Free Twisted Tale of Stormy Gale by Christine Bell Page A

tiptoed up the stairs and approached the chamber where Devlin slept, I was at once relieved and heartsick to hear him snoring still, as if he hadn’t a care in the world. I wished I could have just woken him up, for even one minute. But I wouldn’t lie to him anymore. And I couldn’t tell him the truth. So there was absolutely nothing to say.
    Jesus, what kind of person am I? After all he went through for me. Could I dare to hope that he would just be satisfied to know that we were alive? That he would be able to move on and find happiness now? Maybe even a wife who would love him for his dogged determination and innate kindness. Or the way he smelled, all warm and manlike. Or the way his dimple flashed and his eyes lit up when he laughed. The tears that seemed to be my constant companion of late returned in a rush and I bit my hand to stifle a pitiful sob. Get on with it, you twit.
    I pulled the key from my bag and stuck it in the lock but didn’t turn it, leaving it sticking from the keyhole. Then I reached into the carpetbag one more time and pulled out the sketch of Gilly, tearing off a corner of the sheet and putting the drawing back in my bag. Grabbing a pencil from a nearby desk drawer, I wrote:
Devlin,
For the first time in thirteen years, I truly wish things were different. But they’re not. And still, I can’t leave without letting you know that Bacon and I have lived a wonderful life, with a gentle, loving man who treated us as his own. And you don’t have to worry about us anymore.
Forever,
Stormy
    I folded the note gently and laid it on the floor in front of the door, knowing that once Devlin woke up, he would find the key in the lock and use his ingenuity to free himself. He would find my letter, but not before I had a chance to get away.
    Then I grabbed my bag and walked out of the house, leaving Devlin behind.
    Again.

Chapter Six
    I had purposefully gotten a room close to Leister’s estate so that if a break-in and getaway was necessary, Bacon would be close by and we could make tracks fast. But as I walked the two miles back to the inn, I discovered that covering the relatively short distance still left me way too much time to think.
    I stopped and almost turned back at least a dozen times, only to continue walking because there was no point in going back. It would only delay the inevitable.
    I cared about Devlin a lot. That much was true. And to be honest, even that much was tough for me to swallow because I can count on two fingers how many people I’ve allowed myself to get close to in the last twenty years. Sure, he was gorgeous and funny and sexy and smart and great in bed. But more than that, he was a good man with a shiny, pure soul. If I could find a man like that in the twenty-first century, I’d chain him to my bed. But I couldn’t tell him about the TTM and I couldn’t tell him about time travel, or anything else for that matter. So he couldn’t come with me, and I couldn’t stay in 1800s. Not just because of air-conditioning and tartar-control toothpaste, but also because I needed to take care of Bacon. We made a pact a long time ago that we would never go back to stay, and I could never leave him, so that was that. Not that Bacon was the problem, really. Even if there was no Bacon, and I could stay, Devlin wasn’t the type of guy to let it go.
    “Hey Dev, listen, about all that stuff? The stuff that landed you in the loony bin for six months and ruined your life forever and destroyed your family? Just forget it. I am going to stay here with you and just plead the fifth about what went down that day, where I’ve been and what that machine is. You cool with that?”
    I almost cracked a smile, thinking about what his reaction would be to that. The urge was fleeting as I reminded myself that I would never see his reaction to that or anything else, ever again. My stomach pitched at that, and I would have given anything to click my heels and be home a moment later where I could sleep