Autumn Bones (15 page)

“Wait!” Emmeline held up one hand. “This is about Sinny. This is about
my brother
. And I am telling you, he doesn’t belong here.” Her voice was low and fierce. “Look at him. Look!” She jerked her chin in his direction. Sinclair was posing with the couple, his arms slung amiably around their necks while an obliging member of the waitstaff took a photo. “I rode on that bus today,” she said in a contemptuous tone. “I watched him play the part of a fool for the benefit of dull-witted American tourists, japing like a mountebank.”

“He
likes
his job!” I protested. “Hell, he invented that job! And look, he’s making people happy. What’s wrong with that?”

She shot me a withering glance. “My brother is meant to be a young lion of Judah, not a neutered American house cat. He belongs at home with his own people.”

“Again,” I said, “may I point out that your brother is a grown-ass man who makes his own choices?”

Emmeline ignored me. “I want you to stop seeing him,” she repeated in a clipped Anglo-Caribbean accent. “You wield influence here, no matter how ignorantly or clumsily. I want you to use it. Bid the fairies and whatnot to cease their appearances. Give my brother a reason to come home where he belongs. It’s long past time.”

“Are you serious?” I stared at her in disbelief. “Why in the freaking hell would I do that?”

She didn’t answer, but I felt a palpable sense of menace rolling off her. As the legendary blues musician Muddy Waters would say, Emmeline Palmer definitely had her mojo working. A trickle of ice water ran the length of my spine.

“Are you
threatening
me?” In the moment, I was too incredulous to be angry. “Seriously?”

She glanced across the restaurant at Sinclair, who was making his way toward us. “Let’s just say I’ll give you a month to think about it, shall we?” Her gaze returned to me, hard and implacable. “You’ve got a charming little town here. It doesn’t need my brother and neither do you.”

Her ultimatum was delivered as Sinclair reached the table, which gave me only a split second to decide whether to respond in public and make a scene or suck it up and deal with it later. I chose option number two, getting to my feet so fast it startled Sinclair.

“Daisy? You okay?” he asked.

“Yeah, fine. I, um, spilled beer on my skirt.” I pushed past him. “Just going to rinse it out.”

I got halfway to the bathroom before a tidal wave of fury hit me, leaving me shaking with the effort to control it. I turned the cold water tap on full blast, leaning over the sink and splashing my face.

You’ve got a nice little town here. Be a shame if something happened to it.

Jesus! Seriously? I mean
seriously
? I was Hel’s own agent in Pemkowet. Emmeline had insulted me to my face, then demanded that I help her drive Sinclair out of town. That took a hell of a lot of nerve. Or stupidity.

But what exactly could I do about it? She hadn’t made an explicit threat. She hadn’t broken any mundane laws and she wasn’t in violation of Hel’s rule of order. At least not yet, anyway.

What I could do was talk to Sinclair, which I fully intended to do. But not here, not now. What I
wanted
to do was vent my fury. Give it full rein, let it bring the roof crashing down on our heads if that’s what it took. The old pipes in the bathroom began to creak alarmingly and the sink began to rattle.

Uh-oh.

I took a deep, trembling breath and stared at the water pouring out of the tap, swirling down the drain, willing it to carry my anger away with it. When I thought I had myself under control, I glanced up into the mirror—

—into a sea of flames.

Double uh-oh.

That meant my temper had weakened the Inviolate Wall enough for my father to reach out to me from the infernal plane. Belphegor’s face swam in the fiery sea, black eyes boring into mine, sharp, curving horns jutting from his temples.

Daughter
. His voice echoed inside my skull, deep and amused and, weirdly, almost affectionate.
You have but to ask
.

“No.” I gripped the edges of the sink, shaking my head. “No! Go away!”

The bathroom door opened. “Are you okay, honey?” a woman’s concerned voice asked. Her hand patted me soothingly on the back. “Had a little too much to drink?”

With an effort, I let go of the sink and straightened. It was one of the frumpy ladies in the appliquéd sweatshirts. Hers was green with sunflowers on it, and she had kind eyes.

“I’m fine,” I said gratefully, stealing a peek at the mirror. It was just a mirror again, showing me nothing but my reflection. “Thank you. I just—”

My sentence trailed off into nothing, because I wasn’t sure what to say. I just . . . what? Needed a minute to collect myself because my boyfriend’s secret twin sister had threatened me with obeah? Because I had accidentally invoked the specter of my father, the minor demon and occasional incubus Belphegor?

