Lacybourne Manor

Chapter Thirteen Realisation

Colin Morgan had made up his mind about Sibyl Godwin.

And when Colin made up his mind, that was that.

For the last two weeks, she resolutely kept herself guarded and distant from him.

She was not wheedling her way into his life. She was not using her rather considerable feminine wiles to force some avowal of feeling from him. She made no demands, never dissolved in tears, didn’t ask to go back to Lacybourne and never mentioned Beatrice or Royce.

She had her own life, her own interests, her own business and a job somewhere for which she obviously felt a great deal of passion.

She was not, he decided, a scheming bitch like all the other women of his acquaintance.

She was just… Sibyl.

Colin had no idea why she needed fifty thousand pounds but he knew she had not spent it on herself.

She had not bought a new car (which she definitely needed, how she could lecture him on fuel economy and drive her petrol-guzzling wreck, he could not fathom, though she referred to her MG as “recycling”).

She was not surrounded by bags of new clothes. She didn’t wear expensive jewels. She always dressed well (albeit often endearingly bohemian) but she clearly did not have expensive tastes.

She didn’t drink too much and he’d spent enough time with her to know she didn’t take drugs. She was a resolute vegetarian and the first morning she’d presented him with a breakfast bowl filled with a hideous concoction of organic Wheatabix mixed with yogurt, honey and strawberries, he’d known she was likely not the type to start drinking or taking drugs.

Her home was well-presented, well-kept and sound and she needed nothing to fill it and did nothing to it. He’d seen an open credit card statement and utility bill and shamelessly looked at them, both were paid up fully and current.

It seemed her only extravagance was that she always kept expensive fresh flowers on her dining room table this, he thought (correctly) was an unconscious show of love to her father, but as lovely as they were, she was not spending fifty thousand pounds on them.

She was definitely fit and energetic, except in the mornings when she was quite hilariously moody, and he couldn’t see that she had any ailment which needed treatment.

He had no idea what she did with her days but he knew she worked somewhere, somewhere that meant a great deal to her. He’d discovered last night that she had her own small business and the fact that she was still working meant she hadn’t taken the money so she could quit and spend her days shopping or doing whatever it was that women who didn’t work did with their time.

It could be she’d taken the money to invest in the business, though it seemed a relatively small operation from what he could see, considering it was run out of a chalet in her back garden.

With a temper like hers, he could imagine she’d gotten herself into some kind of trouble with someone but he couldn’t imagine how or with whom.

Whatever she needed the money for, it was likely not for her.

This all made Colin believe there was a reason Sibyl Godwin had come into his life.

And, even if she was an excellent actress hiding a deceitful, larcenous heart, (although this option, day-to-day, was seeming less and less viable) she was still the vision of Beatrice Godwin, she was still extraordinary in bed, she was always surprising him (speaking French, looking, while eating chocolate mousse, (nearly) like she did when she reached orgasm) and he was still going to have her for as long as he wished no matter what it took.

Five months would not be enough; two weeks hadn’t done a thing in assuaging his lust for her. If anything, after two weeks, he wanted her more.

He didn’t question it and didn’t care to, all he knew was that if he wanted more, he’d get it.

And he wanted more.

He’d never met a woman like her, regardless of who she was and what she was. In reality, he knew there were few women who didn’t have deceitful, larcenous hearts so he might as well spend his time with one who was open about it.

Or at least open enough to ask for fifty thousand pounds.

Once.

Since then, she’d tried twice (after the second time he’d ordered her to stop doing it and, with her usual mutinous expression, she’d agreed) to pay the bill at a restaurant when he took her to dinner. She never hinted she wanted presents, nights out, to jet off on holiday or more money.

She also never asked about his work, his family, his life and did not share any information about herself.

She kept him at arm’s length with everything.

Except in bed.

There she was fiery and responsive and utterly magnificent.

He had lied to Sibyl only once, when he told her he didn’t remember anything about the episode in the chalet in her garden the night before. He did remember kissing her. Not the start but definitely the middle and obviously the end. It was like a kiss he’d never given a woman in his life, it was almost unbearably sexy, even going so far as being moving.

Whatever had made him kiss her like that, he could not imagine, but her reaction to it was strange.

Receiving a kiss like that would have been the perfect excuse for any woman to wheedle nearer to him but Sibyl seemed to want to hide it, hide her reaction to the kiss and hide the fact that it had happened at all. She set it aside as if it was unimportant, even though her behaviour said it was anything but.

