Page 21 of Lucy Undying

She nods, waiting for an invitation inside. After a few awkward seconds, her smile drops a bit. “Am I—should I…I’ll just come in then, yeah?” She steps past me into the entry.

I let out a relieved breath and nod. “Yeah.”

Elle’s smile twists, puzzled. “Do Americans not invite people inside?”

“Family custom. We never invite someone in unless they’ve already been inside.” I learned that the hard way as a six-year-old, when I invited a man in because he scared me so badly I was afraid not to. I have only a few memories from that night. His red eyes. The sound as my father hit the wall. The way my mother stood calmly, just out of reach in the darkness.

I have lots of memories of what happened after, though. My new bedroom was so big it echoed, with soaring ceilings that slanted down to an alcove, always sliding my eyes toward two closet doors set up off the floor, too high for me to reach the knobs. Not that I ever wanted to. The doors moved every night as I tried to stay awake, the wood breathing in and out, waiting for me to fall asleep so the darkness held inside could devour me.

Anyway, learned that lesson. No invitations.

Elle’s delicate eyebrows draw close, creating two perfectly symmetrical lines between them. “That’s a really odd custom.”

“You have no idea how odd my family is. So, the house.” I gesture. From the entry, we can see the stairs with hand-carved wood railings I wish I could sell, the hallway leading to the den, locked bedroom, and kitchen, and finally the opening to the sitting room or whatever it’s called. The house I grew up in was palatial, but designed like a modern art gallery, sleek and white and forbidding. There weren’t rooms so much as spaces, almost all of which were off-limits. Any useful or necessary thing like a kitchen or bathrooms or bedrooms were hidden in the back, as though human needs were something shameful.

“It really was frozen in time, wasn’t it?” Elle’s voice is low, like she doesn’t want to disturb the house. I understand the impulse. There’s a sense of something sleeping here. I had the opposite reaction, demanding it wake up and acknowledge me. I’m not good at respecting monsters.

I’d love to impress Elle and pretend I’m here for the history, too. But I can’t abandon my plan, no matter how prismatic her hair or dark blue her eyes or kissable her smile. “Listen. Not to be crass, but I need money. If there’s anything in the house that seems especially museum-worthy, you’re welcome to take it for display. But I’m looking for valuable items I can sell quickly.”

Her nod in response is thoughtful as opposed to judgmental, which is a relief. “Are you clearing out the property to sell? It’s a great location.”

“My focus is smaller items I can liquidate immediately.”

Elle smiles wryly, but she takes a step toward the still-open door. “You’re sure you own this house? I’m not helping you commit a crime?”

I let out a shocked burst of a laugh. Mom called it my donkey bray. I cover my mouth self-consciously. “No. God, no, sorry. If I were asking you to commit a crime with me, I’d come up with something much more exciting. And that involved considerably less dust.”

“Such as?”

“High-profile assassination? Corporate espionage? Some sort of hilarious protest graffiti? I’m not sure. But I am sure I own the house and everything in it. This place has been in my family for generations. I have proof.” I duck into the den and grab the papers I got from my crabby solicitor, then hand them to her. “Here.”

She glances over them, setting her cup of tea on the stairs. “Goldaming?”

Fuck. The weight in her tone makes me certain she knows about Goldaming Life. I can’t answer questions about it. Not now, not with Elle. I want to keep things breezy and fun. Flirty, ideally. “Yup. Iris Goldaming, like I said in the phone message.”

She snaps. “Oh, right! That’s where I know it from. Ha.”

Thank god. I don’t have to explain my mother’s multilevel marketing empire. And if Elle hasn’t heard of it, she’s definitely not a member. If she’d excitedly told me she was walking the Gold Path and asked what gates I’d been through, I’d have thrown up all over her, which is the opposite of flirty.

Elle sets the papers on a side table near the door, then holds out her hand. It’s warm and fits perfectly in mine, just like I remembered. We shake. “We’re in business, then,” she says. “Legal business. Maybe a dash of crime, though, if you come up with a sexy enough one.” Then she’s already moving on into the sitting room. Even the word “sexy” coming out of her lips gives me a rush of that good low warmth.

Calm your tits, calm your tits, I sing in my head. Be cool for once in my life.

I close the front door and lock it. “Does it feel like you’re underwater in here? Like you’re sealed away from the rest of the world? But not in a safe and cozy way? In a way where you’re…”

“Trapped?” Elle’s considering me with her head tilted. “I think houses hold their history, built up over decades. Like dust.” She runs her fingers along the old piano framed in the bay window, then stares at the marks left behind. “All those stories are still here, even if no one knows them anymore. It’s not surprising that Hillingham doesn’t feel friendly to you. It has a strange and sordid past.”

“You know about it?”

“Everyone does. It’s locally notorious.”

I sit on the edge of the stairs. “Do tell!”

Elle leans against the arched entry to the sitting room. “I might have oversold it a bit. It’s mostly just the deaths.”

“Oh, is that all?” I let out a choked laugh. “Please elaborate.”

“The last family to live here—I could be wrong, I’d need to look at local records and I didn’t have time before I came over—all met tragic ends. The father used to sleepwalk. He wandered out one night and never returned.”

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