Richardson let his arms fall to his sides and let off a sardonic chuckle. “Positive, right. This has nothing to do with Phillip being there now, I trust. All a big coincidence.”
“What, exactly, are you insinuating?”
“Nothing,” Richardson said with a heavy sigh. “I’m probably overreacting.”
Jacqueline walked over to her husband and put her arms around his waist. His body stiffened, and she felt a wave of sadness wash over her at his response to her embrace. She pressed her cheek against his chest and recalled the day they met. It seemed like eons ago. Now they had two children and successful careers. Richardson had recently been promoted as a result a recent merger with Mercurio-Atlan, headed by Phillip Mercer, her former business associate. She assumed Richardson was thriving in his new role, taking on new challenges and adapting his skill set accordingly.
Richardson softened and wrapped his arms around her. He patted her head tenderly and took a deep breath. She heard him say something out loud, but her ears were blocked by his chest and left arm. She pulled away slightly and looked up at his clean-shaven chin. “I’m sorry, I missed that.”
“Phillip called me into his office before he left for Chicago.”
Jacqueline tipped her head. “Oh? That’s positive, isn’t it?”
“Not really, no. It… didn’t go well.”
Jacqueline pulled away from his embrace and looked into Richardson’s eyes. He blinked and turned his gaze downward. Jacqueline felt a pang of fear. Being on Phillip’s radar normally meant favorable attention. Meatier projects. Lucrative opportunities for further advancement and bonuses. She had a flash thought he had been terminated, but she couldn’t believe he would have remained mum about it until now. She chose her words carefully to draw him out before jumping to any more conclusions without solid evidence.
“How so? My understanding has been Phillip has been quite pleased with Project Indigo.”
“Yeah, he was. Is. He, uh, reassigned it to Washington.”
Jacqueline reeled. Project Indigo was Richardson’s chance to prove himself in his new role and demonstrate his capabilities. “On what grounds?”
“Grounds?” Richardson shook his head and chuckled bitterly. “On the grounds that Phillip owns the place and can do whatever he damn well pleases.” He glared at Jacqueline. “Remind you of anybody?”
“Well, I… I suppose that is an accurate assessment,” Jacqueline sputtered. “But did he tell you why? Phillip isn’t prone to rash decisions, in my experience.”
“No, I’m well aware you know him more intimately than I do.”
Jacqueline raised her hand to slap him, outraged at the implication. Millie and Monroe, their fraternal twin children wandered into their bedroom and looked up at them. Jacqueline quickly lowered her arm and fought to compose herself. “Mommy and Daddy are having a discussion, children,” she said as sweetly as she could muster. “We will be with you shortly.”
“Monroe changed the Wi-fi password and won’t give it to me,” Millie said.
“No, I didn’t,” Monroe said. “She just can’t spell Xanthroampithicus.”
“That’s not even a word,” Millie whined. “Mommmm, make him change it back.”
Jacqueline smoothed her blouse and skirt and ushered the children from the room. “Monroe, enough of this foolishness. Change it back this instant.”
“The router won’t let me recycle passwords. I’ll have to make it something iterative. How about Xanthroampithicus001?”
Millie stamped her foot. “Mommmmm!”
Richardson stepped forward. “Monroe, change it back. You heard your mother.”
“Yes, sir,” Monroe moaned, and stomped sullenly out of the room, followed closely by Millie, who chided him for getting yelled at by their father.
Jacqueline closed the door behind them. Richardson walked stiffly to the bed and sat down beside Jacqueline’s overnight bag. He ran his fingers along the edge and huffed.
Jacqueline rushed forward and pulled the bag aside. “Don’t touch that. You’ll make it dirty.”
“Fine. I’m sorry,” he said softly.
Jacqueline set about packing the rest of her things, checking off her packing list one item at a time. Richardson huffed louder, causing her to drop her list. “What is it, Richardson? I’ve got an early flight.”
“He called me Cornwallis.”
