Chapter 3 #2
Mr. Grossman made the pretense of stuffing the papers into his satchel as though to imply the conversation was all but over. “They will be managed by my firm.”
“Your firm?” Waverly digested that information. “On behalf of . . . ?” She let her sentence hang.
Mr. Grossman paused and met her eyes. “On behalf of your uncle’s last will and testament, of course.”
It was an extremely unsatisfactory answer. Waverly pursed her lips, refusing to release Mr. Grossman’s gaze.
He coughed, visibly uncomfortable. “Each asset has its own set of instructions. It would take me hours to educate you, Miss Pembrooke, and it would all be for naught. None of it concerns you, nor is it allocated for your benefit.”
“For whose benefit then?” The pit in Waverly’s stomach grew larger with every sidestep and denial from Mr. Grossman.
“The village of Newton Creek will absorb the continued profits into the community. Mr. Traeger wished for the town to thrive in his absence. Now if you’ll excuse me—”
“Who will manage my uncle’s assets?” Waverly ignored the man’s attempt to shut down the conversation.
Mr. Grossman snapped the latch on his satchel and leveled a severe look on Waverly.
“Miss Pembrooke, to give you the briefest of explanations in a way that I pray you will understand, my firm will manage your uncle’s assets until the time of my own personal passing, at which point all assets will be sold and the profits dispersed into various outlets within Newton Creek.
In this way, Leopold Traeger will ensure that Newton Creek will have a promising future, just as he had envisioned it and spent his life bolstering its economy. ”
“But I will not,” Waverly shot back.
So her uncle had left his business assets to Mr. Grossman.
That was essentially the truth of what the lawyer was skirting.
The lawyer would profit. His firm would become the reigning authority over it all.
And to put the final nail in his legacy’s coffin, Uncle Leopold had made sure no one person would gain from his vast wealth and philanthropy.
He would make certain, even from the grave, that he was never forgotten and that Newton Creek’s very survival as a town rested on a dead man’s shoulders.
Mr. Grossman lifted his satchel and rounded the desk. He paused by her chair, looking down his nose at her and giving her an affected expression of pity. “You have several days yet. I’m sure you will figure something out.”
The door closed behind him as he left the room.
Waverly lifted her eyes to the painting and was reminded once more that Uncle Leopold had only ever cared for that which benefited him.
It was very apparent—not that she was surprised—that Waverly was worth less to him than a painting.
For the one above his desk would still be ensconced in Traeger Hall for at least a century, collecting dust like a miser hoarded his riches.
Even her reflection unnerved her. Waverly sat in her nightgown before the mirror on her dressing table, the orange glow from the fireplace behind her keeping the bedroom warm, causing shadows to distort her features.
It was beyond difficult to be at peace in a home where your relatives had been brutally stabbed to death.
Every creak, every moan of the house, every tree branch against a windowpane was the possible announcement that the killer had returned.
Waverly attempted to calm her spirit with prayer, for God had promised to watch over the sparrow, and wasn’t she more important than a bird?
Waverly stilled, her horsehair brush halfway down her lengthy corn silk tresses.
Deep shadows beneath her azure-colored eyes created hollows in her face, ghoulish shadows making her cheekbones razor-sharp and her skin colorless.
The fire flickered and snapped. The four-poster bed behind her boasted broad spindles and a thick mattress that should have been welcoming.
Waverly’s attention shifted to the bed, then to the dark corners where spirits could be hiding, waiting to haunt her when she retired for the night.
Traeger Hall was a crypt of silence.
The fire gave off a loud snap, and Waverly jumped, her brush tangling in her hair and pulling it.
She blinked rapidly to clear her vision and her mind from the unsettling imagination of someone who now shared a house with corpses.
The bodies of her aunt and uncle were posed in their death sleep in the front parlor, surrounded by fresh flowers with their heavily perfumed scent.
Waverly would have gagged had she not known that in another day or so, that perfume would be a saving grace to Traeger Hall.
She should be there right now, standing vigil over them in the event her aunt and uncle miraculously returned to life.
It was a superstition—a wake—but it held some merit.
