The Paris Mysteries (Confessions #3)(9)

I stuffed my laptop into my backpack and followed the headmaster down the hall, through a set of double doors, and out to the gym, with its high echoey ceilings and hardwood floors.

I saw them immediately.

There, between workout mats and weights, were my little brother, Hugo, and another kid, who was bigger and older and was curled into a fetal position on the floor. Hugo’s fists were cocked, and the boy on the floor was bloody and crying.

Hugo shouted the second he saw me.

“This punk said we killed Malcolm and Maud. I told him to take it back. Or else. He wouldn’t do it, Tandy.”

The weird, maybe scared looks from my classmates made some kind of sense now. They thought we were killers. A nurse and a doctor ran toward the moaning kid on the floor, and then Harry drifted in and, in no particular hurry, came over to me.

“Whassup,” said my twin brother.

His pupils were huge, and he had a dopey expression on his face. What the hell?

I whispered, “Harry. Are you stoned?”

“Sit over there,” said Monsieur Avignon, pointing to some folding chairs. “Monsieur Perlman is coming now.”

Oh, crap. We were really in for it now.





Jacob stood in the center of the parlor and looked at us with the hard eyes of a commando. When his expression was cold, it meant that under the surface, he was ripping mad, and oh, man, I do not like it when Jacob is mad.

The three of us had sunk down in square leather chairs, Harry and I guilty by association with Hugo because we’d taken a stand. If Hugo had to leave the International Academy, we’d all go with him.

And Hugo was defiant.

“You can’t expect me to let people accuse us of murdering Malcolm and Maud,” our little brother said. “Uncle Jake, would you take that?”

“I don’t expect you to throw the first punch, Hugo. I don’t expect you to bait other people into throwing the first punch, either.”

“When you’ve been insulted, the first punch is a technicality,” said Hugo. “And I’m not apologizing to that shit, even if his father is the king of France.”

“Hugo. All of you. You just don’t get it. Your inheritance is conditional on good behavior. Monsieur Delavergne used his contacts to get you into that school, and now, Hugo, you thanked him by pooping in the punch bowl.”

Hugo cracked up. He started repeating, “I pooped in the punch bowl,” until he was rolling on the floor with tears in his eyes. Before Jacob seized him by the belt and the back of his neck, I jumped to my feet.

“Define ‘disgrace,’ Jacob, because I don’t get that. Or is it in the fine print of page one thousand forty-three of that document I signed?”

“Sit down, Tandy.”

“I prefer to stand.”

“Sit. Down.”

I sighed. I threw myself back down into the chair and looked up at him like, “What?”

“You want me to define ‘disgrace’? If that boy’s parents go to the media or hire a lawyer, you can bet that’s a disgrace. I have one vote, kids. One vote. If you don’t get yourselves under control, you’re not going to like the repercussions.”

Harry said, “Maybe we could make the problem disappear, Jacob. If Hugo apologizes, could you ask Monsieur Avignon to give us another chance? If he takes us back, no problem, right? I liked the school.”

“Of course you did. You bought marijuana outside the front door, and, Harry, that’s not only a disgrace, it’s a crime.”

“Oh. Monsieur Morel told you. You’re spying on us?” Harry said. “I’d call that disgraceful, Jake.”

“Go to your rooms,” our uncle said. “Leave your phones on the kitchen table. I’m disconnecting the Wi-Fi.”

Hugo shouted, “Nooooooooo!”

Jacob gave me a look that made me feel like a bug. A small bug. About to be squashed. He said, “And by the way, Tandy, don’t go into my pockets again.”

Jacob went on, “You’re all grounded. Think of this house as lockup until I find a school that will take you.”

The three of us left the parlor. In disgrace.

I had no plans to leave the house. After this, I wouldn’t dare, but as I slunk off to my room, I had no idea that before morning, I would be taking a trip into the past. And in the process, I would get one of the greatest shocks of my life.





I have to prepare you for something I wasn’t prepared for myself.

I never expected to run into the ghost of my dead sister.

The night we were kicked out of school was a waking nightmare. I couldn’t sleep for thinking about Gram Hilda’s stiff-necked lawyers and bankers, who looked unforgiving and vengeful.

I thought about Hugo’s incorrigible fighting, and then Harry buying dope right outside school. It wasn’t exactly the action of a casual smoker. And the worst for me, personally, was Jacob’s disappointment in me for filching that key.

The three of us had been awful. Jacob didn’t deserve that, and we all knew it.

I stared at the canopy for hours. I was sweaty and pissed off at myself and beyond restless, and at just after midnight, when I couldn’t lie in bed for another minute, I got up, put on my Converse, and grabbed a flashlight.

I wasn’t going to borrow any keys, but I was determined to map out my grandmother’s house from the basement to her attic atelier. This was partly my house. So what could possibly be wrong with taking a stroll?