Jacqueline felt numb. She looked down at her husband, who in turn stared at his hands as they rested on his lap. She dropped to her knees and clutched his hands in hers. “Oh, honey, he didn’t. That was completely uncalled for.” Nobody called him by his real name, not even her, except when signing legal documents. For all intents and purposes, the C in C. Richardson Winstead was purely decorative.
“Well, he did, and the message was pretty clear. He made me surrender Project Indigo to Washington, then he told me he was re-assessing the org chart in the wake of the merger. He told me much depended on how Chicago went.”
Jacqueline struggled to speak. She said the first thing that came to her mind, despite how defensive it sounded. “Richardson, he was not referring to me. I swear I have no intention of seeing him in Chicago or anywhere else.”
“Maybe he’ll just bump into you in your hotel room.”
She squeezed his hands intently. “Richardson, look at me. Look.” He met her steely gaze. “Nothing is going to happen with him or anyone else. My trip is purely family-related. I will clean up the mess, then return home immediately. Nothing and nobody else is on my agenda.”
He sighed and nodded. “I guess I’ll have to take your word for it.”
“I gave you more than my word.” She raised her wedding ring and let the sparkle strike his eyes before continuing. “I made a vow.”
“So did Britney,” he said.
Jacqueline rose from the floor and patted his shoulder. “I’m quite certain I have no idea to whom you are referring.”
“No,” he said sadly, “you don’t.”
CHAPTER 24: BETRAYAL
Dawn began to break over western suburban Chicago, and James in his ethereal form had to part company with Agnes in her entirety: her physical form had fallen onto her left side on the bed, and her ethereal form laid on the floor beside James. A white glow surrounded them as inky black shapes continued to float around close to the floor languidly, and silently. Agnes looked upon her night visitor’s face and smiled as he put his hand to her cheek. “Agnes,” he said.
“Yes, James?”
“I have to return home. Can I come visit you again?”
Agnes smiled sweetly. “You may.”
James grinned widely, then paused, troubled. “Somebody sent me to you. I was having trouble figuring something out, and she gave me your name, and I found you lying in the bathtub. Two of these… things… came out of you and tried to get me.” He gestured to the black forms.
Agnes frowned, and the white light around her dimmed slightly. “What’s wrong? What couldn’t you figure out?”
James looked down. “My mentor… she wants me to turn a plain old stone into gold. She said that there were others that knew how, but she told me not to search for them. She said I had to figure it out for myself. I got upset with myself and tried to think of how to make gold, when one of my classmates said your name, and I was brought here, like this, and found you.”
The aura that surrounded Agnes dimmed again and began to change color. “Your mentor? What’s her name?”
James looked up, as if to search for the answer above them. “She doesn’t… have a name, I guess. I only know her as…”
Agnes backed away from him. “The Countess.”
James watched her float above the floor. “Yes, that’s her. Do you… know her?”
“Do you?” Her aura was a dark red now.
“Well, no, not really… I mean, Mister Steele has been really nice, and has taught me a lot, but she only came to the manor recently, and she seems to have a whole deeper layer of secret knowledge. Are you…
one of the people she said could turn things into gold?” He looked up at her hopefully.
Agnes tried to float higher, but she couldn’t pass through the ceiling. She began to sink back to the floor, and the black shapes began to move around more energetically, like sharks detecting blood. Her aura turned a deeper red, bordering on black. “Oh Agnes, how could you be such a fool?” She fell into the swarm of black shapes, which enveloped her on contact.
James reached out for her and felt an intense burning sensation as he touched the black mass on the floor. He pulled his hand away, and saw a black aura begin to form around it. “Agnes, no, I’m not here to hurt you. I meant what I said before… I love you.”
Agnes did not make any sound through the black mass that smothered her, but James heard a familiar voice call to him from further away: Come home. He recognized Aubra’s near monotone and struggled with the decision to stay and attempt to break through Agnes’s dark covering or return to the manor and regroup. He stood up and looked upon the black blob in the center of the room. “I’m serious, Agnes, I love you, and I want you to be happy.” The dark aura around his hand turned light gray as the white aura that surrounded the rest of him burned a brighter white.
