These Vicious Masks: A Swoon Novel (26 page)

“And lied to me about searching together,” I said dully.

“I specifically chose not to inform you, because I worried something dangerous might happen,” he said, angrily grabbing the bedsheets. “And I stand by that. This afternoon,
Lord Ridgewood realized I was following him and paid three men to attack me.”

I stilled, heart hammering, searching him for injury. The menacing black eye and bruise on his face were fading, but they still lingered. “Are you hurt?”

“No. But he disappeared while I was occupied.”

Not ready to concede the point, I continued. “It still sounds like I would have been safer with you.”

“You would have been even safer remaining at home,” he returned sharply, moving himself much closer. My heart quickened, and suddenly he was so close, I could smell leather and mint.
“Do you know what it was like? To hear you were in a hospital? I thought you were dead. I thought—” He cut himself off, but by now he was sitting next to me, cradling my face in
his hands.

We both seemed to realize his actions at the same time. I couldn’t feel anything except the rush of blood that sprang up wherever his fingers touched my skin. I couldn’t hear
anything except for the rustle of my hair as he brushed a strand behind my ear. I couldn’t see anything except his expression, so strange I was sure he was about to kiss me again. But when he
leaned forward, lips parted, I found my voice.

“At least
I
found Dr. Beck,” I said, choking back this moment we shared, hoping to return us to our natural state: bickering. Slowly, he pulled back, as well. I could almost
read disappointment in his eyes before a sneer took over his face.

“Being ambushed hardly qualifies as finding the man.” The walls were back up, and I should have felt safe, secure. But somehow, it was only isolating.

“Well, unlike you—”

“Please, stop,” he interrupted, backing away to the farthest corner. “It’s late. If it’s all the same to you, we can continue this argument while we get you
home.”

“I don’t have any proper clothes,” I snapped.

“I bought you a dress,” he snapped back, gesturing to a simple green gown hanging by the window. “And . . . things. For underneath it.”

“What? Wh-where did you even get it?”

“Is it not to your liking? I had to kill two peo—no, that isn’t very funny . . .” His attempt at levity only brought more tension to his shoulders and lines to his
injured face.

“It’s, ah, fine,” I said, slightly stunned. “Thank you.”

“I’ll wait outside. Take your time,” he said, closing the door behind him.

That man. I took a deep breath and wiped my face with his handkerchief left by my bedside. I hardly knew if it was my injuries or the conversation or the brief touch, but I felt a rush in my
head, as if I were still falling through the air without control of my movements or my thoughts.

I stood and slipped off the hospital gown to assess my body closely for injuries. There was nothing to be found. No one would know what happened to me today, and that was exactly how I wanted it
to stay. The green dress fit perfectly, and I could even admire its rich color. Nothing could be done with my wild hair besides running my fingers swiftly through the heavy strands.

When I was ready, Mr. Braddock met me in the corridor and walked me through its twists and turns. He spoke to the woman at the front desk, but she seemed to be distracted by a crisis over a
stabbing victim. My sloppy
Elizabeth Bradent
signature was sufficient to sweep our way out of the dingy hospital and into the waiting hansom.

“Now, I believe you were yelling at me?” Mr. Braddock said, once we were on our way.

“Did you learn anything from those men who attacked you?” I asked.

“No,” he replied with a grimace. “They’d only met him minutes prior.”

“Do you have another plan?”

“Camille’s building is the only possibility—though I doubt she would have remained there, considering the recent commotion.”

“But there is no reason for her to move. I’m the only one who knew the location, and they didn’t expect me to survive that fall. We should go now.”

I already knew what he was going to say, but I thought if I slipped in the suggestion quickly and he agreed to it by accident, it would somehow be set in stone.

But he caught it, his brow knitted in frustration. “No. There’s no
we
for this search. In fact, there are even more reasons for you to stay away now. If they see you are
healed, Dr. Beck will want you for his experiments, too.”