She was more intent on taking care of him and apologising for answering his damn mobile than talking about the kiss, the episode or the rather upsetting fact that he’d apparently physically abused her (another advantage she did not seem willing to turn).

Colin was concerned he’d had a snatch of his life he didn’t remember but with his strange dreams and all that had happened between he and Sibyl, Colin was more interested in her reaction to the entire episode and especially that remarkable kiss.

And she had lied to him once, he knew, about her nightmare. She was a spectacularly bad liar another part of her puzzle that made the option of her being a scheming mercenary less feasible.

However, what she had told him was enough for him to realise that something was connecting them and it was much more than magnificent sex. He wasn’t ready to believe it was something else, a legend or myth brought to life in the form of a tall, curvaceous, annoyingly adorable American woman with leonine hair, but it was something.

Something was definitely not right about Sibyl Godwin. She was not what he expected her to be and, that morning, he was going to find out what, exactly, she was.

When he walked into his office the morning after the incident in the chalet he expected to see Robert Fitzwilliam, the investigator who he had sent on Sibyl’s trail. He’d set the meeting as his first order of business of the morning.

Colin did not expect to see Marian Byrne in his outer office, nor to see his secretary glaring at the older woman with barely concealed distrust.

“Mr. Morgan,” his secretary, Mandy, popped up the minute he entered the room and said, unnecessarily and unusually forcefully, “Mr. Fitzwilliam is here to see you.”

“Thank you Mandy, I can see that,” Colin replied but his eyes were on Mrs. Byrne who seemed quite content and smiled happily at him.

Before he could greet the older woman, Mandy continued, “And this woman, who, by the way, was here yesterday and said she was Neil’s mother but now says she’s not, is Marian Byrne and she says she needs to speak with you urgently. I explained you have a very busy morning but she said she would wait,” Mandy announced, her words coming out in an angry rush.

Colin raised his brows at the Neil comment, wondering why on earth Marian Byrne would pretend to be one of his employee’s mother.

She was still smiling and shrugged her shoulders nonchalantly, giving nothing away.

He’d decided he’d find out soon enough.

“I know Mrs. Byrne. I’ll see her after I speak with Mr. Fitzwilliam.” He turned his attention to the investigator and motioned to the door to his office, inviting, “Robert.” Then Colin walked passed Marian Byrne and nodded politely at her in greeting, saying, “Mrs. Byrne.”

She calmly returned the gesture.

Colin had just settled into his desk chair when the door opened and Mandy brought in a tray of coffee, her usual morning task. She set it on his desk, handed Colin his cup and gave one to Robert then left without a word.

Colin ignored her.

“Shall we start?” Colin invited, ready to hear some answers.

Robert took a sip and put his cup on Colin’s desk.

“Pretty basic stuff, you’ll be pleased to know,” he began, his words slightly surprised Colin and Colin watched him pull a thick file out of a briefcase.

“Sibyl Jezebel Godwin,” Robert started and something shifted inside Colin as Robert read out her full name, her real name, truly she was a Godwin. Some part of him never believed that, for some reason. To have it read to him so calmly felt like a blow.

Christ, did Beatrice Godwin’s descendant walk into Lacybourne three weeks ago?

Dear Christ, had she done so only to have him shout at her?

“Born to Albert Godwin, an Englishman.” Robert lifted his eyes to Colin and the other man’s were benign. They showed no signs that anything he was about to say would be life changing even though, with the two pieces of information he’d given Colin, they already were.

Sibyl’s father was English. She could be descended from Beatrice’s family.

Robert continued. “Her father was born in Wells. He teaches Medieval History and took his first post in Arizona where he met his wife, Marguerite. She was born Marguerite Wilhemina Den in Sedona, Arizona. Bit of a wild one, is Marguerite, an aging hippy, studies witchcraft, been arrested seven times, mostly during demonstrations for civil rights, women’s rights, anti-war, stuff like that. Nothing serious.”

Colin sat in stunned silence as the pieces of Sibyl’s puzzle flew together. Everything about her fit, the damned granola she always seemed to be eating, her lecture about fuel economy, her pets’ names. Not to mentions Sibyl’s bizarre muttered comments of “Oh my goddess” were because her mother had brought her up Wiccan.

