Brimstone Read online

  “I have the situation under control.”

  “Oh, you are all about control.” Juliana’s voice was derisive. “Control and playing it safe.”

  Victoria answered tightly. “Not everyone is about using people up and throwing them out. I’m making a long-term investment.”

  “So am I.”

  “In yourself, you mean.”

  “Do not fuck with me, Victoria.” Frost rimed the woman’s voice. They must have stopped directly outside. I could feel the icy power through the door, sense the dominance shifting between the women like weather patterns. “Never forget who started this. You would never have had the guts to do what I did. And if I hadn’t, where would you be? Married to a city councilman with two mortgages and a minivan in the garage.”

  But Victoria wasn’t done. “Don’t threaten me, Juliana. Where would you be if I hadn’t kept this house going the last twenty years? You need us. You need me.”

  “Not as much as you think,” she purred, clearly a threat. “But my daughter does. Now open the door and let’s see if someone has put their hand in the cookie jar.”

  I’d been careful to put everything back, not just where it looked right, but where it felt right. But I worried that my fear and revulsion might be the psychic equivalent of a neon sign.

  Hurrying to the window, I raised the sash and looked out. Only one floor up, but my heart pounded as if it were a dozen. Looping my bag bandolier-style, I sat on the ledge and swung out one leg, then the other, turning so that I hung out the window, then lowering myself until my dangling feet found the ledge below.

  How did a girl as unathletic as me keep getting into these predicaments? And why was it always heights?

  Clinging white-knuckled to the brick overhang, I managed to lower the window sash, which is tricky from the outside. Then I realized I was going to have to let my feet go, hang from my fingertips, and drop to the ground. Let’s see—sprained or broken ankle versus the Witch Queens of Endor.

  I’d take my chances on crutches.

  Luckily it was autumn, and that meant rain. The ground yielded, absorbed my weight, then dumped me onto my butt, where I have the most padding. I’m telling you: Things work out for Sigmas.

  27

  “Drive,” I wheezed, diving into the backseat of Justin’s car after my sprint from the SAXi house. “I have to beat them back to the Abbotts’.”

  Justin stepped on the gas and the little Honda sped down the street while he fired questions at me. “What the hell were you doing in there? How did you get out? And what do you mean you’re going back to the Abbott house?”

  I pulled off my sweater, yanked the black dress over my head, struggled out of my jeans. “Holly will cover for me, say I’ve been there the whole time.”

  “How do you know that?”

  “Because she hates her mother.” I contorted in the backseat, wrestling with my zipper. If it were a dream instead of a nightmare, the car would be parked and Justin would be back there with me. God had a real sense of humor sometimes.

  “You’re determined to give me a heart attack,” he grumbled, taking another turn at full speed and throwing me against the car door. “I’m going to be gray by the time I’m twenty-five.”

  “You know I can hear you, right?”

  Letting him grouse, I pulled my phone from my jeans and called Holly to tell her I was on the way back, and what I needed from her. When I hung up, Justin asked, “Are you at least going to tell me what you found?”

  “I took pictures of everything.” Searching the floorboard, I came up with my right shoe. “I’ll show you after I put in an appearance at Victoria’s house.”

  “How long?”

  The left shoe was harder to find. “I just have to be there when they get back.”

  When he stopped the car in the street beside the Abbotts’ house, Holly was coming down the back steps. “You really trust this girl?” Justin asked, twisting in his seat so that he could look me in the eye.

  I didn’t think too hard, just went with my gut. “Right now, yes.”

  “More than you trusted Lisa?”

  Low blow. I shot him a glare as I stuck my cell phone into my purse. “Less than I trust Lisa, if my life is at stake.”

  “Maggie.” He caught my hand before I could climb out of the car. “You took pictures of what was there. We can figure out what is going on from outside. You don’t have to go back in.”

  His eyes were almost black in the faint light of the dashboard, fathomless with worry for me. I wanted so much to take that away. Not that I wasn’t scared; since I’d touched that book, all my flippancy, my ambivalence, was gone. This wasn’t just some sorority girls with supernaturally shiny hair, tweaking the probabilities in their favor. This was the capital E. I’d be an idiot not to be scared.

