Haunted Hearts

5

Rufus stared at Elphi and answered her question with one of his own. "In your vast experience, what did you think of tonight's performance?"

Elphi folded her arms across her middle and lifted her chin to a haughty angle. He'd asked the question with barely concealed contempt in his voice, but was it for her or the séance? "You tell me, Lord Treadway. Did Madame Calvert speak the truth about you?"

"She managed one or two lucky guesses," he said with a negligent shrug as her carriage rolled to a stop, proclaiming her turn for departure had arrived at last. "But all in all, I believe she's nothing more than a skilled actress Lady Sanham hired for tonight's festivities."

Poorly concealed desperation in his tone and Rufus's guarded stance revealed he was lying. Elphi knew it as surely as she knew all creamed vegetables were evil and should never have been created. But there was little she could do to prove it.

"I suppose I must take your word on the matter then," she murmured.

"Indeed, I suppose you must."

Elphi forced her lips into a feigned smile and nodded, "Even though I believe you're lying, Lord Treadway."

And there it was, the flare of disbelief in his steel-blue eyes he couldn't hide, providing all the confirmation she needed.

Without another word, despite wanting to hurl one last flaying remark his way, Elphi climbed into her waiting carriage and refused to give in to the urge to peek through the curtains to see if he watched her leave.

The ride home seemed far bumpier and took longer than the drive over, and by the time they arrived, she all but leaped out before it came to a complete stop. She flew up the steps and inside her home in search of Roderick, intent on discussing his abysmal choice of friends.

However, upon finding his study empty, she glanced at the large grandfather clock in the foyer when it let out a mournful chime, then came to a screeching halt and muttered an unladylike curse. It was half-past midnight, which meant, unlike the rest of high society, Roderick—a firm believer in the early to bed early to rise adage since the age of eleven—was sound asleep and had been for the past two and a half hours.

It was one of his peculiarities she'd grown to love about him because the rare moments when he stayed up past his bedtime to attend a ball or the theatre with her, the depth of his devotion shone the brightest.

However, in times such as this, it was a bloody nuisance.

Conversation with her brother would have to wait till the morrow unless she dared wake him, which she might, but it would be akin to disturbing a slumbering lion in its den.

Squaring her shoulders, Elphi clenched her hands into fists and steeled her resolve, rehearsing what she wanted to say as she slowly ascended the stairs and walked to his room.

But her footsteps slowed the closer she came, and she stood gnawing on her lower lip outside his door for several moments, her fist raised, ready to strike, torn between common sense and the need to vent her complete dislike of Lord Rufus Treadway.

There were few things worse in her little world than when someone foolishly awoke her older brother before he'd gotten his full nine hours of uninterrupted sleep.

And the more she pondered the matter, waking Roderick merely to inform him she loathed the man he claimed as his best friend in all the world was most decidedly not worth how unbearable he'd be in the morning.

Sighing in momentary defeat, Elphi lowered her arm and shuffled to her room as she began making a mental list of the many reasons Lord Treadway was a loathsome specimen of the male species.