“About how you murdered three people.”
Chapter 24
“That’s crazy. That’s freakin crazy. What the hell are you saying?” Carlotta bared her teeth, face going red with emotion.
Grace felt the weight of the hammer. It was a clumsy weapon, a stupid one, but if Carlotta turned out to be like her mother, a weapon would be a good thing to have. “There isn’t another solution. I know a lot about your family, your financial situation.”
“What financial situation?” Carlotta demanded.
“Your family is hemorrhaging money. For years, your grandmother has been selling off the family assets in order to maintain this house, to pay the property taxes. Given her hermit ways, it makes sense that she would eliminate all your income properties. I mean, at least to her. Financially, it makes no sense at all. In fact, this house is probably the last of your assets. It’s worth more demolished and redeveloped than it is standing. You could do that now. You’re in charge. You made yourself in charge, the last remaining rational person in this house.”
“That’s bullshit!” Carlotta erupted. “We are rich, and I have a trust fund that I monitor regularly, and it’s fine. The house is fine. The property is worth a ton. Staff gets paid, Lavinia and I get a regular allowance. We own a freakin Rolls—did you not see it in the driveway?”
Grace nearly believed her protest. Still, she went on. “The only thing I don’t know is how you did it. I get it that you didn’t use any ordinary means.” She nodded at the mirror behind Carlotta.
“You are absolutely right.” Carlotta’s voice shook with rage. She spoke through her teeth. “I came in here with a candle and looked in the mirror. Five times, I chanted, ‘Blood-y Mar-y, Blood-y Mar-y. And then, I said, ‘oops, not me—it was Gramma.’ What the hell are you talking about?”
Her voice had reached a scream by the end.
Grace waited for her to run out of breath. “However you did it, you first murdered your grandmother. This was her house, her money. But she squandered it, sold properties in a panic, because the only thing she wanted in life was to live it out here on the third floor. Her insurance policy would pay you, Lavinia and your mother over three million dollars. That was a good start to rebuild the family fortune.”
“But in order for the triple indemnity to come into play, you had to prove that her death wasn’t by natural causes. For some reason, you hired me. Someone who proves, not disproves, insurance fraud. I’m guessing it was to buy time. But when Bentley Marlborough asked me to back off the case, you had to take him out, too.”
“But it wasn’t good enough. Because now your insane mother was the inheritor. Prudence might have been eccentric, but Tibby was stark raving mad. Who knows what she might have done with the money? Things might get so bad that you ended up broke. What would happen to you, then? What would happen to Lavinia?”
“This is such utter crap!” Carlotta pointed at her with a shaking finger. “You have no idea what you’re talking about. You’re as crazy as my family, you know that? No wonder Gramma thought the Longstreets were so awesome. You’re just as loony as she was!”
Grace wasn’t sure whether to take offense at that, to admire Carlotta’s acting, or believe her.
“And how can you kill someone with a mirror?” Carlotta ranted on. “Not even the Evil Queen could kill Snow White with the magic mirror. She had to hire out a huntsman, and then do the job herself. I don’t even know where this second one came from. But it’s just a piece of black glass in a gold frame!”
Carlotta gave the mirror a shove. She looked as shocked as Grace felt when the wall rotated. With a scream, Carlotta was swept into the dark. Grace stood staring at a blank wall. It was just like in a movie, a secret passage to the Batcave, or the library in Young Frankenstein. Stupidly, she studied the floor, but saw no signs that the wall had turned.
“Carlotta!” She stood at the mirror, gazing into the black glass. Behind her, she could see her reflection in the original mirror. And on and on. Infinite regression. Apparently, Carlotta didn’t know about this moving wall, either. “Can you hear me? Are you hurt?”
In the movies, there was always some kind of secret switch. But Grace found that a half-decent shove made the wall turn. Though the wall probably weighed a ton, the perfect balance of the mechanism made the action effortless.
Of course there was a secret room in the mansion. The place was no doubt full of secret caches, passages, hidden spaces. Smugglers built the place after all. And, apparently, had constructed this secret space a long time ago. No light switch graced the wall, so she used the flashlight app on her phone.
