Betsy listened. She thought of her father. The third ear, you must develop the third ear, he would tell her.
She shuddered in the dark so violently that the man next to her shifted his gaze to her.
“It is chilly in here,” she muttered, fixing her stare at the two women on stage.
“I am so sorry to conclude this fascinating discussion,” said the curator. “But our time is up. Thank you all so much for attending tonight’s ‘Red Book Dialogue.’ ”
The audience clapped, and the lights came up fully. Some people rushed forward to ask the psychic questions.
Who did she know who was a Scorpio…other than herself?
She hailed a cab to her hotel. In the dark, her fingers fumbled over the tarot card deep in her jacket pocket.
Betsy shivered in the darkness of the cab. She felt a strong urge to be back in Colorado, back to work. She knew she wouldn’t sleep that night, not until she was back in her own rumpled bed in Carbondale.
Chapter 12
CARBONDALE, COLORADO
DECEMBER 6, 2010
Before she left, Betsy had spoken with her neighbor at Marta’s Market—a Mexican food and clothing store—who had eagerly promised to take care of Ringo anytime Betsy had to be away from home.
“This is just a quick trip,” Betsy promised. “A few days in New York.”
“No hay problema,” said Marta, and her two teenage boys had nodded their heads, smiling from their work stacking crates of fresh vegetables. A waft of fresh roasted chiles came in from the back alley, green chiles blistering in a metal drum over a propane flame.
“We take Ringo for walks, give food, water. Doctora no worry,” said Luis, the eldest. He put his bear-like arm around Betsy.
Luis was the biggest—but gentlest—young man Betsy had ever known. The Latina kids in the neighborhood called him “Arbolon” or “Big Tree.”
Then Marta shooed him away and gave Betsy a kiss on the cheek and a generous abrazo herself. She smelled of sweet corn masa from making tamales.
“Luis and Carlos, they take good care of your doggy.”
Betsy left them the key to the house, a bag of dogfood, Ringo’s leash, and the number of the vet only a half block away.
And her cell phone number, just in case.
Several times a day and once a night, Carlos or Luis walked to the town park with Ringo on a leash, occasionally letting him run loose when they knew a police officer wasn’t around to ticket.
One evening, just after sunset, a girl with jet-black hair and a black wool coat and boots stopped Luis on the sidewalk.
“Where did you get that dog?” she asked. “He’s not yours.”
“It’s Doctora Betsy’s,” said Luis, eyeing her up and down. “Hey, where is the funeral?”
“What?”
“Where is the funeral, girl? You all dressed in black.”
“Funny,” Daisy said.
Luis shrugged, his heavy shoulders lifting and falling with a seismic shift.
“You know Doc Betsy?” he asked.
“Yes, I am a…friend. I was just going to visit her.”
He eyed her silently. Friend, he thought. No, she must be one of the Doctora’s locos. No matter. Underneath all that black-and-white makeup, the girl was bastante guapa. Even with the wild colmillo, a crazy tooth like a lobo.
“Good. La Doctora’s friends are my friends,” he said, winking. “Come have a beer with me, amiga. Doc is out of town for a couple of days.”
Luis noticed the creases in her brow, plastered in white makeup. “You and me and a Tecate, bruja.”
“I can’t. I’m—underage.”
“Yeah? Cool, me too. Come on, funeral girl. Cheer up with some cerveza.”
“I can’t, really. Hey, just let me pet the dog, OK?”
“Sure. Sure. Girls always go for the pups.”
Ringo pushed close to Daisy, licking her bare hand as she scratched his ears. Luis watched as Ringo twisted his body, wagging his tail frantically at the girl.
“He likes you,” said Luis.
“Yeah. I like him, too.”
“Why don’t you come with me? I’ve got to feed him.”
Daisy straightened up from petting the dog. “You have a key to the office, I mean, her house?”
“Yeah, man. She trusts me with the dog, the house. Everything,” he said, puffing out his chest.
Daisy hesitated for just a moment, then, “Sure, yeah why not?”
They walked back along Main Street just as the streetlights flickered on. A gust of cold wind from the mountains barreled down the road, biting at their skin. Daisy put on a pair of black wool gloves.
“Whew! This is when I wish I was back in Veracruz, man. Drinking a cerveza, eating ceviche. Watching the girls in their bikinis. Everyone sweating, drinking, having a good time. Mariachis—”
Luis dug a house key out of his front pocket as they started up the walk. But as they approached the house, Ringo gave a low growl. Luis grabbed his muzzle, silencing him.
