Oblivion (15 page)

Unbidden, a string of accusatory counter-questions began flipping through Isobel's head like cue cards, making it impossible for her to conjure a single excuse.

“I—I'm—”

“Isobel.”

Mr. Nethers swiveled his head in the direction of the soft gasp from within the house.

Over his shoulder, Isobel saw Darcy approaching. Still dressed in the black slacks and pumps from earlier, she moved toward them with purpose, her silk blouse rippling.

“Joe,” Darcy said, placing a manicured hand on his shoulder, “I forgot to tell you. I went ahead and posted that ad for a housekeeper. I know you said you weren't sure, but I thought it would help to take some of the stress off.”

“Her?” He squinted at Isobel, his upper lip twitching into a sneer. “She's a kid.”

“Who needs an after-school job,” Darcy replied.

Isobel kept quiet, eyes flitting between the two as she waited to see if Darcy's fib would convince him.

“Except it's not after school.” Mr. Nethers checked his wristwatch. “Not nearly.”

Darcy took the door from him. “I found the aspirin,” she said. “I packed it with your lunch in the kitchen. You'd better take it with you, though, or else you might as well go ahead and take the rest of the day off.”

“I can't afford to take the rest of the day off,” he snapped, irritably stripping his watch from his wrist. “Especially not since, apparently, we're hiring a housekeeper.” He broke away, adjusting the watch as he headed toward the back hall. “And if you've got time to post a want ad,” he called as he went, “then you've got time to post a sale ad for that damn car.”

“It's not mine to post,” Darcy said, her voice flat, resigned.

“Post the car, Darcy.”

With that, Mr. Nethers swept from the room, disappearing down the hall.

Isobel knew they had to be arguing over the Cougar, confirming her suspicions that Bruce had indeed bequeathed the car to Varen.

“Please come inside,” Darcy said, stepping back, making room for Isobel to enter. “You must be freezing out there without a coat.”

Folding her arms against shivers that had nothing to do with the cold, Isobel stared past the woman, into the mouthlike doorway. Soft yellow light bathed the foyer within.

“He'll leave in just a minute,” Darcy said, and the tremble in her voice made Isobel wonder what she was afraid of. Was it that her husband would find out Isobel's visit pertained to his missing son? Or maybe that Isobel would run off like she had that morning at the fountain, taking all the answers with her?

“It's . . . not him,” Isobel said.

Varen's father might be imposing, and the prospect of invoking his anger had terrified her once, but she'd faced worse—far worse—since she'd first glimpsed him through that closet door.

“He'll suspect something if we stand at the door like this,” Darcy warned, her breath puffing in a small cloud of white.

Isobel vacillated for half a beat longer. Then she stepped into the house.

Her gut tightened with a residual surge of fear as she ventured into the foyer, a series of images flickering through her memory, electrocuting her with the past. The free-floating chandelier. The sheet-covered furniture. The dilapidated stairs. Everything reversed. And the painting on the wall, the one of the storm-tossed—

At the sound of the door clicking shut behind her, Isobel yelped and spun around.

Darcy froze, eyes full of alarm.

“The ship,” Isobel breathed, pressing a hand to her collar and wrapping the hamsa in her fist. “It's gone.”

“Excuse me?” Darcy asked, head tilting.

Isobel pointed at the painting, which had shown only white-capped waves and angry black clouds. Except now the ship had returned.

Lowering her arm, Isobel frowned at the painting. She let go of the charm.

While she'd been in the dreamworld, fighting with Reynolds, she'd seen the same painting come to life. Animated seas had devoured the vessel whole.

“What time is it?” she asked Darcy, the question all but leaping out of her mouth.

“Um, around one. I think.”

“Do you have a watch?” she asked, her anxiety building. “Or a clock?”

Darcy bit her bottom lip, as though refraining from voicing a question. She pointed to the ceiling. “Upstairs. In the office.”

Turning, she crossed to the steps.

Isobel deliberated, shifting from foot to foot. Then she followed.

