Page 9 of When a Lady Kisses a Scot
A charlatan with a conscience. Highly unusual.
Gavin studied Sophie beneath hooded lids. In truth,studiedwas not the most accurate word. He couldn’t tear his gaze from her face. Each softly spoken syllable from her perfectly shaped lips drew him in. Her voice had gone low, her words gentle and consoling, harmless, perhaps even merciful. She mesmerized him, a snake charmer luring a hapless serpent to do her bidding. Pity was, she wasn’t even trying.
He’d believed her a natural mountebank, skilled at deception and manipulation, but now he questioned his initial assessment. Certainly, she conjured the right words. Mrs. Linden followed Sophie’s pronouncements with trusting desperation, a starving woman seeking the emotional sustenance contact with her lost son could provide. Sophie doled out that nourishment, but a cost beyond Mrs. Linden’s coin was in the making. The lies flowed smoothly, but tense lines formed around Sophie’s rosebud mouth. The performance did not come easily to her. So why had she involved herself with Trask’s contrived act?
From the corner of his eye, he spied the upended table. Shards of porcelain surrounded the wood. The placement of a carpet at the table’s side seemed a practical touch, exactly the thing to disguise a tripwire tugged at precisely the right moment. The chimes were an even more effective touch. He’d no doubt Trask had hidden a variety of noisemakers in the recesses of the walls. Clever rigging, most likely leading back to the table, would allow him to employ these distractions whenever a client needed additional convincing. Neil Trask had once tread the boards with Junius Booth. No doubt he’d employed many of the tricks he’d learned on the West End stage in his performances conjuring the dead.
An image of Peter Garner formed in his thoughts, churning the now-familiar anger in his gut. If only Sophie’s talents were real. He’d have her ask Peter how he could have done something so blasted, irrevocably foolish as to drown himself in liquor and plunge off a bridge.
Garner had left no note. Only a calling card with Trask’s name and an address on the Strand. In all the years he’d roomed with Peter at Oxford, he’d never known the man to drink to the point of inebriation. Of course, that was before grief—and Trask’s deceptions—had pushed Peter over the edge.
Dragging his thoughts back to the present, his attention settled back on Sophie. She’d offered words of reassurance to Mrs. Linden, then moved on to offer Josiah Cromwell a few tart admonitions from his dearly departed wife. Seeming quite satisfied that his beloved Louise had ventured between realms to nag him about the condition of his socks and his coffers, Cromwell answered Sophie’s pronouncements with the phrase, “Yes, dear” until his wife’s spirit apparently tired of the one-sided discussion and went on her way.
“Esme has grown weary,” Sophie said in a low murmur. Against his will, a smile tugged at Gavin’s mouth. Sophie hadn’t even given him the satisfaction of appearing flustered when he’d carried on about his illicit relationship with her ethereal liaison. She’d deftly created a sensational, if somewhat improbable, earthly romance for dear old Esme, effectively quelling his ridiculous claims.
Pressing her fingertips to her temples, Sophie rubbed small, weary circles over her brow. Her gaze downcast, she sagged against the table.
I suppose a good performance is exhausting. Well done, Miss Devereaux. I almost want to believe you.
“Esme has taken her leave.” Her voice took on a hushed, throaty quality. She glanced up. Was that a shimmer of tears he glimpsed in her velvet brown eyes? A brilliant touch. Sophie was a talented actress, skilled at manipulating emotions. How better to do so than to appear moved herself?
She came to her feet, pressing her palms against the table as if her legs had gone weak. “And now, if you will excuse me, I must also retire for the evening.”
With that, she swept away from the room, whipping the purple curtain out of her way as she made her retreat.
Around the table, those gathered for the night’s events stared after her. Neil Trask cleared his throat. If Sophie’s hasty departure was part of her act, Trask was an even more skilled actor than Gavin had thought. The man’s reddened complexion and bulging eyes betrayed no concern for his liaison to the spirit world, but rather, anger. Apparently, Trask had not planned on concluding this farce on his own.
“As you can see, Miss Devereaux has been quite moved by her interactions with the other realm.” Trask clutched the edge of the table until his knuckles went white. “We shall resume our gathering at the usual time.”
Gavin drummed his fingers against the table. “If I may be so bold, I believe you are forgetting something, Mr. Trask.”
Trask’s grasp on the table eased, if only enough to allow blood to flow to his fingers. “I doubt that is the case.”
“Each of these good people received some communication, some satisfaction of their quest. While I have been shut out entirely, it would seem.”
McNaughton scowled. “Ah, good God, man…perhaps you exhausted the spirit with the talk of your dead trollop.”
Gavin arched his brows in his manufactured indignation. “I’ll have you know Esme was no trollop.”
“I don’t give a damn if she was a bloody nun, all your babbling about your light-skirts likely sent the spirit scurrying off in disgust.” McNaughton punctuated his statement with a contemptuous bark of a laugh. He rose to his full height, challenge brimming in his expression. “Ye got a problem with me saying that?”
Trask stood, his body stiff, as though he feared he’d have to intervene in an altercation between the two men. Gavin smiled to himself. He wasn’t fool enough to take on the behemoth without good reason. Better to let McNaughton think he’d skulk away. Cowardice could prove as effective a diversion as Trask’s collapsing tables and hidden chimes.
Gavin shot the hulk a glance. McNaughton held a good three stone advantage on him, but he was soft in the middle. A tap on the solar plexus would bring the bloke to his knees. But betraying his skill with his fists would serve no purpose other than to provide a fleeting satisfaction. He’d save that for later, once he’d uncovered the truth behind Peter’s death.
He dropped his gaze to his hands, making a show of nervously tapping the table with his fingers. “No. I do not. You do have a point there.” He met McNaughton’s hard stare. “I may have gone on too fondly about my sweetheart.”
McNaughton gave a nod, though his eyes seemed to harden. “If I see you here again, you’ll keep yer bleedin’ mouth shut.”
“Indeed.” The word was like lye on Gavin’s tongue. Next time the rotter threatened him, he’d see that McNaughton regretted it.
Trask’s gaze wandered to the curtain, as if he expected Sophie to reappear. His mouth pulled taut as he turned back to Gavin.
“Miss Devereaux will meet with you tomorrow evening. I assure you, she will make contact. You will obtain the satisfaction you desire.”
Satisfaction. The word brought a decidedly improper vision of Miss Sophie Devereaux into his thoughts. He brushed the all-too-tempting visage away, but the image invaded his thoughts. Damnation, he had no use for any distraction, even one as stimulating as the plump coral lips teasing him in his fantasy. In any case, given the daggers in her doe-eyed gaze, the notion seemed utterly pointless.
He conjured an image of a crone into his mind, all warts and wrinkles and snaggly teeth, as if that would evict the picture of Sophie that had taken up residence in his mind’s eye. He swallowed hard, forcing himself to focus on the task at hand.
