Beautiful Creatures (17 page)

I’m just asking a question.

He doesn’t know anything.

Lena, we have to try.

“Of course.” Macon took a sip from his glass.

I reached into my pocket and pulled the locket out of the pouch Amma had given me, careful to keep it wrapped in the handkerchief.
All the candles went out. The lights dimmed and then spluttered out. Even the music of the piano died.

Ethan, what are you doing?

I didn’t do anything.

I heard Macon’s voice in the darkness. “What is that in your hand, son?”

“It’s a locket, sir.”

“Do you mind very much if you put it back in your pocket?” His voice was calm, but I knew that he wasn’t. I could tell he
was taking great efforts to compose himself. His glib manner was gone. His voice had an edge, a sense of urgency he was trying
very hard to disguise.

I crammed the locket back into the pouch and stuffed it in my pocket. At the other end of the table, Macon touched his fingers
to the candelabra. One by one, the candles on the table came back to light. The entire feast had disappeared.

In the candlelight, Macon looked sinister. He was also quiet for the first time since I’d met him, as if he was weighing his
options on an invisible scale that somehow held our fate in the balance. It was time to go. Lena was right, this was a bad
idea. Maybe there was a reason Macon Ravenwood never left his house.

“I’m sorry, sir. I didn’t know that would happen. My housekeeper, Amma, acted like the—like it, was really powerful when I
showed it to her. But when Lena and I found it, nothing bad happened.”

Don’t tell him anything else. Don’t mention the visions.

I won’t. I just wanted to find out if I was right about Genevieve.

She didn’t have to worry; I didn’t want to tell Macon Ravenwood anything. I just wanted to get out of there. I started to
get up. “I think I should be getting home, sir. It’s getting late.”

“Would you mind describing the locket to me?” It was more of order than a request. I didn’t say a word.

It was Lena who finally spoke. “It’s old and battered, with a cameo on the front. We found it at Greenbrier.”

Macon twisted his silver ring, agitated. “You should have told me you went to Greenbrier. That’s not part of Ravenwood. I
can’t keep you safe there.”

“I was safe there. I could feel it.” Safe from what? This was more than a little overprotective.

“You weren’t. It’s beyond the boundaries. It can’t be controlled, not by anyone. There is a lot you don’t know. And he—” Macon
gestured to me at the other end of the table. “He knows nothing. He can’t protect you. You shouldn’t have brought him into
this.”

I spoke up. I had to. He was talking about me like I wasn’t even there. “This is about me, too, sir. There were initials on
the back of the locket. ECW. ECW was Ethan Carter Wate, my great-great-great-great-uncle. And the other initials are GKD,
and we’re pretty sure the D stands for Duchannes.”

Ethan, stop.

But I couldn’t. “There’s no reason to keep anything from us because whatever it is that’s happening, it’s happening to both
of us. And like it or not, it seems to be happening right now.” A vase of gardenias went flying across the room and crashed
into the wall. This was the Macon Ravenwood we’d all been telling stories about since we were kids.

“You have no idea what you are talking about, young man.” He stared me right in the eye, with a dark intensity that made the
hair on the back of my neck stand on end. He was having trouble keeping it together now. I had pushed him too far. Boo Radley
rose and paced behind Macon like he was stalking prey, his eyes hauntingly round and familiar.

Don’t say anything else.

His eyes narrowed. The movie star glamour was gone, replaced with something much darker. I wanted to run, but I was rooted
to the ground. Paralyzed.

I was wrong about Ravenwood Manor, and Macon Ravenwood. I was afraid of both of them.

When he finally spoke, it was as if he was speaking to himself. “Five months. Do you know what lengths I will go to, to keep
her safe for five months? What it will cost me? How it will drain me, perhaps, destroy me?” Without a word, Lena moved next
to him, and laid her hand on his shoulder. And then, the storm in his eyes passed as quickly as it had come, and he regained
his composure.

“Amma sounds like a wise woman. I would consider taking her advice. I would return that item to the place where you found
it. Please do not bring it into my home again.” Macon stood up and threw his napkin on the table. “I think our little library
visit will have to wait, don’t you? Lena, can you see to it that your friend finds his way home? It was, of course, an extraordinary
evening. Most illuminating. Please do come again, Mr. Wate.”

And then the room was dark, and he was gone.

I couldn’t get out of the house fast enough. I wanted to get away from Lena’s creepy uncle and his freak show of a house.
What the hell had just happened? Lena rushed me to the door, like she was afraid of what might happen if she didn’t get me
out of there. But as we passed through the main hall, I noticed something I hadn’t before.

The locket. The woman with the haunting gold eyes in the oil painting was wearing the locket. I grabbed Lena’s arm. She saw
it and froze.

It wasn’t there before.

What do you mean?

