Page 23 of Reflections of Silence

What a sight—though I doubted it was the first time he had come across such a scene. Somewhere in my chest, a tiny monster roared with jealousy at the image of another woman in my husband’s arms.At least he’s not the single monster here,I thought wryly.

I managed to gather the tatters of my dress around me, but my husband had efficiently ripped the whole thing down the middle—no wonder it had come off so easily. Keeping it around my shoulders was nigh impossible, and as Charleton had probably seen more of my naked hide than he’d ever expected, it was a moot point. The Lord above knew what my hair looked like.

Settling for gripping the material to my side and leaving my shoulders bare, I straightened, attempting the pretense of some sort of lady-like posture. Charleton’s face went bright red as he surveyed me, half draped over his employer. His face reflected my suspicions of my hair, but I decided to keep up the pretense anyway.

“What did you need, Charleton?”

The valet’s lips twitched as his color began to return to some semblance of normal—what was considered normal, in this place?—and opened his mouth.

I had no idea what he expected to come out, but the tall, thin man snorted a laugh.

A giggle escaped my lips. I clapped a hand over my mouth, clutching the material tight beneath my armpit, but I couldn’t stop. Both of us doubled with laughter, Charleton clinging to the doorway, me over my husband’s prone body.

Inappropriate, Gella.

I gasped as Sebastian berated me in my head. Charleton stopped laughing, peering around fearfully, his shoulders raised to his ears.

“Did—do you hear him, too?” I whispered, the breath of Sebastian’s apparent powers astounding me.

Charleton nodded, his lips pressed in a thin line, unspeaking.

I took a deep breath.

“Wake up.” I leaned over Sebastian’s still form, but he remained unresponsive. I tapped his face. Not so much as a flicker of his eyelids. Contemplating slapping him harder to see if I could get a reaction, I expected him to open his eyes, scare me as a child does, pretending a hurt.

Hands settled on my—very bare—shoulders, and I jumped a mile.

“Jesu Christus, Charleton,” I swore, looking over my shoulder, crossing myself by habit.

The corners of his mouth turned down. “He won’t wake,” he said softly.

Something inside my head agreed, but I pushed on, my logical brain aware and rearing, finally. “What do you mean, hewon’t wake? He was fine and, um, active an hour ago.”

It was my turn to flush, heat rising from the line of material to above my eyebrows. I wouldn’t have been surprised had steam issues from the top of my head.

“But, madame. The sun is rising. He does not...exist...in the moment of light as it breaks on God’s day.”

Well put.

“It’s morning?” I glanced at the hall behind him, then realized the fruitlessness of the action. “You don’t need to be scared of him, Charleton,” I said, searching for a way to lift the body beneath me.

Sebastian exhibited no sign of life bar the frustrating commentary running through my head. I glanced at Charleton, still checking the room around us.

Actually, he does.

Charleton jumped and scurried from the room.

“Would you stop doing that?” I asked in exasperation, addressing Sebastian’s corpse in front of me. Nothing odd about that, talking to a lifeless body bearing my husband’s likeness beneath me. “You’ve scared the man half to death.”

Why aren’t you afraid, Gella?

“He works for you,” I reminded him, wondering how on earth we were going to move him. Sebastian seemed to have gained hundreds of pounds in his sleep. Death? Charleton’s words came back to me, and doubt began to grow deep inside me.

“Can you blame me?” I snapped, continuing my soliloquy and attempting to tug his shirt over his chest. His broad, well-defined chest. My hands passed over ridges of muscle. I swallowed, tracing outlines of his physique.

Are you quite done?

Desisting in groping the man, I returned to tugging the material over him, and moved to his pants, struggling to get them around his round, firm buttocks.

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