When Belle awoke the next morning, she wasn't entirely sure she hadn't had an extremely vivid dream. Personally, she blamed the food. Everything she'd eaten in the past few days had a higher fat count than anything she could ever remember eating back home.
Mrs. Potts called early to let her know there was no way up to the castle from the village, so she'd be on her own again. With a full day by herself stretching before her, Belle decided to spend it exploring the grounds around the castle. There was a nice sized garden out back, though it was frosted over with snow at the moment. There was also a little path that lead from the garden back to a wooded area a few acres from the main house.
She bundled up, putting on several layers under her warmest coat, pulling on her wellies and stuffing her unruly auburn curls under a knit cap. Her gloves were the last touch before heading out into the snow with her camera in pocket.
She came back a few hours later, frozen to the bone, after her camera had started to frost up and refuse to cooperate. She imagined the castle would be lovely come spring, but right now it was mostly a frozen wasteland. Why couldn't Mallory have made her purchase in May?
Of course, then she wouldn't be spending her Christmas at a fairy tale castle in a foreign country, so there were definite perks to the situation.
She stomped the snow out of her boots, trudging in to the warm, stone kitchen to make tea when she came face to face with Lord Bedlay, sitting by the kitchen fire.
Belle gasped, gripping the doorway with one hand as her heart picked up speed in her chest.
He was definitely real, then.
"You can't possibly have been startled by me," Lord Bedlay drawled. "Yes, I'm a ghost. Yes, I'm real. Yes, it wasn't a dream. Are we all caught up now?"
Belle leveled him with a glare.
"What did you mean last night by terrible things?" she asked.
He shrugged, giving her an enigmatic smile.
"I'll leave that up to your imagination, dearie. For now, we have work to do."
"You're right," she agreed. "I do have work to do. I'm supposed to be assessing the castle and drawing up detailed lists of everything wrong with the place."
Lord Bedlay looked affronted. "There's nothing wrong with my castle!"
"Your foundation is crumbling, your wiring is shot, you need central heating because this place is bloody freezing, there are termites in the attic, there's damaged plaster work in almost every room, I could keep going if you're interested."
"Well it's not my fault," he replied, surly. "I'd never have allowed it to fall into this state."
"Well your descendants were less prudent."
"Not my descendants," he snarled. "Distant cousins on my mother's side and my closest living relations that descended on this place and ruined it like the grasping, thieving pests they are. And now they've sold it to an American."
The way he referenced Mal's nationality, it might have been a swear word.
Belle snorted. "Why are you so against this?"
"Because it's my castle!" he cried.
"And what need have you for a castle?" she countered. "It's not as though you can properly enjoy it. Wouldn't you prefer it to be filled with people who appreciate its beauty?"
"People who will pay your employer very handsomely to stay here?" he asked with an arched eyebrow.
Belle let out a long sigh. Mallory had anticipated run ins with the local historic preservation groups or concerned citizens, not a surly ghost who wanted to be left alone.
"Look, we're stuck here, just the two of us, until this snow clears out," she said offering him a smile. "Can't we try to be friends?"
Lord Bedlay eyed her up and down, and something in her shivered at the feeling. "I suppose we can, Miss French."
"Belle," she corrected him. "My friends call me Belle."
"And I'm Rumford Duncan, Lord Bedlay," he replied with a nod.
"It's nice to meet you, Rumford," she said with a smile and small curtsey. She almost thought she heard Rumford stifle a laugh at that. "Now that we've got that out of the way, what exactly do we need to get to work on?"
It turned out that Rumford needed her help in the library. He set her to work rifling through various historical accounts, family records and thick binders filled with hand written letters. Her work was impeded by the fact that her spectral friend was extremely vague in his instructions.
"It would be helpful if you told me what exactly I was looking for," she pointed out.
