I was set off balance by his abrupt question. “He told me that he filled it in and sealed it, when he found out what you and Elizabeth were using it for.”
His widening smile confused me. The bastard seemed infuriatingly satisfied by everything I said.
“He was always missing the point, your husband. The fact of the matter is, Elizabeth would be alive today if Evan hadn’t inserted himself into our lives.” His gaze ran over my face. “She would be sitting where you are right now, happy.”
“Happy?” I asked incredulously. I glanced at the Analyzer on the table. “You mean controlled, don’t you?”
“If Evan gave you the impression that Elizabeth could be controlled in anything, he was dead wrong. It was just easier for him to imagine she was being coerced, when in reality, Elizabeth never did anything she didn’t want to do. She was a force of nature.”
“One that you created and fashioned. You disgust me. You’re the vilest man I’ve ever imagined.”
He made a fake “sad face” and gave a little shrug. Still, I had a feeling that his sarcastic, flippant display was a show.
Madaster did care what I thought of him.
“So… you’ve decided to take Evan’s side, despite the fact that he’s been using you? You’re miserably in love with him, aren’t you?”
“Yes. I love him,” I said. I didn’t hesitate, although I probably should have, given what Evan had done to me. It just struck me in that moment that speaking honestly about love was a weapon against which this man couldn’t defend. But instead of seeming taken aback by my declaration, he again appeared alarmingly self-satisfied.
“I’m not saying that I trust everything Evan says,” I continued. “But you… I trust you far less.”
“And how are you making that judgment?” he asked, suddenly very interested. Focused. Fascinated, even.
“I don’t know what you mean.”
“How are you coming to this certain conclusion about me and my character, when you just met me a few minutes ago? You must be swallowing Evan’s story, wholesale.”
“I’m not.”
“Then answer my question!”
I started at his shout… at his abrupt cruelty.
“I’m coming to my conclusions by sitting here in your disgusting presence,” I found myself shouting back. My face felt very hot. “I decided what I thought of you by meeting your wife, whom you and that witch-nurse of yours ignore and half-starve, when she’s clearly in need of care. I understand all I need to know of your character by the fact that you’ve taunted me by putting that… ”—I pointed at the Analyzer on the table as if it were a live snake—“that thing on the table for me to see.”
His smile ratcheted my fury up another notch.
“I came to my conclusions about you because I know how rotten you are to the core.”
“How do you know?”
“I just know. I don’t know how, but I know you,” I seethed.
“I know how you know,” he said. His blue eyes shone with blazing confidence.
He didn’t move in his chair, but I had the vivid impression that in Madaster’s head, he danced with excitement.
“It’s a little known fact, revealed only to the highest echelons of society—a chosen few,” he said. “It’s why Egyptian kings took their sisters as their wives. It’s why European royalty intermarried. They did it to keep the genes pure. Because if the bloodline can be kept pure enough, certain gifts are given… gifts that yield natural leaders. Psychic abilities, for one thing, most notably with living relatives. The faculty to communicate with and see the deceased ancestors, for another.”
I must have started in shock, because his stare on me grew even m
ore avid. Hungry.
“You have heard her, haven’t you?” He studied my face like he thought it held the secrets to the universe. “You’ve seen her.”
It struck me at that moment, what I heard ringing in his voice. Envy. He envied me, because he thought I’d heard and seen Elizabeth.
Abruptly, I laughed.