Page 70 of Curse in the Quarter
The paramedics finally released her with instructions to seek follow-up care if she experienced breathing difficulties. The crowd began to disperse as firefighters contained what remained of the blaze. And Delphine walked straight to where Bastien stood watching the Archive's destruction, her expression demanding answers he wasn't prepared to give.
“We need to talk,” she said quietly. “Now.”
He nodded toward his car, parked beyond the emergency perimeter. “Not here.”
They drove in silence through Quarter streets that felt different now, charged with the aftermath of open conflict. Bastien could feel Delphine studying him, her researcher's mind cataloging details that hadn't registered during the crisis. The way he'd moved through the fire without protective gear. The strange light that had surrounded him in the flames. The impossible fact that he'd emerged without so much as singed clothing.
He parked near Jackson Square, where late-night tourists provided cover for conversations that couldn't happen in private spaces. They walkedto a bench beside the cathedral, surrounded by the comfortable noise of street musicians and fortune tellers conducting their own forms of business with the unexplained.
“Start talking,” Delphine said, settling beside him with the directness he'd always loved about her. “What are you?”
The question cut straight to the heart of everything he'd hidden for twenty-five years. He could maintain the deception, create some explanation that would preserve the careful distance he'd maintained. Or he could trust her with truth that would change her life forever.
“I'm not human,” he said simply. “Haven't been for a very long time.”
She absorbed this with the calm of someone who'd just watched impossible things happen. Quiet for a long moment, she studied his profile in the square's lamplight. “The fire tonight. It wasn't an accident.”
“No. Someone sent it specifically for you. Someone who wants to hurt me by hurting the people I care about.”
“And you care about me.” It wasn't a question.
“Yes.”
“Why?” She turned to face him directly, her dark eyes searching his face for answers. “We barely know each other. I mean, Ithoughtwe barely knew each other. But the way you looked at me in the Archive that first day . . . like you'd seen a ghost.”
The opening was there, perfect for telling her everything. About Charlotte, about Delia, about love that had survived death and reincarnation and over a century of careful waiting. But looking at her face in the lamplight—alive, unhurt, trusting him with questions that proved her courage—he couldn't bring himself to burden her with the weight of lives she couldn't remember.
“It's complicated,” he said instead. “Your family hasconnections to things that go back generations. People I knew a long time ago. And those connections put you in danger from forces that most people never have to worry about.”
“What kind of forces?”
“The kind that summon fire keyed to specific bloodlines. The kind that see human lives as tools to be used in games that span lifetimes.” He met her gaze steadily. “The kind that won't stop until they get what they want.”
Delphine absorbed this with the same calm she'd shown throughout the conversation. “And what do they want?”
“You. Specifically you, for reasons that go back to your family's history with magic that should have stayed buried.” He reached into his jacket and withdrew the locket, its silver surface catching streetlight. “This belonged to your ancestor. Charlotte Lacroix. She created it as part of experiments that have consequences we're still dealing with today.”
She took the locket, her fingers closing around metal that had been crafted to recognize her touch across lifetimes. “I felt something when I touched this before. Like it was . . . alive.”
“In a sense, it is. Charlotte embedded part of herself into its creation. And that part has been waiting for someone like you to complete what she started.”
“Someone like me, or me specifically?”
The question hit closer to truth than he was prepared to address. “I'm not sure there's a difference.”
She opened the locket, studying the miniature portrait inside with growing recognition. “This woman . . . she looks like me.”
“Family resemblance.”
“More than that.” Delphine's voice carried new intensity. “She looks exactly like me. Same eyes, same bone structure, same everything. That's not normal family resemblance, Bastien. That's . . . something else.”
She was too intelligent, too observant, too trained in recognizing patterns that others missed. The partial truth he'd offered wasn't going to satisfy her for long.
“What aren't you telling me?” she asked, and her tone suggested she already suspected the answer would change everything.
Before he could respond, his phone buzzed with a text from an unknown number.
Unknown:
