Darkest Hour tm-4

by Meg Cabot

  I put my hands on my hips. I don't know if it was the concussion or the fact that my boyfriend had been exorcised, but my bitch quotient was set on high, I think.

  "I have faith, Father Dom," I informed him. "I have plenty of faith. I have faith in myself, and I have faith in you. That's how I know that we can fix this."

  Father Dominic's baby blues widened behind the lenses of his bifocals as he lifted a purple ribbony thing to his lips, kissed it, then slipped it around his neck. "Fix this? Fix what? Whatever do you mean, Susannah?"

  "You know what I mean," I said, because he did.

  "I - " Father Dominic took a metal thing that looked like an ice cream scooper out of his bag, along with a jar of what I could only suppose was holy water. "I realize, of course," he said, "that Maria de Silva Diego will have to be dealt with. That is troubling, but I think you and I are both perfectly well equipped to handle the situation. And the boy, Jack, will have to be seen to and adequately indoctrinated in the appropriate methods of mediation, of which exorcism, as you know, should only be used as a last resort. But - "

  "That's not it," I said.

  Father Dominic looked up from his house blessing preparation. "It isn't?" he echoed questioningly.

  "No," I repeated. "And don't pretend like you don't know what I'm talking about."

  He blinked a few times, reminding me of Clive Clemmings.

  "I can't say that I do know, Susannah," he said. "What are you talking about?"

  "Getting him back," I said.

  "Getting who back, Susannah?" Father Dom's all-night driving marathon was starting to show. He looked tired. He was a handsome guy, for someone in his sixties. I was pretty sure half the nuns and most of the female portion of the Mission's congregation were in love with him. Not that Father D would ever notice. The knowledge that he was a middle-aged hottie would only embarrass Father D.

  "You know who," I said.

  "Jesse? Getting Jesse back?" Father Dominic stood there, the stole around his neck and the dipper thing in one hand. He looked bewildered. "Susannah, you know as well as I do that once spirits find their way out of this world, we lose all contact with them. They're gone. They've moved on."

  "I know. I didn't say it was going to be easy. In fact, I can think of only one way to do it, and even then, well, it'll be risky. But with your help, Father D, it just might work."

  "My help?" Father Dominic looked confused. "My help with what?"

  "Father D," I said. "I want you to exorcise me."

  CHAPTER 12

  "For the last time, Susannah," Father Dominic said. This time he pounded on the steering wheel for emphasis as he said it. "What you are asking is impossible."

  I rolled my eyes. "Hello? What happened to faith? I thought if you had faith, anything was possible."

  Father D didn't like having his own words tossed back at him. I could tell by the way he was grimacing at the reflection of the cars behind us in his rearview mirror.

  "Then let me say that what you are suggesting has a very unlikely chance of succeeding." Driving in Carmel-by-the-Sea is no joke, since the houses have no numbers, and the tourists can't, for the life of them, figure out where they're going. And the traffic is, of course, ninety-eight percent tourists. Father D was frustrated enough by our efforts to get where we were going. My announcement back in my bedroom that I wanted him to exorcise me wasn't helping his mood much, either.

  "Not to mention the fact that it is unethical, immoral, and probably quite dangerous," he concluded, as he waved at a minivan to go ahead and go around us.

  "Right," I said. "But it's not impossible."

  "You seem to be forgetting something," Father D said. "You are not a ghost, nor are you possessed by one."

  "I know. But I have a spirit, right? I mean, a soul. So why can't you exorcise it? Then I can go, you know, have a look around, see if I can find him, and if I do, bring him back." I added as an afterthought, "If he wants to come, of course."

  "Susannah." Father Dom was really fed up with me, you could totally tell. It had been all right, back at the house, when I'd been crying and everything. But then I'd gotten this terrific idea.

  Only Father Dominic didn't think the idea was so terrific, see. I personally found it brilliant. I couldn't believe I hadn't thought of it before. I guess my brain had gotten a little squashed, what with the concussion.

  But there was no reason why my plan shouldn't work. No reason at all.

  Except that Father Dominic would have no part of it.