"I'm not rightly sure," he said, raking a hand through his hair, starting to pace across the stone floor. Belle was struck by how human the action was. Sitting here in the firelight of the library she could almost pretend he was alive. He had ticks, he tapped his foot, flipped his hair, his chest moved in and out as though he were breathing. It was like he was a copy, perfectly preserved and going on as though he were alive. It was disconcerting but fascinating at the same time.
She wasn't exactly sure how she had become such fast friends with a ghost. She assumed she should be slightly more confused, slightly more afraid. Her entire worldview had been turned on its ear by Rumford's existence. But somehow it just felt like sitting in a library with a friend.
Belle assumed that was a reflection of her own loneliness more than anything else.
"There was something important that I knew once," he continued, screwing his eyes up in concentration. "Something that would help. If only I could remember…"
"Perhaps it would be helpful if you told me what these terrible things are that are supposed to happen if the castle passes out of your family," she suggested.
"I don't know," he admitted, looking stricken. "I only know that there's darkness coming if a member of the Duncan family is not always at Bedlay."
"Well, you're still here," she pointed out, hoping it wasn't insensitive to call attention to his status as a ghost. "Shouldn't that keep the darkness away? The man who sold the castle to Mallory wasn't a Duncan and yet the place hasn't fallen down around our heads."
Rumford stopped pacing at that, turning to look at Belle as though he'd just had an epiphany.
"You're right," he rasped. "Pardon me, Belle. I have much to consider."
"Wait, Rumford what are you…" but it was too late. He'd already disappeared from the room.
Belle sighed, leaning back in her chair and rubbing at her tired eyes. She'd spent hours staring at tiny hard to read script and her head was throbbing. She had no idea when she might see Rumford again, or what she could do in the meantime to help him, so she headed back to her room to call Mallory and give her an update on the grounds.
It was weird, not telling her friend and employer about Rumford. But she was fairly certain Mal would think she was insane. It wasn't a conversation she felt the need to have. When Mal asked her if she'd found any more information on the ghost, she simply said she hadn't had the time.
Belle didn't see Rumford the entirety of the following two days. Mrs. Potts called once again to let her know that the village's one snow plow was backed up clearing other roads and wouldn't be able to head up to the castle until the end of the week at the earliest.
She spent the first morning taking inventory of the furniture that had come with the property. After a solitary lunch, she headed up to the library hoping to find Rumford, but the room was empty.
She sat down in the armchair with a sigh. She missed him, oddly enough. How was it possible to miss someone she'd only spent two days with? Someone who wasn't even technically living?
But Rumford's presence had made being alone in the castle bearable. They may have only just met, but she felt connected to him somehow. He was a friend.
The rest of the day passed uneventfully and by the time she went to bed that night, she began to wonder if she really was delusional. It was easy to allay that fear when the man was right in front of her. Despite his incorporeal form, he felt real and solid. His gentle brogue washed over her and she knew she wasn't imagining him. But as soon as he was gone, it was hard to remember how real he felt.
She wrapped herself up in her blankets, falling into a fitful sleep, one plagued with dreams of heat and flames and she woke up shaking and sweating. She hoped the snowplow would make it through today. She wasn't sure she could handle another day in the castle completely on her own.
By the time Rumford showed himself again, it was only a few days until Christmas and four days since the snows had trapped her alone in the castle.
She'd made her way down to the kitchen, book in hand, for afternoon tea only to find him stretched out in a chair before the fire. The same way she'd seen him the morning after their first meeting.
"Where the hell have you been?" she demanded. If he'd been solid she would have thrown something at him, but as it was her book would probably sail straight through his head and land in the fireplace behind him.
"I needed to think," he said quietly, his face impassive.
"About what?" she asked. She was caught somewhere between relief at seeing him again and anger that he had abandoned her for so long.
"Something you said the other day in the library," he clarified. "It triggered a memory. Something I haven't thought of in a long time."
"And?"
"I know what I have to do now."
"Well what is it?" she cried impatiently. "What is it you're not telling me?"
