Ashes on the Waves

  “The rain has stopped. May I walk you home before the next band of showers moves ashore?” I asked.

  She lifted an eyebrow. “So formal. I suppose I’ll need pants for that.”

  “Miss Ronan would appreciate it, probably.”

  Still holding the towel, she picked up her wet jeans. “Getting into these will be a challenge.”

  I turned my back and stared out the foggy glass of my window at the blur of trees swaying in the strong offshore winds. “You strike me as a girl who’s up for a challenge.”

  She made a grunting sound as she dealt with her uncooperative wet jeans. “You certainly threw the gauntlet down in challenge today, Liam MacGregor.” The zing of her zipper was followed by the click of the snap at her waistband. “I hope you know you’re going to lose.”

  “I certainly hope so.”

  11

  The fury of a demon instantly possessed me. I knew myself no longer. My original soul seemed, at once, to take its flight from my body; and a more than fiendish malevolence . . . thrilled every fibre of my frame.

  —Edgar Allan Poe,

  from “The Black Cat,” 1843

  I remembered seeing helicopters come and go from the mansion when I was younger, but this was the first time I’d been close to one.

  Like a fantastic, terrifying dragonfly, it hovered overhead before descending on the circular landing pad, creating gale-force winds.

  I shouldn’t be here, I told myself.

  When I walked Anna home yesterday after the storm, she insisted I come today to meet her friends. I knew our worlds were incompatible and wanted no part of this gathering. Then she kissed me with such passion I would’ve agreed to most anything—and I did, so here I was, full of dread, bracing myself against artificial wind and outsiders.

  The first person off the helicopter was a thin, short, blond girl who ran to At anna and tackled her in a hug. They were joined by a much taller girl with short brown hair who embraced her in a similar manner. Last off was a tall, fair-haired guy about my age. He had broad shoulders and wore a dark green sweater and jeans. I recognized him from the tabloids. He was in many of the pictures with Anna. Unlike the girls, he didn’t run; he strolled slowly over to the group, pulled Anna to him, and kissed her on the mouth.

  This was the first time I’d ever felt the demon inside me stir. Until this moment, I’d always held out hope it would remain dormant forever. A buzzing filled my head and a sickening churn consumed my stomach, making it hard to breathe.

  Anna pushed away from him and immediately sought me with her eyes. I pretended to study the helicopter, walking behind it to put more distance between the group and myself, desperately attempting to force the demon back. I shouldn’t be here.

  The helicopter engine roared and the wind increased until the machine lifted off and eventually zoomed out of sight. The silence it left behind was almost hollow.

  I swallowed the lump in my throat as Anna led her group of friends my way. Everything in me wanted to run away as fast as possible—to run and keep running. But I held firm. She had asked this of me, and I had agreed.

  The short blonde took rapid steps much like a sandpiper in order to keep up with her long-legged companions. Anna and the taller girl walked arm in arm, and the boy trailed behind them, shoulders back, looking directly at me. Again, the demon stirred, causing the hairs on my neck to stand on end.

  “Hey, guys. This is Liam. He lives here on the island,” Anna said. “Liam, this is Suzette.”

  The short girl stepped forward and extended her hand. “Hi, Liam. You can call me Suz.”

  I’d never shaken a girl’s hand. In fact, Anna was the only girl I’d ever touched. Tentatively, I held out my hand and she placed hers lightly in it. When I just stood there, stupefied, she squeezed my fingers and smiled. “Nice to meet ya.”

  “This is Mallory,” Anna said. The tall girl smiled and waved. Relief washed through me when I realized I wouldn’t have to shake her hand.

  “Nicholas Emery.” The boy extended his hand. I took it and he squeezed so hard while shaking it, I was certain my bones would break. The demon surfaced and I squeezed back with equal force until the guy let go.

  “Let’s go inside,” Anna suggested, tugging Nicholas by the sleeve. “We have this freaky housekeeper, but she can really cook and she’s putting dinner out.”

