She considered seeking another bed rather than her own—the residence contained at least thirty other chambers—but in the end decided she was in want of familiar surroundings. When she stepped into her quarters it was to discover that her brother was nowhere to be seen, but her three sisters were all scrunched up in her bed, the twins appearing to be asleep, while Alice was sitting up, pillows at her back, her nose buried in a book. Aiden immediately came to mind, and she wondered if sleep had come easily for him or if it eluded him and forced him to pull one of his many books from the shelves to occupy his mind, so he didn’t think of her.

Silly girl, as though he gave any thought to her at all after she left. If he required distracting, plenty of women in his club would be only too glad to provide a diversion. She didn’t want to acknowledge the spark of jealousy that thought ignited. While she had his attentions, she wanted him giving them to no one else. Perhaps that should have been the prize she sought—but oh, the one she’d claimed could not be measured.

Alice set her book in her lap and looked at Selena with grave concern etched over her features. “Where have you been? We’ve been worried silly.”

“Yes, I can quite see that. Nudge those two awake so you can all scamper back to your rooms.”

Without the nudging, Constance and Florence stirred, squinted at her, and pushed themselves into sitting positions. “You’re back,” they said in unison.

“So I am.”

“Where were you?” Flo asked.

With the mask nestled in the folds of her skirt, she wandered over to the vanity, where she discreetly set it behind an ornate trinket box Lushing had once given her, went to remove her gloves, and realized she’d never put them back on, had left them with Aiden. Fortunately, she wasn’t lacking in coverings for her hands but would need to remember to fetch them tomorrow. As unobtrusively as possible, she barely lifted the lid on her smaller jewelry box, slid out her wedding ring, and returned it to its proper place on her finger. “I needed to get out for a while, to be alone, to find some measure of peace. What are you girls doing in here?”

“We couldn’t sleep with a corpse in residence,” Alice said. “It’s morbid having the casket remaining in the front parlor.”

“It’s the way it’s done, sweeting.”

“I hear him creeping along the hallways,” Connie said.

“You mustn’t speak of dear Lushing in that manner.” Selena sat on the stuffed bench covered in a tapestry of flowers. “Although, if he were a ghost, he wouldn’t haunt you. He loved you all dearly, you know that.”