Secrets At Crescent Point, page 22
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Siyah asked with a pained expression. The Black Adder lighting made the angles of his face harsh, tired. “I don’t understand.”
“I was ashamed,” I said quietly. “And when you refused to leave with me later that night, after the bonfire, we never spoke again.”
Siyah leaned back, his hand to his forehead, his face stricken. “Palmer told me the deputies found evidence that Amy was driving. Her father pled her down to a misdemeanor. I had…I had no idea.”
“I couldn’t stay on Noble,” I whispered. “Not after that. The path I’d taken that night, it scared me. I’d stolen from my father, lied, bribed…what would we have become if we stayed longer?”
“You were afraid I would become my father.” Siyah shook his head, his lips a tight line. “Become what I hated.”
“I thought if we left. If we could escape like we talked about, but you were not mine anymore. You had already run. I just hadn’t realized it until that night.” I lifted my gaze to his and the sorrow there took my breath away. “So I left, too.”
“I’m sorry,” Siyah said, taking my hand in his. “I’m so sorry, Raven.”
“I am afraid that if we let it, the things that ruined us before will do it again.” Bringing my fingers to my lip, I tried to quell the tremble. “All the lies. All of the secrets. They will tear Noble and us apart.”
Siyah kissed the top of my hand, stood, and walked over to the counter. He picked up the knife and unwound the material. Holding the dagger to the light, he squinted at the handle, and sighed. “Then we don’t let it.”
“What are you going to do?”
“I will tell Thompson everything.”
“But the families, the council will not want outside law—”
“We are an honorable people, Raven.” Siyah looked over at me, the cobalt of his eyes striking. “It is time our leaders behaved as such.”
35
Thompson stared at the dagger on the counter with his arms crossed. He looked at Siyah, and then at me and sighed before scratching at his sideburn.
“This dagger belongs to Niklos?” he asked again. “You’re sure?”
“Positive,” Siyah said. “This is the Prevaté family name right here.” He ran the pad of his finger along the flat of the blade. “Someone just used it to try and kill me.”
“And Raven,” Thompson added, his gaze locking with mine. “You would not have survived a three-story drop.”
My heart tumbled with how close I’d come to death. I squared my shoulders, determined to at least appear brave.
“Whoever pushed me from the Titan and tried to kill Siyah, did it with the knife of a dead man,” I said. “There were two of them and…and Siyah saw them too, so I’m not seeing things.”
Thompson’s mouth turned down. “Did you tell Siyah about the warrant?”
“The what?” Siyah’s gaze flitted from me to Thompson, and my cheeks burned.
“No, I’d forgotten.” So distracted with the scene of Siyah and Lenora outside the club and then the beach…it completely slipped my mind.
“What is this, now?” Siyah asked. “A warrant?”
“For knives and any type of blade.” Thompson shook his head as he checked his watch. “The warrant is due to come through by six this morning, I just got word.”
“I thought you said Monday?” I panicked, how had I forgotten something so important?
“That was only if they had to bring it out by boat, the fax is back up, so I’ll probably get it when the office opens.”
“You think I was involved because he was found on my property.” Siyah rubbed his face with both hands. “This is not a preemptive move, Thompson. I had no idea you were coming. If I thought to conceal this, I would have tossed it off the side of my boat, not called you over.”
“I’m not saying that, but it looks really bad, Siyah. All of this.” His face pulled into a frown. “The face at the carousel, the attack in the tunnels below the boardwalk, someone threatening Raven in the dark yesterday—”
“The what?” Siyah’s jaw tightened and I wrung my hands nervously.
“I–I didn’t get a chance to tell him that, either.” I bit my lip as Thompson looked at me with exasperation.
“Someone threatened you?” The anger on Siyah’s face sent alarm blaring through me.