"The curse," he murmured, turning to gaze into the fire.
"A curse?" Belle was skeptical. Just how much supernatural stuff was she going to encounter here?
"Don't sound so cynical, dearie, you're talking to a ghost, remember?"
"How could I forget?" Belle said with a roll of her eyes. She took a calming breath before heading to the stovetop to make tea, waiting for him to explain.
"There was a dark curse placed on my family centuries ago," he continued softly. "When my great-great grandfather built this castle, he took the land it stands on by force. It was tended by a farmer and his family, and my sainted ancestor wanted it for himself. He killed the man, burned down his farm and had his widow accused of witchcraft. In those days, the country had been seized by paranoia and was apt to blame witches for just about anything from political strife to dying crops to plague. The poor woman didn't stand a chance and was burned at the stake.
"But the joke was on my ancestor," he continued. "Because the farmer's widow actually was a witch and she cursed my family. His blood would never leave these lands. His family would be bound to the dirt beneath their feet for all eternity. One must always be bound. When my great-grandfather died, he haunted this place until his son died after him and so on down to me. That's why I'm still here. That's why I can't move on."
"That's quite the tale," Belle said, pulling the kettle from the burner and placing it on the hob. "But it still doesn't explain the terrible things. You've been stuck here for one hundred years already."
"Aye," he agreed. "That bastard cousin of mine wasn't the blood of the original Lord Bedlay. The house passed out of his immediate descendants and I am cursed to spend my days a specter here."
"Because you died without an heir?" she reasoned.
Rumford looked sad at that, looking down at his slightly translucent hands clasped in his lap.
"My wee boy, Bailey," he said sadly. "Only seventeen when he passed. I couldn't have him trapped here."
"That's why you did it," Belle gasped, dropping the teacup she was holding. It hit the floor and rolled under the kitchen table, but she made no move to retrieve it. "You drowned yourself in the loch so Bailey wouldn't have to haunt this place. You took his place."
He didn't say anything, just continued to stare at his hands.
"But you doomed yourself," she pointed out. "By the rules of the curse, without another heir you'll be stuck here forever."
"What should I have done?" he rasped out. "Forced my son to be trapped, neither living nor dead, never moving on, while I courted some chit, remarried, had another family without him? Forced to feel the presence of my child all around me, but never being able to truly be with him? Spirits are an abomination. We should not be here. To see him like that, it would have driven me mad."
He looked so pained, so sad, that Belle wished she could reach out and touch him. If he were solid she would. She would have taken his hand, hugged him if he'd allow it. But her new friend is only barely there, incorporeal and touching him is like trying to grasp fog.
"I'm sorry," she said, lacking anything else to say.
"It's not your fault," he said with a shake of his head. "I'd be in this position whether or not your employer purchased the place."
Belle supposed that was true. If the cousins who had inherited the house upon Rumford's death weren't descended from the original Lord Bedlay, Rum wouldn't be able to pass the curse on to them. When they died, they moved on. But Rumford had been trapped between worlds for a century, cursed to pay for the sins of his fathers.
And then, Belle had an epiphany.
"So the solution is simple," she said suddenly. "We have to find someone else who is an heir of the original Lord Bedlay and bring them here."
"I've told you," he said with a pained expression. "I'm it. I have no siblings, no nieces or nephews. My only child dead before he ever had children of his own. There's no one else. It's hopeless."
"Bastards," she said simply.
"I beg your pardon?"
"You noble types always had mistresses and illegitimate children," she pointed out, noting that Rumford looked slightly affronted. "You're telling me not one of your ancestors from 1580 on had a by-blow?"
"Perhaps," he said, sitting forward. "But how would we ever find them?"
"Someone must have known about them, possibly written something down," she said with a shrug. "Don't worry, Rumford, we'll find a way for you to move on. I promise."
And she meant it, she realized. She'd stay here as long as it took. She would help him. Because that's what friends did.
"Thank you, Belle," he said with a timid smile that made his ghostly face look almost boyish. He really was quite handsome. For one brief moment, Belle wondered what it might have been like if she'd met him when he was alive. She wondered if she'd have stood a chance. And then she pushed that thought far from her mind because developing feelings for a ghost you were attempting to help pass on to the next life was a one-way trip to heartbreak.
"It's my pleasure," she returned.
They spent the rest of the day back in the library, rifling through pages of old journals and historical accounts of the family. Rumford was racking his memory for any stories he may have heard during his lifetime of illegitimate family members.
"It's hard to remember my life," he said, after a long period of silence. "Death is so traumatic that it wipes a lot of your memories."
He didn't elaborate, and Belle didn't want to ask. It hurt to dwell on her friend's predicament, that he'd been trapped here so long that the details of his own life had faded. And truth be told, despite the fact that she was actively trying to help him move on, she didn't like to think about the fact that he was dead. He seemed so alive, so real, standing before her.
The closest she'd felt to someone in years, and he wasn't even technically real.
Belle stifled a yawn. It had grown late as they sat together in the library, heads bowed over their respective tomes. The sun had set hours ago and her eyes felt droopy with exhaustion. But Belle wasn't about to call attention to her tiredness. She had a limited time in Scotland and she didn't want to squander precious time when she could be helping Rumford.
She stifled another yawn, trying to mask it behind her hair, but Rumford's head popped up at the action.
"You're exhausted," he observed. "None of that. Off to bed with you."
"Excuse me?" she returned. "We've barely scratched the surface here."
"And the books will still be here tomorrow," he said with a slight grin. "I'm flattered you're so committed to helping me, but you're still very much alive and therefore need your sleep."
Belle had to concede that he was right. Staring at pages of tiny script as her eyes crossed wasn't doing them any favors.
"Fine," she sighed. "But only if you come with me."
Rumford's eyes widened comically at that and Belle briefly wondered if she'd overstepped her bounds. Just because she felt oddly close to him didn't mean he felt the same way about her. Maybe she was being highly improper.
But the first night they'd met he'd pointed out his lack of body when she'd accused him of watching her change. There wasn't much a body could get up to with no blood.
Rumford was still sitting – or hovering really – over one of the armchairs, eyes staring at her unblinkingly as his mouth parted slightly.
"I don't mean like that," Belle said with a roll of her eyes. "I just meant that we could talk a little more. I like your company and this castle is lonely at night."
He nodded shyly at that, standing from the chair and following her down to her second floor bedroom.
"I'm, uh, just going to get changed," she said haltingly, feeling suddenly nervous, as she never had before.
She grabbed her pajamas and slipped behind the wooden changing screen in the corner, tossing her clothes over the top of it before pulling on a nightgown and wrapping a sweater around her shoulders. She didn't know why she'd foregone her usual flannel pajamas. It certainly wasn't as though she were dressing for a ghost.
She came out from behind the screen to see Rumford standing awkwardly beside the bed, his hands clasped in front of him and his posture rigid.
He looked adorably flummoxed.
Belle climbed into the big four poster, pulling the covers up to her chin and reclining back against the pillows. All the while, Rumford merely watched her, his Adam's apple bobbing in the warm glow of the firelight.
She patted the bed next to her and Rumford swallowed again before lowering himself down onto the bed. It was an odd feeling. Belle almost expected the bed to jostle under his weight, to feel the solid presence of someone sitting beside her. But there was no movement of the mattress, just the pale form of her friend sitting beside her.
Belle rolled onto her side to face him and eventually he stretched out next to her.
"Do you sleep?" she asked, suddenly realizing she had no idea of the answer.
"Not really," he said cryptically. "I can turn my mind off, float if you will. I can pass years that way. But it's not sleep, it's just…nothing."
"Do you do that often?" she had to ask. "Turn your mind off I mean."