This part of the house hadn’t received the housekeepers’ attention. Dust lay in a heavy patina on the floor. Grace saw her own tracks. She saw only a few paces of Carlotta’s slippered feet. Then, a swooping disturbance, as if a thirty foot broom had swept just one corner.
Being on the top story, she felt heat prickling her skin. Overhead were bare roof planks. That smell of hot wood, just short of smoke and fire, lingered. “Carlotta?” Her voice echoed.
A few paces in, she saw a stairway. Dust covered the treads. Mostly. That curving swoop led through the grime, a slithering, winding trail leading up those steps. She saw no sign of Carlotta’s footprints—just this ghastly trail.
What did it mean?
There was only one way to find out. Reluctantly, she followed the snaky signs up. The stairs were more like a ship’s ladder, steep with steps barely more than rungs. They led to a trap door. Grace saw it was unlocked. Did Carlotta go out on the roof? Did the thing that made the curving path follow her? Carry her?
Grace pushed the door open, seeing a crack of pre-dawn sky. And something lurking much closer. Eyes turned her way. They were unblinking. Pupils were slits.
She dropped the door, nearly falling down the stairs. Her heart raced, her skin covered with clammy sweat. Grace fell under a mental attack, a spell of fear.
Four stories down. Steep, steep cliffs.
That alien voice returned to her head; images not her own thoughts. Nausea churned. Grace imagined falling from the widow’s walk, past the three stories of the Myerscough house. And still plummeting, down, down toward wave-swept rocks a hundred feet below.
Four ssstoriesss down. Sssteep, ssssteep cliffsssss.
Grace lost her balance and felt herself in free fall.
Chapter 25
The suddenness with which she hit the floor jarred her mind from the crushing fear. Yes, she had fallen off the steep stairs. But it was only about five feet to the ground. She had easily survived. Grace wasn’t even hurt. The awful thoughts vanished. Grace pondered the reason. Maybe whatever spelled her could only keep up that kind of intensity for a brief time. If so, she had to move before it rested, or recharged, or whatever it did.
A moment later, she pulled herself out onto the roof. Glancing around, she saw nothing but the dim view. The widow’s walk spanned the four chimneys of the house. Grace had heard that widow’s walks were built to fight chimney fires back in the day. Wrought iron fencing stood on the edge toward the ocean. Morning sun was still submerged in the east.
Grace felt a calm, in the air and in her mind. The raging terror evaporated like dew at first light. Still air held a damp chill and the scent of brine. She took a deep breath. As long as she didn’t stray too close to the edge of the roof, she’d be okay.
Carefully avoiding looking down, she scanned the roof for signs of Carlotta, or whatever might have taken her. Though weathered, planks of the widow’s walk felt solid enough. The only other thing up here was the quarter-attic. Grace didn’t know what else to call it. It wasn’t domed like a cupola, or flat roofed like an Italianate belvedere. It was obviously constructed for a view of the sea.
There was no other place to search. Grace followed a railed walkway. When a slight breeze wafted, an outer door of the attic drifted open. She paused. Did someone want her to go into the odd structure? Grace hefted the hammer and moved on.
; Inside, a telescope dominated the eastern window. It was nearly dripping with verdigris. The patina made it look as if it were recovered from a shipwreck. Central, a low map table squatted. Grace could imagine a long ago Captain Myerscough plotting a new expedition, inspired by this room. Or, perhaps on the lookout for British ships who might report his unscheduled anchoring at Cove Park.
There were drawers in the map table. She pulled one open, squinting. Grace thought it was empty, but a shadow had fallen. But why a shadow? The sun was about to rise.
When she looked east, she saw the lower half of the window covered in black. That shouldn’t be. There weren’t panes in the frames, no shutters on—what the what? The window to the north suddenly went black on the bottom as well. Grace stepped in a circle, seeing each window suddenly darkened. In her mind, she saw a giant paint roller steadily painting over the glass. In a moment, the east window went completely dark, the others blacking out in turn.
