Christmas at Draycott Abbey Read Online Free PDF

as the butler turned, climbing a marble stairway. “I can walk. My head hurts, but I’m feeling a little stronger.”
    “I wouldn’t hear of it. Ian was most specific. You are to rest. I think you’ll like this room. It is one of Lady Draycott’s favorites.”
    Clair’s breath caught as he nudged open a door with his foot.
    Blush pink curtains of thick velvet hung beside towering windows. Antique carpets glowed on warm mahogany floors. A fire flickered below a carved stone mantelpiece.
    “It’s beautiful.” Clair was relieved to see the phone on the lacquer desk near the window. Meanwhile, the pounding in her forehead was growing worse. “Do you have some aspirin, Marston? Then I think I can rest.”
    “I will bring you everything you need. I’m sure Ian will be back to check on you soon. He has gone outside but he didn’t want you to be disturbed.”
    “I see. I’ll be fine here. Thank you again, Marston.”
    As soon as the butler closed the door, she darted to the phone. The number she needed was burned into her memory. She dialed quickly and waited.
    The inspector Clair needed to contact was out. She left a message on his voice mail, telling him that she was at Draycott Abbey and she had important information for him.
    But she left no details, not in an unsecured voice mail. She could not risk turning the information over to the wrong hands. As she hung up the phone, Clair’s shoulders slumped.
    She wanted to be done with this responsibility. She wanted to forget these men she had watched for weeks. She told herself that she had done the best possible under the circumstances.
    She had been tracked and watched so long that she could not begin to accept that the nightmare was finally over. Curling up on the bed, she closed her eyes and tugged a blanket over her shoulders, lulled by the sound of the rain at the windows.
    She tried to believe that she would be safe here. Finally, after so many long weeks.
    After so many long centuries , a voice whispered…
    She closed her eyes and slid down into dreams.

     
    Marston spread another blanket over the woman’s motionless body and then stirred the fire. He had brought tea and soup, but she was already asleep.
    Her drawn face made him shake his head. But now she was safe. No harm would come to her at the abbey. After a final glance at the room, he closed the door softly and moved outside. His chair was already waiting in the corridor. He sank down, keeping guard just as Ian had asked.
    The butler had asked no questions, but he was perfectly aware of what kind of work Nicholas Draycott did. And if his old friend Izzy Teague was venturing to the abbey in a storm like this, it could only mean one thing.
    A job of of deadly importance.
    So Marston would wait and watch. He was no longer a young man, but he knew things about the abbey that few people did. The air seemed cold, heavy with memories. Glancing down the hall to the Long Gallery, he thought he saw a flicker of light and the sudden movement of the velvet curtains.
    Just a trick of his eyesight, an illusion of the shadows, Marston thought. Just another one of the abbey’s little tricks. He had often seen such odd movements in the Long Gallery, near Adrian Draycott’s imposing portrait.
    Over the years, the abbey butler had seen many strange things when the moon was high, and tonight some instinct whispered for him to keep all his senses alert. With grave eyes, he studied the closed doors of the silent corridor. Reaching down, he felt the reassuring outline of the heavy metal flask filled with steaming Earl Grey tea. It was a special blend made exclusively for the Draycott family, as it had been done for centuries, since the family first had tea holdings in Kashmir.
    Marston savored the bracing brew. But his real comfort came in the weight of the heavy metal flask. He was not too old to use it as a weapon should the need arise.
    The thought made him smile grimly as the wind snarled and rain hammered at the