Devil and the Deep (The Ceruleans: Book 4) (19 page)

I couldn’t take another tête-à-tête in the conservatory, not
with that ‘truth will set you free’ poster staring us in the face. So when I
found Evangeline downstairs, I suggested that we took a walk together.

‘I know just the place,’ she said. ‘Just give me a moment to
get ready.’

I waited for my great-grandmother outside the main door,
sitting on a wooden bench. I was calm – strangely calm, given what was to come.

When Evangeline appeared a few minutes later, I had to choke
down a laugh. From the ankle up she was, as ever, a beautiful, elegant lady,
dressed in a yellow shift dress with coordinating fluffy wrap. But gone were
her usual dainty heels and in their place was a pair of Adidas trainers.

She caught me looking and smiled ruefully. ‘At my age, dear,
when it comes to taking a walk on uneven ground, one has to sacrifice vanity
for practicality. I learned that the hard way last month when I lost my footing
in the top field and broke my hip.’

‘Oh!’ I said quickly. ‘I’m sorry – are you all right now?’

‘Of course. I was barely lying there a few minutes before
the cavalry arrived and fixed me up. But it was rather embarrassing, so
afterwards, when Jude bought me these’ – she gestured to her footwear – ‘I
thought I’d better use them.’

She took a look at my feet. ‘Now you, Scarlett, are much
more sensible. You live in these trainer things, I see.’

‘Can’t walk in heels. My mother wears them all the time,
though. It used to drive my father mad because they made her taller than him.’

I watched Evangeline for some flicker of reaction at the
mention of my father, but she simply linked her arm with mine and said, ‘Come
on, dear. I’ll show you a special part of the island.’

As we walked, we kept up an easy conversation. Evangeline
told me about her new project creating a sensory room for the babies on the
island. I told her about Luke’s cafe opening and the many positive reviews that
had run in local newspapers this week.

Evangeline walked slowly and leaned on me a little for
support, but she was in good spirits, clearly delighted by my impromptu visit.
I almost felt guilty for the turn in conversation I knew I’d be executing soon,
and how that would change the mood between us. But I knew that even if
Evangeline was prepared to withhold the truth in order to protect me, I
wouldn’t do the same for her. I couldn’t.

We’d taken the path up the hill behind the hotel that led
south. In my time here I’d come to know the island well – not difficult given
its size – but I’d always avoided the small fenced-off field at the
southernmost tip. It soon became apparent, though, that it was our destination
today.

As we entered through a creaky wooden gate, we fell silent
and slowed so that we could look at each grave marker in turn. There were no
great slabs here, no grand monuments, just simple stone crosses, each inscribed
with a single name.

Evangeline settled on a bench in front of markers for a Saul
and a Noah and a John, and I sat next to her.

‘No dates?’ I asked.

‘No dates,’ she said. ‘Because we don’t believe how long you
have in this world is of significance – all who exist are equal; it is the
person we remember, not their life span.’ She gestured vaguely. ‘A tiny baby
who’s taken by God is just as important as a man who’s lived many decades.’

‘A baby?’ I looked at the markers. ‘Here? I thought Cerulean
babies couldn’t die?’

‘It’s rare,’ she said. ‘But it happens.’

I thought of my time in the treehouse with Luke and had to
fight a dark wave of fear.

‘This is where I come,’ said Evangeline. ‘It’s my thinking
place, I suppose you could say. I’ve been coming here since the early days of
being on the island. But especially since...’ She pointed at a cross before us.
‘I thought, perhaps, given that you’ve been so interested in family, you’d like
to know where your great-grandfather is buried.’

I stared at the name on the marker:
John
.

‘He was a good man, Scarlett. Some didn’t understand him: he
wasn’t a man disposed to humour, and he was unforgiving in his beliefs. But his
heart was pure and good, and he was a wonderful partner to me.’

I looked at her and saw moisture glinting in her lashes.

‘You must miss him,’ I said.

‘Of course. But I have Nathaniel now, and he’s a good man
too. And in any case, I don’t think it will be that long until I’m reunited
with all those who’ve passed on.’

She fixed her eyes on the graves and I let my gaze wander to
the sea beyond. The day was cloudy and the water was a dismal grey.

‘Evangeline,’ I said. ‘I’m here for a reason.’

