“You and me both, and he said they made him do it.” She laughed then, but there was no mirth to it. “Can you believe that? As if someone can actually make someone cheat on their girlfriend.”
“They?” I frowned. “Wait, was he heaps drunk? Did someone take advantage of him?”
“No,” she howled. “They made him.”
“Who are they? His friends?”
“He wouldn’t say,” she said, scrubbing a tissue beneath her nose. “He said he couldn’t say anything else, and so I told him to leave.”
I didn’t dare ask if she’d spoken to him since. His name flashing on the screen of her phone told me they hadn’t. And I didn’t dare ask if they’d broken up.
I peeked at my phone in my lap, waiting for a text from Cory after asking how she was doing. A stupid question, probably, but I needed to check in, and Mom had hurried me out the door as I was texting.
“Where are we going again?” I asked her now.
January, seated across from me in the back of the Town Car, expelled a breath and grabbed a bottle of champagne from the minibar. The Town Car now made more sense. We rarely used them unless she needed to for work, to drink or was planning to drink. “I’ve been in denial, I’m afraid.”
I made a face. “Huh?” She popped the lid. “About what?”
We rolled farther into town, and she put the visor up, ensuring the driver wasn’t privy to whatever it was she was muttering about.
“I’ve tried,” she said, seeming close to tears.
“Mom,” I said, a nervous laugh accompanying my next words. “What’s going on?”
She didn’t answer, just drank straight from the bottle. And then she drank some more. She kept going until she’d nearly polished off half the bottle.
Her anxiety was making me anxious.
“Do I need some of that?” I tried to joke.
“Oh, probably.” She handed it over, and I took it, alarm snaking through me. “We’re almost there, so I’d hurry up and drink.”
I set the bottle back in the fridge, needing something to do. “Almost where?”
“You’ll see. Put your seat belt on.”
I rolled my eyes but clipped it on.
“I daresay you’ve heard rumors every now and then about some of the people who live on the island.”
“You’ll need to be more specific, I’m afraid,” I said, frowning. “Rumors are social currency here, and I’m not a very social person.”
She plucked at nothing on her tight cream dress. “You’ve not heard murmurings of the society?”
“Are you referring to the council meetings you attend?” I wondered what that had to do with anything. “What, are they like secret meetups for singles or something?”
Mom snorted. “Hardly, and no, I’m talking about Nightingale.”
“Never heard of it.”
“Them,” she said. “We’ve been born into it, and the only other way in is via marriage.”
I was so confused right now. “Born into…” I laughed, suggesting with sarcasm, “Oh, like a for-real secret society?”
“Yes, and it’s far more deranged than any rumors could suggest. I’ve tried.” She moaned then and rubbed her temples. “Lord, have I tried, but this day was always coming, and I’ve just been too chickenshit to put my naïve, off with the fairies child through it.”
“Hey,” I said, annoyed. “Wait, what?”
“You heard me. It’s time for you to initiate, Fern, and there’s not a damn thing I can do to stop it. But what I have done,” her voice lowered, her eyes sharp on mine, “is made your arrival far easier than most.”
Initiate.
Arrival.
What in the love of fuck was happening right now?
“You’re joking, right?” Laughing again, I shook my head. “This sounds like a cult.”
“Call it what you like, but just keep your mouth shut around those who’re not members.” When I opened said mouth to ask one of the billion other questions, she snapped, “The rest can wait until we’re in my office.”
The car pulled into a driveway behind the hotel, and a man in a dark navy suit opened my door. “Good morning, ladies.”
“The paperwork is on my desk?” Mom asked, throwing her arm around when I failed to move.
I climbed out, and he closed the door behind me. “Ready and waiting.”
“Thank you, Dick.”
Dick? “I thought your assistant’s name was…” Oh. “Never mind.”
“Richard does whatever I tell him and that includes tolerating the name Dick.”
“Why not just call him Rich? Rick? Or I don’t know, maybe even Richard?” I asked as we stepped inside two blacked-out glass doors and entered a stark, glowing foyer.
“Life’s a bitch, Fern. One must take enjoyment wherever they can. If that’s at the expense of others, then so be it.” She then added dryly, “Besides, he’s paid too much to care.”
I wasn’t about to argue, but I did withhold a laugh.
We entered an elevator fit for at least twenty people. With the exception of the back wall, which was mirrored, the rest was all glass, granting view to every floor.
I caught glimpses of rooms, and as we rose higher, what appeared to be conference rooms. When we reached the top, I felt my stomach drop. You could see the entire island, and then it just fell away, replaced by water and small glimpses of Ardent Falls and Old Isle. “Wow.”
Mom stayed silent, and then the doors opened with a ping to reveal a huge foyer that broke into two hallways. Upon the ceiling were fat babies with wings, playing amongst the clouds between patches of glass shielded sky.
We moved straight ahead, gliding past weird writing in gold frames. I struggled to keep up, let alone ask what they were.
And then I saw it at the end of the hall.
Inside a black gilded frame was the same picture as Jude’s tattoo. This one was larger, more detailed. The birds taking flight from the mouths of the snakes and soaring toward the frame glittered in a way that made it seem like they were moving each time you tilted your head.
Nightingale.
“Fern,” Mom called. “You’re not supposed to be here yet, so we need to make this quick.”
“Mom,” I said, at a loss for words. I pointed at the picture, my head swimming.
“Shit, are you going to faint?”
Unsure, I used the wall for support as I waded to her as though I was walking through quicksand. “I thought your office was on the ground floor.”
“That’s a decoy.”
“A what and why?”
“Enough,” she said, waving me into what was apparently her real office, the door already open. “Sit.”
In a soft brown leather chair, I waited for her to quit pacing behind her desk. She’d be a while, so I looked around and studied the stained floor-to-ceiling shelves. Upon them sat thick black books with silver and gold embossed spines. No words labeled them, but roman numerals.
“Fern, you need to initiate before you turn nineteen.”
She hadn’t stopped pacing. “Why?”