Page 27 of Four Promises to Love

“Not at all.” He leaned back in the hard chair, his feet firmly planted and posture deliberately nonchalant. “I am curious about the spectacle you have planned.”

“It is no spectacle but a journey into the unknown.”

“Having attended your prior performance, I have an idea of what to expect.”

In fact, he thought her assistants must be nearby, pulling strings unseen. He recalled the flickering lights and swaying chandelier from the last séance and wondered what else Seraphina and her little troublemakers had up their sleeves.

“Ah, but this experience will be different. You will not be a spectator but a participant.”

He forced his tensed shoulders to relax. Seraphina was a gifted actress, but she could not summon spirits. His ghosts were private, and they would stay that way.

“I have no desire to commune with spirits,” he said.

“You will not be doing the communing. I will. Unless”—she lifted a brow—“you have reason to fear what the spirits choose to share with me about your past?”

Memories splattered like blood on snow. Ruthlessly, he shoved them aside. His past had nothing to do with what was happening here. This was a ruse, a sham—and he was here to prove it.

He flicked a piece of lint from the sleeve of his frock coat. “It takes more than theatrics to frighten me.”

“If you wish, you may give me the name of a spirit you wish to contact. You saw my success with Mrs. Elmwood’s husband. All I would require is a personal item⁠—”

“Let us drop the pretense, shall we? You and I both know that you can no more converse with the dead than I can sprout wings and fly.”

“My, such certainty. Conviction is the province of cynics, you know.”

“Call me what you will.” He crossed his arms. “I do not carry sentimental tokens. If you wish to convince me of your ‘talent,’ you will have to do so in some other fashion.”

“I sense a certain degree of hostility.”

“And I sense a certain degree of deceit.”

“Very well.” She smiled thinly. “I shall proceed without a personal token.”

She sat with her slender shoulders straight, her eyes resting upon the spirit bowl. She said nothing, her lace-covered hands folded on the table in front of her. Her absolute focus made it seem as if the rest of the room, including him, ceased to exist for her. As the silence stretched, he became aware of his heart thumping against his ribs. Then the chandelier dimmed, so slowly that he questioned his own senses. But no, it was getting darker in the room, the shadows seeming to swirl.

This is not real. This is a trick—a sham.

Suddenly, her hand shot over the table toward him.

“Take my hand,” she said.

Her voice was deeper and sultrier, with a commanding resonance. Anyone could alter their voice, he told himself. Her gaze remained fixed on the spirit bowl, but it was unfocused as if she were looking beyond it. She held out a gloved hand. Reluctantly, he uncrossed his arms and took it. When she linked her fingers with his, he felt a strange leap in his gut.

That leap turned into a jolt when ripples started spreading over the surface of the spirit bowl. He squinted, trying to discern what was causing the disturbance. It had to be a hidden mechanism of some kind⁠—

“An image is coming to me—a gift from the spirit world.” Her voice was tinny and hollow, like it was coming from a distance. “I see you now. I have a sense of…coldness. Swirling around you.”

He stilled, feeling the lash of the winter wind against his cheek, the crunch of ice beneath the thin soles of his boots. A chill ran through him.

She cannot talk to spirits. She is making this up.

“Yes, I have taken a stroll through the London fog,” he said mockingly. “That is a good guess, Seraphina.”

“The spirits are not showing me London but a different place. Somewhere foreign and inhospitable…”

Bleak mountain passes swept through his mind, the cliffs bare as weathered bones. The feeling of exposure clenched his gut: the wind and the cold, nowhere to take shelter. Unlike the English countryside where he’d grown up, there were no trees or hedges, not even a fold in the earth in which a man could hide⁠—

“Yes, I see it more clearly now. This cold, unwelcoming place. You are there for a purpose.”