Kiss of Death (21 page)

My back pushes against the armchair. I curl up against it, eyes snapping open, staring in disbelief at what I see: Aunt Gwen and Taylor, swaying back and forth in the window embrasure. But no, not Taylor; that’s what I’m finding so hard to process. It’s a male version of Taylor, built on a bigger scale; the same shaggy hair, the same wide shoulders, the same strong features.

My brain’s firing so slowly that it takes me a ludicrously long time to work out what’s blindingly obvious.

“Seth!” I say finally. “You’re
Seth
!”

He swings round at hearing his name, momentarily distracted, his heavy fringe tumbling across his eyes, his hold on Aunt Gwen slackening. Aunt Gwen, gasping for breath, reaches out, hand rising like a claw to scratch at his face. I scream a warning to him. Seth looks back and slaps her hand away just before her nails can make contact with his skin.

And that’s what sends her off balance. Her feet slide from underneath her, her legs shoot up. She snatches desperately for the window frame, and misses. It looks as if she’s sitting down in thin air. Her skirt bunches up around her knees, her bottom tips back. Her head jerks madly, her eyes bulging more than I’ve ever seen them before; her mouth opens in a scream.

The last thing I see of Aunt Gwen is the soles of her shoes as she falls off the ledge, back into nothingness, her scream thin and faraway. The scream of someone who knows she’s already dead.

seventeen
“I LOVE YOU VERY MUCH, SCARLETT”

I’m sitting quietly, turning something over in my hand. A pendant on a silver chain, a bright blue stone that I used to think was an aquamarine, in a simple silver setting. It used to belong to my mother; my father gave it to her on my fourth birthday, because it was the same color as my eyes. Wakefield blue, she called the color, and my father must have gone to a lot of trouble and expense to find it.

When Mr. Barnes deliberately knocked my parents off their scooter that summer day, when he stopped the van he’d been driving to make sure they were dead, he took this pendant from my mother’s neck. Like a trophy. And he gave it to his wife, Dawn, Jase’s mother, who never wore it, because she was suspicious about where it came from—he told her not to wear it out in public, not to show it off to anyone.

Dawn, who couldn’t say boo to a goose, wasn’t brave enough to ask any awkward questions. Scared, intimidated by her increasingly drunken and violent husband, she put the pendant in a drawer and pretended it didn’t exist. And years later, when Jase and I started seeing each other, Jase remembered the necklace his mother had left behind, and thought I might like it, because it matched my eyes.

I loved it from the moment he gave it to me; I wore it constantly. Until Lizzie Livermore, who, if nothing else, is an expert on expensive jewelry, looked closely at it and told me it wasn’t an aquamarine at all. It’s a round-cut blue diamond, very rare and very valuable. And when I learned that, I started to trace the story of the pendant, like tugging on a loose thread that ends up unraveling a whole garment.

Of course, now that I know it’s a diamond, I wonder how I could ever have thought it was anything else. It sparkles as I hold it to the light, and though it glints brightly, the layers of blue beneath are velvety, with a depth that—according to Lizzie—is too rich for a semiprecious stone, but is characteristic of a diamond.

I never let Aunt Gwen see me wearing it, because Jase had given it to me, and she was so opposed to our relationship that she was quite capable of confiscating any present from him. But of course, that was before I knew the truth about the necklace, what it really was. I realize, thinking over the whole story, that it would have driven Aunt Gwen crazy to know that Mr. Barnes had taken my mother’s necklace for Dawn. To me, that says that although he killed my parents in a conspiracy with Aunt Gwen, it was purely for financial benefit. His feelings must always have been with his wife, if he bothered to lean down and snatch this pendant off my mother’s neck for her.

I swallow hard at the image this calls up. It’s horrible. And it was all for nothing. If anything, Aunt Gwen was worse off after she had her brother and sister-in-law killed; not only did her lover, Mr. Barnes, turn into a drunk, her mother—my grandmother—marooned her in the gatehouse with an orphaned four-year-old.

All for nothing. I can’t think about it too long; the pain and the waste are too overwhelming. If I let myself think about what my life would have been like if I’d grown up with my parents alive—parents who loved me, and would probably have had more children, so I’d have had little sisters and brothers to play with—it makes the biggest lump come up in my throat.

And then I think, the first time this idea has ever come to me:
If I had a younger brother, it would be him who’d inherit Wakefield Hall, not me. Because the whole estate is entailed on a male heir, if there is one.

