Page 91 of Rules for Ruin

“And my daughter mentioned that you and Mr. Royce were both absent again during the musicale. Not to mention his behavior toward you at Cremorne Gardens. He carried you off, my daughter claims.” He patted Effie’s hand. “You wouldn’t like to have your name linked to his, would you, my dear?”

“Rather it should be linked to someone else’s?”

“If you are so inclined,” he said. “You’re a charming girl. Choose your course correctly, and the future will be yours to make.”

“A tempting proposition,” Effie murmured. “I shall certainly think on it.” With that, she deftly slipped her fingers free of his, reaching to turn another page. The same fragrance stirred. But this time it wasn’t the bewilderingly familiar scent that demanded her attention. It was something else. Her eye was caught by a scrap of Latin at the top right corner of the page.

It was no medieval text. It had been added much later. The ink was still dark, the handwriting starkly familiar.

Donum meum tibi

in coniugii nostri vigilia.

—E.W.

Effie’s gaze jerked to Lord Compton’s face. He was staring at the inscription, too, a deep groove forming between his brows. He appeared as confounded by its presence as she was. Indeed, if his expression was to judge, he had never seen it before in his life.

And perhaps he hadn’t, if he’d never read the books in their entirety.

If he had, he would have found Miss Corvus’s message to him years ago. She had obviously expected him to. She’d likely assumed he would treasure this collection, would read it from beginning to end multiple times, just as she had assuredly done. For they were her books, weren’t they?

Effie recognized it in the exact instant she recognized the elusive fragrance. It was the same faint scent that had lingered among the black cloth–draped surfaces and crumbling dried flowers of Miss Corvus’s private quarters at the Academy. The perfume of a long-ago sweetness turned acrid by betrayal.

“My gift to you on the eve of our marriage,” Effie read aloud in a tone of affected bewilderment. “Signed E. W.”

They were the same letters the Academy girls had been taught to transpose in their samplers. Remnants of who Miss Corvus had been before Compton had destroyed her. The W was surely for Wingard. Effie could only guess at what the E might stand for.

“Was this written by one of your distant ancestors, my lord?” she asked.

“Yes,” he said after a tense moment. “Someone long dead, presumably. I shall see about having it expunged.”

“You don’t approve of sentiment?”

“I don’t approve of someone defacing my books,” he said tightly.

But the medieval collection wasn’t his. It had never been his. Miss Corvus had given it to him as an early wedding gift, hadn’t she? And he had kept it, the blackguard, just as he’d kept control of her fortune.

It may not be a compromising letter or a trove of damning documents, but it was proof of their former connection. Proof he’d accepted a costly gift from Miss Corvus in exchange for his promise to marry her. At minimum, that must at least be breach of contract, mustn’t it?

Effie had to send a sampler to the Academy without delay. In the meanwhile…

“Pray don’t attempt to have the writing expunged, my lord,” she said. “It would only ruin the book and decrease the collection’s value.”

Lord Compton’s mouth pursed with displeasure at the prospect. “It would be a risk,” he conceded.

“One far too great to take. Ill-advised as well. That inscription is part of your history now. And one’s history can never truly be erased, can it? No matter how much we might wish it to be.” Carefully closing the book, Effie rose from her seat. There was no more point in remaining, not when she’d found such a seemingly valuable piece of information. “Forgive me, I must return to Brook Street.”

He stood. “So soon?”

“I fear I have already lingered too long.”

“Nonsense. Lady Belwood can surely spare you for a few moments more.” He moved toward her, coming as close as the hem of her crinoline would allow. “There are nine books remaining in my collection, and I am presently at liberty to show them to you. I can’t promise when I will be so again.”

Effie backed away from him. “You are too generous, sir. But it’s not my hostess I’m thinking of. It is my own obligations.” Inclining her head to him in curt farewell, she turned in a swish of violet-sprigged organdy and swiftly exited the library.

She had a great deal of sewing to do.

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