Grace fumbled for her phone, for the flashlight app. When she turned it on, she expected to see something black, but instead saw something ivory colored. Stepping closer to a window, the covering proved somewhat glossy. When she was close enough to touch, she saw regular banding. Not stripes, exactly, but a texture of horizontal shapes.
Then the latch on the door snapped hard. Wood creaked, and then groaned. In front of her eyes, the bizarre window covering moved. First the lower section. Then the upper section. As they shifted, splintering cracks ensued. The entire structure shifted.
Grace realized the situation. The windows were not covered. They were wrapped. The quarter attic was wrapped in the coils of an enormous snake. The bright, banded material was the scales of the underbelly. The coils moved, slightly out of sync. Studs and rafters moaned. Grace’s ears popped.
The snake was crushing the entire attic.
Panic jerked her into motion. Stairs led here, she’d seem them on the third floor. But where the hell were they? She cast around with the light, seeing no exit. Splinters rained down, and dust. Above her head, white wood exploded from dark as a rafter gave way. She ducked away from the debris.
Ssstay ssstill.
Invading thoughts this time stilled her fear, lulled her into inaction. Grace mused that this was the way a supernatural snake hypnotized its prey. Not with the fearsome glare of unblinking eyes, but with slithering thoughts that constricted her consciousness. Like any other prey, Grace hadn’t realized she was in the grip of Manasa until it was too late. Until now.
Ssstay ssstill.
Grace took a seat on the floor. The snake’s method of attack fascinated her. The south wall buckled as she considered what a perfect predator this mother of snakes was. For a week, it had undermined Grace’s self-confidence, worming its way deeper. Snaking its way deeper? She chuckled. Now that She had mental control, the physical attack began. Inescapable, Grace thought. How had she ever hoped to fight against Her?
Hell, if she’d known what she was up against, she probably would have thrown herself into the snake’s coils days ago. Euphoria filled her mind, dream-like, pleasant. This wasn’t going to hurt a bit. In fact, Grace might even enjoy it.
Under the pressure of constricting coils, the south wall caved in completely. Lathe and plaster, rough cut two-by-fours crashed into the room. Grace didn’t even flinch. She coughed out a little plaster dust.
Impact of the wall landing on the map table moved it a few inches. What was that beneath? Grace had to wave away dust before her eyes to get a good look.
All at once, the terror flooded back.
Chapter 26
Against her neck, the cameo flashed with intense heat, as if trying to wake her up. Grace didn’t need it. Beneath the map table, the stairway was revealed. With escape at hand, her mind once again threw off the coils of the monster predator.
Ssstay ssstill.
“Screw you!”
But with the wall collapsed on top of the table, how was she going to move it? Certainly, it had some sort of balanced swivel and mechanism like the rotating mirror wall had. Of course, it might not be working so well, with a few hundred pounds of demolition on top of it.
Grace gripped the top edge, bent her knees, and hauled. The table moved not an inch. Crap! Plaster cracked as if it had been shot from outside. Wood squealed its structural failure. Now the east wall was giving way. In no time, the attic would be crushed, and Grace along with it.
Skin beneath her cameo stung as if sun burned. Grace grabbed it, feeling the heat. “Stop it! You’re not helping at all.”
The sensation of pain faded. Grace could think. What she needed to do was act. There seemed only one thing to do. She snuggled down into the debris, sitting down, her back against fallen boards. Her feet went up against the table. Placing her hands flat on the floor, she shoved. Her teeth were bared over a grunt of effort. A scraping sound; the smallest jerk of motion; she watched the detritus laden table move.
An inch.
Dammit!
Ssstay ssstill.
“Shut. Up!”
She relaxed her legs, panting. Grace wasn’t strong enough to move the table. Picking up the hammer, she wondered if she could rip the piece of furniture apart enough to get past it. Given the fact that this square room had become a triangle in about thirty seconds, she didn’t think she’d have time.
Another rafter snapped. Grace shielded herself from the falling board. The other half swung down, half-hinged to the opposite wall. It hit the table. The table moved. She saw the gap beneath close.