I turned back to look at her and found she’d been watching
me, her expression resigned. ‘I thought as much. So tell me, Scarlett – what do
you need from me today?’

‘The truth about my father.’

This time she didn’t manage to contain her reaction – I saw
the flicker in her eyes. I ploughed on:

‘I know Hugo isn’t my father, or Sienna’s. I know our father
is a Cerulean. I know he is a
Fallen
Cerulean. I know he is Gabriel.’

The change in Evangeline’s colour so alarmed me that without
thinking I put my hands on hers and let my healing light flood into her.

But she brushed me away. ‘No,’ she said. ‘Stop.’

Evangeline focused on my great-grandfather’s grave and
breathed deeply. It was a minute before she spoke, and when she did she seemed
to have recovered her composure, though I saw that her hands, in her lap, still
trembled.

‘Scarlett,’ she said, ‘you have to know that the burden of
keeping this from you is not one I’ve carried lightly. I believe in honesty. I
do. But with Elizabeth having made a new life for herself and put the past
behind her, I didn’t feel it was my place to tell you of your real father. And
if I had, I knew how it would hurt you. Your father, your sister – I wished to
spare you from the pain I see in your eyes right now. You have every right to
be angry with me, but please know that everything I do, it is to protect the
good
.’

‘I’m not angry,’ I told her. ‘I’ve kept enough truths hidden
myself this past year to protect people. But while Sienna made it clear she
wants nothing to do with me, Gabriel seems to want to talk, and –’

‘Stay!’ she implored. ‘The only way to be safe is to stay
here, on the island. He won’t come here. He hasn’t been here since the day I
told him to leave. And if he did, there are enough of us to stand between you
and him.’

‘You know I can’t stay here. Not forever. And I’m not going
to run from him. He can’t hurt me. If he tries, I can just Travel.’

‘I don’t expect him to hurt you physically. You’re his
daughter, and I’m sure in his twisted heart that means something. It’s his
words that worry me – how he can manipulate.’

Her lip curled on that word,
manipulate
. As if it
were something she would never dream of doing. I didn’t challenge her, though;
I played along.

‘Then tell me about him,’ I said. ‘Please, tell me about my
family. So that I know the truth and I can stand firm against his lies.’

She stared at me, and I wondered for a moment whether she
saw through me – saw that I too could manipulate. But then she nodded and said:

‘You’re right, and I will tell you. Before I do, though, you
must promise me this, Scarlett: you will be careful with that man. Whatever he
says, however he seems to you, however much you may yearn for a father in your
life, he’s done many wicked, unforgiveable things.’ She looked again at the
grave markers. ‘He has sinned,’ she said.

‘I’ll be careful,’ I promised her.

And in a grassy field devoted to remembrances of those loved
and lost, she told me of a man named Gabriel.

May, 1994. In the sleepy village of Twycombe, Devon, a
girl met a boy.

The girl, Elizabeth, was seventeen, the only daughter of
a couple who’d lived alone on the west cliff all of her life.

The boy, Gabriel, was nineteen, a newcomer to the cove,
just passing through. A Cerulean.

The two fell in love. But they had only a little time in
the sweet flush of romance before their relationship was discovered.

Elizabeth’s father, Peter, was furious. He would not let
his daughter, human, be with a Cerulean. He knew the consequences of that.

Evangeline and John were similarly disturbed, and they
instructed Gabriel to leave the girl alone.

But the more their elders tried to pull them apart, the
more Gabriel and Elizabeth held on to each other.

Until Gabriel crossed a line.

He had always been a challenging Cerulean to shape.
Spirited. Wilful. Opinionated. But the tattoo on his arm read Serviam – I will
serve – and he did. He was obedient. There was no way anyone could have known
what was building inside him.

One day, he just snapped. In a single incident, he shed
his innocence. He took a life and he restored a life – he committed murder and
he resurrected the dead.

When it was done, he returned to the island. He stood
before Evangeline and John, dripping blood from the wounds his sins had ripped
open. He was remorseless, blazing with vindication that he had done right.

Gabriel was Outcast. No longer a Cerulean. He was told to
leave the island, to leave Twycombe, and never come back.

He left the island. He left Twycombe. But not alone: he
took with him the innocent young girl who worshipped him blindly.

