Underworld (22 page)

I
opened my eyes. Just like before, it took me a few seconds to remember why the light filtering through my bedroom curtains looked so unfamiliar. It was because I wasn’t in my bedroom.

This time when I turned my head and saw the boy in bed next to me, I didn’t freak out … at least until I saw the book he was reading.

I sat up … too fast. I sank back down against the pillows, putting a hand over my eyes.

“Headache?” John asked. His tone was solicitous, but also a little … something else. I couldn’t tell what.

I nodded. I didn’t really have a headache. I had actually slept dreamlessly and amazingly well.

But I thought I might
get
a headache soon if we had to discuss the book in his hands.

“Here,” he said, and I looked between my fingers to see what he was offering me.

A cup and saucer. I sat up, more slowly this time.

The cup contained hot tea with milk. I took it from him and sipped, keeping a careful eye on him.

“How are you?” he asked.

“I’m fine,” I said. I noticed that he’d already showered. His hair was damp. He had on a fresh new shirt and pair of jeans. He’d even put on his boots.

I, on the other hand, was still wearing my white dress. It had never been intended for use as a nightgown, and was scandalously wrinkled. He had the distinct advantage over me, lookswise.

Hoping to change the subject from the book, which I feared he wasn’t going to let go — it was a conversation I knew we had to have. I just wasn’t prepared to have it before breakfast — I asked in a too-bright voice, “Off to sort the dead?”

“To get Frank,” he said.

“Oh,” I said. I’d forgotten all about Frank. “Well, tell him hi from me. I hope he had fun with Kayla.”

He held up the book. Rats.

“Where did you get this?” he asked, his voice hard as stone.

“Where did
you
get it?” I countered. It was always better to go on the offensive than be on the defensive. “I believe that was in my bag, my personal property, and you removed it. You should know better than to —”

“I believe part of
cohabitation
means that what is mine is yours and what is yours is mine, as you proved yesterday when you went through every single one of my personal belongings while I was at work. Or is that not how you found your bag in the first place?” he asked.

I took another sip of tea while I considered how to reply. He completely had me.

“Mr. Smith gave it to me,” I said, finally deciding it was best to go with the truth.

“Mr. Smith,” he said, scowling. “I should have known.”

“Yes,” I said. “You should have. What was that about last night, with Patrick and the pomegranates?”

Some of the color left his face. “I thought you knew,” he said.

“Of course not,” I said. “You made us leave before I got to find out.”

“You said last night” — he took the teacup from me and swiftly downed its contents, as if he needed quick sustenance, then set the cup aside — “that you understood the consequences.”

“There won’t
be
any consequences from last night,” I said. “Life can’t grow in a place of death. I checked with Mr. Smith.”

“
That’s
what you meant?” He looked even paler.

“Well, of course. What did
you
mean?”

He opened his mouth, but no sound came out. He kept his gaze glued to the book in his hands. He looked as if he’d been punched in the gut.

“John.” Anxiety gripping me, as much due to his expression as his silence, I rose to my knees. “What sort of consequences did
you
mean? And what did Patrick mean when he said it was all right to eat whatever I wanted? When I told you the exact same thing yesterday, you said I was —”

I saw that some color had come back into his cheeks, and I realized something amazing: He was blushing. “I know,” he interrupted. “I know what I said yesterday. But I didn’t want you to think you could leave if … well, if things didn’t turn out well between us. All I wanted was for you to give me a chance. I thought if you felt you
had
to stay because the Fates had decreed it, then you would. That’s how badly I wanted you to stay. I lied.” He stared down at the book in his hands. “I realize now it was the wrong thing to do. But you hadn’t even given it twenty-four hours, and you already wanted to go —”

“I wanted to take things at my own pace,” I reminded him. “Not
leave
. Those aren’t the same thing, John.”

“I understand that,” he said. He lifted his tortured gaze. “
Now.
And I’m sorry. If it means anything, I honestly
did
think you knew. And I felt sick for lying to you. I wanted to tell you, lots of times. But I just … couldn’t. And when we got to your mother’s house, and I could see how much you missed her and wanted to stay there, I almost … I … but when it came down to it, I couldn’t let you go. I was almost glad when your grandmother showed up,” he added, with some of his old wild ferocity. “It gave me a good excuse to take you away again.”

I knew I should have been horribly angry with him … and a part of me was.

But there was another part of me that wanted to laugh at his masculine bullheadedness, though I restrained myself, not feeling laughter would be the appropriate response.

“I forgive you,” I said gravely. “This time. But I can’t believe you did something so awful. You’d better never do it again. Honestly, I expected better behavior from a lord of the dead. Especially when I’ve told you so many times that it’s you I want, no matter where you are.”

His expression of a dog that had been beaten too many times by its owner began to fade. Now a hopeful look dawned upon his face.

“John,” I said, reaching out to caress his cheek. “I don’t need some silly rule to make me stay and try to work things out with you. I’ll always do that, because I love you.”

It was sad that this was something that seemed to be news to him.

“Do you mean it?” he asked, reaching up to grasp my hand, an eager light glowing in his eyes.

“Of course I do,” I said, smiling.

“Good.” He held up
A History of the Isle of Bones
. “So did you read this?”

I lowered my hand from his face. We may have just shared an important moment in our relationship, but I apparently wasn’t going to be let off the hook about that stupid book.

“Parts of it,” I confessed. “The parts about the
Liberty
.”

He flinched as if I’d struck him. The light in his eyes died.

“So,” he said. “You know the truth about the man I killed. He was my father.”

The color in his cheeks had fled once again, leaving them pale. There were shadows under his eyes I hadn’t noticed before, and his lips were pressed together tightly.

“Yes,” I said, feeling as if the word were being wrung out of me.

“I guess you know now why I didn’t want to talk about it,” he said, lowering his gaze. “It’s a shameful thing. Have you known all along?”

I shrugged. “That he was your father? Just since last night. But I always knew you must have had your reasons. You said he was a monster. That’s what you said about your family.” I kept my gaze on the front cover of the book. “All except your mother.”

“I hated the way he treated her,” John said. “The only times I ever remember her being happy was when he was away at sea, and that was when I was very young. After I got older, he ruined that, too, by forcing me to go with him on his voyages, so I barely saw her. She was his second wife. He drove his first to an early grave with his” — he glanced at me, and said, looking embarrassed — “philandering and drunkenness.”

I think he’d have chosen less polite words if he’d been speaking to a man.

“Oh,” I said, in a small voice. I knew my family wasn’t perfect, but I was realizing how lucky I was to have them … Grandma notwithstanding.

“The sons he had by his first wife,” John went on, “they were no better than he was. I was the only
son
employed at Hayden and Sons, though I had three older brothers. My father never forced any of them to work at the family business. They were too brilliant at spending all its profits — on women and cards, as it turns out. I realized someone had to support my mother, or she’d end up in the poorhouse. They don’t have those now, but they were terrible places they sent people, primarily women and children, who couldn’t support themselves. The
Liberty
was the only ship my father hadn’t managed to lose to my brothers’ creditors. Can you understand any of this, Pierce?”

I nodded, swallowing hard against the lump forming in my throat. He looked so ashamed.

“I didn’t even realize we were carrying the Persephone Diamond” — he ran a finger along it, and I shivered as his skin touched mine — “until my father showed it to me when we were already on our way to Havana. One of my brothers had won it in a card game, and found a buyer for it in Isla Huesos. Very convenient, since we could drop it off on our way back to England. I didn’t like the plan, but there was nothing I could do about it once we were out to sea. I knew the necklace was probably stolen, but I had no idea from where, or what it was worth. I certainly didn’t know it was …” He paused.

“Cursed?” I offered, my voice croaky because of my unshed tears.

