Seduction (26 page)

“My, isn’t this
lovely
!” Marie-Therèse exclaimed, delicately touching a porcelain vase that bore the psychic imprint of a family in mourning for a man who had recently been beheaded. I could almost see his blood on it.

“Um,” I grunted, turning away.

We had our tea back in the sitting room. Marie-Therèse marveled at the tiny scones and petit-fours that the maid served us from a silver platter, but eating was the last thing I felt like doing. Something was wrong here. I just couldn’t put my finger on what it was.

Then I saw the tray shaking, and I realized it was the maid. She was the same one the butler had spoken to on the stairway, and her hands were trembling. The cords on her neck were standing out too, as if she were doing everything in her power to keep from screaming. I tried to catch her eye, but she stared resolutely ahead.

“Excuse me,” I said, touching her elbow. “Rose?”

We both gasped at the same time. The silver tray flew into the air, tossing pastries everywhere. Rose fell to her knees, murmuring apologies as she picked up the tiny cakes, just as the butler bustled in. His face was red. He looked as if he were about to burst with anger.

“It wasn’t her fault,” I blurted. “I startled her.”

The man brought himself under control—at least momentarily—and managed a curt bow in my direction. “Very good, mademoiselle,” he said, although the look he gave the maid could have burned through steel.

Marie-Therèse was looking bewildered. “Maybe we should go,” I suggested, hauling her out of her seat.

“What . . . what was that about?” she whispered as I pushed her down the length of the driveway. “Could we not have called a taxi from inside the house?”

“I needed the air,” I said, continuing to propel her forward. I wasn’t about to tell Marie-Therèse, but when I’d touched the maid’s arm, something like pure fear had shot out of her. Fear, and a single, screaming thought:
My God, don’t make me watch another one die!

CHAPTER

•

THIRTY

I really couldn’t afford it, but in the interest of time, we took a taxi all the way back to the house on the Rue des Âmes Perdues.

“Thank you, dear,” Marie-Therèse said. “You’ve done so much to set my mind at rest.”

“Glad to help,” I muttered, practically shoving the old lady back into her room. “Well . . .” I pretended to yawn. I still had things to do. “See you later.”

“But Katy, can you explain why you insisted that we leave so—”

“Sorry,” I said, stretching exaggeratedly. “Another time. Student’s hours, you know.”

She looked at her watch. “But it’s barely seven o’clock.”

“That late?” I said, yawning again. “Nighty night.” I pushed her door shut.

Then I ran to Peter’s room. I was still angry and confused about his participation in the Enclave—not to mention his
holier-than-thou attitude afterward, but I could wait to discuss those things with him. At the moment, there was something more pressing on my mind.

I knocked on the door, hoping fervently that he was in. For a change, he was. “You have to help me,” I said, plastering myself against the inside of his door.

“What’d you do?” He squinted at me suspiciously.

“I didn’t do anything!” I hissed. “It’s these people. I told you, something’s wrong here.”

Peter frowned. “What, exactly?”

I plopped myself onto his bed. “Remember when we were talking about the so-called country house where the old people go?”

He nodded.

“Well, they go, all right. But they don’t come back.”

“Huh?”

“None of the furniture’s been used for hundreds of years. And when I touched the maid who brought us tea—”

“Wait a minute. You went there? To the old folks’ home?”

“I had to see if it was a real place.”

“And it was.”

I nodded. “But when I touched the maid, she freaked out. And when I tuned in to her thoughts, all she could think about was that she didn’t want to see anyone else die.”

Peter looked at me expectantly.

“Well?” I shrilled. “What are we going to do?”

“What do you mean?”

“I
mean
we can’t let Marie-Therèse go there!” I thought,
How dense could a person be?
“Didn’t you say that Jeremiah asked you to move her out on her birthday? Well, don’t!”

“Katy—”

“They
die
there, Peter!”

He blinked.

“Is something wrong with your eye?” I nearly shouted.

“No . . . no . . .” He rubbed his nose. “It’s just that . . . well, it
is
a retirement home. I don’t imagine too many of the residents leave there to go skiing in Vail.”

I sat back, glaring at him. “I’m telling you, it was
weird
there, Peter.”

“Okay. But a lot of places are weird. Whitfield isn’t exactly normal either.”

“But—”

He held up a hand so that I’d let him finish. “We are dealing with witches, after all. And it’s not like the place was a haunted house or anything, if there were servants bringing you tea.”

“The butler was weird too,” I muttered.

He shrugged.

“Rude.”

Peter rolled his eyes. “A rude French butler. How shocking. Better call the media.”

“You’re not being any help at all.”

“I’m sorry, Katy. But I have to be up at five in the morning. Jeremiah needs me to—”

“Jeremiah!” I exclaimed. “Where is he?”

Peter looked stricken. “Actually, he’s here,” he said with a sigh. “He’s with Sophie.”

“Where?”

“In her room, I guess. But Katy—”

“Never mind,” I said, leaping from his bed. “Forget I ever came here.”

“I just wish you’d—”

I closed the door behind me. “—be reasonable,” I heard him finish.

You be reasonable,
I thought.
You and the Barbie witches you’re so thick with.

• • •

My next stop was at Sophie’s bedroom door. This was going to be tricky, I knew. Sophie didn’t like me, and if she was talking with Jeremiah, they were probably discussing something important. But what could be more important than someone’s life? I squared my shoulders and prepared to knock.