Daisy saw movement in the office window, beyond the aspen trees. She put a hand on Luis’s arm. “Someone’s in there!”
Luis’s body turned stone hard. He pulled a switchblade out of his pocket and snapped it open.
“You wait here and hold the dog.”
“The hell I will. I’m coming.”
They crept closer to the window.
A man in black stood hunched over Betsy’s desk.
“What’s he doing?” said Luis.
Daisy squinted in the darkness.
“He’s going through her papers,” said Daisy.
Ringo growled again. Luis tried to hold his muzzle, but the dog tore away and began to bark frantically. He leapt at the window, snarling.
Luis raced to the door, struggling with the key in the lock, leaving Daisy with the dog, which lunged at the glass, still barking.
The intruder looked up at the snarling dog. His eyes were the palest blue, the shade of a washed-out sky. His skin was ashen, with a bluish cast—the color of dead flesh.
He looked straight into Daisy’s eyes, as if he could see her perfectly in the darkness. And then he smiled.
She screamed so loud all Main Street heard her.
Chapter 13
DAISY HART’S JOURNAL
ASPEN, COLORADO
DECEMBER 6, 2010
After I saw the burglar, I was so freaked out all I wanted to do was talk to Betsy.
But she isn’t here. When I need her most. When she needs me the most, damn it! I got an eerie sense. Someone is out to hurt her bad.
That dude rifling through her drawers had looned-out blue eyes, the color of glacial lakes. A sinister blue. He was looking for something—I bet it wasn’t money.
I’m doing some research, trying to get a fix on Dr. Betsy, where she is taking me with all this journaling. I’ve been Googling Jung. He is wicked intense—like he was surfing the darkness when they were just inventing cars and stuff.
But I totally get it. I’m thinking of starting a blog, especially for Goths. Dreams, especially.
Ever since I started with Betsy, my dreams have become more…disturbing. I used to remember just bits of a night’s dream, weird fragments—a checkered tile floor or stones in the battlement of a castle. Red shoes.
Now the dreams are intense. The colors scream, and every detail sizzles.
There is one dream I will not share with anybody.
I dream of blood. Vats of blood. Human blood. A woman made of white marble slides into a shiny brass tub with wide bands of copper. A tub of blood.
Her body submerges shoulder deep and she sighs with satisfaction. Ahhh! she says. Ahhhhh!
Like she was in a freaking bubble bath.
She cups her hands and splashes her stony face, the red liquid clotting in her cuticles, coloring her fingertips.
It is so freaking Goth, but it totally creeps me out. I wake up bolt upright in bed, screaming my head off.
My mother runs in, shouting, “Wake up, darling, wake up!”
But I can’t forget the last image in the dream: the rock woman smiling, slowly gliding down into the bath until she submerges completely, disappearing into the blood.
Chapter 14
SOMEWHERE IN SLOVAKIA
DECEMBER 7, 2010
Grace felt a cold draft from an open door and heard the hollow echo of footsteps. Blinded by the hood, she focused her other senses and her wits. The echoing footsteps. The cold draft, despite the warm fire she could feel and hear crackling somewhere nearby. She must be in a large building—too cavernous to heat effectively. There was a smell, musty and rich—and cold. Beeswax, cedar, the tangy odor of ancient carpets and mildewing tapestries, damp from the humidity of constant rains. The scents of a castle.
“Are you ready to talk now, Dr. Path?” asked a man in fluent, if accented, English. Someone drew off the hood, making her gray hair stand on end.
She looked around the room. Three emaciated women stood, staring at her, their eyes sunk deep into their sockets. They looked pathetically unhealthy—starving and pallid.
She blinked, trying to focus her eyes. The women were wearing white face paint. There was a hunger in their eyes—starving beasts watching something to feast upon.
She turned to the speaker—and recoiled in surprise. It was the man who had bought her champagne for no apparent reason in Piestany an hour before she was kidnapped. The stranger, a tall man with white hair, had skin as pale as a corpse, except for his purplish lips.
“Why am I here? What do you want from me?” she asked, narrowing her eyes.
“I only want to meet your daughter,” said the man, folding his hands in front of him. “I believe she has something that rightfully belongs to me.”
“Who are you?”
“You may address me as Count.”
Grace blinked her eyes, trying to focus. The man was a blur of white skin and sensuous lips.
“Would you like your spectacles?” he asked.
Spectacles, she thought, not glasses. His accent is possibly Hungarian. He must have been schooled in England, or had an English tutor as a child.
“Yes. Please,” she forced herself to say.