Page 90 of His Wicked Charm

“A priest’s clothes?”

“Yes, the vestment that’s worn over the cassock. But obviously not a normal priest’s surplice.” Lilah ran her hand over the embroidered triskeles on the shoulders, one on each side and a third one high on the back. Multiple spirals were sewn down the left side of the robe.

“What do you want to wager there are twenty-seven of these spirals on the front?” Con asked. “Three times three times three.”

Con folded the garment and handed it to Lilah, then rummaged in the trunk again. “There are two more robes in here. Aha. And here are some candles. Ceremonial, I’d guess. Some books.”

“If this was where they stored their paraphernalia, they would be likely keep the key in here, too, wouldn’t they?”

“One hopes. We need to take everything out of this trunk and examine it.” He cast a glance around the dusty room. “But not here.”

“You’re right. I’ll tell Ruggins to have it brought up to—where should we do this? The library?”

“How about Sir Jasper’s billiards room?” Con suggested.

“The smoking room?” Lilah asked, surprised.

“Yes. It’s one of the few rooms in this house that actually has a key. I think we may want to lock these things up.” He delved into the trunk again and came up with two small bundles of papers, wrapped round with ribbons. “But these, I think, we’ll take up and look at now.”

“Letters?”

“Hopefully very informative letters.” Con handed her one of the bundles, returning the surplice to the trunk.

Lilah hurried back up the stairs, filled with anticipation. She wondered if this was what Con felt when he was on the trail of a clue in one of his investigations. She could understand why he enjoyed it. The hunt was exhilarating.

Inside the smoking room, Con shucked off his jacket as he was wont to when he began work. Lilah watched him roll up his sleeves, and heat curled deep inside her in response to the sight, just as it had the other day. But now she knew what lay beneath his clothes, the pleasures hinted at.

She remembered the different textures of his skin—his stomach smooth as satin, the firm, fleshy nipples, the prickle of hair on his chest—and she remembered, too, that intriguing way the hair narrowed to a thin line leading downward. She thought of her forefinger trailing down it.

As if feeling her gaze, Con looked over at her. His face shifted subtly. “If you continue to look at me that way, we’d better lock the door.”

For a moment, Lilah was tempted to do just that, which went to prove how very deeply she was in trouble, but she recovered her wits and shook her head. Con sat down on the floor and untied the ribbon on his bundle, spilling the letters out in front of him. Con had a peculiar propensity for sitting on the floor, but she could see the sense in it here. She sat down beside him and began to go through her batch of letters in a more orderly fashion, laying them out in neat piles beside her.

“All these are from Sabrina’s grandfather Emory.”

“Mine are from Bertram Dearborn.” Con looked at his much smaller stack. “Clearly our Bertie was not much of a correspondent.” He watched her organize her letters. “Tell me, what are you doing?”

Lilah looked up. “Separating them by dates. I’m putting the ones dating from before Ambrose’s book in one pile, the much later ones in another, and these are the ones from right around the beginning of the Brotherhood.” She frowned at his grin. “What are you laughing at?”

“Not laughing, sweet Lilah. I just enjoy watching you work. You’re so orderly.” He reached out to take her hand and bring it up to kiss.

Lilah couldn’t suppress the little shiver that ran through her at the touch of lips on her skin, but she covered with a tart response. “Yours, I see, are rather more haphazard.” She nodded at the pile spread out in front of him.

He kissed her hand again and released it, then turned back to his task, plucking out a letter from the pile and scanning it rapidly. Lilah, too, began to read, starting with the letters around the first dates in the book.

“I found something,” Lilah announced triumphantly. “This is from Emory at Oxford. He talks about school, but then he says how much he’s looking forward to the holiday and ‘going on a lark with you and Bertie.’” She added her own emphasis to the last few words. “And he wonders whether they will ‘stumble over any skeletons down there.’”

“Sounds like they were going down into the dungeons, doesn’t it? We may have to check it again. Perhaps we should take more lanterns.”

Lilah returned to her stack. “Emory starts writing again after he returns to Oxford. He references their ‘discovery.’ So they found it between—” she checked the dates of the two letters “—December 5, 1840, and January 19, 1841. The first recorded date in my grandfather’s book was in June of 1841.”

“It took Ambrose a few months to cook up his theories and start conducting ceremonies. They found it close to the winter solstice. So that might be why they decided to tie the ceremonies to those four times. What does he say about their discovery?”

“Nothing helpful. He doesn’t say what it is or where they found it.” Lilah handed Con the letter and picked up another. “Here he’s making plans to ‘try it again.’ That’s three months later.”

“Here’s one from Bertie—the man was not good about dating his missives. He goes on and on about how his luck at the tables has changed.” He scanned a few more pages. “This one calls the idea of the keys a ‘bang-up notion.’ Next he’s talking about an investment and attributing it to—I’m not sure of this word—Mattie, I think.”

“Matres, perhaps?” Lilah answered. “Emory has a pretty long discourse on Ambrose’s theory about ‘Matres’ in this letter. Wasn’t that in the book?”