"Yes," he admitted. "I wouldn't have been able to stand a century of this monotony without that ability."
How sad of an existence must he have that oblivion is his best option? Belle stared into his haunted eyes and her heart broke for him.
"You said you had trouble remembering your life," she observed. "Has it faded with time or is it a consequence of…what you are?" She couldn't quite bring herself to say "ghost". Not with him lying beside her on the bed feeling so alive she thought she might be able to reach out and touch him.
"I didn't remember any of it, not the curse or my son," he said, shaking his head sadly. "No one ever speaks to me. No one has ever tried. The past one hundred years I've floated around this castle, appearing every few years to frighten someone and break up the monotony. Otherwise I was just here, sedate, the years flowing together until I didn't even realize how much time had passed."
"Rumford," she said sadly, but she had no words of comfort for him, for the hell he found himself in.
"Until you," he continued. "Something about your presence brought me back."
He reached out a hand, cupping her cheek. She could feel it, like a feather brush across her skin, light and insubstantial but undeniably there.
"I can feel you," she gasped.
"Well don't sound so surprised, dearie," he said with a smirk. "I can manipulate objects can't I? Why shouldn't I be able to touch you?"
As he said it, the feel of his hand grew firmer against her cheek, more substantial. If she closed her eyes and focused on it, she could almost pretend he was alive and solid. That he was just a man rather than the echo of one.
"Why me?" she asked. "How did I bring you back?"
Rumford shrugged, stroking her cheek lightly, almost absent-mindedly.
"I'm not sure. But from the moment you arrived here, something within me woke up."
Belle sat up slightly at that and Rumford's hand dropped from her cheek. She missed his touch immediately.
"So you did watch me," she said with an arched eyebrow.
Rumford looked sheepish, glancing off across the room.
"I felt your presence," he tried to explain. "It was like I was floating and then all of a sudden I was pulled back, drawn to you. I didn't want to frighten you away, so I stayed invisible and tried to figure out what it was about you that pulled at me."
"So the noises outside my room, that was you?"
Rumford shrugged again, looking slightly uncomfortable.
"I had to get your attention somehow."
"And the strange lights in the hallway upstairs?"
"I followed you up to the library," he admitted. "I liked that you were drawn there. It's always been my favorite room of the castle."
"So that's why Mrs. Potts wouldn't come in the day of the snow storm," Belle said, the woman's behavior suddenly making sense. "She must have sensed you somehow."
"She's always been sensitive to the spirit realm," he agreed. "It makes her particularly skittish around me."
"I can't think why," Belle said, stifling a yawn behind her hand. "You're lovely."
If it were possible, Belle thought he might have blushed at her words. As it was, his pale, colorless cheeks seemed to grow darker.
"I'm afraid you're a little sleep drunk, dearie," he deflected. But Belle just shook her head with a giggle.
"And you?" he asked, fingering one of her curls so it brushed against her cheek lightly. "What drew you halfway around the world at Christmas?"
Belle shrugged. When Mrs. Potts had asked the same question, it had seemed vaguely intrusive. But when Rumford asked, it felt like he was actually concerned.
"I was lonely," she said simply. "It seemed like a better option to be alone somewhere new and exciting than to be alone at home."
"Why are you so lonely?"
"My father's not well," she explained. "He drinks ever since my mother died. He has cirrhosis of the liver and I was worried about him so I forced him into a rehabilitation center. He hasn't really forgiven me for that and he's the only family I have. I kind of drifted away from my college friends. They all have exciting lives and families. Meanwhile I'm just…me."
"You're more than enough," he said softly. And in that moment, Belle believed him. "For what it's worth, I'm glad you're here with me."
She smiled, blushing slightly at the intensity in his eyes.
Rumford opened his mouth as though he wanted to say something else, but thought better of it.
"I should let you get some sleep," he said instead.
"Wait," she called, before he could fade away from her again. "Will you stay? Please?"
