by Calia Read
Against my better judgment, I find myself nodding.
“LIVINGSTON, I NEED your help.”
Livingston, who is talking to some blonde, gives me a quick look. “I’m a bit preoccupied right now.”
I lean in. “It’s urgent.”
He gives the blonde a sultry smile and holds up a finger before he turns toward me. His smile disappears, and he looks exasperated. “What could you possibly want?”
“I’m sorry to interrupt this love connection of yours, but I just want to know if you can take me back to Belgrave later.”
“When is later?”
“I don’t know. An hour or two from now?”
“That means I’d be gone for an hour but still have enough time to come back here,” Livingston mutters. I clear my throat, and he glances at me. “Where’s your snappish husband?”
“He left.”
Livingston’s brows lift. “Without you?”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
I sigh. “Because Nat was tired and I wanted to stay.”
“So you could bother me?”
“Look, the quicker you answer, the quicker you can get back to blondie.”
On cue, Blondie shoots him a sultry look that has him hooked.
“Yes, I’ll take you home,” he replies instantly, giving Blondie a devastating smile.
“Are you sure?”
“Of course,” he says before he stalks back toward his flavor of the moment. I could’ve asked him for a kidney and a million dollars, and he would’ve agreed.
With that done, I exhale loudly, look around the room, and begin to strategically smile at this person and say hi to that person. I do laps around the room, waiting until Livingston is distracted enough to stop glancing my way. Then I can slip into the hall and find Asa’s office.
Asa Calhoun is a successful man. Better yet, he’s an arrogant man. I’m hard-pressed to believe he wouldn’t have a place in his home where he could relax with some brandy or a cigar and muse over his greatness.
After my fourth lap around the parlor, I say hi to one of Étienne’s employees, Edward. He has kind eyes and a sincere smile that always puts me at ease. Every time I see him, his glasses are cockeyed, and I have to fight the urge to straighten them.
For a moment, I take in the room and the people inside it. From the dresses to the furniture and lighting, everything about this time has a romanticism attached to it that I’ll probably never get used to.
I glance at Livingston, leaning against the wall. The drink in his hands is almost empty. I’m clear across the room, but even I can tell he’s tipsy.
Now is my time to move.
I slip out of the room without anyone the wiser. Could be that most people have drunk so much they’re perilously close to being wasted. A man to my left laughs uproariously. No one is around him. He heavily slumps against the wall, his drink spilling onto the floor. Yep. Drunk and possibly crazy. But I’m okay with that; it makes sneaking into Asa’s office all the easier.
Their voices become faint as I move down the hallway. Asa’s home is impressive, similar in design of the Old Serene’s parents’ home. Three stories high with the narrow side facing the road. Typically a piazza runs the length of the house, and rooms are spread out across each floor.
I doubt Asa’s office is on the third floor. Second? Maybe. When Étienne and I stepped into the foyer, we were directed to the left, where the dinner party was located. The whole time, I kept in the back of my head that there was a closed door to the right.
That door is now fifteen steps ahead of me. My body tingles in anticipation. I quicken my steps but remind myself to slow down. If anyone’s behind me, I need to make it look as if I’m taking a small breather from the party.
Then up ahead of me, I hear crying. It’s so soft, so indiscernible, at first I think it’s in my head. But the sound becomes more distinct. I step into the foyer and see a blonde sitting against the wall. The round foyer table and massive floral arrangement partially obscure her from view.
I look around to see if anyone else might swoop in and help her, but there’s no one. I’m half-tempted to walk past her, but then she lifts her head and makes direct eye contact with me.
I could continue moving down the hall as if I hadn’t seen her, but that would be a huge bitch move on my part.
I take a few steps in her direction. When I’m close enough, I awkwardly clear my throat. “Are you okay?”
She straightens her bony shoulders and attempts to wipe her tears with shaking hands before she looks at me. “Yes. I-I’m just having a bad night.”
I’ve become so accustomed to the Charlestonian accent that it takes me a second to fully absorb her English accent. It’s such a stark contrast that I find myself leaning closer. “We’ve all been there. If I had a tissue, I’d give it to you,” I finally reply.
“That’s quite all right. It’s the thought that counts.”
The two of us stand there stiffly as we try to fill the silence. There’s something familiar about her.
I speak first. “Is it a guy problem?”
She blinks rapidly, her lashes fluttering like butterfly wings. She seems hesitant to answer and looks at the pine floors, then back at me. “Yes, it is.”
I move closer and slide down the wall until my butt hits the floor. I want to cross my legs, but this dress is too uncomfortable. Instead, I mimic her posture. I’m not the best at small talk or breaking awkward silences, but dear God, this lady makes me look outgoing. I drum my fingers on the floor and exhale. “Look, you don’t have to tell me, but—”
My words are cut short when I glance at her left wrist. It bears four narrow lines in red with an undertone of blue. I’m sure if she turned her wrist around, I’d see one more line to complete the handprint. She goes to tuck a strand of hair behind her ear but freezes when she sees what I’m staring at.
She drops her hand like a dead-weight in her lap.
It’s none of my business. I don’t even know this woman. I should give her privacy and pretend I didn’t see a thing. Yes, privacy is probably what she wants. But who am I kidding?
“Did he do this to you?” I ask bluntly.
Immediately, she crosses her arms. Her bruised wrist disappears. “Yes.” She sighs. “He did.”
My brows raise; her willingness to tell the truth is the last thing I expected. I look at my laced fingers, mulling over what to say next. Suddenly, it occurs to me why she’s so familiar. She was one of the many ladies Livingston flirted with tonight. “Did Livingston do this to you? If he did, I could kick his ass for you. Do you want me to?”
“No! It wasn’t Livingston!” she says urgently. “It was someone else.”
“Are you married to this guy?”
She looks at me from the corner of her eye and shakes her head. “No… no, I am not.”
I want to ask her who he is, but I don’t want to break the moment. We’re sharing a sense of anonymity that brings a sense of freedom with it. We don’t know each other and have no clue whether we’ll ever cross paths again.
“Do you love him?” I ask.
She smiles faintly. “I suppose I do. When he does this, though…”
I find myself nodding and leaning in, anxious to hear what she’s going to say.
She sighs loudly before she closes her eyes and gently taps her head against the wall. “It’s impossible to explain my situation.”
“That’s okay. You don’t have to.”
Once again, she becomes silent and remains unmovable, her eyes still closed.
“If you want some privacy, I can leave,” I offer.
Her eyes flash open. “No. Stay. I appreciate your company more than you know.”
Longingly, I glance toward the hallway, straining to hear any footsteps heading this way. I settle back against the wall and stare forward.
Seconds pass before the woman softly clears her throat. “I know you’re wondering if he’s done this before.”
&n
bsp; I turn my head in her direction. I could lie, but what’s the point? “I am, but you don’t need to explain to me. Just know that weak is the man who hurts a woman.”
The lady’s lips slightly part and she stares at me.
“I know it’s none of my business, so take everything I say with a grain of salt. He sounds like a complete piece of shit. And you seem like a great girl. It sounds cliché, but you deserve better. You know that. Right?”
By the time I finish my corny speech, her eyes are a bit glassy. Her mouth opens, but before she can utter a word, a door slams somewhere within the house. Her eyes widen imperceptibly, and she jumps to her feet. I follow her. Shit. Is the guy who did this still here?
“I should be going.”
“Are you sure?”
She nods and casts a furtive glance toward the party.
In an act of desperation, I grab her hand. “Do you need a ride somewhere? Granted, I won’t be the one driving, but I’ll drag Livingston’s horny ass out of the ballroom and make him take you wherever you need to go.”
