“If we’re behind bars, Monsieur le maire,” I say calmly, “then you can kiss being a diwaller goodbye.”
“Is that so? Because if I’m not mistaken, Roland, you’ve already gotten your piece.”
Could the man be more predictable? I’m half tempted to force de Morel to unlock the safe so I can shove my piece at the tweed-wearing maggot. The expression on Rainier’s face tells me he’d offer no objection.
“If you lock him up, Monsieur Keene . . . or any one of us”—Cadence’s voice is as dark as that ink blot on the scroll behind her—“when my piece shows up, I’ll sit back and watch it destroy our town.”
If I didn’t know her any better, if I didn’t know she’d sooner doom herself than innocents, I’d worry she’d follow through. After all, she exhibits none of the usual tells a liar does: her lids don’t twitch; her gaze doesn’t shift; her skin doesn’t turn blotchy.
“A seat to save a town. My offer isn’t terribly wicked.”
“Until the Quatrefoil’s assembled, there is no Council. We can’t promise you something we don’t have,” Gaëlle says.
He taps his phone’s screen with a buffed fingernail. “Do you want more deaths on your conscience?”
“Dad, stop. This is hard enough.”
I shove the icepack at Bastian, who jerks out of his stupor, then go toe-to-toe with the mayor. “I’m the only one responsible for Emilie’s death. As for a seat, you can have mine. Magic killed my parents. Killed Cadence’s mother. Killed this kid. When all of this is over, I’m out of here.” I’ve got to get out. I’m done hurting people. “Just do your fucking job and protect the people of Brume from any further dangers.”
“Slate!” Cadence gasps.
Geoffrey grins and slides the phone back into his jacket. “Deal. And don’t renege on it, or I’ll have you arrested.” He pats his pocket. “I have our entire conversation recorded and have already sent it to my email accounts. Plural.”
“And you wonder why Camille committed suicide.” De Morel’s smile is so vicious it douses Geoffrey’s.
“Rainier, that was uncalled for,” Adrien snaps.
“Apologies.” De Morel doesn’t sound apologetic. “Thank you for your visit and subordination, Geoffrey.” His chair squeaks as he leans back into it.
The mayor doesn’t smile. Not even cockily. For someone who got what he came for, he doesn’t seem particularly victorious.
He stares down at Emilie, a muscle jumping in his jaw. “I’ll let you dispose of the body. And don’t tell me what you do with it.”
“Her, not it,” I grit out.
Geoffrey’s eyes meet mine. “I don’t want to know what you do with her.” And then he turns and strides out of the study.
Once the front door clangs shut, Adrien asks, “So, what do we do with her?”
Gaëlle gnaws on her bottom lip. “The lake.”
There’s something inhumane about dumping a body into water. Especially a little girl’s.
I want to do what they do in the fairy tales: cover her with flower petals and keep her in a glass coffin. “Dump her in the lake, and she’ll be fish food. Not to mention that during spring melt, parts of her could resurface.”
“Then what do you suggest, Roland? Incinerate her perhaps?” de Morel suggests.
“What if once the Quatrefoil’s reassembled”—Cadence studies the framed photo on de Morel’s desk, that of a woman holding an infant, a woman who looks a lot like Cadence—“what if it reverses the curse?”
I want to tell her that hope is dangerous, that it disappoints far more than it gratifies, but bite my tongue.
Gaëlle reaches out to Cadence and squeezes her hand. “Unless we succeed soon, her body will start to decay. There’s a reason necromancy has always been considered a forbidden art.”
“You mean, she’d rise a zombie?” These are the first words Bastian’s said in almost an hour.
“It’s just a hypothesis.”
“A sound one.” De Morel’s gaze drifts to the frame on his desk, and I recall his wife’s state of decay.
If only I could delete that sight from my mind. That entire night. Except the part when I stood next to Cadence during the countdown. I want to hold on to that.
“So, the crypt or the lake?” Adrien asks.
“The crypt’s too easy to break into. Wouldn’t want some drunk vagabond stumbling upon her body.” Rainier’s stare, although not as poisonous as the one he fired at Geoffrey, hits its mark: me.
