The Lore Chronicles Collection - Kathryn Le Veque Page 0,2

that great. It’s a big, drafty barn that smells like a sewer sometimes.”

She laughed softly. “Well, it’s still pretty cool,” she said, her attention returning to the painting. “And it has this. Since you seem to know a lot about the house, do you know much about the painting?”

He tore his focus from her, his gaze drifting up to the painting once more. “A bit,” he said. “Probably more than most. What did you want to know?”

Lee shrugged. “Everything,” she said. “Is it true that it’s named after the woman in the picture? Her name is Hope?”

He cocked his head thoughtfully. “That has been a family debate for many years,” he said. “Some say that’s her name, but other say it’s the feeling of the painting, like the feeling you have when you look at it. She’s either running to, or running away, from something.”

A big clap of thunder sounded overhead and the lights flashed, throwing them into dimness for a few seconds. Lee happened to be looking at the painting at the time and she would swear, until the day she died, that in that moment of darkness, she could see something that looked like great scarring up the side of the woman’s neck. But as soon as the lights came back on again, it disappeared.

Her mouth popped open in astonishment.

“Holy shit,” she breathed, hand over her mouth. “Did you see that?”

Ash was looking up at the lights, apparently oblivious to her muttering. “That’s another thing about this house,” he said. “The generator is a touchy beast. I’d better go check on it.”

She was still glued to the painting but she managed to spare him a glance. Since he hadn’t commented on what she thought she’d seen, she didn’t press it. She didn’t want to look like an idiot.

Maybe it was the power of suggestion… but maybe not.

“Do you work here?” she asked.

“I live here.”

Now, he had her full attention. “A live-in caretaker? That’s awesome.”

He shook his head. “You misunderstand,” he said. “I live here. My family has lived her for four hundred years. I’m Ash Russe.”

Now, Lee felt like an idiot. “Oh,” she said, laughing softly. “I didn’t realize… it’s very nice to meet you, Ash. I’m Lee Williams and I love your house. I can’t explain it, but it’s very familiar to me.”

He was grinning at her. “Thank you very much,” he said, shaking her hand for a second time and holding it just a little longer than necessary. “If you’ve got some time, I’ll tell you more about this painting after I check on the generator.”

Lee looked around, wondering where her tour had gone. “I’m with a tour, but I’d love to hear it,” she said. “I can’t pass up the opportunity to hear it from the family who owns it.”

“Good,” Ash said. “I don’t do this for just anyone, but I will admit, you give me a sense of déjà vu, too. Have you ever been to England before? Up here in Yorkshire, I mean. Maybe we’ve met before?”

She shook her head. “I haven’t been up in the north like this,” she said. “I’ve been to London a few times, but I don’t think we’ve met. I would have remembered.”

There was something warm in the way she said it and his eyes reflected that warmth. “I swear you look familiar,” he said. “Lee. Lee. Is that short for something?”

She appeared somewhat embarrassed. “My mother is from Mississippi,” she said. “I was named for my grandmother and her mother – Eulalie. But I have gone by Lee since I was very young. Eulalie for a three-year-old is a mouthful.”

“Eulalie,” he repeated, rolling it over his tongue. “Till the yellow-haired young Eulalie became my smiling bride.”

“Come again?”

“It’s from a poem by Poe. You haven’t heard of it?”

Recognition dawned and she nodded her head. “Yes, absolutely,” she said. “That’s where the family name came from.”

He was still smiling at her but he turned back to the painting, back to the woman who was either running from something or running to something.

Hope.

“That painting was done by a blind man,” he said quietly. “Not in the literal sense, but it was commissioned by an ancestor of mine who had lost his sight in an accident. That painting is his wife, whom he called Hope. Whether or not that was her real name is up for debate, but that’s what he called her. It’s even on her tombstone. He couldn’t see her, so he had an artist come to Blackmoor and