Robert went on, “Albert and Marguerite had two children, both girls, yours, of course, Sibyl, and a younger daughter, Scarlett. They both were straight A students, honour role, Who’s Who, barely missed school, travelled a lot with their parents as the father went from university to university. Never showed any signs of trouble with all the moving around, as kids sometimes do. Though Scarlett is a bit of a wild one, like her mother. Sibyl seems less, er… prone to that, or at least in that way. Sibyl has two degrees, a Bachelor of Arts in languages and another in Social Work. Scarlett is finishing up the final months of a neurology residency.”

Robert kept talking and Colin felt his gut clench painfully as the information flowed at him, something about Customs and Immigration, something else about a domestic abuse charity and something alarming about an animal shelter.

Sibyl owned Brightrose Cottage outright, deeded over to her by her parents upon her move to England over a year ago.

She had only had three boyfriends that Robert could find, a fact Colin could hardly believe.

She had close relationships with family and friends, a fact Colin definitely believed.

She currently worked part-time at a community centre on a deprived council estate in Weston-super-Mare (which must be the source of “the girls” who needed her).

Robert only imparted one small piece of information to Colin that he already knew. Sibyl ran a small, but rather lucrative, business on the side making bath salts and shampoo. It would have been very lucrative if she didn’t divide forty percent of her profits between Amnesty International and a small, local animal shelter that took in abused cats that couldn’t be re-homed.

“From what I heard, they love her at the Centre and she spends more time there then she gets paid for. Pretty tight with the family that runs the place as volunteers, a Kyle and Tina and especially their daughter Jemma. There was a little bit of trouble a few weeks ago but you saw to that, obviously,” Robert finished and nodded at Colin, with what, Colin thought, was a strange gesture of respect.

Colin stared at him. He had no idea what the man was talking about. He hadn’t even known Sibyl worked at a community centre.

Therefore, he asked, “Sorry?”

“The minibus. Your girl was making some waves about the local minibus company the council had contracted with to transport the pensioners. Some issue with a blind lady who was living in squalor, your girl found out about it, cleaned up the woman’s house and set up a rota to look after her. She raised hell with Social Services that the driver didn’t report it. They couldn’t do a thing and your girl was furious. She lost her nut with the minibus driver when she saw him. A few days later, during a delivery to the Day Centre, one of the pensioners fell out of the bus, broke a hip. Apparently this lady was a particular favourite of Sibyl’s and she took it hard. Then, out-of-the-blue, there was a convenient ‘anonymous’ donation, clearly from you, fifty thousand pounds. Bang, new minibus, enough to train one of the volunteers as a driver, insure the bus, well… I don’t have to tell you.”

Colin felt his heart squeeze painfully and he found he was having difficulty breathing but Fitzwilliam wasn’t done.

“Lucky she met you. Found herself a nice patron, you two make a striking couple if you don’t mind my saying. Of course, investigating her I had to watch you for awhile, you understand, since you spend so much time with her. Can’t say I blame you…”

Colin wasn’t listening to him, he was thinking of Sibyl, who she was and what she’d done.

Sibyl had sold her body for a minibus for old-age pensioners.

Not only that, she’d quit her job (before she could be fired) at the domestic violence charity because she’d been found sitting on the porch of a client training her father’s shotgun on an abuser who had dared to approach his estranged wife’s house in the middle of the night.

And what had Robert said about what she did to the people who brought in the dog who’d been burned by cigarette butts?

He didn’t want to think, couldn’t think, all he could remember was her staring at the money in the briefcase and saying, “Thank you,” like it was the answer to her prayers.

Clearly it was the answer to a prayer, a prayer for a bunch of old people to whom she was not related, who simply came to her Centre. People who were in the hands of a thoughtless driver who wasn’t responsible for them but should have had enough feeling to at least take note and some care, and didn’t.

So, Sibyl did.

“Christ,” he said under his breath.

“What’s that?” Robert asked him.

A memory came to Colin and his tight chest seized.

“What was the date of the accident with the woman who broke her hip?” Robert looked at him curiously and told him the date, a date Colin remembered very well. He remembered Sibyl talking earnestly to her friend Kyle, her body stiff and jerky as she walked back to her house, her mind consumed with something unpleasant.

The date he’d made her his whore.

“Christ,” he clipped viciously, shook his head and found when he looked down at his hands on his desk they were shaking.

He clenched them into fists.

This woman, his woman, walked into his home innocently for a tour and he’d treated her like a common criminal.