Rumford smiled sadly, reaching out a hand to push a curl back from her forehead. It was such a gentle, natural thing, and Belle closed her eyes in pleasure at the sensation, like a breeze stirring against her hair.
"Whatever you wish," he said softly.
And with her spectral friend beside her, Belle fell into a dreamless sleep.
The next morning dawned bright, the sunlight cutting through the gap in the curtains and spilling across Belle's face.
She rolled over on her side and opened her eyes to find herself alone.
Sitting up, she rubbed at her eyes, trying to quell her disappointment. She couldn't really expect Rumford to stay by her side all night. It must be boring to watch another person sleep when you were denied the benefit of rest yourself.
She kicked her legs out from under the covers, swinging them over the side of the bed and shivering in the cold air before she noticed him, her ghost, sitting next to the fireplace with one of her many books in hand.
"You're still here," she said, surprised.
Rumford looked up from the book with a grin that made her knees feel slightly shaky. She blamed the cold.
"There's a lovely young woman in my bed. Where else would I be?"
Belle could feel herself blushing at his compliment, but his words struck her.
"Your bed?" she asked. "Was this your room?"
"Aye," he agreed. "Mrs. Potts put you in the master suite."
"Well then I apologize for imposing," she returned, walking toward the fire and rubbing her hands together in front of its warmth. She was sure she was a mess, rumpled and hair mussed from sleep. But Rumford was smiling at her as though she were something wonderful.
"It's no bother," he assured her. "You get much better use of it than I do."
She smiled at him and he smiled at her, and Belle was suddenly overcome with shyness. It felt as though their relationship, as it were, had changed somehow last night. They were more intimate now, despite nothing taking place. Nothing ever could take place she reminded herself.
But he'd been able to touch her.
Belle felt herself blush again and pushed that thought right out of her mind. But it was comforting to know that whatever pull she felt toward him, he felt it too. She wasn't alone.
"I quite like this Harry Potter," Rumford said suddenly, waving the book at her. "I've almost finished the book. It's terribly obvious that Professor Snape is the villain, though."
"Oh is it?" Belle smirked. "Well you just keep reading on that, then."
Suddenly Rumford's smile disappeared, the book dropping to the table next to the armchair.
"There's someone here," he said, a split second before a loud banging could be heard from the floor below them.
"I guess the snow plow finally made its way up here," Belle mused. "It's probably just some of the staff."
But Rumford shook his head.
"No, it's something else. Something strange," he said, fixing his eyes on her. "You need to answer it."
Without another word he faded out of view.
Belle darted behind her changing screen, pulling on jeans and a sweater and finger combing her tangled curls before rushing down the stairs. Another loud knock sounded against the solid front doors, and Belle struggled to pull one open only for her jaw to drop at the sight of the man on the castle's front steps.
"Good morning," he said in an eerily familiar Scottish brogue. "I'm looking for Isabelle French, might you be her?"
Belle just nodded dumbly. It was like someone had taken Rumford and filled him in. The man before her had the same pointed nose, same thin smile, same large eyes. But instead of being a pale, slightly translucent echo, he was solid. His eyes were a deep chocolate brown, his brown hair lightly streaked with grey near his temples, his cheeks pink with cold. He was flesh and blood and bone.
"My name is Tristan Gold," the man said. "I'm here on behalf of the Historic Scottish Register in Edinburgh."
Belle was so shocked at the man's appearance that she had trouble finding words.
"What?" she finally asked, and the man looked at her as though she were missing several vital brain cells.
"This castle is a listed historical site," he explained slowly. "As such any and all renovations done to the property are required to go through my client's office. This is a protected site, Miss French. You can't lift a paintbrush without my permission."
Belle shook her head. This was about the renovations to the castle. She'd spent the past few days so caught up with Rumford that she'd all but forgotten her original purpose in being in Scotland. She had been sent to Bedlay for specifically this purpose; to deal with lawyers and bureaucrats and concerned citizens alike. But this Mr. Gold had caught her off guard.
