Page 36 of His to Keep
Winter arrives before I know it. As the temperature dips, frost creeps into the corners of the windows, dusting the branches of the trees outside. When not even cocooning myself in the blankets at night does anything to battle my shivers away, I’m forced to beg Father Aaron for warmer clothes. He said he would, though it’s obvious he’s still annoyed with me for running. Maybe he only agreed because he doesn’t want me to die of hypothermia before the ceremony. That would betragic.
I wake to fuzzy, warm pajamas, socks, cardigans, and knitted sweaters the following morning. Placed neatly at the foot of the bed, there’s a note beside them that reads:my angel.My stomach rolls. That he’d been in the room at some point during the night and maybe even watched me sleep.
Too cold to rid my stomach of what little food there is in it, I stop thinking and reluctantly pull the thickest sweater from the pile over my head. Next, the long socks that cover to just below my knees. Already, I feel warmer. Even Callum got new sweaters—black and gray ones, while mine remain lighter colors of whites and creams.
At dinnertime, already sensing a change in the air, Father Aaron reveals the weather forecaster warned snow is predicted to fall in the coming days. He’s to take John into town to stock up on essentials just as everybody else has been advised to do. While they’re gone, he wants Callum to bring up the coal and firewood from the basement and me to assist Penny in cleaning out all the fireplaces in the house.
“I assume you’re wondering why I’ve decided it’s time for you to get used to the rest of the house, Ava,” he says while we’re eating. A grin shapes his lips as he puts a meaty cutting of steak into his mouth. “I had new security installed, courtesy of a friend of mine. It’s now safe for you to get to know your surroundings. I hope it makes you happy to no longer be confined to one room.”
My first thought is I’m trapped, only to be distracted when he reaches over and covers his large hand over mine. My body freezes, and I try so hard not to look at Callum, who’s gone rigid beside me. While I know it shouldn’t, I marvel at his reaction. We haven’t kissed again since that night, even keeping a little distance from each other. But knowing why he’s so tense excites me. Makes my chest flutter despite hating the clamminess from Father Aaron’s hand on mine.
“You won’t be allowed outside until I believe you deserve it. I hadn’t wanted you to see the fence yet. You ruined the surprise.” Patting my hand, he finally removes it, and Callum looks away, stabbing his fork into a carrot. “A gift,” Father Aaron continues. “I know how you long to be outside, but I couldn’t risk you running. I know it will take you a while to understand that I’m trying to protect you from the outside. I hope one day you see that. For now, the house is free to explore.”
Slicing into his meat, I watch blood ooze from the morsel on his plate, hating him with all my being.Somegift.Nothing he’s doing is protecting anyone. The abuse he’s reigning down is destroying us. But I’ve learned now, and I know nodding my head is better than not. When I do, it pleases him, and I think maybe a part of me died the day I saw that fence. Perhaps I’ve always been meant to be compliant and weak. As if Gran had been preparing me for this life all along. The thought annoys me, and I vow that Father Aaron won’t destroy me. I’ll ruin him first. I just don’t know how yet.
After dinner ends, I begin what feels like a new chapter in this house. From what I can tell, the security is high-tech, with coded keypads on the doors. I imagine they’re alarmed, the windows too, and I know that means I truly am stuck in this house unless I somehow acquire the codes. But then the fence is another barrier I have to contend with.
After Father Aaron leaves with John to go into town, and Callum stalks off to do his jobs, I glumly follow Penny into the living room. It feels weird not going straight back to the room and being locked inside. Maybe a tiny part of me wishes Icouldgo back up there. At least I can shut the others out.
“We’ll clean this one first,” Penny says, pointing to a vast, unused fireplace that’s seen better days. “It connects to the pipes and heats the bedrooms.” Giving me an apron to cover my clothes with, she hands me a brush and shovel. “Brush up the ash and put it into the metal bucket. I’ll be back with water to clean. There’s a beautiful design beneath all this black soot, and it will please our Lord if we remove it.”