  "No," he said. Which was what he'd been saying ever since I first mentioned it. "What you are suggesting, Susannah, has never been done before. There isn't the slightest guarantee it will work. Or that, if it does, you will be able to return to your body."

  "That," I said calmly, "is where the rope comes in."

  "No!" Father Dominic shouted.

  He had to slam on the brakes at that very moment because a tour bus came barreling along from out of nowhere, and, there being no traffic lights in downtown Carmel, there were often differences of opinion over whose turn it was at four-way stops. I heard the holy water, still in its jar in his black bag on the backseat, slosh around.

  You wouldn't have thought there'd be any left, what with the dousing Father D had given our house. That stuff had been seriously flying. I hoped he was right about Maria and Felix being too Catholic to dare to cross the threshold of a newly blessed home. Because if he was wrong, I'd pretty much made a big ass out of myself in front of Dopey for no reason. Dopey had been all, "Whatcha doing that for, Father D?" when Father Dominic got to his room with the aspergillum, which turned out to be what the dippy thing was called.

  "Because your sister asked me to," Father Dom replied as he flicked holy water all over Dopey's weight bench - probably the only time that thing had ever come close to being cleaned.

  "Suze asked you to bless my room?" I could hear Dopey's voice all the way down the hall, in my own room. I'm sure neither of them knew I was listening.

  "She asked me to bless the house," Father Dominic said. "She was very disturbed by the discovery of the skeleton in your backyard, as I'm sure you know. I would greatly appreciate it if you would show her a little extra kindness for the next few days, Bradley."

  Bradley! In my room, I started cracking up. Bradley! Who knew?

  I don't know what Dopey said in reply to Father Dom's suggestion that he be nicer to me, because I took the opportunity to shower and change into civilized clothing. I figured twelve hours was more than enough to go around in sweats. Any more than that and you are, quite frankly, wallowing in your own sorrow. Jesse would not want my grieving over him to affect my by-now-famous sense of fashion.

  Besides, I had a plan.

  So it was that, showered, made up, and attired in what I considered to be the height of mediator chic in the form of a slip dress and sandals, I felt prepared to take on not only the minions of Satan but the staff at the Carmel Pine Cone, in front of whose office Father D had promised to drop me. I had not only figured out, you see, a way to get Jesse back: I'd figured out a way to avenge Clive Clemmings's death, not to mention his grandfather's.

  Oh, yes. I still had it. But good.

  "It is out of the question, Susannah," Father Dominic said. "So put the idea from your head. Wherever he is now, Jesse is in a better place than he was. Let him rest there."

  "Fine," I said. We pulled up in front of a low building, heavily shaded by pine trees. The offices of the local rag.

  "Fine," Father Dominic said, putting his car into park. "I'll wait out here for you. It would probably be better if I didn't come in, I suppose."

  "Probably," I said. "And there's no need to wait. I'll find my own way home." I undid my seat belt.

  "Susannah," Father Dominic said.

  I lifted my sunglasses and peered at him. "Yes?"

  "I'll wait here for you," he said. "We still have a good deal of work to do, you and I."

  I screwed up my face. "We do?"

 
; "Maria and Diego," Father D reminded me gently. "You are protected from them at home now, but they are still at large, and will, I think be excessively angry when they realize you are not dead - " I had finally broken down and explained to him what had happened to my head. "We need to make preparations, you and I, to deal with them."

  "Oh," I said. "That."

  I had, of course, forgotten all about it. Not because I did not feel Maria and her husband needed to be dealt with, but because I knew my idea of dealing with them and Father D's idea were not exactly going to gel. I mean, priests aren't really big on beating adversaries into bloody pulps. They're more into gentle reasoning.

  "Sure," I said. "Yeah. We should get right on that."

  "And of course - " Father D looked really odd. I realized why when the next words that came out of his mouth were, "We've got to decide what's to be done with Jesse's remains."

  Jesse's remains. The words hit me like twin punches. Jesse's remains. Oh God.

  "I was thinking," Father Dominic said, still choosing his words with elaborate care, "of putting in a formal request with the coroner's office to have the remains transferred to the church for burial in the Mission cemetery. Do you agree with me that that would be appropriate?"