She gives me another appreciative smile before she moves toward the front door. “No, I assure you, I’ll be fine.”
“I’m sorry.” What for? I don’t know; the words just slipped out of my mouth before I could think twice.
She gives my arm a small squeeze. “You have nothing to be sorry for. Thank you for keeping me company.”
I watch her slip out of the front door, and I stand there for a few seconds, trying to figure out what the hell happened. Should I go after her and make sure she’s okay? Something tells me that if I tried, she would rebuke my efforts once again. The honest and sincere moment we had has been broken.
Sighing loudly, I shake my head. I need to focus on the task at hand—finding his office and searching it.
The hallway is empty, so I hurry toward the closed door mere steps away. When my hand curls around the knob, I brace myself for the door to be locked. Surprisingly, there’s a small click, and the door creaks open. Instead of basking in this minor stroke of luck, I creep into the room and shut the door.
Asa Calhoun’s office isn’t much different then Étienne’s, from the plush Tabriz carpet to the linenfold oak paneling. What, does everyone in this time have the same interior decorator?
The desk is directly in front of me. The only thing that sets his office apart from Étienne’s is the fact that Asa’s isn’t nearly as organized. Papers are haphazardly strewn across the surface. A fountain pen with the cap tossed aside bleeds black ink onto a blank document.
I don’t know where to search first or what to look for, and I know I don’t have much time before Livingston finally looks around the parlor and realizes I’m not there. Or until Asa decides to visit his office. I hurry across the room, sit behind the desk, and frantically scour the papers dispersed across the desk. Most of them are correspondences. So far, there’s nothing of interest in plain sight.
I move on to the drawers.
The narrow drawer in the middle opens up immediately, but it’s filled with office supplies, matches, and a pair of wire-rimmed spectacles. The two drawers on the left are locked. So is the upper drawer on the right. As I reach the bottom right drawer, I touch the back of my hair to fish out a hairpin. It’s a long shot, but I have to at least try to get into the drawers. I become so preoccupied with untangling strands of hair from the pin that it takes me a few seconds to realize that the bottom drawer has opened right up. Immediately, I abandoned the pin and riffle through the drawer. Unsurprisingly, it’s filled to the hilt with papers and more papers.
Wedged between the papers in a ledger of some sort. I lean in to get a better look as I lift a stack of documents and place it on my lap. The spine is a dark red, and the front and back are black. I thumb through it, and I’m only a few pages in when I realize it’s an accounting ledger. Every single page is filled with transactions and balances. It dates all the way back to September 3rd, 1911 and stops on April 12th, 1912. The day I arrived.
The hairs on the back of my neck stand up.
The ledger is incredibly detailed, yet all this proves is that Asa Calhoun is a competent accountant. As I skim through the ledger a second time, I notice small, impeccable writing at the very top of one of the pages. It takes me a few seconds before I realize it’s the name of Étienne’s company and the words “Copy Two.”
Copy two? How many copies of this ledger are there and why?
“If you come this way, we can speak in more depth in my—”
My head jerks up.
“Shit,” I hiss and hastily shove all the papers back into the drawers before I slam it shut.
Frantically, I hunt for a good place to hide. There are no closets. The curtains aren’t an option. I could hide behind the desk, but that’s too great of a risk. My heart slams against my ribcage, desperately seeking a way out of this situation. Just like me.
I turn to the right, look past the painting on the wall, and see the windows. I do a double take. The windows facing the front of the house are the narrow latticed kind. Shimmying out of them would be impossible. But the ones behind the desk are casement windows with glass panes in the shape of diamonds. My hands shake as I lean the ledger against the window and unlock the fastener. There’s a soft rush of air and the hinges squeak in protest as the window opens inward.
I snatch the ledger and lean out the window to see how far the drop is. Not bad at all. The worst that can happen is I’ll get a few scratches from the hedges, but I’ll take that over getting caught in Asa’s office any day.