  “There’s no way she cooks as good as you do, Annie,” Nicholas said. “Nobody does.”

  My demon rolled over.

  “I can’t wait until you open your restaurant,” Mallory said, stepping up on the porch.

  Anna shrugged. “Dad hasn’t even agreed to culinary school yet.”

  I stood frozen. I had no idea Anna wanted to open a restaurant. My feeling of being an outsider doubled. I didn’t belong here.

  Suz paused at the stop of the steps. “I’m starving. Come on, Liam.”

  I’d never been inside the mansion and had always hoped to keep it that way. The entry was tiled in dark marble with wood paneling stretching upward to the arched ceiling. The dominant feature was an ornately carved wooden staircase originating from the second-story balcond-soody and parting in a curved V to form two symmetrical arches—the result reminiscent of mandibles on an enormous spider.

  At the top of the staircase, an oil portrait of a man I assumed to be the mastermind behind the building’s construction, Anna’s great-great grandfather, stared down with indifference.

  “Oooh. Cool place,” Mallory said, rotating in a circle in the middle of the room.

  Nicholas was studying a device in his hand. “I’m not getting any signal.”

  The petite blonde, Suzette, rubbed her arms as if they were cold, but if the house were affecting her as it did me, her goose bumps were not a result of the temperature.

  Anna paused in the arch to the left of the stairs. “Phones don’t work here. There’s no cell tower on the island, Nicky.”

  He shoved the phone into his back pocket. “That explains why you haven’t answered my texts. I just thought you were being a bitch.”

  My vision blurred momentarily and my jaw clenched so tightly, it ached.

  “Well, I was being a bitch, but I never received any messages,” Anna said with a smile, disappearing into the next room.

  Mallory and Nicholas followed her, but I stayed just inside the entry, feeling completely outside myself.

  “You coming?” Suzette asked, pausing in the archway.

  “In a moment,” I answered, feigning interest in a tapestry over the doorway until she disappeared into the next room.

  I took a deep breath and let it out slowly. When Nicholas had called Anna a name, the beast inside me stretched again, inspiring the impulse to charge him. I was reticent to join Anna’s party until I was certain I had control over it.

  “Hey.” Anna’s gentle touch on my shoulder dissipated whatever darkness had overtaken me. “What’s going on?”

  “Nothing. I . . .” Her cobalt blouse accentuated the darker ring around her irises. I longed to hold her, to kiss her, to drown in those eyes and keep the demon inside me locked away. “Anna, I have to leave.”

  “Why?” Her brow furrowed.

  “I don’t belong here. I shouldn’t be here.”

  “He’s right,” Miss Ronan said, causing both of us to jump. “He does not belong here.” She was carrying a large silver tray with a domed cover and didn’t even pause on her way through the entry hall to the room where Anna’s friends were laughing and talking.

  Anna shuddered. “Oooh. She gives me the creeps. I need to put a collar with a bell on it around her neck like a cat so she can’t sneak up on me like that. She does it all the time.”

  The image of Miss Ronan with a bell around her neck made me smile.

  “Really, what does she have against you, Liam?”

  The truth. “The same thing everyone else does, I suppose.”

  “Not me.” She stood on her tiptoes and brushed her lips across mine. “Please stay. Just for
dinner, okay? Then you can take off if you still want to.”

  “Anna, I—”

  “I have a very good argument to convince you.” She circled her arms around my neck and pulled my lips to hers. In a few moments, any objection I had to staying dissipated. She released. Se a ve me and we stared at each other, breathing heavily.

  “Well?” she said.

  “Your logic is irrefutable.”

  She winked. “Thought so.”

  Taking my hand in hers, she led me through the arched doorway into a large dining room. It had a high vaulted ceiling and parallel vertical support beams that made it look as though we were inside the rib cage of a huge beast. At the end of the room, there was an enormous, ornate fireplace with flames blazing to the top of the opening, which was tall enough for a man to walk under—like a passage to hell.

  I shuddered.

