How will I thank him?
It’s an odd thought, really, thanking a person for killing someone for you. I’m honestly not sure if that’s why I really want to see him again.
I push that all behind me. It never happened. If I tell anyone, something tells me that beautiful angel of death will make me pay. His parting words made it clear he has the ability to administer swift, harsh punishment.
So I stare at myself. And I focus on what comes next.
I need a good haircut, but I can mask the split ends by putting my hair up. I sweep it into a ponytail then swirl it into a bun I keep in place with bobby pins. I tuck the dried ends into the bun so only glossy hair shows. I’m wearing sensible pearl earrings, and the lightest brush of makeup like the night before.
I’m not sure what awaits me, but I’m at the point where I have nothing to lose.
I’ve come a long way since the day I found the truth out.
The day I saw my bank accounts and wallet had been emptied, and even the change jar I kept on the mantle in my living room gone, was the day that changed the course of my life forever. I stared, unbelieving, before I fell to my knees.
It was a lie. All of it.
My landlord told me I was six months in arrears on rent, revealing that the money I’d given my boyfriend had never been paid to the landlord at all. When I went to file a report with the police, I was told Ashton Bryant, the man I was prepared to pledge my life to… never existed.
I’d been swindled. Conned. And didn’t have a penny to my name to show for it. How can you sue a guy that doesn’t technically exist? He was the first man I’d said I love you to. I’d been cheated out of everything I owned and everything that mattered to me.
I had charged my phone in the car, so I punch the address into the GPS app, even though I’ve done this so many times by now I feel as if I know the route by heart.
I’m ten minutes away. Ten minutes to the road that takes me to the next season of my life, the next stage.
Hearing at The Castle, 11 a.m.
Please bring proof of identification.
It should’ve been a red flag that Ashton systematically cut out every friend I ever had, but at the time, it had felt like he was devoted to me. No one loved me like he did. No one understood me like he did. They were all jealous or toxic or problematic.
In retrospect, he made his moves so no one would thwart his plans.
So I have no one. Nothing but a letter addressed to me and this facade of professionalism I can maintain for a few more hours.
How odd, to get a letter directing me to a castle. I looked up anything I could about the location, and all I could find was a small Wikipedia entry online about the history of The Castle. It’s several centuries old and now owned by the Montavio family.
But no Google searches could tell me who they were. All I know is a recent Montavio family death is what prompted the letter sent to me.
Why?
Pictures show a large, stately looking castle nestled deep on the North Shore of Boston in a coastal city called Gloucester in Cape Anne. It seems The Castle was once shown publicly but isn’t anymore.
I have no family to ask and Google didn’t help, so the only choice I have is to go. What do I have to lose?
Still, I feel as if I’m traveling to a country I’ve never heard of, and I don’t even know the language.
My hands shake on the wheel as I make the drive. It’s a bright, sunny, but chilly day here. I wrap my sweater around me as I pull down a long, circular driveway. I stifle a gasp at the sheer magnificence of this castle. I thought maybe the pictures made it look larger than it really is, some sort of a trick of the light or an optical illusion… but they didn’t. If anything, they failed to capture the brilliance of it.
I feel as if any moment, a knight bearing a sword and shield or a minstrel carrying an instrument will stride into view. I can almost hear the strings of music on a harp or lyre, almost hear the clash of weapons in a battle on the lawn.
I hope I get to explore this place. It’s the stuff of dreams, with its towers and turrets, vines along the roof and walls, gardens that encase the exterior, and large, ornate, stained glass windows at the very top. Bright orange mums bloom in the fall garden amidst vibrant greens, hardy plants and flowers that can withstand the chill of autumn before the frost.