Then she’d sold her body to him to make a group of old people safe.

And he’d made her feel like a whore so she could do it.

Money was scarce in the voluntary sector, he knew that, his company received dozens of requests a week for donations and he, personally, was asked to become a benefactor on a regular basis.

It would likely take a small community centre on a deprived council estate years to raise the funds to buy a bus.

Sibyl had seen her chance and grabbed it.

“You should know you have two tails.” Robert was continuing. “The woman out there…” He jerked his head to the door of Colin’s office. “And I think someone else, though can’t get a lock on them. Both have been watching you and Miss Godwin pretty closely. Do you want me to find out why?”

Colin was reeling with the information he’d learned, the fact that Beatrice Godwin, reincarnated had finally walked into his life and he could barely process any more.

“Look into the other one,” he ordered distractedly. “I’ll talk to Mrs. Byrne and I’ll phone you if I need anything further.”

Robert put the file on his desk and stood. “Can I say, Mr. Morgan…?”

Colin was staring at the file, knowing Sibyl’s remarkable life was inside.

He opened it randomly somewhere in the middle. He saw a copy of a newspaper clipping announcing, “Local Girl Wins Volunteer of the Year Award.” A younger Sibyl was shown in the photograph, holding up a plaque and smiling at the camera with her dazzling smile.

“Mr. Morgan?”

Colin’s head came up sharply. “What is it?”

His voice was impatient. He had things to do.

He calculated the time.

Colin’s mother and sister were at Lacybourne now, meddling and needling him about the American woman named Godwin. A woman he had not expected, three weeks ago, that they would ever meet.

Now, he knew, they most definitely would considering they’d be grandmother and aunt to that woman’s children.

Robert continued. “I know it isn’t my place to say but your Sibyl, she’s a bit… well, she’s got her heart in the right place but sometimes…” He stopped and then repeated himself, obviously uncomfortable. “It isn’t my place but you should keep an eye on her. She gets herself into trouble sometimes. Well… a good bit of the time.”

Colin nodded distractedly. That, as well as many other things about Sibyl, was now stunningly clear.

“Please send Mrs. Byrne in on your way out,” Colin ordered.

Dismissed, Robert left and Colin sifted through the file on his desk, watching Sibyl’s life pass by. On the last page there was a picture of her with four young girls aged around ten or eleven. They were staring at her with rapt attention as if she was the centre of the universe and she was smiling at them, her arms in full gesture, almost like she was dancing.

They needed me, she’d said.

“Jesus,” he growled.

“Mr. Morgan?”

He looked at Mrs. Byrne who was walking into his office.

“Please have a seat, Mrs. Byrne,” Colin invited, firmly controlling his thoughts, all of which damned him to hell, and he closed the file carefully.

She was watching him but she sat in a chair opposite his desk.

“Before you tell me what’s so urgent you’re here first thing in the morning, could I ask you one question?” he enquired politely.

“Certainly, Mr. Morgan,” she replied agreeably.

“Your story, about Sibyl, you met her the night before she came to my home, is that true?”

She watched him for a moment and then she nodded. “I told you, I know you may not believe me –” she began.

“Oh, I believe you,” Colin said smoothly.

This announcement startled her but she recovered quickly.

“But the reason I’m here is to tell you what my part is in all of this,” Mrs. Byrne explained.

“All of what?”

“You, Sibyl and Royce and Beatrice Morgan,” she announced.

He did not show any reaction to this.

Colin had a great deal to do and did not have the patience to sit through this interview. Considering she was just a meddling National Trust volunteer who had very clumsily, not to mention with the addition of with unneeded mystery, instigated a meeting with him and an American woman who looked like the portrait of Beatrice Godwin, Colin lost interest in her.

“Do you know of Esmeralda Crane?” Mrs. Byrne asked.

That got his attention and his eyes focussed on her.

Of course he knew Esmeralda Crane. Anyone with any knowledge of the legend of Royce and Beatrice knew it was Esmeralda Crane, the local midwife rumoured to be a witch who discovered the bodies of the newlyweds. She was also rumoured to be the one who cast the spell on them, linking their souls for eternity.

He sat back in his chair and raised his eyebrows but did not respond.

She inclined her head. “I’m her great, great… let’s just say, many ‘greats’ granddaughter.”

Colin decided the old woman sitting across from him was clearly unbalanced.

