Chapter Forty-Four

The Way To Go Home

"Why, the crafty old fox…" Michael whistled down the telephone very early the next morning. "What did Wilton think he was playing at? And why did he saddle you with it all? I mean, he never breathed a word about being born Irish. Did Jennifer ever know?"

"Your guess is as good as mine," I replied wryly. "I know his sense of humour had an ironic and very dry twist. Now that I know he was born here, it explains a lot about his nature."

"Yeah…" I could hear the frown in Michael's tone. "Did you really have no idea he owned all of that stuff over in Ireland? I mean, a castle and a thousand acres would be a bit of a hard thing to hide. Jennifer won't be pleased when she finds out. You know how much of her father's life she missed out on when she was younger."

I shrugged. "No, Wilton never mentioned any of it. Not once. But then, it seems, there were many things he neglected to tell me. Maggie Flynn knew something of it. But I'm not about to ask her now. It would have been better if it had all stayed buried and forgotten. I still haven't decided if I'm going to tell Jennifer."

I hadn't breathed a word about my unexpected advancement to the peerage. I knew Michael would take great delight in ribbing me about it at every turn.

"Your choice, of course. So, now what?" Michael asked. "What are you going to do with it all? Sell up and come back to LA? Because we need you both back here, like yesterday. We're barely keeping up with all the work that's coming in. Kitt and Danny are doing their best, but they work in the field like me. We don't know how to drive a desk and don't plan on trying to learn."

The vast distance between us crackled over the telephone line as I pondered my reply. I could not, in all conscience, run out on my new obligations. Not without, at least, taking the time to go and see what I'd been saddled with.

I'd already spent some time talking through our options with Carolyn. Ever practical, my wife had asked if I had any thought to sell everything and make a clean break. I could see her inner conflict in her eyes. She too was torn.

But I knew she was getting homesick, and we also had Kat's health to consider. It would be better if we all flew home. But the obligation Wilton had left me with, still niggled.

"I honestly have no idea," I'd replied to her with a sigh. "We will have to go and see it all first. My mind is still reeling with everything that happened last night."

"Yes, of course…" Carolyn had sighed. "I'm sorry. I know you'll work it all out to suit everyone." She shook her head. "But I do miss Montecito and the comforts of our home."

"I know…" I kissed her temple. "Me, too…"

She'd hugged me then, and left me to my phone call to LA. She went downstairs to enjoy an early breakfast with Edward and Kat. We had another two days ahead of us at Miss O'Flaherty's bookshop.

Being late for her opening time was another of that autocratic lady's cardinal sins. One she did not tolerate in any of her authors. She'd made that quite clear on our first day in her shop.

I smiled ruefully as I shook my head. "We'll get back as soon as we can," I reassured Michael. "It'll take another week or two to settle things here, anyway. We're driving down to Cork in two days. Then we will travel back up to Wicklow and see exactly what it is that I've inherited. Then I'll let you know our plans."

"Yeah, well…" Michael mused. "As long as you don't come back here as some kind of fancy Irish earl, or something worse. Like a right royal pain in the butt. There'd be no living with you then, if you got some kind of crazy title to go along with your castle."

He chuckled. "Lord Devon Miles…" His deeply amused laughter echoed down the line. "Lord! We'd have to put all our charges up for a start!"

I grimaced. "I'm not expecting much. But I'll telephone you again the moment we know anything more," I replied quickly, as I deftly skirted his twisted sense of humour. "Look, I've got to go, or I'll be late. We'll get back as soon as we can. Take care. Goodbye…" I hung up before he could think of anything more ribald to say about the unexpected twist in my life.

※※※※※

A week later:

"I thought Mr Browne said this place only had ten bedrooms…" Kat commented in a wondering tone as we all got out of our hired car.

"Yes, he did…" Edward nodded as he took her hand. "It seems he neglected to inform us about all the rest of the castle…" He whistled low and with awe.

"It truly is impressive…" I marvelled as I pushed my fingers through Devon's.