Without a second thought, I drop the ledger into the shrubbery, where it softly lands. I grab the hem of my dress and draw the material up to my knees. I extend my left leg out the window, then I’m awkwardly straddling the windowsill. When I twist my body to the left, the right sleeve of the dress becomes snagged on the side paneling of the window and tears. There’s no time to look it over because Asa’s voice is getting louder and louder. He’s seconds away from opening the door.
Unceremoniously, I jump from the window. That’s a bit of a stretch. More like fall in a giant heap onto the ground. Hastily, I scramble away from the shrub poking my left side and blindly pat the ground around me for the ledger. A few seconds later, I find it. Right as Asa’s office door opens.
His booming voice drifts toward me. I want to eavesdrop and find out who he’s speaking with, but I don’t want to be discovered. So as quietly as possible, I scoot back until my butt and shoulder blades touch the stucco. The plaster is cold against my skin, giving me goose bumps as I move away from the window.
It’s only when I’m mere steps away from the backyard that I stop and take a deep breath. I close my eyes, tip my head back against the stucco, and smile triumphantly.
I didn’t think it would work. I thought Étienne would be suspicious of me wanting to stay. I thought I’d be thwarted from even getting the chance to enter Asa’s office, let alone searching the space.
But I did, and I succeeded.
I open my eyes and glance at the ledger. I have no idea if what I stole from Asa’s office implicates him in anything, but it’s all I’ve got to go on at this point. To be sure my eyes didn’t deceive me, I open up the ledger and look at the last logged transaction. It still says April 12th, 1912.
That isn’t a coincidence. It has to mean something. Has to.
As my adrenaline high wears off, I come to my feet and try to fix my dress, although it’s useless; I look like I’ve been drug behind a semi. There are dirt stains everywhere and equal tears to match. If anyone asks, I’ll say I tripped walking down the porch steps. I don’t think it’ll pass, but I’ll use it anyway. After dusting off my hands, I grab the ledger and head toward the front of the house.
“Coming from someone who’s jumped from a balcony and a handful of windows, your technique was all wrong.”
Gasping, I whirl around and see Livingston a few steps away. How did I not hear him? His arms are crossed, and he’s wearing that playful smi
rk. He’s the picture of good-natured and mischievous, but his eyes keep volleying between the path I came from and the notebook I’m tightly clutching to my chest.
I could tell Livingston that it’s not what he thinks and offer up some farfetched alibi. But he’s probably used every excuse known to man.
I fake a yawn and rub one of my eyes. “I’d love to stay and chat, but it’s getting late. I should be going.” I start walking toward the front entrance until Livingston’s words stop me in my tracks.
“What were you doing in Asa’s office?”
There’s a good chance Livingston will immediately go back and tell Étienne what he saw. I can’t afford to let that happen, so I turn around and face Livingston.
“I don’t trust Asa,” I admit.
“So you decided to break into his office?”
“No. I mean… yes.” I take a deep breath. “I want to make sure that he’s not doing anything… wrong behind Étienne’s back.”
“Even if he was, why would you care?”
“I know you think I don’t care about your brother, but you have it all wrong. I do care. I care a lot,” I say softly.
That wipes the smile off Livingston’s face. His lips go into a firm line and his eyes narrow. He’s never looked more like Étienne. He moves closer and peers at me intently. “I accept that you and Étienne have a unique marriage. Nat accepts it. Your friends accept it. The staff at Belgrave accept it. But what I can’t accept is you cruelly pretending to care for my brother because you’re bored.”
“Is that what you think?” I ask. “That I’m bored?”
He crosses his arms. “Isn’t that always the case?”
He doesn’t know who you are. He’s simply judging you on who he thinks you are, I tell myself over and over, trying to calm down. But it doesn’t have the desired effect. “Look, Livingston, I understand that I’ve made some mistakes in the past.”
He arches a brow in disbelief and gives me a stare that says, “Ya think?”