Except it felt like something, like a missing piece was falling into place, though I couldn’t yet verbalize what I meant.
“Oh God. Is that…?” Savilla toed at something on the ground as she backed away, distracting me from the gargoyle.
I jumped, thinking that she was pointing out a dead mouse, but no… it was a tuft of fuzz. I bent down and plucked out the two-inch-long furry object.
“What is that?” Savilla asked, cringing as I picked it up.
“Fur, but it’s not real.” I lifted it toward Savilla to touch, but she pulled her hands away.
“How do you know?”
“I guess the same way that you and Lacy can tell a Chanel pump from a knock-off.”
That logic she could follow.
“It’s definitely not from an animal,” I clarified, before studying the area around the statue for more. “But why would it be here?”
“Maybe it’s from a jacket,” Savilla suggested. “Oooo… or, like, a synthetic mink coat.”
I thought of the fuzzy gray jacket Presley had been wearing on the first night. Had Presley come down here, found the diamond in the paws of the gargoyle statue, and taken it, planning to kill Brett? But how would she know about the Vampire Room, much less that a diamond might be hidden here?
“When’s the last time the Vampire Room was actually used?” I asked Savilla.
“Not in my lifetime, as far as I know.”
I glanced one more time at the gargoyle holding the velvet and tucked the tuft of fake fur into my pocket to show Charlie. I was getting closer.
THIRTY-TWO
It was almost eleven o’clock when everyone arrived, including Miss 1962, who’d somehow made it down the stairs with a walker, loudly proclaiming that she’d heard we were attempting to contact the dead. I couldn’t help but smile at her, an older version of Mina who kept a hand on her gram’s shoulder as they took their seat. I lingered on the pair of them, marveling at how alike they appeared despite their fifty-year age difference.
Then, Lacy caught my eye and lifted a finger to remind me we needed to proceed as soon as possible. I reminded myself that Charlie was at the door, ready for whatever might happen in the next few minutes, and I took a deep breath. I’d taken one semester of theater in high school. I could do this.
I rang a bell, stretched out a hand to settle the room, and spoke. “Let’s begin, everyone.”
I closed my eyes and placed both hands on the table where we’d put all the things that I could pretend to use to contact Brett Brinkley. There was a notebook and pen, a Monopoly board, the UNO deck, and one of Brett’s watches that Presley had lent us. Even with the oddities in front of me, no one laughed or said a word. Maybe it was curiosity or maybe it was actual belief, but all fidgeting stopped.
Even though I hadn’t personally felt much grief over Brett’s death, a somber mood overcame me too. Not that I’d wanted him to die, certainly, and not that I would wish the strange fate of being choked—and, worse, internally torn up and effectively strangled—by a diamond on the worst person I knew, but up until that moment I hadn’t felt much in the way of Brett’s absence.
I realized, however, that Presley must have felt something as I heard faint crying coming from the direction of where she was seated a few yards away.
I touched the watch and began to speak. “Brett, we are here to listen.” I paused, uncertain but trying not to show it. “We want to know you are with us.”
Lacy tugged at a thread connected to a card in the center of the UNO deck, and half of the stack tumbled onto its side.
Gasps sounded and a mumbled,No.
Okay. This was real to some of them, which meant our plan might actually work.
I picked up the watch and raised it above my head, letting my eyes flutter in a way that I’d seen in movies. “He’s here,” I said softly. “He’s with us now.”
Presley, her voice shaky but free of tears, asked, “Are you okay, Brett?”
I stole a glance at her and noticed that she wasn’t the one who’d been crying. It was the person next to her. Mina Davis. I supposed that made sense. The two of us had, after all, tried and failed to save his life. When Mina caught my eyes on her, she looked down, and Miss 1962 placed a wrinkled hand on her granddaughter’s.
I cleared my throat and did my best Brett impersonation, which had to be all kinds of disrespectful to the dead. But this was where we were at.
“I’m good,” I practically growled in an effort to mimic Brett’s deeper register.
