listening intently from where he sat in an armchair near the couch.
She paused to explain what she’d seen. When she finished, Ian shared a significant look with Lucien.
“It’s him. Kam Reardon,” Ian said to Lucien. “He must have some kind of hideout underground. It’s what I suspected. I’m convinced there’s a tunnel entrance into this house. He gets in, but I can’t figure out how. If he’s underground, that’s why I haven’t been able to find him when I search the grounds.”