Grim Haven (Devilborn Book 1) (6 page)

I considered him. He was joking like he thought the whole thing was ridiculous. But he lived at the Mount Phearson, and he’d just been at a Garden Club event the night before. Surely he wasn’t one of those who dismissed the Bristol devil as a mere folktale.

But it seemed he was. “Sorry to make light though, it must have made your childhood hard,” he went on.

“Um… yeah,” I agreed. “I got picked on a lot. For a lot of reasons.”

A savvier kid than I’d been could easily have parlayed being the devil’s daughter into some lofty status among the schoolchildren of Bristol. But I was also a maid’s daughter, and then a maid myself. I was poor, and didn’t exactly dress to impress. I was also shy to the point of paralysis, always reading and hopeless at, well, pretty much anything that wasn’t reading. Given all of that, being the devil’s daughter didn’t make me cool. It just made me weird. Maybe even a little creepy. An object of scorn among those who didn’t believe in the legend, and suspicion among those who did.

“So now you’re back, in a position of power in the community,” Lance said with a raised eyebrow. “This might actually be fun to watch.”

“It’s not like that,” I said. “I didn’t come back for revenge.”

“Why did you come back? Sounded like John Pickwick had to do a little convincing to get you to.”

“I have a lot of history with the Mount Phearson. It’s been a big part of my life.” I shrugged, hoping to sound casual. “And I haven’t got anywhere better to go. My apartment just burned down. I wasn’t working a job with a lot of what you’d call upward mobility.” Which reminded me, I needed to call Terry and break the news that I wasn’t coming back. Not that I thought he would take it hard. I’d be little more than a footnote, when he was grieving the loss of Cooper.

We’d reached The Witch’s Brew by then. “Who owns this place, by the way?” I asked as Lance held the door open for me. “It wasn’t here when I left Bristol.”

“Couple by the name of Thaggard,” Lance said. “Nice people.”

Thaggard. The name sounded vaguely familiar. Someone—a football player, I thought—who’d been a few years ahead of me in school. I gave them points for the name of their shop, anyway. Were they poking fun at all the rumors about Bristol being a den of demons and witches, or confirming them? Maybe both. It was probably good for tourist traffic, anyway.

The place smelled delightfully of cinnamon and chocolate, and seemed to be as much about the pastries as the coffee. But it was busy, and I was nervous as I scanned the crowd. Hotel staff tends to turn over fairly quickly; I didn’t expect to be recognized much at the Mount Phearson. But outside its doors, Bristol was a small town, and I wasn’t in the mood for any reunions.

A couple of the faces were familiar, but most of them were getting their coffee to go, and they were too preoccupied to notice me. I hoped we’d be able to find an out-of-the-way table, and keep it that way.

I recognized the woman behind the counter. Wendy something (Thaggard now, I supposed). She was older than me, too, but one of those people who everyone just seems to know. Not beautiful, but charismatic. Probably a homecoming queen. We wouldn’t have been at the high school at the same time, though, which almost certainly meant she wouldn’t know who I was.

No such luck. She took one look at me as I came to the front of the line and said, “Verity Thane. Everyone’s been wondering whether you’d come back.”

“Well, here I am,” I said.

She held out a hand to shake. “Wendy Thaggard. Used to be Wendy MacLeary, but I don’t think we knew each other as kids?”

“No, I don’t think we did.”

She glanced at Lance and smiled. “Well, I don’t want to be the one who comes between Lance Boyle and his business, so I’ll just ask what you’d like for now. But you should stop by some other time, when you have time to chat.” She gave me a look I couldn’t interpret. “I think we’d have a few things to talk about.”

“Sure.” I kept my face neutral as I gave her my order.

What did she mean by that?

Like most kids who grew up bullied in a small town, I was used to thinking of Bristol as full of enemies. And this particular small town could take the word
enemy
to a whole new level. I would have to figure out who mine were. And my friends, too, if I had any. I certainly never did as a kid. But there’d been nothing hostile in Wendy’s appraisal of me.

A few minutes later, I sat across from Lance in the quietest corner we could find, sipping tea and nibbling on what was quite possibly the best almond croissant I’d ever tasted.

“So, you’re coming into this at a rather delicate time,” Lance said. “We’ve got a lot of renovations going on, as I’m sure you’ve noticed.”

“Don’t worry about me interfering,” I said. “I have a lot to learn before I make any major decisions. You just continue to do whatever you’ve been doing. But I’ll need you to bring me up to speed on all of it.”

He considered me over the rim of his cup, a posture that, given his height, struck me as designed to be imposing. “You give orders pretty easily for one so young. But I suppose you’re older than you look.”

I smiled and made a noncommittal noise. On the contrary, at a month shy of my twenty-fifth birthday, I was probably even younger than he thought. But I’d always been mature for my age. Or at least, I had been since I was thirteen.

“Madeline Underwood very famously took over the running of the Mount Phearson when she was only nineteen,” I said.

“Fair enough, I suppose.”

“Did you know Miss Underwood well?”

“I didn’t know her at all,” said Lance. “She didn’t normally employ a manager, as I’m sure you know. Mr. Pickwick hired me to take over day-to-day operations after she went to prison.”

“But then you were given free rein?”

“In most ways.”

“So all these renovations are your projects.”

Lance sighed. “I’ve found it very frustrating that the hotel has rested on its laurels for so long. A small, quiet getaway town like Bristol flourishes on the basis of certain things, none of which the Mount Phearson possesses.”

“Such as?”

“A spa, for one thing. Fine dining for another. Frankly, I’m surprised this town has managed to make it as a destination for as long as it has, with so little to offer besides antiques shops and mountain views. They certainly can’t count on that luck to continue indefinitely.”

I smiled, deciding to test him. “Sure they can. They made a deal with the devil, remember?”

He glowered at me. “Even for those superstitious enough to believe in such things, you’d think they’d have stopped resisting change once their devil left. But I had a hell of a time, if you’ll pardon the pun, getting some of the permits.”

I stared at him. “What do you mean, left?”

“You didn’t hear? Apparently the devil packed up and shipped out a few years back. Or so the ladies of the Garden Club tell me.”

“I… how? Why?”

Lance’s smile suggested he thought I was putting him on. Which I supposed was a natural reaction, for a stranger, to how shocked and confused I must have sounded. “Right. He’s supposed to be your father. Well, sorry to be the bearer of dysfunctional family news, but apparently your dad ran off.”

“Just like that?”

“Nobody seems to know why. Only that the deal is off. They seemed to take the diner going out of business as confirmation.”

“When was this?”

Lance shrugged. “Two, three years ago.”

I busied myself with unnecessarily stirring the inch of tea left in my mug, not wanting to show how much this news disturbed me.

My father had never been a part of my life, not directly. But the knowledge of him had always afforded me a sort of protection and security. As bad as things got when I was a kid, I always felt that nobody could
really
hurt me. Not if they believed I was their guardian demon’s daughter. Sure, the ones who didn’t put any stock in the stories might push me in the hall or spit in my lunch, but they didn’t matter. The ones who used magic were the ones you needed to watch out for, and they all believed.

But now he was gone.

How could Bristol even exist without its devil?

Differently, that’s how.

I swirled my tea around. “So that’s why.”

“Why what?” asked Lance.

Why not every feeling I’d had since crossing the town line had been sinister. Why Madeline Underwood had died miles away from here, powerless, alone, and disgraced.

The darkness has lifted.

And probably everybody in Bristol had reacted the same way I just did—with confusion and fear. Uncertainty about how we’d manage without our patron. After all, the darkness was all Bristol had ever known.

But light was a good thing, wasn’t it? The devil had brought peace and prosperity, it was true. But he was still a devil.

I smiled at Lance. “Bristol has a chance to reinvent itself.”

Into my safe haven?

He snapped his fingers and pointed at me, smiling himself. “Exactly what I’ve been trying to tell all of them.”

“And they don’t disagree. It just won’t be up to
you
to reinvent it.” Wendy had come over with fresh drinks for us, in paper to-go cups. “A couple for the road, on the house. But Lance, how many times have I told you this? Bristol doesn’t want its future decided by outsiders.”

I frowned at her. “I am not an outsider.”

Wendy gave me a sympathetic look, but shrugged. “You are now. As far as most people will be concerned, you’re a stranger.” She looked back at Lance. “And your ideas are great, but you’ve got to be more diplomatic. You know how the Garden Club is. They’re used to running things.”

Lance stood up. “Why do you think Agatha and I went to their thing last night? Call it a diplomatic mission.” He grinned at Wendy. “And somehow I don’t think you’re in a position to offer advice on endearing oneself to the Garden Club.”

Wendy returned his smile in a way that made me think she might be an ally, after all. Any enemy of Miss Underwood’s coven was a friend of mine.

“Well,” Lance said to me, “shall we go see some of the things I’ve been telling you about?”

“Sure. Lead the way.” I looked at Wendy. “Thanks for the extra tea.”

“Thanks for coming in.” Her voice was friendly enough, but I couldn’t read her face.

We walked back to the hotel, and Lance showed me around the spa already under construction, the square building I’d seen the night before. Then he led me back toward the far corner of the grounds.

I stopped dead in my tracks halfway there.

“Cordelia!”

Lance looked at me like I’d lost it, which was probably to be expected, as the object of my excited greeting was not a person, but a tree.

“Did you just call that tree Cordelia?” he asked.

“It’s from a book,” I said absently, without taking my eyes off the old black walnut that stood alone, the only thing but grass on this part of the lawn. “I mean, not specifically, but that’s where I got the idea. A children’s book. She names the trees.”

I stepped up to Cordelia and put my palm on her trunk. How could I have forgotten her? “I used to climb this tree as a kid. To read or just to sit.”

Or to hide.

I turned back to Lance, whose expression still clearly communicated his certainty that I was insane.

“Lance, I don’t know how long it’ll be until I’m legally your boss,” I said. “But I swear to you, if you cut down this tree for any reason, the first thing I will do when that day comes is fire you.”

He raised his eyebrows. Then, looking a bit like he was trying not to laugh, nodded. “Well, then. Good thing I have no plans to use this part of the grounds as anything but green space. Your tree here would provide some lovely shade for a picnic. Shall we continue?”

“Please.”

After a few seconds of walking in silence, Lance said, “So, good climbing tree, is it?”

“It is.”

“My boys may be too old for that now, but I’ll let them know, just in case.” He cleared his throat. “That’s my awkward way of bringing up my two kids. Since you just pointed out that you may be my boss by the time summer rolls around.”

“Summer?”

“They live with my first wife, outside of Charlotte. Because of the distance, the usual custody arrangements of sharing weekends and so forth don’t work. They spend their summers here with me and Agatha.”

I glanced at him, his jaw tight, and felt guilty for not giving much consideration to how awful this must be, for everyone at the hotel, but especially him. Who knew how long things would be up in the air during probate, or whatever the legal process was. And then a stranger would be their boss. They had no idea what I was like, whether they’d be able to continue as they had been. And Lance had so many grand plans.

I’d just have to keep trying to reassure him. All I wanted was a safe place to hide from the Wicks. Learning to run a hotel was secondary.

Mostly secondary. I had to admit, the idea of the Mount Phearson being mine, now that Miss Underwood and my father were gone, was becoming a little appealing.