Page 90 of Eyes of the Grave
It was a good question. “I’ve been here all of twice since Viktor took me in. I was six. I don’t remember much before that.”
“Yeah, well, we’re gonna change that.” Striding across the room, she pulled something from her pocket. She held it to her lips and then tossed it into the circle with me. “There. Look at that.”
I didn’t move an inch. I didn’t even look at where it fell. “What is it?”
“A picture I think you’ll find very interesting. I know I did when I opened Viktor’s letter.” Her eyes narrowed. “I’m curious to see if you’ll react the same way I did.”
I hesitated. Looking at Poppet, I had that same sense of familiarity again. It tugged at the back of my mind, but how could I trust it? She was a shapeshifter. She could wear any face she wanted. Hell, she could’ve been a man in disguise.
I frowned. My gut told me her face was real. She really looked like me, but her posture was strange. She was caught between puffing her chest and being completely at ease. Her expression was a mixture of anger and something else. She almost looked sad, but it went deeper than that. She looked broken.
That expression was enough for me to pick up the picture. I unfolded it and a happy family of five stared back at me. Five. A mother, a father, and three little bundles wrapped in pink.
“What is this?” I recognized the woman and the man. I kept their wedding photo beside my bed. They were my parents, but three babies? That was wrong. I was an only child.
“I told you, it’s a picture,” Poppet hissed, massaging the back of her neck with one hand.
I exhaled a long breath. “Obviously.”
“Oh, you mean the fact that you’re not an only child and there are three babies? Yeah, that got me too.” She chuckled. “Well, I’m not sure which one is which, but one of them is you, another is me, and the third, I don’t know, but I think it’s safe to assume she’s our sister. I mean, seriously, look at us. I feel like I’m looking in a mirror. A preppy, happy mirror.” Her lips curled in disgust, and she sat on the arm of the couch, bouncing on her toes.
My jaw dropped in shock and confusion. “Me, preppy? How dare—I don’t have sisters. I’m an only child.”
“Oh my god. You’re impossible.” She threw her hands up again and stood up, pacing the floor, raking her fingers through her hair. “You’re telling me that you never wondered why I kept wearing a slightly different version of your face? I’m a shapeshifter. I could be anyone in the world, and I don’t make mistakes. Any image I project is exactly what it’s supposed to be.”
A small part of me wanted to crush the picture into a ball and throw it back at her, but the larger part of me won out. I refolded the picture and shoved it into the pocket of my pajama pants.If she wanted it back, she’d have to ask for it and let me out.
Viktor had given me one picture of my parents after the accident. One. Could this be why he got so mad whenever I asked for more? Did I really have sisters? I’d know if I had sisters. Wouldn’t I?
A lump formed in my throat. “Pictures might be worth a million words, or whatever, but we’ve still got two problems here. One, you’ve already admitted that you’ve got some sort of vendetta against me, so I know you’ve got something nefarious planned, and two, pictures are easy to fake. I’m a PI, I see doctored photos all the time.”
She gaped at me. “You’ve gotta be—It’s not fake. Viktor left it for me in my letter.”
“What letter?” I knew exactly which letter she was referring to, but I wasn’t about to tell my kidnapper that.
“I know you found the boxes. You’re wearing the cuff. Your envelope was the one with the R on it. I was the P. I found it, I changed the spells, and manipulated the cuff in your box. You wouldn’t be here if I hadn’t.”
“Well, that explains the world’s worst piece of jewelry on my wrist.” I shook my hand, rattling the bracelet in question. “And my headache. Now, if only you’d let me go.”
She laughed and massaged her neck again, pacing once more. “Not gonna happen. She’s in my head, and I can’t…I can’t…It’s not gonna happen.”
I swallowed the lump in my throat. Something was very wrong with Poppet. I had to distract her. “How’d you get past the shock spell? How’d you reset it?”
“It’s part of my charm. Shapeshifter, remember? I pretended to be you.” She sighed. “Are any of your memories resurfacing? Any at all? This is getting tiresome.”
“How did you get past the wards on the house?” Annoying her was mildly entertaining but pushing her got more dangerous by the second. “They’re built to detect and repel creatures like you.”
“There are no other creatures like me.”
I laughed. “Someone’s full of themselves.”
“Answer my question. Are you remembering anything?”
“Answer mine first,” I said. It wasn’t exactly true that the house repelled shapeshifters. It repelled illusions. No one hiding their true form could enter the house, and even then, they needed permission from someone in the family.
Poppet smiled. “The wards didn’t affect me. I’m a Devereaux just like you.”
“Okay, fine.” I sighed. “If you’re my sister then why are you doing this? Why kill Nadia? Why kill anyone? You could have just come to me when you found out.”