He stood with us as we all stared up at the sprawling, multi-storied grey stone castle that had greeted us the moment we turned the last bend in the long, winding driveway. The castle dominated the far end of a wide avenue lined with tall, narrow Italian cypress trees that moved their tops gently in the late afternoon breeze. It did appear as if the whole place had just stepped out of a storybook or from an ancient fable.

The tall central part of the house gleamed in the unexpectedly warm sunshine. It looked more like a castle, with its crenelations along the edges of the lofty roofline. I could envisage archers sheltered there as they fired arrows down onto any unwanted intruders or invaders. I did feel as if we were intruding into its peaceful majesty and splendid isolation as it sat comfortably among the huge gardens and sprawling lawns that surrounded it.

Then, on either side of the main part, ran a long, double-storied wing that was crowned with multiple chimneys. They balanced everything into an elegant whole that did take our breath away.

Kat put a hand to the swell of her abdomen. "I'm getting an ache in my neck just by trying to look at it all."

"The heating bill alone must cost a fortune…" my ever-practical son commented.

"And just who is going to clean all of those windows?" Kat wanted to know.

She turned back to the sweeping views behind us. "Not to mention the size of the gardens as we drove up..." She shook her head. "I would need an army of men to keep it all under control."

"I don't wish to think of how far you would have to walk just to find your breakfast," I added ruefully, studying the sprawling nature of the place.

But the bemused banter did a lot to calm the butterflies that whirled around in my stomach. I could feel Devon's tension through my clasp on his fingers. I sensed he had the same feeling of disconnection.

"It will be all right," I said quietly. "We don't have to stay. We can just look around and then leave."

"Yes…" He nodded absently. "We don't have to stay…" He shook his head. "But first, we'd better go inside. I did telephone them this morning to say we would be arriving today."

Just then, one half of the massive, nail-studded, front door opened, and a tall woman dressed in black walked out to stand at the top of a flight of stone steps. "Welcome to Dúnrowan…" She frowned down at us.

Again, that feeling of being an intruder into a closeted world feathered up and down my spine. I took an involuntary step closer to Devon and tightened my grip further on his hand.

"I'll bid you a good afternoon, despite the lateness of the hour, Lord Rathmore," the woman continued, dropping a quick curtsy. "We've been expecting you well before these past few hours now. I'm Mrs Lacey. Mr Browne informed me of your coming to visit us."

There was a soft rebuke in her brisk Irish voice as she turned to indicate the interior of the house with a sweep of her raised hand. "If you and your family would care to come inside. I'll be able to introduce you to the rest of the staff."

"Is it too late to change our minds and make a run for it?" Edward asked wryly, in a quiet aside as we all did as we were asked and walked up the stone front steps together.

※※※※※

Five days later:

"Can you think of any reason why Wilton Knight would wish to keep all of this from you?" I asked Devon, as I looked around the opulence of the enormous suite of rooms he now shared with mum, as the new master of the house. "And from his daughter."

"There is the question." My father shrugged as he adjusted the set of his bow tie.

Mrs Lacey had informed us on our first day that it was expected at Dúnrowan that we always dressed formally for dinner every night. None of us had dared to contradict her.

Devon frowned. "Wilton never gave me any indication about any of it. I can only guess that somehow, he found out that the place where he was born was up for sale and he had the means to purchase it. Maybe he was laying some old ghosts."

He sighed as he surveyed himself in the full-length mirror. "It's just as well we brought all these clothes with us." He adjusted his cufflinks and turned away from his reflection. "How do I look?"

"Like the lord of the manor," I teased him, knowing both our hearts were not in such constant and stifling formality.

"Don't worry, son," he replied with a narrowed look as Mum walked into the room from the adjoining bathroom. "All of this will be yours, one day. And the title to go with it."

"We still haven't decided what we're going to do with it all," Mum said as she walked to the mirror to adjust the set of the triple string of pearls around her neck. "I mean, can either of you see yourselves living permanently in this setting?"

