Peak of the Devil (The Adventures of Lydia Trinket Book 2)

by Jen Rasmussen

  I ignored them for the present, dropping beside Phineas to try to do something. He was bleeding from his eyes, and his lips had turned black. What the hell did black lips mean?

  They mean you have to get him the hell out of here, is what.

  I reached over him to pull open the back door of my car. I let go of Wulf’s leash, and he put himself between Phineas and the new arrivals, snarling. At the same time, Madeline was saying something to Penny, but I couldn’t hear what over Phineas’s screams.

  I glanced up when I heard a laugh. It was the man beside Madeline. The lights in the parking lot were enough for me to make out dark hair and the kind of smarmy smile that men who get a lot of sex always seem to have, even though normal women can tell they’re vile. I guessed I was meeting Amias at last.

  I took the gun back out of my pocket. Amias looked at it and smiled. His teeth were very bright. That was all I could take in before I dropped the gun, screaming. It had gone scorching hot in my hand. My palm and fingers were blistering already.

  Phineas screamed again, then broke off with a sickening wet sound. He was coughing blood that looked more like tar.

  Madeline Underwood was reciting something. Amias was laughing again.

  Then Penny started reciting too, and threw a handful of something that looked like pebbles at Amias. Amias took a fast step backwards. I took advantage of the moment to haul Phineas into the back seat of my car. Wulf jumped in after him and turned, baring his teeth, clearly prepared to guard him with his life.

  I picked up the gun again, but Penny screamed at me.

  “You can’t win that way! Get him out of here now or he will die!”

  “Get in the car, then!”

  Penny paused just long enough to hold up one hand, fingers splayed out. Was she waving?

  Then she took a bottle from her pocket, and flung herself at her sister and Amias.

  First she threw more of the pebbles, then the contents of the bottle, which seemed to be some sort of thick liquid, square in Amias’s face. I didn’t have time to think about it then, but later I wished I’d had time to ask her about her anti-fiend products, and where I might be able to buy some.

  Amias fell down and screamed like a girl. Madeline Underwood screamed like a vengeful spirit. Wasn’t that backwards?

  “Penny, get in the car!”

  “GO!”

  Wulf let out a wail that sounded more like a cat’s than a dog’s. Phineas was coughing again, and wheezing. Drowning in his own blood? She was right: I had to get him out of there. Immediately.

  So I did. I don’t know what else I could have done. Phineas was dying. I probably would have died too. If Amias could make a gun blistering hot, I saw no reason he couldn’t do the same to a station wagon. Our only hope of getting away seemed to be the distraction Penny was now providing.

  The last thing I saw as I sped out of the parking lot was Amias holding one arm out straight, palm toward Penny. I stopped and pointed the gun out the window, but I couldn’t get a clear shot at him without risking Penny too.

  “GO!” Penny shouted again, muffled this time and strangely… bubbly.

  I pushed the gas pedal down as far as it would go.

  I kept talking to Phineas as I drove, but he didn’t answer. Eventually, though, his breathing steadied a little. I pulled over as soon as I felt safe enough to do it, maybe ten miles out of Bristol.

  The blood all over his face was drying. His lips were still dark, but they were red, at least. I put my ear to his chest and found a heartbeat, irregular, but there. I briefly wondered if I could take him to the hospital, if he was physically the same as us, or close enough. But even if he was, I knew they wouldn’t know what to do with these kinds of injuries. Martha’s library was as likely to help him as anything else. I found a blanket and wrapped it around him.

  “Keep an eye on him,” I said to Wulf, who was on the floor in the back seat, licking Phineas’s pale hand.

  I started driving again, talking to Phineas every so often, telling him to hang on. And also crying.

  I didn’t find out until later that she’d had an “accident” while “hiking,” but I didn’t need the confirmation in her sister’s lies to know that Miss Penny Dreadful had just committed suicide so we could get away, and Phineas could live.

  Where did she get the nerve, Mark Underwood had asked her. Where indeed? I thought maybe she always had the nerve. Maybe it was just lying dormant, waiting until Max was safe to show itself.

