Book of Horrors (Nightmare Hall) (4 page)

Debrah’s mouth fell open. Lilith said softly, “Wow, you’re kidding!” and Jude’s face turned scarlet.

With envy? Reed wondered. Or anger?

Link didn’t congratulate her. Instead, he frowned. “I didn’t know she had a son.”

Reed repressed a grin. Link was so transparent. Last night he’d done her this wonderful favor by telling her about the job opening, and now he was regretting it because McCoy had a good-looking son.

“Not a lot of people do,” Rain told Link. “But I think, therefore I am.”

“What?” Clearly, Link had never heard of the philosopher Descartes.

Reed didn’t laugh. It would have been too insulting to Link.

Link put a proprietary arm around Reed’s shoulders. “Your mother isn’t going to work Reed too hard, is she?”

Any second now, Reed thought dryly, he’s going to grab me by my hair and drag me off to his cave.

“No. I don’t think so.”

“Good. Can’t have my girl getting overworked. She has to save some energy for
me.”
Then he added something that Reed wasn’t prepared for. “So,” he said to Rain, “you have any idea where Carl might be? Carl Nordstrum, your mother’s ex-assistant? No one’s seen him. Anywhere.”

“He left without giving notice,” Reed said quickly. She smiled at Rain and added conspiratorially, “Good help is so hard to find these days.”

“There are rumors,” Link persisted.

Reed’s smile widened. The woman was famous and she lived in a secluded house in a grove of pine trees, and when she went to town, she took her black mynah with her. Of
course
there were rumors. But to humor Link, she said, “What kind of rumors?”

“I think we should table this discussion,” he said, his eyes on Rain, “until later. Come to Vinnie’s with us. We’ll talk about it there.”

“No, that’s okay,” Rain said quickly. “I’ve heard all the rumors. You’re not telling me anything I don’t already know. Like, my mother can’t keep help because she’s nuts. Like, people quit because she throws screaming tantrums. And then there’s the one that says our house is haunted. Strange noises, rattling chains, the whole bit. That’s my favorite. It’s hers, too.”

“Your mother
knows
about the stories?” Reed asked him.

He nodded. “Sure. We joke about them. People have been telling stories about my mother since her first book came out. I was six years old, and the kids at school started teasing me about her. Some parents would tell their kids she had to be crazy to write the kind of books she writes. So there were stories.

“After a while, I got used to it. Then she became rich and famous and the stories eased up a little. But they’re still around. Now, we just laugh about it.”

There was an edge to Link’s voice as he said, “So you don’t think there’s anything weird about Carl Nordstrum suddenly not showing up in class or at his dorm?”

A light flurry of snowflakes had begun to fall. “I don’t know anything
about
Carl Nordstrum,” Rain said. “Once my mother’s assistants leave, I don’t keep up with where they go next. None of my business.” To Reed, he said, “Listen, I’ve got to get going. Thanks for taking the job. You’re not starting until Monday, right?”

Reed nodded. She had asked for weekends off. McCoy had frowned and said, “But
I
work weekends!” Reed had stood her ground. Weekends were for finishing up essays and other assignments, for doing laundry and running errands in town to pick up toothpaste or pantyhose or looseleaf, and in the evenings, for movies, parties, dances. Weekends were playtime. She wasn’t willing to give that up, not even for Victoria McCoy.

And since tomorrow was Friday, there hadn’t seemed much point in working just the one day, so they’d agreed on Monday as a good starting point.

“See you then,” Rain said, and waving a casual good-bye, turned in the direction of the communications building.

Reed watched him stride away, shoulders slightly hunched, long legs rapidly covering the ground feathered with fresh snowflakes. She was about to turn away when something in the sky above Rain’s head caught her attention.

Something black. Circling overhead.

The black object made no sound, but as the snow began to thicken, blurring Reed’s view, she thought she saw glossy black wings flapping.

“Why don’t you cut chem and come to Vinnie’s with us?” Link urged. “I’m “starving. It’ll be fun walking while it’s snowing. C’mon.”

Reed’s eyes remained fixed on the black object in the sky, which seemed to be swooping closer to the science building. It wouldn’t kill her to cut chem, but Lilith and Debrah and Jude were visibly pouting, mad at her for stealing that job out from under their noses. How much fun could eating an early lunch with them be right now?