In the event a person was not truly dead, they would prefer not to be buried alive.
Waverly had heard of one man who’d been buried only to awaken later, six feet underground, the weight of earth holding down the lid of his coffin.
His salvation was the string tied to his toe that traveled to the open air above him, which if pulled would ring a bell.
A bell.
Waverly stilled, her brush held against her chest, staring at the mirror, her reflection her only companion.
“Bells pronounce what is and what is to come, don’t they?” she asked herself. Her mind traveled to the bell tower Uncle Leopold had built.
“When someone comes with the intent to murder and take my life, ring the bell.”
She’d questioned her uncle’s paranoia. Her aunt had never addressed it. His reminder came almost daily. Waverly knew he’d reiterated it frequently in town among men of importance. Among the authorities who would send their policemen to the aid and service of Uncle Leopold.
“Who would even want to come to Uncle’s rescue?” Waverly resumed brushing her hair. “No one liked him. They merely needed him.”
And that was the wily wickedness of Uncle Leopold’s death.
His brutal slaying had been not only the affirmation of Uncle’s prophetic conviction that the bell would need to be rung one day to save his life but the revelation that even in his death, Uncle Leopold had arranged his assets in such a way that Newton Creek would still need him, would still be reminded of him every day.
“You were crafty, Uncle. Suspicious and crafty and in complete admiration of yourself.”
Waverly set the hairbrush on the dressing table.
No. She would not perch overnight by her aunt and uncle’s bodies.
She would not give Uncle Leopold the satisfaction of commanding her from the grave.
If she had a plan, if she had anywhere to go, Waverly would leave Traeger Hall tonight.
She wouldn’t stay here in this tomb of terrible memories, in this place of violence and death.
She would embrace the comfort of another human life and the warmth of a pleasurable host’s fireplace.
But no. Tonight she had nowhere to go. No one to turn to. The people of Newton Creek had associated Waverly with her uncle’s domineering authority. To them, Waverly was a Traeger—even though she wasn’t.
So tonight, she was alone.
Traeger Hall’s servants had retired to the servants’ quarters, a smaller, separate building on the property, because, in Uncle Leopold’s words, “Only idiots share habitats with people they cannot trust with their lives.” But as the chimes of the grandfather clock reverberated from the first floor through the cavernous rooms and hallways, Waverly would have gladly shared the empty manor with a complete stranger.
Well, unless that stranger was the unknown fiend who had broken into Traeger Hall and stabbed her aunt and uncle with the vehemence of someone who reveled in the sight of blood.
Perhaps a stranger wouldn’t be preferred right now, but Waverly would have been thankful to have even the stableboy sleeping outside her bedroom door.
It would mean there was someone living and breathing in Traeger Hall besides herself.
It would mean the moments she sensed someone breathing behind her and just out of sight could be accounted for.
But alone in Traeger Hall, Waverly had no one she could blame for the feeling that eyes moved to follow her as she shifted in her chair.
She had no one to blame for the sound of a door closing somewhere down the hallway.
She had no way to explain the garbled chime of the grandfather clock, halting at the chime of nine when it should have gone on to the stroke of midnight.
The echo of the aborted chime rang in the distance, causing Waverly to freeze.
Her eyes met her reflection, and she stared at her companion self.
The grandfather clock in the front hall had chimed relentlessly since the day Waverly had arrived at Traeger Hall.
“The only reason it would malfunction tonight was if someone—some hand—had stilled it mid-stroke.” Waverly’s whispering only unsettled her more. Her voice was hoarse, but it was also loud in the stillness.
The termination of the clock’s chimes had stopped time. Or at least that was the conclusion Waverly came to.
Her bare foot brushed against something soft but solid, and she startled, recoiling at what must certainly be her dead aunt’s roaming ghost. Instead, Waverly met the blue-eyed stare of the long-haired, orange-and-white cat that had come to rub against her leg.
“Foo!” She bent down and swept the feline into her arms, ignoring his muted meow of protest at being held like an infant. Waverly pressed her face into the cat’s silken fur belly, its fur tickling her nostrils.
The cat was real.
It was alive.
It was biting her!