Banishing the Dark (Arcadia Bell #4)(61)

“Oh, no. It was after the boy died that I saw them next,” she said, leaning back in her chair with her juice can. “Imagine my surprise when I bumped into them at Gifts of the Magi.”

Jupe glanced between Grandma Vega and Leticia.

“A magical supply shop on the highway between Morella and La Sirena,” Leticia explained. “It closed down a few years ago when the owner died.”

“Got it,” Jupe said. “So, wait, they were here in the area? Were they visiting the lodge in Morella?”

Leticia’s grandmother slurped the last of her juice and shook her head. “That was the surprise. If they were on official business, they’d be staying in Morella at the lodge. It has guest rooms for traveling dignitaries. Makes it easier when other members come down from San Francisco or if the caliph visited, may the gods rest his soul.” She kissed her hexagram pendant in tribute.

“So if they weren’t visiting the lodge on official business, why were they here?”

“They had a winter home in La Sirena.”

Jupe frowned. “Are you sure we’re talking about the same Duvals? They’re from Florida.”

“Enola and Alexander,” she said, grunting as she pushed herself out of the recliner. She shuffled across the room to a bookshelf and removed a worn photo album before plunking it down on the coffee table. “Where is it . . . ?” She paged through thick black sheets of old photographs affixed with paper corners. “Here we are. Mrs. Pendleton took this of us—she was the Gifts of the Magi owner who died a few years back. That’s me, in the middle.”

Jupe squinted at a three-by-five photograph taken inside the magical supply shop. He recognized the Duvals instantly from pictures in the true-crime books he’d read about the Black Lodge murders. They looked uncomfortable and were flanking a much younger Grandma Vega, who was smiling from ear to ear.

She tapped the photo with a long fingernail. “They made me promise to keep their winter home hush-hush because they were busy writing a book and didn’t want people from the order popping over and interrupting them. Understandable, of course. And I kept my word.”

Jupe leaned closer to read the squiggly handwriting on the bottom of the photo: “The Duvals, January 1989.” Crap! That was the year Cady was born . . . only, she was born October 1. He knew, because her driver’s license had her fake birthday, but she’d told him her real birthday back when she first started dating his dad. Jupe counted backward from October 1. Nine months would be January, the same time her parents were here in La Sirena. What did this all mean?

“Hold on,” he said. “They spent January 1989 here in La Sirena. That’s what you’re saying?”

“Yes, but that was only the first year, right after they’d bought the winter home. They came back the very next winter solstice with their new daughter, the Moonchild. She was only three months old, I believe. I was the first person outside the main lodge to see her in person,” she said proudly.

Cady! She’d seen Cady as a baby. This was crazy. Jupe’s mind was speeding off in ten different directions at once. He’d come here expecting to get some information on summoning a demon and ended up uncovering something Cady herself didn’t even know. “So you saw them twice? In 1989 and 1990?”

“And every winter after that. They wrote their books here because it was peaceful,” the old woman said. “They usually came by themselves, especially after their daughter got older. But every year around the holidays, I’d have breakfast with them at that vegetarian diner near the farmer’s market. Well, that is, until they died in that terrible car accident with their daughter seven years ago.”

She chuckled to herself and closed the photograph album. “You know, I could’ve sworn I’d seen them last year at a gas station on the north end of Ocean Avenue, but Leticia’s mama said that was impossible. And she was right, of course. Can’t see dead people, can you? My eyes aren’t what they once were.”

Santo mierda.

I was dreaming about shrimp again. This time, Lon was showing me how to catch them with a fishing pole in a stream. But while he was struggling to reel one in, I walked away and found myself in a strangely familiar field. Tall grass. Wildflowers. And standing in the middle of it with her back to me was a tall, leggy woman with graying hair.

A terrible anxiety came over my dream body.

The woman turned around and smiled triumphantly. “Ma petite lune. You are awake.”

Snapping out of sleep, I tumbled off the bed in a cold sweat. Several panicked moments ticked by as I jerked my head around, looking for my mother in the shadows, unsure of where I was. Or when it was . . .

Twentynine Palms. The cheap motel. Two in the afternoon.

Daytime. The safe time to sleep. So that was only a dream. Right? I pushed off the floor and looked at Lon. He was stretched out on the bed, softly snoring. His halo was still healthy. But when my gaze slipped over the rumpled sheet, I found the problem.

I’d forgotten to charge the ward.

No protection. I had slept without any protection, and now my mother knew I was no longer in a coma. Worse, she’d managed to tap into my dreams during the daytime.

Mad at myself and scared, I sat on the floor next to the bed and wilted into a shaking mess. My breathing quickened. It didn’t take long before I was hyperventilating and nauseated. I stuck my head between my knees and tried to count myself into a calmer state. The mattress creaked. A warm hand smoothed across my shoulders as Lon settled on the floor beside me.