Page 100 of If Looks Could Kill
“Miss Stella,” I said, as calmly as I could, “why on earth would I be jealous of Pearl?”
She came closer. Her snakes hissed. Dizziness washed over me.
“Ma’am,” I said—keep talking, keep talking—“what are you doing?”
“She is my daughter,” she said. “She will inherit my fortune. You thought you could get her out of the way and take it all for yourself.”
I took another step back. My pulse raced, but my mind said, Aha, this is nothing more than a big misunderstanding. I’ll just explain, and—
“You can’t believe that,” I reasoned. “This is the first I’ve even heard of… any of that.”
“Liar,” she said. “You’ve always been jealous of Pearl. I can smell it on you.”
Her snakes punched the air. I kept sliding back, and she kept following.
“She is the beauty,” Miss Stella said, “not you. She has the ancient fire, not you. She is everyone’s concern, not you.”
She wasn’t raving. She was cold and sane and calculating. She had read me, then reached her claws into my heart and ripped it from my ribs.
Leave here, Tabitha. Get out. You need to go.
I hesitated. If I left… I needed answers. Yet the impulse, I thought, hadn’t come from me.
She snatched my wrist. I tried to pull away, but her grip was steel, small though she was.
I am alone in a house with a brokenhearted and wrathful Medusa, I realized. And nobody knows I’m here.
Close your eyes.I didn’t know why, but I clamped them shut.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” I tried to keep my voice even. “I’m trying to find Pearl. I came to see if you could tell me how she seemed before she left.”
“She loved me.” Miss Stella’s voice caught plaintively. “As a daughter loves a mother. She was ready to die to defend me.”
Still her grip held my wrist with supernatural strength.
Her words made no sense, but her intentions were crystal clear.
If I screamed, would anyone hear?
“Miss Stella,” I said gently, “would you please let me go?”
She yanked me closer. “Look at me.”
I heard her snakes hissing. I felt her sour breath on my face.
I turned my face away, but she grabbed my chin and yanked it back. “Look at me.”
The shock of fear felt like falling into cold water. This couldn’t be real.
“Why do you want to hurt me?” I wept. “What have I done to you?”
“You’ve robbed me,” she whispered. “How do I know you haven’t murdered Pearl?”
Such nonsense was unanswerable. “How have I robbed you? I would never hurt Pearl.” My voice was a plea if my words were not. Come to your senses, ma’am. “If I did… those things you said, why would I come back here?”
“Look at me.”
“No, Miss Stella,” I told her. “I don’t dare.”
