Chapter 9

"You see, you cannot even look at me," Blaine whispered as I continued to stand by the door, "It is all over now." He looked down at his hands, his eyes full, one blink allowing a tear to fall down his perfect face. I could not bear the sadness, could not see him like that, I walked quickly to him as he turned to walk away towards the cold window.

"No, you're not to say that," I said, clutching onto his arms from behind, "It's not all over, it will just be us, no more secrets, no more shadows."

"No," Blaine said, turning around and looking sadly at my face, "We only have a few hours, a few days…" He kissed me then, soft and warm against my lips, cold from outside. He seemed to savour the moment, his fingers finding the nape of my neck and pulling me closer. I could feel his heart beat through his shirt and I clung on determined to make this last forever. I never wanted to leave this place, if only I could have Blaine, be his and his alone.

But it seemed that truth now wanted to reveal its ugly head and be fully known and understood and as Blaine drifted away from me sadly, I started to think that maybe Blaine hadn't really loved me in the first place. I must have been such a poor substitute for Rebecca when I arrived at Manderley. Rebecca was the greatest hostess; I was nothing and could only mock her memory by my costume.

"What was she really like?" I asked timidly in the silence as Blaine wandered near the window again, "Do you wish she was still here after all this has happened?"

Blaine looked up at me sharply, failing to understand my meaning. "What are you talking about?" he asked.

"Do you miss her? I sometimes think you would prefer to have her here with you, being a perfect hostess to your guests at Manderley and running the household like it should be run. Instead you are left with me."

"Of course I would rather have you!" Blaine exclaimed, "I told you before I wasn't attracted to her, she was never my type."

"But apart from that? She clearly knew how to run the estate, knew how to impress people with her vivacity and beauty. I am very poor in comparison. I think you must have loved her despite the fact that she was a woman." I looked down, barely able to voice my worries, feeling foolish. Blaine had closed the distance quickly and he tilted my chin so my gaze met his own. His eyes had softened and he kissed me sweetly on the cheek.

"Kurt, you never have to worry on that account. I hated her," and his face changed. The sweet man that had just kissed me, turned vicious and hate-filled. His dark eyes seemed to cloud over with hatred and he couldn't bear to look at me and feel such a way. He started pacing the room.

"I hated her with all that I have," Blaine continued, "Everyone told me how lucky I was when I married her. She was so beautiful, so accomplished," he said, looking ahead in the distance, seeming to imagine her face. "She's got everything needed in a wife, they all said: breeding, brains and beauty. Oh how I believed them, but I never had a moment's happiness with her. She had no tenderness, no real love about her." I could only repeat to myself quietly the fact that I held onto so dearly. Blaine didn't love her. Blaine never loved Rebecca at all.

"Do you remember that time you saw me at that cliff in Monte Carlo?" he said as he walked over to me, earnestly looking into my eyes. I nodded.

"That's where we went on honeymoon and there that she told me all about herself. Things I cannot even repeat to you, someone so full of love and compassion like you," he said, his eyes softening as he looked at me. "I remember her so clearly on that cliff, black hair dancing in the wind and her laugh, so teasing, almost psychotic. She said she had known that I had never found her attractive. She had noticed how when our parents set us up, that I had looked at others differently. She knew I preferred men and she didn't care. She thought it was funny, something she could use against me." Blaine looked so tired, he gently leaned on the back of an arm chair, needing support as he continued the story.

"She knew we couldn't divorce after four days of marriage so she said she'd make a bargain with me - play the devoted wife, mistress of my precious Manderley, make it the best estate in England. She said people would visit us, envy us, comment that we were the luckiest, happiest couple in the country. What a grand joke it will be! What a triumph!" Blaine almost seemed mad in the half-light, eyes wide.

"I shouldn't have played along," he said, "I shouldn't have agreed to the deal but she knew that I would protect the family honour, would care more for tradition and would hate to take her to the divorce courts. I was younger then, more aware of what I needed to do to protect my family name, make sure my father approved of my actions. You must hate me," he said, looking sadly at me, his shoulders sunken, "You despise me don't you? Like I despise myself."

"Of course I don't Blaine," I said, tears appearing in my eyes but our distance remained. He continued to pace, leaving his place by the window.

"And I kept the bargain, and she did too, or so it would seem but she became careless, spending whole weekends in her flat in London and forgetting herself at parties. She would drink, prey on other men. She even tried poor Frank and her cousin Jack, well he was a bad influence too. They would come back here," he said, looking around the cottage we were standing in. "I told them to be more careful but they wouldn't listen, just laughed and carried on, living the high life, caring only for their own pleasure. She made me a laughing stock."

He stood by the door frame, fist clenched and as he spoke he pounded the frame almost wondering what he had become.

"One night, when I knew she had returned here quietly from London, I thought Favell was here with her. I decided that I couldn't stand the filthy deceit any longer, so I came down here prepared to have it out with them but she was alone. She was sitting on that divan, a big ashtray full of cigarettes stubs beside her. She looked ill, out of sorts and suddenly she got up, her nightdress flowing around her as she moved." We both turned to the mentioned divan and I could imagine her there, draped over the sofa and then moving. Her ghost seemed to haunt us still.

