A Vision in Velvet: A Witchcraft Mystery (26 page)

Oscar gazed at me, his green eyes huge and crumbs on his snout. “You want me to
go
?”

We were back in my apartment, after yet another exhausting chat with Inspector Carlos Romero. I was still soaked through from the rainstorm but had finally managed to unpeel my clingy familiar from my body so I could at least towel dry my hair. Oscar was sitting on the counter with the open cookie jar in his lap, and I had just been trying to explain to him the bad-news, good-news situation: I’d destroyed his wings, but he was no longer beholden to Aidan. In fact, he was free to go wherever he wanted.

“Why do you want me to
go
?” he whined as he stuffed another chocolate-chip oatmeal cookie in his mouth. He’d been eating since we’d walked back through the door of the apartment. “Are you mad at me?”

“
No
, of course not. I meant what I said. You are my family. This is your home as well as mine. But I don’t want to
force
you to be here. I’m not your mistress anymore. I feel so bad about your wings, Oscar, but now you are your own pig. Or whatever. You are your own
Oscar
.”

“Where would I go?”

“I don’t know . . . visit your family, maybe?”

“My family’s a little . . . dysfunctional.”

“I thought you were searching for your mother.”

He shrugged. “I always look, but let’s face it: There are a lot of gargoyles to track down. Unless you want to go with me?”

“I could manage a trip or two, of course. I would love that. But this is my home, and I don’t want to leave it, or Aunt Cora’s Closet, for very long. But . . . I have an idea. I’d like to give you this.”

I held out the Ashen Witch’s gold velvet cape.

“For me?”

“You said you could use it to ‘travel’ around, didn’t you? Now that everything’s happened, it doesn’t seem to have the same visions attached to it. Anyway, I destroyed your wings, so I thought . . . I know it’s not the same, but I’d like you to have it. And you can keep it safe, so it doesn’t fall into the wrong hands.”

He gaped at me for a moment, but finally took the cape, cuddled it for a brief moment, then scampered up above the icebox to hide it in his cubby. I wondered whether he would use it as intended, to travel and look for his mother, or just as another of the blankets he slept with.

Oscar jumped back down, seeming embarrassed by our display of emotion.

“So, that professor tried to follow the old box, which he thought was maybe still in the trunk, because he was looking for”—he dropped his voice to a whisper—“Deliverance Corydon? But the box with her ashes had been buried at the base of the tree?”

“Seems like it. Will first heard the legends when he grew up back East. Through his research, he came to believe that Bart had the box with the ashes, but the truth was they had been buried at the base of the tree
generations ago by the Woolsey relatives when they came here by wagon train. They thought she’d be trapped; they never realized anyone would work to release Deliverance from the heartwood. But Lance, as Deliverance’s familiar, kept an eye on the Woolseys through the years and finally wound up with a very apt job—working with frogs—at the Cal Academy, alongside Nina Woolsey.”

Oscar shook his head. “Some familiars are bad news, I tell ya.”

“Will became obsessed with the stories and with Deliverance Corydon. When he found out Hannah had sold the trunk, he confronted Sebastian. I guess Sebastian had sold it to me on purpose, to keep it safe. He knew I had worked with Aidan Rhodes in the past. I wish he’d just talked to me about it.”

“Doesn’t work that way.”

“So I gathered. Anyway, Sebastian refused to tell Will who he’d sold the trunk to.”

“I guess Sebastian wasn’t so bad then, right? He probably only kept the secret because he was afraid of Aidan, but whatever.”

“Either way, I’m grateful. If he’d told Will I had the trunk . . .” I trailed off with a shrug. “Maybe
I
would have been the blood sacrifice.”

“Excuse me?”

“Sebastian tried to convince Will of the truth, that the box with the symbols had been buried a long time ago at the base of the tree. Bart knew about the tree from the family Bible. Will took Sebastian there, and they looked around for it, but of course the box had mostly disintegrated years ago. Will got frustrated, and it occurred to him that if Deliverance really was part of the tree, he could offer her a blood sacrifice.”

“To make her stronger,” said Oscar.

“Is that why she abducted you?” I asked softly.

Oscar shrugged one bony shoulder. “I think she did it
first as a distraction. She thought it would throw you off track, keep you from nosing around too much. She thought Will would manage to free her. All he needed was to make a few more blood sacrifices . . . and once he’d killed, I guess it gets easier.”