“You are?” he asked out of politeness because he was not at all interested in her tale and was trying to figure out a way to get rid of her.

Quickly.

“Yes, Mr. Morgan. And I, like my mother and her mother and so on, back to Granny Esmeralda, am a witch.”

Yes, Colin decided, clearly unbalanced.

He lost his patience but held onto his good manners.

Barely.

“Mrs. Byrne –”

She interrupted him. “Did anything unusual happen to you yesterday, Mr. Morgan?”

Colin froze.

She was watching him knowingly. What she saw while regarding him answered her question.

“I was in your offices yesterday, as your secretary told you. I should apologise for what I did but I don’t think there were any unpleasant consequences. It has been vowed down the line of Granny Esmeralda to do whatever needs to be done to –”

“What were you doing in my offices yesterday, Mrs. Byrne?” Colin cut into her rambling.

She fiddled with the straps on her handbag and hedged, “It was for a good cause.” But when he leaned forward menacingly she rushed on, “I put a potion in your coffee.”

She couldn’t have surprised him more if she got up and danced a jig on his desk.

Then he realised what she was saying and the implications and he began to lose his temper.

His tone was low and even when he asked, “What kind of potion?”

“A magical potion to bring forward a past life, in your case the life of Royce Morgan,” she explained.

He stared at her in disbelief.

There was, he knew, no such thing as magic.

She carried on. “For a time, a brief time, Royce, through you, would be in this world again. Using your body to exist in this time, he would be you but he would be you as Royce.”

Colin felt his fury building as he stared at the woman and realisation dawned.

The kiss.

If this bizarre explanation was true then he had, as Royce, been in Sibyl’s small chalet in her back garden most likely kissing who he thought was Beatrice.

And Sibyl had kissed him back.

You weren’t yourself, Sibyl told him.

He wasn’t himself; he was Royce fucking Morgan, kissing Sibyl. Kissing Sibyl in a way that made tears come to her eyes.

Colin felt a searing jealousy tear through him even though he knew it was ridiculous, because it had been him but also, it had not.

Fury he could no longer contain made Colin slowly stand.

Mrs. Byrne watched him, her calm never leaving her and she stood as well.

“I had to do what I did,” she defended herself. “You and Sibyl did not have a very good start and things were not progressing very smoothly.”

His hands were clenched into fists but he held himself in check, though his voice was dangerous.

“Do not ever do that again, particularly, do not give such a…” he could barely make himself say it because he could barely believe it, “potion to Sibyl.”

“Of course not! I wouldn’t dream of it!” she cried, clearly affronted at the very thought.

“But you not only dreamt of it, you did it, to me,” he shot back.

“You’re a bit more difficult than Sibyl. She’s a sweet woman,” Mrs. Byrne replied calmly.

“I know that!”Colin thundered and, surprisingly in the face of his fury, Marian Byrne smiled.

“Well, finally. I thought you thought we were a couple of con artists. Hardly complimentary of myself but certainly not Sibyl…”

He stopped listening to her, sat back down in his chair and buried his head in his hands, resting his elbows on his desk.

This, although he didn’t know it, was a posture Mrs. Byrne was familiar with as she’d seen Sibyl do precisely the same thing.

His carefully controlled life had just turned over.

He was sleeping with a real life avenging (if somewhat misguided) angel, willing to raise shotguns at abusive husbands and sell her body for old people. This same angel was, apparently, the living reincarnation of the woman he, and his entire family, thought would magically enter his life at some point, not only to be his wife, but also to fulfil some longstanding legend of true love. He was right then sitting across from a “witch” who thought she was, and could even be, the descendent of the famous Esmeralda Crane. And she’d given him a magical potion that evidently worked, very well. He’d just decided to marry Sibyl, though he could not imagine, considering her spectacular temper, how she would react to all of this. And in the midst of that, how he’d convince her to bind herself to him in holy matrimony at the end of it, considering what he’d done to her.

Mrs. Byrne cut into his thoughts by asking, “Mr. Morgan, are you quite all right?”

His head came up with a jerk.

“Mrs. Byrne,” he starting, making a quick decision, “what are you doing for dinner next Tuesday evening?”

Colin had finally broken her steady calm and she blinked in surprise.

“I… I… don’t have any plans,” she stammered.

“Good, then you’ll be able to join my family, and Sibyl’s, at dinner at Lacybourne.”

She stared.

She smiled.

She accepted.

“I’d be delighted.”