And then I heard their conversation.

“How can I?” Jeremiah said, sounding exasperated.

“For God’s sake, be quiet!” Sophie hissed. “Do you want everyone to hear you? Would you like to explain yourself to the stupid American girl?”

That made me take notice.

“All right,” Jeremiah said. “But you ask for too much.”

“Oh? And you think I do not deserve this thing I ask?”

“It’s not that—”

“I, who gave you up so that another woman might have you?”

“She was my wife, Sophie.”

“You were mine long before you married her!” Sophie spat.

“And I am yours still.”

She made a sneering sound. “So? What good are you to me now? Look at you, an old man.”

“Sophie, that’s enough.”

“And you want to see me become like you? Dried up, ugly, useless—”

“I don’t think I want to see you at all, Sophie,” he said with an air of deadly quiet. “Good night.”

When I heard him walking toward the door, I jumped out of the way, sprinting as far down the hallway as I could get, but I don’t think I fooled anyone. Jeremiah stood watching me for a moment as I peered over my shoulder, pretending to be absorbed in the wallpaper. Then he shook his head and hurried down the curved stairway.

At that point I dropped the pretense that I just happened to be in the corridor when he left Sophie’s room. “Mr. Shaw,” I called after him. “Please listen to me. It’s about Marie-Therèse—”

He stopped and stared at me, looking very irritated. “What about her?” he snapped.

“Her birthday,” I said, breathless from all my running. “You have to call it off.”

“Call off her birthday?” he asked, looking genuinely confused.

“The celebration of it. The . . . you know,” I whispered. I mimed abducting Marie-Therèse and carrying her away, but I don’t think he caught on.

“You ought to speak with Peter,” he said, preparing to bolt.

I put my hand on his arm. “I’m speaking to you, sir,” I said. I was aware of how pushy I sounded, but I had to make him listen to me. “Mr. Shaw, I don’t exactly know what’s going on here, but it’s not right to send an old lady away from the only home she knows, especially since that place—the Poplars—is so strange.”

“Strange? In what way?”

I took a deep breath. “People die there,” I said.

He frowned slightly, looking annoyed again. “I’m afraid I can’t help you,” he said, heading down the stairs.

Then an odd thing happened. He stopped suddenly, looked around, and then climbed back up again and met my eyes with his own. “I know you’ve been to see the old man,” he said in a low voice.

For a moment I was flummoxed. I’d always thought of
him
as the old man.

“Azrael.”

I gasped.
Oh, God,
I thought frantically.
How did he find out? Who had followed me?
A rush of panic flooded through my veins.
One day an enterprising young fellow will visit me and then kill me for my old clock. Oh, God, oh God oh—

“Thank you,” Jeremiah said. He touched my arm for a moment, and then retracted it. “Thank you for your kindness to him.”

Thank you? He was thanking me?

“Er . . . what did you . . .”

But he was already down the stairs and out the door.

CHAPTER

•

THIRTY-ONE

If possible, things had become even more confusing. Peter hadn’t been any help, and Jeremiah Shaw, who eerily seemed to have been spying on me, nevertheless wasn’t about to change his mind about expelling Marie-Therèse from the house. I had to come up with something else to help my aging friend before she got sent to the Good-bye Corral as punishment for getting old.

After wracking my brain for a while, I decided there might be one other person I could talk to. I didn’t think he could help me any more than the others, but maybe he’d be able to give me an idea or two.

• • •

“Azrael?” I called experimentally, hearing my voice echo eerily through the maze of tunnels.

He didn’t answer me, but when I peeked into his candlelit alcove, he was shuffling toward the entrance.

“Yes?” he asked quietly. I couldn’t tell if he was glad to see me or not.

“Can I . . .” I felt horrible, barging in on him after he’d made it perfectly clear—twice—that he wanted to be alone, but it was too late to turn tail and run. “I’m really sorry,” I said, holding out a two-liter bottle of Perrier water and today’s edition of
Paris Soir
. “I know you didn’t want company, and you asked me not to bother you again, but I was just wondering—”

“Ah, I see it is my young friend Katy Ainsworth,” he said, taking the bottle from my hands.

“You . . . you don’t mind that I came here?” I asked.

“I did not say that.”

“Oh.” I hung my head.

“But since you are here, perhaps we might share a cup of tea.”

I looked up. The old man was smiling. I smiled back.

“Besides, how could I turn away someone who brings me fizzy water?”

“I’m sorry I didn’t bring any food today,” I said. “It’s Saturday.”

“Quite all right. I won’t starve without your culinary creations, delicious as they are.”

“Really?”
Cervelles au beurre noir
, a.k.a. buttered brains of baby cows, was on the schedule for Monday’s class. Chef Durant might like it, but personally, I’d boil my shoes and gobble them whole before I’d eat that.

“I take it you do not cook regularly
chez toi
?”

“No,” I admitted. I didn’t want to mention that even eating brains would be preferable to dining with those skanks. “There’s a cook where I live.”

“I know,” he said.

“You do?”

He nodded his shaggy head. “I knew as soon as you mentioned the dreaded Joelle. The witches of the Rue des Âmes Perdues are a long-established coven.”

I could only blink in response. “You know about them?” I whispered.