He sat back, pushing his hair off of his forehead. He thought back to what he’d done earlier that day, the look on the woman’s face as he’d begun speaking to her.
She’d been wary of him at first, with his bandaged face, even if he was in a hospital courtyard. And she’d looked briefly terrified when he’d looked at her full on and she’d realized he was a skeleton under the bandages.
But it’d been the first time he’d been outside Windisle in the bright light of day, and the dual cover had felt necessary. Creepy stuff, he knew. But damn if it hadn’t been worth it to see the blatant hope that had filled her eyes when she’d realized what she was holding in her hand.
So . . . maybe not happy exactly. But not miserable either, and damn but it was a nice reprieve. “Happy-ish,” he answered, putting a teasing note in his voice.
He heard the smile in hers as she said, “It makes me happy to hear you happy . . . ish.”
Jonah laughed, quickly pulling his shirt over his head and tossing it in the direction of the clothes hamper.
“Jonah, do you remember the other night when I asked if you believed in prophecy?”
“Yeah.”
“Well . . . I asked because I went to this fortune teller and she said some stuff that made me wonder.”
“A fortune teller, Clara?”
“I know. I never really believed in all that stuff before either. But it was . . . I don’t know, eerie, I guess. Anyway, she told me I was seeking the answers to a mystery and told me it was very important that I keep looking.”
“You mean, the mystery of the curse put on John and Angelina?” It was the reason Clara had shown up at Windisle in the first place, he remembered that now. Help me help you, Angelina.
“Yes.”
He blew out a breath. “Who isn’t searching for the answer to a mystery though, Clara? Even if the ‘mystery’ is just an unknown . . . you know, will I find success in my career? Will I find love? Will the Mets win the World Series?”
The explanation of how the unknown fortune teller had struck on Clara’s searching for answers to a mystery felt a little weak, even to him, but fortune tellers were con artists, plain and simple. Whatever method she’d used to land on something that happened to apply to Clara, it had been an accident. Trickery.
“I guess.” She drew out the words, clearly unconvinced. “In any case, whether her statements came from the great beyond or not,” she said with an ironic lilt to her tone, “I don’t want to dismiss anything, and she renewed my desire to find out more about Angelina and that curse.”
“Okay.” Jonah unbuttoned his jeans and let them fall to the floor where he kicked them off. He sat on his bed, clad only in his boxers, leaning back on the pillows against the headboard.
He loved the decisiveness in her voice, loved that quality about her in general because he knew it was the reason she’d kept coming back for him. Clara had decided there was something worth knowing in Jonah, and because she’d decided it, she hadn’t given up even when he’d told her to. She was . . . God, she was amazing. The thought filled up his chest until he felt he might overflow with his admiration for her.
Clara was beautiful and elegant, and he couldn’t help noticing those things, but damn if he didn’t also like the hell out of her. “And how are you going to do that?”
“Well, I’ve been thinking about the avenues I still have to explore. There aren’t many, but . . . I was hoping you might be able to help me. What can you tell me about Astrid Chamberlain?”
“Astrid Chamberlain? Not a lot, to be honest. Justin was a big family history buff. He would have been able to tell you anything you wanted to know.”
He was quiet for a moment as he remembered Justin prattling on about Windisle and the things he’d discovered. Justin had wanted to sell the property to the preservation society, and Jonah hadn’t been against it at the time, but he’d been busy . . . he kept putting Justin off whenever he mentioned it . . . told him they’d deal with the sale of Windisle once Jonah had more time. Of course, looking back, Jonah could admit that would have been never.
“He had some folders of information, family trees and whatnot, that I think I put in the attic. I could get them out for you.”
“Would you?” She breathed the question and Jonah smiled, thinking that her reaction had exceeded the actual worth of some dusty paperwork in the attic of Windisle.
“Of course.”
She was quiet for a beat. “The thing is, Jonah, I have this feeling that the answers are all somewhere. I just . . . they’re waiting to be put together and I don’t know, but I sense this . . . ticking. Does that sound crazy?”
It did, sort of, but the real funny thing was, at her words, he felt it too. This drumming right under his ribcage that made him feel like rushing to the attic that second and getting that paperwork for her. Or maybe it was just his intense desire to please this woman in any way he was capable. And the truth was, his capabilities were very limited.
“No, it doesn’t sound crazy. It’s an interesting story, Clara. And the people who can provide answers, or pass on stories are either dead or very old.”
“Yes,” she said, but he sensed something in her voice that told him his explanation about the rush to find answers didn’t feel quite right to her.
“What about the old priestess who spoke the riddle to breaking the curse at the party in the ’30s. Do you know her name?”
The name appeared in Jonah’s head as if it’d been scrawled across his brain. “Actually I do, strangely enough. It’s one of the things in Justin’s files—an original invitation to that party. It was one of the things he showed me, and it had the priestess’s name on it. She was the entertainment.”
He’d glanced at the invitation, other things on his mind at the time, but he remembered the priestess’s name because it had been unusual and he’d repeated the alliteration in his head. “Sibille Simoneaux.”
Clara said her name softly once and then again, as though to commit it to memory. “Do you think her family might be alive?”
“I have no idea, but even so, you can’t just go knocking on strangers’ doors alone. There are dangerous people and lots of unsavory parts of New Orleans.”
“Come with me.”
Jonah expelled a breath. “You know I can’t.”
Clara was quiet for a moment. “Maybe I could go there.”
“Here?”
“Inside Windisle. I could help you look through those papers.”
“I don’t think so.” He shut his eyes, hating that he was rejecting her in any capacity. He’d stood her up once and this felt like he was doing it again but . . . no, he couldn’t allow her to go beyond the weeping wall, to see the place where he showed his scarred and ruined face. Not only did he not want her to see it, but this place was safe for him. Here, he didn’t hide. Not from the trees or the ghosts or Myrtle or Cecil. And not from a beautiful girl who would grimace when she laid her eyes upon him the way all the others had. Even his own mother hadn’t been able to bear the sight of him. His heart beat dully. No, he couldn’t invite her in.
“Okay,” she said softly, understanding lacing her tone and causing him to feel even guiltier. “But will you call me tomorrow if you have a chance to look through those papers? Anything you find, Jonah, will you share it with me?”
I’d share everything with you if I could. Even my blackened soul . . . “Yes. I’ll call you tomorrow.”
“Okay.” There was a smile in her voice. “Sleep tight.”
“You, too. Goodnight, Clara.”
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN
April, 1861
Angelina removed the hood obscuring her face and shut the door behind her, turning to John with a smile that immediately fell. “What is it? The look on your face, John. Is something wrong?”
He walked to her, his boot steps loud on the old wooden floor of the boathouse on his family’s vast estate.
They’d been meeting there since Astrid had begun covering for Angelina by sending her on fabricated errands in town. Instead, Angelina would go to the small structure on the edge of the Mississippi, and she and John would spend a few hours together in a location where they didn’t have to worry about being caught. It still housed equipment and tools, but no one came to the Whitfield estate boathouse since John’s father had passed away earlier that year.