She turned to frown at all the antique furniture and brocade curtains. The four-poster bed was enormous. Everything we'd encountered in Dúnrowan was larger than life and incredibly grand. Even the dogs were huge and hairy wolfhounds.

It was from another time when flaunting your wealth was required. But the formality of it all was beginning to suffocate us.

I shook my head. "It's more like a five-star hotel than a home. I have to say it's all too rich for my blood. I wonder how many times Wilton actually visited the place."

I sighed. I longed for the simplicity of Gull Cottage and Kat's small seaside house where we still lived while we looked for somewhere bigger that we could both fall in love with. It needs be, a project that we could turn into a house that reflected our personalities. A rambling house of this size was certainly not it.

"Kat has asked Mrs Lacey for a tray to be brought up to her room," I added. "She wants to have an early night after another long day. She spent too much time outside with the gardeners. She's exhausted."

I had to ask. "Do you think your Wilton is playing some great cosmic joke on you two with all of this?"

Devon gave a short laugh full of derision as he extended his arm for Mum to take. "Oh, I don't think, I know," he said decisively. "Wilton had a very uncanny knack of not being around when you most needed him to be. Especially in his later years, when he was totally focussed on the only thing that truly mattered to him. Perfecting his dream for Kitt and Michael to be a one man, one car crusade against evil. I'm only sorry he didn't live to see it come to pass as he had envisioned."

He opened the bedroom door for me to pass through ahead of them. "But now, I'm very sure he's up there somewhere, with his late son, Garthe, laughing his head off and enjoying himself hugely. I can't blame him."

Mum hugged his arm. "You still miss him, don't you? I'm only sorry I never got to meet him."

Devon nodded. "Wilton Knight was one-of-a-kind. Men like him do not exist anymore. He made life conform to his rules. The only thing he couldn't order was his own death. But he made his own kind of peace with it and that was enough for him. He's buried back at FLAG headquarters, up on a hill under the stand of oak trees. He still looks down on everything he created."

"He must have been one hell of a man…" I shook my head as we walked down the long corridor toward the grand staircase that gave access to the ground floor and the formal dining room that I was beginning to heartily detest.

I wondered how soon it would be before we could all be released and return to what we knew. I was aware that Kat was not in favour of our staying much longer in this elaborately gilded cage.

※※※※※

I stood in the deep window embrace of our bedroom with the curtains pulled closed behind me. Even though it was gone midnight, and I was tired, I found I couldn't sleep. I felt restless and ill at ease.

Everything about the castle, and its surroundings, was larger than life and still very hard to take in. Mrs Lacey had made sure we were taken on the grand tour and looked into every room and out-building. The last five days had been a whirl of activity and becoming the lady of the manor was beginning to drag at my tired senses. I doubted I would ever get used to the place.

After we'd left the dining room and returned to the master bedroom, Devon and I had talked at length about our plans for his unexpected inheritance. But we still came to no firm conclusions. It played on my mind and kept me from my rest.

Now my husband was asleep in the vast, snowy whiteness of the four-poster bed and I was restless and awake, staring out at the moonlit view of gardens and hills in the distance. A soft night wind moved branches and made shapes that could be taken for a glimpse of ethereal human forms. Although we had seen and heard nothing remotely untoward about the place, I could quite believe the tales about it could be haunted by restless spirits. There was that quality of timelessness about it all as if past owners had never truly left.

More than once a slight breeze had brushed across the back of my neck, making me jump and turn to look. Of course, there was nothing there. But the impression of unseen eyes observing us, remained.

"We've been away from home for too long now…." I sighed as I rested my forehead against the pane of cold glass.

I needed the comfort and simplicity of Gull Cottage and the world I knew. Ireland was very beautiful, and everyone had been very kind to us, but my feet itched to return to Montecito. I missed everyone in our small family and all their doings.

Kat and I had done a great deal of work in the attic, clearing, cleaning and sorting. But there was still more to do and, Sean, my editor had not let up on his ideas for more novels about Captain Greig and his romantic adventures at sea. He was impatient to begin.

