These Vicious Masks: A Swoon Novel(24)

“Ev-lyn?”

I spun around to find a figure standing in the doorway, her red hair wild, her face wan. Miss Grey. “Is R-Rose still with you?” she asked, her voice quavering.

I shook my head.

“He took her?” she asked, eyes wide.

The way she spoke sent my heart racing. This time I managed to speak, slightly. “Who took her? Where is she?”

She gazed up at the ceiling. “Then—she must be here. Please, Evelyn, you have to find her before—”

And I saw past her, past the doorway, to the staircase leading up to the third floor, and nothing else mattered. I flew up the stairs, the darkness swallowing me back up and spitting me out into my bed, and I lay awake until the sun rose, hating these dreams that could solve nothing at all.





THE TICKING OF the giant grandfather clock grew as loud as life as I waited, resentfully, with Mr. Braddock in his friend’s large and obviously well-loved London home. We stood in a drawing room lined with faded floral wallpaper and elegant chairs inviting us to delight in the rainy light, which, under normal circumstances, might have made for a cozy morning visit. But for the moment, it was quite the opposite. I crushed the folds of my gown in my fists and hovered in the middle of the room.

“Mr. and Mrs. Lodge will be downstairs shortly,” Cushing, their quiet steward, said before shutting the door, imprisoning me inside.

I was even more confused than I was last night. This did not look to be a ploy. Laura had confirmed that the Lodges not only existed, but they were apparently a respectable family that had only recently withdrawn from social events because of their daughter’s illness. But Mr. Kent had insisted Mr. Braddock was not to be trusted, when I urged him to continue the search without me for the day. And I hadn’t even told him the whole story about the powers. Mr. Braddock surely had ulterior motives for creating such an elaborate explanation, but for the life of me, I could not determine what they were. Was the man cleverer than he looked or just crazier? The line separating the two seemed rather thin.

“So, who is this friend of yours?” I blurted out, hoping to distract myself.

Mr. Braddock glared at me as if I had just stepped on a kitten. “Miss Mae Lodge.”

“Quite informative. Where did you meet?”

“A house.”

“Do you willfully circumvent all questions?”

“As I recall from last night, my full, honest answers were not to your liking. At least cryptic responses require less breath.”

“Then you admit to being purposefully cryptic and mysterious?”

“Sebastian!” a rich, friendly voice interrupted Mr. Braddock’s elegiac sigh. An older man and woman stood at the door, both excited to see him—heaven knows why. With an elegant bow, Mr. Braddock greeted the couple, whom he introduced as Mr. and Mrs. Lodge.

Mrs. Lodge’s puff of blond hair bounced gently as she turned her welcoming countenance toward me. “Thank you for coming, Miss Wyndham,” she said, clasping her hands. “We are terribly in your debt for helping our Mae.” I had done nothing yet.

Her husband, a thin, red-faced man with snowy hair, had the same honest smile as his wife. I was finally forced to discard the idea that Mr. Braddock might have me here for some other purpose. Their distress was written into every line that creased their kind faces. “Sebastian has told us the stories of your work. We find that dedication to be by far the most important quality, after some of the doctors we’ve seen.”

“Has anyone given her a diagnosis?” I asked.

Mrs. Lodge gave a sober nod. “There have been a number of them. But more recently, the doctors have suggested Addison’s.”

I stared at them blankly. Addison’s? Was that a real disease? I resisted the urge to burn Mr. Braddock with my eyes. He brought me here to cure a disease I had never even heard of. How could I let these kind people think there was anything I could possibly do to help?

“I am afraid that there may be little I can do,” I started, giving voice to my thoughts, but their faces fell so quickly, I felt compelled to continue. “But I will do what I can to see to her comfort.”

The Lodges nodded eagerly, and I felt like the worst of charlatans, peddling Evelyn Wyndham’s Magically Useless Elixir.

“Shall we head upstairs?” Mr. Lodge smiled at me expectantly.

I forced out the words. “Yes, of course.”

Miss Lodge’s room was massive—at least twice the size of my own in Bramhurst. Her parents had spared no expense to make her comfortable. Buried beneath the silk sheets and quilts, she was barely visible. The shuttered windows blocked all but a few beams of sunlight. Beside her bed was a snug nook, settled with a plush chair and damask chaise, presumably to make bedside visitors more comfortable. A rather bleak consideration, really.

The Lodges roused their daughter, and she struggled to summon the energy to rise a few inches until Mr. Braddock stepped into her sight. She was up at once. Though she had little strength to express her excitement, it was apparent in her tanned yet obviously sickly face.

“Sebastian!”

“Mae, how are you?” Mr. Braddock asked with an affectionate smile so unexpected, I almost tripped. Who knew the man had teeth?

“I’m well,” Miss Lodge replied serenely, though she hardly looked it.

He hesitated near the doorway as if he couldn’t bear to see her illness up close. “I would like you to meet someone. This is Miss Evelyn Wyndham. She and her sister are talented nurses from Bramhurst.”