“It was just a …” My voice broke as I told him about the lights going off while I sat in the workroom. I recounted the strange noises in the dark, the mirror frosting over, and the scratching at the door as I trembled
“You said the mirror frosted?” Siyah’s face registered a strange look, like a lost thought finally captured.
“You didn’t mention that to me,” Thompson added.
“I know it sounds crazy, but—”
“Not crazy.” Siyah stepped to me, his hands on my shoulders, gaze holding mine with quiet assurance. “Show me.”
We rode in Thompson’s cruiser from the Black Adder to the loft building to avoid the deluge hammering down from the roiling black clouds.
Still dark as pitch out, midnight struck on the antique clock resting on Siyah’s fireplace mantel as we walked into his home.
“I need to check the old plans for the other rooms in the building.” He rummaged through the pile of rolled up blueprints standing in the corner of the loft, unrolled one, and squinted.
I walked to his kitchen and took the key I’d left there when I tried to leave yesterday. Back when I was sure running from Noble would take away the pain and worry. “I have the key, but I never closed the room. I just ran, so I’m not sure…”
“You said this happened yesterday?” He asked and strode to the far side of the loft, returning with a crowbar. “How soon after I gave you the key?”
I bit my lip, thinking. “Sonja was exhausted after her shower so she went to lie down. I guess that was maybe twenty minutes after you left.” I remembered our argument. My telling him he had a duty to be with Lenora and my throat ached. I’d been so cold, had treated him with so much distrust. “I–I…”
Siyah’s hand cupped my cheek, adjusting my gaze to his. “That’s done, now,” he whispered. “Those words, that doubt, all of it.”
I nodded, catching Thompson’s form over Siyah’s shoulder as he studied his shoes.
“Show me,” Siyah repeated
I covered his hand with mine, trying for a brave smile. “OK.”
We took the stairwell down to the first floor, and though I walked between two armed and capable men, the dank and dark of the hallway still sent a tremor through me.
Thompson carried his large flashlight and when Siyah tried the hall lights, they did not work. The beam from the flashlight showed burst and blackened bulbs hanging from the ceiling. I swallowed hard, remembering my terror.
Siyah slipped his hand over mine, the warmth and gentle squeeze giving me some measure of calm despite my racing heart.
The doors were all closed, keeping the hallway in darkness save for Thompson’s beam.
We stopped walking when the light picked up my notebooks and pencils still strewn along the hallway floor where I’d dropped them in fear. I pointed to the far door, the workroom.
“I fell asleep in there,” I explained, recounting my experience, “And tried to make it back to the loft, but the lights burst, and then it was so dark…” I squeezed my eyes, trying to remember the events without reliving the fear.
Siyah rubbed a strong hand along my back, soothing as he pulled me closer. “You’re not alone now,” he said. “You’re safe.”
I nodded in the dark despite no one being able to see it. “Some…one called my name in the dark, and then the doors slammed. I saw a light down that way.” I pointed to the opposite end of the hall, where I’d run in a panic.
“She was herded,” Thompson said.
Siyah nodded, his eyes dark in the dim light.
“To that specific place,” Siyah said and the steel in his voice made me worry. “A setup.”
“What happened next?” Thompson asked, apparently oblivious to gathering heat in Siyah’s words.
“I ran to the room, thinking it might lead out, but it was…I put a chair up under the doorknob to keep out whoever was chasing me.” I snaked my hand around Siyah’s upper arm, his bicep tight, rigid like his face. He was angry, and I worried that I should have told him all of this sooner. “Something scratched along the outside of the door, and then the mirror…” My voice trailed off as we neared the room.
The door, flung open by Sonja amid my screams, stood slightly ajar.
Siyah pushed through first. He flicked on the light and the garish colors and faded velvet drapery assaulted my eyes. In the harshness of the fluorescent lights, the bowls of bones and jars with fake organs looked like something out of a high school play. Everything that seemed so sinister in the dark now appeared simply old and decrepit.
I shook my head, frustration welling.
“You said you saw something in here with you?” Thompson asked.