“I doubt you will get very far yourself. We clearly need each other’s assistance.”

He scoffed at that. “
You
need
my
assistance. Your presence only makes it more difficult for me.”

“Then you don’t need to know what Dr. Beck’s power is? Silly me, I thought it might be helpful.”

His eyes stopped, dead still, his lips half parted and frozen. I had his full attention. “You learned what it is?”

“He admitted it on the roof. He can see the future, expect things before they happen.”

Lines twisted across Mr. Braddock’s forehead as he receded from the present, replaying his encounters with the man. “He never did seem surprised or anxious. He always looked bored,
like you were speaking too slowly.”

“So if it’s true, what do we do now?”

For an eternity, he stared out the window at the streaming rain, the muddy streets, the dark shops shuttered and gated, the buildings half hidden in fog. “I don’t know,” he
finally said. “I’m sorry. I need more time to think.”

“I have one idea,” I lied.

“What is it?”

“You don’t need to know that yet. I’m sure you plan to go to Camille’s tonight after you take me home. But I won’t have you doing everything without me. Tomorrow
morning, you will pick me up, along with Miss Grey and Mr. Kent, and we will go together. If not, I shall go out on my own again, and you will have to kidnap me to fully stop me, which in some ways
would be considered a strange and criminal turn of events.”

He had no response, or—judging by his expression—no polite, gentlemanly one. His eyes flickered as he struggled to determine what clues he had overlooked, what I had solved that he
couldn’t. After another long, uncomfortable silence, Mr. Braddock filled it with a half-grunted, half-muttered something that sounded like “As you wish.”

The victory felt hollow this time. “Well, I
wish
I knew what the right choice was.”

He looked at me steadily, perhaps trying to determine if I was being sarcastic. “What do you mean?”

“If Dr. Beck can see the future, then he knows what actions he must take to realize it, no matter how vicious they may be. But all we can do is make a decision and pray it’s the
right one. None of them have been so far, though.”

He turned away in contemplation. With every movement of the cab, the glare of the reading lamp washed over his cheek, the moonlight glimmered in his green eyes, and the gas lanterns flickered
around his straight nose. The hues mingled together, floating over his face, exchanging caresses with the shadows.

“I don’t believe there’s ever a right choice,” he said finally. “No matter how much you plan, there’s always something unexpected, something unaccounted for
that goes wrong.”

“That . . . is a terrible answer,” I said, shaking my head.

“I suspected you would say that.”

“Because it was terrible.”

“Because of who you are. When we first met, I thought you angry, stubborn, and infuriatingly willful.”

“And now?” Even as I spoke the words, I wondered why I cared so much.

He blinked. “I still think you’re angry, stubborn, and infuriatingly willful. But I’ve come to rather like it, especially when it’s directed at someone who isn’t
me. You simply refuse to settle. You keep pushing forward to get what you want, no matter what gets in your way, no matter what hurts you. It’s most admirable.”

I found his admiration made my head spin slightly and had to have a quick, firm talk with myself before I could meet his eyes again. The carriage stopped outside the Kents’, and Mr.
Braddock climbed out, circled around, and helped me down. My fingers prickled from his touch, which seemed to last an age.

“Tomorrow, then,” he said, letting go of my hand.

“Tomorrow,” I repeated, swells of my breath mingling with the frigid air. The fog had risen out of the streets, kissing the rooftops of buildings, and the rain had stopped, leaving
the city slick, shiny, and vivid. “If I can trust you’ll come this time.”

“You can.” Mr. Braddock hesitated at the cab and half turned, looking unconvinced himself. He came back to me, taking off his hat and speaking hurriedly. “But I know my word
isn’t quite enough for you now. All I have left to offer you is my name, so that you may curse it if necessary.”

“I’ve already done that a great deal, Mr. Braddock.”

His fingers tapped on the hat. “Well, I—I was hoping my given name had a clean slate.”

