Mr. Carr lifted out a glass container, round with a tiny stopper in its top. She only saw it for a second before he lifted it out of view, but there was a glow inside that swirled, and yet she might have also said the thing was completely empty, an odd mix but a familiar one. Then his voice, low and almost broken, choked out, “Bastards. This wasn’t part of the deal.”
She heard him moving beyond where she could see. Desperate, she crawled forward on her belly to the edge of the envelope and glanced up. Jordan Carr was staring down, and she almost screamed, but he wasn’t looking at her. He was staring into his hand, the jar pressed up against the scorch mark in his palm. He was intensely focused, sweat already breaking out on his brow. That nothing-like glow inside rattled, and then it was gone.
The jar came falling back to the desktop as he sucked in a sharp breath over his teeth and clutched his hand in pain. The bottle clanged into the lacquered wood and bounced across, right toward her. It was too thick to shatter, but it careened in Lorelei’s direction, and she squeezed her eyes shut, throwing arms over her head as it rolled right into the envelope’s opening and crushed it down.
The ringing of the crash was all around as her whole body was compressed between the folds. The already cramped space went pitch black, suddenly hot and oppressive, and she squeezed her knees up to her chest to fold away from whatever might come next.
As the booming in her ears fell away, she could just make out Mr. Carr’s footsteps and another click of a door. Lorelei remained in the tight ball, the heat and darkness pressing in on her as everything felt that much heavier, silent and waiting.
And then there was shuffling, grunting, and light poured in on her. Grier grabbed her arms still folded over her head and pulled her out of the sweaty, plastic prison in one deft movement. Habian was sneering at her from his spot on top of the envelope, batting pointed wings as he held it open. Tuatha sighed, placing a hand on Lorelei’s head as she tried to scramble to her feet, the room and the faery’s palm cold against her hot skin.
“That was a close one, huh?” Tuatha wasted no time wrapping her arms around her from behind. “In my experience with you folk, we’ve got either less than a minute or at least half an hour until he comes out of the bathroom, but I don’t think we should risk it.” She grabbed Lorelei and took off upward. “I hope you found what you needed.”
Habian grumbled and grabbed Grier, and Lorelei strained her neck to see as much as she could of the room as they went. The desk drawer was still open, and inside she could see more ripped up envelopes and empty glass jars, these ones truly empty. And then they were back in the wall and safe once again. Though how safe, Lorelei didn’t know.
CHAPTER 30
NOTHING
Lorelei couldn’t be entirely sure of what she’d seen, but she knew what she felt: stuck like a gold-plated shih tzu. Those bottles in Mr. Carr’s desk drawer were unique enough, but the glow reminded her of the spark Conrad had shown her months ago when he was drunk, the one he had extracted from a siren’s blood and said was dangerous and needed to be kept top secret. Of course, she bet lots of magical things looked like that—she knew it, even—but it nagged at the back of her mind in a way she didn’t like.
Telling Conrad would have been ideal if it didn’t also include having to explain why she’d been snooping in the first place. He was already prickly about her wanting into Mr. Carr’s mail for reasons she couldn’t understand, so what was she supposed to say? Well, I just thought maybe he was hunting humans, which I am by the way—sorry for lying to you for so long!
There was also the very slight chance the contents actually were the exact thing Conrad had made: a spark reverse engineered out of a hexed creature’s blood. He acted like no one else, at least no one he knew of, had done something like that before, and that it was an illicit thing to do, which possibly meant Conrad himself had something to do with all of this. Maybe that was even the reason he didn’t want her going through Mr. Carr’s mail. If Mr. Carr really were sent by the mayor, and the mayor was Bridgette’s father, and Conrad had dated Bridgette for so long…
No, it was too complicated to consider on the clock, and frankly too deep a conspiratorial hole for her to go down at all. Coupled with the fact she was totally bogged down with work, the theories were sitting on her shoulders like Aly might but with none of the fuzzy warmth or ear grooming. And with Ziah sick, consigned to bed after finally relenting to Philomena and giving up what was probably a bit too much blood with back-to-back cupid appointments, Lorelei was just on the verge of being totally overwhelmed.