I don’t react, because I deserved that.
Adrien heaves a deep sigh. “So the lake it is.” He crouches and bundles up Emilie, wincing every time his fingers graze her limbs.
I swallow down a painful ache in my throat. “I’ll do it.”
I shove Adrien away. He puts up no fight. I lean over and cradle the small body, trying desperately to get into the zone where nothing can touch me, a zone that saved me from losing my mind more than once in foster care. But she’s so light . . . and the length of her hair that tumbles down over my forearm smells like kid: strawberry toothpaste, waxy crayons, and rainbows.
Cadence tucks the sheet tighter around Emilie’s body. “I’ll go with you.”
“No.”
“This wasn’t me giving you a choice, Slate.”
“I’m coming too,” Bastian pipes in.
I grit my teeth, desperate to argue, to preserve their innocence just a while longer, but the set of Cadence’s features and the determination in Bastian’s eyes shut me up. The only way those two aren’t coming with me is if I truss them up which I doubt either would appreciate, so I relent.
As we head out, de Morel pulls a set of keys from a drawer and hands them to Cadence. “Don’t dump the sheet with her. And put some rocks in her clothes, so—”
“Enough,” I say. “I know what to do.”
Cadence blanches.
Rainier smirks. “I have no doubt you do, Roland.”
Cadence is sweet, and I’m corrupt to the marrow. One more reason I need to leave this town . . .
I take the elevator down while Cadence and Bastian take the stairs. In the fancy gold-and-glass capsule, I blink like the time Bastian doused me with pepper spray, thinking I was a thief come to rob the apartment.
Hold it together, Slate.
I inhale slowly, sliding much needed oxygen into my lungs.
Cadence has put her coat back on by the time I reach the lobby, and she’s already holding the front door open. She leads us around the house, down the steep, snow-covered lawn visible from Rainier’s office. I don’t look over my shoulder to see if he’s staring at us. Not that I would see him considering how hard it’s snowing.
Again.
Where did the earlier sun go?
Cadence clings to Bastian’s arm while I tighten my hold on Emilie. As we get closer, the fog thickens. Soon, I can barely see more than a couple feet ahead of me.
When we reach de Morel’s private dock, Bastian crouches down to collect stones from the pebbled shore.
“We’re not weighing her down,” I say.
“We’re not?” Cadence’s bare fingers are already red from the biting cold.
“Emilie’s mother deserves closure. She deserves to know her daughter won’t be coming home.”
Cadence’s thick lashes obscure her downturned eyes, but I catch her wiping them on the back of her hand. “I wish I could wake up and find out all of this was a nightmare.”
And I wish I could make this come true.
Cadence unlocks the gate, and we trudge over the icy wooden boards of the dock. In the mist, the boat is nothing more than a shadowy mass until we’re practically on top of it. After being in the manoir, I was expecting the boat to be a goliath navigational showcase. But, for once, Rainier seems to have reined in his ostentatious taste. A midsized walkaround bobs at the end of the dock, between a deicer and a specially-made ramp for wheelchair access.
I hug Emilie’s body to my chest as I straddle the gunwale. Cadence is already u
nlocking the cabin door, and Bastian starts to lift the buoys and unlatch the ropes hooking the vessel to the dock. Above us, a crow stains the mist like an inkblot, dipping so low I swear I can feel the flap of its wings against my forehead. Its caws are loud and abrasive and raise the hairs on the back of my neck. Bastian swears and waves his arms at it. It carves back into the mist but leaves me with a fist of dread clenching my gut.
The motor starts, discharging a jet of exhaust. Cadence is at the helm, brows furrowed in concentration. Any other time, I’d be going on about how sexy she looks in control. But right now, the only thing on my mind is the horror of the situation.
We cut through the fog, Cadence guided by the glowing screen of the GPS.
The din of the motor is muffled by the pounding of my heart. I remind myself to breathe, but when I take a breath, I smell Emilie.
“We’re really doing this, huh?” Bastian asks.
“Have another suggestion?” It comes out sharper than necessary.
Bastian looks away and into the white cloud surrounding us. I should apologize but don’t.
The boat shudders to a standstill, and Cadence turns her red-rimmed eyes to us. “This is the deepest part of the lake.”
With the motor off and the mist suffocating us like a pillow, the only sound is our strained breaths. I’ve only been to church a few times in my life—foster mom number two dragged us there on Sundays to atone for her religious use of illegal substances—but kneeling on the cold floor of the stern throws me straight back to those wooden pews and silent stretches of prayer. No matter how many times I swallow, I can’t get rid of the prickling in my throat.
I peel away the sheet, exposing the kid’s moon-pale flesh. Emilie looks asleep, her eyes closed, her little rosebud mouth slightly parted. I lift her, cradling her against my pounding heart and lean over the gunwale. I hesitate, but then loosen my grip and her body rolls away and splashes into the steel gray water.
Her hair spreads and dances around her like dripping honey. Her pink pajamas create a bright, incongruous spot in the silver mist. But then the water grabs hold of her and tugs her under. We watch until the surface of the water is once again smooth and gray.
Cadence muffles her sobs in her coat collar as she starts the motor and makes a tight U-turn back toward the dock. None of us say a word.
The cold air slaps my face, coaxing tears from me. I squeeze the bridge of my nose and shut my eyes, but only manage to get myself under control when we’re mooring the boat.
The three of us stare at the dock but don’t make a move to get out.
Damp trails glitter on Cadence’s cheeks. Even Bastian is bawling. I grip his shoulder and squeeze. Then I slide my arms around Cadence’s waist and reel her in, inhaling her warmth, reveling in the sound of her beating heart. I hold her tight, to keep her, and myself, from shattering.
34
Cadence
It’s been five days since we fed Emilie to the lake. Five days since we all retreated into our own heads, trying to deal with the little girl’s death, yet knowing we can’t hide from the Quatrefoil’s dark magic forever.
Five quiet days.
Classes were canceled, and half the student body fled Brume the moment Geoffrey announced the new viral outbreak. Those who stayed have mostly remained indoors, holing themselves up behind fogged windows, watching the cloud cover pour snow so thick it looks like clumps of down.
Or at least, that’s what I did.
I’ve been traveling between my bed, window seat, and kitchen, trying not to think of the little girl floating among the fish.
The first three days, I managed to avoid Papa, but by the fourth day, he found me scraping mayo onto a piece of bread and forced me to talk. I told him how he treated Slate wasn’t fair, that it was shameful. He reminded me that Slate was an extortionist and that I shouldn’t trust a word that came out of his mouth.
“Stop it, Papa.”
“Stop what? Protecting my little girl? I see the way he looks at you, Cadence, and I don’t like it one bit.”
I’d gone back to slathering my bread in mayo, anger making white globs of sauce splatter the countertop.
“I’ve had an eye on the boy for a long time now, ma chérie. I know all about his devious ways. He doesn’t care about you. He sees you as prey. Do you know how many women he’s charmed into his bed just to leave them hurting and alone when he runs off with their grandmother’s engagement ring or their great aunt’s pearls? He sleeps with women for their jewels and wallets.”
“That’s not true.”
“Oh, Cadence. Think about it. What kind of man opens a sarcophagus to steal from a corpse? Not an honest one.”
My skin prickled with annoyance. He was simply badmouthing Slate to keep me away. Well, it wouldn’t work. Gritting my teeth, I slapped slivers of tomatoes and shredded smoked chicken between my bread slices, then crushed the sandwich together and left my father alone in the kitchen.
The sandwich remained on my nightstand untouched. The same way Slate’s last two text messages—Hey, how are you holding up? In the mood for dinner?—remained unanswered.
In the back of my mind, I kept hearing Slate tell Geoffroy, When all of this is over, I’m out of here. And Papa’s accusation sank deeper and deeper under my skin.
I phoned Alma, who’d trudged through knee-high snow to comfort me. The minute she’d arrived, I told her about my conversation with my father. From her ruffled brow, I sensed her hesitation to dismiss his claims.
