Ergo the reason for the non-disclosure agreement, which was all the more important of the two contracts in my opinion. Nobody could know what I'd found here. Not yet and maybe not for a long time to come. The reason I was here, and the art I had to catalog was going to be on secret squirrel duty. As I read over the NDA further, it covered "any works of historic or artistic value discovered at the Donadea-Rothvale property, the location and contents of aforementioned works to be held in such confidence as to be secret, revealed only with permission from, and at such time of the owner's choosing, Mr. Ivan G. Everley, Lord Rothvale XIII." Further down in the agreement, there was also wordage which covered any private relationship I might undertake with him here or in London, "as exclusive between Gabrielle Hargreave and Ivan Everley, with knowledge of such relationship limited, for security purposes, to family only; friends on individual approval in advance by Ivan Everley."
There would be no contact whatsoever with the press. "No formal or informal interviews granted to an individual, an affiliated group, or any media organization without the prior approval by both parties." And my favorite bullet statement in the whole thing: "No sharing publicly or otherwise of any knowledge of governmental business of the United Kingdom which might be revealed incidentally due to proximity to cabinet minister, The Secretary of Culture, Olympics, Media and Sport, The Lord Rothvale." So, any government secrets I might overhear from Ivan had to go with me to my grave. Well, oh-kay then. Sounded about right for my trip to Isthisforrealsville with a layover at Thisisnotadrill along the way—just to make sure I got the message loud and clear. Good God.
Of course, absolutely no posting of images or statuses regarding our private relationship to our personal social media accounts. Pretty much anything going on between Ivan and me (professionally or privately) was not to be shared with anyone anywhere. I had no problem with the NDA. In fact, I appreciated every secretive word of it. Ivan was keeping his promise to me that nobody had to know about us. He was a man of his word and I liked that about him, among other things.
I sat back in the chair and looked up to study the room again. This beautiful, elegant suite in an old neo-Gothic manor house set in the remote coastal landscape of Northern Ireland was a literal jewel box.
And the paintings inside it were the jewels.
I was starting to feel sleepy after signing both agreements and leaving them on the desk for Mr. Finnegan to retrieve whenever he reappeared at some point. I think I was just mentally exhausted from all I'd had to take in over the past twenty-four hours. As I leaned back from the desk and yawned, rubbing the top of my head through my hair to soothe my tired, tired brain, I noticed some fancy leather books on a shelf inside the glass cabinet beside the desk. My mind started buzzing because they looked an awfully lot like diaries—the sort a lady from the 1800s would use for writing.
I wonder if they belonged to a certain lady who lived here a long time ago. A certain Lady Rothvale perhaps…
My hand was visibly shaking as I opened the door to the cabinet and took a closer look. There were five books all bound the same in red leather. I pulled out the first and held it under the light of the desk lamp to read the gold embossed lettering on the front.
Journal of Lady Imogene Rothvale
The remaining volumes were embossed with the same lettering through to the year 1816. Five years of Lady Rothvale nine's journals were here for me to read?
No effing way.
I opened the book and turned through random pages carefully since it was over two hundred years old and saw that each page was literally filled from top to bottom. No wasted space at all. There were a lot of words on these precious pages.
I couldn't read it now though—not without my glasses. I was too tired and too overwhelmed to start in on this discovery tonight, but it was exactly the kind of proof of provenance that would be invaluable if Lady Imogene had written down anything about Tristan Mallerton and the paintings her husband had commissioned in her journals. Almost as valuable as the art itself because her journals would validate the creation of the work in the absence of other recorded documentation of its existence.
I returned the volume carefully to its shelf, switched off the lamp and other lights in the sitting room, and headed into the bedroom to prepare myself for bed and some well-earned sleep.
Once I was under the covers of my sumptuous bed, I saw that I'd forgotten to close the drapes at the big picture window. It was late summer, so the night sky had a glow from the sun on the other side of the planet that didn't happen in California. The night sky here wasn't quite as dark as the southern US states would be, but I was used to it after four years of living in London. The nighttime landscape of Donadea was almost as stunning as the daytime one with the stars and the moon twinkling above the vastness.
I fell asleep while admiring the romantic view of the night sky shining through the picture window from my bed, glad that I hadn't drawn the drapes after all.
And wishing Ivan had returned already, because I had so much to share with him about what I'd discovered.
But I also wanted to tell him that I'd missed him while he'd been gone.
Even as sleepy as I was, I realized I hadn't longed for anyone in the way I was missing Ivan right now.
Never had I ever felt the way I was feeling about him.
Ivan was uniquely special in that way...for me.
Chapter 10
IVAN
I had every intention of leaving Gabrielle alone to sleep. I truly did. I'd been determined to just go to bed when I returned at nearly half-past eleven.
But shower first. I needed to wash away the day I'd had before sleeping was even possible for me. A day for which the first half had been the best I could remember in forever, and the second half had been utter and complete crap.
My mind was only on her while I was in getting clean. That she was still here at all was surprisingly remarkable. I hadn't been at all confident it would be the case. But Finnegan assured me she was settled in at her desk hard at work the old fashioned way—with a pen and paper. He told me the contracts had been delivered for her signature, and to him she'd seemed comfortable and content when he'd left her on her own after clearing away her dinner things. Which was rather unbelievable considering the situation I'd left her in. All afternoon I'd been imagining how she would've demanded a ride to the airport to put as much distance between herself and Donadea (and me) as quickly as possible.
But she didn't. There were no hysterics or pleas to be returned to London. At some point she'd calmly left the study and met the dogs, who fell in love with her immediately according to Finnegan. Then she came back upstairs with them where he'd given her a tour of her new rooms. No surprise about the dogs falling in love with her. Didn't everyone? She had to have seen what I did to that drone though. She was the one to spot it first. Recalling the look on her face when she screamed made me cringe even now. She'd been so perfectly submissive throughout the whole scene in my study—which was so fucking good—until it all went balls up in the worst possible way right at the end. If a single image of us ever saw the light of day, I swear they'll have to add "murderer" to my list of credentials. I was so done with this gross invasion into my privacy. Just completely finished with all of it. If it cost me my job in cabinet, then so be it. I didn't need the headache, or the job to live a peaceful life. I had plenty to keep me busy without government responsibilities. Gabrielle would have a lot of questions now and I'd have to tell her where all this shit came from, and why. I dreaded telling her, but I would because she deserved to know the truth.