"Are you alright, Miss French?" he asked, his tone slightly annoyed.
"Fine," she replied. "You just look shockingly like someone I know."
"Lucky for him," Gold drawled.
Stepping back, Belle opened the door a little wider.
"Please come in, Mr. Gold," she said with the most pleasant smile she could muster. "You've come a long way from Edinburgh."
Gold followed her into the entry hall and Belle was suddenly at a loss as to what to do with him.
"Can I get you some tea? I'm afraid the staff is still down in the village. They haven't been able to get up here for the past few days with the snow. Yours is the first face I've seen in close to a week."
That wasn't strictly true, but Belle could hardly say she'd been keeping company with the historic castle's historic resident ghost.
"That's not necessary, Miss French," he said stiffly. "This isn't a social call."
"I bet you're fun at parties," she mumbled under her breath.
"I beg your pardon?"
"Nothing," she said quickly. "What exactly can I help you with?"
"As I said, I'm here to make sure you don't make any unnecessary changes to this castle."
"I fail to see what my employer plans to do with a property that she's legally purchased has to do with you," Belle said, crossing her arms against her chest.
"This might say otherwise."
Gold pulled something from the inside pocket of his jacket, holding forth a folded packet of paper.
"What's this?" Belle asked, taking the paper from his outstretched hand.
"That is an injunction," he said with a smirk. "I'm afraid there are some issues with the sale of this property. Namely that the selling party had no rights to this castle."
"What?" Belle gasped.
"It seems Mr. Whale was acting outside the terms of the entail when he sold Bedlay Castle."
Belle quickly unfolded the packet of paper, scanning through it.
"You see, by the terms of the entail, the property was to go to the closest living relative upon Lord Bedlay's death without an heir. That relative was then supposed to be a steward of the property, passing down the position from father to son. There is a stipulation that the castle cannot be sold, and if the steward can no longer perform his duties, it reverts to the possession of the state."
"So you're saying that my employer doesn't own this castle," Belle said, her heart thumping wildly in her chest. This was not a situation she'd foreseen.
"That's exactly what I'm saying," Mr. Gold returned smugly. "Enjoy your time here. I'll expect you out by the end of the week."
He might share a face with Rumford, but Tristan Gold had nothing else in common with her friend.
"Why are you doing this?" she demanded. "What does it matter to the Historic Scottish Register or whoever you claim to work for?"
"I'm merely attempting to preserve an important cultural landmark," he said. "I'm one of the good guys, Miss French."
The implication of that sentence was, of course, that Belle was the villain here. To be honest, she'd stopped caring about Mallory's luxury hotel. If she had to find another job when she made it back to New York, so be it. But Rumford was trapped here. If the castle passed into the hands of the state it would cease to be privately owned. It would be a museum, a tourist attraction. He'd be trapped forever.
Her quest to find an heir to Lord Bedlay had never seemed so urgent.
"I'm sure you'll want to contact your attorneys," Mr. Gold continued, heading for the front doors. "I'm staying in the village for the time being. You can contact me at the Bed and Breakfast if you have any questions."
And then he slipped out, down the gravel walk to where a Range Rover was waiting.
Belle wasn't sure who she was more nervous about breaking this new development to, Mallory or Rumford.
She bit the bullet and called Mallory first, explaining everything she'd learned that morning as quickly as possible. After all, Mal only had money on the line. Rumford had eternal torment.
"Fucking fuckers," Mal growled across the Skype connection. It was 3 in the morning New York time and her boss was less than pleased to be awoken with bad news. Her blonde curls were sticking up at odd angles, a silk bathrobe wrapped around her lithe form.
"What do you want me to do?" Belle asked miserably.
"Nothing," Mal said with a shake of her head. "Proceed as normal. I'm sending Regina there first thing in the morning."