And Lance had tried to stop me as well, I thought, chasing me through the basement of the Cal Academy. I still wondered whether poisoning Conrad had been deliberate, or an accident—after all, Conrad had slapped Lance on the back. But I doubted I’d ever have the chance to ask him; Lance was nowhere to be found, and Carlos had informed me that he was not putting out an APB for a missing frog, no matter what I said.

I let out a loud sigh; Oscar did the same.

“Maybe Will realized there was something else valuable in the trunk—”

“The cape?”

“Maybe. Or maybe he just didn’t believe Sebastian about the ashes, so he traced the trunk to Aunt Flora’s Closet. He put the ledger back where he found it, though, because he knew of Aidan’s association with Sebastian. Aidan probably would have been able to track the book.”

“How’d Will know so much about this sort of thing in the first place? Most cowans are clueless with this stuff.”

“It was his field of study. He taught at UC Berkeley.”

“They paid the man for that? His classes must have been a little cuckoo.”

“I guess so.”

“But . . .
why
would he do it? Why would you want to bring back that . . .
thing
?”

“I don’t know if we’ll ever know the answer to that. I think people can easily be seduced by magic, whether it’s for good or evil. That’s why it scares even me, sometimes.”

“Even
you
?”

I nodded as I poured him another glass of milk. We hadn’t even had breakfast yet, and Oscar had gone through nearly a dozen cookies. But I was feeling extra indulgent; my heart swelled, just watching him eat. “What was it like, in there?”

“It was mostly . . . just dark. And damp. And I was sort of in a different dimension, so I couldn’t really tell what was going on. But . . . I was scared that she would absorb me, somehow, for good. Maybe find a way to use me to increase her power.”

“Didn’t you know I would come for you?”

He nodded vigorously and bit into another cookie. “You said old-man Bart had a love curse on him, too? Did that disappear when
she
died?”

“As far as I understand inheritable curses, it should continue despite her demise—that’s the point of a deathbed curse, after all. But Herve gave me a spell—once I get my strength back, I’ll cast it and see if I can help Bart out. That is, if he even
needs
my help . . . He’s been getting along well with one of Bronwyn’s coven sisters. It’s possible it wasn’t a curse so much as a self-fulfilling prophecy.”

“Hey, wait . . .” Oscar glanced at my moon calendar, then turned and gaped at me. “Do you know what today is?”

“What?” Dread swept over me as realization dawned. “Today’s . . .
Saturday
?”

He fixed me with a suspicious glare. “
I’m
the one who’s been stuck in a netherworld for a week, and you can’t remember which day it is?”

“I guess I’ve been a little busy saving your hide,” I said, feeling put-upon. All I wanted was a long shower and a longer nap.

“You’re no quitter, mistress, I’ll give ya that. Hey! I’ll go with you if you want! I could pass you notes on the algebra questions!”

“I don’t believe in cheating, but . . . you know algebra?”

“Sure; it’s easy.”

“Thanks, Oscar, but I think I’ll try to pass on my own.”

“I was wondering. . . . What did you have to do to destroy Deliverance Corydon?”

“I’m sorry?”

“What did you have to sacrifice to defeat her?”

“I sacrificed your wings.”

“That was to get me back. But defeating her . . . It was something more than that, wasn’t it?”

My fingertips tingled. I remembered that vision I had at the tree, when I was back in time. I was back, and Deliverance held out her hand and took me onto the pyre with her. I knew now that I was connected through time to the Ashen Witch. But as for Deliverance, in the end she had been defeated almost too easily. I wasn’t yet certain whether she was gone for good, or would continue to haunt me. But as Graciela would say,
así es la vida
. Such is life. I would deal with it if and when it became a problem.

“I’m starved,” said Oscar, interrupting my thoughts.

“How about some French toast?”

Sailor was moving around in the bedroom, no doubt roused by the smell of coffee. Downstairs, I could hear Bronwyn, Maya, and Susan coming into the shop—I had forgotten I had invited them to come to breakfast this morning before I went to take the GED.

I pulled out a dozen eggs, milk, and bread. I had friends and family coming for breakfast and a ridiculous test to take. And then a well-deserved nap.

The many other items on my to-do list were just going to have to
wait.

