by Rose Wulf
Hilary grinned mischievously and bumped her shoulder into Angela’s. “So, do you think you’re still opposed to being each other’s dates at my wedding?”
Angela rolled her eyes. “Let’s not get ahead of ourselves, okay?”
“True, true,” Hilary allowed with a nod of her head and jokingly pursed lips. “You should make an appointment to see this one, by the way. The outside’s gorgeous.”
“Huh?” Angela belatedly turned her gaze in the direction of Hilary’s extended hand. She promptly felt like an idiot. Hilary was referring to the two-story, dark brick house set a handful of yards back in a mostly green lawn. There was, of course, a sign in the middle of the yard. “Oh, good point!” she exclaimed, immediately seeing the visual appeal. She was undecided on the location of the house, as it was only a couple of neighborhoods over from her parents, but that also meant it was nicer and a little more private.
She had barely returned her pen and notepad to her purse when an unexpected, familiar voice called out to her from the general direction of the idling engine she hadn’t registered hearing.
“Angie, baby, why aren’t you taking my calls?”
That voice was like nails on a chalkboard. She shuddered and her smile fell instantly into a frown. What could Geoff possibly have been doing out there?
“I don’t think you’re supposed to be calling her that anymore, Solberg,” Hilary said calmly as Angela turned toward them. Hilary remained standing at the foot of the driveway, where she’d been when Angela had gone jogging up to the real estate sign. Geoff, unfortunately, was walking up that driveway, his old Pathfinder parked at the curb behind Hilary.
“I don’t think this concerns you,” Geoff returned as he paused to glare at Hilary.
Grinding her teeth, Angela held a little tighter to her purse straps and started toward her friend, intending to brush right past her obnoxious ex. “And I don’t think I have anything left to say to you.” Shifting her attention to her best friend, she added, “Let’s keep going, Hilary.”
Geoff reached out and caught her by the elbow as she passed him. “No, really, we should talk about this.”
Angela jerked back, startled by his touch, and her arm twisted awkwardly when he refused to release her. “Geoff,” she snapped, a note of warning in her voice, “let me go right now.”
“Not until I know you’re willing to talk,” Geoff said plainly.
“Hold her there long enough and the cops won’t even need to ask us any questions,” Hilary threatened.
Geoff looked over at Hilary in shock, his grip loosening faintly. “You called the fucking cops?”
Angela yanked her arm out of his hold and stepped away as Hilary replied, “No, but I was about to. Guess it’s your lucky day.”
“You’re a helluva bitch, you know that?” Geoff said in frustration.
“I’m sorry,” Angela said as she rejoined Hilary, now several paces away from Geoff. “Where in any of this am I supposed to be seeing a man worth wasting my breath on?”
“Come on, Ange,” Hilary said, “there’s nothing else on this street, anyway.”
“Don’t you dare walk away from me!” Geoff shouted as they turned their backs to him.
Angela paused and glanced back over at him with narrowed eyes. “I’ll do whatever I want, actually.” Something struck her as odd, then, and she asked, “But just what are you doing here, anyway?” Geoff didn’t live in Darien. He’d never lived in Darien.
“I was looking for you, obviously,” he replied. He took a step forward, his expression making it clear he thought her question had been the beginning of an actual conversation.
She hardened her glare. “You’re verging on stalking, Geoff. I don’t recommend you push it.” Then she turned her back to him completely, simultaneously dipping her hand into her purse for her phone. He was starting to make her decidedly uncomfortable.
“Angie, baby, wait!” Geoff called behind her.
“I am not your ‘baby’!” Angela called back without breaking stride. She supposed she should have cared if she made a scene. It was late afternoon on a Monday in a residential neighborhood. There were probably several people watching them from their windows. But she really didn’t care at all. If anything, she kind of hoped one or three of those people called whichever relative of hers they happened to know best. That would be interesting. Of course, that would also result in a bigger scene, and she knew—logically—they didn’t need any of those.
