Page 38 of Stilettos & Secrets on the 7 Seas

A banging sounded against the wall. “For the love of us humans!” Gertie shouted. “Quiet down. Y’all are wakin’ the dead.”

A mortified giggle escaped from my lips. I looked over at Caiyan. His head rested on the pillow, and dark curls lay damp against his forehead.

“Did she just refer to us as inhuman?”

He propped up on his elbow. “Sunshine, after that round, I’d say we deserve it.”

Shazam!

Fourteen

My outhouse plopped down in a dense thicket of woods parted in the center as a landing area for guests. I’d been to Rogue’s castle in Russia right after theTitanicfiasco but hadn’t jumped in my outhouse. I had no idea the location, so I squirreled the landing coordinates from Campy. As Fredericka’s defender, he knew the exact spot of her secret lair.

Caiyan said Roguegavehim information before he died. He didn’t saytoldhim. After debating those words over my morning coffee, I decided to go straight to the source.

The woods surrounded a small arm of the sea that fed an actual moat around the mountain that supported Rogue’s castle. I guess it would be Fredericka’s castle now, or maybe Sasha’s if she ever returned to our time.

I walked down a pebbled footpath landscaped with pink and white flowers. Electric lanterns spaced along the route hung on hooks, I assumed to guide Rogue home after his clandestine missions carried into the wee hours.

Stopping in the middle of a small footbridge that led over the moat, I leaned back and looked up at the tall, ice cream cone-sculpted towers. Perfect for holding Rapunzel or Princess Fiona or Sleeping Beauty hostage. Crenelated battlements cut along the top of the walls like the lower teeth of the Devil’s hound.

A creepy shiver zinged up my spine and I felt like someone watched me. “Fredericka’s probably hanging from the rafters like a vigilante vampire bat,” I said, taking in the onion-shaped Kremlin dome.

Rogue didn’t use the conventional method of vessels. At least not the kind a traveler could land in a hanger or a meadow. Sasha and Fredericka had twin minisubs that required a water landing platform. Not so easy to travel in like my outhouse, but it suited the Russian sisters.

My shoes clicked on the slate stepstones that circled the tower as I searched for the stairs that led way, way, way up. The side of the mountain opened, an opening cut with such precision that I didn’t see it until Fredericka stood in the doorway wearing dark jeans and a black button-down shirt. The dark eyeliner was missing, and her lips were a clear gloss instead of her normal blood-red lipstick. The Joan Jet haircut had grown out into long, straight strands. It looked good on her.

I sent her a finger wave.

“I saw you land.” Her accent sounded thicker, more pronounced. More Russian, more scary. No doubt a result of living in her homeland these past few months. “To what do I owe a visit from Cowboy Barbie?”

Fredericka got pleasure in punching my buttons. I wouldn’t call us friends. She wouldn’t mind getting her perfectly manicured devil-red claws into Caiyan, and I had issues with that. I wasn’t positive she hadn’t already sunk them into his gorgeous flesh.

I stopped in front of her. “Did you just happen to be staring out the window, or were you perched in the belfry?”

Her mouth twisted into a faint smile. “We have cameras. I thought you might want to ride the elevator, or you could take the stairs?” She motioned toward the massive stone steps that wrapped around the mountain. I grimaced, recalling the many, many steps leading up to the main entrance of the castle.

“That was thoughtful of you.”

It was a smooth ride to the main floor. We didn’t speak, and the silence made me fidget.

The elevator doors opened. She swished past me and continued down a long hallway with cathedral ceilings and Belgian blackstone floors.

I followed her into the grand room with the same stone floors, though covered with plush rugs and layered with leather sofas and tufted cherry armchairs. Rainbows of summer sunshine fell through narrow gothic stained-glass windows framed by thick velvet curtains, warming the room.

Fredericka saw me admiring the windows.

“The castle was built in the late twelfth century to monitor the main trade routes and protect the coastline from invasion.” She extended her arm and made a game show hostess sweep. “This room is the keep. The stronghold of the castle and my grandfather’s favorite. At least, that’s what I read in his journals since I didn’t know him.”

“I remember this room from my last visit.”

“You mean the day I discovered I had a family that the WTF kept from me? The same day my grandfather died and my long-lost twin sister fled with the King’s eye?”

I cringed. OK, maybe I shouldn’t have brought it up.

“Can I get something to drink?” I asked.

“Water, soda, Vodka?” Fredericka motioned toward a leather chair. The wordstaywent unsaid.

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