I stared down at the gardens below and shook my head. I was so entranced by the moonlit view, I had no sense that Devon had risen from the bed and had looked for me, until the curtains parted, and his arms came around me from behind. I gasped at the sudden, warm contact of his front against my back through the silk of my nightgown.

He pulled me back into him and nuzzled my neck. "You're cold. You can't sleep?"

"No…" I sighed long and low as I nestled back into his solid warmth. "I keep thinking about what Mr Browne said about the castle being haunted by a restless spirit. He implied that the entity had set fire to the house out of spite."

I shook my head. "Or out of loneliness…"

"Well…" Devon lifted one hand to stoke his fingers across the base of my neck. "We're no experts on the supernatural, despite the fact we share a house with a pair of ghosts. Daniel and Emma would be the ones to ask but they're five thousand miles away. We can't exactly telephone them to get their advice." His soft chuckle echoed through me.

"You're right, of course…" I blew a discontented sigh. "I just wish…"

"Ah, wishes…" Devon moved his hands to my waist and turned me to him, as he drew me from the curtained alcove and back into the room.

"I thought we'd already agreed they can be the most damnably inconvenient things at times…" He leaned down to kiss me as the deeply fringed brocade fell closed behind me, shutting out the view of the moonlit gardens.

"I can see you're unhappy…" he said softly, drawing me back into his embrace. "I know all of this is a very large shock and will take some getting used to. But are you willing to give it a try?"

"I thought I was…" I replied honestly, staring at the generous curve of his mouth. "But now that we've been here for a few days…"

I shook my head. "It is as Edward said. More like a five-star hotel, than a home. My heart just isn't in it. We can't live here, like this. Not without making some very big changes."

I shifted my shoulders in apology. "I'm sorry. I know this is now all yours and we should stay. But I do miss our home in Montecito. This place could never be a home. It's just too big and too overwhelming."

"Yes…" Devon breathed against my lips as he bent down to kiss me. "I got the same feeling when we were down at dinner. We were all too stiff and formal. I've been feeling like a prisoner in that blasted dinner suit."

"Exactly!" I jumped on the idea. "None of this is us. We can't be ourselves. We'd always be on show. People would have expectations we couldn't meet."

I gripped his shoulders. "I mean, the place would be all right for the occasional holiday, and it would be magical to spend a Christmas here when the grandchildren are older. And I can certainly use it as the backdrop for my next Edward Grainger novel. But to live here, full time…" A deep shiver passed through me.

"Were you just touched by a ghost?" Devon whispered softly as he felt the tremor in my limbs. "But if we decide not to stay, then Wilton's will dictates that we must sell everything. As always with him, it was all or nothing. He never lived his life by half measures."

"Yes, about that…" I drew close to him, sliding my hands from his shoulders to his waist and then below. "I have an idea I've been thinking about. You don't have to sell a thing. You didn't see poor Mr Browne's face when you signed his paperwork. He looked as if he was losing a cherished part of himself."

I caressed the firm shape of his behind with my hands. "He looked so sad and upset to be giving the place away to strangers. He said he and his family enjoyed many happy times here. That his wife was born on the estate, just as Wilton was. That's why he loves it."

"What are you getting at?" Devon tangled the soft silk of my nightgown between his fingers.

"Mr Browne could never afford to buy the whole estate from you. But, from what we've seen so far, he's proven himself to be a very effective manager. Mrs Lacey speaks highly of him. And he said his wife and children love coming here. What could be more perfect? He can stay on here and we can go home."

I teased at him as he caressed my hips. "Why not allow him and his family to continue in that role and that will allow us to return to LA. Let us get back to who we truly are. Not those four unhappy-looking people trying to make conversation down there in that huge dining room."

Devon stared down at me. I could see his sharp mind working overtime on the idea. It was quite wonderful and yet so very simple. I marvelled that we didn't think of it before. We would only be going back to the status quo.

"Of course, since you will still own the estate, you'll continue as Lord Rathmore. Just as Wilton Knight did," I said then, with a small smile of relief. "You will become as he was, a long-distance owner."