Come home now, James. Aubra’s voice was louder now, and more stern. James looked at the black blob once more, and then at Agnes’s trembling physical body on the bed. He rose from the floor and did his best to kiss her head before leaving. “I’m sorry.” James vanished, leaving Agnes alone in the dark.
The dark blob diminished and filled Agnes’s ethereal form. She appeared to be a shadow, but with defined facial features. Her ethereal form slipped silently back into her physical form, and Agnes shivered violently on the bed. Tears spilled down her cheeks and onto her comforter.
“Never come back,” she whispered into the darkness.
CHAPTER 25: THURSDAY
Gracie awoke in a strange bed, covered by a crocheted blanket, woven with thick strands of blue and violet yarn. She rubbed her eyes and looked around at the unfamiliar sights. The sparse decorating scheme from the living room continued into the bedroom, which ran completely counter to her expectations as set by Annabella’s hair salon. The realization that Trixie and Annabella were two distinctly different people struck her as she searched in vain for painted skulls or red velvet accents.
Annabella laid on her back, eyes closed, and smiling wide. Gracie rolled onto her right side and looked upon Annabella’s face. After months of fantasizing about the possibility of this moment, Gracie felt a blend of excitement and disappointment now that it had arrived. Gone was the haunted house and cadre of vampires that she assumed made up the bulk of Trixie’s entourage, replaced by a plain apartment with rustic and shabby furnishings.
Annabella wiggled her nose and fluttered her eyelids. Her left eye opened and rolled around, observing the ceiling. She sucked in a breath and turned to her left to meet Gracie’s gaze. “Hey, you.”
“Hey.”
Annabella stretched and yawned, then rolled onto her left side. “Well, that was not normally how I spend my Wednesday nights.”
“Yeah, me neither.”
Annabella reached out and ran her fingers through a crop of Gracie’s hair. “Honey, you desperately need this fixed. Let me take care of this.”
A scowl flashed across Gracie’s face. “Is that what you do, take care of things?” She was surprised at her reaction, but the dinner fiasco was still stinging her pride.
Annabella slid her finger down to Gracie’s lips, and pressed down in a shushing motion. “Just you, silly. Let me take care of you.”
Gracie took hold of her hand and kissed it before pulling it from her mouth. “You already do. I owe you so much as it is.”
Annabella shook her head slowly. “Sweetie, don’t keep score on me, okay? Dinner was marvelous. And last night,” she reached out her other hand to run her fingers through Gracie’s hair, “was incredible.”
Gracie’s eyes widened. “Seriously? I mean, you’ve got so much more experience, and I have no idea what I’m doing most of the time.”
Annabella pulled Gracie’s hand to her lips and kissed it. “You’re doing just fine.”
Gracie’s eyes began to well up with tears. After falling out with Aimee and losing any chance at reconciliation when she got a new boyfriend—the thought made Gracie’s stomach turn—she never expected to fall in with someone more, well, mature. She slid her free hand up from under the blanket and stroked Annabella’s cheek. To feel Annabella’s bare skin against her fingers was everything, in that moment. Gracie never imagined that this could happen, having a grown-up dinner date at a fancy restaurant with a beautiful woman, then spending the night at her place, and now, their futures slowly entwining. She wanted this, but doubted she deserved it.
Annabella brought her left hand down and brushed a tear from Gracie’s eye. “Sweetie, what?”
Gracie squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. “I just don’t want to mess this up.”
Annabella bent forward and pressed her forehead against Gracie’s. “You won’t mess this up.”
“How do you know?”
“Because you care enough to worry about messing this up. But, sweetie, I’m serious, we’re going to have to work on that self-esteem.” She kissed her nose, then rolled onto her right side. Gracie heard clanking sounds as Annabella fumbled around for something on her nightstand. She rolled back over, and swiped her finger across her cell phone, bathing them in a blue glow. She raised her arm and tilted the phone. “Smile, hon.”