Peter and Alice were beside themselves at the
disappearance of their daughter. They searched all over for her. The Ceruleans
searched all over for her. But there was no trace.

And then, the following year, Gabriel and Elizabeth
returned to the cottage on the cliff. Elizabeth begged for forgiveness and a
chance to be a family, and Peter and Alice took one look at the tiny baby girl
in Gabriel’s arms and melted.

Peter arranged for the young family to live in the
vicarage of St Mary’s: the perfect setting for Gabriel to work for redemption.
But Gabriel did no such thing. In his time away from Elizabeth, which was ever
more frequent and prolonged, he was no longer healing – he was taking lives.

The family was a ticking time bomb, but to everyone’s
surprise it was Elizabeth – the only one who was oblivious to the true severity
of the situation – who pressed the detonator. One day, tired of her partner’s
constant abandonment, she left him. She took a train to London with nothing but
a pram and a suitcase.

Gabriel left Twycombe the same day. He didn’t come back,
but his actions, and those of the Ceruleans who eventually joined him, ensured
he was never forgotten.

Elizabeth did come back to Twycombe, but not for several
years. When she did, it was with a husband on her arm and two little girls so
close you’d have thought them twins.

When I left the island that evening, I Travelled directly to
Luke’s roof terrace, where he’d told Jude he would meet me. I found him standing
at the glass barrier and looking out at clouds tinged pink by the setting sun.
He didn’t hear me approach, and when I went to slide my arms around him he
jumped at the contact.

‘It’s only me,’ I said quickly, hands up, as he spun around.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I’ve been on edge all day. Come here –’

We collided in a hug and squeezed hard enough to hurt. For a
long time we stayed that way, neither of us moving, slowly casting off all the
horror and fear of the night before. It was me who broke away. I gestured to a
pair of chairs on the terrace and we sat, face to face, knee to knee, hand in
hand.

‘How’s Grannie?’ I asked first.

‘Fine,’ he said. ‘They found a room for her at another home.
It’s a little further from here, but her room’s nicer – bigger and with a sea
view. She’s actually on really good form. I think all the adventure and company
perked her up. Though she keeps telling everyone about blue angels, so the
staff think she’s off in the clouds.’

‘And Cara?’

‘Shaken. Last night brought back some difficult memories.
She’ll be fine, though. She and Chester are staying at Si’s; he’ll get Cara
through it.’

‘And are
you
okay?’

‘I am now you’re home. I had nightmares about you in that
fire.’

‘But I’m all right. You know that.’

‘How can you be? I mean, the fire, Gabriel…’

I shrugged. ‘I wasn’t okay. I didn’t sleep well either. But
this morning I felt calmer. The island helps, I
think. It’s like taking
a break from the real world there. Or maybe it’s just that after all this time,
I’m getting better at moving on after a drama.’

Luke frowned. ‘It shouldn’t be that way. You shouldn’t be
getting hardened to painful shocks. You shouldn’t keep getting swept up in
dramas.’

‘Sorry,’ I said at once.

‘For what?’

‘All the dramas.’

‘Well, they’re hardly your fault, are they?’

And yet I felt guilty. I was the Cerulean. I was the one
with a seriously dysfunctional family. Luke was just a regular guy who wanted
to lead a regular life.

‘So how did it go with Evangeline?’ he said. ‘Did she tell
you…?’

‘Yes.’

‘And you believe her?’

‘Yes.’

Silence, and then:

‘If you don’t want to talk about it now, I understand.’

‘Do you
want
me to talk about it?’

He looked confused. ‘Of course, Scarlett. You know you can
talk to me – about anything.’

Anything. Like what we’d done yesterday in that treehouse.
Like what our being intimate could create.

Suddenly, I was happy to talk – about Evangeline, about the
island, about my parents. The story tumbled out of me, clumsy and nowhere near
as poetic as Evangeline’s version had been.

‘... and then off he went to build an army of killers like
him,’ I finished.

I waited for Luke’s reaction. When it came, it made me
smile:

‘Blimey. So
that
’s your father’s story? He’s like
Romeo meets Darth Vader.’

‘But Gabriel missed the “I
am
your father” line,’ I
pointed out. ‘And trying to tempt me to the Dark Side.’

