Page 43 of The Beautiful Ones

“No. Gratitude is a debt, and you have reason enough to fear debts.”

He turned and disappeared into the darkness of the courtyard, leaving behind the bitter scent of frozen earth and crushed gardenias.

The kitchen slowly warmed.

Dinah snatched my hands and examined my face as if Warren might have left some injury she could not see.

“Go to your room,” she said. “Bolt the door.”

“You believe a bolt will stop them?”

“No.” Her fingers tightened around mine. “But sometimes doing a useless thing is better than standing still.”

I left her beside the dying hearth and began climbing the servants' staircase.

At the second landing, the air changed.

It did not become cold. It grew sweet.

The fragrance of gardenias gathered around me until each breath tasted of white petals left too long in water. Octavia Fairhaven sat upon the sill of the narrow landing window, though I had heard no footsteps and could not imagine how she had reached it before me. Moonlight poured through her cream nightdress, making her appear almost translucent.

She held my tin cup in one gloved hand.

I had left it hidden behind the kitchen pitcher.

“My cousin admires you,” she said.

“Your cousin frightens me.”

“The two conditions are not incompatible.”

I moved toward the wall, leaving as much space between us as the narrow staircase allowed.

Octavia turned the cup slowly. “Warren Dewey offered to purchase your contract.”

“I heard him.”

“He would not have freed you. Men like Warren confuse possession with generosity.”

“And the Fairhavens do not?”

Her pink mouth curved.

“We are more honest about the distinction.”

She rose from the sill. The lace hem of her nightdress did not stir against the floorboards.

“Three years remain,” she said. “One hundred and fifty-seven Sundays marked upon your wall. A very long time for a young woman who crosses out each week as though she were tunneling from a prison.”

My skin prickled.

“Adrian told you.”

“Adrian does not need to tell me what you desire.”

She extended the tin cup toward me.

Inside it lay a silver coin stamped with a crowned head I did not recognize.