Chapter 36
This can’t be real.
Pacing back and forth behind the couch, I chew on my thumbnail as my mind whirls. Too many questions bombard me at once, but I can’t grab hold of a single one. Because I’m stuck on a panicked auto-repeat.
This is crazy. This is crazy. This is crazy.
I try to convince myself that GraveDanger is wrong, that he’s misinformed or a sensationalist. He’s a dark-tourism junkie I met online. I don’t know him. Why would I trust anything he says? Much less the wild claim made in his last message?
I stop and stare at the rain-lashed window, streams of water distorting my view of the park.
Because despite the absurdity of what he wrote, it fits the pattern of Maison Marteau. Just one more dark puzzle piece sliding perfectly into place.
But what was done to her body
Because her body was drained of blood.
Two similar stories from two different sources.
“But they’re dark tourists,” I say to myself, walking toward the desk before pivoting to walk back, Clairee’s golden eyes tracking my every step.
The rational, left-lobe part of my brain argues against acceptance. Because it’s crazy.
It’s crazy. It’s crazy. It’s crazy.
But the other side, the one governed by instinct and intuition, the one prickling hairs on my neck and stabbing pins in my heart . . .
That side is horrified.
That side has no doubt at all.
“Okay, let’s think this through.” I glance at Clairee, my feline sounding board. “Let’s look at all the events individually.” I nod to myself, eager to examine the data and dispel the panic.
The first thing I consider is the murder-suicide. Something more common than most of us would like to admit, and certainly no reason to be afraid of the mansion.
Then there’s the girl found in the catacombs. A tragedy for sure, a horrific accident. But in all probability, that’s all it was. A terrible accident.
Hands on my hips, I stare into space, still pacing but with less agitation.
Thinking rationally is helping. It’s calming me down. Instead of the tourist with the skull T-shirt, I think of his girlfriend and what she said. That a house as old as Maison Marteau is going to have history. And it’s going to have seen some death.
“So, what’s bothering me the most?” I look to Clairee, but she’s closed her eyes.
“I guess that’s your advice,” I say, leaning over the sofa to rub her back, her silky hair a balm to my nerves. “Don’t worry and just go to sleep.”
But it’s the middle of the day, and I can’t stop worrying. Not with blood humming through my veins and in my ears.
Blood.
Bloodlines.
Missing women.
Dead women.
Why did GraveDanger’s message unsettle me? Because it’s another claim that bad things have happened here.
But more concerning, they’ve happened in recent years.
I need to talk to someone else. Someone who has questions like I do, who doesn’t trust the Marteau family, and won’t tell me I’ve come unhinged.
The only person who checks all those boxes is Alice.
My phone lies atop the desk, so I snatch it from the wood surface and open the photo-sharing app. I haven’t heard from her in two days. Not since she screamed at the manservant and the mansion in general.
I keep the message short and simple, telling her we need to talk. As soon as I hit send, I’m back to pacing. This time, I keep hold of my phone, fully expecting an instant reply.
But the more minutes pass, the more my frustration grows.
I consider trying to leave again, just packing up and putting this place in my past. But the strikes are still in effect. I won’t be able to get a cab or check into a hotel. That paints an ugly but realistic picture—me out in the rain, struggling with two pieces of luggage and one small cat.
I don’t even have a pet carrier. Leaving is impossible.
Nibbling my thumbnail, I jitter my leg. I need to stay where I am.
I might be on edge, jumping at every sound, but I’ll do what I did the last time I got scared.
The night I read Carmilla and felt like I was being watched.
I’ll bar the doors and check the windows, then lock myself into the bedroom to sleep.
Maybe I’m overreacting. Maybe I’m paranoid. Maybe my distress over Mackenzie has messed with my head.
But I’ve learned too much to take any chances.
Lunging for my laptop, I check to see if GraveDanger is still online. When I see the little green light beside his name, I shoot off one more question.
Do you know the name of the girl from the party?
I don’t have to wait long.
Lina Ivarrson
Ivarrson. Sounds Nordic. Maybe Swedish?
As in a tourist who might have been in Paris alone. With no one to miss her.
Like Rose.
Thanks for your help.
I quickly send the message to GraveDanger before jumping over to a search engine. I type the name Lina Ivarrson and Bois De Boulogne, the park where she was found. Then I add Paris for good measure.
There aren’t many links to online publications, because the murder occurred before the invention of the internet, but I do find a true-crime blog.
Clicking on the link, I pull up the post and copy the text. Then I paste the words into a translation site. The English makes it easier to skim the paragraphs, and I don’t need to read far before the words I’m looking for leap from the screen.
The victim was identified as Swedish tourist Lina Ivarrson, a source close to the case revealed.
A sensation of crawling skitters down my back.
I was right. A tourist.
I read on, paying closer attention and looking for any specifics that might corroborate GraveDanger’s information.
Why was the body exsanguinated before being abandoned in one of Paris’s busiest parks?
“Holy shit.” I slap a hand to my mouth, still scanning the text. The blogger writes that Lina Ivarrson was last seen on the bridge, that the witness’s name is undisclosed, and the case was never solved.
But then that’s all. The post ends on a cliffhanger. No mention of suspects, or a party, or Maison Marteau.
Is this evidence of corrupt law enforcement being bought off by the Marteaus?
Or is it nothing more than an online conspiracy theory?
Rubbing my forehead, I drop the laptop on the couch cushions and pick up my phone. Still no word from Alice.
I’m too disturbed to sit still, my body and brain both buzzing with alarm. Trying to figure out my next move, I cross my arms and stare at the fireplace. The hearth is an empty hull, blackened and coated with soot.
Then my eyes travel to a small round table, the Carmilla book resting on the shiny wood. The book I found on the red chair downstairs. The one I convinced myself had been there all along.
But it hadn’t.
Someone came into the apartment and left it for me to find.
But why?
I’ve known something was off about this mansion for a while, but I didn’t want to believe it. Now all the stories and hearsay are coming together, like photos and strings on a murder board.
But the center is missing an essential piece.
As I stare at the book and its worn and yellowed pages, the answer clicks in my head like the strike of a match. There’s still one place left I might find some answers.
I lift my gaze to the ceiling.
And I know what I have to do.