Page 25 of Hextreme Measures

“Because my father wished it.” Ellen’s lips curved down even further. “I was a spinster, according to my father. He was a banker and owned four banks in the state. Can you imagine? Four.”

“I never really think about who owns the banks,” Ofelia admitted.

“Normally, they’re companies now, not individuals. Back when my grandfather started, that wasn’t the norm. My family’s money came from steamships originally, and they were one of the few families to adjust when the switch came. They managed to hold onto their wealth and went into banking, which was a whole other type of wealth.”

Ofelia was stymied by where the conversation was going, but she figured it was germane to the story that Ellen had to tell her, so she just nodded. “You’re basically saying that your family had money.”

Ellen smirked. “And a lot of it. That’s why my refusal to marry when I was younger was met with such … disappointment.” She made a face when saying the last word. “I wanted to be my own businesswoman, but my father believed that women should be wives and nothing more.”

Ofelia thought of her father and how proud he’d been when she announced she wanted to run Krewe. The bar had been his life — maybe too much — but he was happy to hand it over to Ofelia at the time. He knew she would take care of it.

“I can practically hear the train chugging along in your head,” Ellen acknowledged. She pointed at Ofelia’s engagement ring. “I’m guessing you don’t have the same problem.”

“No, but my family doesn’t have the same amount of money that yours obviously does,” she replied.

“I know more about you than you know about me,” Ellen countered. “I’ve watched you work your way between problems in the city. You’re a powerhouse, as a witch and a woman. You took over your father’s business, and he seems happy with how things turned out.”

“My father never looked at me as if I didn’t have a business mind simply because I was a woman,” Ofelia replied. “I know that happens to other people, other women, but he was never that way with me. He had … other demons.”

Ellen’s smile softened. “I know those stories, too. Your mother and I move in some of the same social circles.”

Ofelia immediately balked. “You can’t always trust what my mother says about my father,” she said hurriedly.

Ellen chuckled. “I don’t. Take a breath.”

Ofelia did just that.

“Your mother is a unique individual,” Ellen continued after a beat. “She’s not what I would call evil. She’s not entirely on the side of good either. She lives in a gray area that I find fascinating, if a little frightening.”

Ofelia made a grumbling sound deep in her throat. “She finds herself fascinating, too.”

Ellen snorted. “I like that you don’t gloss over who your parents are. You love them both and make more allowances for your father, as you should.” She paused a beat. “Tales of his mental illness made it all the way out here. My heart broke for you when I heard you had locked him up. I know you fought against that for a long time.”

“It turns out that was the best thing for him,” Ofelia replied. “He’s doing really well right now.”

“So I hear.” Ellen rubbed her hands over her knees. “I don’t bring up your father to shame you. I wish I had the strength to deal with my father as you did yours. Instead, I kowtowed to him, and when he insisted I had to marry because he’d arranged it for me, I didn’t fight him as I should. I believed, since I was in my 30s at that point, that he’d given up on the idea of an arranged marriage.”

Ofelia was bothered by that term. “Is that how you looked at it? As an arranged marriage, I mean.”

“Yes.” Ellen bobbed her head. “My father wanted to cement a relationship between our family and Leonard. He believed a marriage would do it. There was just one little problem.”

“You didn’t want to marry Leonard,” Ofelia guessed.

“No, and it made me angry when the marriage happened against my will,” Ellen admitted. “It made me even angrier when he took his mistress on our honeymoon. It made me angriest when he had a family with his mistress.

“I didn’t want to marry him,” she continued. “I didn’t expect him to be faithful. We only consummated the marriage a handful of times, always at his behest. I did not look at him that way.”

Ofelia had an inkling that she knew why Ellen hadn’t looked at Leonard that way — beyond the obvious — but it wasn’t important. At least not now. “You were embarrassed because everybody knew what he was doing,” she guessed.

“Yes.” Ellen was grim. “Each passing day made me angrier. That’s when she came.”

Ofelia sat straighter in her chair. “Who?”

“Her name was Carolina, or so she said. I have no idea if that was her real name. She crept into my window in the middle of the night — Leonard and I had separate rooms — and she tried to appeal to my sense of hatred for my husband.”

“She talked to you?” Ofelia had to wrap her head around that. “She didn’t just scream and attack you?”

“No. She wanted me to join her.”