Inheritance (The Lost Bride Trilogy, #1)(21)

And the focus in his green eyes that inevitably turned to a smile when he turned to her.

Let’s set you up, monkey, and see what you’ve got.

He’d never turned her away, never told her he was too busy. And he’d taught her, as patiently as he’d taught his high school students, how to use space, color, the absence of color, how to add texture and dimension, light, shadow.

After his death—months and months after, when they could face it—she’d helped her mother store or give away his paints and tools, box up his sketchbooks.

Some of his canvases had gone to galleries, and eventually sold. Others, unfinished, were still stacked against the wall.

“I’ve always loved coming up here.” Cleo slid an arm around Sonya’s waist. “I never met him, but coming up here always makes me feel like I did.”

“I know.” Sonya tipped her head toward Cleo’s. “When I look back, I think how much patience, how much simple good-heartedness he had to make time for me. Not just giving me time, but giving me his interest.

“When I was about ten, I showed him a drawing. For a poster for a school project. After he looked at it, he looked at me. So serious. So, so serious I thought, oh, it’s a silly drawing, just dumb and silly. Then he told me to come back on Saturday. He’d get the poster board, and I could use the studio.

“And that was the moment—when he looked at me, when he said that to me—I knew I was going to be an artist. Not just play at it, or have a little fun. He changed my life that day.”

Shaking her head, she brushed a hand over the easel that still stood under the skylight.

“He didn’t have enough time. His art was just starting to move, but he didn’t have enough time.”

She moved over to one of the storage boxes that held his sketch pads. “Mom and I didn’t go through all of these. Later, we talked about doing that but never did. What would we do with them? We’d never throw them out. We wouldn’t sell them even if we could. She’s never used this space, not even for storage.”

“Some loves are forever.”

They sat on the floor, each with a pile of sketchbooks. As she paged through, Sonya understood the full meaning of poignant. It hurt, and it warmed, it brushed the dust off old sorrows even as it lifted new joy.

“He was so good. Look, it’s Mom holding me when I was a baby. Both of us curled up sleeping.”

“Here’s another one of you—what were you, about six or seven?—having a tea party in your room. Wearing a tiara! I need a tiara.”

She set the book aside, picked another.

“Oh! Sonya! Look.”

A dream sketch, Sonya thought. Not the manor. The mirror.

Her father, in those battered jeans, a paint-splattered sweatshirt. He held a paintbrush in one hand, his palette in the other.

In the glass, the reflection—the man, the brother—stood in rough boots, a plaid shirt loose over a tee. He, too, held a brush and palette.

Her father wore his hair back in a stub of a tail, as he did when he’d gone too long without a trim. Collin, for surely it was, wore his above the collar of the shirt.

Animals snarled and flew on the thick frame of the cheval glass. Wolves, fangs sharp; a hawk, wings spread, talons curled; a buck, with antlers tipped like razors; a coiled cobra; a two-headed dragon; a bear rearing up on its back legs; a cougar on the spring.

“He saw this, Sonya. It’s so detailed. And, Jesus, that mirror is creepy. There’s more in here. The same mirror, but they’re wearing different clothes—and … different ages. Some younger, some older.”

“They’re just boys here. He drew these from memory. Has to be. The same mirror, but they can’t be more than six or seven. Dad’s holding a little car. But in this one, Collin’s holding it. It’s the same car, Cleo. Isn’t it?”

“It looks the same. He passed it to his brother through the mirror?”

“That’s not possible.”

“In a dream, everything’s possible.”

“Dinner’s here,” Winter called from the bottom of the steps.

She insisted they eat at the table—like the civilized—and on plates, not out of cartons.

“Marshall contacted Mr. Doyle. Mr. Doyle is emailing Marshall the files, and they’re meeting tomorrow.”

“Already?”

“Marshall wanted the meeting, and Mr. Doyle—Marshall told me—was more than amenable. You’ll be able to make a better decision once Marshall goes over all the documents and meets Collin Poole’s lawyer.”

“I’m really grateful. It takes a load off.”

“See? We’ll all sleep better.”

Sonya didn’t count on it.

“We found a sketchbook with at least a dozen drawings of the mirror dream. Some with them as boys.”

“Your dad said he’d had the dream his whole life.”

“The mirror’s a nightmare,” Cleo put in, plucking up a pot sticker with chopsticks. “Decorated with predatory birds, animals, reptiles. Nothing I’d want to use to check out how my butt looks.”

“Didn’t Dad have a bunch of little cars? Toy cars?”

“His beloved Matchbox cars?” Winter smiled as she ate. “You played with them when you were two, three, but lost interest. You didn’t play with dolls much either. Always arts and crafts for you.”