  But I’d be worse than a coward if I didn’t do everything I could to stop it. And right now, everything meant going into Victoria’s house and preserving my place within the Sigmas.

  “If things were the other way around,” I asked, “would you retreat to a safe distance?”

  “That’s not the point.”

  I smiled, even though there was no time for it. “I love that you’re such a chauvinist.”

  He didn’t bother to deny it. He didn’t really have a chance, because the car door opened and Holly said, “Just kiss already. We’ve got to get going.”

  Justin glared at her, then at me. “If you’re not at my place in thirty minutes, I’m coming back here … with crosses and holy water if necessary.”

  “Okay.” I looked him in the eye as I said it, making it a promise. “Thirty minutes.”

  I climbed out of the car and straightened my dress. Holly grabbed my arm and we hurried to the back porch. I cast one last look back to make sure Justin was leaving. Did that make me Orpheus or Eurydice? Things didn’t turn out well for either of them.

  I entered the kitchen on Holly’s heels. The catering staff continued packing up their stuff, casting curious glances our way, but mostly ignoring us the way Holly ignored them. “I have been hiding out back here, avoiding Mommie Dearest. We’ll just say that you’ve been helping me while I’ve been …”

  “Drunk off your ass?”

  “Don’t diss the drunk that saved your butt.” She peered out the window as a car pulled into the drive behind the house. Justin’s taillights had barely disappeared.

  “Come on.” She pulled me down the hall to a small bedroom with an attached bath. Holly went into the bathroom and sat on the side of the tub. I stared, bemused, until she pointed to the stack of finger towels by the sink. Catching a clue, I ran some water and soaked a cloth, ready to pretend I’d been tending to her for some time.

  The back door slammed, then footsteps rang in the hall. “Holly?” I knew Juliana’s voice now. Her telling Victoria to eff off had made a big impression. “The waitstaff said …”

  She appeared in the doorway to find Holly looking wan, while I mopped her brow and her damp red hair.

  “Oh, Holly.” Her expression was a mixture of disgust and disdain. “Are you determined to humiliate me? You couldn’t be drunk at one of your own parties?”

  “What fun would that be?” Holly asked, convincingly inebriated and belligerent.

  Juliana eyed me next, and I felt the full weight of it in my stomach. “And you. What have you been up to, Maggie?”

  “She’s been with me, Mom.”

  “Holly wasn’t feeling very well,” I said, lies on top of lies, all smoke screen. “I thought I’d better stay with her.”

  Victoria appeared behind the other woman and took in the scene. “Oh. Holly, really.”

  Juliana turned her attention to spin control. “Fortunately, Holly had the good sense to take herself out of public view.”

  The currents of power shifted again, and Victoria now had the upper hand. “Do you realize how serious this is? At the very least, she should be brought up before Standards.”

  “Oh, really. You want it to
come out that a minor got drunk at your house?”

  Victoria didn’t blink. “She’d nevertheless be out of the sorority.”

  To my surprise, Juliana backed down. She might have the edge where mojo was concerned, but Victoria had boxed her in. Her eyes flashed at the knowledge, and her mouth went white at the corners, making her look much closer to her real age.

  “I won’t forget this, Victoria.” She turned to go, calling her daughter to heel. “Come on, Holly.”

  “Can’t I just go back to the dorm?”

  “Now.” In her anger, all semblance of shielding dropped away, and she stood before us, a mass of fury and frustration. Holly rose, jaw jutting but silent, to face her.

  I felt a protective spark in my chest, wanting to shield the girl who, screwed up as she was, had helped me. But Victoria’s tiny head shake silenced me; I would only make things worse for Holly by speaking up for her.

  Instead I just offered her a hand up, and steadied her once she was on her feet. “Will you be okay?” I whispered.

  “You say that like I’ve never done this before.” She gave me a tipsy salute and trailed after her fuming mother.

  When they left, the chapter sponsor folded her arms and leaned against the doorframe, studying me, reminding me I wasn’t off the hook yet.

  “You two have become rather good friends, haven’t you?”

  “We hit it off during Rush.”

  “Her mother expected her to be the head of her pledge class. Holly lacks your ability and ambition, but don’t let your friendship bring down your guard.”