Grier was tired too, more down than usual, and while he didn’t fight with Lorelei when she gave him tasks, he sure took twice as long to get them done, and over the next week or so, he became increasingly lazy. Grier was acting extra strange one evening, and after Lorelei reminded him for the fifth time to de-ice the front steps, he finally admitted that he kept forgetting because he had contraband on him in the form of Hana’s stolen journal and didn’t know what to do with it.
Lorelei pulled him into the office and slammed the door shut. “You’re going to put that back right now,” she said with all the disapproval of someone who hadn’t gone through the contents of the very same girl’s phone.
Grier hung his head, still managing to be taller than her. “Okay, yeah, I will, but look. I think she just wants to go home.” He showed her the photos that had been tucked inside of a village nestled within mountains, the ones they saw from their hiding spot in the ceiling. Light-colored stone structures were built into the steep mountainside with arching windows made up of blue glass and adorned with colorful flags and glowing lanterns.
Many of the photos, though, were taken inside a specific room, large with beautiful mosaics on the floors and fountains running its length against the walls. People were dancing before a wide, open balcony that jutted out from the mountainside to look over the forested world below. There was a young girl in many of the photos who looked just like a very little Hana with a wide smile and glimmering, dark eyes. Notably, this girl had two parents who clearly adored her, always hugging and kissing her, and even a slightly younger Ando appeared to be in a few.
Lorelei flipped through the pictures slowly, her face falling with each one. “She can’t go home,” she said in a whisper, remembering how Ando had said only the walls of Moonlit Shores Manor were safe for her now. There was a low moan from somewhere around them like the foundation to the manor were settling. She handed the photos back with a sigh. “You have to put these back. I know you care about her, but she has a private journal for a reason. Did you read any of it?”
His face went red, but he told her he hadn’t, dubiously at best. “I just thought there might be a way to help her in here. She almost never comes out of her room anymore unless it’s for work. I don’t even know if she’ll be willing to go to the party, and she loves parties.”
Lorelei’s brows raised. “Party?”
“Yeah, it’s in like a week or something? Ziah has one every year. You know, she hates winter, so she has a thing around Valentine’s Day when it’s coldest.”
“Valentine’s Day? You guys don’t do Christmas but you’re cool with St. Valentine?” Lorelei stepped out of the office for the foyer to check for guests, but it was empty.
“It’s all Ziah’s idea, you shouldn’t be that surprised, you know how she is. Maybe she forgot to tell you.” Grier pointed to Ziah’s planner nestled safely under the front desk. “But I know she sent out all the invitations, like, two months ago? They’re in these bright, red envelopes. She makes a real big deal about it.”
“People are already invited?” Lorelei snatched up the magenta binder and flipped through Ziah’s perfectly laid out pages.
“Oh, yeah. Arista loves it because the place is always full, and she and Seamus get out of town to avoid all the noise.”
Lorelei’s heart jumped as she finally found the plans for a party that apparently warranted six whole pages of Ziah’s precious, organizat
ional space. Color-coded and hand written in her slanted but gloriously legible script, all the details were already decided, and if her perfect check marks were indeed correct, most of the tasks were already taken care of: a band had been scheduled, the menu was settled with Ando, Ren had confirmed a shipment of specialty wine, but there was a task, Tell Lorelei, that had yet to be marked off. Beside it was a slightly more hastily scribbled next time I see her with a smiley face doodled in. That made Lorelei chuckle despite that Ziah had been so busy between bloodletting and studying she’d apparently forgotten all together.
There was one other unmarked task: Venue, White Room - Absolutely must do test run!
Hana passed through the foyer then with a cup of tea for Mr. Ecknees, face turned down and somber, and Grier hid her journal behind his back, watching her with almost no nuance. “I gotta go put this back,” he whispered and scurried off.