"I don't care about the title," Devon countered, as he frowned over my idea.

"But my being a lady will look very good on the front of my novels," I teased as I played my fingers across his hips. "And I do like making love with the real-life lord…" I felt a flood of relief that he did not deny my idea.

"My lady…" Devon breathed against the skin of my neck. "You drive a very hard bargain…"

"My lord…" I replied gratefully, knowing I had won the argument.

※※※※※

"You're offering to pay me to take care of the whole estate for you?" Browne gasped. "As a permanent, live-in position for me and my family? Oh, my lord…"

"I can't think of anyone better." I smiled as I listened to the man's incredulous tone whisper down the telephone line. "I'm afraid this castle is not really for us. But would you be interested? Carolyn thought you would."

I frowned. "And please, call me Devon. My lord is far too formal."

"Thank you, my lord… I mean, Devon."

"Is that a yes to my proposal?" I continued. "Or do you need some time to think about it. Discuss it with your wife."

"Well, no. I… I never looked for such a wonderful promotion. For you to place such trust in me. That is to say, I would be very honoured, my… um, Devon. I know my Bernadette will be over the moon. She loves it there."

"Very well." I sighed with relief as I looked out the window of our bedroom. "Then we'll be leaving the castle and driving back up to Dublin the day after tomorrow. Let's meet for lunch in that same hotel we stayed in before we fly out to LA the next day. We can deal with all the details then and sign the paperwork."

"I'll look forward to it, Sir…" Browne breathed gratefully. "And thank you. You have no idea how much this means to me. To all of us."

"Oh, I think I have a fair idea…" I smiled. "I'll give you my contact details if you ever need me for anything. Please do not hesitate to ask. Goodbye."

"Goodbye and thank you again…" Browne stammered as I hung up the receiver.

I turned to see Carolyn smiling at me. She was seated on the side of the vast fourposter bed. Her look of relief was almost palpable.

She shook her head. "Now all we have to do is pack and tell Mrs Lacey we're not staying."

I waved a dismissive hand. "Piece of cake. I really do think she would prefer to have Mr Browne running the place rather than her lord of the manor. I don't think she likes Americans."

"I'll make it up to you…" Carolyn promised as she pulled me against her and kissed me. I couldn't wait for the day after tomorrow to arrive.

※※※※※

The steering wheel of our jeep ran smoothly through my hands as I turned up the driveway of Gull Cottage. I don't think I had been more grateful to see our home than in that moment. Everything looked so familiar and comforting.

I glanced at Carolyn, who was asleep in the passenger seat with her head back against the rest behind her. Edward was cradling a sleeping Kat in the back seat. Our eyes met in the rear-view mirror. He smiled at me, and I could see the depth of gratitude in his eyes.

"No place like home, right?" I asked softly, as Carolyn stirred awake.

"No, there is not…" Edward nodded. "Here is the place where we truly know who we are. Long may it last."

"Yes…" I agreed softly, as I opened my door and got out.

I stood and stretched my arms to the sky with a long sigh. I almost didn't hear the sharp tapping of urgent high heels coming up the driveway behind us.

"We've got company," Edward remarked as he helped Kat get down from the Jeep. "It's Susan Collins, the estate agent you put us in touch with. You remember? The woman who sold you this house. She's been looking for a home for us."

"Good afternoon. I'm so glad you're back," Susan commented as she hurried up to us. "I've been waiting to see you. But your maid said you were away overseas, and she didn't know when you would be back."

"Good afternoon. How lovely to see you again. We've just got back." Carolyn shook hands with her. "What can we do for you?"

"Well…" The young woman's eyes sparkled. "Do I have news for you." She smiled happily at Edward and Kat as she held up her notebook. "I've found you the most perfect house. It's only just come on the market. I can't wait to show it to you two."

She turned and beckoned us to follow her lead. Bemused by the unexpected turn of events, we all obediently returned down the driveway.

※※※※※