“Can I help Miss Darling find her way back?”
“Do you want to?”
He hesitated, then, seeing that she noticed, hurried to answer. “Of course, it’s what she wants more than anything.”
Harper stared at him for another moment, then shook her head. “You can’t time travel without permission, so don’t think about it. That is, if you figure out how. You can’t time travel until you’ve been taught how to do it properly. Thoren Ashmore was lost to his twin daughters for over twenty years of their lives and ended up in a noose before he was rescued.”
“Who rescued him?” Gray asked.
She waved the question away. “That’s another story. Just remember not to fiddle with time. There’s punishment for it.”
Something in his chest thumped and rose to his throat. “Is that what happened to my mother?”
Harper closed her eyes and gritted her teeth, then with a sigh, “Yes,” she admitted. “Yes, Grayson—and before you ask, none of us knows where or when she is.”
“Was she running away? From me?”
Tears filled Harper’s loving eyes, and she began to shake her head when Gray was distracted by a tiny sound in his head.
Sir? Are you truly hearing me?
What?Whose was this cautious, curious, squeaky voice in his head?I think so. Who is this?
It’s Tabby. We were never introduced. Kitty, my grandmother, was once the head mouse here. She loved you very much.
Kitty.Gray remembered her and felt his belly sink to his feet. His friends were real, and he’d forgotten them. He’d left them.
I told the others you were back. No one believes me.
Gray slid his astonished gaze to Harper. “Do you hear this?”
She listened. “Hear what?”
“It’s Tabby,” he told her. “Her grandmother Kitty was a head mouse here. Harper, I can hear her speaking.
“The lady you search for is at the Gable home,”he repeated so Harper could follow along,“but she waited until the man left the room and then she said, ‘I can’t stay with him. I must go no matter how much of my heart is already lost.’”
Harper’s eyes opened wider when she cast him a stunned look. Gray wasn’t sure what surprised her so: that he was hearing a mouse speaking to him, or that Miss Darling’s heart was lost to Will Gable? It didn’t surprise him. Why wouldn’t she choose the victim over the killer? It sickened him that the one girl he opened to a bit, was thinking of Will Gable when she was with him.
“Grayson, what is it? Has she lost her heart to you already?”
He gave Harper a confused look. “To me?” No. She wasn’t speaking about him. Was she? But…she wasn’t staying. Whether she meant him or Gable, the point was she had to go. “What do I care who she meant?” he grumbled to Harper, then thanked Tabby for her news.
“Grayson, you’re pouting.”
“No, I’m not,” he said, rolling back into bed. “I want to dance.”
“You always want to dance when you’re feeling upset.” She came near and tucked his blanket under his neck when his teeth chattered. He pushed the blanket off and wiped the sweat off his brow. “The physician said to stay in bed, so no dancing tonight.”
How could she sound so calm when he felt as if he were losing his wits, his logic, his strength, someone else in his life?
“Grayson, dearest,” she said in a soft voice while she took the seat Sarah had pulled closer to the bed, “are you jealous of Miss Darling and Will Gable?”
He started to deny it, but what good would that do him? He needed to know what to do about it if he was jealous.
“Does thinking of them make you feel angry?” she pressed gently.
“If you must know, then yes, it makes me feel a bit angry. But that’s normal possessive behavior. It doesn’t mean anything.”