Page 79 of Atone, Adonis

He’d let Chester out when he knew he shouldn’t. But it had been too much, too hard, to see that look of betrayal on her face. He’d lied to her when he said he wouldn’t. He’d kept secret after secret. And not even important ones. She already knew those.

It was harder than he’d thought, to let her all the way in. To stop using Chester as a shield for his heart. It felt too open and vulnerable, like the very pink skin that grew back after a bad sunburn. He’d protected it the only way he’d known how, like a goddamned coward.

He ran a hand down his face. And then exhaled sharply, only to find Gilbert turning into the corridor.

“Inspector Hughes has arrived, my lord,” he said. “Shall I show him into the morning room?”

Fred nodded once, absently. He found he no longer cared about the Inspector or that someone in his household was leaking information to The Poisoned Quill. He didn’t care about anything, really, that wasn’t his wife and the echoing silence she’d left in her wake. He felt his chest constrict and his breathing go shallow.

“My lord?” Gilbert said again after a moment when Fred hadn’t moved.

“Yes. Quite.” Fred shook his head and gulped in air, trying to clear his mind. And then he followed Gilbert down the hall.

The Inspector arrived a moment later, his gaze already moving about the room as Fred now knew it habitually did.

“Thank you for coming,” Fred said and Hughes narrowed his eyes on him.

“Difficult morning, my lord?”

“You’ve read The Quill, I take it.”

“I have. And unless you did make plans for Mister Farrow to return to Sedgewick Manor, I believe we have our culprit. It was the chef’s letter who insinuated Mister Farrow’s return. Should we make our way to the kitchen?”

“Yes. I suppose we should.”

They may as well, even though it no longer mattered to him. Not without Jules.

Clara was at her station when they entered the kitchen. The room looked as it always did, with the late morning sun streaming through the high window and the scent of stock and herbs wafting over from the large kettle on the hob.

It was, Fred thought, the most orderly room in the house. Peaceful and beautiful in ways he’d always loved, always found comforting. But now, now, he could pick up one of those knives and hurl it straight at the chef without a single moment of hesitation. He glanced at the orderly array of them and considered it. And then he considered setting fire to the whole damned manor house instead.

Except that Hughes was standing next to him, watching him consider those things, and the Inspector’s presence stayed his hand. As did the fact that in the end, this was no one’s fault but his own.

Clara did not look up immediately when they entered. She continued chopping her way through various piles of root vegetables with steady, practiced strokes.

“Miss Clarke,” Hughes said.

Fred watched her closely. She did not seem surprised to find them in the kitchen, though perhaps her movements were jerkier than he might have expected from a practiced chef. And her knife strokes were landing closer to her fingertips than was prudent.

“My lord, Inspector,” she finally greeted them.

“I must pass on my thanks,” Hughes said, voice as mild and calm as always. “Inadvertent though your actions might have been.”

Clara’s knife did pause then for a moment before she scraped the sliced turnips into a pile and began on the carrots. “I don’t know what you mean, sir.”

“I think you do.” Hughes stepped further into the room. “You have worked here for how long, Miss Clarke?”

“Here in Dorset? I’ve just come down this spring when my lord moved from London.”

“And before that?”

“Seven years with Lord Chester. Five with the previous Earl.”

“Ah.” Hughes nodded. “Thank you.”

And then the Inspector fell quiet and just…stared. Fred didn’t immediately understand what he was doing, but then he clocked how nervous Clara became under his gaze. It only took a few minutes for her hands to begin to tremble. Another before she squirmed. And then she reached up with a sleeve and wiped perspiration from her forehead.

He had to squelch a smile. The Inspector was letting her marinate in her own nerves and guilt.