Lorelei spent the afternoon going over Ziah’s list, making calls to confirm everything was still on schedule. Grier took over the desk that evening, and she scarfed down some dinner before taking the planner to the back hall to pace in front of the white room’s door. She hadn’t ever gone in by herself, the room giving off such an intense magical aura she always felt unnerved in it unless it had already conjured up another place within its walls.
She muttered about a venue, no other notes on that, but couldn’t exactly be angry with Ziah since she’d gotten everything else done. She tugged on the end of her braid, turning on her heel to pace back the other way, and ran right into a solid wall, the planner clattering out of her hand.
Lorelei huffed, feeling defeated as some of Ziah’s post it notes detached and fluttered to the floor.
“Sorry.” Conrad stood there, hands up, then tipped his head. “You all right?”
She looked down at the planner then back up to him and shook her head.
“Isn’t this Ziah’s?” He picked up the book and the scattered notes, flicking through the pages.
She nodded, huffing again and crossing her arms.
“Okay, help me out here and actually tell me what’s wrong.”
She pointed at the white room’s door, and it all came out in a sort of exasperated barrage that Ziah hadn’t planned any kind of venue for a party that she hadn’t told Lorelei about for the holiday that, frankly, none of them should be celebrating if consistency were a thing around here, which it definitely wasn’t, and, boy, was she getting really overwhelmed.
Conrad looked scared, but just for a second, then clenched his jaw. “We can fix this.”
The inside of the white room lived up to its name, stark and bright like a hospital but decidedly less interesting. Other than the single light bulb hanging from the ceiling’s center and the switch and timer on the wall by the door, there was nothing else. Not even a single window.
Lorelei tapped a foot on the concrete floor, clutching Ziah’s planner to her chest. “Have you ever done this before?”
“A couple times.” He rocked back onto his heels. “When I was a kid, mostly. Never went very well, and Arista would get pretty irritated with the places I ended up. I don’t think Ziah’s going to want this party in the jungle though, so why don’t you give it a go first?”
Lorelei glanced at the switch on the wall, biting her cheek. She hoped it didn’t take magic, but the buzzing spark in the air suggested the room was full of it already.
“Go on,” he said.
“Okay, I’m doing it!” She eyed him, reaching for the switch then stopping. “I’m just not sure what a test run means. I thought the white room could only bring a place here one time. If we do that now, then we won’t be able to bring it back for the actual party.”
“Sort of.” He leveled his hand in front of him and wobbled it. “You can make anything show up with the switch, but it’s not exactly real. Once you twist the timer, the space solidifies, and you can interact with it. Otherwise, it’s more like a set for a play, so it won’t feel exactly right, and it won’t last much longer than ten or fifteen minutes. So, you know, go crazy.”
Lorelei put her hand on the switch with a huff. She cleared her throat and addressed the room like she’d heard Ziah do before. “Hi, there. Um, we’re having a party for Valentine’s Day, I guess, and its theme is supposed to be masquerade, so do you think you could please show us what you’ve got for that?”
With a flick of the switch, the room’s air sizzled. Electrified and dry, Lorelei’s skin crawled with a staticky charge. The light popped, but as the glass of the bulb fell to the ground, it transformed itself into a small handful of pink and white, heart-shaped confetti, leaving behind a slightly bigger light with a dome over it, bright and sickly yellow.
The walls remained white, but crepe paper banners dropped down from them, red and pink, and balloons expanded up from the concrete floor to bounce against one another then settle back down on the ground. Lorelei waited another moment, but nothing else happened. It looked like the world’s saddest elementary school party. With glassy eyes, she looked at Conrad.
“Wow,” he said, scratching his head. “You really blew it.”
“Damn it.” She kicked at one of the balloons, and it bound away from them, disrupting the others. One of the crepe paper banners fell off the wall in a slow, sad heap.
