Page 30 of The Lost Letter: A Victorian Romance

“No. Why should it? He had no opportunity to do so.”

Sebastian’s gaze narrowed. “Not even when he posted them?”

Sylvia had the oddest sensation that his question was not what it seemed. She answered it anyway, telling him the truth—for better or for worse. “My father did not post my letters,” she said. “I did.”

Sebastian drew back in blank dismay. “You?”

Miss Stafford gave him a puzzled look. “Yes.” She paused. “Well, at least, my maid did.”

Her maid. He felt a palpable wave of relief. Without conscious thought, he rubbed the scarred side of his face.

She watched him with swift concern. “Does it hurt very much?”

He immediately dropped his hand. They were sitting perilously close. Close enough that she could see his scars, even in the candlelight. He felt a rush of intense embarrassment. “Not significantly.”

“Lady Harker said that you have been prescribed laudanum, but that you refuse to take it.”

“Did she? I am not surprised. My sister has informed me that she told you a great many things in order to lure you here. Most of which are patently untrue.”

“Oh?”

“For one, it may interest you to know that my sister is not in an interesting condition, as she puts it. For another, I do not keep a pistol at my bedside. Nor do I entertain thoughts of blowing my brains out.”

For an instant, Miss Stafford looked stunned. “My goodness,” she said. And then, very slowly, her mouth curved into a smile. A genuine smile, dimples and all. “And to think I thought her a bit silly to begin with.”

“Only a bit?”

“Yet she knew precisely what to say to get me to come here. Worried that you might do something stupid, indeed. And to say that she had found you weeping while clutching a lock of my hair! How gullible I am.”

Sebastian turned a dull red. Curse and confound his sister! Had she really told Sylvia Stafford that? Not that it wasn’t true. He had been weeping and holding a lock of her hair. But the tears had come after waking from a particularly terrible nightmare about the uprising. And he had been holding her lock of hair in his hand because it always calmed him during times of great stress.

“Julia should not have lied to you,” he said. “Not about something like that.”

“I think your sister would say or do anything to help you. You are quite lucky in that regard.”

“Lucky, am I?” One corner of his mouth hitched up as he recollected Julia sprinting from his rooms earlier that afternoon. “When she told me what she had done, I nearly throttled her.”

“I am glad she told you,” Miss Stafford said. “And I am glad things are not as dire as she described them.”

“Is that the only reason you agreed to come? To prevent me from putting a period to my existence?”

“In large part, yes. Though I am not sure what I could have done to prevent it. Especially when you have spent most of my visit avoiding me.” Her fingertips traced absently along the lines of the embroidered seat cushion at her side. “Why did you not join us for dinner this evening?”

Sebastian’s shattered senses sounded a dull warning. He dismissed it as a false alarm. “Because I had a paper to finish for the philosophical society.” It was not entirely a lie. He had spent most of the evening toiling over that blasted paper. “Why? What sinister motive did you assign to me?”

“I thought you did not wish to be in company with me.”

“A foolish assumption.”

“Is it? After how you’ve sneered at me since the day I arrived?”

Sebastian winced. “Have I sneered?”

“You know that you have.”

“Then I must beg your pardon.” What else could he say? That he had sought to punish her for rejecting him? That he had wished to humble her? To show her how little she had meant to him then and how much less she meant to him now?

In the process, he had been more than insulting. He had been purposefully cruel. It had been childish of him and damnably uncivil.