It was hard to stand there and do nothing, though, especially since the day had fallen into dusk as he was waiting for Glynis to arrive, making Will painfully aware of how much time was passing. Even if Rosemary had simply gone out for a walk, she should have been home long before this. He tried not to jump to worst-case scenarios — a mugging, an out-of-control car leaping up on the sidewalk to knock her down — but it was difficult, especially because he knew Rosemary’s powers should have been enough to protect her against those sorts of ordinary mishaps. Which meant she might have come up against something even her own remarkable talents couldn’t save her from.
At length, Glynis opened her eyes. Her expression was troubled as she said, “Someone was here. I can feel just a little of their vibrations, someone who doesn’t feel like either you or Rosemary.”
Alarm sang its shrill song along his nerve endings. “Who?”
“I don’t know,” she replied, brows puckering faintly. “I can’t see them clearly. They weren’t here long enough to leave much of an impression. Male…I think. But nothing more than that.”
That tiny piece of information was less than reassuring. A strange man had been here, and now Rosemary was missing. Will would never suspect her of cheating on him, but he found himself far more troubled that it had been a man here and not a woman. “Would you be able to feel if there was any kind of a struggle?”
“Maybe,” Glynis said, still frowning. “Did you see evidence of one?”
“No,” Will said. “But maybe it wasn’t a physical kind of struggle.”
“You think it was the demons.”
She hadn’t phrased the comment as a question, but he went ahead and answered it anyway. “Honestly, I’m not sure what to think. I just know it isn’t like Rosemary to disappear like this. I checked with my next-door neighbor, and she hadn’t seen her, either. So, either she’s taking the world’s longest afternoon walk, or someone or something has come along to spirit her away.”
For a long moment, Glynis didn’t reply, only stood there with her hands spread slightly, as though reaching out to touch the currents of air in the room and trying to read something of what they said. “I don’t feel anything like that here, but I’ve never had an encounter with a demon before. I’m not sure what they’re supposed to feel like.”
“Nothing good,” Will said grimly, although he wondered how different a cambion would feel from a full-blood demon…and whether a quarter-blood man like Caleb would feel any different from a human at all. Yes, Caleb Lockwood was dead, but the Greencastle cambions each had a son, meaning there were six more of that generation out there somewhere. For all Will knew, one of them had been instructed to take up where Caleb had left off, so to speak, and was now tasked with carrying out the demon clan’s dirty work.
“Well, I’m not feeling that. Just the presence of someone here, although I can’t detect whether they meant Rosemary good or ill.”
He was about to reply that maybe that was a good thing, that if a truly evil presence had been here, surely Glynis would have been able to feel it, when his phone buzzed in his pocket. At once he pulled it out, and tried not to sag in relief as he read the text on the home screen.
Will, I’m so sorry to bail on you like this, but Celeste and Tyler are both sick, and I headed over to her house to help out. I left my car at the house and took a Lyft because the parking at her place is really tight. Hope that’s okay.
I’m not sure when I’ll be back home. I’ll try to let you know as soon as I know. Love you.
Since Glynis was watching him with inquiring eyes, he went over to her and held out the phone so she could read the message on the screen for herself. However, she didn’t appear relieved by what she saw, but instead seemed to frown that much more.
“Celeste never said anything to me about her or Tyler being ill,” she said. “And I talked to her just this morning.”
“Maybe it’s something that came on this afternoon,” Will suggested, and Glynis only shook her head.
“I suppose that’s possible, but still….” The words trailed off, and she fidgeted with the heavy silver and turquoise bracelet she wore on her right wrist. “Something doesn’t feel right. Let me call Celeste and check with her.”
“A good idea,” he agreed, although he could already feel his heart sinking. Something told him that Rosemary’s text wasn’t real — or rather, while she might have sent it from her phone, its contents couldn’t possibly be the truth, that for whatever reason, the message had been sent under duress.
He waited as Glynis went over to her purse, which she’d set down on the dining room table, and got out her phone. She entered a number rather than pull it up from her contacts list, which seemed to make sense. Clearly, she had her daughter’s number memorized and had no need to look it up.
“Hi, Celeste,” she said after a brief pause. “How are you doing? I heard you weren’t well.” Another, longer pause, during which her finely arched brows — so like Rosemary’s — pulled together in obvious confusion and worry. “You’re fine? Tyler’s fine? And Rosemary isn’t there?” Once again, she appeared to wait as Celeste replied, although Glynis looked over at Will and gave a brief shake of her head, as if to confirm what he already knew.
Celeste and her family were fine, and Rosemary had vanished into thin air.
Worry knotted in his gut, but he made himself stand off to one side as Glynis did her best to let Celeste know that everything was okay, that it was just a misunderstanding, and she’d see Celeste the next day when she went over to help with Tyler’s Halloween costume. That reassurance signaled the end of the call, because she pulled the phone away from her ear after that and sent Will a very worried look.
“I don’t know why Rosemary sent you that text, but it’s all a fabrication,” Glynis said. “Celeste hasn’t seen her, and the whole family is fine and healthy.”