It wouldn’t be fair. I feel a rush of resentment rise up in me at the thought—and not just resentment, but a love for Wakefield Hall I didn’t even know I had. The centuries of history, the beautiful old central wing; the maze, the lake, the terraces with their views over Lime Walk. It’ll be all mine one day. It’s a huge responsibility to take care of it, to keep it as perfectly as my grandmother does. The weight settles on my shoulders. I’ve always known it was there, and now I’ve accepted it.

The idea of my parents having a boy after me, a boy who would take that all away from me, is harder to bear. For the first time, I feel something in common with Aunt Gwen. I have an inkling of the anger and resentment she must have felt, growing up knowing that her brother would, one day, have all of Wakefield. Aunt Gwen wouldn’t be cast out without a penny, of course. There’s plenty of family money to go round. But it must have been really bitter for her to realize that just because her brother was a boy, he was the crown prince, and she was a very distant second.

I can’t ever forgive her for what she did to my parents, and what she tried to do to me. But at least I can understand it, a little.

“Scarlett? Scarlett!” Penny, my grandmother’s secretary, has to call my name twice, I’m so lost in thought. She leans over her desk, waving her hand to catch my attention. “You can go through now. She’s ready for you.”

The entire Wakefield Hall contingent came back on the train from Edinburgh first thing this morning. We only got back to school half an hour ago, and Miss Carter brought me straight to my grandmother’s suite of rooms. I’ve got my pull suitcase here, propped up against the wall, and for a moment I debate taking it in with me, before Penny gestures to me to leave it where it is.

I pause with my hand on the doorknob. I can’t believe I was seriously considering dragging and bumping my suitcase into my grandmother’s elegant, exquisitely decorated study. I must be feeling even more disoriented than I realize. I’m dreading this interview with my grandmother. It’s all still sinking in, probably because I was zoned out for most of yesterday, knocked out by the trauma of my struggle with Aunt Gwen, the shock of her death, all heavily overlaid with the antihistamines she’d given me. The strain of keeping my story straight to the police was horrendous, even with Seth backing me up.

We kept our version of events as simple as possible: Aunt Gwen was taking me up to her room to make me some tea when Seth walked into the school, making a surprise visit to his sister while traveling through Edinburgh. Aunt Gwen naturally offered Seth a cup of tea too, telling him he could wait with us until the rest of the school party got back from their excursion; I felt dizzy, Aunt Gwen kindly opened a window to give me some cool air, leaned out too far, slipped, and fell in a terrible freak accident. Seth coached me over and over before the police came, telling me not to add any extra details that might catch us out, focusing completely on putting across the most basic story possible.

Even so, the police didn’t like it at all. I wanted Seth to go before they came, telling him he shouldn’t be mixed up with them, but he’d refused, saying that they wouldn’t believe a story this implausible unless there were two witnesses. Seth turned out to be right; they questioned us for hours, trying to find holes in the story, convinced that we were in some sort of conspiracy. It helped that everyone, especially Taylor, swore up and down that I’d never met Seth before, which made it incredibly unlikely that we would have got together to plan something as extreme as killing my aunt; in the end, with no evidence to the contrary, and both of us telling the same story, there was nothing they could do but let us go with great reluctance.

Seth was amazing. I was pretty much a total wreck, and he was a tower of strength: calm, detached, clearheaded, focusing not on Aunt Gwen’s awful death, or what she’d tried to do to me, but on the single task of selling our story to the police. He seemed so much older than me; I know he’s twenty, which is quite a bit older, but honestly, it was like talking to an adult, one I could completely trust. I liked him and was intimidated by his poise in equal measure. And it made me realize why Taylor’s so confident in so many areas: with a brother like that to model yourself on, how could you not be?

Afterward, I was so shattered they put me straight to bed. I passed out, sleeping through until Taylor woke me this morning in time to pack and catch the train; and then, in the first-class seat Miss Carter had thoughtfully booked for me, I passed out all over again, watched over by her and Jane. It’s extraordinary how the aftermath of extreme stress can knock you out utterly and completely as the adrenaline floods out of your system, leaving you just a drained, exhausted shell.

But as I eventually turn the handle and step into my grandmother’s sanctum, the sight of her shocks me to the core. However bad I felt yesterday and today, she looks infinitely worse. Lady Wakefield is always perfectly poised and groomed, her white hair smooth, her twinset and pearls exquisitely appropriate, her blue eyes bright and sharp. This afternoon is no exception; she doesn’t have a hair out of place. But her face is a pale, fragile mask, white as paper and massed with lines, like tissue that’s been crumpled in someone’s hand; her eyes are faded and full of pain.

I’m supposed to call her Lady Wakefield in term time, because I’m a pupil at the school and she’s the headmistress. My grandmother imposed that rule on me as soon as I came here as a student, and she’s very strict about it.

