Page 94 of The Darkest Chase
The question of who killed Brian Newcomb and why.
The heaviness of Miss Lewis’ grief and my weird reaction to it.
The shock etched on Janelle’s face and just what her denial might be hiding.
What the chief might be doing every day when it’s not feasible that he’s hanging around the Jacobins all day.
My intuition tells me there’s something deeper going on, something goddamned disturbing.
Bowden’s always been off.
The man smiles a little too easy, a little too bright, and he laughs at the oddest times. It’s like he puts a lot of effort into being disarming and harmless.
As I head down the street toward the station, I pass A Touch of Grey.
I can’t help glancing in the shop window, but Talia’s nowhere in sight. She’s probably holed up in the workshop in the back.
Move on, I tell myself, but I stop when a faint jingle across the street and a flash of sunlight off glass catch my attention.
Out of habit, I scan that direction.
Then stop.
Ephraim Jacobin steps out of the butcher’s shop on the other side of the lane.
He’s a lean specter cut in black, dressed in their archaic-looking handmade clothes with a buttoned shirt and neat pants and suspenders. His wide-brimmed hat lays low over his face and his thick black and grey beard bells out over his chest.
There’s nothing inherently wrong about Ephraim stopping at the butcher’s. The Jacobins sell pig meat and blood to the shop all the time.
Still, I don’t like how he stops one bit.
How his head turns toward me.
No—not me.
He’s looking at Talia’s shop.
The man stares at the window for too long, his scarecrow expression unreadable—right before his eyes snap to me with a sharpness that says he knows I’m watching.
He knows why.
I see it in the slimy, overly polite way he tips his hat at me.
Yeah, I don’t fucking like it. Don’t like him being within a hundred yards of Talia.
My teeth are clenched as I hold his eyes.
Then I turn and walk pointedly inside her shop.
11
DARK DESIRES (TALIA)
Ibarely register the bell over the shop door jingling.
Not when Grandpa and I practically have our heads knocked together, poring over a sample book of wood grains and finishes and fabrics, debating color, texture, and etching methods.
We’ve been at it all morning, ever since I showed him my revised sketches and asked his opinion on adding Xavier’s indoor water installations without making everything too awkward.