Evermore (2 page)

Lady Willoughby looked like an insect frozen
in a block of ice. Her large eyes bulged, accentuating the thinness
of her face and long neck. "Oh, uh, yes. This is Miss Emily
Chambers and her sister, Miss Celia Chambers."

"You!" Lord Preston stepped
forward, looking like a thundercloud about to ruin a picnic. "What
are
you
doing
here?"

"We were just leaving." I didn't want an ugly
confrontation with him, not in front of women we wanted—needed—as
our customers, and not while Lady Preston and Adelaide were
present. It would only humiliate them. Something that Lord Preston
seemed to care little about.

Adelaide made a small, wheezing sound of
misery, but her mother was all action. She moved smoothly to Lord
Preston's side and clasped his arm. "What a lovely surprise," she
said, situating herself between her husband and me. It didn't do
any good. He simply glared at me over the top of her head. "This is
a fortuitous meeting," she went on in her placating voice. "You can
escort us home. Perhaps we'll send the carriage ahead and we all
three can walk. It's not far and the day is pleasant."

Lord Preston blinked. He looked down at his
wife and his expression softened. It was only then that I noticed
the whiteness of Lady Preston's knuckles as they gripped his arm.
He couldn't fail to have felt her fingers through his coat
sleeve.

Celia looped her arm through mine and hustled
me toward our hostess. "Thank you for your kind invitation," she
said as if they were old friends and we had not come to conduct
business. Trade of any sort was frowned upon by Upper Society.
People should not be seen to earn money, or heard to talk about
working for a living. Work was vulgar, coarse, something only the
middle and lower classes needed to do. I didn't think we could
afford to worry about such niceties, but Celia thought otherwise.
She didn't ask Lady Willoughby about payment, nor did she sell our
services to any of the other ladies present. It was as if we'd
simply stopped by for afternoon tea.

"I'm sorry Lord Fulham couldn't oblige us by
staying longer," I said. I felt Celia twitch beside me. So be it. I
wanted to give Lady Willoughby an explanation for her father's
all-too-brief visit. Whether she believed me or not, I couldn't
say, although her polite smile did seem a little pained. "Sometimes
it happens. The spirit world is unpredictable."

Lord Preston muttered something from the
doorway. It was probably just as well that I couldn't hear him
because it mustn't have been kind if Lady Preston's tight-lipped
expression was anything to go by. She tugged her husband aside so
that we could leave the drawing room. I didn't want to pass him,
but I had no choice.

"Goodbye, Adelaide," I said to my friend.

She gave me a reassuring smile, which I
returned to the best of my ability. Then I was alongside Lord and
Lady Preston. Despite Celia's attempt to drag me past, I paused.
And beamed.

"Thank you, Lady Preston," I said. "It's been
lovely to see you again."

"And you, Miss Chambers. You and your sister
are always welcome at our house."

I won't deny that it felt good to see Lord
Preston's face turn a deep shade of violet. He did manage not to
splutter his outrage and retract his wife's offer, which must have
taken a great deal of effort.

"We shall see you at the ball," Lady Preston
went on.

Lord Preston grunted but held his tongue.

Celia finally drew me forward and we were met
outside the drawing room by the butler. He escorted us to the front
door and paid Celia the amount due for the séance.

"I thought Lord Preston was going to argue
with you right in front of everyone," she said once we were on the
pavement out the front of the Willoughbys' townhouse.

"I thought his head was going to explode." I
laughed. I was feeling reckless and ridiculous all of a sudden.
Surviving a battle with Lord Preston always did that to me, and I
had not only survived on this occasion, I had won.

We walked through the exclusive area of
Belgravia, past tall, slender buildings and along streets swept
clean of mud and horse dung. But not even Belgravia could escape
London's soot. It dusted front porch steps and window shutters,
nestled into the grooves between bricks, and threw a veil across
the sky, shielding us from the sun.

"It seems Lord Preston knows we're going to
Adelaide's ball," I said, sobering. "I was a little afraid that
we'd turn up on the night and he'd throw us out."

