“It’s not just the house we stand to inherit. There’s money,” Eustace told him.
“Alotof it,” Cordelia confirmed. “And after the blood appeared that day, the paperwork we needed to sign for the trust went missing.”
Gordon shrugged. “So. Even if they kept you from inheriting, that doesn’t mean it would go to them, whoevertheyare.”
He had a point. Cordelia eyed her sister. “Mr. Togers said something about a contingency.”
“Who stands to benefit from that?” Gordon asked.
“He wouldn’t say,” Cordelia answered.
“You don’t think it’s him, do you?” Eustace asked. “He knows this family backward and forward.”
But Gordon quickly dismissed the idea. “If Togers stood to gain from your loss, he would have taken aim at Augusta a long time ago. He’s the trustee, after all. He could have found a way to redirect her assets if he’d wanted to. It’s more likely the contingency divides the money between a set of charities your great-aunt selected than that it goes to any one person.”
“He did say he’d send another set of papers over,” Eustace admitted, eliminating the old man from their suspicions. “So what do they want then, if not the money?” she asked, butCordelia still couldn’t answer that concretely, though her sister’s words rose up in response—It’s our blood. That’s what someone is hunting.
“Something else we inherit along with this place,” she suggested. “Something big, or else they would have just stolen it already. They’ve been inside the house more than once.”
“A better question,” Gordon said, “is why they would take this from your mother’s body. And how would they get it?”
“Souvenir? Identification?” That tattoo being removed had something to do with their mother’s aneurysm. Whoever took it knew that. They did it on purpose. They killed her. She just didn’t understand how. “They must have been there. They did this to her, or they know the person who did.”
“Right. Okay.” Gordon turned toward the sink, resting both hands on the edge. “What about that stuff around it? What does it say?”
Eustace cleared her throat. “It’s a bind rune—another curse. More complicated this time. They’ve used Nauthiz again. They really wanna drive that particular point home,” she said, pointing to one spoke. “And this one here that just looks like a line is Isa. It means bringing something to a standstill. This is Hagalaz.It meansdisruption.” She sighed. “But these three on the bottom are reversed. They’re all facing the wrong way. It indicates an inherently negative meaning. Fehu—which is usually money and status—here meansloss.Loss of property. Loss of wealth. Loss of reputation. And Kenaz reversed, which meansendorending.And this is Tiewaz, which should meanvictory—favor with the gods. But here…”
“Failure,” Gordon finished for her.
“Right,” Eustace said. “As if we’re being passed over in a competition. As if we’ve lost favor of some kind.”
“Even our mother’s tattoo has been placed upside down,” Cordelia told him. “It’s supposed to meanprotection,but theywant us to know that we’re vulnerable. We couldn’t save her, and we can’t save ourselves.”
“Jesus,” Gordon responded, horrified. “This person is sick.”
“We thought you should know,” Cordelia told him. “Because you live here too.”
“What about the police?” he asked, turning to face them again.
“We called you first,” Eustace told him. “We wanted you to see it just how we found it.”
“I don’t want the police putting their hands all over our mother’s remains,” Cordelia said. “I don’t want them involved.”
Gordon hung his head, giving it a heavy shake. “I can understand that, but what do you propose instead? We just let this bastard keep terrorizing you?”
She took a deep breath. “No. But I don’t think the police can protect us anyway. He’s too smart for that, whoever he is. He knows more than we do. He’ll be two steps ahead of them as well. We can’t hide behind a few small-town officers.”
“How do you beat somebody at their own game?” Eustace asked them.
Gordon shrugged. “Learn the rules?”
“Exactly,” she said. “You have to be two steps ahead ofthem.”
Cordelia saw the twinkle in her sister’s eye. “You mean go on the offensive instead of the defensive?”
“That’s precisely what I mean,” Eustace answered. “We have to start hunting this guy the way he’s hunting us. He ran from me last night, and he’s staying hidden, pulling his pranks under cover of darkness. That means that beneath his flair for menace he’s scared. Ofus.”
“Wait.” Gordon put a hand out. “Back up. You chased this guy?”
