“Someone tried to get into the room last night,” Lisette told Severine. “Which was terrifying. Then later, your dog sat up and stared at the wall until I was sure I had gone mad.”
“Did he?” Severine asked. “As though there were rats in the walls?”
“Or a ghost!” Lisette laughed nervously and then added, “I don’t think I am being paid enough for this madness.”
“You aren’t,” Severine agreed. “Where did Anubis find the rats?”
Lisette gestured and Severine snorted. “It must have been terrifying. And was I snoring?”
“You were. Why aren’t you scared?”
Severine grinned and then admitted, “I spent the last half-dozen years in an electric-less nunnery. I suppose it’s quite terrifying to find yourself alone in the dark with a useless heap snoring next to you, but Sister Sophie did snore so. We had different cells, but her snore carried through the wing.”
Lisette stared at Severine. “Have you gone mad, cher? It wasn’t just dark. Someone was trying to get in. You were drugged. Someone means you ill.”
“Or they want this?” Severine said, lifting the envelope that had been tucked under her pillow. “I must find a good hiding place for these.” Severine sighed. “I would give a limb for coffee that I thought might not be drugged.”
“Good luck with that.” Lisette scowled. “I saw Mr. Brand give you that after dinner. Anyone could have seen, too. But you were drugged during dinner. So maybe that isn’t what they want.”
Severine considered. “I am not at my best, it seems. You are right. So, more likely is that they wanted something else.”
“Something,” Lisette said, “that required you helpless.”
Severine shivered despite herself. There were options there, she realized, and the taking of those keys were the most innocent of them.
“What is it going to be?” Lisette snapped, her eyes flashing with a concerned fury. “A pillow over the face while you’re sleeping? Another murder? A rape by those cousins of yours who want your money?”
Severine placed her hand over her stomach. “Coffee?”
Lisette’s mouth dropped. “I won’t be responsible for your death.”
“Of course you won’t be,” Severine said softly. “Wherever my follies lead me, they’re my own. You aren’t my savior, and I am not yours.”
Lisette scoffed. “Damn right. I don’t need you to save me.”
“I might need you to save me,” Severine amended, “if only through your friendship. Which I have no desire to lose. What if I take you home?”
Lisette frowned and then muttered, “The roads are flooded. There’s no leaving.”
“Isn’t there?” Severine felt trapped instantly. She could imagine the feel of shackles on her wrists and ankles. Whatever was intended for her, there was no escape. “I find myself suddenly alarmed.”
“Finally,” Lisette snapped. “You have got to re-engage in your life, Severine. You can’t let them take it away from you.”
Severine looked up and then slowly said, “I know. I just don’t know how.”
“I wish I could tell you.” Lisette smoothed back Severine’s hair before slapping her on the cheeks. It wasn’t the hard strike of the day before from Grandmère but it wasn’t gentle either. “Wake up.”
Severine rose. “I think we start with coffee. Then we’ll check on the car. Then I suppose I’ll find something to bring me joy.”
Lisette muttered under her breath about a spoiled girl who didn’t know what she liked. Severine grinned through it all. She clucked to her dogs, tucked the envelope into her chemise, and said, “I suppose we had better stick together.”
“Are you really going to let those servants fix you coffee?”
Severine laughed. “Darling Lisette, my education was finished by nuns. I shall make my own and some for you as well, thank you very much.”
“What will you say to the servants?”
Severine shook her head at that. She didn’t know. Those who had betrayed her couldn’t really stay, could they? She made her way to the kitchens with Lisette and the dogs, only getting lost once. When they arrived, they heard the sound of a male voice shouting, and Severine stepped silently into the kitchen.
No one noticed them enter and Severine found the shouting fellow to be none other than Mr. Brand.
“Which one of you did it?” It wasn’t the first time he had asked the question, Severine guessed, given the firmness with which every gaze was locked onto the floor.
Silence was the only reply. Mr. Brand repeated the question, growing more incensed as he was met by silence.
Finally, Severine spoke, startling them all. “Perhaps we should leave it at that.”
“Leave it?” Mr. Brand’s fingers were flexing in and out of fists as Severine crossed and took a coffee pot down, filling it with water.
“I can do that, Miss DuNoir,” one of the servants said.
Severine laughed lightly but didn’t offer the coffee pot and she set the water to boiling on the already lit stove before digging through the cupboards on her own to find the coffee. She sniffed a few canisters, locating the chicory, and then turned to face the room.
“Leave it,” Severine said easily, crossing to the back door and letting her dogs out. She left the door cracked, so they could return. She turned to the rest. “Rather than focusing on things in the past, let’s look to the future, shall we?”
No one said anything, but Mr. Brand waved for her to proceed. His fury hadn’t lessened in the least.
“The future?” a timid voice asked.
She turned, but she didn’t see who had spoken. “When my grandmother exits this house.”
“Is that happening?” the housekeeper asked.
“Grandmère rules on the generosity of Mr. Brand now, and eventually, myself. Her day will certainly come to an end.”
“You’ll throw out your granny?” Lisette demanded.
Severine shook her head. “Throw out? One can hardly make homeless a woman who owns a house in her own right.”
Lisette lifted her brows and then glanced at the servants. If Severine hadn’t insisted on establishing Lisette as a friend, would Lisette be able to connive her way into their gossip and secrets? Severine let her
