July (6 page)
Authors: Gabrielle Lord
I paid really careful attention to everything I did, so that I could leave the room exactly as it was before I entered it. Then I plonked myself down on a recliner, front row, centre.
I’d picked out a movie from the collection that made me think of Winter—
Bonnie and Clyde
.
Winter
and I shared such a strange connection—we were both different, we were both like outlaws, on our own. Had she really known about the Jewel all along, and lied to me about it? The
picture
of her I’d seen in Sligo’s safe—wearing the Jewel—didn’t make any sense. She had seemed so committed to getting me into Sligo’s place, and out of there in one piece with the Jewel in
my
possession.
Anyway, I thought to myself, I had to put that mystery out of my mind for now—I had a movie to watch.
I woke up in a sweat and quickly scrambled off the recliner chair I was sprawled on. I’d let myself fall asleep after watching the movie last night, but my old nightmare had returned and sent my mind into a spin.
Weird shadows filled the spacious room. I jumped up and went to the living room, back to my place on the rug, still trying to shake the white toy dog and the wailing baby from my head. When the sound wouldn’t go away, I realised a real baby was crying, far away in a neighbouring property. Huddled against the wall, I tried telling myself everything was all right.
I couldn’t fool myself. I was still haunted by the dark and desolate nightmare—its thick atmosphere wouldn’t let me go. The world of the nightmare was too similar to the world I was sitting in right now—with a dark, deserted house,
and the sound of a baby crying. Someone lost and abandoned. Someone exactly like me.
My mind flashed back to the ‘Twin Baby Abduction Nightmare’ article I’d seen at
Great-uncle
Bartholomew’s house.
What had he been hiding, and why?
Did those babies have something to do with me … and my recurring nightmare? When Bartholomew was dying, had he meant to say that one of them was me? Or had that been a slip of the tongue? A sick feeling in my gut grew the more I thought about it. It was starting to feel way too personal.
Twin baby
. The face of my double hovered in my consciousness. He had my face.
Dad and Rafe were twins.
Was I?
The thought of having a long-lost twin seemed impossible. If only I could call my mum to ask her for the truth.
I fell back on my sleeping-bag. Right now, I couldn’t deal with this.
The house phone was ringing. I waited, hoping it would match Boges’s code. After two short rings, followed by one long, I snatched it up.
‘Eric Blair’s back!’ he said. ‘I’ve been scoping out your dad’s old office on my way to school, and this morning I saw some new guy heading up the stairs outside the building. Immediately he caught my attention—he looked a bit frail—like someone who hasn’t seen the sun in a while.’
‘Yeah?’ I urged, excitement building.
‘And then this woman,’ Boges continued, ‘ran up the stairs after him, calling out—wait for it—
Eric
!’
‘No way!’
‘Yes, way! It
has
to be him. You must try
calling
him again.’
‘I will, I’ll try on a public phone today.’
‘Cool. I have to go, but I’ll see you on
Wednesday
.’
It took me quite a while to find a public phone in Crystal Beach, and I pounced on the first one I saw, dialling Eric with flying fingers.
‘Eric Blair, please,’ I said when the
receptionist
picked up. I noted it was a new voice, and was relieved I didn’t have to deal with the suspicious woman from my last call.
‘One moment,’ came the reply.
I waited, wondering what in the world I was going to say to him. I’d been anticipating this moment for so long, but hadn’t figured out a strategy. I had no idea how he was going to react to hearing from me.
‘Thank you for holding,’ the voice returned, like a recording. ‘Transferring you through.’
I could hardly believe it. Finally, I was
getting
the chance to talk to the guy that had been with Dad in Ireland, when he got sick.
‘Eric Blair speaking.’ His voice was tentative and gentle. ‘Hello?’
‘Mr Blair,’ I said, ‘I’ve been trying to get in touch with you for quite some time …’ I faltered, completely freaking out about what to say.
‘Yes, and how can I help you?’
‘Please don’t hang up on me when I tell you who I am—I really need your help, and have been counting on you for information.’
‘Information on what?’ he asked in a voice that was a little more familiar to me. He’d always sounded very confident and
straightforward
when I’d taken calls for Dad back home, way before the illness took hold.
‘I’m Tom Ormond’s son.’
There was a long silence at the other end before he spoke again.
‘Cal?’
‘Yes.’
