Page 74 of Infernal Hearts

Rani’s voice sounds behind me, short and snippy. “Maybe I should call Theresa and see if there’s another clue she can give us.”

“You’re just looking for a reason to call her.”

“Can you really blame me? I never thought I’d be into a hippie mountain chick, but damn.”

It’s nice that she’s branching out of her normal go-go girl taste, but this isn’t helpful right now. “Yeah, yeah, keep it in your pants for a hot second. We have a job to do.”

The sun is right at the golden hour—when everything is bathed in a brilliant orange light, looking otherworldly. I take a second to look around at the mix of tangerine and shadows. Even a place that stinks of death can be beautiful.

Finally, we get to the last row, and a door that has elegant steelwork that matches the key. Ambrose.

“I think this is it.” My voice is quiet, but my pulse is pounding.

Rani comes up behind me, putting her hand on my shoulder blade. “You ready for this?”

My pulse pounds, but I steel myself. “As I’ll ever be.”

Putting the key in the lock, a resounding little pop clicks through the air and the iron bars swing open. Dane’s necklace weighs on my chest, and I find myself wishing it would give me some sort of sign that we’re closer. But I know in my gut I don’t need one. This is the place—the key worked.

We walk inside the stone building, a single sarcophagus sitting in the middle of the room. It’s strange. Why would someone build a crypt for a single person?

As soon as we take a few more steps, a screeching and stirring sound flies out of the upper corners of the room. I quickly shield myself, startled, but Rani doesn’t flinch. She rips off her sunglasses, and a bright light flashes throughout the room from her eyes. The sound of stone hitting the ground echoes around us, cracking and crumbling.

I cautiously look back at the floor, and a pile of petrified bats lay on the floor, as if someone had perfectly sculpted them from marble.

“False alarm.” She puts her sunglasses back on. “But can’t be too careful. This place feels wrong. It’s making me jumpy.”

“I agree.” There’s supernatural energy inside the room. It penetrates my core. I put my hand in front of me, pawing around the room. The walls are clean, but the center of the room is radiating with it. “You think it’s in here?”

“Only one way to find out.” Rani pushes the lid aside, but there’s no body inside. It’s a staircase. She shudders. “Of course we’d find the world’s creepiest fucking basement on this search. Please don’t tell me we’re going down there.”

“I think we have to.” Climbing into the sarcophagus, I take the narrow stairs into the dark room, my supernatural eyes cutting through the blackness.

The bottom is a relatively large room, about the size of Jay’s guest house. It’s packed full of chests and boxes, floor to ceiling, a small path winding between all of them.

Rani comes down behind me. “I already hate this.”

“Me, too.” I pick through the nearest container. It’s full of vials. But of what? I pick one up, holding it up to the light. It’s black inside the glass. Some are full of purple fluid. Others, blue. “It’s all blood of different magical creatures.”

She looks inside the one closest to her. “This one’s full of teeth.”

A chill runs up my spine. What did my brother get himself into here? Did he find something he wasn’t supposed to? Did he fall into a mess he couldn’t get out of?

Rani and I comb through the path, looking inside boxes along the way. Samples of hair. Tins full of powders. All of it reeks of magical creatures, and I wouldn’t be surprised if there was DNA of every known type down here. We get to the back of the room, and a gigantic bookshelf covers the wall. More leather-bound journals.

I pick one up, thumbing through it. The first page has one word: fairies. Inside are detailed drawings of their anatomy, lists of the powers, their weaknesses, and their strengths. It’s a complete medical journal dated back to the late 1800s. And its author signed his name at the back of the book.

Dr. Richard Ambrose.

“Rani, help me look through these.” I put the fairy journal aside and pull out another. This time it says vampire.

“What am I looking for?” She shines her light at the shelves, lightly running her fingers over the spines of the diaries.

“Something on incubi.” I shelve the vampire journal and pull out another. Djinn. Still no luck.

We go through each book one at a time—and there are hundreds. You’d think he would at least alphabetize them, but he probably knew all of this information by heart.

My pulse races. Who is this Dr. Ambrose and why is this place down here? What kind of work did he do? And how the hell did he find out all of this information?

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