"She walked towards me. 'When I have a child,' she said, 'Neither you nor anyone else could prove it wasn't yours. You'd like to have an heir wouldn't you Blaine for your precious Manderley?' And she started to laugh. 'I'd be the perfect mother, just like I've been the perfect wife,' she said, delighting in the marvellous joke she was saying. 'It should give you the thrill of your life to see my son grow up, knowing that he would own the place when you die.' She got closer and closer to me, now facing me, with one hand in her pocket, the other holding a cigarette."

I could just imagine her and Blaine seemed to lift his eyes in front of him, as if he could see her still, his eyes wide, hating but oh so scared and I wanted to go to him, break the spell but I couldn't. I just watched him battle with this imaginary woman in front of him.

"She wanted to know what I thought," Blaine said, "'What are you going to do about it Blaine?' she asked me, 'Aren't you going to kill me?' She laughed, kept mocking me, getting closer and closer and as I was backed towards the door, I flung her aside, trying to escape her psychotic laugh. She went through the door and landed." Blaine opened the little door all of a sudden, indicating the room that contained rope, shipping tackle and boating supplies. They still remained but there was no other indication that anything untoward had happened there. Just a space. Blaine walked away from the tiny room, staring at the space on the floor transfixed, horrified.

"She must have hit her head on some heavy metal tackle and I remember wondering why she was still smiling…" his voice trailed away, his eyes hollow and unfeeling. "I realised she was dead," he whispered.

"But you didn't kill her," I exclaimed, "It was an accident."

"Who would believe me?" he asked quietly, not looking my way, "I had to do something, I carried her outside to the boat," and Blaine walked to the window again, reliving the horror, seeing for himself where he had travelled to, what low depths he had sunk to. "It was very dark, no moon, and I put her in the cabin and when the boat seemed a safe distance from the shore I took a spike and drove it again and again through the planking of the hull. The water came in fast and I climbed into the dingy and sailed away. I saw the boat keel over and sink," he said, a note of finality in his voice, his ordeal of reliving the nightmare over.

I almost ran to him. "Blaine, does anyone know of this?" I asked gripping his arms, trying to bring him back to me.

"No, only you and me."

"Maybe they won't know it's her, you can say you don't know her."

"No they're bound to recognise her, the rings she wore. They'll identify her body and then they'll remember the other woman."

"You can say that you didn't know, that the day you identified the other woman, you weren't yourself. Only you and I know Blaine, Rebecca can't harm you now." I grabbed his arms, wanted him to realise, try to save himself.

"I said before that I did a very foolish and selfish thing bringing you here," Blaine whispered, looking at me for the first time in quite a while, tears springing to his eyes. "I have loved you so much Kurt," he said, "But I knew she would win in the end, Rebecca would win." He turned away, to look at me too painful. I followed him, turning him around to face me again.

"No she hasn't won," I said, "No matter what happens, she hasn't won."

Suddenly the phone rang, disturbing the eerie silence and we looked at each other. Blaine answered and it appeared to be Frank relaying news and as soon as he put the phone down, Blaine seemed to be bracing himself for the inevitable.

"That was Colonel Julian he's the Chief Constable of the county. He asked if I could possibly have made a mistake about the body I identified." And that was it, Blaine left the cottage, returned to his car so he could travel to the mortuary to identify this new body and I was ushered to bed to await Blaine's fate.

xXx

I lay there waiting, alternating between crying and thinking. I wasn't sure if Blaine would come into my room that night, our goodbye so fleeting but I knew I wouldn't sleep until I knew, until he was in my arms.

He did enter my room very late that night or early the next morning and I heard him before I saw him, his silhouette appearing before me in the early morning light from the window. He was still wearing his wet coat and as he took it off to set aside, I saw the lines on his face. He seemed to have aged terribly in the last few hours and I realised how much he would need me.

He undressed and got under the covers and I took him to me, he buried his head in the nook between my neck and shoulders and his cold breath tickled me as he breathed me in, desperate for life and warmth again. After a while I asked him what happened.

"I identified her body and they all agreed that it was understandable that I had a made a mistake under the circumstances," he scoffed quietly, "There will be an inquest tomorrow, reopening the old wounds that fester and grow." He sighed deeply. "They are examining the boat now."

"So soon?"

"Oh yes, these things are dealt with quickly, you know," he almost laughed, "And of course the Colonel suggested we go for a round of golf soon."

"They clearly don't suspect a thing Blaine," I said, hope dripping from my voice, "They'll believe it was an accident."

Blaine couldn't say anything, didn't want to get his hopes up but I knew, I hoped for the both of us. He lay there in my arms limply for a while, barely moving, then suddenly clung to me desperately.

"Kurt, never leave me, let us have tonight, even if this doesn't work, though I may be taken in the morning. Let us have tonight." His voice broke with a sob and I brought him ever closer, desperate to help him believe, never once letting my mind assume that this would be the end. I could only hope and believe.

We made love that night, desperate and fast but so tender and I gasped as he brought me higher and higher. I never wanted it to end and as we came down from the high, I could hear Blaine sobbing quietly as I lay in his arms. I could only scrunch my eyes shut against the world and hope for the both of us.