“A reflection in the mirror just outside the window.” I pointed to the shards of mirror on the floor near the wall. “I hit the mirror with a candlestick, I think.”
“I have not been in these rooms since the renovation on the outside began a few months ago, but I do remember this room from when the Boardwalk was still open.” Siyah rubbed his eyes, his lips in a grim line.
“You do any work in here?” Thompson asked, stepping over and shining the light on the floor. The beam glinted off the shards of mirror. “See anything weird down here?”
“No, nothing.” Siyah looked around. “I hired some teens from the island to clear out all the shops and booths of props and trash. It was not a priority like the areas outside. I don’t think I ever checked with more than a passing glance. I did not have time, but it was my impression this room had been cleared, the contents sold or thrown away.”
“This mirror, it was attached here?” Thompson asked, leaning in. “See that?”
I squinted where his beam hit the plaster of the wall. “Yes, there’s a hole here.”
Siyah ran the pad of his finger over it and I could see his jaw working. He raised his crowbar.
“Siyah,” I shouted, “Wait—”
He hit the wall with a shuddering blow, the plaster breaking away in pieces as the crowbar tore chunks from the beams, revealing a hidden room behind it.
“What in the world?” Thompson leaned forward, shining the light into the small alcove. “There’s a ladder leading down from the room above.”
“Trap door in the floor of a closet,” Siyah said. “I had to check the plans to be sure, but...”
“You knew about this?” I peered into the opening, my gut tumbling.
Inside the small room, knobs and switches lined the wall. I tried one and the table in the center of the room behind us vibrated. Another one made the window sash crash down. A third sent the lights flickering. My face burned with embarrassment and anger. Someone deliberately funneled me into this room to terrorize me with parlor tricks.
Siyah stood there, bar in hand, panting with quiet fury.
“I see something back here,” Thompson said. “It looks like a hose leading from some sort of pressurized tank to the hole in the wall where the mirror would have been.”
“It’s a compressed gas used for freeze-drying, like liquid nitrogen,” Siyah said.
“But I’ve been here, back when Luka’s old aunt Serena used to work the carnival,” I said, not understanding. “I never heard of things freezing like that mirror did.”
“Why would you?” Siyah answered, his jaw tight. “This nonsense was for the tourists, not the Romany people. Besides, this…” He held up the hose, his face angry. “This, I believe, is a recent addition.”
“It’s new and there’s no dust,” Thompson said, agreeing. “Everything else here is covered in a layer of it, but the tank and the hose, even the mirror is clean.”
“They mounted a mirror over what was probably a picture with a hole for spying and used the freezing vapor to frost the edges while you were looking,” Siyah said. “It probably would have broken even if you hadn’t hit it. That type of quick temperature fluctuation would have shattered it.”
“They hate me this much?” I asked, suddenly so hurt I could hardly breathe. “The thought of me at your side is so terrible that an attempt to frighten like this escalates to pushing me off a three story structure?” I wiped my face, trembling.
“You think her family capable of this?” Thompson asked. “Lenora’s?”
“I believe they could be behind that scare in the woods, when you were hit by the branch, and perhaps this, as well. I would not put it past them, but attempted murder? And why kill Niklos? He was already missing before you even arrived. No one but Sonja knew about your visit…”
“This doesn’t quite fit,” Thompson said. “What we found here explains some things, but not others.”
“I found reports of strange lights and sounds out here on Noble in the newspapers. Things like beasts rising from the ground…what would Lenora’s family have to do with that? Some of those things happened years before they arrived,” I said, my thoughts tumbling together like popcorn over the hearth fire. “Like the glowing in the water and on Elgin.”
“Elgin is glowing?” Siyah asked. “What?”
“You heard he was found on the beach, right?” Thompson asked. “Well, we get him to the morgue and shut off the lights and the guy starts glowing. Isn’t fading, either.”
