He turned me around and pulled me against him, his body connecting with mine. “A thing easily changed. But not here.” He looked around with a dark light in his eyes.
“Are sexual pursuits always on your mind?” I whispered, though I didn’t know why—we were completely alone.
“When you are pressed against me, most definitely,” he said, gaze heavy. “Let’s be done here.”
I was happy to leave. There was something about the over-organized feel and stripped smell of the house that made my skin crawl. He picked up the key ring and the invitations and locked the door behind us. The birds chirped discordantly as we walked down the path and back up the street.
“What do you think of Octavia Winstead?” he asked.
“I don’t know.” It felt like bad form to say I found something about her house off-putting when she had died so horribly. I looked at him. “What do you?”
He stayed silent for a minute as we walked past brownstones and lovely brick facades, colorful flowers trailing from their pots and troughs.
“Single-minded.”
I nodded. “So likely single-minded about the man following her too?”
“Yes.”
“Do you think she might have gone after him?”
“Perhaps. But she was murdered on a corner far from here. Far from the address of her stalker as well.” He tapped the bag containing the papers we’d collected. “Why?”
I shook my head. “Perhaps we will find an answer in her papers.”
~*~
I settled in with Octavia’s journal after dinner in my room in Gabriel’s Ashfield house. He had stepped out, but I expected him back shortly. I’d had to retrieve the journal from his room. How it had ended up there, I didn’t know. It had been in my bag.
He had called the journal silly, but I couldn’t help seeking it out. The words on the pages unfolded like a story. Fascinating and horrifying.
We have a new one. He is so delightful. We call him our little avenger. He is more prickly than our last, full of spirit—seemsto think we are blackmailers! I laughed, for it is nothing but the truth. And yet we have so much to teach him. I see the way M.N. looks at him. How they all do. He is beautiful. A crown jewel.
A hand touched my shoulder, then drew up my throat, under my chin to my cheek. I hadn’t even heard him walk up the stairs; I was so absorbed. I leaned into the touch, as I had for the past two days, and turned the page to the next entry, dated a week later.
He is more beautiful than anything we’ve seen. And defiant. I have never seen a more defiant servant. Must be his mother that put ideas in his head. Or the way the other servants dote on him. He acts above his station.
But there is something quite seductive in that. I doubt our little avenger would be as near to our hearts were he a beautiful face on a bland, eager package. There are so many of those and they can’t keep our interest for long. They don’t respond to the toys as well and their disgusting eagerness shows their breeding—like dogs.
Not like our little avenger. And the sweetest part is the look in his eyes. When reminded of his place and what will happen to his family if he doesn’t comply, they always so blazingly speak of retribution. Banked fire and eternal damnation. I find it amusing that he thinks he might hold the key to our downfall. That he would try to beat us at our own game.
The fingers on my cheek lifted. “What are you reading?”
I was left staring at my hands as he plucked the book from my grasp. “Octavia Winstead’sjournal? Where did you get this?”
“From the pile insideyourroom. Speaking of which, I put that in my bag! How didyouget it?”
“You put all the documents in your bag. I started going through them.”
“Well, you already dismissed the journal.” I waved my hand. “Hand it here.”
“There is no reason to read this tripe.” He gripped the book, his eyes a dark jade.
“I beg to differ. It gives a terrible insight into the deceased.”
“Here is an insight—she’s dead. This book is ten years old. Go through more recent documents.”
“But the book is filled with reasons to murder her.”