“Someone must have made Rosemary send me that text,” Will said. He did his best to remain calm and focus on the problem at hand, mostly because he knew getting so worked up that he couldn’t think straight wouldn’t help any of them, least of all Rosemary.
“To keep you from worrying?”
“I would assume so,” he replied. “And it might have even worked if you hadn’t been here. After all, I wouldn’t have any reason not to believe her, and I probably wouldn’t have called Celeste to check to make sure the story was true.” He hesitated for a moment, wondering if it was appropriate to say what had been in his mind, then decided the hell with it. “Things are still pretty new between Rosemary and me, and I wouldn’t have wanted to come off as some kind of controlling, suspicious jerk.”
“I understand,” Glynis said quietly. “But I’m glad you followed your instincts and called me, because at least now we know something very strange is going on here.” She paused for a moment, gaze moving toward the front window, where a pair of car headlights briefly backlit the heavy curtains there before moving on. “What should we do? Call the police?”
Maybe that would become necessary at some point, although Will honestly didn’t know how much help the police would be. Not if the Greencastle demons were involved in all this. Anyway, Rosemary hadn’t been missing long enough yet.
And thank God it was the Glendale P.D. who’d been working on Caleb’s case, and not the Pasadena cops. At least if he had to make that call, they wouldn’t already be harboring suspicions about Rosemary McGuire and the strange events she’d gotten mixed up in.
“Not yet,” Will told Glynis, and she tilted her head toward him, waiting for him to go on.
“First, I need to call Michael Covenant.”
Daniel Lockwood ordered dinner in from the same restaurant where she and Will had eaten breakfast when they’d come to town a few days earlier. Rosemary might have been amused by the coincidence, although she guessed it probably wasn’t coincidence at all, but rather the small selection of eating establishments in town.
Anyway, the food was good, and she made herself eat
the roast chicken and grilled vegetables she’d ordered, mostly because she figured that starving herself wouldn’t help matters any. She needed to be fit and ready to face whatever happened next.
The conversation was surprisingly mundane; Rosemary had a feeling that Daniel Lockwood was trying to keep things light in an attempt to put her at ease. Like that was going to happen.
Still, while she couldn’t exactly relax, she wasn’t quite as tense as she might otherwise have been, especially since the three men didn’t try to immediately involve her in the discussion, but rather talked about the Halloween carnival being held in a few days and which the bank was helping to sponsor, and about what Caleb planned to do now that his work in California was done.
“It’s time for you to start working at the bank again,” Daniel said, and Caleb frowned slightly.
“I was thinking about going back to school.”
“For what?”
“To get my master’s degree.”
“A waste of time,” Daniel pronounced, then took a bite of his grilled pork chop. “You don’t need a master’s to run a bank.”
“Maybe I don’t want to run a bank.”
That comment made the half-demon send a displeased, pale-eyed glare at his son. “What else are you going to do with your life?”
Obviously, Caleb had been the recipient of many such stares, because he seemed singularly unaffected by his father’s annoyance as he reached for the glass of merlot in front of him. “Get my master’s degree in film studies.”
“What about you, Rosemary?” Gerald inquired, clearly trying to deflect the conversation to a topic that was a little less fraught.
“What about me?” she replied, wishing he hadn’t addressed her directly. It was hard enough being in the same room with him, knowing what he’d done to her mother, without having to act as if this was all normal and there was nothing strange about having a civilized conversation with a demonic rapist.
“Where did you go to college?”
As if he didn’t already know all about her. Still, if he wanted to play this game, she’d go along…for now. “I didn’t go to college,” she told him. “I decided it really wasn’t for me. And I don’t regret my decision. I like being a small business owner. Co-owner,” she amended. “My sisters and I all run our store together.”
“Not much money in bookstores, is there?” Daniel asked with a curl of the lip.
She realized that even if he hadn’t been a half-demon cambion who’d basically kidnapped her and had been making her life a living hell for the past week, she’d still think he was a raging asshole. “There’s enough,” she said evenly, then reached for her own glass of wine so she could take a sip. “Not everyone on the planet has bought into the capitalistic wet dream of amassing more wealth than any one person could possibly need.”
Across the table from her, Caleb let out a snort that sounded suspiciously like a suppressed laugh. Even Gerald’s mouth twitched a bit in amusement, although Daniel didn’t look at all impressed by her reply.
“Typical millennial remark,” he said, eyes still narrowed.
She shrugged. “Okay, boomer.”
This time, Caleb didn’t even bother to hide his chuckle. Grinning, he swallowed some more wine and remarked, “Not exactly your typical demon, is she?”
“No,” Daniel said with a slight grimace. “I blame her mother.”
Thanks, Mom, Rosemary thought, and realized she had a lot to thank her mother for. After all, for a family of psychics, the McGuires were pretty level-headed. Also, she knew she needed to remember that even if Gerald Gates turned out to be her father, she was still far more human than demon. Obviously, those with mixed blood here in Greencastle wanted to cling to their demon heritage. That was their truth, though; it didn’t have to be hers.