As she grabbed the banister, she took a moment to will its varnished surface to transform into a boa constrictor. The banister did not respond to her silent command, but this provided less comfort than she'd been hoping for. Especially since, in her periphery, she thought she'd seen someone standing in the parlor.

Could it be that her mind, punch-drunk from the terrors of the other side, had become conditioned to anticipate horrors at every turn?

No. She
was
awake. And now—now it was time to get a grip.

Isobel reached the second floor just as Darcy opened the closest of several doors. Whisking past her, Isobel entered a spacious office.

A pair of cream curtains flanked the room's lone window. Papers, ledgers, and notebooks littered the surface of an enormous oak desk.

While Darcy remained in the hall, presumably to listen for her husband, Isobel made a beeline for the squat, antique windup clock that sat on one corner of the desk. In reaching for it, though, she knocked over a small picture frame.

The image within made her stop cold.

Varen's smooth and serious face stared up at her.

Picking up the photo, Isobel studied the black-and-white image more closely. She could tell by the angle that Varen had snapped the photo himself. In it, he lay against a bed of brittle leaves. He held the camera above, gazing straight into the lens so that his hair fell away from his face, leaving his eyes more naked than she had ever seen them.

Varen's jade irises, Isobel knew, should have appeared pale gray in the photo. But they were black as inkwells.

Pressing her fingers to the glass, Isobel wished so badly that she could reach through the expanse of months separating this moment from the one in which Varen had taken the self-portrait. When
had
he taken it? How long after Lilith had begun to thread herself into his life? How long after she'd started to take control?

Downstairs, the front door slammed.

Ignoring the sound and the silence that followed, Isobel flipped the photo over. The soft
tick-tock
of the desk clock boomed in her ears while she pried the frame open.

Just as she'd suspected, Varen's violet writing blazed against the watermarked paper.

There was no date, though. No lines of looping poetry. Only one word.

Lost,
he'd written in his beautiful and old-world hand.

Isobel shut her eyes, but the word remained, searing bright against the backs of her lids like a neon sign. She wondered where Varen's parents had found the photo. Mixed among his things?

They had to have seen the writing on the back.

Isobel assumed that the cold, stark office belonged to Mr. Nethers; how many times had he glanced at this picture of his own son and not realized that something was horribly wrong? That these eyes were not his son's? Had he even kept the photo on his desk before Varen's disappearance? Somehow, she doubted it.

Something brushed against her leg. Startled, Isobel fumbled against the desk, dropping the frame onto its surface, where it clattered apart.

Whirling, she scanned the floor.

There weren't any bugs filing out in droves. No spindly fingers tipped in claws. No birds. Only Slipper, Varen's Siamese cat.

The creature peered up at Isobel with icy eyes, electric blue against the dark center of her face. Meowing, the feline flashed a pair of sharp white fangs, leaving Isobel to wonder if she'd been issued a plea or a threat.

“You can relax,” Darcy said, shutting the door to an inch. “He's gone.”

Isobel looked up from the cat, meeting the woman's gaze dead-on. “I'm not afraid of him,” she replied. “Though I can tell you are.”

Darcy folded her arms. “He's . . . going through a lot right now. We both are.”

“I guess he was going through a lot that night the two of you came home early from that benefit party too.”

Isobel swallowed hard, both awed and cowed by her own audacity.

But something about the photo of Varen had stirred anger in her. Darcy cared. That much was clear. But it was growing more and more apparent that her reach extended only so far as it was allowed.

“What were you—” Darcy started, but Isobel cut her off.

“You've probably guessed by now that I was here—there. With him in his room.” Isobel flicked her eyes toward the ceiling. “We were doing homework that night you saw me drive away with him. He had put me in the closet almost as soon as he heard the front door open. He . . . was afraid too, I think.”

Darcy drew a shaky breath and let it go. Folding her arms in tighter, she gripped either elbow. “I read the note.”

“I figured,” Isobel said, “since you knew my name.”

And just like that, their conversation had jumped from one uncomfortable track to another.