Fortunately, it didn’t seem to matter to the nice lady in the sunflower sweatshirt. “As long as you’re okay.”

I turned off the tap. “Thank you. I appreciate it.”

“Don’t mention it.” She gave me another pat and a warm, weary smile. “We’ve all got to take care of one another, honey.”

Her kindness gave me the strength I needed to wrestle the last fraying tendrils of my temper under control and venture back out into the bar to face the prospect of making polite conversation with my boyfriend and his twin sister, who I wished had stayed a secret but who was apparently my new nemesis.

Stormy weather, indeed.

Fourteen

S
ome
how I got through the evening.

The music helped. Ironically, it also helped that Emmeline was so adept at being two-faced, falling back on the easy, self-deprecating charm that had lured me into complacency in the first place.

Sinclair wasn’t fooled, at least not by me. He knew I was on edge. When I first returned to the table, he gave me an inquiring furrowed-brow look. I replied with a barely perceptible headshake that meant I didn’t want to talk about it now.

So we didn’t.

We listened to the rest of the set, and when the band took a break, Emmeline asked if we’d mind making it an early night since it had been a long travel day for her. I don’t think I’ve ever cleared out of a bar faster in my life. I was in such a hurry I almost forgot to leave a tip for the band in the fishbowl atop the piano. I hustled out the door into the parking lot—and then stopped abruptly.

A solitary figure was awaiting us under the lone floodlight that illuminated the lot, leaning against the pole, hands shoved in the pockets of his jeans. There was a motorcycle alongside him, a pared-down vintage model that looked like a prop from an old World War II movie. The light spilling from above highlighted his fair hair and the unnatural pallor of his narrow face and his skinny bare arms.

“Cooper,” I said aloud.

“Evenin’, m’lady.” He freed one hand to tip an imaginary hat to me. “Everything all right?”

I should have realized that Stefan would sense the barrage of fury I’d very nearly unleashed. “Everything’s fine. Did Stefan send you?”

“He did.” Cooper levered himself away from the pole. “The big man himself. Said he felt a surge in the Force or somewhat and sent me to have a look. I had a peep through the window.” He sauntered closer, hands back in his pockets. “Looked amiable enough to me, didn’t it? A few chums having a pint. So I reckoned I’d wait out here.”

Sinclair stepped forward to block him. “Daisy, do you know this guy?”

“Yeah.” I put one hand on Sinclair’s shoulder. “He’s okay.”

Cooper sniffed. “Faint praise, Miss Daisy!” Rocking back on his heels, he studied Sinclair. “This your bloke?”

“That,” I said, “would be none of your business.”

“Touchy touchy!” He gave me a crooked sideways grin. Neon light from the bar signs glittered in his pupils, which waxed as he turned his attention to Emmeline, and just as swiftly contracted to pinpoints. “Hello! What do we have here?”

“Emmeline Palmer.” She extended one hand to him, cool as a cucumber. “Pleased to make your acquaintance. Mr. Cooper, is it?”

Cooper kept his hands in his pockets. “You’re wearing a ward, aren’t you, darling? Quite a powerful one. Don’t think I fancy a taste of it,” he added thoughtfully. “Afraid of the local hobgoblins and bugaboos, are we?”

“I’m a lawyer, Mr. Cooper.” Emmeline gave a faint shrug. Light glinted on the polished leopard-spotted surface of the cowry shell and gold chain strung around her neck. “We like to be prepared.”

He eyed her. “Right.”

I glanced at Sinclair. He looked like he’d had as much covert tension and subterfuge as he could stand and was ready to blow. “Cooper! Will you thank Stefan for me and tell him everything’s fine?”

“I will,” he said. “He said to tell you to be in touch. He’s got somewhat that might help out with your little project.” With that, Cooper sauntered back toward his bike, straddled it, kicked it to life, and roared out of the parking lot.

Sinclair turned to me. “You want to tell me what the hell that was all about?”

I really, really didn’t. Not here and now, not in front of dear Emmy, who was glancing back and forth between us with interest, waiting to see how this was going to play out. I, um, hadn’t exactly been forthcoming yet about my bond with Stefan Ludovic. “It’s nothing. Like Cooper said, he was just checking things out.” I gave Sinclair my best puppy-dog eyes, pleading silently with him to let it go.