But, running toward her, full of worry at how frail she looks, I forget it completely.

“Grandma!” I exclaim, plopping down on the upholstered footstool next to her chair, taking the hand she’s holding out to me.

“Oh, Scarlett …” To my utter amazement, she starts to cry. It should be frightening, my grandmother crying, showing her vulnerability, because she’s always so strong. But actually, surprisingly, it comes as a huge relief. “Scarlett,” she sobs, “you’re all I have left.…”

She raises her other hand and strokes my hair gently, something no one has done for a long, long time. It’s so comforting that tears form in my own eyes. I lean against her knees.

“I’m not going anywhere, Grandma,” I assure her, trying to find words that will make her feel better. “I’m right here—I’ll always be here.…”

“Both my children, gone,” my grandmother sobs quietly. “And Sally, lovely Sally—she and Patrick adored each other, they were such a happy couple … how could this have happened? How could my family have come to this, just one Wakefield left, apart from me? I thought Patrick and Sally would have a whole family of their own, running around the gardens, playing on the lawns … and now it’s just you left, Scarlett. Just you.”

She’s still holding my hand, so tightly that her rings are cutting into me, but all I do is squeeze hers back, too choked up to be able to say a word.

“It’s my fault,” she says desolately. “I loved Patrick better, and Gwen knew it. Children always know if their mother has a favorite. Poor Gwen, I never felt the same about her, and I couldn’t pretend to. She was her father’s pet, but he died too young. If he’d lived, maybe everything would have been different … maybe Gwen would have been less bitter, less resentful … but he died, and I miss him every day.…”

I never knew my grandfather; he died a long time ago, well before I was born. I’ve seen photographs, of course. That’s how I know Aunt Gwen took after him. Thinking of Aunt Gwen makes me shiver, and my hand tightens even more on my grandmother’s, holding on to the only relative I have left, the only one I’ve ever been able to trust.

“I should never have let Gwen bring you up,” she says. “Never.”

Patting my hand, she reaches into her pocket for a handkerchief; nothing as common as tissues for my grandmother. She dabs her eyes as she continues:

“I wanted to have you here, at the Hall. That’s what Penny suggested I do. Hire a nice nanny to live in, furnish your parents’ room, keep you under my own eye. But Gwen was in her thirties, a much more appropriate age to bring up a child. And Mrs. Bodger had just moved out of the gatehouse into the old-age home at Wakefield—countless generations of children grew up in the gatehouse. I remember all the little Bodgers playing in the garden. It was a very happy little family home. I hoped that you and Gwen would come together, make your own little family. Redeem what had happened, somehow.” She gulps. “I meant it for the best, Scarlett. If I was distant with you, it’s because I didn’t want to undermine Gwen; she was in loco parentis with you, after all. I didn’t want to tread on her toes.”

How much has she guessed?
I wonder as she blows her nose with perfect elegance: Lady Wakefield could give princesses lessons in etiquette.
From the way she’s talking, she must have some idea of what happened between me and Aunt Gwen yesterday afternoon. If she really believed it had just been a tragic accident, she’d be asking me questions about it, talking very differently. She’d be mourning Aunt Gwen. Concerned whether I’d been traumatized by seeing the fall, still in shock at Aunt Gwen’s horrible death.

But I’m not hearing any of that. Instead, my grandmother’s telling me that she should never have left me alone with Aunt Gwen. That she has a half suspicion, at least, that Aunt Gwen wasn’t trustworthy as far as I’m concerned.

“I had no idea that anything was wrong.…” She gulps. “Well, it would be more honest to say I didn’t
want
to have any idea that something might be wrong, Scarlett,” she says piteously. “My son was gone, and so was his wife. Gwen was my only daughter. My only living child. How could I bring myself to believe that she …” She trails off, squeezing my hand tightly. “I
never
thought any harm would come to you,” she says more strongly.
“Never.”

I remember Aunt Gwen telling me yesterday that she thought her mother suspected what she had done. I hadn’t truly believed her. Because if my grandmother left me in the care of the woman she thought might have killed my parents—a woman who would have a motive to kill me, too—that would have been incredibly irresponsible of her.

And if there’s one word that doesn’t describe Lady Wakefield in any way, it’s irresponsible.

I look up at her, into her blue eyes. I sense she did have a tiny inkling that Aunt Gwen might be capable of murder, but I sense too that she’s spent every day of her life since my parents’ death suppressing that instinct with every ounce of willpower that she possesses. There’s absolutely no way that my grandmother would have decreed that I was going to live with Aunt Gwen if she had truly believed that inkling. She would never have risked my life.