“Kate is at the hospital, and she has long hours. If we’re going to do it, now’s the time,” I whispered. I would never do this alone, but with Gwenn, what could possibly go wrong if there was two of us?
She grinned. “Let’s do this.”
“So, you think it’s Blake in that painting?” I asked as we passed the gossip chair.
She turned to me and sighed. “It could also be his great-great-grandfather,” she said, shaking her head.
“What I do know for sure is that there is something not right with Blake and his family.”
Or anyone else in the town they own and run.
“Okay, let’s do this,” Gwenn said, ready to pull the curtains open.
“Wait!” I yelled, my voice echoing through the house.
“Oh my God, Evelyn, you almost gave me a heart attack,” she said, clutching her chest and stepping away from the curtains.
“There’s a whole bunch of dust on those curtains. If we pull them open, Kate will know we’ve been in there, and she specifically told me not to go in,” I explained quickly.
“How many true crime shows have you watched?” she asked, rolling her eyes but grinning.
“I had insomnia for a while. Okay,” I breathed. “How are we going to do this?”
Gwenn slowly began to pull the curtain to the side. “There’s an old wooden door,” she whispered. “Hold these curtains up so I can try to open it.”
I stepped forward and carefully took hold of both dusty curtains as Gwenn reached for the old, bronze door handle.
“Locked.” Her shoulders slumped.
“Skeleton key,” I whispered, remembering that my key was meant to open every door in the house.
“Wait here.” I carefully handed the curtain back to her. I bolted up the stairs and found my black jeans on the floor, pulling the key out of the back pocket.
“I’ve got it,” I called as I bolted back down the stairs.
“Hurry, the dust in these curtains is shaving days off my life already,” Gwenn croaked.
“Just hold them in place.” I maneuvered around Gwenn and quickly took in the old wooden door. I slid the key into the lock, and we both took a sharp breath as it clicked and turned. I took the key out, clenched it in my fist.
“I cannot believe that actually worked,” Gwenn said, her voice laced with excitement.
I pushed the door open, and a soft cloud of dust and cold air erupted around us.
“Wonderful,” Gwenn coughed as I walked in, and she followed.
“Maybe close the door in case Kate comes back,” I said, turning back to her. “I’d rather be stuck in here than her catching us.” I thought about Kate’s expression should she discover us in here.
Gwenn pulled the door closed carefully and then turned back around to face the passageway.
“Wow,” she mouthed.
“Yeah,” I whispered as my arms dropped to my sides.
Chapter Ten
“How old do you think all of this is?” Gwenn asked, gazing around.
“Old.”
The long passageway had only one source of light, a small window right at the end. It was completely built of gray stone, including the ceiling.
“There isn’t even any electricity,” Gwenn said, slowly walking past me and up to a candelabra hoisted to the wall. I followed her and began looking at some of the dozens of paintings framed in gold and silver, now just leaning on the walls.
“Who are all these people?” Gwenn asked now also walking through the hallway examining all the people in the paintings.
“People from Greyhaven.” I pointed to one of the paintings. “Look, it’s the school or the old town hall.”
“Seventeen eighty-nine,” Gwenn mumbled, bending down to read the date. “Why does Kate have all of these in here?” She straightened up and looked at me.
“I think my family has lived here for generations. This stuff probably belonged to them,” I said, staring at the three men standing in front of the town hall. They were all handsome and their ostentatious clothing told me they had been extremely wealthy.
“You know,” Gwenn said, pointing to the man in the middle, “he kind of looks like Blake too, just older than he is now.”
“God, you’re right,” I whispered narrowing my eyes at the man with the same eyes, hair and lips as Blake. “He really does.”
“Should we see what’s behind these doors?” Gwenn whispered. The sound of her voice echoed softly in the room.
“Which one first?” I asked, looking at the door next to us and then turning toward the other two behind us.
“Let’s try this one,” Gwenn said, turning to the door directly behind her. She turned the doorknob and pushed. “It’s locked. Where’s that key of yours?”
“Here,” I said, passing her the bronze skeleton key.
“It doesn’t fit.” Her shoulders slumped.
“Which probably means all the answers are behind that door,” I mumbled.
“Did your crime shows tell you how to pick a lock?” she asked, stepping back to examine the door.
“No.” I smiled. “But I did watch a movie that told me how to take a door apart,” I said, raising my brow toward the bronze hinges. I walked up to them and turned to Gwenn. “I think if we pry these hinges out, we could just about get through the opening.”
Gwenn’s smile suddenly left her. “Do you hear that?” she whispered.
“It’s a car,” I gasped. “Kate’s back, run!”
We both walked as fast as we could, trying desperately not to kick up any dust as we went.
“Hurry,” I whispered as Gwenn opened the wooden door carefully and held the curtains up for me.
“Lock it later. We still have to pretend we were somewhere in the house, not here!” she hissed.
I eased the curtains back into place.
“The kitchen, through there.” I pointed.
Gwenn started walking as I followed her. I threw one more glance at the curtains. Kate would never know unless she tried to open the now unlocked door.
