destroy the Duchess, he was certainly willing to listen in on her private conversations.
I had never once considered Phelon as a suspect.
And that had been worse than arrogant because if anyone should have known that Maman did not suffer fools and that Phelon could not possibly be the inbred dolt he seemed, it was me. I had allowed myself to be deceived by appearances and my own bias.
Andi said again, more urgently, “Cos?”
“I’m still here.”
“Yes, you are,” someone said from behind me.
I turned quickly, though not quickly enough, and something hard and shiny swung at me out of the darkness.
The flat side of a shovel slammed against my head.
I dropped my phone, which was squeaking in alarm, and pitched forward.
Just before everything went black, Phelon added, “But not for long.”
Chapter Eighteen
“You could have waited till we heard what he had to say.”
I winced. Waite’s voice hurts my head even when I don’t have concussion.
“We know what he was going to say,” Phelon answered. He added, in a light, affected tone that I guess was supposed to be me, “The Goddess won’t like that! You’re in trouble now!”
Waite muttered, “The Goddess won’t like it.”
“The Goddess is a myth just like their Jesus or any of the rest of it.”
Waite’s reply was too low for me to make out the words.
To which Phelon answered, “But you haven’t come up with a better idea.”
I unstuck my eyelids, pried open my eyes. I was lying on the floor. No, a marble hearth in front of a fireplace, and the bright yellow and red flames hurt to look at. I moved cautiously. My hands were bound. Tightly. My ankles were bound. Tightly. With rope, yes, but also with spellcraft.
“I didn’t say I didn’t want to kill him. I want to kill him. I’m saying, we can’t do it here. He came by taxi. How are we going to hide that?”
“A forgetting spell.” Phelon sounded his usual blasé and slightly bored self.
“On which taxi driver? We can’t put a spell on all of them.”
“What does it matter? So what if he came here by taxi? How is anyone going to prove that he didn’t leave of his own free will?”
“On foot?”
“Why not? Anyway, they can’t check with every single cab company and every single Uber or Lyft driver.”
Oh yes they could. They could and they would. I had personal experience of that. They, whoever they might turn out to be in this jurisdiction, would check the trains too, and the buses, and truckers regularly driving this route, and random passing cars that might have picked up a lone hitchhiker.
“By the Lord and Lady, Phelon, he’s married to a police commissioner.”
“Of a different city, in a different county.”
“You really think that matters? You really think they won’t search this place from top to bottom?”
“They won’t find anything. Who cares?”
Far from calming my cousin, Phelon’s easy-breezy what’s-a-little-murder-between-family attitude seemed to be making Waite more agitated and nervous. “It isn’t just about the police. We’ll have reporters here asking questions. TV crews taking pictures. It’s the last thing we can afford.”
“No. The last thing we can afford is this little prick blabbing his mouth to anyone.”
Waite fell silent.
I eased back a fraction, trying to see if I could get some leverage so I could push myself up. A large portrait of my mother hung over the fireplace. She gazed skeptically down at me. Except, it wasn’t my mother. It was Aunt Iolanthe.
“What do you suppose his plan was?” Waite wondered from somewhere overhead.
I closed my eyes.
Phelon’s voice joined Waite’s. “I told you. Don’t you watch any television at all? He was coming to tell you that he knew what you were up to, and if you didn’t stop it, he would have to turn you in.” He sounded amused.
“What? No. That’s not—he had to have a better plan than that.”
“It’s true. It’s what mortals do. I’ve seen it on Poirot many times. Also Dateline.”
Maman would not approve of all that watching of mortal TV. Granted, Maman would not approve of any of this.
“He’s not mortal.”
“He might as well be.”
My head was thumping in sickening time with my heart.
Would Andi go straight to John? I thought she would.
Was that good news or bad news? Did I prefer John in a fury to being murdered? I would have to consider… The floor squeaked as they moved away. I heard the clink of crystal, the splash of liquid. I closed my eyes, tried to focus.
These ties that bind must fall away
I must