  A long, dark wood table was covered in dishes containing more food than I’d ever seen in one place—even village gatherings. Five of us couldn’t possibly eat this much.

  “We’re going super casual and eating over by the fireplace,” Anna said. “Go ahead. Dig in!” Her friends picked up plates from the end of the table and filled them with pork, turkey, fresh vegetables, and bread. My mouth watered and my stomach rumbled, but I waited, watching to see how they managed the food so I wouldn’t do something wrong. They held their plates with one hand and procured food with the other. Because I only had one functional arm, I would have to set the plate down and bring the food to it, and there wasn’t enough room to set it down except at the end, which would make it awkward. I would certainly drop the item from the serving utensil before I made it back to the plate.

  “Go ahead, Liam,” Anna said as her friends moved to the fireplace.

  “No, I’m fine. I ate before I came.” My stomach rumbled again, exposing my lie.

  Anna’s brow furrowed, then relaxed. She glanced at my useless arm and smiled. “Come with me.” She handed me a plate and grabbed one herself. Wordlessly, bringing no attention to us at all, she led me down the table, heaping my plate with large portions of meat along with the side dishes but only fruit, vegetables, and bread on her own. Her friends were deep in conversation in a sitting area by the fireplace and didn’t even notice she was assisting me.

  Nicholas gestured for Anna to sit next to him on a small sofa facing the fire, but she plopped down in an overstuffed chair next to Mallory instead. I chose the chair opposite Anna since my only other option was sharing the sofa with Nicholas, who was glaring at me like he wanted to throw me into the fireplace.

  “I love this place,” Mallory said, cutting a carrot with her fork. “Why haven’t you brought us here before?”

  Anna shifted uneasily, meeting my eyes fleetingly before she answered. “Well, we don’t come here anymore. My parents used to when I was a kid, but we stopped when my uncle died.”

  “So, this was your uncle’s house?” Nicholas asked.

  Anna shoved some rice around on her plate with her fork. “No. It’s my mom’s. Her grandfather built it, so it passed from her mom to her. Uncle Frank just lived here.”

  I’d never tasted turkey like this. It practically melted in my mouth. I fought the urge to gobble it as fast as possible and instead cut off small bites with my fork, emulating my companions.

  “So, why don’t you come anymore? Does it make your mom sad?” Suzette asked.

  Anna shrugged. “I don’t know. We just don’t.”

  “Man, if I had a place like this, I’d be here aldtead. I cl the time,” Mallory said.

  “Me too,” Nicholas agreed. “Hey, why don’t we go check out the cliffs and jetty tonight? It looked cool from the helicopter.”

  “No!” Anna said, then tempered her tone with less panic. “No. I’d rather just hang out inside tonight and catch up with what’s going on at home. I’ll give you a tour in the morning.”

  My hackles stood at the sensation of being watched. I looked over my shoulder to find Miss Ronan lurking in the doorway. She met my gaze directly, her dark expression unchanging. “Will you be needing anything else, Miss Leighton? If not, I’m going to retire for the night. The new maid will clear the dishes when she comes in the morning,” she said.

  Anna flinched at the sound of her voice, catching her fork before it slid from her plate. “No. Thank you. That’s all.”

  Miss Ronan slipped from view.

  “God. Why does she sneak up like that?” Anna said through her teeth. “I hate it.”

  “We had a housekeeper like that when I was a kid,” Mallory said. “Mom fired her.”

  “We have one that sings all the time,” Nicholas said from the table, where he was loading his plate with seconds. “It drives me crazy. My little sister loves her, so my parents make me be nice to her.”

  “It’s really hard to find good help,” Suzette said. “At least she’s an excellent cook, Anna.”

  “Yeah,” Anna agreed. An awkward silence filled the room. I felt certain the mood and conversation would be much different were I not present.

  I was content the demon was dormant at the moment. It seemed directly tied to Nicholas, so my strategy was to avoid him at all costs so as not to awaken it again.

  “So tell me what’s going on back at home,” Anna said.

  Her friends then launched into animated descriptions of parties, people, and events so foreign to me, I had no desire to keep up. I focused instead on the amazing feast in my lap. I could have lived for a week on this amount of food. As much as I disliked Brigid Ronan, I had to admit the food was delicious and I’d never tasted anything like it. Occasionally, I would look up to find Anna watching me. She always responded with an encouraging smile.

  “So how long are you going to be here?” Mallory asked, setting her plate on the low table in front of us and folding her napkin.

  Anna shrugged. “Until my brother’s wedding’s over, I guess.”

  Mallory laughed. “Yeah, you can’t very well embarrass the bride from here, can you?”

  “Who cares if she’s embarrassed?” Nicholas said, putting another slice of roast beef on his plate. “She’s a bitch.”

  “You don’t even know her, Nicky,” Suzette said, clutching her plate tightly. “Anna’s brother likes her.”

  Nicholas strode to the sofa. “He likes her money and connections. Both sets of parents had this marriage worked out from the time they were born.” He walked behind Anna’s chair and placed his hands on her shoulders. “Just like you and me, huh, Annie?”

  Anna’s eyes narrowed. “Shut up, Nicky.”

  A prearranged marriage? The demon roiled inside. No longer hungry, I set my fork down.

  Nicholas looked right at me as if issuime arranged ng a challenge. He was handsome, rich, and educated. What threat could a one-armed, destitute villager pose? None. I didn’t belong in this world.

  “I need to go, Anna.” I stood. “It was nice to meet all of you.” Not wanting any objection from Anna, I strode to the exit as quickly as possible, trying not to run like the coward I was.

  “Leaving so soon?” Miss Ronan said, opening the door for me.

  “Liam, wait!” It was Suzette.

  From the dining room, Anna’s and Nicholas’s angry voices filled my ears.

  “Nick was just trolling you. Don’t let him get to you like that. It’s a game to him,” she said.

  “I don’t play games.”

  “Look. Anna will set him straight and it’ll all be good. Come on back in. We didn’t even get to know you.”

  “There is nothing to know,” I said.

  The smirk on Miss Ronan’s face made my stomach churn.

  Suzette glared at her, then walked through the door she held open. I followed her out. “Excuse us,” Suzette said, taking the door handle from Miss Ronan and pulling it closed behind us.

  “Come talk to me, Liam,” she said, stopping next to the fountain at the side of the house. I hadn’t really paid attention to it when I saw it before. I had b
een too distracted by Anna. Grecian dolphins spit water from the top level, and the water trickled over the edge of three bowls, flowing finally into the large basin at the bottom with a bench-like ledge making the surround. I imagined Anna’s slender fingers trailing lightly along the surface as she had done when we were here the other day—trailing lightly over my skin as she had done on the rocks yesterday. Anna. Promised to Nicholas. My heart sank.

  I had no right to brood. She could never be mine. Deep down, I knew this. Still, somewhere in that deep recess of my heart I kept secret—even from myself—I had hoped. But I hadn’t even realized it until now.

  Ridiculous, I told myself. She was as far out of my reach as the full moon over our heads.

  “How did you meet Anna?” Suzette asked, strolling to the opposite side of the fountain.

  “When we were children, her family came here frequently. Her nanny allowed her to play with me on the beach. We played together every day for an entire summer.”

  “So you’ve known each other a long time, then.” Suzette sat on the ledge of the fountain. “Sort of grew up together?”

  “Not really.” The next winter, her uncle disappeared. The commonly held belief was that he drowned. The family only visited a couple of times after that and didn’t stay more than a couple of nights. “We haven’t seen each other since that summer.”

  I liked Suzette. She seemed genuine and kind. I stared up at the gargoyle glaring menacingly at us. Suzette didn’t belong here either. “How about you? Did you meet Anna at school?”

  “Yep. We go to school together. She was the first friend I made there.” She took a deep breath. “It’s hard breaking into that world.”

  I was certain it was. My island was grim, but at least I knew its perils. A world as complicated and vast as Anna’s would be untenable.