"That's completely unnecessary," Belle cried. The last thing she wanted was Regina Mills sniffing around Bedlay. Mallory's chief legal council had always rubbed her the wrong way, her smile a little too fixed and a little too sharp to be real.
"Belle, you've done a good job so far, but I need an attorney on this," Mal said placatingly. "Regina will be there soon to sort through this Gold character."
Belle gave a huff. Time with Rumford, helping him sort through the past, would be increasingly difficult if Regina was also in residence.
"Do you have any good news?" Mal asked pointedly. "Any backstory on our ghost?"
Belle couldn't help the wistful smile that crossed her face at the mention of Rumford.
"I'll take that as a yes," Mal smirked. "What have you got?"
"Oh, well, he was the lord who owned the castle. He drowned himself after his only son was killed at the Battle of the Somme."
She tried to keep things as brief as possible. There was no way she was bringing up a curse, though she was certain Mallory would go gaga for it.
"Well that's kind of pathetic," Mal huffed. "No love story at all? I guess there's no good news then."
"I guess not," Belle said sadly.
She hung up her Skype call with Mal, who promised to call her later in the day with Regina's flight information.
"So that's why you've taken an interest in me," a voice said from behind her back.
Belle whipped around to see Rumford standing in the doorway of her room.
"Rum, it's not what…"
"You want to use me for tourism," he accused. "Getting all the information you can, seeking out the monster's weaknesses."
"No!" she cried. "I told Mallory about the castle being haunted before I ever met you. She's been hounding the subject ever since!"
But Rumford wasn't listening to her. He was shaking his head looking equal parts saddened and angry.
"For a moment, I'd thought…" he trailed off. "It doesn't matter."
Then with a slight shimmer of the air, he was gone.
"Rumford!" Belle called, rushing toward the doorway he'd so recently vacated. "Come back here, right now!"
There was no crackle of electricity, no subconscious awareness of his presence. Wherever he was, he wasn't nearby.
"Fine, you stubborn ass," she called out to the room at large even though he probably couldn't hear her. "I'll just sort this all out on my own shall I?"
Never mind that there was every chance the heir they'd been looking for had just been plopped in their very laps. The resemblance between Rumford and Mr. Gold was too striking to be coincidence. He had to be related somehow.
The problem now was figuring out how to prove it. And, more importantly, how to get Gold to stay at Bedlay so that Rumford could eventually be at rest.
Rumford had said that a member of the Duncan family must always be at Bedlay; that the Duncan blood could never leave this land. Perhaps if Mr. Gold were to move on to the property permanently, the curse would pass from Rumford.
Belle sighed, leaning her head against her hands. This was all speculation. She didn't even know if Gold was actually related to Lord Bedlay or not. She didn't know how the rules of a curse worked. It was all ridiculous, and if she'd told herself a week ago what she would be up to now, she'd never have believed it.
She trudged back up to the library, hoping to find something, anything, on its many shelves that would point to Tristan Gold being related to the original Lord Bedlay. It was a long shot, but for now it was all she had.
She spent the rest of the day entrenched in the library, books stacked up around her and head swimming with dates and names of people long since dead. Mrs. Potts had arrived shortly after Gold along with the rest of the staff and the castle was back in business.
It had been nice, in a way, when the castle belonged to just her and Rumford. But that was over for the time being. If she didn't figure something out soon, the castle would belong to the state, and she'd be kicked to the curb.
When her search of the library didn't yield any information on a Gold, she turned to information on the man himself. A quick Google search told her that Tristan Gold was a real estate attorney based out of Edinburgh. From what she could tell, it seemed his work for the Historic Scottish Register was pro bono. Otherwise his clients seemed like high-end developers like Mallory. It was strange, but perhaps he simply had a fondness for old buildings.
Belle bit her lip as she weighed her options. The way she saw it, she would have to go directly to the source. She needed to question Tristan Gold.