Gracie looked up into the phone screen and saw their faces stare back at her in a tightly cropped frame. Annabella pressed the photo shutter button twice in rapid succession, then she turned to face Gracie and asked for a kiss. Gracie happily obliged her, and Annabella pressed the shutter button four more times. She winked at Gracie, then looked up at her phone, swiping and tapping the screen, then tapping it one last time, triumphantly. Seconds later, Gracie’s phone buzzed.
“Is that you?”
“It’s us,” Annabella said. “Something to remember this by at work today.”
Gracie blinked. Work? At that moment, her alarm clock app jangled, ruining the mood and sending her scrambling to silence her phone. She tossed the phone aside and laid on her back. “Ugh, weekdays suck.”
Annabella smiled. “They’re not so bad sometimes.”
Gracie reached for her phone once more. “Crap, I have to figure out how to get to work from here.” She swiped and tapped her phone and searched for Modern Roofing Supply. After the top results loaded, she tapped an icon that said DIRECTIONS and mapped the route. An automated voice announced, “You are on the fastest route. You will arrive at your destination at 7:35 A.M.” Gracie groaned. “I start at 8.”
“So that gives you 25 minutes to get ready.”
“Yeah, I guess so.”
“Are you ready?”
Gracie sighed. “No.”
Annabella tossed the blanket aside and pressed up against her, playfully. “Too bad.”
CHAPTER 26: BREAKFAST MEETING
James scrunched up his face and rubbed his eyes as he awoke in his room in Eddington Manor. He reached over for his glasses, and as he slid them up his nose, he saw Aubra standing beside the bed, arms folded tightly across her chest. James sat bolt upright. “Uh, personal space?”
Aubra scowled at him and spoke in a low monotone. “What were you doing?”
“Sleeping, obviously.”
“Don’t lie to me. It just wastes our time and makes me angry.”
James sighed. “I tried to help Agnes, but… well, I think I made things worse somehow.” Aubra squeezed her arms tighter around her chest and twisted from side to side. James hated it when she did that. He flopped back onto the mattress and pulled his bedding up to his chin. Aubra reached out and gave the blanket a sharp tug. James exhaled sharply and said to the ceiling, “Okay, what?”
“You need to learn to follow directions.” Aubra folded her
arms again and continued twisting in place.
James propped himself up on his elbow. “What directions? You said, ‘Purity of something or other’ and walked out, if I remember correctly.”
“Purity of heart.”
“Right, ‘purity of heart’.” He pushed his glasses up his nose. “What’s that supposed to mean, anyway?”
“You were told to ask for guidance. Did you?”
“I… I thought I did. I can’t remember.” James shifted on the mattress. “What do you know about that, anyway? Saying ‘purity of heart’ doesn’t seem to be doing much for anybody.”
“You should have asked for guidance, instead of rushing in to save your girlfriend.” James picked up on the faint hint of jealousy, which was strange coming from a girl half his age.
“She’s not my girlfriend,” he said, looking down.
“You told her you loved her. She’s your girlfriend.”
“Uh, well… I don’t think it’s as simple as all of that. Besides, what are you doing in my room, anyway? Shouldn’t you be getting ready for breakfast?”
“It is as simple as that,” Aubra snapped. “I said we were friends, and we became friends, didn’t we?”
James sighed. “Yes.”
“I wanted to ask if you’d sit with me at breakfast.”
“We always sit together at breakfast.”
Aubra stood still and tapped the floor with the tip of her slipper. “I meant as friends.”
James scratched his head. “How is that any different?”
“It means we’d be sitting together because we want to, not just because we happened to get seats near each other,” Aubra said.
“Huh. Well, yeah… sure, I don’t see why not.”
“You need to get better at being friends.” Aubra turned on her tip-toe and marched stiffly out of his room.
James fell back onto his pillow and pressed the heels of his palms to his forehead. “Can I do anything right today?”
For Centuries More Page 10