Oh, that’s what he was asking. My face warmed as I tested the name in my head.

“I’m sorry,” he said after a moment, shaking his head. “That was improper of me to ask. I apologize—”

“No, it’s . . . certainly no more improper than seeing me in a hospital gown. I was just seeing how I liked it.”

The corner of his lip pulled up slightly. And was that a blush? “Does it meet your approval?”

“Well, Sebastian,” I said, feeling the strange sound wash over my tongue like a breaking wave. “It isn’t at all good for cursing. But I suppose we can find another use
for it. As you might with mine.”

He smiled widely at that and opened the cab door.

“I look forward to it, Evelyn,” he replied, and the way my name left his lips and drifted into the air sent a peculiar glow through me, not unlike his touch did.

Except this lingered long after he rolled away.

T
UFFINS OPENED THE
door with a bleak expression. The lights were bright, and the muffled sounds of a chattering crowd
floated downstairs. The dinner party.

“Lady Kent wishes to see you in the drawing room,” he said, almost timidly.

My stomach roiled as he marched through the portrait-plastered hallway, up the stairs, and past the music room, where all the guests seemed to be gathered. I desperately clung to the hope that
all this fuss was to offer me a fresh raspberry tart to try before the others, but Tuffins’s manner made me feel more like a prisoner being led to the gallows.

“Do I get any last words?” I asked.

A smile almost broke on his reserved expression. He let me into the room. “She will be here in a moment,” he said, shutting the door gently behind me.

As usual, the stuffy room was filled with the waft of perfume and smoke. I stood in the center, unsure what my strategy should be. This was about my absence, surely. I needed a good excuse. I
cautiously huddled into a side chair by the fireplace, preparing profuse apologies and innocent gazes.

The door flew open, and in hobbled Lady Kent, who greeted me with a glare.

“Miss Wyndham,” she said before stiffly lowering herself into an uncomfortably close seat, only a low tea table separating us. She took a sip from her wineglass and twisted her mouth
sourly. “Absent all day again.”

“I’m so terribly sorry,” I said with such remorse, one would have thought I burned down a schoolhouse full of sick children. “I did not mean to return so late. I was at
the Cages’ in the afternoon, and they insisted I stay longer, and I was such a poor judge of time. Between listening to Eliza play the pianoforte and hearing John tell stories of his travels,
I completely lost track of the evening! Oh heavens, I feel so very awful for not being here. Is Laura cross with me?”

“Did you say the Cages?” Lady Kent asked, leaning forward with a piercing look.

“Oh, they are lovely—dear old friends from Melchester,” I said, praying I wasn’t describing real people. “It’s a rare occurrence to find them in town, so I do
hope to get the chance to introduce you if there is to be a party.”

“I don’t believe I know of them,” Lady Kent said, folding her hands on her lap. “Chiefly because I don’t believe they exist.”

I barely knew how to respond to that. “I . . . uh, I’m sorry, did—”

“This morning,” she continued, her words stampeding over mine, “I heard some distressing news about your recent . . . activities at the Argyll Rooms.”

Hang it. Sebastian and Mr. Kent had warned me. My mind cycled through hundreds of potential excuses: I had a twin; another Evelyn Wyndham was attempting to ruin my name; I had mistaken the place
for a dressmaker’s shop; I had visited multiple rooms of a church on Argyll Road, which must be the source of all the confusion. Dear God, nothing would work.

“Perhaps their vision—”

“Spare me the excuses and pretenses,” Lady Kent replied with infuriating certainty. “I don’t have the time for a story about another delightful family. I knew it was a
mistake to let my daughter near you, but still, I was persuaded to invite you for dinners, even let you stay as a guest, and
this
is how you repay a kindness? You stay in
my
home
while you visit brothels, travel unaccompanied with unmarried ruffians, and even . . . attend to them privately at their home! I knew you had come for some man, but I hadn’t anticipated even
your
behavior could be so wanton and disgusting!”