Don’t miss the new release in Juliet Blackwell’s

Haunted Home Renovation mystery series,

KEEPER OF THE CASTLE

Coming from Obsidian in December

wherever books and e-books are sold.

I wrapped up my day a little early and headed to Pacific Heights to pick up my ex-stepson, Caleb, whom I had talked into joining me, my dad, and our friend Stan at Garfield Lumber’s annual barbecue.

“I don’t know why I have to go to this lame barbecue,” grumbled the seventeen-year-old. His chestnut hair fell so low over his forehead, it almost covered his near-black eyes, which was probably the idea. I tamped down on the urge to push it back so I could see his expression.

“It’s . . . fun,” I said. Which was sort of a lie. “Anyway . . . it’s tradition.”

“Not the same thing.”

The truth was, Garfield Lumber was old-school. The nails were still kept in the same bins they had been in since 1929; the long wooden counter was scarred and gouged; the slower-selling items on the shelves had acquired a thick layer of dust. And if you stepped into Garfield without knowing what you were doing, the staff could be downright rude. There was no Helpful Hardware Man here; “Don’t Waste My Time” was Garfield Lumber’s unofficial motto. And if you valued your life
and all your body parts, you didn’t mention a certain huge store that catered to the DIY crowd. On the other hand, once they got to know you, the folks at Garfield would go the extra distance to make sure you had what you needed to get the job done right. In a rapidly growing and ever-changing region like the Bay Area, Garfield Lumber was untouched and entirely predictable.

I loved it. Probably because it was a place I always had been—and would always be—“Bill’s girl, Mel.”

“Besides,” I continued, “you have to eat, right?”

“Stale hot dogs? Oh, yum,” Caleb said in a snarky tone that reminded me a little too much of myself.

There was no denying the barbecue was no great shakes; at Garfield Lumber, even their hot dogs tasted like they’d been around a while. But no one seemed to mind. It was a rare chance to mill around with folks who were normally in a rush, to chill out and knock back a beer or two while swapping jokes, tales of construction mishaps, and the occasional delicious bit of gossip.

“Besides,” I continued, “it’s important to Dad. He wants to show you off, introduce you to his friends.”

I glanced at Caleb. That got him. Caleb was sullen as all get-out lately, but my dad’s opinion mattered to him.

It had taken a little while, but my dad had finally welcomed Caleb into the Turner clan. There were no blood ties between us, but I had married Caleb’s father, Daniel, when Caleb was five and had been his official stepmother for eight years. I adored him, and the absolute hardest thing about leaving Daniel had been realizing that I would no longer have any legal tie to Caleb, who
felt like my son. My heartbreak was lessened when I realized that Caleb was as loath to give me up as I was to let him go. Caleb’s mother, with whom I had always gotten along well, was happy to allow Caleb to spend time with me, especially when she had to travel for business, because Daniel’s new wife was not thrilled with the idea of being a stepmother. As a result, even after the divorce, Caleb had spent a lot of time with me, including numerous overnight visits at my dad’s house, and so we had remained close. Now that he was seventeen—a difficult age—I was in the peculiar position of being able to speak to him not as a parent, but as a concerned, trusted adult. Despite his apparent disdain for all adults, he confided in me more than in his parents.

We headed over the Bay Bridge, which connected San Francisco to Oakland and the East Bay. The bridge was made of two spans that met at Yerba Buena Island, and the eastern section was brand-new, the old one having failed in the last serious earthquake to hit the area. Its single tower soared skyward in a dramatic sweep.

I enjoyed the novelty but held my tongue. The last thing Caleb wanted to talk about was architecture.

“So we’ll just pick up Dad and Stan at the house and then head on over to the barbecue. I’ll take you back after, or your dad says you can spend the night if you want.”

“Whatever.”

But his interest was sparked when we turned the corner onto the street where I lived in an old farmhouse with my dad and Stan.

“Who’s
that
?” asked Caleb as we both spied a shiny black stretch limousine pulled up to the curb.

This wasn’t the kind of neighborhood where you saw a lot of limousines. It wasn’t prom season, and unless my dad had become a high-rolling drug dealer while I wasn’t looking . . .

As I drew closer, I could see Ellis Elrich—flanked by
two unsmiling muscle-bound men, who could only be bodyguards—standing on the sidewalk, talking to my father. Dog was barking wildly and ineffectually while wagging his tail, as was his wont.

