Page 54 of Fiendish Delights
Slim hissed a warning under his breath while Hugo and Gordon stayed quiet. ‘Hello?’ I asked.
Hester raised her head weakly. ‘Yeah, spill the beans. Even I can work out something is wrong, and I’m at death’s door.’
The awkward silence stretched out, but sooner or later somebody would break it. Normally, I’d have kept my curiosity to myself – everyone deserved to keep their secrets – but thisparticular secret could jeopardise our treasure hunt if this tension continued.
It was Gordon who sighed heavily and started to explain. ‘Several years ago I was hired to do a job that Hugo didn’t approve of. That’s all.’
‘What you do is your business.’ Hugo’s knuckles were white as he gripped the steering wheel more tightly. ‘You are free to choose whatever job you want.’
Gordon snorted but didn’t say anything else. For goodness’ sake. ‘That’s not a lot of information to go on,’ I protested.
‘Never a truer word was spoken,’ Hugo muttered.
Gordon sat up. ‘Just because there’s not a lot of information doesn’t mean it’s not worth investigating.’
‘How long has it been since you started? Seven years? What have you actually discovered in that time?’
I blinked. The last time I’d heard Hugo sound so bitter was when he’d discovered I was a spider’s silk addict.
‘Not much,’ Gordon answered.
Hugo sniffed. ‘Well, then. You should stop taking Grace’s money and let the matter lie. Lady Rose is dead. Nobody knows what happened or who killed her – but my family certainly had nothing to do with it.’
My eyes widened. Whoa.
‘I can confirm that I have found no evidence that suggests your family was connected with her disappearance,’ Gordon said.
‘See?’
‘And no evidence that exonerates them either,’ he added bravely.
Otis and Hester were now fully awake, their hangovers forgotten. ‘What are you talking about?’ Otis asked, wide-eyed. ‘Who’s Lady Rose?’
‘Why did Hugo’s family kill her?’ Hester whispered.
‘They didn’t,’ Hugo snapped. A muscle ticked in his jaw. ‘The Assigney family own the land next to Pemberville Castle. Our families have never been … friendly. Thirty years ago Rose, the sole heir to the Assigney fortune, disappeared. One day she was there, the next day she wasn’t. Nobody knows what happened to her.
‘My parents had tried to reach out to her in the weeks before her disappearance to smooth things over and bury the hatchet. They’d visited her a few times but she wasn’t interested in speaking to them. They kept trying, however. They were the last people to see her alive.’
Whoa again. ‘So there’s a suggestion that your mum and dad killed her?’ No wonder they tended to stay out of the country.
‘It’s a stupid rumour.’
I wondered if there was any truth in it. As if he were reading my mind, Hugo growled, ‘They did not do it.’
‘For the record,’ Gordon said, ‘I was hired by Rose’s great-aunt, Grace Assigney, to find her – dead or alive. I was not hired to establish the guilt or innocence of any party.’
I was starting to understand. ‘But your involvement and your investigation has stoked the rumours and stirred up bad feelings.’
‘Not deliberately. Lady Rose deserves to be found. When she is, we can establish what happened to her and that could put your family in the clear once and for all.’
‘There’s been no trace of her for thirty years,’ Hugo said. ‘She’s gone. The work you’ve done over the past seven years has been pointless.’ He paused. ‘Unless you’ve discovered something you’re not telling us?’
Gordon was silent and I turned around to look at him. ‘I’ve found nothing,’ he said eventually. ‘Only a series of dead ends.’
‘Because there’s nothing to find,’ Hugo said. ‘And there never will be.’
My stomach clenched uneasily. So even high elves had skeletons in their closets. I managed not to say that out loud; it wouldn’t have been a wise move.
