Unraveled by Her by Wendy Leigh Page A

China,” “Only You,” “Best Thing That Ever Happened to Me,” “Time After Time,” “Embraceable You,” “Can’t Take My Eyes off You,” and finally, “You’re the First, the Last, My Everything,” and I listen, overcome by the love, passion, and emotion in Robert’s choice of the lyrics and the music.
    â€œAll another way of telling you exactly how I feel about you,” he says, stroking my hand.
    I manage a faint smile, and for the first time in days eat a little supper, then fall fast asleep.

    The same nightmare haunts me.
    Tamara, with a green face and a pointed hat, riding a dart gun and headed straight toward me.
    And Georgiana, her hair jet-black, her nails and mouth deep red, a diamond and ruby tiara on her head, brandishing a violet-colored bomb.
    And then the flames, the fire, the boom, dust everywhere, gasoline, and me running, running, running, straight into Robert’s arms. Only when I get there, he’s vanished into thin air, nowhere to be found.
    As always, I wake up screaming.
    â€œPerhaps if I hypnotize you,” Robert says, his voice gentle and concerned.
    Hypnosis. The equivalent of a truth serum . . . I’m just not ready. . . .
    I give him a faint smile, then shake my head.
    â€œShe’s perking up, Mr. Hartwell. In a day or two, I think you can take her home,” I hear the doctor say as I drift back to sleep.

    As Robert and I pass through the gates of Hartwell Castle and up the drive, I catch a glimpse of Hartwell Island in the distance. The island is barren, bare, all vegetation razed to the ground in the fire. The mausoleum is now just a burned-out shell. But though it’s just a ruin, the sight of those ruins still makes my stomach turn, and I have to avert my eyes from them.
    Robert puts his arms around me and pulls me close.
    â€œDon’t look back, my darling. It’s all over now. She’s dead, and you’re safe,” he says.
    If only that were true . . .
    Later that night, when we are alone together in our suite, he pours me a glass of Cristal, then sits on the sofa next to me, hugs me to his chest, and says, “Sweetheart, after I watched the look of horror on your face as we drove up to the castle tonight and you saw Hartwell Island again, I issued an order for the entire island to be bulldozed tomorrow.
    â€œIrrespective of that, I want you to know that after everything Tamara put you through, if she hadn’t burned the mausoleum down herself, I’d have personally dismantled it piece by piece and razed the island to the ground myself,” he adds, with an undertone of so much fury in his voice that I tremble inwardly.
    Then he gently undresses me and puts me into bed.
    â€œYou must rest, cara mia. And I’ll make us supper,” he says, but I go straight to sleep and only wake up in the morning.
    My head still hurts, my throat still hurts, and I’m still dizzy. Dizzy and confused and—where it counts most of all—tongue-tied.
    When he sees the condition I’m in, how drained I still am, how emotionally fragile, Robert focuses his attention on me even more single-mindedly than he did before the kidnapping, all in the service of making sure I feel safe, happy, and loved.
    To my surprise and delight, he serves me breakfast in bed; fresh-squeezed pineapple juice followed by a smoked salmon and caviar omelet he has cooked for me himself. He feeds me each mouthful of omelet, followed by fresh fruit salad, spoon by spoon.
    I eat it all, love it all, his tenderness, care, and consideration for me. But no matter how much I love him, part of me isn’t really here with him at all. Part of me is still back in the mausoleum with her. Sometimes I think I dreamed the whole nightmare. Dreamed that she was still alive, that she kidnapped me, that she was forcing me to write her autobiography to win Robert back.
    But other times I know it