But she did want to hear all about the McCoy rumors Link had mentioned. And she
was
hungry.

She turned.

In the sky overhead, the black object turned, too.

It turned toward Reed.

A
HARSH SHRIEKING SOUND
just above Reed brought her head up. Coarse, bristly feathers brushed against her ear. A claw dug into her shoulder. Another shrieking caw split her eardrum.

She gasped and staggered backward, throwing up her hands to bat frantically at the air around her.

Coarse black feathers flapped near her hair. A claw yanked at one long, dark strand and became entangled.

Reed felt the claws on her shoulder, heard the snapping beak. She covered her eyes and screamed again and again.

Everyone froze.

Then Link ripped off his windbreaker and waved it between Reed and the frenzied bird.

Debrah swung her heavy shoulder bag, but succeeded only in hitting Reed on the arm.

Jude bent to scoop up a snowball to throw at the bird, but ended up with little more than a handful of flakes.

Lilith dug into her purse and threw every object she could find: compact, hairbrush, wallet. But the bird hung on tenaciously.

It was Rain, hearing the commotion and running back to the steps of the science building, who thrust out an arm and snared the bird. He lifted it gently off Reed’s shoulder.

“Poe,” he said quietly, “what are you doing out here in this weather?”

Reed sagged against Lilith as the weight was lifted from her shoulder. “Poe?” she breathed, her eyes on Rain, gently cradling the bird in his hands. “That’s
your
bird that attacked me?”

“He’s got a bird?” Link said. “With a
name?”

“It wasn’t attacking you, Reed,” Rain said. He unzipped his ski jacket and thrust the bird inside, carefully covering it with the jacket’s folds. “Our jackets are the same color. He thought you were me, so he came down to sit on your shoulder, the way he does on mine.” Glancing down at the bird, he said, “Poe, you scared the lady. Shame on you!”

“He … he wasn’t attacking?” Reed asked, her fingers gingerly checking her face for scratches. There were none. “He thought I was you?”

“Got tangled in your hair, that’s all.” Rain partially zipped his jacket, so that only Poe’s beak protruded. “This bird wouldn’t hurt you, Reed. He’s a
pet.
Tame as a kitten. But he shouldn’t be out in this weather. My mother must have …”

Left the cage door open, Reed thought.
And
the door to the cottage.

“Maybe they went for a walk,” she suggested aloud. “And then Poe got away and went looking for you. And,” she added ruefully, “thought he’d found you when he saw my jacket.”

Rain shook his head. Long, dark hair brushed the collar of his jacket. “I don’t think McCoy would go out when it’s threatening snow. Too easy to get … lost. But I’d better get this bird back home.” He looked at Reed, apology in his dark eyes. “Sorry about the scare. See you Monday.”

“You’re not still taking that job, are you?” Link asked, barely waiting until Rain was out of hearing distance. “That bird is nuts! And if that guy’s mother can’t even take a walk in the woods without getting lost, sounds to me like you’re going to be a glorified baby-sitter for her, not a writer’s assistant.”

“Don’t be mean, Link.” Reed ran a hand through her hair to untangle the damage Poe had done. “She’s been sick, McCoy has. So Rain worries about her. But she’s fine now. Anyone could get lost in the woods around here if it snowed a lot. And I’m not going to be babysitting, I’m going to be answering fan mail and the telephone. That’s enough for me right now. Later on, when she trusts me more, I’ll be doing more important stuff.”

McCoy’s whispered, “I can’t trust anyone” buzzed in Reed’s ears. She ignored it.

“If you get to see her work-in-progress before it’s published,” Jude said darkly, “I’ll strangle you with my bare hands.”

“Not if I get to her first,” Debrah said heatedly. “What a lowlife thing to do, finding out about that opening and scuttling over to McCoy’s house before the rest of us even knew about it.”

“Like you wouldn’t have done exactly the same thing,” Reed retorted. “Except you probably would have gone last night instead of this morning, Debrah.”

“You sure you’re okay?” Link asked, bending to scrutinize her face.

“I’m fine. Not a scratch on me. And my hair has probably never looked better. Maybe I should try having Poe comb it for me every day.” But the laugh that emerged from her mouth was weak.