“Come on, Angie, let’s talk!” Geoff tried. At least his voice didn’t sound any closer.
“My God,” Hilary whispered, “I never took him for this kind of desperate.”
“I don’t have any idea what his angle is,” Angela admitted, her own whisper a little harsher than normal. “But he’s really getting on my nerves. After everything that went down, I thought he’d be thrilled to be free.”
“Me, too,” Hilary agreed as they rounded the next corner. She leaned a little backward as she walked, craning her neck to see around Angela and down the sidewalk. “Oh, good, it looks like he’s getting back in his car.”
Angela released a breath. “As long as it’s not to better follow us, I’m happy.”
“Do you think he would?”
“At this point? I have no idea,” Angela said with a sigh.
“Well, good news,” Hilary said, a grin building. “You definitely traded up!”
Angela could only shake her head, too distracted to be in any way humiliated by the comment. Hilary was right, anyway. She’d finally, indisputably, upgraded her love life.
****
“Jacob,” Sarah called quietly as she poked her head into the space her husband had taken as his office. He grunted without lifting his attention from his laptop and she took that as the only acknowledgment she was likely to get, so she continued with her question. “Who is Eric talking to?”
She wasn’t overly fond of strangers in her home, so to say she’d been surprised when Eric had walked in through the front door a few minutes earlier with an unfamiliar, brown-haired young man in tow would be an understatement. Eric still looked like he’d gone a couple of rounds with a brick wall and he was too stubborn to even try concealing the bruises on his face. He also refused to let them take him to a doctor, so his probably broken wrist was being swung around in an adjustable splint Sarah was sure he took off at night. The rest of his injuries were either internal—she suspected he had a cracked rib—or easily hidden by modest clothing, but the bruises alone made him look like a mess. Yet he’d still gone out and befriended someone new.
“How should I know?” Jacob said, still without looking over at her.
Sarah frowned. Is he still mad at me for that stupid comment? He probably was. Or something else entirely. “Well, I would like it if one of us knew. You know I’m uncomfortable with strangers in the house.”
“I’m sure Eric knows him,” Jacob replied as if that changed anything. She assumed Eric knew him.
“You’re not the least bit curious?”
Jacob finally lifted his gaze to her, reminding her that it was hard to tell when he was actually glaring anymore. Nearly every expression he made looked at least a little like a glare now, thanks to his scars. “What I am is busy, Sarah. If it’s bothering you so much, go ask yourself.”
Sarah balked at him, somehow struck by his response. It was his brother’s guest. Her instincts screamed it had something to do with their lifelong plot of revenge. That was all Eric lived for. If nothing else, she’d have thought that possibility would get Jacob’s attention. Apparently not. “Fine,” she snapped, turning on her heel. “I’ll investigate.”
“Close the door,” Jacob commanded behind her.
She deliberately ignored him, deciding the least he could do was get off his lazy ass long enough to close his own damned door. What was he going to do about it? Get mad at her? He was always mad at her now, and the longer he stayed mad at her, the angrier she got in turn. It was a terrible, vicious cycle a
nd she didn’t know how to make it stop. But that wasn’t her priority as she neared the sitting room, where Eric had taken the stranger. Their voices drifted out to her.
“Offering to pay me to stalk my ex-girlfriend?” Sarah didn’t recognize this voice, meaning it either belonged to the stranger she knew about or Eric had brought in another.
“That’s basically it, yeah,” Eric replied.
“What do you get out of it?” the stranger asked.
“Information,” Eric said. “I just need to know what you see when you’re watching her. And no, I don’t give a damn what panties she’s wearing. I want to know where she goes, who she spends her time with, if she’s got a regular schedule. That kind of thing.”
Sarah was close enough now to see the stranger sitting on her favorite sofa shrug as he offered, “I’ve got a print-out of her class schedule. It’s not doin’ me any good. You want that, too?”
Eric’s no-longer-swollen lips lifted in a smirk. “Please.”