"You thought Lady Preston hadn't discussed it
with him first?" Celia scoffed. "Of course she had. She wouldn't
invite anyone against her husband's wishes."

"I suppose not." I had assumed my invitation
was sent before he was shown the guest list to ensure it couldn't
be retracted. George's invitation too. "But why would he agree to
have me there when he can't bear the sight of me?"

"Because it's obviously important to
Adelaide," Celia said. "He wants to make her happy. She is his only
surviving child after all."

I stopped and stared at her. She stopped too.
"What is it?" she asked.

"You amaze me sometimes, Celia. That was
quite an astute observation."

"You don't have the monopoly on cleverness in
this family, you know."

I couldn't think of any response that
wouldn't offend her so I continued walking. "I admit that I had
assumed Lord Preston wouldn't care about Adelaide's wishes."

"On some things, perhaps not, but on this
matter it seems he does. His wife's wishes too, of course."

That lulled me into a thoughtful silence.
Perhaps Lord Preston wasn't the tyrant I'd originally pegged him to
be.

"Did Lord Fulham's spirit say anything to
you?" Celia asked, stopping at the intersection with busy Sloane
Street. "From the look on your face, I'd say he did and that it
wasn't something you liked hearing. He didn't insult you, did
he?"

"No. He appeared much faded and very
weak."

"As with Madame Friage yesterday."

I'd told Celia my concerns
following our last séance, but both of us had dismissed Madame
Friage's faintness at the time. We’d assumed she was about to
crossover from the Waiting Area to the Otherworld, but now Lord
Fulham had appeared just as faded, and he had said he was not going
to cross. That he
could
not, and nor could the other spirits.

The steady stream of omnibuses and coaches
meant we had to concentrate as we crossed Sloane Street and neither
of us spoke until we reached the other side.

I rounded on Celia as she shook her skirt to
dislodge some of the street grime that had dared cling to its hem.
"I'm worried," I said. "Something is wrong in the Waiting
Area."

"It would appear so."

"We must do something. I should summon
J—"

"No! You will not summon him. We can work
around this little problem without him."

Work around? Little problem? "Celia, what are
you talking about? This is a potential disaster, not only for the
poor spirits who can't cross, but for our business too. If word
gets out that ghosts aren't co-operating, then our bookings will
dry up. I can't conduct a séance without ghosts." If anything would
propel Celia into action it would be the mention of our income
dwindling.

"You could pretend the spirits are
present."

"Celia!" I could no more act my way through
an entire séance than I could perform on a stage in front of
hundreds of people. The latter had been another of Celia's wild
schemes only the week before, one I'd refused to participate
in.

"It may be the only way." She clutched my
hand and looked at me with an expression that hardened her pretty
features and wrinkled her otherwise smooth brow. "Emily, we cannot
afford to lose any customers."

A carriage rolled up and the window was
pushed down by a hand clad in a brown leather glove. Lord Preston's
hand, going by the family's coat of arms on the carriage door.

The first voice I heard was not Lord
Preston's, however, but his wife's. "Please, leave her be,
Reginald. There's no need to create a scene."

Celia took my arm. The sharp talons of her
fingers pierced through the layers of my clothing. "Is there
something we can do for you, my lord?" she asked coolly.

Lord Preston's face appeared through the
window, his tall hat skimming the top of the frame. He was
handsome, for an older man, but his prominent brow made him look
angry all the time. Or perhaps being angry all of the time was what
had made his brow so pronounced in the first place.

"Do not think I've given
up," he snarled. "Do not think you've gotten away with anything,
Miss Chambers. You are a fraud. Your tricks are heartless and cruel
and I
will
discredit you."

Celia took a step back as
if he'd pushed her, but I stood my ground, even as she tried to
pull me away from the coach. I would not give into him. I was many
things—a fatherless bastard of African descent, a woman of trade,
and a magnet for trouble—but I was
not
a fraud.

