The Wrong Girl

Chapter 11

"Violet?" Jack's soft voice startled me out of my foggy stupor. "Violet? Are you telling us you didn't know?"

"How could she not know?" asked Sylvia.

How indeed.

Her face appeared in front of mine, her big eyes filled with concern. "Are you all right, Violet? You look very pale."

I gripped the chair arms until my fingers ached, but I didn't let go. If I did, I was sure I would tip over. My thoughts raced so fast I couldn't quite grasp them. All I knew was that if I could start fires, then everyone at Windamere had lied to me.

Including Vi.

"Violet?" Jack still knelt in front of me, so close I could feel the heat radiating from him. It made my skin hot, my blood hotter.

Or was that the heat within me? It all began to make sense. I'd never felt cold, never needed a coat to go outside and I hated wearing gloves. Where Vi had shivered through our wintry walks, I'd relished the cold breeze against my skin, the frost in the air.

"Do you need to lie down?" he asked me.

I shook my head. "I need...answers."

"Whatever we can provide, we will." He took a deep breath and scrubbed his hand over his jaw.

"Why did you lie to us?" Langley said. "You let us believe you could start fires even though you thought you couldn't."

"Don't," Jack warned. "Our questions can wait. Let Violet ask hers first."

Langley heaved a deep sigh. "Very well. I suppose you'd like to know what happened up there."

I nodded.

"Bollard told me what the Gladstone fellow told you."

"Bollard followed us!" Jack snapped. "Bloody hell, August. Why?"

"I originally sent him to London to make sure Violet didn't escape." He gave a jerky nod of apology. "I didn't quite trust her." At Jack's protest, he put up his hand and continued over the top of him. "He followed all three of you when you visited your friend. Bollard's deaf mother taught him to read lips, and he used the skill in order to keep his distance. He missed some of the conversations thanks to the poor light, but he caught most. As well as the meeting you had with your friend, he told me everything the Gladstone fellow told Violet."

"What did he tell her?" Sylvia clicked her tongue. "And why am I always the last to know?"

"Gladstone informed Violet that her narcolepsy could be cured by subjecting her to a profound dose of the emotion that triggers it."

"But we didn't know what that emotion was," Jack said.

"I suspected it was anger. I always did. That first time she unexpectedly fell asleep here and almost set my laboratory on fire, her temper was pronounced."

"The first time...?" I whispered. "There...there was a fire? Why didn't anyone tell me?" I remembered the fresh scorch marks on Langley's floor that hadn't been there upon my first visit...I'd thought Jack had put them there. That was me?

Jack and Langley looked askance. "We merely assumed you'd been aware of what happened that day," Jack said. "It never occurred to me to discuss the incident in detail. Wait a moment." He turned to Langley. "I see now. You lied to her about not being able to leave because you wanted her to get angry. You let her think Sylvia and I were in on the trickery."

"What do you mean?" Sylvia stamped a hand on her hip. "Once again I'm the last to know everything."

"I had no choice," Langley said to Jack, ignoring her. He shrugged, as if it were nothing. As if manipulating my emotions and making me believe Jack lied didn't matter, as long as he got the outcome he wanted.