Something twisted in the pit of Sarah’s stomach. This was why she hated overhearing anything to do with their vendetta against the Hawkes. Sometimes their plans sounded downright villainous, and regardless of whatever slight was done to them in the past, it still nauseated her. But she pushed past the familiar feeling and cleared her throat politely.
“Yeah?” Eric asked when he and his guest looked over at her.
Keeping a small, formal smile on her face, Sarah said, “You didn’t tell me you were bringing company over. Are we expecting more for dinner?”
“Nah,” the stranger replied casually. “Thanks, but I’ve got dinner plans.”
“Sorry,” Eric offered almost simultaneously. He gestured with his injured wrist and said, “This is Geoff Solberg. He’s a new friend of mine.”
Chapter Ten
“You’re not going to believe this,” Daniel announced excitedly as he strode into the living room on Thursday afternoon.
Angela, who’d been busy cooing over her gorgeous little niece, looked up in sync with several of her surrounding family members. Arianna was visiting while Dean was at work, so Lillian and Christopher had also gathered to take advantage of the opportunity to play with Kira.
“What is it, Daniel?” Lillian asked as Arianna scooped her daughter into her arms again.
Daniel held up a packet of obviously-crisp white paper, bound together by a plastic spiral on one side. There was minimal writing on the cover and Angela couldn’t read it properly from her viewpoint, though she thought she made out the word diary. Which thoroughly confused her.
“My sister-in-law found several interesting texts recently,” Daniel said, “one of which is what enabled us to uncover the origin of this feud, but she also found something even more astounding. The diary of Joan Batmeson.” He patted the bound papers proudly, making it clear that was a copy of the aforementioned diary.
“I’m sorry,” Arianna said, “but who’s Joan Batmeson?”
Daniel’s smile remained wide when he replied, “She was the fiancée of one of the Grey brothers, Abraham. And according to my sister-in-law, there are several mentions of a conflict with another family and some, quote, very bizarre happenings.”
“Wait,” Angela began, stepping forward to stand beside her mother. “Grey was the name of the elemental family whose brother was killed, right? The murder that started it all?”
“Yes,” Daniel replied with a nod. “And now we have access to a firsthand account! Apparently, Joan was writing in this diary when it all started. The murder of Cuthbert Grey is first mentioned in the third entry.” As he spoke, he flipped the notebook open, paused to examine the first page, and then turned to the next before folding the entire thing back. “Ah,” he exclaimed, “here it is!”
“That’s astounding,” Lillian said, her tone honestly impressed. “We could learn a lot from this if she kept decent records of the original events. Does Nicholas know about it?”
Daniel lowered the book a bit and nodded again, his expression sobering as the reality overrode his excitement. “Yes. I requested a second copy be mailed to him, so he should also be receiving it today.”
“May I see it?” Angela asked, holding out her hand expectantly. Daniel handed over the book, still folded back to the relevant entry, and her gaze landed on the typed text. She couldn’t help but reflect that it was something of a shame she wasn’t getting a look at the original, but she understood that mailing a notebook several hundred years old overseas was far too risky. She opted to read the entry aloud when she realized it was fairly short.
“‘Cuthbert was killed today. I still remember the look of horror on my brother’s face when he told me that he’d seen Cuthbert’s body lying in the road, blackened from a terrible burn. Of course, I immediately went to Abraham to offer what comfort I could. If only there was more I could do. The entire family is devastated. And poor Mabel. I doubt she’ll ever recover. I cannot imagine how terrible it must be to lose your betrothed to murder, let alone at the hands of your own brother. Worse yet, Clemence insisted on confronting Reuben herself. Abraham and his brothers went with her, leaving the rest of us to wait and pray for their safe return. The earth will mourn this day for a long, long time I fear.’”
The room was silent when Angela finished, everyone absorbing what she’d read, and she glanced down, to the next entry. It was dated for the same day, indicating it had simply been added separately. It was just one line, so she read that, too. “‘Clemence is dead.’”
Seconds ticked by before Arianna quietly asked, “That’s all it says?”
