Page 18 of Dead Wrong

“We need to identify the trigger from the first incident,” Bastien said, moving till he was all I could see.

“It wasn’t anything special,” I admitted, thinking back. “I was just looking at the roses.”

“But it was a place you’d been before,” Bastien confirmed. “That’s what drew you down. Try looking around again. Let your mind wander till you’ve found something to latch on to.”

I did as I was asked, though not without a touch of skepticism. I allowed my mind to drift as I turned in place, taking in my surroundings. We were standing in the center of the gardens now, flanked by hedge walls on either side of the path. Topiaries broke the sidewalk at regular intervals, each meticulously shaped into unique characters or objects of striking detail. A green knight stood closest, its helmet and armor seamlessly sculpted from twisting branches and verdant leaves. Further down the path, a dragon rose up above the scenery, wings of scarlet leaves stretched toward the sky and a maw of sharp, thorny teeth.

“Nothing feels familiar,” I confessed after a moment.

“Then we’ll keep moving,” Bastien replied, staying close by. Even though he wasn’t touching me, through the aura wrapped around us, I was under the near-constant barrage of sensations radiating off of him—pulsing their way down the thread.

The sweet smell of coffee. The dulcet tones of wind chimes. The calming comfort of a blanket warmed by the fireside.

Shaking off the fuzziness, I started down the sidewalk in the direction of the looming building, feeling more like a disgruntled tour guide with every step as Bastien and Lorelei fell in line behind me.

Even though I was supposed to be letting my mind wander over the landscape, I couldn’t help but be drawn back to Bastien, a moth to the flame of his magnetism. Did he notice the way my eyes kept drifting over him? He paused by another topiary—a full-figured woman holding a tipped urn that spilled clean water into the pond at her feet—and my gaze lingered on the way the light seemed to bend around the contours of Bastien’s body. Like even the sunlight wanted to embrace him.

I halted my steps, squinting to make sure I wasn’t hallucinating. The light reallywasbending around Bastien. Darkening above, the sun’s light was extinguished, and torches illuminated the pathway once again with flickering green light as we sunk into the folds of my memory.

Lorelei hastened to my side, her heels now muted against the pavement. “Is this it?”

I nodded as Bastien joined us, and a faceless shadow emerged in my periphery. Before I could speak, my body went rigid, limbs seizing, then propelling me forward on the path. The others hurried after me, keeping stride with the forced pace. One of the faceless shadows—this one in a billowing dress—materialized in front of me, my hand raising to meet theirs.

Layers of black smoke peeled away from the figure, revealing Lynette’s pale face.

Lorelei and Bastien sucked in a synched breath.

“There you are,” murmured Lorelei, closing the gap between us as if she feared Lynette would slip away again.

“So, you’re coming tonight, right?” Lynette asked, dragging me along behind her as she weaved around more faceless figures. “To Amelia’s.”

A groan built in my throat. “Why does that dullard always get to play hostess? She’s so plain it hurts. A rice cake has more personality.”

“Because she is a dear friend,” Lynette reminded me, a twinge of attitude creeping into her voice. “And I do think that you’d find tonight’s activitiesveryentertaining.”

I felt my posture straighten as I placed a hand over my chest in a dramatic flair. “A thousand apologies, but I’m afraid I must decline. I’m dreadfully busy tonight, so you’ll have to enjoy the blandness of Amelia’s all by your lonesome.”

Lynette snorted a laugh. “You’re an awful liar, Tobias.”

Lorelei made a choking sound to my right.

“At least when you’re lying to me,” Lynette continued. “You should know that by now.”

And maybe I did know it once, this connection between Lynette and I that made it impossible to hide the truth from one another. Why was it then, looking back at this memory, that I ignored the shadow of something darker behind my sister’s smile?

What was she hiding?

“Fine, but if she brings out those hideous dolls of hers, I will gnaw off my own arm if it means escape.”

“Who is she talking about?” Lorelei asked, her voice echoing over Lynette’s chatter as she continued to pull me toward the looming stone building.

“Amelia VanDoughten,” I answered, my voice reverberating against the shadows that lurked in the periphery. A dull ache thrummed behind my eyes, but I dismissed it as merely a strain from my concentration. “She’s one of Lynette’s oldest friends. Another Adored nepo-socialite.”

Lorelei nodded, her lips pursing into a straight line as she scribbled a note, muttering to herself. It sounded like she was shoring up the timeline. So far, she didn’t seem surprised by anything discussed between me and Lynette. Maybe she was better informed than I had first thought.

We reached the bottom of a long stone staircase leading up to the pavilion attached to the stone building that overlooked the gardens. Lynette hesitated at the bottom stair, and her attention pulled to a recess tucked between the pavilion’s support pillars where a tall, handsome gentleman lurked, his dark eyes trained on us.

Familiarity pawed at my mind as I watched the man, but between Lorelei’s muttering and the throbbing ache in my head, it was hard to focus long enough to figure out why. The angles of the man’s face and his stern posture stuck out like the details of a long-forgotten dream. His hair—the color of crimson autumn leaves streaked with strands of white sunlight—was pulled back tight from his face, his thin frame lending itself to a life lived in libraries and his complexion to hours spent indoors. He was dressed in finery like the rest of the guests, a tunic of pale blue complete with a golden half-cape draped across one shoulder and down the small of his back. But it was his eyes that held my attention, two dark orbs that drank up the light around them, drawing you in like the hypnotic stare of a viper.

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