  Something hard grew in my throat. I hied to swallow it down.

  "Yes," I said. It came out sounding funny, though. "What about a headstone?"

  Father Dominic said, "Well, that might be difficult, seeing as how I highly doubt the coroner will be able to make a positive identification."

  Right. They didn't have dental X-rays back when Jesse'd been alive.

  "Maybe," Father Dominic said, "a simple cross . . ."

  "No," I said. "A headstone. I have three thousand dollars." More if I took back all those Jimmy Choos. Good thing I'd saved the receipts. Who needed a fall wardrobe, anyway? "Do you think that would cover it?"

  "Oh," Father Dominic said, looking taken aback. "Susannah, I - "

  "You can let me know," I said. Suddenly, I didn't think I could sit there on the street anymore, discussing this with him. I opened the passenger door. "I better go. See you in a few."

  And I started to get out of the car.

  But not soon enough. Father D called my name again.

  "Father D," I began impatiently, but he held up a hand.

  "Just hear me out, Susannah," he said. "It isn't that I don't wish there was something we could do to bring Jesse back. I, too, wish that he could, as you said, have found his own way to wherever it was he was supposed to have gone after death. I do. I truly do. I just don't think that going to the extreme you're suggesting is ... well, necessary. And I certainly don't think it's what he would have wanted, your risking your life for his sake."

  I thought about that. I really did. Father D was absolutely right, of course. Jesse would not have wanted me to risk my life for him, not ever. Especially considering the fact that he doesn't even have one anymore. A life, I mean.

  But let's face it, Jesse's from a slightly different era. Back when he was born, girls spent all their time at quilting bees. They didn't exactly go around routinely kicking butt the way we do now.

  And even though Jesse's seen me kick butt a million times, it still makes him nervous, you can totally tell. You would think he'd be used to it by now, but no. I mean, he was even surprised when he heard about Maria and her knife. I guess that's kind of understandable. Come on, little Miss Hoop Skirt, poppin' a blade?

  Still, even after a century and a half of knowing she was the one who had ordered the hit on him, that completely blew his mind. I mean, that sexism thing, they drive that stuff down deep. It hasn't been easy, curing him of it.

  Anyway, all I'm saying is, Father D's right: Jesse definitely would not want me to risk my life for him.

  But we don't always get what we want, do we?

  "Fine," I said again. You would have thought that Father D would notice how accommodating I'd become all of a sudden. I mean, didn't he realize that he wasn't the only person in town who could help me? I had an ace up my sleeve, and he didn't even know it.

  "Be back in a flash," I said with a full-on, hundred-watt smile.

  Then I turned and went into the offices of the Carmel Pine Cone like I was just going in there to place a personal ad or something.

  What I was doing, of course, was something way more insidious.

  "Is Cee Cee Wells here?" I asked the pimply kid at the reception desk.

  He looked up, startled. I don't know what freaked him out more, my slip dress or the fact that I'd asked to see Cee Cee.

  "Over there," he said, pointing. His voice wobbled all over the place.

  "Thanks," I said, and started down a long and quite messy corridor, passing a lot of industrious journalists who were eagerly tapping out their stories on the recent spate of wind chime thefts off people's front porches, and the more alarming problem of parking in front of the post office.

  Cee Cee was in a cubicle in the back. It appeared to be the photocopier cubicle, because that was what she was doing: photocopying.

  "Oh my God," she said, when she saw me. "What are you doing here?"

  She didn't say it in an unhappy way, though.

  "Slumming," I said, and settled myself into an office chair beside the fax machine.

  "I can see that," Cee Cee said. She was taking her role as girl reporter very seriously. Her long, stick-straight white hair was coiled up on top of her hair with a Number 2 pencil, and there was a smudge of toner on one pink cheek. "Why aren't you at the resort?"

  "Mental health day," I said. "On account of the dead body they found in our backyard yesterday."

  Cee Cee dropped a ream of paper.