“Why is everything in this house so old and dark?” Gwenn whispered as we arrived in the kitchen. She immediately sat down at the small table in the center of the room, and I followed suit.
We both took a deep, steadying breath as Kate opened the front door.
“Evelyn?” she called.
“In here,” I called back, my voice a higher pitch than usual.
“Gwenn?” Kate exclaimed. “It’s nice to see you here.” A half-smile formed on her lips, most likely relieved that I had made a friend. Or an ally.
“Hi, Kate.” Gwenn smiled and widened her eyes innocently. “I was just leaving,” she said, turning to me, her smile frozen to her face.
“Not on my account?” Kate asked, walking into the kitchen toward the island. “I’m afraid I can’t stay long.” She sat down across from me. “I have to meet Viktor Greyson and some of the other founding families to discuss some events coming up.” She was giving me more detail into her life than I was used to.
“Viktor Greyson, as in, Blake Greyson’s father?” I asked, pretending to be distracted by the small glass candle holder in the middle of the table.
“Yes, did you meet him at school today? Do you know him, Gwenn?”
“Not really. I’ve only ever seen him a few times. He’s a bit of a mystery actually,” Gwenn ventured.
I watched Kate closely, but she immediately turned to reach for a glass. She turned back to us and smiled.
“I’ve known Viktor for years. Blake has been gone for a while. I only ever met him once with your mothe—” she broke off as I looked up at her.
“My mom? How is that possible?” I asked. Had I met Blake before? Had my mother really come back here with me?
“I meant to say his mom,” Kate explain
ed, getting up. “I met him years ago when he was just a little boy.”
“Do you know his sister Ravenna?” Gwenn asked, sitting forward a bit.
“I can’t remember,” she said, frowning. “I really do have to go now.” She forced a smile and ignored my question. “Why don’t you girls come and meet me at Eden for dinner at around seven? My treat?” Her voice was as high pitched as mine had been earlier.
“Sure,” Gwenn replied before I could decline. “We’d love to.” She beamed.
“Okay,” Kate said with a bit too much enthusiasm. “Bye.” She walked out of the kitchen.
“What was that all about?” I mouthed to Gwenn.
“You’re right, she is hiding something,” Gwenn said, her eyes wide, her excitement as thick as the dust in the passageway.
“Try to contain your glee.” I grinned and rolled my eyes.
“You know what this means, don’t you?” She leaned toward me now as we heard Kate’s car start.
“We can break into the room without interruption,” I replied, feeling my stomach clench and my own excitement course through my veins.
“Wait till we hear the sound of the gate, and then we’ll go,” Gwenn said, now leaning back in her chair as we sat in silence.
“There it is,” I whispered. “Let’s go.”
Getting through the first door was easier this time; we knew the drill. My heart hammered against my chest as we reached the next door on the right.
“Okay, we just need to pull the bolts out of the hinges. It should be easy enough,” I said, examining the crude old workmanship of the door.
“I’m surprised medieval people even bothered with locks if you could break in this easily,” Gwenn muttered as I pulled on the door.
Turns out it’s not that easy.
“It’s stuck.”
“It’s old,” Gwenn replied. “I’m going to find some oil in the kitchen. Wait here,” she said as she walked back down the passageway.
As soon as Gwenn stepped out of the passageway, I realized that I really didn’t want to be in there alone. I looked at the paintings leaning on the wall in front of me and was about to follow Gwenn out when I noticed a flash of white hair in one of the paintings hiding behind another. I inhaled sharply. Was it Astara? I walked up to the painting that concealed the blond hair and shifted it to the side.
“I’m back, and I found some sunflower oil, not as healthy as olive, but I’m sure the door will be just fine,” Gwenn said, maneuvering back into the passageway.
“Evelyn?”
“It’s her,” I replied, unable to tear my eyes away from her. “Astara, 1548.”
“This is the woman from your dreams?”
“Yeah, this is exactly her,” I mouthed. I wasn’t going crazy, but how was I dreaming about a woman that had been dead for five centuries?
Gwenn took a deep, steadying breath. “At least we know you’re not imagining things,” she said, reflecting my thoughts.
“Yeah, but what does it mean? At least me being crazy was a reasonable and almost logical explanation. I don’t understand how this is happening?”
“Maybe this place is haunted?” she muttered. “As ridiculous as it is, if you’re dreaming about this Astara lady and seeing her hovering in front of this passage, something is definitely going on. Sweet lord, please do not let her body be decaying behind the door we’re about to open.” She closed her eyes and pinched the bridge of her nose.
“There’s only one way to find out,” I said, nodding. “We have to get into that room.”
It took us half a bottle of sunflower oil and ten minutes to unbolt the door.
“We may have to change before dinner,” Gwenn said, looking down at her light-blue jeans that were now completely stained with oil.
“I’ve got a few dresses upstairs,” I mumbled as we pulled open the side of the door.
“Good thing you’re so skinny,” Gwenn remarked as I began squeezing through the gap we had created. My back scraped the cold stone wall, and I exhaled to make myself even smaller. As soon as I burst into the room, my eyes darted around.
