Chapter 23
She swept into the room in her long gown, feet bare against the smooth floor. It was her personal indulgence—going barefoot. A secret little scandal that only she knew about.
Hemsy always got annoyed at her when he found out she wasn’t wearing shoes to the formal parties they hosted, but she felt more grounded, more in control when her feet were touching wood or stone or—preferably—earth.
He scoffed at that, too.
Called her a foolish, silly thing. Told her that their children had better not inherit her dirty magic.
She wondered if she would ever get up the courage to kill him while he slept.
She’d lost count of the number of times she’d considered it, watching him breathe, raspingly loudly, through his open mouth in the hours after he’d asserted his marital rights.
She didn’t really mind most of the time.
She didn’t enjoy it, either, but she knew enough about the world to know that he was her only chance at children, so she put up with the rutting and the grunting, and then, in the darkness, would contemplate smothering him with a pillow or slowly poisoning him or slitting his throat.
She wasn’t sure she’d ever actually do it, but the fantasies were nice.
I supposed I ought to be grateful that I wasn’t dead. At least not yet, although the aching cold in my bones was severe enough that I wasn’t sure how much longer I wouldn’t be.
I wondered who the woman had been, the one who had gone barefoot to her dinner parties. And what relation she bore to Garraway, if this was actually his house. The sense I got from the thoughts were that they were very old—so probably a grandmother or great-grandmother, or maybe great-aunt.
I wondered if he knew he was descended from a witch. What he thought about it, if he did.
I got the sense from his arrogance that he probably didn’t know—and he wouldn’t be happy about it.
I was tempted to tell him, just to make him have to suffer what he thought of as the indignity.
But in order to do that I would have to have the strength to speak, and I didn’t.
I also wasn’t sure I wanted him to know I was a psychic.
Or that I was awake.
“You have to get rid of him,” a new man’s voice snapped.
About me, presumably.
“He’s much stronger than we thought.” This was Garraway, excited. “I could get a lot of power from him.”
“Not worth it,” said the new voice.
“But Philip,” Garraway almost wheedled. “He’s so strong.”
“And in order for you to take what you want, you’d have to keep him. Feed him. Nurse him back to health.” A pause. “During which time he could escape, or someone could find out about him, either by stumbling through these pathetic remains of an estate or because one of your hired thugs talks.”
“My men are loyal.”
“Your men,” the man named Philip retorted, his voice dripping with disdain, “are drooling excuses for humanity. The one is just as likely to brag to his little buddies as he is to keep his shovel-like trap shut, and the other one looks as though he might be thinking about developing a conscience.” Another pause.
“You’ll need to do something about that, too. ”
“My men are mine, Philip.” Garraway sounded like he was getting angry, now.
“And if either one of them starts talking, they’re going to be your problem to deal with and your mess to clean up,” came the response. “Just like this piece of shit.”
Presumably, I was the piece of shit in question.
“Let me hold on to him for a week or two,” Garraway said, his voice pleading. “I could gain so much from him.”
“It’s a bad idea, Martin,” came the sharp response. “He’s going to be a problem, one way or another. And we can’t afford that kind of a problem, not with the FBI sticking their noses into everyone’s business.”
“They don’t know who we are,” Garraway insisted. “They can’t possibly.”
“They knew enough to search Tranquil Brook,” the man called Philip insisted.
“And that’s a good deal closer than I’d like, by a long shot.
” Another pause, and when he spoke again, his voice was low and tight, angry.
Threatening. “I didn’t pay good money for you to play with your food, Martin.
Take whatever’s left right now, and throw him in the damn well. ”
“Just a few days, Philip. There’s not enough—”
“Now, or never.”
I didn’t know much about wells, but I knew enough to know that me being thrown down one would be very, very bad.
A hand closed on my upper arm, and I lashed out.
“Fug!”
I got a glimpse of Gennaro staggering away, blood pouring from his nose as though I’d hit him with a fist or foot instead of magic.
And then my head rocked to the side, pain blooming across my face.
