Page 42 of The Lost Letter: A Victorian Romance

The thought was devastating.

And yet it made a great deal of sense.

She had told him that she had been very green and very stupid. She had apologized for her over exuberance. And she had said that she was deathly ashamed even to think of what she had written to him then.

Sebastian clenched his fist until his hand ached. It did not make a difference now, he told himself. She did not want him. Not even if it meant she might become a countess. She would prefer to remain a servant rather than spend one more moment in his company.

It was because of his scars, he had no doubt. Because she could not get over the horror of what had happened to his face. Because she found him ugly. Repulsive.

“How dear you were to me,” she had whispered as she touched his cheek.

The single sentence had been playing over and over in his head for the past two days. He had been deeply affected when she murmured it to him in the library, spurred on to take her in his arms and passionately kiss her. It was only now, in the painful aftermath of her flight back to London, that he understood the true significance of her words.

“How dear you were to me.”

She had spoken in the past tense. A fact he would have registered instantly if he had not been so undone by the sweetness of her caresses and the heady perfume of her warm, violet scented skin.

The past tense, Sebastian thought bitterly, because her feelings for him were in the past.

Nevertheless, if Milsom found some sort of proof about Sir Roderick’s role in subverting her letters, Sylvia would have to be informed. She needed to know the truth about what had happened every bit as much as Sebastian needed to know himself.

He would not see her again, of course. He would not force his attentions where they were not wanted. And a journey to London was out of the question. Just imagining the reaction those in society would have to the sight of his face was enough to sap his courage.

No. He would not go to London. When he learned what Milsom had discovered, he would relay it to Sylvia in a letter. One final letter explaining all he knew of what had happened three years ago.

It would be a suitable ending to this whole painful affair.

Sebastian woke in the morning to the sound of Milsom moving about the room. He was making an ungodly racket. Clanging the water can against the washbasin, clattering the shaving implements, and unnecessarily flapping Sebastian’s shirts about.

“Quiet, damn you!” Sebastian growled at him. “And shut those blasted curtains! Are you trying to blind me in both eyes?”

Unperturbed, Milsom brought him a tray on which sat a single glass filled with a brownish liquid. Sebastian recognized it at once as one of his valet’s noxious tonics, guaranteed to alleviate the aftereffects of a night of heavy drinking. With a scorching oath, he drank it down and thrust the empty glass back into Milsom’s hand.

An hour later, Sebastian was up, washed, dressed, and for the first time in three days, clean-shaven. Milsom had accomplished the whole with an infuriatingly smug expression. “Out with it,” Sebastian ordered as he knotted his cravat.

“My lord?”

“You’ve been three days in London, Milsom. Unless you’ve expended the whole of it jug bitten in a tavern or unconscious in a brothel, I expect you have spent your time attempting to question Harriet Button.”

“Quite so, but I was not entirely sure you would wish to know, my lord. Lady Harker has informed me that Miss Stafford left three days ago. And that you have since been confined to your apartments” —he cleared his throat— “drinking the cellar dry, I believe my lady said.”

“I intend to write Miss Stafford,” Sebastian replied coldly. He met Milsom’s eyes in the mirror of his dressing table. “And when I do, I should like to have the full story. If you know it, Milsom, pray spit it out before I must assist you in doing so.”

Milsom was impervious to threats. “As you say, my lord.” He busied himself clearing away the shaving implements. “I did speak with Miss Button. It was not an easy interview to arrange.”

“Hence the three days.”

“Precisely so, my lord. Miss Button is almost always in company with Lady Ponsonby. I observed them for the first two days, awaiting an opportunity to approach, but it was not until yesterday that Miss Button set out on her own. She went to a chemist in Bond Street. I ventured to speak to her—a course of action which was not, initially, well received.”

“I trust that the purse I gave you was of some help.”

“It was an immense help, my lord.”

“Well?” Sebastian prompted. “What did the confounded woman say?”

“Miss Button told me that Miss Stafford did, indeed, write to you. Twice a week for over half a year, she said. Once a week to follow. There were, according to Miss Button, nearly one hundred letters in total.”

Sebastian’s hands stilled on his cravat. He inhaled deeply. “Go on.”