“Dog? I suppose that’s a matter of perception. However,” the man lowered to his haunches. “I believe you call himuncle.”
Everlasting hell.
Chapter Twenty-Two
Violet tried thedoorknob for what must be the hundredth time. Wrapped her fingers about the knob and turned it with a sharp twist born of pure, unreasonable hope.
Still locked.
Just like the windows she’d tested earlier.
She let her forehead rest briefly against the cool wood and vented at the knob again out of pure frustration.Blast you, Percival!She couldn’t stand the silence that settled over a room when the key had been turned and footsteps had retreated and no one was coming. She had thought she would never stand inside that silence again.So blast you, too, Reginald!
With a scowl, she straightened and stepped away from the door, smoothed her skirts with stiff hands. She got three steps before she swiveled to glare at the knob. Fine. Let’s tryonelast time.
She marched over and twisted the thing angrily.
Locked.
What had her governess always said?To persist in a useless effort is not fortitude, but obstinacy.How many hours had passed since she’d started this futile ritual? She couldn’t say. More than a few. Nevertheless, she’d rather be obstinate than do nothing at all.
A short, mad, breathless laugh escaped her before she could stop herself. She pressed her lips together at once, as though sound itself might be dangerous here. The bedchamber answered her with silence—thick, upholstered, oppressive silence, the sort that could choke a person if exposed to it for too long. Spiraling would do her no good here.
Her gaze swept the chamber again.
The room could have been cut from any rich house in London. Stripped of anything that might be used as a weapon, that was.
A cage, then.
One simply lined with patterned wallpaper. Violet preferred a good old dungeon over this.
A bed large enough for a queen dominated the chamber, and Violet refused to go anywhere near the thing. Given who had taken her, what was intended of her, she would have lit it on fire if she could.
She turned from the door and crossed the chamber to the wall beside the fireplace. If there was one thing her brother had taught her—unintentionally, and at great cost—it was that locked doors were rarely the only doors. She went to the nearest wall and pressed her palm flat against the paneling.
Sound.
Violet refused to rejoice just yet. She moved her hand slowly along the seam of the wallpaper, tracing where the paneling met, feeling for a catch, a hollow, a betrayal in the wood beneath her palm. Nothing. She leaned her weight in, listening. The panel did not shift. It did not reveal anything other than its stubborn indifference to her inquiry.
She stepped back and tried again, this time with the tip of her fingers, tapping lightly, methodically. One panel.
Then the next.
Then the next.
The panels held fast beneath her palms.
Her hands fell to her side. How long had she been at this? They’d never have given her a chamber with a possible secret door. Would she ever escape at this rate?
Drake.
The name came with a violent jolt, her body remembering those last moments her mind had been trying, unsuccessfully, to forget.
Was he dead?
The question struck without warning, sharp enough to rob the air from her throat. He had collapsed at her feet again. How could such a strong man have such a dreadful penchant for collapse?
Not funny, Vi.