Well, she’d wanted to learn more about the dark side, hadn’t she? The dim, ugly house, the writer acting oddly, the bird swooping down upon her … quite a beginning for the first few hours of her association with McCoy.

With a promise of more fascinating things to come, Reed told herself with an attempt at bravado. Things were just beginning to get interesting. “Let’s go to Vinnie’s,” she said.

“That guy is weird,” Link said as they all headed for Vinnie’s through the rapidly thickening snowfall.

“He’s also gorgeous,” Lilith said.

Fickle Lilith, Reed thought with a grin as they marched across campus. Still, if Lilith fastened her attentions on Rain, she wouldn’t be after Link while Reed was working at McCoy’s.

“I don’t think he’s the least bit weird,” Reed said defensively. “He got that bird off me, and I’m grateful.”

Link’s mouth tightened. “Is he going to be there at the house while you’re working?” he asked.

“Probably not.” Link had done her a big favor. She shouldn’t torture him. “He has classes. And his mother said he was busy.”

“He’d better be.”

“Ooh, someone’s jealous,” Lilith said coyly.

“Come on, let’s hurry,” Reed snapped, annoyed. “I’m starving.”

Vinnie’s, an Italian restaurant in town, wasn’t crowded. In the middle of the morning, even the most avid pizza-lovers were in class.

They had already been served when Jude thrust a sheaf of papers at Reed and said, “You have
got
to show McCoy some of my work. It’s the least you can do, after the sneaky way you got that job.”

“I didn’t sneak,” Reed said calmly. “I walked right up to the front door in broad daylight.”

“Yeah, well, you owe me. I’m dying to get her opinion of my stuff.” Jude reached for the salt shaker and dosed his salad liberally. “Speaking of McCoy, didn’t she write a book about birds attacking people?”

“Yes,” Link astonished Reed by being the first to answer. He reached behind him to his backpack, slung over the back of the seat. “I have it with me, as a matter of fact. It’s called
Wings of Fear,
and it’s about a pack of vultures that terrorize a girls’ private boarding school. I’m about halfway through it. Pretty creepy.”

Reed stared at him in surprise. “You’re reading one of McCoy’s books?”

Link’s angled cheekbones flushed red. “I
can
read. And I just thought, since you’re so hung up on her stuff, I’d see what all the fuss was about.”

He really was sweet, Reed decided. First the job, which he had to know might keep her too busy to see him as much as he’d like, and now this person, who allegedly couldn’t sit through a Superman comic, was wading through one of McCoy’s novels, all for
her.

“I’ve read it,” Debrah said, nodding. She glanced over at Reed. “And there’s more than one passage in there about a group of girls being attacked by the birds. That
is
weird. I mean, after what just happened …”

Link had pulled the thick book from his backpack, flipped the pages open, and now he began reading aloud:

“It was twilight, that time of day that bids good-bye to the flush of dew and the golden afternoon sun but is not quite ready to welcome the darkness of night. The uniformed girls walked in pairs along the dusty path, chattering like magpies about the day’s events.

“Like magpies
…

“Above them, unnoticed, the birds sat, hovering like black clouds that had sunk down from the sky and nestled in the trees.

“They made no sound.

“It was Cassie, trailing along behind, alone as always, who noticed the thick cluster of black overhead. When she did, she stopped on the path, thrust her hands into the pockets of her plaid jumper, and tilted her head with interest.

“They’re going to do something bad, she thought to herself. Cassie had a very clear image of what ‘doing something bad’ meant. She had experience in that area, and had spent more hours in disciplinary isolation at Chadwicke’s School for Young Ladies than any other student. The other girls tormented her about it, teasing her endlessly, shouting at her that she wasn’t a ‘young lady.’ The chances were very good that she never would be.

“The birds, with their beady little eyes and those yucky wattles hanging from their chins, were going
to
do something terrible. She knew it.

“She should warn the others. There they went, dancing along the path ahead of her, gossiping about other girls and talking about boys and the upcoming dance on Saturday night as if nothing different or weird or unpleasant could ever happen in their world. But it was about to, Cassie knew that, and she should warn them.

“If she warned them, they would change their minds about her. They would see that she was, after all, a responsible, mature, caring young lady. And they’d stop teasing and tormenting her.

“But … then they’d never be punished for the way they’d treated her.