Page 46 of Unbroken
After what happened at the Breakwater Club, Ves didn’t want to leave Noct behind when they visited Mrs. Rice. Time might be of the essence, but if the other Dark Young put in an appearance, having someone else immune to her toxins might make all the difference. Which meant waiting until after dark to visit the Rice home.
Irene and Sebastian both protested, but Mortimer agreed with Ves and Noct, and they eventually gave in. Sebastian used the museum phone to call the Rice house, but reported Mrs. Rice hung up on him. He sent her several telegrams over the course of the afternoon, none of which were answered.
Mr. Tubbs turned up around three o’clock, escorted to the library by one of the security staff who apparently had heard something about the attempt to break in the previous weekend, at least enough to know Tubbs was tangentially involved. Since Sebastian was off sending yet another telegram, Ves agreed to meet with him.
Tubbs seemed meeker than he had before, or at least more subdued, as he followed Ves back to the bindery. Seeing Penelope’s corpse, transformed into a leech, had clearly struck him hard.
“I went to look at Penny’s grave,” he said, once they were seated. “Someone had painted on it, as with Mr. Siewert. It showed…it showed a figure I assume was meant to be her, bursting out of the ground.”
It made a certain amount of sense, if the paintings were part of the magic being used to control the WHS members. “I’m sorry.”
“I scrubbed it off, but I’ll never forget it. Every time I go to visit her grave from now on, I’ll know she isn’t there, that the horrible drawing was there…but at least Perry will never find out.” He wiped at his eyes. “Tell me—has anything else happened?”
He listened carefully while Ves explained what he could of the events of the last two nights. “So Mr. Fuller is dead,” Tubbs said at last, face set in grim lines. “And this woman—you think she’s behind it all?”
“We’re fairly certain of it,” Ves said. “But I must warn you she isn’t….”
He trailed off, trying to decide what to say. He’d glossed over all the details on how Fuller died, or his killer’s appearance.
“Does she have an inhuman heritage?” Tubbs asked, surprising him. At Ves’s expression, he sighed. “I was here in 1902, you know. Does she have the blood of the sea?”
“No. Something else.”
Tubbs straightened his shoulders. “I’m not afraid of her.”
“You should be,” Ves said bluntly. “I?—”
The door swung open. “Damn the woman—we’re going to have to go to her house and break down the door,” Sebastian said as he came in. Catching sight of Tubbs, he came to an abrupt halt. “Oh. I didn’t know you were here.”
Tubbs bristled. “And a good thing for me, since you’re clearly hiding something. Whose house? Are you talking about Mrs. Rice?”
“Er…” Sebastian’s eyes cut toward Ves, as if to ask what had been said before he arrived.
Tubbs didn’t miss the look. “I’m not an idiot, you know! All the other WHS members are dead.” He rose to his feet. “Very well—let’s go to her house now.”
“And get arrested by police for breaking and entering in broad daylight?” Sebastian exclaimed. “Absolutely not.”
“After dark, then.” Tubbs’s hands curled into fists, as though expecting a fight. “I won’t be brushed aside. You didn’t have the decency to tell me you were interrogating Fuller or visiting Mrs. Norris, but you are not doing this in secrecy. I have the right to be there.”
This wouldn’t end well, but Ves couldn’t imagine how they’d stop Tubbs from showing up wherever he pleased, short of physically restraining him. “There may be danger, even in talking to an old woman in her home,” he warned.
“I don’t care.” Tubbs picked up his hat and made for the door to the bindery, brushing past Sebastian as he did so. “I will see you gentlemen tonight.”
As dusk fell, Irene drove them all to the Rice mansion. A few houses down, she slowed long enough for Noct and Ves to both slip out of the auto. They would station themselves on the roof and in the garden, forming a first line of defense if the other Dark Young returned.
“Remember,” Ves said as he climbed out, “if you sense her nearby, do whatever it takes to alert us. Shout, throw something out a window, bang pans together, anything.”
“I’ll stick my head out the nearest window and yell at the top of my lungs,” Sebastian assured him. After seeing what had happened to Fuller, he had no wish to suffer the same fate. “Be careful, angel.”
“You, too.” Then the brothers were gone, vanishing into the growing darkness without so much as a whisper.
When Irene pulled over to the curb in front of the house, Tubbs was already there. Possibly he’d been waiting for hours, determined not to be left out yet again. God, the man was persistent.
“There you are,” he said irritably, as soon as Sebastian opened his door. “Where’s Mr. Rune?”
“Somewhere else,” Sebastian replied shortly. “Let’s try knocking on the door—maybe she’ll let us in voluntarily.”
“I’ll knock.” Irene took the lead. She’d changed into a fashionable dinner dress and a hat sporting an enormous taffeta bow on one side. “Mrs. Rice might be more amenable to speaking to another woman.”