"Is that all, my lord?" I asked with the
sweetest voice I could muster through my seething anger. "Because
I'm very busy and there's a ghost over there who wishes to speak to
me." It was a lie, but it made him look in the direction of my nod,
which I found perversely amusing.

"Reginald, please," came Lady Preston's
pleading voice from within the carriage. "Let's go. For Adelaide's
sake."

I thought I heard sniffing,
but I could have been mistaken. The rumbling of dozens of wheels
and
clip clop
of
horses' hooves along Sloane Street was enough to drown out most
small sounds.

"Cease your fraudulent act, Miss Chambers,"
Lord Preston said, his voice lowered enough that I could still hear
it but probably not his wife and daughter behind him. "For their
sakes, if not for your own." He withdrew into the cabin and pulled
up the window with a violent shove. The coach rolled away and
joined the traffic.

I stared after it. My heart kicked violently
inside my chest as if it were restarting after having ceased. My
hands began to shake and I clasped them tightly together so that
Celia didn't notice.

"What a rude, horrid man," she said. "Pay him
no mind. His words are just that, words. As long as he doesn't
repeat them at the ball, all will be well, and I do believe he'll
keep his opinions to himself that night."

I hoped she was right. He might be prepared
to discredit me in front of his family, but he had refrained in
public so far. That wasn't to say he wouldn't have a few private,
quiet words with his friends over dinner. I wouldn't put anything
past Lord Preston when it came to smearing my reputation.

"It dumbfounds me that a father would say
such things to his daughter's friend," I said.

"Not even if he thought he was right?" Celia
asked, steering me down the pavement. "Perhaps he thinks he's
protecting her from further hurt. She and her mother have suffered
greatly from Jacob's death, and if he truly believes you are indeed
a fraud, he would not want you hurting them further with what he
thinks are lies."

Sometimes I hated it when she made sense.
"Stop making excuses for him, Celia. He's awful and that's
that."

"His manners could certainly do with some
improving. Whoever said the upper classes were the most polite got
it wrong. In my opinion, they are the most ill-mannered."

We walked side by side past shops and
distinctive red brick houses until we reached Druids Way. I planted
my hand on my hat to stop it being blown off in the sudden breeze
that always greeted us in our street. Celia had a ribbon beneath
her chin keeping her bonnet securely in place so that she could
continue to hold my arm and carry the carpet bag.

With my head bent into the wind, I didn't see
the spirit until we reached the steps leading up to our front door.
He was sitting on the top step, his forehead resting on arms
crossed over his knees. I couldn't see his face, but I didn't need
to. I knew who it was, even though the difference in him was
profound.

"Jacob!"

He lifted his head and I was struck by the
weariness that shadowed his eyes. His shoulders were stooped, as if
they carried a load too heavy to bear. "Em."

I pulled free of Celia and ran to him.
"What's happened?" I squatted before him and touched his cheek. It
was cooler than usual. "You're so faint." Despite Madame Friage and
Lord Fulham both appearing extremely faded, I hadn't thought Jacob
would suffer the same fate. He was more solid than every other
spirit I'd encountered. Whereas they were smudged at the edges, he
was as sharp and bold to me as any live person.

Not anymore. Whatever had befallen them
affected Jacob as well. Which meant he was struggling to remain in
our realm.

Jacob closed his hand over mine. It didn't
feel as solid as usual, and that scared me. "I'm growing fainter
because I'm dying, Em."

"But you're already dead."

He gave me a crooked smile. "Yes, but not
like this. This is different. If I continue to fade, I'll no longer
exist as a conscious entity. None of us will."

No. It wasn't possible. There must be some
horrible mistake. But Jacob didn't look like a man in error. He
closed his eyes and tipped his head forward onto his knees
again.

Oh God.

"What's he saying?" Celia asked.

My throat tightened, but I managed to speak,
albeit softly. "He says he, and all the spirits in the Waiting
Area, are going to become nothing."

CHAPTER 2

"This requires a cup of tea," Celia
announced. "Let's go inside."