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“Just around the corner in every woman’s mind is a lovely dress, a wonderful suit, or entire costume which will make an enchanting new creature of her.”
—Wilhela Cushman
Low-level strip lights along the baseboards provided a shadowy illumination to the museum’s architecture and design displays, much like a flashl
ight held under someone’s face as they told a camp-side ghost story. A shiver snaked its way up Sylvie’s spine.
“Why don’t we talk here?” Her taffeta skirt rustled as she sat down on the bench near a collection of handblown glass.
Ivy remained standing. Something in the tilt of her head and tension in her jaw made Sylvie’s unease bloom into anxiety. She glanced back at the foyer packed with elegantly dressed guests, and the urge to return to the safety of the crowd turned her palms clammy.
“Say, how about we go grab a drink first?” She stood and took a few steps back.
Ivy shook her head. “There’s a new installation I really want to show you. It’s pretty amazing and just a little bit farther in.” She laced her fingers together and brought her joined hands to her lips as if in prayer, gripping them so tightly her pale knuckles turned white. Crisscrossing red marks covered her hands. “Please.”
Something predatory glimmered in Ivy’s eyes. Sylvie’s anxiety grew as she realized the marks were nearly healed scratches, the kind of damage a cat might have inflicted. But Ivy was allergic to cats. She’d always said if she was going to get a pet it would be a rat. Oh, God. Sylvie’s heart skipped a beat as the image of the dead rat the troll had sent her flashed in her mind. What if Tony had been right about Ivy? Anders had never confessed to being the stalker, but he had admitted to everything else. Why leave out something as trivial as hacking a Web site?
He wouldn’t.
And Tony had said he sent only a few emails, early on, before the threats got serious.
Which left…
Ivy?
But before Sylvie could take her suspicions to the cops, she had to get the other woman to talk. “Okay. Lead on, Macduff.”
As they walked farther down the hall, Sylvie made sure to stay out of arm’s reach.
“You know the quote is actually ‘Lay on, Macduff’? It’s been misquoted for nearly a hundred fifty years. Crazy, right? It’s from Macbeth’s speech when he’s ordering Macduff to launch a vigorous attack.” Ivy chuckled as she turned a corner. “How appropriate.”
The tall redhead stopped suddenly and Sylvie had to pull up short so she wouldn’t ram into her.
“Here we are. Isn’t it beautiful?”
Sylvie stepped around Ivy and her breath caught, the stunning display momentarily outshining her suspicions. It was a throne. Unlike the half-shadowed lighting of the rest of the displays, it sat bathed in a soft glow. Designed to look like a medieval throne, its back soared twenty-feet high. However, instead of being carved from oak or another hardwood, it had been fashioned of gleaming gold, copper, and silver coins stacked one upon the other.
“It’s called the Throne of Hope.” Ivy’s voice echoed in the quiet room. “The artist is Trace Wilkes. He inherited a huge tract of land, and when he was clearing it to build a stand-alone studio, the workers found a small, long-abandoned wishing well. Some of the coins in it date back from the 1700s, but the most recent coin found was dated 1910.”
Ivy reached over the red velvet rope surrounding the display and glided her long fingers over the coins before stepping back. “Instead of leaving the well as it was, Wilkes drained it and—once his new studio was built over the wishing well’s grave—he used the coins to make this throne.”
Hoping to lull Ivy into her comfort zone and keep her talking, Sylvie kept her own mouth shut and leaned closer, pretending to inspect the chair. She watched Ivy out of the corner of her eye as the other woman fiddled with her beaded evening clutch.
“It’s absolutely gorgeous to behold,” Ivy continued, taking a step closer, “but it’s made from something worse than blood money. He stole their wishes, their hopes.”
Something in her voice made Sylvie turn. But too late. Something sharp jabbed into her neck and fire shot through her jugular.
“He stole their dreams, all for his own glory.” Ivy’s voice turned hard. “Sound familiar?”
Panic roared through Sylvie’s body and she stumbled. “It was you.”
Ivy arched an eyebrow and shrugged her shoulders. “What do you think?” She tipped her head and regarded Sylvie. “I considered using a gun, but this way I get to watch you squirm when you finally realize it was me tormenting you…and that now you’re going to die.”
Sylvie’s survival instinct spurred her into attack mode, and she lunged forward. But the world wavered and she fell to the floor, her legs tangling in her voluminous tulle underskirt. She pushed up against the hard marble with trembling arms that didn’t seem to be a part of her own body. Icy fear strangled her lungs. Instinctively, she sought out her clutch with her asthma medicine, but her limbs failed to respond to her mind’s commands.
An all-encompassing euphoria overpowered her. Warmth soaked deep into her bones. It was as though she’d dashed across a snow-covered deck and then sank up to her chin into a steaming hot tub. All of her muscles melted into warm goo. Way back in the furthest corner of her mind a voice screamed for help, but by the time it reached her, it was only a faint echo. God she felt so amazing.
“W-what…” Even that one word had taken supreme effort to utter.