That painting has been hanging there since I was a child. I’ve walked by it a thousand times. She was never wearing a locket.

9.15

W
e barely spoke as we drove back to my house. I didn’t know what to say, and Lena just looked grateful I wasn’t saying it.
She let me drive, which was good because I needed something to distract me until my pulse slowed back down. We passed my street,
but I didn’t care. I wasn’t ready to go home. I didn’t know what was going on with Lena, or her house, or her uncle, but she
was going to tell me.

“You passed your street.” It was the first thing she’d said since we left Ravenwood.

“I know.”

“You think my uncle is crazy, like everyone else. Just say it. Old Man Ravenwood.” Her voice was bitter. “I need to get home.”

I didn’t say a word as we circled the General’s Green, the round patch of faded grass that encircled just about the only thing
in Gatlin that ever made it into the guidebooks—the General, a statue of Civil War General Jubal A. Early. The General stood
his ground, just as he always had, which now struck me as sort of wrong. Everything had changed; everything kept changing.
I was different, seeing things and feeling things and doing things that even a week ago would have seemed impossible. It felt
like the General should have changed, too.

I turned down Dove Street and pulled the hearse over alongside the curb, right under the sign that said welcome to gatlin,
home of the south’s most unique historic plantation homes and the world’s best buttermilk pie. I wasn’t sure about the pie,
but the rest was true.

“What are you doing?”

I turned the car off. “We need to talk.”

“I don’t park with guys.” It was a joke, but I could hear it in her voice. She was petrified.

“Start talking.”

“About what?”

“You’re kidding, right?” I was trying not to shout.

She pulled at her necklace, twisting the tab from a soda can. “I don’t know what you want me to say.”

“How about explaining what just happened back there.”

She stared out the window, into the darkness. “He was angry. Sometimes he loses his temper.”

“Loses his temper? You mean hurls things across the room without touching them and lights candles without matches?”

“Ethan, I’m sorry.” Her voice was quiet.

But mine wasn’t. The more she avoided my questions, the angrier it made me. “I don’t want you to be sorry. I want you tell
me what’s going on.”

“With what?”

“With your uncle and his weird house, that he somehow managed to redecorate within a couple of days. With the food that appears
and disappears. With all that talk about boundaries and protecting you. Pick one.”

She shook her head. “I can’t talk about it. And you wouldn’t understand, anyway.”

“How do you know if you don’t give me a chance?”

“My family is different from other families. Trust me, you can’t handle it.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“Face it, Ethan. You say you’re not like the rest of them, but you are. You want me to be different, but just a little. Not
really different.”

“You know what? You’re as crazy as your uncle.”

“You came to my house without being invited, and now you’re angry because you didn’t like what you saw.”

I didn’t answer. I couldn’t see out the windows, and I couldn’t think clearly, either.

“And you’re angry because you’re afraid. You all are. Deep down, you’re all the same.” Lena sounded tired now, like she had
already given up.

“No.” I looked at her. “You’re afraid.”

She laughed, bitterly. “Yeah, right. The things I’m afraid of, you couldn’t even imagine.”

“You’re afraid to trust me.”

She didn’t say anything.

“You’re afraid to get to know someone well enough to notice whether or not they show up for school.”

She dragged her finger through the fog on her window. It made a shaky line, like a zigzag.

“You’re afraid to stick around and see what happens.”

The zigzag turned into what looked like a bolt of lightning.

“You’re not from here. You’re right. And you’re not just a little different.”

She was still staring out the window, at nothing, because you still couldn’t see out of it. But I could see her. I could see
everything. “You’re incredibly, absolutely, extremely, supremely, unbelievably different.” I touched her arm, with just my
fingertips, and immediately I felt the warmth of electricity. “I know because deep down, I think I am, too. So tell me. Please.
Different how?”

“I don’t want to tell you.”

A tear dripped down her cheek. I caught it with my finger, and it burned. “Why not?”

“Because this could be my last chance to be a normal girl, even if it is in Gatlin. Because you’re my only friend here. Because
if I tell you, you won’t believe me. Or worse, you will.” She opened her eyes, and looked into mine. “Either way, you’re never
going to want to talk to me again.”

There was a rap on the window, and we both jumped. A flashlight shone through the fogged-in glass. I dropped my hand and rolled
down the window, swearing under my breath.

“Kids get lost on your way home?” Fatty. He was grinning like he’d stumbled across two doughnuts on the side of the road.

“No, sir. We’re on our way home right now.”

“This isn’t your car, Mr. Wate.”

“No, sir.”

He shined his flashlight over at Lena, lingering for a long time. “Then move on, and get home. Don’t want to keep Amma waitin’.”

“Yes, sir.” I turned the key in the ignition. When I looked in the rearview mirror, I could see his girlfriend, Amanda, in
the front seat of his police cruiser, giggling.