Dammit
.

When Dad asked me last night how the trip to Marin had gone, I’d kept it vague, and soon enough his attention had turned back to the football game and his attempts to program his new smartphone.

It wasn’t that I had been keeping McCall’s murder a secret, exactly. But I was a little tired of having to explain why people seemed to die wherever I was on a construction project. It was downright eerie when I stopped and thought about it.

And since I hadn’t been planning to sign on to the project anyway, it seemed an unnecessary worry.

I climbed out of my Scion with caution.

“Here’s my girl,” said Dad in the kind of booming, cheerful voice he reserved for important clients. My father wasn’t easily impressed, but he did feel that the client was king and took that to its logical extension.

Dad wasn’t a large man, but even now he retained the muscles of a life lived on a construction site, though he now had a prominent beer belly and thinning gray hair. Today he was wearing his usual outfit of worn blue jeans and a formerly white T-shirt.

Ellis Elrich, for his part, was wearing what I was certain must be a very expensive suit.

“Ah, the famous Mel Turner.” When Ellis Elrich turned his attention to me, I understood why everyone was so gaga over him. Charisma. The man had it in spades. There was an intensity to his eyes, a keen intelligence that was apparent from the start. Or maybe it was just his aura—I never used to believe in such things, but now that I was in the ghost business, it was getting easier for me to imagine that we all put out energy, some more
clearly than others, and that other people sensed and reacted to that energy. “May I call you Mel?”

“Of course. But what—”

“And let me introduce my driver, Buzz, and this is Andrew and Omar.”

“Hello,” I said. Buzz nodded in greeting, but Andrew and Omar remained silent and stoic, flanking Elrich, their eyes hidden behind sunglasses.

“And who’s this young man?” Elrich asked.

“I’m Caleb.”

Elrich put out his hand, and to my surprise, Caleb shook it, standing up straight and nodding in a sort of hail-fellow-well-met stance.

“Nice to meet you, Caleb,” said Elrich. “You look like you play soccer.”

“Yeah, and baseball.” Caleb nodded. “Too short for basketball.”

“Ah, well, soccer’s more poetic, anyway. And remember what Satchel Paige said: ‘Never let your head hang down. Never give up and sit down and grieve. Find another way.’ There’s always another way.” Elrich gave Caleb a warm smile before turning back to me. “Mel, it is
such
a pleasure. I was so disappointed we weren’t able to talk yesterday.”

“Well . . . it was understandable. Under the circumstances, it would have been awkward to keep the sherry hour going.”

He held my gaze for a long time, then nodded. “In any case . . . I know this seems sudden, but in fact I spoke with Graham previously about whether Turner Construction might take over the Wakefield job, or even work together with Pete Nolan. Now, with what happened yesterday . . .” He trailed off, sadness in his eyes. “Anyway, we’re in a real race with time here, and I hear you’ve done joint projects in the past.”

“Only one, and it was a highly unusual project.”

“I think you’ll agree that this project is pretty unusual too,” said Elrich. “Not only will Wakefield serve as a retreat center for the Elrich Method, but also as a pilot project for incorporating green techniques in historical renovations. I understand that’s of particular interest to you.”

I shrugged and nodded. Clearly, Graham had been talking.

“Graham also mentioned you’re an anthropologist, which is perfect for this sort of project, which combines history, culture, and architecture. It’s an archaeologist’s dream.”

“I’m not really that kind of anthropologist.”

“I can’t just let this project grind to a halt. Nolan’s workers don’t deserve to lose their jobs over this. And combined with your own staff, you can employ all those people and get a great job done as well. Keep Graham Donovan working on the most exciting project of his career and be an essential part of a fantastic project yourself. I don’t have to tell you that this is the kind of building that can make history, and you’ll have the resources you need to make it happen, do it right.”

Stan and Dad were watching the proceedings with avid interest, but they kept mute. I appreciated the way they were standing back and letting me make this decision, as head of the company. When I’d stepped in to take over Turner Construction “for a few months” after my father fell apart following the sudden loss of my mother, I’d assumed Dad would pull himself together and step back in to run the company he had built, and I would take off for Europe. But it had been years now, and I had come to accept that my dad was permanently retired. The company was now mine, for better or worse. I should have gotten used to it.