“So,” Gerald said hastily, “I was thinking we could head out to Indianapolis around ten tomorrow morning, if that’s all right with you, Rosemary.”
Was there such a thing as a demonic peacemaker? She wouldn’t have thought so, but it seemed that Gerald Gates was doing his best to fulfill that role at the moment. “Ten is fine,” she replied. “Or even earlier. Might as well get this over with quickly so I can get home, right?”
“You’ll still have to wait for the results,” Daniel said in repressing tones.
Gerald let out a breath — possibly of annoyance, although his neutral expression didn’t change. “Yes, but we can expedite those. We’ll have them in twenty-four hours.”
Meaning she’d have to spend another night here. The thought made Rosemary feel more resigned than anything else; somehow, she’d known she wouldn’t be able to get away after just one night in Greencastle. She’d brought her phone with her to the table, since she’d expected to get a text from Will in reply to the message she’d sent him, but so far, she hadn’t heard anything at all. His silence seemed strange to her. Maybe he’d gotten hung up with something at work and had only been able to read her text without having the time to compose an answer. She supposed that was a possibility, especially since she knew they were short-staffed at All Saints at the moment.
“That’s not so bad,” she said, doing her best to keep her tone even. No point in giving Daniel the satisfaction of knowing how on edge she was. “I mean, with my cover story of my nephew being sick, being away from Will for two nights won’t seem too strange. Anything more, and he might start to get suspicious.”
“Oh, it won’t take any longer than that,” Gerald assured her.
She did her best to smile at him, still trying to maintain the illusion that she wasn’t inwardly writhing at the thought of being in the same room with him, and they all lapsed into silence after that as they finished their meals. By that point, it was a little after nine o’clock, a little early to go to bed, but she pleaded weariness anyway and went upstairs. Daniel didn’t try to stop her — probably because he figured he’d had enough of her company by that point, and it was safer to have her confined to the guest room upstairs than wandering around the house.
Even though she doubted it would do any good, she locked the door before going to check out the en suite bathroom. Just as Caleb had said, it was stocked with anything she might possibly need — a toothbrush still in its package, a tube of toothpaste, mouthwash, dental floss, face wash, moisturizer, and more. There was even one of those fluffy white terrycloth bathrobes, the kind you might find in a five-star hotel or spa, hanging from the hook on the back of the bathroom door.
And when she peeked in the closet, she saw a couple of sweaters and matching skirts hanging there, along with a pair of high-heeled boots. Definitely not the kind of clothes she was used to wearing, but she supposed if Caleb had pilfered those items from his mother’s wardrobe, then he couldn’t exactly have provided the sorts of flowy skirts and knit tops that filled Rosemary’s own closet.
So you’ll look like a lady who lunches for a couple of days, she told herself as she changed out of her own skirt and top and into a silky blue nightgown with the tags still attached. Something else Caleb had conjured out of nowhere, like the package of underwear, or an item taken from his mother, one he knew Rosemary wouldn’t object to because it was brand-new?
Hard to say. Mrs. Lockwood definitely seemed like the type of person to have a lot of unworn clothing tucked away in her closet or dresser, so either explanation seemed equally plausible. While the nightgown didn’t seem very substantial for a cold October night in Indiana, Rosemary had to admit that the house was kept fairly warm, and there were extra blankets stacked on the closet shelf, just in case.
She went into the bathroom and washed her face and brushed her teeth, then came back out into the bedroom and inspected her phone for what felt like the hundredth time, even though she knew she’d really only looked at it about five times.
Or maybe ten.
Obviously, the number of times she’d glanced at the screen didn’t seem to make any difference, because no matter how often she looked at the damn thing, no mess
ages from Will appeared. She unlocked the phone, thinking maybe she should try texting him again now that no one was looking over her shoulder. Shouldn’t she let him know what was really going on?
Her finger hovered over the screen, and then, with a sigh, she set the phone down on the nightstand. Just because she was alone at the moment didn’t mean Daniel Lockwood wouldn’t still have some way of snooping to see if she’d sent any unauthorized messages.
Okay, she’d forget about that plan for the moment. Time to try something else.
She sat on the bed and visualized Will’s house — the kitchen this time, just in case that might help her cause. Small but neat and laid out nicely, with butcher-block countertops and that lovely window in the wall above the sink, allowing whoever stood there to look out on the backyard as they were doing the dishes. Just the mental picture was enough to send a wave of homesickness washing over her, even though the place wasn’t technically her home.
It sure felt that way, though.
A deep breath, and then she imagined herself standing in the kitchen. Imagined the faint scent of cinnamon on the air, along with the slightest trace of wood smoke from the fire they’d had the night before. Called to the powers that lay coiled within her.
Apparently, those powers were asleep, or had decided to take the evening off, because she didn’t budge even a single inch. She still sat on the edge of the bed, mussing the elaborately embroidered duvet cover, and it didn’t look as though she was going anywhere.
Rosemary sighed. It wasn’t that her powers were gone. They were just being blocked. Clearly, Daniel Lockwood wasn’t going to let down his guard. She was stuck here until she got this blood test out of the way…maybe longer.
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