She stared at Jennie. “So that’s her story—”
“The one she told me,” Jennie corrected.
Violet took note of the difference. “Okay. What about you? We know you’ve traveled and studied these things. The occult. Witchcraft. You killed one. There’s a lot you seem to know, but forgive me if I say there’s also a lot you don’t seem to know.”
Sad-eyed, Jennie laughed. “You saying I’ve wasted my life?”
“Not at all. You saved our lives at least once. I’ll never call that a waste. It’s just that Maggie treated me so kindly, and I know it was different because she wasn’t my mother, but I feel like she gave you an impossible task. To give up any chance of a normal life, an ordinary quiet life, to put yourself in danger you didn’t ask for. Danger you could avoid if you wanted to.”
Jennie gripped the steering wheel. Eyes on the road. “If Malcolm can’t get this done, everyone’s in danger. There’s no avoiding that.”
“So she didn’t have enough faith in either of us,” Malcolm chimed in. “Nothing new there.”
“Besides,” Jennie said, “who wants an ordinary life? A coupleof kids, a picket fence, a husband who wears a suit and tie and comes home smelling like his secretary’s perfume?”
That stung. Violet glanced away. “It doesn’t have to be like that.”
“I see. The nightclub chanteuse yearns for a cozy chair by the fireplace and a hubby who’s always home for dinner.”
“Is that so wrong?”
Jennie cocked her eyebrow. “Of course not. But for Malcolm’s sake, I hope this thing between you is about more than you wanting that life, and deciding one brother is a better bet than another.”
Cold as Violet’s face was, the words seared her.
“Jesus Christ, Jennie,” Malcolm said.
Violet held up a hand to still him. Stared at Jennie. “You’ve been all over the world, I’m guessing mostly alone. If you’ve never been in love, I’m sorry for you. Your brother Elias knew how to be charming, but his charm was always for show. Scratch the surface of that man, and there’s nothing underneath. I never loved him, but I wanted to. Instead, I found kindness and love and all the things I hope you find one day, whether you earn them or not. Because that’s the thing, Jennie… this kind of thing happens whether you earn it or not, deserve it or not, expect it or not. As long as Malcolm wants me, he’s got me, and I don’t give a good goddamn what you think about us.”
The rhythm of the wipers and the road were the only reply. Maggie had gone silent. Benjy kept grinning. Malcolm waited, maybe holding his breath.
“I mean, what the hell do I know?” Jennie said. “Your biggest mistake was marrying Elias in the first place, and he’s dead now, or near enough.”
The snow. The road. The wipers. The grin.
“Her story,” Malcolm said.
Jennie glanced over her shoulder at him. Violet kept looking out her window.
“What you told us about Maggie… Violet said that’s her story,” Malcolm went on. “But it’s not, is it? Otherwise, why isthis happening to her now? One of us was with her every moment from the minute she died.”
“So she was bitten before then,” Jennie replied.
Malcolm had been turning it over in his head. “I think that’s true. I also think it’s not recent. What if she was infected with this thing a very long time ago?”
The tires crunched through deepening snow.
“You think she’s been carrying this inside her all along,” Violet said, never turning. Never looking back at him.
Jennie stiffened. “No way.”
“Think about our mother,” Malcolm said. “Think about Maggie Wise, the neighborhood witch. The woman who could never admit fault for anything, no matter how small. Loving and generous to the people around her, unless they dared suggest she might take the blame for something. Unless it might challenge the image she wanted to portray.”
“Mal.”
“If someone asked you to describe Maggie, how many words do you think you’d use up before you got toselflessorheroic, because the version of her story you just told us could easily include those words? Maggie Wise went to war against a breed of homicidal monsters for the good of the people?”
Jennie’s hands flexed on the steering wheel. She stared straight ahead.