Angela looked over at her, her eyes burning faintly, and lowered the book. “That was all for that day.”
“The same day?” Ari repeated, eyes widening.
Feeling unexplainably upset, Angela handed the book back to Daniel, saying, “That’s amazing. Horrifying, but amazing. Excuse me.”
Kira started crying in her mother’s arms as Angela fast-walked from the room and somehow, the baby’s cries pushed her own over the edge. Angela reached up and wiped at her eyes in frustration with one hand even as she fumbled with the door handle with the other.
What is wrong with me? She was getting awfully emotional over a tragedy that was centuries old. It was ridiculous. Clearly, the Greys weren’t even their direct ancestors, since their legacy-carrier had gotten herself killed. She supposed it was possible that Joan was her ancestor, though. She remembered Daniel mentioning previously that Abraham Grey’s fiancée was the legacy of a different family of elementals. Because, once upon a time, there had been so many of them that they had been able to interact and become friends. Wouldn’t that be nice?
And how bad, then, had this feud gotten? Had there really been that many different families of elementals? Or had they all just been gathered in a close geographical proximity?
Angela doubted they’d ever know the answer. It didn’t really matter anymore, anyway. It shouldn’t even matter, at least not so directly, that Clemence Grey had gone and gotten herself killed. But … it could have been me. Or Mom. And that was the crux of it. Two of her own uncles had been murdered long before her time. What if Lillian had been so distraught with grief that she’d gotten herself killed, too, just like Clemence Grey had? Then she and her brothers would never have been born. Angela could certainly—easily—see herself reacting that way, if one of her brothers were killed. At least Lillian hadn’t had an actual enemy to blame at the time. She hadn’t known their faces. Angela did, and she knew she’d hunt them down, one by one, if she ever lost a loved one to them.
“Whoa! Hey, what’s wrong?”
Angela started, realizing too late her vision had gone a little more than blurry, when Vaughn’s voice cut through her panicked thoughts. His arm came around her waist, hauling her slightly to the side and entirely into his strong chest. His other hand threaded through her hair, thumb massaging her scalp as he tucked her head beneath his chin, and she let her eyes close. She really just needed to breathe, clear her mind a litt
le, and maybe indulge in a distraction. She could do all of that with Vaughn.
“Angie?” he asked softly.
Finding her voice, Angela twisted her hands into his shirt and mumbled, “Sorry. I’m just being stupid and overemotional.”
She couldn’t see his face, but the frown was obvious in his voice. “I doubt that. Tell me what’s upsetting you.”
Angela stuttered when she tried to answer him. She still wasn’t entirely sure. So, slowly, she replied, “Daniel found a diary from when this all started. Written by the fiancée of one of the brothers.” She paused, pulled in a breath, and explained what little she’d been able to figure out about her current mood and how it connected to the diary. It didn’t make any more sense said out loud than it did in her head.
“Well,” Vaughn replied after a second, “I was right.”
His odd response broke through her haze and Angela sniffled as she pushed back enough to look up at him. “Huh?”
He offered her a rare, soft smile and explained, “You aren’t being stupid or overemotional. How could you not draw comparisons between their situation and yours?”
Gee, when he says it, it almost sounds rational. “So then … it’s not weird that I’m crying?”
His smile shifted into a teasing grin and he returned, “How do you want me to answer that, exactly?”
Angela laughed and thumped his chest with the palm of one hand before letting herself slump against him once more. “Don’t be a jerk,” she teased.
“Sorry,” Vaughn said, his arms tightening around her again. “I’m told it comes naturally.”
“Hey,” Angela said, disregarding his lame joke, “what’re you doing out here? Don’t you have to work?”
This time, Vaughn sighed, and a couple of seconds passed before he grumbled, “No, I stupidly gave my shift away before I considered that would mean being stuck at home with my parents and Aunt Riley.”
“They’re still going at it?” Angela asked carefully, assuming she already knew the answer.
Vaughn’s responding grin was bitter. “Only whenever they’re in the same room.”