“I don’t know. I like him. He’s funny. And hot. And certainly intriguing. But some people are good at hiding their game. And if he extorts people for a living . . . well, then, maybe your dad’s right.”
I’d called her over for comfort, not for her to gang up on me. But Alma thinks the world of Papa. His words hold weight for her. Enough weight for her to question her own opinions.
“You can take the boy off the streets, but you can’t take the streets off the boy, sweetie.”
I knew she was watching out for me, but that just made me simmer harder.
“Remember when he stole my ring at the New Year’s Eve party?”
“He gave it right back.”
“Because you told him to. It doesn’t make him evil, but it definitely makes his motive to stick around Brume questionable.”
“He’s the son of the Rolands! That’s why he’s sticking around.” I didn’t mention the Bloodstone, which he had stolen from my mother. Oh, God, they were right . . . Still, I said, “He’s not here to steal my inheritance. He’s got one of his own.”
“You can still have fun with him, just be careful.” Alma tapped the charm bracelet I’d inherited from Maman. “Might want to take that off.”
She and my father managed to plant a toxic seed that grew as the hours ticked by. He was a thief and a gigolo. He didn’t fit in Brume.
On the fifth day, I needed to get out of my house. But to go where? The streets hadn’t been cleared and the weather was bleak, like my mood. As though I’d broadcasted my desire for an escape, I received an offer in the form of a text message.
CHARLOTTE: Surprise birthday party at Adrien’s tonight. 7 p.m. I know you and him are close so come. And you can bring Slate. ;)
ME: I’ll be there.
I said nothing about Slate or to Slate. But I did call Alma.
I hug the magnum of champagne I took from Papa’s cellar to my chest as I slog through the snow to Third Kelc’h. The weather’s awful, but I still wore a dress and packed a pair of heeled booties inside my fabric tote to replace my heavy-duty rubber snow boots.
“Cadence!” I turn to find Alma plowing toward me. “Look at you.” She lets out a wolf whistle.
I’m tempted to roll my eyes. “I straightened my hair and put on mascara.”
“And lipstick.”
“Just gloss.”
“Ugh. That’s right. Your lips are already stupidly so red. You do know I hate you for that.” She catches up to me, and we resume our walk.
“How are you feeling today? About . . . you know . . . him whom we shall not name.”
I’ve come to terms with the fact that the kiss Slate and I shared was our last.
“Fine,” I lie. My heart feels as crushed as the snow beneath my boots. I think of Emilie, and her fate puts my dilemma in perspective.
“You know what the best way to get over someone is?”
“No. What?”
“Getting under someone else.” Alma waggles her eyebrows.
I sigh, because she’s right. I got over my crush on Adrien by crushing on Slate. Now, I need to find someone else. Except I know everyone else in Brume, and considering our town is under fake-quarantine, there’s no way Charlotte invited out-of-towners to her little party.
“I have the worst taste in men.”
Alma bumps her shoulder into mine. “You don’t. Brume just offers limited variety.”
“You live here too, and you don’t end up wanting all the wrong ones.”
“Because I’m way less picky. Not to mention, I’m not looking for long-term.”
“I don’t want long-term.”
Alma raises a single eyebrow. “Really?”
“Yes, really.”
She lets out an eloquent snort. “Since when?”
“Since tonight. You know what? Tonight, I’m going to hook up with someone, and I’m going to have a one-night-stand.”
Her eyes go very round and very wide. “Cadence de Morel, has a spirit possessed you?”
I grit my molars at the mention of spirits and possession. Why oh why did she have to mention the occult?
“No.” My tone’s as dry as the inside of my mouth. I wedge my arm more firmly around the champagne and trample the snow toward Adrien’s two-story, gray stone house that glows like a beacon in the cold winter night.
“You okay?” Alma has to trot to keep up with me.
I expel a breath that clings to the air. “I’ve just realized life is short.” Emilie’s body floats up behind my lids. “And I don’t want to die a virgin.”
Of Wicked Blood: A Slow Burn Romantic Urban Fantasy (The Quatrefoil Chronicles Book 1) Page 29