‘No wonder your mum left and never told you about him,
Scarlett
.
’

‘Though from her point of view, his only crime was being
absent – she can’t have known what he was, what he is.’

‘Are you sure?’

‘I’m sure. She doesn’t know about the Ceruleans. Otherwise
she’d have protected me and Sienna.’

Luke nodded. ‘I guess that makes sense. So the way your mum
sees it, she fell in love with Gabriel, ran off with him when her parents tried
to split them up, felt increasingly let down by him and, finally, left him.’

‘And somewhere in the middle, they decided to come back to
the cove.’

‘Why?’

‘No idea. But at least I know now why my grandfather was so “het
up”, as Grannie put it. It must have been his worst nightmare – his daughter
falling in love with a Cerulean.’

‘I don’t know,’ said Luke, arching an eyebrow. ‘It’s not
so
bad being in love with a Cerulean.’

‘Maybe. But I’m a good-guy Cerulean – not a bad’un, like
him.’

He stiffened and his smile vanished. ‘Scarlett, you joke about
it – but this is serious. Your father is lurking about. You know he’s
dangerous. You know somehow your sister did get tempted to the “Dark Side” – to
being a “bad’un”. What if he gets to you?’

I rolled my eyes. ‘You and Jude
have
been talking. You
sound just like him.’

‘I’m just worried about you. About
him
. I don’t want
you near that man.’

‘If he wants to come and talk to me, Luke, no one can stop
that.’

‘You can’t stop him coming, maybe, but you can stop him
talking. The minute he opens his mouth, you tell him where to go. Shut him
down.’

‘I won’t be doing that. I want to hear what he has to say.’

‘What? Why? You don’t owe that man anything!’

‘No, I don’t. But
he
owes
me
a great deal.’

‘You want him to make it up to you? You want him to build a relationship
with you?’

‘No. Of course not.’

‘So why do you want to hear a word out of his lying lips?!’

Luke was dangerously close to shouting, and that was pushing
me dangerously close to tears. I shook off his hands and stood up and moved
back, putting a little distance between us.

‘Because he’s kept away from me for eighteen years,’ I said,
‘and the fact he’s found me now means he has something to say. Something
important. And given the fact that he’s corrupted my sister and devastated my
mother and ignored me for a lifetime, I have some things to say to him too.’

‘But there, what you just said – he
corrupted
Sienna.
What if he can corrupt you?’

‘Nice, Luke,’ I snapped back. ‘You love me but you have zero
faith in me.’ The first tears fell and I scrubbed them away with my fists. ‘You
know me,’ I said, ‘you
know
me, and you think I have it in me to turn
into one of
them –
you think I could kill!’

‘No!’ He sprang to his feet and gripped my shoulders hard. ‘No!
Of course I don’t believe that of you. You’re
good
.’

I tried to get away from him; I was hurt and angry and I
didn’t want him near me. But he pulled me to his chest and trapped me there.

‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I do have faith in you.
I’m sorry.’

I held on to being hurt and angry for a few more rounds of ‘sorry’,
and then the dam broke and I cried until his t-shirt was wet under my cheek.

Eventually, when I was quiet, he let me go. I walked to the
edge of the terrace and focused on the distant waves, darkening as they
swallowed the sun.

Luke came to stand beside me. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said again.

‘It’s okay,’ I told him without looking at him. ‘I know you
mean well. It’s just… it feels like we do this now. Fight. We didn’t used to.’

He put a hand over mine on the balustrade. ‘Maybe that’s
true,’ he said. ‘Maybe at the start we didn’t. Back then, everything was so
simple. The stuff we’re dealing with now – it’s hard, Scarlett. We’re bound to
struggle sometimes. All that matters is that we make up in the end.’

‘But I don’t like fighting,’ I said. ‘Sienna was always
ready for a row, even when we were tiny. And Mum and Hugo were constantly at
it. Little snide comments. Bickering. Full-scale slanging matches. I used to
hide when they really got into it. I could never stand it.’

‘My mum and dad used to fight too, you know,’ said Luke. ‘Not
often, but when they did, you knew about it. Dad was the strong, silent type,
and it drove Mum mad sometimes. She’d needle him but he never blew – she’d yell
and he wouldn’t, and then she’d run out of steam. Eventually. Once, she didn’t
come down until she’d thrown a bowl of cereal at him. I remember him sitting at
the kitchen table, peeling cornflakes off his work shirt and asking Cara to
pass the sugar, and then Mum cracked up, and so did he, and they were rolling
about laughing together.’