He rocked his head to the side. “You need to be a lot firmer and more specific. Remember, this is a Ziah thing, so it’s got to be over the top, and she’s going to want it to be…romantic, I guess.”
“Why don’t you do it, then?”
He reached back and took the switch, glaring out at the sorry excuse for a venue she had conjured. “Listen up, we need something more adult than this, obviously. It needs to be dark and edgy and way sexier in here.”
When he flicked the switch, the room’s sizzle was decidedly sizzlier. Lorelei felt a jolt through her chest as if a whole host of butterflies had burst from their cocoons. The floors darkened under her feet, the color pouring across and climbing up the walls, painting them deep crimson. The crepe paper dropped down, transforming into velvety curtains, and the balloons expanded into tufted cushions in reds and blacks scattered all over the floor.
A fireplace bloomed to life at the back wall, before it a tiger skin rug. Paintings grew from single points along the walls depicting men and women, naked and striking curious poses, and from some unseen jukebox a bassline dropped followed by a sultry saxophone. The whole thing felt very much like a basement room you would only be allowed entry in by answering a very specific type of ad and using a safe word.
“Too sexy,” Lorelei squeaked, slapping at the wall and landing on Conrad’s hand as he flipped the switch again.
The room returned to its stark white version, the music petering out as the cushions deflated into nothing, the fire popped and swallowed itself, and the paint splashed to the floor taking the lewd images with it. She pulled her hand back from his and blew out a breath.
“That wasn’t what I meant,” Conrad grumbled through grit teeth, rubbing his face.
Lorelei started laughing then, squeezing the planner to her chest. “I don’t know, it was pretty accurate considering the description.”
“Okay, better idea: is there a place you know of that might work? Someplace you’ve actually been or seen?”
“Like that?” She coughed. “Um, no.”
“I know you’ve never been anywhere like that,” he said, rolling his eyes, and for a second she felt offended. “It can be any place, just something that’s big enough to hold everyone and fancy enough to make Ziah happy.”
Lorelei’s mind filled with the settings of every piece of artwork she’d ever loved, Matisse’s colorful interiors, the stained glass in Notre-Dame Cathedral, and she even giggled at the thought of conjuring up something from one of Toulouse-Lautrec’s Moulin Rouge depictions. But then she had a better idea. “Hey, Manor, I know you were watching when Grier and I talked earlier. Do you remember Hana’s photos of where she grew up? There was that big, beautiful bu
ilding with those fountains and tiles and a balcony looking out over the mountains. Can you bring that place here for us?”
She looked back at Conrad. He shrugged and flicked the switch.
The whiteness of the room melted this time with a shadow passing over the space, drowning it in a warm but dark grey. The room expanded out and away from them, the ceiling doming with an intricate, coffered pattern and medallions that encircled crystal chandeliers as they grew down and lit the space with a twilit glow.
Fluffy cushions and loveseats popped up from the ground, bouncing as they settled into circles, some stowed away alone in corners and dark spaces. The walls were filled with windows from floor to ceiling, arched, the light blue from the stained glass, broken up by lead scrolling. In a trough along both walls were deep wells filled with dark water and floating lilies, the gentle sound of fountains emptying out into them from the wall filling the air.
Along the back, the whole space was open and set with archways that led onto a half circle balcony. Lorelei strode across the huge ballroom. She expected to run into the far wall that would have been there in its static, white state, but she never did. Instead, she was able to pass under the arches onto the terrace and straight out to the edge of the balcony.
Beyond lay mountains, snowcapped and still. The tops of evergreen trees plunged steeply downward, and in the middle of the lush forest that grew along the bottom of the mountain was a lake that sparkled with moonlit water. It was truly beautiful, but it was hollow, without a breeze, the sounds somewhat artificial when she listened hard enough to them. Though she knew it was only because it was a snapshot, not quite real without turning the dial below the switch, she got a creepy chill.
The Wayward Deed (Vacancy Book 2) Page 30