  "Oh my God!" she gushed. "That was you? I mean, there's a mention of a coroner's call up to the hills in the Police Beat section, but somebody said it must have been a Native American burial site or something...."

  "Oh, no," I said. "Not unless the Native Americans around here wore spurs."

  "Spurs?" Cee Cee reached for a notepad that was resting on top of the copier, then pulled the pencil from the knot on top of her head, causing her long hair to fall down around her shoulders. Because she is an albino, Cee Cee keeps the vast majority of her skin protected from the sun at all times, even when she's working inside an office. Today was no exception. In spite of the heat outside, she was wearing jeans and a brown button-up sweater.

  On the other hand, the air-conditioning in the place had to be on high. It was like an icebox in there.

  "Spill," Cee Cee said, perching on the edge of the table that supported the fax machine.

  I did. I spilled it all. Everything, from the letters Dopey had found to my trip to Clive's office to his untimely death the day before. I mentioned Clive's grandfather's book and Jesse and the historically significant role my house had played in his murder. I told her about Maria and Diego and their no-account kids, the fact that Jesse's portrait was now missing from the historical society, and my suspicions that the skeleton found in my backyard belonged to him.

  When I was through, Cee Cee raised her gaze from the notepad and went, "Geez, Simon. This could be a movie of the week."

  "Lifetime channel," I agreed.

  Cee Cee pointed at me with the pencil. "Tiffani-Amber Thiessen could play Maria!"

  "So," I said. "Are you going to print it?"

  "Heck, yeah," Cee Cee said. "I mean, it's got everything. Romance and murder and intrigue and local interest. Too bad almost everybody involved has been dead a hundred years, or more. Still, if I can get confirmation from the coroner that your skeleton belonged to a male in his twenties . . . Any idea how they did it? Killed him, I mean?"

  I thought about Dopey and his shovel. "Well," I said, "if they shot him - you know, in the head - I doubt the coroner will be able to tell, thanks to Brad's ham-fisted digging technique."

  Cee Cee looked at me. "You want to borrow my sweater?"

  Surprised, I shook my head. "Why?"

  "You're shivering."

/>   I was, but not because I was cold.

  "I'm okay," I said. "Look, Cee Cee, it's really important you get them to run this story. And they have to do it soon. Like tomorrow."

  She said, not looking up again from her notepad, "Oh, I know. And I think it'd go great alongside Dr. Clemmings's obituary, you know? The project he was working on when he died. That kind of thing."

  "So," I said, "it'll run tomorrow? Do you think it'll run tomorrow?"

  Cee Cee shrugged. "They won't want to run it until they get the coroner's report on the body. And that could take weeks."

  Weeks? I didn't have weeks. And though Cee Cee didn't know it, she didn't have weeks either.

  I was shaking uncontrollably now. Because I had realized, of course, what I'd just done: put Cee Cee in the same kind of jeapordy I'd put Clive Clemmings in. Clive had been just fine until Maria had overheard him telling his dictaphone what I'd said about Jesse. Then faster than you could say The Haunting, he was suffering from a massive, paranormally induced coronary. Had I just sentenced Cee Cee to the same gruesome end? While I highly doubted Maria was going to ransack the offices of the Carmel Pine Cone the way she had the Carmel historical society, there was still a chance she might find out what I had done.

  I needed that story to run right away. The sooner people found out the truth about Maria and Felix Diego, the better my chances of them not killing me - or the people I cared about.

  "It's got to run tomorrow," I said. "Please, Cee Cee. Can't you call the coroner and get some kind of unofficial statement?"

  Cee Cee did look up from her notebook then. She looked up and said, "Suze. What is the rush? These people have been dead for like forever. What does it matter?"

  "It matters," I said. My teeth were starting to chatter. "It just really matters, okay, Cee Cee? Please, please see what you can do to put a rush on it. And promise you won't talk about it. The story, I mean. Outside these offices. It's really important that you keep it to yourself."

  Cee Cee reached out and laid a hand on my bare shoulder. Her fingers were very warm and soft. "Suze," she said, peering down at me sort of intently. "What did you do to your head? Where'd that giant bruise under your bangs come from?"