“It isn’t cursed,” John said deliberately, rearranging the chain around my neck, “if you’re wearing it. It’s blessed. It wasn’t until we were halfway from Havana to Isla Huesos that I found out my father had hatched his own little scheme, with William Rector —”

I raised my eyebrows at the name.

“Yes,” John said grimly. “Of the famed Rector family. My father had contacted Rector, and agreed purposefully to wreck the
Liberty
on the reef —”

This I didn’t understand. “Wreck his own boat?
Why?
”

“It was done,” John said, his tone bitter. “Not often, but there were rumors. Captains would wreck their own ships, pretend it was an accident, then split the salvage award — they could make thousands more in one night than they could in
years
at sea. They’d arrange the site of the so-called accident with a particular wrecker in advance. Most often, no one was wiser.”

“Like an insurance scam,” I said.

John nodded. “My father was in debt to his ears. The
Liberty
was a new ship, a good one. Her hull could take a good ramming, and recover. But most important, he could pocket the Persephone Diamond and claim it was lost at sea. No one would ever know the difference, including my brother … and the buyer.”

“Steal from his own son? Oh, John.” My heart went out to him.

He shook his head. “No, Pierce,” he said. “The necklace isn’t why we fought … or why he died. I didn’t care about any of that. My father could have taken that necklace and disappeared forever and I’d have wished him well. It was the fact that he was going to put the
Liberty
, and her crew, at risk, all for the sake of a few extra thousand dollars … that I couldn’t allow.
Henry
was on that ship, Pierce. Little Henry, and three dozen other men, including Frank, and Mr. Graves, and Mr. Liu. What if something happened to them? What if something went wrong? Ramming a ship purposefully into a rock isn’t ever the best idea, but it was October … October is never a good month in that strait. Those waters are churning, hot from the long summer. Storms can come sweeping in from nowhere.”

I remembered my dream. A storm
had
come sweeping in … and John had been the one lost in it forever.

“I begged my father not to go through with it. I knew Rector. One of the only obligations a wrecker has is to rescue the crew first, cargo second. But Rector would sooner have let a crew drown than risk losing a single bale of cotton, especially if they were selling high. Never mind what would happen if it was proven in court that Hayden and Sons had colluded to sink its own cargo. The business would be ruined forever. But I saw the gleam in my father’s eye.” John’s own eyes grew hard at the memory. “So we fought. Things got violent, as they often did with him, because he was a drinker. This time, for the first time, I fought back … and he lost. But it turned out most of the crew was as greedy as my father — which makes sense, since he hired them — and wanted to continue with the wrecking scheme. And you know the rest.”

“But the
Liberty
wasn’t wrecked,” I said. “It made it into port.”

“Because when that storm whipped up, there was only one man who was a good enough navigator to strand it without killing half the men on board.” His grin was rueful. “And they’d tossed him overboard. The men who were for the wrecking scheme decided not to go through with it.”

“John, I’m so sorry,” I said. “No wonder you hate the Rectors so much.”

“They’re bottom-feeders,” he said, the grin vanishing. “They’ve always preyed on the weak and helpless, taking advantage of those who can’t help themselves. My father and William Rector were hateful men who were blind to everyone else’s needs but their own —”

He was interrupted by a muffled chime. It sounded, of all things, like the ring of a cell phone.

“What was
that
?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” John said, looking as bewildered as I was. The tone sounded again, just as urgently. “It sounds like it’s coming from …”

He bent down, then found my book bag on the floor. He lifted it to the bed. The chime rang again, this time sounding much closer.

“That’s my cell phone,” I said, finally recognizing the tone. I grabbed my bag and began rifling through it.

“Pierce,” John said. “That’s not possi —”

I pulled out the phone as it was ringing for a fourth time. “Yes,” I said to him, irritated. “It
is
possible, if you’re the queen of the Underworld. I get special privileges. Haven’t you noticed by now?” The screen said
Unknown Caller
. I pressed the green OK button. “Hello?”