Slinking between Isobel's ankles, tail unwinding from her calf, Slipper padded to sit in front of the gap in the door.

“I've never known him to say he loved anything,” Darcy began again, eager, it seemed, to stamp out the awkward silence that had settled into the room. “Or anyone. Not even when talking about something like writing or drawing. Not even Slipper.” She gestured loosely to the cat. “Or Bruce.”

Isobel looked up, surprised.

“Varen didn't use that word,” Darcy added in a murmur. “You . . . you must be very special.”

Her words took Isobel aback, though they shouldn't have. After all, it was no secret to her that Varen treated his heart like a vault. He kept so much to himself—practically everything.

Of course, he'd been conditioned to. The less people knew about the things he cared for, yearned for—the less his
father
knew about them—the less likely they were to be stripped away. Or damaged by ridicule.

Keep away,
Varen's exterior had always said. But the black clothing and the sunglasses and the biting sharp tongue had only been part of an elaborate defense system meant to shut everyone out. Somehow Isobel had penetrated through its boundaries. Somehow she would need to do so again.

“Varen is the special one,” Isobel said, plucking the black-and-white picture from its frame.

“Is?” Darcy asked, eyes wide with sudden intensity, filled with equal parts hope and fear.

“I'm not here because of the note,” Isobel began. “I'm here because I need to know . . . about Madeline.”

Darcy's expression changed, hardening with suspicion. “How do you know that name?”

“Varen. He . . . told me she left.”

“He
told
you that?”

“Nothing else. Not even when I asked. Why? What happened?”

“What does she have to do with this?” Darcy asked.

“You
do
know something.”

“Apparently a lot less than you,” Darcy said, her tone sharpening.

“I need to know what happened,” Isobel said.

“And I need to know what you know about Varen's whereabouts. Where did you get that note? When did he give it to you? If you don't start talking now, I'll call the police.”

“Because they've been so much help so far.”

“If you know where he is—”

“
You
know where he is!” Isobel yelled. Catching herself, she lowered her voice again. “You said so yourself this morning.”

Darcy stiffened. Her hands clutched her elbows tighter.

Isobel could tell she wanted to talk, but something was holding her back. It was not the same something that had held her back before, though, that night in Varen's room. Or minutes earlier, when Mr. Nethers had commanded her to post Varen's car. This time, her fear stemmed not from her husband, but from having to admit—no,
accept
—that something more was at work, something she couldn't explain or understand.

“I gave you that note today because I thought it was all over,” Isobel said. “Because I thought you deserved an answer. Confirmation of what you were trying to tell me you already knew. Because I thought you actually care—”

“I
do
care,” Darcy cut in. She pressed her hands to her heart. “
So much
. Joe does too. He's beside himself. This whole thing, it's tearing him apart. It's tearing
us
apart. He just doesn't—he can't—he's—”

“He's what?” Isobel asked. “What excuses him? I mean, besides you.”

Darcy's mouth fell open, but Isobel didn't regret her words. Hadn't Varen once confronted Isobel with a similar inquiry when she'd dismissed Brad's behavior? Hadn't he been right?

“Never mind,” Isobel said, glancing down at the picture. “Just . . . forget it. I should have known better than to come here. It's obvious that you only care about
looking
like you care.”

Isobel left her place by the desk and started for the door, taking the photo with her.

“Madeline lives in Boston,” Darcy blurted.

Isobel stopped short. Slipper stood, fur prickling, ready to shoot through the gap as soon as it opened wide enough.

“She could write or call,” Darcy went on, and Isobel remained rooted, listening without moving. “But she doesn't. She even took on a new legal name. Joe went digging years ago. Before we got married. He doesn't know I know that. But . . . I got worried when he refused to get rid of her piano. I thought he was still holding on to the hope that she might . . . come back one day. So I went through his files. But it's clear Madeline doesn't want to be found. She left them, Isobel. She left both of them without a word. And no word since. That's . . . that's everything. I don't know any more than that.”