  But why show itself at all?

  She could have just let it go. Max was out of danger. I wouldn’t have made her come to the hotel. I didn’t even want her to come to the hotel. She could have just given me the combination to the vault, and been home in front of her TV, in her pajamas, drinking a beer, at that very moment. So why wasn’t she?

  I was halfway home before I guessed the answer. Before I realized what she’d been doing with her hand, back there in the parking lot.

  She called them assholes. She practically went out of her way to show she didn’t care that they were dead. But she also called me to Bristol, hoping I would stop her sister. Maybe she felt more remorse than she let on. Maybe enough to seek atonement.

  She wasn’t waving at all. She was saying something.

  Five.

  I said a prayer for the soul of Matilda Underwood, and drove on.

  I spent a week at Martha Corey’s house, on an air mattress in her library, while Phineas lay unconscious in the spare room not chosen by Max. Max spent most of that week in the closet of what had become his bedroom, keening and crying for his sister. Phineas, on the other hand, was dead quiet. But at least he wasn’t dead dead. His heartbeat settled into something resembling a regular rhythm, his breathing steadied. But for five days he didn’t move or make a sound. He looked like a wax figure, although his skin was so hot it hurt to touch him.

  I remembered all the rosemary tea he’d forced on me when I was poisoned. I scoured Martha’s library for recipes and tried anything and everything that called for rosemary. With a great deal of effort I could force him to swallow, but nothing seemed to do any good. I was reminded very unpleasantly of Gemma, after Jeffrey Litauer had gotten his hands on her. And I was only now discovering just how bad that one turned out.

  I warned Charlie and Norbert not to visit me at Martha’s, or tell Warren I was there. I didn’t want to put anyone else in danger. Lord knew I sucked at rescues. I’d gotten Phineas out, but I wasn’t at all sure he’d live. And I’d left Penny there. Charlie, as always when I was doing something death defying, was furious enough about it to oblige my request to be left alone. Norbert snuck over the occasional rye and tonic, for which I was supremely grateful, even though I scolded him for it.

  At least Beowulf was okay. He and Jack Nimble reached a truce that turned into downright friendship by the end of that week.

  I was less okay. I had nightmares about Penny every night. I took out a little—very little, but any small bit helped—of my stress on the genealogy research firm, with an angry email calling them slacker fuckheads. Not in those exact words, but closer than was probably professional of me. That was on the first day I was at Martha’s. They wrote back, finally, on the fifth. (Slacker fuckheads.)

  They’d attached family trees for the Phearsons and the Pierces. Or I should say, one family tree that included both. And boy, was it loaded with fun facts.

  Fun Fact Number One: Gemma Pierce’s mother was Letitia Tanner Pierce, daughter of Phineas’s Mercy. They had no record of Mercy being married, and no information on Letitia’s father. Amias seemed a likely suspect, especially once I rechecked the dates and ruled out Phineas.

  Fun Fact Number Two: Gemma Pierce’s aunt was Mary Pierce Phearson, wife of the much acclaimed Colonel Phearson. And they had nine children who went on to be fruitful and multiply all over the place (but mostly Bristol). When it came time to find hearts for the ritual, there were no more Pierces or Tanners, but there were plenty of descendants of Gemma’s Phea
rson cousins within easy reach.

  Fun Fact Number Three: One of those Phearson cousins was the forebear of one Cyrus Basker. Somewhere down along that tree’s many and crooked branches was the trail to my canteen.

  Fun Fact Number Four: The reason there were no more Pierces for heart-harvesting purposes was that their line came to an end in 1923, when a ten-year-old boy named Hugh Pierce, a many times great nephew of Gemma’s, fell down a well. Here, at last, was my little boy ghost. It had to be. He was the only child under sixteen who died in Bristol that year, something the researcher noted was highly unusual for the times.

  Not in Bristol, honey. They only meet tragic ends when Amias decides they’re more useful that way. So what use were you dead, Hugh? Or how inconvenient were you alive?

  I had no answers to those questions, but at least I knew his name.

  I got answers, as it turned out, two days later. And from the last place I’d have expected them.