What the hell was she going to do now?
But then she saw it. On the opposite side of the table, another gap opened beneath. She dragged herself out of the rubble pile. The weight of the collapsed wall had moved the map table. Moved it with a lot of force. Moved that secret door in the wrong direction.
With a quick shove, Grace opened the door, the furniture swiveling, hinged on one leg. She had been pushing against the hinge. All around her, the walls closed, juddering and lurching tight. Without time to look for stairs or a railing, Grace jumped into the hole beneath the table.
Immediately, she was knocked sideways. Her foot had caught on something. She dropped the hammer and her phone. Grace fell. She felt her arm and hip bump down a bunch of stairs. Her head hit something hard.
Dazed, she felt another hail of debris. Wiping dirt and dust off her face, she rolled onto her side. Nothing broken. Probably. Given how dark it was, her phone was probably destroyed. She knew where the hammer was. She had fallen on it. Pulling it from beneath her butt, she rolled to her feet with a groan.
Light filtered down from above. And then a shadow revealed itself, writhing down toward her. Grace ran for it.
She’d been here before, with Paisley. How the hell had they gotten out? A weird dragging sound echoed behind her, keeping her moving through the dark third floor. As she passed half-familiar rooms, she suddenly remembered. They had gotten to the stair landing through a bedroom. The bedroom was off the hall of mirrors.
Crap on a cracker!
Putting on speed, she slammed a few doors open, hoping she could outrun the horror behind her. When she reached the hall with the twin Mirrors of Manasa, she forced herself not to hesitate. Something else did.
“Grace! Help me! Grace!”
She skidded to a stop. The voice sounded like it came from a distance, or was muted by thick—
Glass.
In the black mirror, she saw Carlotta screaming. Despite a glimpse of pounding fists, her mouth open enough to see her fillings, Grace could barely hear the screams of utter horror.
Grace put her hand on the glossy black stone. She felt nothing but cool. Carlotta’s eyes went wide, looking past Grace’s shoulder. Grace caught the reflection. She whirled around.
“Lavinia?”
The giantess stood, eyes wandering aimlessly, arms behind her as she swayed from side to side.
“I’ve gotta get you out of here, okay? There’s something in the house. Come on.”
An innocent, almost idiotic, smile spread across the woman’s face. “I know, silly.”
“You know?”
Lavinia nodded emphatically. “Uh-huh. It’s been here for a long time. It talks to me.”
“It—it what?”
Chapter 27
“People think I don’t know things. But I know. I know Gramma was too afraid to look after us. And Mommy was too sick.” The childlike face became downcast. “My friend said that me and Carlotta would end up like the shopping cart lady at the market. Or the stinky man who goes through the garbage cans. Because Gramma was too scared to leave her room and Mommy was too sick to think about us. We had to take care of ourselves. But my friend said she could help.”
Grace took a step back, felt the wall press her back. “What else did she say?”
“That Mr. Mar-bro could help us, and you could, too. But we couldn’t let you tell anybody. People are mean. They don’t understand. Sometimes, they make me so mad!”
“Oh, well, I wouldn’t tell anybody. Part of my job is keeping secrets. And I’m working for you.”
“So was Mr. Mar-bro. But he told you not to help. I had to give him a hug.”
Thoughts raced through Grace’s head so fast they were a blur. “A hug?”
Again with the emphatic nod. “Uh-huh. It doesn’t hurt. It just makes you go to sleep. Gramma didn’t want to hug at first. She wanted to jump out the window. But that would have hurt! I didn’t want Gramma to hurt.”
“No, of course not. You love your Gramma.”
“And Mommy, too.”
“Right. Mommy, too,” Grace echoed inanely, trying to sort out the impossible thoughts making an undeniable but ghastly conclusion.
“Now I’m gonna hug you.”
There was nowhere for Grace to go. Her back was to the wall. Lavinia stood between her and the doors. “You know, I’m really not the touchy-feely type, Lavinia.”
The Sinister Secrets of the Snake Mirror Page 9
