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“What if—” Ling stopped short.
“What if what?” Henry said.
“What if she was talking to you from the land of the dead?”
“No!” Sam said, pointing a finger at them. “She is not dead! Conor heard her, too.”
“That’s no guarantee,” Ling said.
“How do we even know it’s your mother, Sam? What if it’s just one more trick from the King of Crows?” Evie said.
&
nbsp; A reedy horn blasted faintly in the distance.
“Our car,” Ling said. “They’ll be looking for us.”
Evie gave the clearing one last backward glance, hoping for some signal from James, but it was just a dead place inside the woods. “I don’t like that you’re here with him,” Evie said to Jericho on the walk back to the estate. “It’s not too late to come with us.”
“I don’t think I should just now,” Jericho said, and let the why remain unspoken. “I’ll stay here and keep looking for clues. See if I can find out anything more about Anna Provenza. It’s the least I can do. Somehow, I’ll get up to that solarium and poke around.”
Back at the estate, Marlowe’s fancy Rolls-Royce was packed and ready to transport the Diviners to the train station. “Well. We’ll see you at the exhibition, I suppose,” Evie said, looking uncomfortable.
“Sure. At the exhibition,” Jericho echoed.
He ached to hold her. He would probably never hold her again.
Evie watched Ames shutting the lid of the trunk over their cases. She didn’t know what to think. She’d cared deeply for Jericho; still did, really. Like her, he was deeply flawed. His open admission of his faults and foibles was a relief compared with the sanctimonious, sure-of-themselves people she’d known in Zenith, Ohio. The ones who’d turn up their noses at messy girls like Evie, then slink off and commit their sins in the dark. But was it enough? Where did you draw the line? Evie’s heart ached as she shook Jericho’s hand and climbed into the backseat. She had never been less sure of the lines between right and wrong, between desire and destruction in her life.
“So long, Jericho,” she said.
“So long, Evie,” he echoed.
Good-bye, Jericho thought. Because this was good-bye. Even if she didn’t say it outright. He hated Marlowe for what he’d done. And he hated knowing that a beast lurked somewhere inside his own soul. I’m sorry, he wanted to shout to the heavens. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
“Don’t take any wooden nickels,” he said. It was what Sergeant Leonard always said. For all Jericho knew, it was the last thing he’d probably ever say to Evie, and it was the dumbest.
As the car curved down the long driveway, Evie glanced back at the turreted estate. Jericho was still standing there with the sun glinting off his shoulders until it seemed that he was the sun itself.
NO REAL HARM
Jericho found Marlowe in his pristine study. “How was your visit with your friends?” Marlowe asked.
“Evie will probably never want anything to do with me again after what happened yesterday.”
“No real harm came to her,” Marlowe scoffed.
Jericho reeled. “No real harm? I attacked her!” Jericho wanted to punch Marlowe. “What’s in that serum you gave me? I want to know. I deserve to know.”
“I told you, vitamins.”
“What else?”
“It’s a highly calibrated secret formula patented by Marlowe Industries.”
“What else?” Jericho demanded.
Jake Marlowe’s eyes went flinty. “You really want to know?”
