This Wicked Game

SEVENTEEN

Claire wasn’t even fully awake when she made her way down the stairs, phone in hand.

The early morning sun streamed in through the sheer curtains on the windows, casting golden light across the hardwood floors.

It was quiet. Her parents must have had a late night.

She approached the door to her dad’s study, wondering if it would be locked. She couldn’t remember a time—ever—when she had entered the room without her dad inside it. But it was open, and she stepped into the room, closing the door behind her.

She took a minute to familiarize herself with the space. A hulking wooden desk stood in front of two big windows. Claire was surprised to see a small love seat in front of the fireplace. She didn’t remember it being there, and she wondered if her dad used it to read or nap or if it was just one of her mother’s attempts at interior design.

Her eyes settled on the wall of pictures near the fireplace. It was a kind of nook, shadowed by the bump-out of the chimney. There had always been pictures there, but Claire had never paid attention to them. She vaguely recalled them as old and full of people she didn’t know or remember.

She crossed the room until she was standing in front of the wall, her eyes sweeping the collection of photographs until she found what she was looking for.

It was there, near the bottom on the left, beneath a picture of some ancestor and above a photograph of her dad with her uncle Philip before he died.

Right where it had been in her dream

Claire lifted the frame off the wall, careful not to knock any of the ones around it to the ground.

The photograph was eerily familiar. She flashed to the moment in the dream, just before the picture had been taken, and then to the younger version of her dad, placing it there and walking away. She lifted her cell phone, scrolling through the pictures she’d taken in Maximilian’s room. When she came to the group photo, she stopped, comparing it to the framed one in her other hand.

It was the same.

No, wait. Not exactly the same.

She looked closer. She saw her dad, head bent as he installed the photograph in the frame, a penknife on the desk at his elbow.

And then, when she looked even more closely, she saw the difference in the photographs.

The one from the house on Dauphine showed all the members of the Guild.

The one on her dad’s wall, slightly smaller, a sliver of the photograph shaved off the side.

It wasn’t difficult to tell what had been removed on the version in her dad’s office. It was the man at the edge of the photograph, the pale, dark-eyed one Claire remembered from her dream, and the little girl in the wheelchair.

Claire stood up straighter, the implications of the discovery hitting her like a lead brick.

Maximilian had been part of the Guild. And not just someone who had a key and a license to purchase product. Someone who had been in the circle of power.

Someone who had been one of them.

She sat on her bed, looking at the picture on her phone, trying to figure out what to do next. They had a saying in the Guild.

Once a member, always a member.

The only person Claire knew of who had ever left the organization was Crazy Eddie, and he’d been kicked out.

But something had happened with Maximilian, too. She didn’t know what it was or what it had to do with the letters in his bag, but it had been serious enough for the Guild to renounce him completely. For her own father to remove him from the Guild’s photographic history.

She was getting ready to call Xander when the house phone rang from the hall. A glance at the clock told her it was only 8:00 a.m., early for a phone call on a Sunday. She hurried out of her room, trying to catch it before it woke up her parents.

“Hello, Kincaid residence, Claire speaking.”

“Good morning, Claire,” a gruff voice said on the other end of the line. “This is Bernard Toussaint. I’d like to speak to your mother or father.”

The voice was even, but there was an undercurrent of tension that Claire felt even through the phone line.

“Um . . .” Claire looked up the stairs, wondering if she should wake her parents.

“It’s urgent,” Bernard added.

“Oh . . . okay. Hold on.”

Claire headed toward her parents’ room, the phone still in her hand, and knocked softly on the door.

Her dad appeared a few seconds later, shrugging his robe onto his shoulders. “What is it? Is everything okay?”

“Uncle Bernard’s on the phone for you,” she said, holding out the cordless phone. “He said it’s urgent.”

He looked surprised, but he took the phone. “Hello? Bernard?”

Claire made no move to leave. Between the discovery of the picture and the early morning phone call, her curiosity was at an all-time high.

“When?” Her dad’s face was very still. He sighed, running a tired hand over his face. “Did they take anything?”

He made some more sounds, spoke a few one-word answers into the phone.

“Fine. Yes. We’ll be there as soon as we can.” He hung up, staring at the phone like he didn’t know what it was.

“What’s going on?” Claire asked. “Is everything okay?”

Her dad looked over at her. “The Toussaint house was broken into. We need to get over there right away.”

“I can come, too, right?” Claire asked, her mind already turning to Xander. This time, she had no desire to be left out of the Guild’s business.

“Of course.” He headed back into the bedroom. “Be ready in an hour.”

“Wait!” Claire called after him.

He turned, meeting her eyes.

“Everyone’s fine. Sophie has been taken to her grandmother’s.” He hesitated before continuing. “And Xander’s okay, too.”

Her shoulders sagged with relief as her dad kissed her forehead. He left her standing in the hall, wondering how long her parents had been keeping her secret.