“And the attack in the tunnels,” Siyah said and told Thompson about it.
“It’s like they can’t make up their mind,” I said quietly.
“What do you mean?” Thompson asked.
“Sometimes they want to scare me and sometimes they want to kill me,” I said evenly. “I believe that whoever tried to topple those fun house mirrors on me meant to seriously hurt me, but then, instead of escalating, they scare me again with cheap tricks? I don’t understand.”
“I agree,” Thompson said. “Something is really off with all of this.”
“Perhaps,” Siyah said, a quiet calm settling down over his features. “We are not asking the right questions.”
“Like who hates me?” I asked, my nerves finally frayed. “Who doesn’t hate me, Siyah?”
“If I had been killed on the Titan, the dagger belonging to Niklos surely would have been planted in my home. Or they might have hurt Raven with it, thus tying Niklos to us. Do you agree?” Siyah looked at Thompson, who nodded. “We need to ask who would benefit from both ridding Noble of Raven and framing me for Niklos’s death.”
“Lenora’s family would want one, but not the other, right?” Thompson asked. “Because they want the marriage. Framing you would hurt them.”
“And who would attack my family? Try to kill us in our sleep?” I asked, frustration welling as the pieces to this terrible mystery refused to fit together. “How is it all connected?”
“I don’t know,” Siyah said and pulled me into a hug. “But, I will make this stop. I promise you that.”
“This is more than the council can handle, Siyah,” Thompson said, and I remembered him giving the same sentiment earlier.
“In that we are in agreement,” Siyah said, and something dark flitted behind his beautiful eyes. “It is apparent to me now that the council is broken.”
“What does that mean?” Thompson asked.
“It means that a storm is coming to Noble,” I said, my heart tumbling. “And I don’t know if it will survive.”
36
Siyah
In the early morning hours, Siyah called the members of the council, and told them to gather at first light at the Cavaler home. He had wondered what would become of his talk with Lenora, and now it seemed he would find out. Though he held only the title of “Heir Apparent” to the Cavaler seat at the table, he suspected the council members might attend out of morbid curiosity, if nothing else.
Leaving Raven with Thompson at the station, he sought peace, protection, and strength to do what he must. He prayed for clarity and above all, wisdom.
Now as his footsteps echoed along the hall of his father’s home, spikes of apprehension trilled along his spine. Chattering and the sound of children playing echoed down the long corridor, and as he passed the side rooms leading to the dining hall he saw the young ones bustling with the wives, teenagers, and elderly relatives of each council seat holder. Taking in a deep breath, he steadied his thoughts. He would not be facing a table of elder men, but a house filled with the families of Noble.
He pushed through the French doors, swinging them open as he entered.
Seven men his father’s age sat around a large mahogany table. Behind them, a group of women gathered against the wall.
Lenora sat with her cousins and her sister on a couch opposite the door. Vincent, her brother, glared at him. Luka stood in the corner with his arms crossed, face half in shadow.
Siyah stifled the scowl that flared when he saw them. They’d intentionally terrified the woman he loved, and it took all his resolve to handle it with honor. The old Siyah would have been quick to settle things with his fists, but that was the old man, the one he’d shed for his new life of faith. He reminded himself of this as he faced the council.
“What is this about?” Deakon rasped, his frail body draped with an expensive black suit. He stood to meet Siyah, irritation creasing the skin around his eyes. “You call an emergency meeting, for what?”
“You know why I am here,” Siyah said, his voice even despite the anger churning. “You helped them.”
“Know what?” Szoram, one of the oldest of the council, squinted rheumy eyes. “Say your piece, boy. I have not had breakfast.”
“I am not intended to marry Lenora,” Siyah said evenly. “Though my father and hers have spoken and planned, I did not give my consent. I knew what was happening and let it, and that is something for which I must ask for forgiveness.” He looked at Lenora, who blinked as a tear slid down her face. “But that does not excuse what they have done to one of our own.”