  I was downstairs in the kitchen helping Martha make some shockingly ordinary, for her, bread when the doorbell rang. Martha’s bell didn’t ring often, and I was still worrying about the Underwoods. I looked at Martha, but she was already leaving the kitchen.

  “Be careful!” I called after her. “Look who it is first!”

  A few seconds later I heard Martha chattering happily, although I couldn’t make out what she was saying. Then she called to me.

  “Lydia, dear, you have a guest!”

  A guest? There was no scenario in which a guest coming for me at Martha Corey’s house was a good thing. I hurried into the front hallway, afraid I’d see some Underwood or other gloating over poor Martha’s body if I didn’t hurry.

  But it was Norbert standing there.

  “Norbert! You scared me half to death. I told you, you guys can’t visit me here.”

  “Well, you should have told your friends not to visit you at our place, then. There’s a lady in my kitchen looking for you, and she won’t leave. I threatened to call the police, but she seemed to think there was some unpleasantness with my gun that might make me wish to avoid police involvement.”

  “I told you, it was self-defense,” I said.

  “Not helping.”

  “Is this woman really thin, like all over?”

  “Not even a little. Hugely pregnant. Very expensive maternity clothes, and very white teeth.”

  Fuck.

  I left Martha’s without bothering with a coat or even shoes, and ran for Charlie’s house in my socks, Norbert trailing behind me.

  “Please tell me you did not leave her in that house with Warren,” I called to him over my shoulder.

  He fell in step beside me. “I did not leave her in that house with Warren. What do you take me for? He and Charlie are on the field trip today, remember?”

  “Right. Of course.” (I had no idea what he was talking about.)

  By then I’d gone through the back door to find Gemma Pierce—in Suzanne Warner’s body—sitting at what was once my kitchen table.

  For a second I just stood there, a little (or maybe a lot) confounded by the sight of her, this Gemma except not Gemma. She’d laughed with me and taught me and saved me. She’d killed a pregnant woman and stolen her body.

  She got to her feet, and despite her bulging belly, I braced myself for an attack.

  But she didn’t attack me. She only held up one hand and said, “Wait.”

  “What, no pepper spray?” I asked.

  “That was for them. For show, I mean. Something was expected of me. But if I really wanted to kill you, I would have used a real weapon.”

  “You mean like poison?”

  “That wasn’t me.”

  I laughed at that. “Gemma, what do you want? I’m supposed to think we’re friends now, is that it?”

  “Certainly not. I have no interest in your friendship. A fat lot of good it’s done me in the past.”

  Ouch. That one hit me right in the guilt. I tried not to show it.

  “Then what do you want?” I asked again. “Because I’m about out of patience, and I’m armed.”

  That wasn’t true, but close enough. Norbert’s gun was around here someplace, and he wasn’t in the kitchen anymore. So he was probably armed by then, anyway.

  “I want to talk to you. I assume you’d like me out of this house, no?”

  “Yes.”

  Norbert came back into the kitchen and gave me a slight nod, confirming that he’d gone to get his gun. But I knew he’d rather do just about anything other than fire it. I felt bad for putting him in this position, but I thanked heaven that Charlie and Warren weren’t home.

  “Well, I arrived by cab,” Gemma said. “The only way to get me to leave is to take me yourself. We can talk in the car.”

  And with that, she walked out of the kitchen. I looked at Norbert, who shrugged at me.

  “Well, it does get her out of here,” I said.

  “Yes, but she may be leading you into a trap.”

  “With me driving?”

  “She might attack you.”

  “Then why didn’t she do that as soon as I walked in?”

  “She’s waiting to get you alone.”

  I sighed. “She looks like she’s about to go into labor any second. I’ll take my chances.”

  “Fine. Take me with you for backup, then. Is she a real ghost? I want to hear what she has to say.”

  “She was a real ghost. And you can’t come, Norbert, this is my job.” I kissed him on the cheek and walked out before he could argue any more.

  I won’t lie, I was curious. And I wanted to talk to her, too. I had a few things to say to Gemma Pierce that I thought would feel mighty good to get off my chest.

