The police officer crouched down beside them. He was big and scary, but at least he wasn’t crying. “I’m afraid your mommy and daddy were in a really bad accident. Their car was hit by a big truck.”
Jillian started to wail.
Louise reached for the police officer and caught tight to his shirt. “Are — are they — are they dead?”
“No!” Jillian howled. “No!”
The officer flinched at Jillian’s cry but nodded solemnly. Louise pulled Jillian between them and clung to his strength. Jillian burrowed tight into Louise, wailing, refusing to take comfort from the man.
Principal Wiley said something about going to the office and pulling their records to call their emergency contact. “Your grandmother is on her way. She was at a charity event nearby.”
“We don’t have. .” Louise started to say that they didn’t have a grandmother and then remembered that they did. “What?”
“Here she is now.” Principal Wiley beckoned to someone at the lobby doors.
And like something out of a nightmare, Anna Desmarais came sweeping down the center aisle, tall and regal as a queen. She wore a black cocktail dress and diamonds at her neck.
Louise clung tighter to the officer against the flood of impossibility that was about to sweep them away from everything they knew. “Aunt Kitty is our emergency contact.”
Principal Wiley shook his head. “According to your records, Kitty Kennedy is a family friend. We needed to call an actual relative.”
Louise whimpered and looked to Jillian. She wanted Jillian to stop crying; her twin was so much better at explaining.
“Oh, you poor babies.” Anna sunk down and opened her arms. “Yes, I know, it hurts so bad. Come here, ladybug.”
Jillian unwrapped from Louise to let herself be coaxed into the woman’s embrace. Louise stood feeling like she would collapse.
“We’ll get Jillian’s street clothes from the changing room.” Principal Wiley tapped Miss Hamilton’s shoulder and pointed toward the hallway.
Louise could only whimper as he led away the only person they knew in the room, leaving them alone with strangers.
31: Lost In Darkness
There was a sleek black limo parked in the school-bus lane outside the school. It had rained sometime during the play, and the night gleamed wet and dangerous. A tall driver in a black suit got out as they approached and opened the back doors.
All the warnings to not get into cars with strangers played through Louise’s mind.
Louise glanced at the police officer and Principal Wiley watching, letting them be taken. They couldn’t see the wrongness of this. They knew nothing about Esme’s warnings.
She kept a firm hold on Nikola, who seemed to be stumbling through the same grief that she was feeling. There had been no chance to check to see if Joy was still asleep in Tesla’s storage bin or if the baby dragon had woken up and gone in search of food. “We’ll get in first.”
Louise pretended to struggle with getting Nikola into the limo, praying that Jillian was coherent enough to delay Anna. She cracked the top of the storage chamber, and Joy peered up at her, nearly vibrating with nervousness.
“Stay.” She used Tesla’s command, knowing that if she were overheard, the adults would assume she was talking to the nanny-bot. She fished a handful of jawbreakers out of her pocket and poured them in with Joy and hurriedly closed the lid.
The need for distraction, though, had broken what little control Jillian might have had. Wailing, she needed to be lifted into the car.
Louise knew that Esme’s family was crazy rich, but it was another thing to drive up to a mansion larger than their school and spill out of the limo into a foyer that was all polished marble, gleaming gold leaf, and sparkling crystal.
Their footsteps echoed through vast empty areas as they made their way through the house to a second-floor bedroom.
“This is Esme’s old room.” Anna moved through the large room, flicking on lights. It was a great cave of a room with a twenty-foot ceiling. At one time it had been decorated in the same tween princess-style as Elle’s bedroom. Apparently it was the set of furniture that rich people bought their little girls. In the Pondwaters’ case, it was an effort to mold their daughter into a demure princess. Whatever reason had moved Anna to purchase the furniture, it obviously had been a complete failure. Every piece had been attacked, defiled, and remodeled by someone who was as whimsical as she was angry.
The four-poster bed had been sprayed high-gloss lacquer black and fitted in what looked like a steampunk elevator cage so it could be raised up to a loft area. The other pieces had also been sprayed black and trimmed with silver, and random gears and cogs had been added. The mirrored vanity had been merged with obscure antique electronics so it looked like the control console of an ancient spacecraft. One wall was floor-to-ceiling bookcases with a tall library ladder on a brass rail. Another wall had faux windows installed and painted so they seemed like they were looking out over eighteenth-century Paris with airships drifting past a half-built Eiffel Tower. There was no sign of real windows, as if Esme had drywalled over them. An odd assortment of furniture crowded the room, from a half-disassembled pinball machine to model airships strung from the ceiling.
“You’ll have to share Esme’s bedroom tonight.” Anna opened a door and turned on another light, revealing a Jack and Jill bathroom that had been spared the steampunk makeover. “Lain’s bedroom is connected through here, but it’s empty. Lain moved all her things to Elfhome, but Esme just walked away from everything.”
“Everything” included old paper books and toys and gadgets crowding the bookcase shelves.
Anna threw a huge wall-mounted knife switch, and the bed lowered down to the ground. “We’ll get some furniture for the other room and — which one of you is the oldest?”
“We’re twins,” Louise said. “We’re the same age.”
“One of you was born first.” Anna started to strip the comforter and sheets from the bed. Dust scented the air as if no one had touched the bed for nearly twenty years.
Louise welcomed the flare of anger. “Mom and Dad said that there isn’t an ‘oldest’ and ‘youngest’ for us.” Since their father had fainted during the delivery, there had been a lot of confusion in the birthing room, and it was possible that their parents simply hadn’t known.
“We’ve always shared a bedroom,” Jillian whispered and clung to Louise as if Anna was about to force them apart.
Anna sighed, dropping the comforter and sheets onto the floor. “I suppose, for now, it won’t hurt for you to share a room.”
There was a knock on the door. It opened, and a tall, elegant woman swept into the room with fresh linens in her hands. She had that same hidden elf look that Ming had, as if everything that said “elf” had been carefully erased, and yet nothing could hide the tall, willowy build and the unearthly beauty.
“I’m sorry,” the non-elf said. “I only had time to dust and run a mop around the room. The vacuum cleaner threw another hissy fit. I wish we could find a good old-fashioned one without any sensors or filters or computers.”
“This is Celine.” Anna dipped a hand toward the female. “She’s been our housekeeper since she was very young.”
Louise eyed the female. If Tristan was nearly forty and looked ten, then how old was Celine? The housekeeper seemed unaware of the twins’ stares. She unfurled the bottom sheet and then expertly tucked the corners around the ends of the mattress.
Anna stripped the pillowcase from one of the pillows and gave it a tentative sniff. “These are too musty.” She gazed about the room. “I don’t know why I left everything this way. Esme’s not coming back. Even if she could, she wouldn’t. She hated this house.”