Page 82 of Wicked Beasts
“I know it was you,” I mutter.
The dark figure steps into the light from the shadowed corner, and the first thing that strikes me is the glint in his hollow eyes—cold, sharp, empty. His features are washed out by the shadows, his skin so pale, it seems almost translucent. In the time I’ve lived at the Black estate, Mortimer has never quite looked entirely human. He looks like something that’s lingered in the house far too long, a ghost in a barely living body.
“You killed that man, didn’t you?”
“I already told you, Miss Amara,” Mortimer replies, his voice as smooth as it is chilling. “The man from the garden did not die.”
“Well, why did you hurt him?”
“I didn’thurthim. Isavedhim.”
“What? Why?”
“I needed a response time.”
Confusion knots in my chest, and I stare at him, trying to make sense of the cryptic statement. My fingers absently trace the rose charm resting against my collarbone, its cool surface grounding me as I fumble with it, seeking some kind of comfort. “For?”
“How long it would take for him to arrive.”
Himwho?
A sickening twist coils in my stomach, and a cold shiver slithers down my spine. His words are weighed; I feel them pressing down against my lungs, ready to clasp a hand around my throat and drag me underwater again.
“Dr. Wollstonecraft.”
“Youcalled for that doctor—before I—” I stammer, the realization sinking in. That’s how he got there so fast. “YouknewTristan?—”
“Mr. Black,” he corrects, just as he always has.
I clench my jaw, inhaling sharply through my gritted teeth, frustration bubbling up. But then, it hits me. To Mortimer, there had never been aTristanand aDante—onlyMr. Black.Always the same to him. Always the same to Mrs. Wong and Manu. The shadows begin to form shapes in my mind.
“You knewMr. Blackwould try to kill himself?”
“I suspected. He has considered it in the past.” Mortimer’s gaze drifts to the covered portrait on the wall, and there's something in the way his eyes linger there—something distant, almost mournful. “Do you remember his birthday? The fight in the east wing…”
I nod, remembering the crashes I heard and his distress.
“Dante was sabotaging his efforts. My assumption is, he crossed a line when he tried to kill you. I care for Mr. Black in any form he takes. I worked for his parents; I’ve known him since he was just a boy.” Mortimer pauses, and when his gazefinally meets mine again, it feels unnerving. “You understand now, don't you? Dante is Tristan’s?—”
Any form he takes.
“Shadow.” My voice is so soft, it’s just above a whisper. It clicks into place, and I finally understand how Mortimer could help Dr. Shadow. He didn’t want to losehim. As my mind spins, reorganizing my memories with this realization, I marvel at how I never saw it. The two of them, so similar, yet so different—by what magic had I never recognized one in the form of the other?
Tristan gave me that collection on purpose. He was trying to tell me something without actually saying it. ‘You wouldn’t believe me if I told you.’
Mortimer nods, though we both know it isn’t necessary. The secret is in the open, the need for discretion long since passed.
“As dark as his name. Two halves of the same coin. Mr. Black tried to suppress the pieces of himself he believed would hold him back from his academic success—indulgence, lust…sinful acts. Anything that could cause distraction.” He steps closer, his voice lowering, smooth like velvet but sharp as a blade. “His girlfriend—at the time—did not like that. She liked who he was when he was reckless. Temperamental. Angry. Possessive.” Mortimer’s smile is slow, calculated, the kind of smile that doesn’t reach his eyes. “Instead of letting him go and moving on, Cordelia wanted to destroy him. She wanted him to destroyhimself.” He pauses for a moment, as if weighing the next words carefully, the silence between us thickening. “And shecursedhim with her own suicide.”
My eyes widen as I tug the rose charm back and forth on the chain around my neck. “She’sdead?”
The weight of his words press down on me, the room suddenly too small, too suffocating. My heart races, every inch of me screaming that something in Mortimer’s words isn’t right. I want to say curses aren’t real, that my fears and my dreams havebeen nothing but gaps filled by my own overactive imagination, that I’ve seen Cordelia in the woods—alive. But then, I think of the recent dreams where I’ve taken her place. I think of how I followed her into the forest and the trail of dead grass in my wake. Her hair in the water. Her reflection in my mirror.
I know it isn’t the work of my imagination. Something isn’t right. Something hasn’t been right since before I accepted the job. I know Mortimer isn’t lying to me. He has no reason to, not anymore.
“Who hurt that man in the garden?”
“I think you know,” he says, a coldness in his voice.