But still, Dad and Stan were both invested in the future of Turner Construction, and they were as nervous as
I was about the lack of work in the pipeline. Here stood a fabulously wealthy client with a project seemingly custom-made for Turner Construction, and I was balking? Since I hadn’t filled them in on the details of what happened yesterday, they were bound to be confused by my attitude.

Elrich reached down to pet Dog. The canine wagged his tail and leaned his considerable weight against the billionaire’s leg, leaving long brown hairs on his fine suit. Buzz looked annoyed on his boss’s behalf, but Elrich didn’t seem to mind; on the contrary, he seemed determined to make everyone like him, and he appeared to be doing so.

“I don’t know anything about reconstructing an ancient building,” I said. “I do historical reconstruction, but that’s in a San Francisco context—we’re talking a hundred years, not six hundred.”

“Not a problem,” said Elrich with a confident shake of his well-coiffed head. “I have a special consultant on the job, Florian Libole. Have you heard of him?”

No one in my business didn’t know the name of Florian Libole. So it really had been his inscription on those drawings Graham showed me.

“Of course,” I said, “Libole’s internationally renowned.”

“That’s right. He’s very anxious to meet you.”

“To meet
me
?”

“There aren’t that many firms that specialize in this sort of thing here in California, as you know. If you refuse me, I’m afraid I’ll have to import someone from back east or, worse, from Europe. They would take time getting their bearings, not to mention that a job of this magnitude should be dealt with locally as much as possible. Don’t you think so?”

“I don’t know. I have several other jobs going, and with the commute . . .”

“You’re welcome to stay at my place,” he said. “It’s huge, built to house plenty of folks. I’ve got several people staying there now, and I’ve invited Graham as well. In fact, according to my assistant, the house could use some sprucing up. It’s a sort of Spanish-revival, mission style, lots of hand-painted tile—you didn’t get a chance to look through it yesterday, but I think you’ll like it. Don’t forget your bathing suit; we have a beautiful pool. And please bring the dog—he’ll love running free on the fenced grounds.”

I looked at Stan’s face, my dad, Caleb, even Dog. They all seemed to like Ellis Elrich. And Turner Construction needed a job like this.

But then, only Dog knew all the facts of what we’d seen yesterday, and he wasn’t talking.

“I’ll think about it,” I said. “I’m sorry. I can’t commit without thinking it over. I hope you didn’t come all the way here just to talk to me about this.”

“I had some business in San Francisco anyway, and I rarely take time to explore Oakland. Florian tells me I simply must stop by and see the Chapel of the Chimes while I’m here. He says it’s a hidden gem. Oakland really is a beautiful city.”

That was very politic of him. My dad’s house was nowhere near the Chapel of the Chimes; instead, we live in the Fruitvale section of Oakland, a neighborhood once chock-full of orchards but now jammed with small bungalows all in a row, with the exception of the old farmhouse. Working class, to be kind; “gritty” was the adjective most often applied to the area by outsiders.

“Just in case you decide to join us.” Elrich signaled to one of the burly men next to him, who reached into his breast pocket and extracted a plain manila envelope. He handed it to Elrich, who offered it to me. “This contains documents that will fill you in on a few of the details and, most importantly, a check with a deposit.”

I peeked in at the figure he’d written and gulped. The check was huge. It didn’t take an accountant to realize the sum would keep Turner Construction—and all the people we employed—solvent for a full year. And this was just his “deposit.”

“You think about it,” said Elrich. “And let me know by tomorrow morning. I’m sorry to rush you, but we don’t have much time to lose. Even with yesterday’s tragedy, it’s essential we keep on schedule to the extent possible.”

“Do you have the go-ahead from the police to start construction again already?”

“That won’t be a problem.”

“Okay, I’ll . . . think about it,” I repeated. I wasn’t promising anything, but I’d be lying if I claimed the size of that check hadn’t swayed me.

We watched the limo glide down the street. The appearance of the luxury vehicle had coaxed several of our neighbors out onto their porches, and a trio of laughing kids chased it for a block before giving up.

“A limo like that’s even more exciting than when the garbage truck fell into the sinkhole right there. Remember that?” observed Stan. He explained to Caleb: “It took three industrial tow trucks to pull the lumbering truck out of the hole, and it forced the city to finally fix the problem for good.”