“Little shit,” snapped the man called Philip, looking disdainfully down at the blood and saliva on his shoe left when he’d split open my lip with his kick. “Get back over here and throw him down the damn well, you coward.”
Gennaro, still bleeding profusely and grumbling, staggered back over, smearing blood across his face with the back of one hand. He was looking at me warily, as though I might do whatever I’d done to him again.
He wasn’t wrong. If I could have, I absolutely would have—or worse.
But I couldn’t, although I tried. Desperately.
He threw me roughly over his shoulder, and I barely had the strength to flutter my eyes open a few times on the way out to the yard, through what must once have been a garden, if I was judging correctly from the overgrown and uneven brick path moving beneath Gennaro’s feet, and into the shade.
I felt rough brick—or stone or cement, I wasn’t sure—scrape against my calves and shoulder, my head striking it hard enough to bring stars into the darkness behind my lids.
And then the sickening feeling of falling.
And the crunch of impact—the sound, then the pain, and then nothing.
Yet again, I was surprised that I wasn’t yet dead.
This time, I spared a moment to wish that the fall had actually killed me, because the prospect of lying here in complete darkness, thick, cold mud oozing around my aching body, my head throbbing and ears ringing with a pulse keeping time with my heart until I did finally die in a few hours or—God forbid—days was far more horrifying than just being dead.
It took a moment—seconds, probably—for me to notice that my whole arm felt like it was on fire, cold, and being torn to shreds, and I gasped at the pain.
That couldn’t possibly be good.
I tried to move it.
And passed out again.
When I slithered back into consciousness once more, I did my very best to not even think about moving my arm.
I reached out with the other, finding the curving arc of the wall not far behind me. Feeling the rounded-rectangular shape of bricks and mortar.
And then I reached too far, and pain washed over me as my other arm shifted.
Panting, I lay still, knowing that this was where and how I was going to die.
I tried to find enough strength to call for Sylvia. Or Archie. Or anyone dead who might be even remotely near by.
While there was a faint tickle of magic in my gut, I didn’t have enough to summon even the ghost of a bug who had died in the mud of the well. Not that that was actually possible.
I could feel the warmth of tears tracking their way out of my eyes.
I didn’t want to die.
Especially not like this, and not here.
I didn’t want to just disappear, no one knowing where I was or the fact that I’d been murdered, much less by whom.
And then I realized how foolish a thought that was. I might not have enough power left to summon a ghost for help, but when I did die, I could absolutely find Ward and tell him what had happened.
That was a small comfort, at least.
A very small comfort.
I was absolutely going to haunt Garraway. And the man he’d called Philip. And probably also Gennaro.
I’d give them nightmares—
Nightmares.
I tried Ward first.
Then Mason.
Then Hart.
Beck.
Violette.
None of them were asleep.
I’d promised… but…
I just had to hope he’d forgive me.
He was already looking around, his movements urgent and agitated, by the time I pushed through the heavy limbs of the willow.
“I’m sorry,” I gushed out. “I know I promised but—”
“Rayn!” He ran up to me, his hands grabbing my arms hard—fingers biting into my biceps.
I winced in spite of myself, even though my dream arm wasn’t as mangled as my real arm must have been. I wasn’t actually asleep or unconscious—yet—and I could still feel the sharp-throbbing-nauseating pain.
“I’m sorry.” He let go of me.
“It’s okay,” I said. “I—”
“Can you tell me where you are?” he asked, interrupting me.
“No—not exactly.”
“Can you describe it?”
“I’m in a well,” I said, hearing my voice crack. “It’s dark. Wet.”
“Brick or stone?” he asked.
“What?”
“The walls of the well. Brick or stone?”
“Brick, I think.”
“Did you wake up there?”
“N-no.” I described the room I’d awakened in, the rough journey through the abandoned room, out through the garden. The empty feeling of the house itself. “They said it was Garraway’s house,” I told him, hoping that might help.
“Did they knock you out when they took you?”
“Y-yes,” I told him, my head swimming. “Ra-Raj?”
“We’re going to find you,” he promised, his voice almost harsh in its intensity.
“I think I’m—I’m going to pass out,” I stammered. “I can’t—”