Summoning the Night (Arcadia Bell #2)(78)

Tears welled. I couldn’t stop them. I was shaky and exhausted and I wanted to crawl into a hole and die. But I couldn’t. I had to fix things. I needed to get home, or someplace private, where I could try to summon Duke Chora again. If he was riding someone right now, and if Bishop had been telling the truth about the possessions being timed and temporary, then maybe I could summon him in a few hours. At dawn. A long shot, but it was all I had.

“This is a disaster,” Dare said, looking between me and Lon. “And tomorrow is Halloween night, so let me tell you what’s going to happen. All of the remaining kids are going to be locked up in a room inside my house at noon. I’m putting a hundred armed guards inside and outside that room. And tomorrow night, I’m going to send a hundred more people to patrol the streets of La Sirena. The two of you are going to help them. And you’re not going to sleep until you bring me back every single one of the missing kids, and Merrin’s head on a f*cking pike.”

Lon and I said nothing. Mark Dare turned and shook his head as he walked back to the police officers near the float. His father marched toward me until he stood an inch away. I tried to step back, but he got in my face and spoke in an angry whisper—“I am not happy”—so close I could feel his hot breath on my face. “You have failed me, and you are now mine. I own you. You will spend the rest of your life repaying me for the lives that have been stolen from my community under your watch.”

My heart was beating so fast I thought it might break through my chest. I could hear Lon behind Dare, telling him to leave me alone, but his voice might as well been a mile away.

Dare’s head dropped lower. He spoke directly in my ear. “A lifetime of service. I own you now. Me, Ambrose Dare, and the Hellfire Club, not your occult order, the E∴E∴ Do you understand me . . . Sélène Duval?”

My skin grew cold. My pulse was faster than a hummingbird’s wings. The sound of the crowd receded. There was nothing but Dare’s voice in my ear, even as it lowered to the barest whisper: “I know who you are now.”

Halloween.

Our busiest night at the bar, and I wouldn’t be there. Kar Yee wasn’t happy. Neither was Jupe as he dumped Mr. Piggy’s crate on my coffee table late that afternoon and shrugged his backpack off his shoulder. “Worst birthday, ever,” he grumbled.

I had to agree. I pocketed my phone and ran a hand through the back of Jupe’s frizzy hair. Foxglove’s sleek black form trotted around my living room, sniffing every corner and cataloging all the strange scents that her keen Lab nose encountered; it was her first visit here. Last night after the parade disaster, Lon and I drove back to La Sirena and took turns checking on Jupe while he slept. Today we made a new plan and filled the SUV like Noah’s Ark, loading up every person and beast, minus the Holidays, and drove here to my place.

I hadn’t slept or eaten. My stomach was still twisted in knots from an attempted summoning earlier in the day. Two attempted summonings, actually, both of them failures. Chora didn’t appear, which meant that he wasn’t in the Æthyr during the daytime. Merrin had lied. Big surprise. I wondered if he really had an Æthyric spell that could call Chora on this plane, or if that was just a lie, too.

When I caught my reflection in the window, I couldn’t believe it was me. Then again, maybe I didn’t recognize myself because I didn’t really know who I was anymore. Sélène was supposed to be buried in my past, along with my dead parents. The only connection I had to that life was through E∴E∴, and that was minimal at best these days.

Hadn’t I suffered enough? I just wanted it all to go away. I wanted a nice, normal life. No Moonchild, no FBI, no serial-killer parents. No looking over my shoulder and being constantly afraid. But Dare wouldn’t let that happen now.

“Trick-or-treating is banned throughout the entire county? How can that be legal?” Jupe complained.

Lon ignored him. “There are too many windows in here. The house ward will keep Merrin from coming inside, but it won’t stop a bullet if he shoots through the window.”

“Your place has twice as much glass,” I argued.

“Either way, I’m not going to Dare’s house,” Jupe said as he opened the door to Mr. Piggy’s crate and pulled out the hedgehog. “No way. I hate all those kids. I’m not gonna sit around in some rich guy’s panic room all night like a sitting duck.”

“I already told you that you didn’t have to,” Lon said. “He can kiss my ass.”

“Good,” Jupe said. “Besides, Foxglove will warn us if anything comes. If she can see ghosts, she can see anything.”

Lon smoothed a thumb down one side of his mustache. “We could leave town. We’ve got a good four, five hours of daylight left.”

“You know I can’t do that,” I said. “And I don’t want you and Jupe to be unprotected halfway down the coast. We stick to our plan—you stay here with Jupe, and I’m going to get far away from both of you and meet up with Dare’s people.”

“And then what? I know you’re planning something.”

I darted a glance at Jupe.

“Go to the kitchen,” Lon said. “Cady and I need to talk in private.”

“I can hear you in the kitchen,” Jupe argued. “It’s still daytime. I’ll just go outside.”