“All right.” He sounded reluctant, but he agreed. “Let’s get out of here.”

Emmeline slid obligingly behind the wheel of her rental convertible. “What a peculiar young man,” she remarked, pulling onto the rural highway. “Is he even old enough for a driver’s license?”

“Cooper?” I met her gaze in the rearview mirror. “Yeah, you could say so. He’s more than two hundred years old. He was hanged to death in the Irish Rebellion of 1798.”

Funny how those kind of details stay with you.

Her eyelids flickered slightly. “I see.”

“He’s not a duppy, Emmy,” Sinclair said. “He’s a ghoul.”

Duppy
. It seemed like I’d heard that word before. I wanted to ask what a duppy was, but I kept my mouth shut on the question for now. It was worth noting that Emmeline hadn’t been able to recognize a ghoul on sight. That, I thought, was why she’d offered to shake Cooper’s hand; she was trying to get a read on him. It was also worth noting that she’d done it without the slightest trace of fear, and Cooper had been wary enough to refuse.

Okay, duly noted. Dear Emmy was packing some serious mojo and should not be underestimated.

By the time they dropped me off at my apartment, my head was aching with the effort of containing my various emotions. It was about half an hour later, around ten thirty or so, that Sinclair called. I’d thought he might. I was sitting on my screened porch listening to Billie Holiday, a few candles lit, a glass of scotch in my hand and Mogwai on my lap, kneading and purring. I was as calm as I was going to get.

“So what’s up, Daisy?” Sinclair asked without preamble. “What’s going on?”

“Is your sister there?”

“No,” he said. “I offered, but she’s staying at a B and B downtown. Why? What did she say to you?” He hesitated. “Does it have anything to do with that rat-faced little ghoul checking up on you?”

I stroked Mogwai’s calico fur. “Do you know why she’s here?”

“Yeah.” Sinclair let out a sigh. “To try to talk me into coming home. Home to Jamaica. At least during the off season. But you know . . .” There was a faint wistful note in his voice. “I think she misses me, too.”

“You must miss her,” I said.

“We’ve spent most of our lives missing each other, Daise,” he said. “But we’re on different paths.”

According to his sister, the path of obeah was a path of balance, a path between light and dark. That was one of those things that sounded good on paper, all profound and mystical, until you started wondering exactly what the hell it meant, what the real-world ramifications were for mundane and eldritch alike.

And I didn’t know. I had no idea. All I knew was that Emmeline was on it and Sinclair wasn’t, but she and their powerful mother thought he should be.

“Daisy?”

“Yeah.” I shifted Mogwai’s bulk into a more comfortable position. “Look . . . I don’t want to get in the middle of this.”

“What did she say to you?” Sinclair repeated.

I gazed out into the night, listening to the sounds of Pemkowet. It was quieter than it had been in months. It would get even quieter in the months to come. “Do you ever regret not following the same path as your sister?”

“No
.
”
His reply was prompt and sure. “Daisy . . . listen, it’s a long story. It’s part of the conversation I promised you. But the short answer is no. A definitive no.” He paused. “Are you going to answer my question?”

I scratched Mogwai under his chin. He lifted it to allow me access, curling his lip with pleasure to reveal a sharp eyetooth. “Emmeline asked me to stop seeing you. To call off the fairies, use my influence in the eldritch community. To give you a reason not to stay here. To go home.”

There was a short, shocked silence. “She
what
?”

“Yeah.”

Sinclair laughed. “Oh, hell, no! Emmy, Emmy! I know she only just met you, but what in the world made her think
you
of all people would agree to it?”

See, here’s where it got tricky. Vague, creeping menace does not a coherent threat make. And I might be entirely in the right here, but I was also the outsider in this equation. Families, even dysfunctional families—hell, maybe
especially
dysfunctional families—tend to turn on outsiders who slander another member of the clan. I’d seen enough of it with the Cassopolis family to know that. Jen could bitch about her abusive father, her passive mother, and her blood-slut sister, Bethany, all day long, but heaven help anyone else who did the same. That right was reserved for family.

So I temporized. “Oh, I think she thought I’d be swayed by her formidable nature. She
is
pretty formidable, isn’t she?”