“What do you see?” Gwenn asked as she began squeezing through the gap.
“I think we’ve just broken into someone’s bedroom, or their prison cell,” I whispered, looking around the gray stone room, illuminated by one small window surrounded by bronze prison bars.
“Ugh,” Gwenn moaned as she collapsed into the room. “I need to stop eating pudding cups.” She gasped as she stood back up. “Holy crap.” Her eyes darted around the room.
“I think they had a woman imprisoned in here,” I said, walking forward a bit.
“And not in a nice way,” Gwenn added, walking up to the single rotting wooden bed with a thin straw mattress and a dusty gray blanket that looked at least three hundred years old. The only other furniture in the room was a small wooden desk and chair. A hairbrush, a small mirror, a silver hair clip, and a small book lay on the table.
“Purgatorio—Dante Alighieri,” Gwenn read the golden letters on the blue leather book.
“What?” I gaped.
“Dante’s Inferno,” Gwenn shrugged.
It’s a coincidence Evelyn, what else would it be? My own copy of Dante’s Inferno was on my nightstand.
“Is there anything in the drawer?” I asked as she pulled it open.
“An old piece of paper,” she said, pulling it out. “I can’t read it.” She passed it to me.
“Sunt, venient ad te,” I whispered. “They’re coming for you.”
“Who the hell was trapped in here?” Gwenn whispered, looking around the bare room again.
“Astara maybe?” I said, darting my eyes around, trying to find another clue.
Gwenn looked down at her watch. “We had better go. It’s already six-thirty. Kate will be in Eden in half an hour, and we still have to change.”
“We’ll come back and look at the rest of the rooms tomorrow,” I said.
She started squeezing herself through the door. “Let’s hope I’ve lost three pounds by then,” she gasped as she made it through to the passage. “Come on, give me your hand.” She held the door ajar from the other side.
I took her hand and started squeezing myself between the cold stone and the wooden door. Just as I managed to get my head and the right side of my body through the gap to come face-to-face with Gwenn, I felt an icy-cold hand grab my left hand and pull. My head jerked and slammed against the heavy wooden door.
“Evelyn!” Gwenn cried as she pulled on my right hand. “What the hell are you doing?”
“It’s not me! It’s not me!”
The hand was digging its nails into my wrists now, scratching me and trying to pull me back into the room.
“Gwenn, something is trying to pull me back in,” I cried.
She immediately grabbed my arm by the elbow and pulled. My back scraped against the wall so hard that I felt the marks where my skin came off burn, but Gwenn won the tug of war. The hand let go, and I catapulted toward Gwenn as the door slammed shut.
“Oh my God Evelyn.”
We both looked down at my arm. Fingernails had torn into my hand, but as I turned my arm over the words HELP ME were etched into the soft skin of my arm.
Chapter Eleven
“There definitely wasn’t anyone in that room, we would have seen it,” Gwenn repeated for the tenth time as we made our way to Eden in her Mini Cooper.
“We would have seen them.” I nodded, the same answer I had given her the other nine times. Gwenn’s constant protests against the logic of the situation had interrupted my every thought. I hadn’t thought of Blake for at least three hours. I hadn’t thought of my family for the past three hours—the guilt of that washed over me. How could you forget them?
“Can we maybe not go back in there tomorrow?” Gwenn asked, breaking m
y thoughts.
Gwenn and I had run up to my room without locking the door and shut ourselves in. We changed into clean dresses and bolted out of the house as quickly as we could, not even glancing at the curtain.
“We never have to go in there again,” I replied.
Well, you don’t. I’m going back in tomorrow.
I had to know what was in there, and a few scratches were not going to stop me. I had thrown on a pink cashmere cardigan to cover the scratches, which had stopped bleeding by the time we reached the bedroom.
“I don’t even know how you can sleep there after today,” Gwenn said as she drove into what appeared to be the town center. It was a circular piazza with small shops and one restaurant, Eden, surrounding a beautiful fountain that had a statue of an angel holding a sword in the center.
“That is a massive angel,” I said as we drove past the fifteen-foot statue.
“Do you think Astara died in that room?” Gwenn asked, ignoring my sightseeing.
“No, I don’t. If my dreams are anything to go by, she was killed in a meadow somewhere in a forest near here,” I replied, thinking back to the first dream I had had of her.
“How did they do it?”
“A man ripped her heart from her chest with his hand.”
“Is that even possible?”
“I think we can both safely assume that anything is possible,” I replied and lifted my arm to indicate the scratch marks.
Gwenn glanced at me and then shook her head as she looked back to the road.
“I just don’t even know how to start trying to find a reason for any of this.”
She parked the car in front of Eden between a Lamborghini and a Rolls Royce. Everyone in this town really was rich.
I stepped out of her car and looked at the row of expensive cars and felt my brow lift. How did people in this small village make enough money to afford all of these things?
“Come on, we’re late,” Gwenn said, slamming her door shut.
I followed her to the restaurant, deep in thought about Astara and how everything here was so strange, and pretty much crashed into someone wearing a black coat.
The Eternal Page 9