The Toussaints’ driveway was already crowded when Claire’s dad pulled up. People were milling around the property, including a few men in suits that Claire assumed were part of the much-whispered about private security team Bernard and Estelle quietly paid to keep the Guild’s current headquarters—their house—secure.

Claire wasn’t surprised at the lack of “real” law enforcement. Even though voodoo wasn’t illegal, Guild business wasn’t something they shared with outsiders.

The house was more crowded than the yard. A locksmith was already at work on the front door, adding an intimidating dead bolt and changing the lock on the original knob. She had no doubt the same thing was taking place on all the doors to the house.

“Mr. and Mrs. Kincaid.” Betsy rushed toward them as they stepped through the open door. The distress was visible on her face, and she waved them forward, leading them to the library.

Claire heard the murmur of voices before they reached the room. When they got there, everyone only looked up for a second before returning to their conversations, or in Bridget’s case, the drink in her hand.

Estelle sat on a damask-covered chair talking to Julia St. Martin, while Bernard whispered quietly to Reynaud. Estelle’s expression was calm despite the fact that her face was pale, her hands gripping the sides of the chair.

Betsy hurried forward, bending to say something to her before she retreated.

“I better go check on Estelle,” Claire’s mother said, patting her daughter on the shoulder.

Claire spotted Xander in his customary spot at the back of the room. Their eyes met, but he didn’t move. She knew that it was for her.

“Go ahead,” her dad said, tipping his head slightly to Xander. “I need to speak to Bernard.”

She took a deep breath and headed toward Xander. His eyes were guarded, his arms folded across his chest in a gesture of self-protection. It was harder than it had ever been not to put her arms around him.

“Hey,” she said softly, standing close to him. “You okay?”

He nodded. “They didn’t take anything and no one got hurt, so I guess it could have been worse.”

“When did it happen?” she asked.

“This morning while we were at church.”

“How did you know if nothing was taken?”

“The alarms on the back door were tripped.” He hesitated before continuing. “And stuff was moved around in my room like it had been in Allegra’s and the others.”

Something cold slithered up her back as he said it.

“And you’re sure nothing was taken?”

“Nothing we could see.”

She had an image of Maximilian touching Xander’s things, looking for something personal. Something Xander wouldn’t miss.

“So they’re really doing it,” Claire said softly, horrified all over again. “They’re taking stuff from us.”

“Not all of us.”

She met his eyes. “Right. Everyone but me.”

She felt guilty, like it was her fault she hadn’t been victimized. Then she remembered the photograph and her discovery.

“I think I found out something about Max—”

“Not yet,” Xander said, looking around nervously. “The meeting’s about to start.”

Bernard stood and cleared his throat. “As you all know, we suffered a residential break-in this morning while we were at church. The details aren’t significant except to say it was very like the break-ins some of you in this room experienced. Nothing appears to be missing. In fact, we might not know at all except for a broken window in the study and some things moved around in Alexandre’s room.”

“I’d like to know what’s really going on,” Bridget suddenly demanded.

Even from the back of the room, Claire could see Bridget’s hands trembling.

Bernard leveled his gaze at her. “I assure you that we are using every means available to get to the bottom of it. You know as much as we know.”

Bridget laughed a little, but it was as brittle as the ice in her glass. “I highly doubt that. I know I’m the newest member here, but that doesn’t give you a right to keep me in the dark. Someone broke into my house, too, you know.”

“I think we all know what’s going on here,” Julia St. Martin said quietly.

The room grew hushed as everyone looked at Bernard.

This is it, Claire thought. He’s going to tell the truth. He’s going to tell them Max is behind the orders of panther blood, the break-ins, all of it. He’s going to explain why.

“Julia.” Bernard’s voice was a warning, a low rumble of thunder just before a violent storm. “That will be all.”

She sat up straighter, indecision warring across her elegant features. Claire had a flash of Allegra. Saw her strength in the set of her mother’s jaw, her stubbornness in the fire lighting Julia’s eyes.

“We have to do something,” Julia said softly, fear threading her voice.

Claire watched Bernard’s face carefully, wondering if it was her imagination that his right eye was twitching a little.

“It’s all under control,” he said. “My alarm system is being upgraded as we speak, and I’ve asked Palmwood Security to consult with each and every one of you before you leave. The Guild will fund immediate upgrades to your stores and residences as you see fit, and we will retain on-site security for those of you who want it until the threat passes.”

“And what if it doesn’t?” Julia asked.

“It will,” Bernard insisted. His eyes dared anyone to disagree.

The room was uncomfortably silent, some of the women fidgeting with their clothes while the men stood quietly by, making it clear they didn’t intend to challenge Bernard’s authority.

Catching Claire’s eye, Xander tipped his head toward the hall. They slipped out the door at the back of the room and headed outside.