When she leaves, I set to work. Charred wood and dust make me cough as I remove the grate and brush ash onto the shovel before dumping it into the bucket. As I’m finishing brushing the last remnants, Penny returns with a bucket of water with suds. She hands me a cloth while she picks up the scrubbing brush.
“Wipe after me.” It’s the most authoritative I’ve ever heard her be, and it confuses me how she can go from crazy to this. How she can try and poison me with food and then burn my legs with hot soup. Isthisthe real her? A calm, calculating woman who maybe acts insane but really isn’t beneath it all.
After she scrubs an area, I wipe away the traces of black soot, seeing a swirly gray and black design beneath the dirt. And she’s right, it is a beautiful design, which is a surprise to me. That something pretty can be in this house at all. We work in silence for ten minutes, and I think back to the days after running. When I told Father Aaron that Penny had opened the door and told me to run, she wasn’t punished for it. Not in the way he usually does by beating her until she’s bruised and swollen. I’m not entirely sure he said anything to her, and part of me thinks it’s because of the fence.
I’m relieved my confession didn’t cause her harm, given what I know about her now. She’s been through an ordeal I can’t even begin to imagine. But still, a tiny voice of doubt in my head whispers that she planned it. To get me into trouble like John often does with Callum. I know she hates me. Her eyes don’t hide it. Every time she looks at me, hatred stares back. Maybe I’m a threat to her, I’m not sure. Being alone with her now is unsettling. Like if I were to turn my back for just a second, she’ll stab me.
“Penny?” Her hand ceases scrubbing, and she slowly looks up at me with wide eyes. It’s the first time I’ve ever addressed her. Spoken to her. I shouldn’t ask what I’m about to, but I must know. “Did you know about the fence when you told me to run?”
“Don’t talk to me, Satan whore,” she sneers. “You shouldn’t be here. Not you or—”
“Penny,” Callum’s voice sounds across the room, making us both jump. He’s back, arms full of firewood and a bag of coal at his feet. A wordless exchange happens between them both, and grumbling something beneath her breath, she turns away and continues scrubbing.
Making his way into the room, Callum dumps the wood into the crate next to the fireplace and then goes back for the coal. Once the heavy bag is heaved into the coal bucket, he says, “I’ll take Ava to clean the library’s fireplace. It’s started snowing.”
A library?
Nodding his head for me to follow, I put the cloth back into the bucket and rush after him, going down a different route of the house that I’ve never been to before.
“This place is deceiving,” I say with a shudder, soaking in everything we pass, coldness sweeping my shoulder blades from all the creepy, dark décor. No natural light filters in because of the shutters, and I wonder how different this place would look with them open. Instead, the occasional gloomy oil lantern on the wall lights the path. Does Father Aaron not like using electricity? “You wouldn’t think it was this big from the outside. Maybe that’s the point…”
Callum turns to glance over his shoulder at me. “The point?”
“Yes. It’s confusing and dark. Almost like it was designed to keep people hidden away. Forever lost to the world.”
“Poetic.” He makes a left turn. “Maybe we can find you a book of dark little poems?”
“Don’t tease. I doubt ourfavorableLord would entertain poetry in his house of doom—dark or not.”
“Wait until you see.” He opens a door and stands aside so I can go in first. The moment I step inside, my mouth drops open in surprise. Rows of floor-to-ceiling shelves are filled with books, so many of them, it’s like I’m floating in a dream. “It looks like the library room right out of Beauty and the Beast.”
“Beauty and the Beast?”
I turn to him, about to demand that he can’t be serious about not knowing what that is when I stop. He’s closed the door and is now leaning back against it. Reaching behind his back, he turns the lock. The click sounds, and my stomach tumbles. “You’ve…um…never heard of Beauty and the Beast?”
“No.” And he probably doesn’t care. He doesn’tlooklike he does. Trying to distract me from the wings soaring inside my stomach, I go over to one of the shelves and pull out a book at random. I flick through the pages, maybe to see if this isn’t my imagination and is indeed an actual book. It is, of course, and much to my surprise, it’s a romance. As if sensing my unspoken question, Callum reveals, “My great grandfather had this room specially made for his wife. My father doesn’t like to come in here.”