Page 54 of Mortdale

“I meant it. When the scent of magic hit the air, they got distracted, which gave me an opportunity to get through them quicker.”

“Didn’t look like you needed my help.”

He dumped the cigarette butt on the toilet and turned to me. “I’m going to check on Piper.” Pinching my chin between his fingers, he lifted my attention back to his face. “You’re good?”

“I’m a big girl. I can handle it.”

“I know you are,” he said, dropping a quick glance down my body as he backed away and left.

I risked a quick look down my body.

Yup.

My totally soaked, thin nightgown was sticking to every inch of my skin, including my nipples which were poking through the fabric. Thank the Goddess he was so tall or I would have poked his eyes out.

Chapter 10

Willow

He’d not left the mansion for a week straight since the attempted kidnapping of Piper, and I hadn’t seen him leave his office for that same amount of time. Which had become a hindrance to every single plan I’d been concocting, which all revolved around me accessing his office again.

With some help from the librarian, I’d managed to map out the locations of each red maiden whose husband had died right after their death—the only way I’d managed to locate who’d died out of the list Agnes had given me. From the society pages, I deduced the red maidens also not often crossed paths with one another at formal events, let alone recently before their deaths. I’d failed to make any connection there. Their deaths had been sporadic, not even occurring in the order of the year they’d been married. Out of nowhere, too, it seemed, because months, weeks, days before their deaths they’d been photographed attending social functions in tip-top shape, smiling ear to ear, clinging to the arms of their vampire husbands.

The mechanical pen hit my temple repeatedly as my eyes jumped around the pin marks I’d made on the map. “What is even happening here?”

Thomas rolled on his back, all four paws up in the air. “The witches do not care. They refuse to speak to me.”

“Maybe they’re just scared.” Maybe.

“We should eat. Makes it better,” Thomas echoed. “We can share the little girl. You can have the eyes. They taste good.”

I gave him a shove with my foot and watched his fat stomach bounce with each step as he rolled all the way down.

Laying back against the stair steps, I covered my bloodshot eyes with my cold palms. There were only so many cemetery trips I could drag Liam to before he’d go and report it to my lord-husband. And the witches that were alive were not allowed to socialise and consort with another witch without a chaperone. That was without taking into consideration that Theodora had told me most of the high nobility forbade their witch-wives from fraternising with other witches so as not to draw unwanted attention from the church. Two witches were a party too many, according to the clergy. I’d enlisted Thomas in tracking them down the first week I’d arrived in Mortdale. And I was yet to receive any letter or news or a single reply of any kind back. They’d all banished Thomas the moment he’d told them about the matter.

Ethel, what did I get us into?

I nearly jumped to my feet when the main doors drew open, letting in blistering rain and two cloaked figures.

Arthur shook the hail off his shoulders, turning to grab the other person’s cloak. The grouchy guard paused and winced when he noticed me curled up on the steps.

A woman stood next to him, maybe only a few years older than me. Dressed in a tight blood-red dress, her copper red hair was propped against her head in coils with various pins and a patterned crimson scarf elegantly draped around her neck despite the choking summer humidity. She noticed me standing at the top of the stairs. Her head tilted to the side as she studied me, from the frizz on my head to my naked toes poking under my nightgown.

“Come on, witch-woman. Let me take you to your room,” Arthur said, coming up the stairs.

“Who is she?” I leaned in to whisper at him.

The man wouldn’t meet my eyes, his mouth parting and closing a few times before giving me a vague answer. “He needs to feed.”

“But we already have a cook.”

Arthur snorted and blasted on a heaving cough. There wasn’t enough time for me to process that look because my attention was drawn to the woman as she pulled the scarf off, revealing a bruised mark just above the crook of her neck. She met my eyes and smirked as she slipped into Logan’s study.

My pulse beat so hard in my throat it was choking me.

“Does he always feed from her?”

Arthur scratched his head. “Mostly. We all have our regulars. Irena is one of Logan’s.”