  She was waiting for me in the driveway. I hesitated, not wanting to go next door to get my car keys (and my shoes) for fear of giving away Max’s whereabouts. But Gemma was quick, always had been. She smiled at me, showing off those trademark dimples that had somehow managed to stay with her even in another body.

  “I know Max is there, but even if I didn’t, your staring at the house would have given you away. I don’t care about him.”

  “If you knew we were there, why didn’t you knock on that door?”

  Gemma gestured back toward Charlie’s house. “Because I knew I had a better chance of getting you to cooperate if you were trying to protect them. Now get your car, please. I don’t care where we go. Your choice, as long as you agree to listen to me.” She opened the very expensive handbag she was carrying and held it out to me. “Feel free to search it for pepper spray first, if you like.”

  Don’t think I didn’t.

  She didn’t say much until we were halfway to the mall, which was where I’d decided to take her. It was an odd choice, but it was the first public, crowded place I could think of. I meant it when I told Norbert I was pretty sure I had the meager skills required to take on a heavily pregnant woman, but I wasn’t about to take unnecessary chances, either.

  I was as quiet as she was. I didn’t know what she wanted, and I wanted to find out before I started yelling at her. That left small talk, and I couldn’t even begin to guess how to make such a thing with a nineteenth-century woman in a contemporary woman’s body. So, how about all those advances in leg shaving, huh?

  Finally Gemma said, “Enemies may work together, when they have a common enemy, no?”

  Enemies. We’d been friends, once. But that was before she got attacked by Jeffrey, trying to help me. Before I left her in the netherworld to recover on her own. I’d had my reasons at the time, and she’d told us to go, but that didn’t make it okay that we did. I was torn between apologizing to her and punching her in the face.

  Instead of doing either I asked, “Who’s this common enemy?”

  “Amias.”

  “Amias. The fiend who brought you back to life. Is your enemy.” What kind of load of shit was she trying to sell me? Maybe this was a waste of my time, after all. Did she not know how much I knew?”

  “Yes. Ha
s it occurred to you to wonder why he brought me back?”

  “It has. We assumed you were a factor in the sanctuary bargain.”

  “Exactly right. I was brought back using Pierce blood, but it’s a living Tanner he needs, and there weren’t any left.”

  “And what was in it for you? Last I heard, you wanted nothing to do with the real world anymore.”

  “That was before you ruined my netherworld,” she snapped. “This is all your fault!” For a second she was the vengeful, unbalanced Gemma that seemed to lurk below the surface, even before. But she quickly got herself under control. She patted her pregnant belly. “This was the next best thing. Children, a husband, a nice house. I’m rich, you know.”

  “No, Suzanne Warner is rich. Was rich. You are a murderer who has nothing she didn’t steal from somebody else.”

  Gemma shrugged, completely unconcerned. “Suzanne Warner was a bitch, I hear.”

  What was with all these Bristol people, thinking someone being an asshole or a bitch was an okay reason to kill them? I turned into the mall lot and parked, but I didn’t get out. “What do you want, Gemma?”

  She looked out at the mall. “A pretzel, since you’ve brought me here. I’ve become fascinated with hot pretzels dipped in nacho cheese.”

  I was about to tell her to fuck off, but I was still curious, so instead I said, “You don’t deserve a pretzel. But that poor unlucky baby might.”

  Walking beside me inside, Gemma sounded a little worried, maybe even contrite, for the first time. “She’s not unlucky. I’m going to be a good mother, you know.”

  “Doesn’t make it okay. Even if it’s true.”

  I bought us both a pretzel. Just because I was hanging out with a murderer, and Penny was dead, and Phineas was back at Martha’s possibly dying himself, didn’t mean I didn’t have an appetite. We sat down by the fountain to eat them, and now that she was settled in, it seemed Gemma was ready to get down to business at last.

  “You banished a fiend once. I want you to tell me how to do it. I want to banish Amias.”

  I stared at her, but she just licked salt off her fingers and waited. Finally I said, “That’s completely different. Jeffrey Litauer was dead. And I had something to banish him into.”