“He is trying to convince me he doesn’t love me anymore,” Constantine murmured late that afternoon in Callum’s study where she sat with Guinevere, Lilias, and Frederica after she’d sent them missives saying she needed them. All three of her friends had been waiting patiently for her to speak since they’d arrived some half hour earlier, but her thoughts were so jumbled she couldn’t work out where to begin, or even exactly how to articulate what she was feeling. And the longer she’d sat here trying to put her thoughts into words, the smaller the room felt and the more it felt like a big hand was pressing upon her chest. She knew suddenly exactly how she felt. Afraid. Afraid that she would not be able to reach him, to make him be honest, but she wasn’t sure why.
“I am almost sure he is trying to convince me he doesn’t love me anymore,” she said again, her friends all staring at her with looks of pity and outrage. “What I don’t know is why.”
“Men are fools,” Frederica announced.
“Of course, they are.” Guinevere gave Frederica a stern look before settling a gentler one on Constantine. “Why don’t you start from the beginning, so we—” she motioned between herself, Lilias, and Frederica “—can help you figure out why Kilgore has taken such an imprudent path.”
Constantine’s stomach turned, making her feel sick. She looked down at her hands, staring at her interlocked fingers. “He admitted that he did love me,” she said, her stomach knotting further. “But he said that man is dead. That the asylum killed him. It could be, I suppose, that he is telling the truth.” She did not want to face the possibility but felt she must at least say it. “It could be that I’m simply seeing that which is not there, because I so badly want it to be, but I don’t think so,” she whispered, her throat aching with the desire to cry. “I think he does love me, but is trying to convince me he doesn’t, and the only reason I can think why he’d do this, is to protect me. But I don’t know why, and I’m starting to fear I will not be able to unravel the secrets he’s hiding. I will not be able to reach him. And then what?” Tears slipped out of her eyes and down her cheeks.
“Darling,” Guinevere said, her voice soothing, “tell us what happened so we can all think through this together.”
Looking up as she dashed away her tears, Constantine nodded. “I did as you both said and procured a flimsy creation from Madame Toussant, which I waited in—freezing, I might add—for hours until Callum returned home. He didn’t get home until near dawn!”
“I shall never wed a lord,” Frederica announced. “They think of no one but themselves, and—”
“Freddy!” Guinevere scolded.
Frederica scowled. “Fine, I’ll hush, but it seems perfectly true to me.”
“Do go on, Constantine. Don’t pay any heed to Frederica,” Guinevere said. “She’s yet to fall in love, so she doesn’t know what she will and will not do.”
Constantine shot Frederica an apologetic look, but her friend simply shrugged as if to say her sister’s scolding didn’t bother her.
“He smelled like a barrel of brandy,” Constantine continued, the room filling with derisive sounds from her friends. “And—” she pressed her fingertips to her face, recalling his battered one “—he had been fighting. His lip was cracked, and his eye was swollen.”
“With whom had he been fighting?” Guinevere asked.
Constantine shrugged. “I don’t know, but he seemed jolly well pleased about having been beaten.”
“Men are so odd,” Frederica said.
Constantine drew her gaze to Frederica, then Guinevere and Lilias. “His hands were battered, too.” She glanced down at her own smooth skin. “What sort of gentlemen fight without gloves?”
“I can think of one,” Frederica said, drawing a surprised look not only from Constantine but from Guinevere, as well. Lilias, however, looked suspiciously as if Frederica’s announcement was not shocking.
“Who?” Guinevere demanded.
“Mr. Beckford. I happen to know for a fact that he has bare-knuckle fights in the cellar of his and Carrington’s club.”
Constantine felt her mouth slip open, as did Guinevere’s. “However do you know that?” Guinevere demanded.
“Well,” Frederica began, “last year, I went on a mission for SLAR that took me to Mr. Beckford’s side of Town, and I was accosted.”
“What!” Guinevere gasped.
Frederica grinned. “Yes. It was quite the adventure.”
“Freddy,” Guinevere groaned. “You are entirely too wild. How will you ever wed if you go about like this?”
Frederica snorted. “You’re a fine one to talk. You went about climbing trees and rescuing women from dangerous rogues in private libraries before you wed Carrington. Now, kindly let me finish.”
Guinevere offered an apologetic look to Constantine. “I’m sorry, dearest. Freddy’s news just surprised me.”
“Me as well,” Constantine said.
“Really!” Lilias exclaimed. “Let us get back to Constantine’s problems at hand. Freddy went on a mission last year, she was accosted, Mr. Beckford and his sister aided her, and apparently Freddy has developed a friendship with…?”
“Oh no. There’s no friendship with Blythe. That’s Mr. Beckford’s sister. She quite dislikes theton. But we have developed an arrangement—a secret one. She aids women in the rookeries in finding a better way of life, and I’ve taken to helping her. Her brother doesn’t know. If he did, I imagine he’d try to put a stop to it. Anyway, during this arrangement, I’ve secretly been inside the Orcus Society and into the cellar where I witnessed men, gentlemen and ruffians alike, fighting bare-knuckled.”