I looked at Luke. He was smiling at the memory and I found
it infectious.

‘Hurling food in a temper, eh?’ I teased gently. ‘Like
mother like son.’

He laughed. ‘Yeah, Mum would totally have been looking down
from heaven and egging me on as I threw dips at Jude.’

‘She didn’t mind rows then? And getting angry? My mum always
fell apart afterwards – she’d be in such a state, even if the row was all her.’

‘My mum always said it was healthy to express anger, as long
as you did it with respect for others.’

I raised an eyebrow. ‘And throwing cereal is respectful?’

‘No, even she had to admit she’d crossed a line there. But
then she did have a thing about using cereal to vent.’

‘Huh?’

He grinned. ‘She used to throw dry cereal all over the
kitchen floor – cornflakes, rice puffs, the crunchy stuff – and then stamp all
over it until it was dust. When Cara and I were little and all riled up, out
came the cereal packet. I stamped a
lot
of cereal in my time. Works for
all kinds of difficult feelings, you know.’

‘Your mum sounds amazing, Luke,’ I said.

‘She was. She’d have liked you.’

‘Really? I’m not sure I’m a mother’s dream girlfriend for
her son, what with all my baggage.’

It was meant to be a joke, but he didn’t smile.

‘You have to stop doing that, Scarlett,’ he said seriously. ‘Putting
yourself down. I love you as you are. And the other stuff – none of it matters,
as long as we’re together.’

‘So, the rows?’

‘Healthy.’

‘And the Cerulean bit of me?’

‘Nothing we can’t manage.’

‘And the family drama?’

‘We’ll get through it. And keep hoping for a quiet life one
day.’

I thought about a quiet life with Luke. That was a good
dream. A dream worth fighting for.

‘Love you,’ he whispered, touching his forehead to mine.

‘Love you too,’ I told him.

We stayed like that for a little while, until the fast-encroaching
night whipped up a wind to make me shiver.

‘Come on,’ said Luke, slinging an arm around my shoulders. ‘Let’s
get inside and work out what comes next.’

*

Two hot chocolates and a monster slab of coffee cake later
and we’d reached a decision: it was time for me to go home to the cottage. I
couldn’t stay at Luke’s – I needed space – and I wouldn’t hide away on the
island. Plus, it seemed clear that Gabriel’s ‘see you soon’ would be followed
by a visit in the not-too-distant future, and if he was going to pick a place
for our meeting, it would be the cottage – familiar to us both, and isolated
from people. If that’s where he was going, I wanted him to find me. Soon. I
wanted it over.

There was just one thing we hadn’t agreed on: whether I
would face Gabriel alone. Instinctively, I wanted to keep Luke away from the
thick of the action. But he was determined to be with me, and there was just no
arguing with the truth in his words:

‘You’ve done all of this without me, Scarlett. All the early
stuff with Jude. The island. Newquay with Daniel and your sister. The fire. You
do it alone, and then you tell me about it later, when it’s all over. I know
you think you’re protecting me by keeping me separate. But you’re not – you’re
shutting me out, making it harder for me to understand. Let me in. Let me be
there. I’m your boyfriend; it’s only right.’

He was looking at me so earnestly and I should have been
serious, I know. But a dot of cream on his nose made me smile. I reached over
the kitchen table and rubbed it off.

‘Okay,’ I said.

‘Okay?’

‘Okay. Come and meet Gabriel – outcast, murderer and...
father.’

The words wiped the smile off my face.

‘I’ll be there,’ said Luke. ‘You’ll be safe.’

‘I know.’

‘But you still look anxious.’

‘I don’t want to be! I want to be strong. I want him to look
at me and see I’m unbreakable and unswayable and he can’t get to me.’

Luke cocked his head and looked thoughtful. ‘You know,’ he
said, ‘I might just have the answer to dealing with that fear of yours.’

‘Oh yes?’

And that is how a blue-eyed boy and a green-eyed girl came
to be in a dimly lit kitchen at midnight, stamping over a carpet of rapidly
disintegrating honey hoops breakfast cereal to the beat of David Guetta’s ‘Titanium’.