“Iron and holy water. Testing her for evil.” Mrs. Dunwoody spills a couple drops of the holy water into my palm. There’s a faint hum through my skin in those two little spots, but it’s not painful, and I manage to keep my face neutral under her scrutiny.
“You’re not corrupted,” she says, corking the small bottle. “Not yet. But you need to clean out all this Wiccan mess. Can’t risk having it here, so close toit.”
“It?” I shake my head. “Mrs. Dunwoody, if you know of some danger around here, you have to tell me. Please.”
She purses her lips. “I liked your aunt. She was good people. Kept to herself, worked hard, was thoughtful of others. What about you, Miss Allard? Are you good people? Ishe?” She jerks her head toward Dorian.
“Far from it.” Dorian’s blue eyes are narrowed, his mouth a grimline. “And because I’m not a good person, I suggest you tell us everything you know, immediately, or I’ll have to make you talk.”
“Dorian!” I shove his arm. “Stop it.”
But he’s holding Mrs. Dunwoody’s gaze with that blank, icy, remorseless look he wears sometimes—the look of a thing utterly soulless. As an understanding passes between them, alarm and fear carve deeper lines into her face.
“Long ago, something was buried near here,” she says. “Over the centuries, pagans have tried to stir it up. But people like me have always been here, holding it down, keeping it under, until now. Something is disturbing the peace, causing these manifestations. If we can’t get it under control, we can expect the apocalypse. The Second Coming, not of the Lord but of the Devil, old Satan himself. Pain and tribulation.”
Her story is way different from Lloyd-Henry’s. But there’s enough similarity to thoroughly freak me out.
“This thing that’s buried—where is it located?”
Mrs. Dunwoody shakes her head. “No, no. I can’t tell you that.”
Dorian uncrosses his arms and takes a single step forward. There’s menace in the rigid lines of his shoulders, in the slow weight of that step. He exudes the lethal confidence of a man who has faced down people much worse than my neighbor and gotten the exact outcome he wanted.
“Threaten me all you want,” Mrs. Dunwoody gasps. “I won’t tell you a thing. And I can’t stay here a minute longer. Take my advice and burn all this nonsense as soon as I leave. Destroy it. Claim the protection of the cross and the Scriptures. Save yourself.”
She totters out the front door, mumbling a prayer. Though Screwtape is lurking nearby, he doesn’t try to dart out. He doesn’t seem to want anything to do with Mrs. Dunwoody, or Dorian, forthat matter. His yellow gaze reproaches me for allowing them into the house at all.
I shut the door behind my neighbor and turn to Dorian. “So…time to call Lloyd-Henry?”
He pulls his phone from his pocket. “I’m doing that right fucking now.”
“Good idea.”
16
Baz
Lloyd isn’t much help. He asks a bunch of doubtful questions, like he thinks we’re overreacting to my overly religious neighbor, and he seems unimpressed by the correlation between what she said and what he read from the old book.
“I don’t know what you want me to tell you,” he says. “I don’t have any more information beyond that. There’s a couple people I can ask around here, see if they know anything. Otherwise…if you see a stick-monster, light it on fire and run, like you did before.”
“I got torn to shreds before,” grumbles Dorian. “Thanks for nothing.” He sighs.
“Dorian, my heart, you know I would help you more if I could. I just can’t get away right now. There are too many interesting things happening here.”
“Like what?”
“I’ll tell you all about it when I get home. Until then, be careful.”
“I hate being careful.” Dorian ends the call and massages his forehead with his fingertips. “Baz, I don’t like the idea of you staying here alone tonight.”
“I’ve got Bible verses on my door, remember? And if those don’t work, I’ll just throw my ‘pagan nonsense’ at the monsters and yell, ‘Hey, I’m on your side!’ Either way, I’ll be just fine.”
“I could stay here,” he offers. “I could sleep on the couch, or…I think I saw a guest room back here…” He’s striding down the short hall, opening the door across from the bathroom before I can stop him.
“No,” I gasp, too late.
Dorian halts in the doorway, staring into my painting room. “Baz, I thought you said you didn’t have any more pieces to sell.”
