Page 37 of Haunting the Deep

My stomach does a quick flip. “Elijah?” I say, my voice unsure as I walk through the foyer and down the hallway. I step into the ballroom.

“Elijah?” I say more clearly.

No response.

“I know you hear me.” Still no response. I walk past the piano and the beautifully laid-out crystal, used for old-timey cocktail parties—the kind where everyone smokes with those long cigarette holders.

“Elijah, come on.” Nothing.

I rub my hands over my face and exhale. “You can’t just show up last night after being MIA for six months and then not respond to me.”

Silence.

“So you’re scared to talk to me?” I say.

“I hear you,” he says in his old-world accent.

I whip around. He’s in front of the fireplace in a white button-down shirt, a black vest, and black dress pants. His dark hair falls in waves around his face, framing his gray eyes.

We’re both quiet for a long couple of seconds.

“Sit.” He gestures toward the couch behind me and walks to an armchair on my right. He waits for me to situate myself on the couch before sitting himself. Our knees face each other. I don’t know what to do with my hands. I’m still having trouble believing he’s actually here, that my brain isn’t playing a trick on me.

“That dress,” he says. “Tell me all that you know about it.” His voice is slightly strained, like he’s fighting the urge to leave.

I blink at him. “Wait. Slow down. That’s not why I…You want to talk about thedress?”

He looks uncomfortable. “If it had a spell on it, as I suspect it may have, then yes, I certainly do want to talk about the dress.”

I laugh a short laugh. “The dress?” He comes back with no explanation? No greeting, nothing? “Maybe you want to talk about the card, too?”

“I do.”

“Or football?”

He raises an eyebrow at me.

“Well, the message on the card is all I know.” My tone is clipped.

He sighs like he’s trying very hard to not react. “Then you do not know who Myra H.H. is?”

“My great-great-something-aunt who survived theTitanic,” I say, and wave my hand in the air with frustration. “And speaking of theTitanic,why did you throw that book into the secret study?”

“I had begun to suspect that theTitanicwas an important factor.”

He’s been watching this unfold and hasn’t said a word to me. My chest tightens. “And you said nothing?”

“I did not intend to interfere with your life again,” he says, like he finds this whole conversation painful.

My mouth opens. “Too late.”

He hesitates. “Samantha, I am sorry that I kissed you last night. I should never have done it.”

Wait, what?I stand up, pushing my hair back from my face. “Don’t apologize. I haven’t been sitting around pining for you, whatever you might think.”

“I did not think you were,” he says. “Now, if you will just tell me what information you have thus far, I—”

“I don’t need your help.” I glare at him and his perfect posture. If he won’t talk to me about why he left, then I won’t talk to him.