Midnight Bayou

so rough in here. You got taste, cher. ” She poked her head in the bathroom, where workmen clanged and cursed. “Which is more than I can say for whoever did thisbathroom. That you there, Tripadoe? Your mama know you eat with that mouth?”
    She leaned on the doorjamb, spent a few minutes chatting with his plumbers. And Declan could stand back and just look at her.
    It was pathetic, he told himself, this puppy-dog crush he’d developed.
    And when she glanced at him over her shoulder, he felt the jolt right down to the soles of his feet.
    “Why don’t I show you the ballroom. It’s going to be the showcase.”
    “Sure, I’d like to see that.” But when they started out, she gestured toward the stairs. “What’s up there?”
    “More empty rooms. Storage, some of the servants’ quarters.”
    “Let’s have a look.”
    “It’s nothing special.” He made a grab for her hand, but she was already going up.
    “Can you get to the belvedere from here?” she asked. “I used to look over at that and imagine standing up there.”
    “It’s easier from the—don’t!”
    His sharp order had her hand freezing on the dull brass knob of the nursery. “What’s wrong? You got a woman chained in here? All your secrets locked inside here, cher ?”
    “No, it’s just . . .” He could feel the panic rising, burning the base of his throat. “There’s something wrong with that room.”
    “Something wrong with most of them,” she tossed back, and opened the door.
    He was right. It hit her immediately, that same throbbing sense of grief and loss and loneliness. She saw walls and floor and windows, dust and neglect. And felt as if her heart were breaking.
    Even as she started to speak, the cold swept in. She felt it blow over her skin like breath, pass through her hair like fingers.
    “It’s the center,” she declared, though she was far from sure what she meant, or how she knew. “Can you feel it? Can you?”
    He swayed in the doorway. Bearing down, he dug his fingers into the jamb. His fear was unreasonable, spearing like knives into bones. It was his house, he reminded himself grimly. His goddamn house. He took a step inside, then a second.
    The room spun. He heard a scream, saw Lena’s face, the alarm that leaped over it. He thought he saw her mouth move, form his name. Then his vision grayed, white spots dancing through the mist.
    “Declan. Here now, cher. Here, darling.”
    Someone was stroking his hair, his face. He felt lips brush over his. He opened his eyes to a blur, so simply closed them again.
    “No, you don’t.” She tapped his cheeks now with fingers that trembled lightly. He’d gone down like a tree under the ax, right after his face had drained of color and his eyes had rolled back white. “Open your eyes.”
    “What the hell happened?”
    “You fainted.”
    His eyes opened now, focused on her face. Mortification warred with a vague nausea. “Excuse me, men don’t faint. We do, on occasion, pass out or lose consciousness. But we do not faint.”
    The breath she let out was a shudder of relief. He may have cracked his head, she thought, but he’d come to with his wits about him. “I beg your pardon. You passed out. Cold. Hit the floor hard enough to bounce your head off it.” She leaned down again, brushed her lips over the raw scrape on his forehead. “You’re going to have a bruise, bébé . I couldn’t catch you. I guess if I had, you’d’ve taken us both down.”
    She had managed to roll him over, and now stroked her fingers over his pale cheeks. “You do a lot of passing out?”
    “Usually I have to drink myself into oblivion first, which I haven’t done since college. Look, at the risk of embarrassing myself twice in a matter of minutes, I really have to get the hell out of this room.”
    “Okay. All right. Can you stand? I don’t think I can haul you up, cher . You’re a pretty big guy.”
    “Yeah.” He got to his knees, tried to catch his breath, but it was clogging again. It felt like a semi had parked on his chest, and his heart was tripping to try to find a beat. He staggered up, stumbled.
    Lena wrapped an arm around his waist, took as much of his weight as she could manage. “One step, two steps. We’ll just get you downstairs so you can lie down.”
    “It’s okay. I’ll be okay.” His ears were ringing. The minute he got out of the room, he headed for the steps, then just sank down and put his head between his knees. “Jesus.”
    “There now,