‘Cal. I’m really sorry about what happened to your father. I was unwell myself, and have been a bit … umm … out of touch, but I know that you’re in trouble. It’s only my first day back in the office, so I can’t really talk to you right now, but you should give me your number and we can chat another time.’
‘Please,’ I said. ‘I have so many questions about what happened in Ireland. And don’t believe what you’ve heard about me. None of it’s true.’
He took down my mobile number and we hung up.
It wasn’t until I was halfway back to the mansion that I realised I’d given him a number he couldn’t even call me on.
Shortly before four o’clock, I waited for Boges near the busy ticket line. I kept my head down and avoided eye contact, following the rule of the street. Nobody took any notice of me standing there like anyone else waiting for a friend to show up for a movie.
Somehow I’d managed to shove all thoughts of that haunting ‘Twin Baby Abduction Nightmare’ headline into the deepest corner of my mind, but it hadn’t been so easy to squeeze Winter in there with it. I couldn’t get her floaty hair and tiny bird tattoo out of my mind, and I couldn’t stop picturing the photo I’d seen of her in the
silver
dress wearing the Ormond Jewel around her neck. If she knew about it all along, why didn’t she just say so? And then why did she help us steal it? There had to be another explanation.
Without her help, we never could have penetrated Sligo’s security to get into the safe.
Boges hadn’t shown up yet, and I wished he’d hurry. This wait in public was doing my head in. I was thinking about the mysterious warning I’d received:
If the heir dies before his sixteenth birthday
…
I didn’t know what ‘the heir’ in the message was about, but my sixteenth birthday, 31 July, was coming up fast. I couldn’t help but believe it referred to me, and that right now I was a bigger target than ever.
July also meant the anniversary of Dad’s death. He died only a matter of days before my birthday, which meant that my fifteenth had been absolutely miserable.
The memory of it returned as if it had
happened
yesterday. Mum was like a ghost, filled with grief, drifting around the house like a lost soul. She and Gabbi tried so hard to make my birthday count—they even baked me a cake and gave me an awesome skateboard—but it was way too soon. The house was still fresh with the scent of flowers from Dad’s funeral.
When the three of us sat at the table, lit up by the glow of the candles on my birthday
cake, the empty chair was all we could focus on.
Gabbi stared at it with longing. ‘It’s not fair,’ she’d cried. ‘How can anyone have a birthday without Dad? Why did he have to leave us like this? It’s just not fair!’
Mum put her arms around both of us,
pulling
us tight. Through tears she said that he’d always be there, in our hearts. She said that we’d all have to be strong and go on without him; we’d have to be there for each other, because he would be so sad if he saw us falling apart.
Something vibrated in my bag. Confused, I dug my mobile out, and was shocked to see a glimmer of life on the stained screen—someone had just sent me a message.
I fumbled, trying to see if there was a number with it, but the phone blacked out again. I looked around, worried—was I being watched right now? Was a skull on a lifeless phone a warning?
I pulled my hoodie around my face and quickly walked away from the cinema. At the first side street I started running, not stopping until I was five or six blocks away, in the area around Central Station, where I ducked into a phone booth and called Boges.
‘Someone’s just messaged me—sent me a pic of a skull, saying “Gotcha”! I bolted from the cinemas, and right now I’m in a phone booth at the station. I didn’t even think my mobile was working!’
‘You’ve gotta lose that mobile! I’ll get you another one,’ said Boges. ‘How did anyone get your number?’
‘Maybe Sligo’s on to Winter. Maybe he knows that she’s been helping me, and he got into her phone.’
‘Maybe she
gave
it to him.’
‘No way. She’s on our side, not his,’ I said. I still hadn’t told Boges about the photo of Winter I’d found in the safe, but I was feeling more protective of her than ever—I feared what Sligo would do to her if he found out she’d been assisting his enemy.
Boges had been held up at home and it was too late now for me to double back to the cinema and meet him. We agreed to meet up tomorrow, at a new location. He told me again to get rid of the phone in case someone, somehow, was tracking it.
I did better than lose it. It took me about three minutes to dodge security, jump the station ticket barriers and run down to one of the platforms. No-one even noticed as I slipped my phone through one of the windows of the train, and disappeared again.
If Sligo or Oriana de la Force were able to get a GPS reading on my half-dead mobile, they’d think I was heading west, fast.
I’d learned something from Bartholomew and Maggers.