  “No, ma’am.”

  “Even among wolves, there are alphas and there are betas.”

  “I understand.” In the other room, I’d thrown my purse onto the bed, and it began to buzz in time to my vibrating phone. Had it been thirty minutes already?

  “Go ahead.” Victoria stepped aside to let me pass.

  I answered as soon as I fumbled the cell free from my bag. “Hi, Mom.”

  “Are you on your way?” Justin’s voice brooked no argument.

  “Just about. Let me ask.” I closed my eyes for the briefest moment, hoping my cloaking device would last just a little longer, then turned to face Victoria. “My mom’s not feeling well. Wants to know if I can come home.”

  “Of course,” she said. “You have to take care of your family.”

  I smiled a humble thank-you and she accepted it with a regal nod. “On my way now,” I said into the phone.

  “You’d better be,” he said, before I closed the phone and picked up my purse.

  “Thank you for hosting the party,” I told Victoria, falling back on good manners to get me out the door.

  “I’m happy to do it,” she answered, in the same polite tone. “Now, go home and take care of your mother. She’s in a delicate condition, after all.”

  “Thanks,” I said again, and made my exit through the back door to where my Jeep was parked down the street.

  It wasn’t until later that I thought to wonder when I’d told her that Mom was pregnant.

  28

  Justin lived in an efficiency apartment, part of off-campus housing, not far from Greek Row. I’d never been to his place before. Actually, I’d never been to any guy’s apartment before, so I had no idea how his compared.

  Mostly, he had books. There was a futon, a milk-crate side table, a large desk with neatly organized work stacked beside a closed laptop, and some cinder-block-and-plank shelves that held CDs, a small TV, and a smaller stereo. But mostly books.

  “It’s not much,” Justin said as he gestured me in. “But make yourself at home.”

  “Sure.” Small, but obviously his space. Posters on the wall; a distinctive quilt covering the back of the futon. Two enormous bulletin boards over the desk were filled with notes and pictures of green, wet places and weathered Gaelic faces.

  A framed picture on the bookshelf showed a formally posed couple. The man stood behind the woman, his hand on her shoulder, her fingers covering his. They smiled at the camera, but there seemed to be a connection solely between them. They could only be Justin’s parents. He looked just like his dad, but he had his mother’s friendly brown eyes.

  Another photo showed Justin looking about fifteen or sixteen and very gangly, laughing with another boy who had him in a headlock. They wore khakis, oxford shirts, blazers with a crest on the pocket. The other boy was bigger, with shoulders like a linebacker, black hair, and startling blue eyes.

  I picked up the picture. Images welled in my head, incomplete and indistinct: classrooms and chapel, roughhousing after school, fights and reconciliation.

  “We look like a couple of dorks in those uniforms.” I hadn’t heard Justin come up behind me. “That’s Henry,” he said, nodding at the photo.

  “The one who almost got kicked out of school with you?”

  “Yeah. We’d planned to go to the same college. Man, was I mad at him when he went to seminary instead.”

  “You don’t think he’ll make a good priest?”

  “It’s a little hard to reconcile that with the guy who used to sneak Playboys into our dormitory.” He set the photo back on the shelf. “Are you hungry?”

  My stomach growled at the thought of food. Aside from a few canapés, I hadn’t eaten. “It feels later than nine o’clock.”

  “I’ll order a pizza while you upload the pictures.”

  He’d brought in my camera case, and I’d had my laptop in the trunk of the Jeep. I set up on the end of his desk and rolled the chair over, careful not to catch the skirt of my dress in the wheels.

  Justin hung up with the pizza place and joined me. “Okay. Let’s see what you’ve got.”

  I opened the pictures on the laptop screen. “This is the incense burner from the pledging ceremony. The lamp was there, too.”

  Propping one hand on the desk and the other on the back of my chair, he leaned over my shoulder. “Can you zoom in on the symbols?” I did, and he made a thinking noise.

  “They look like astrological signs,” I said.

  “Or alchemical, which borrowed a lot from astrology. Go to the lamp.” He leaned in closer to look. “Yeah. Those are definitely hermetic.”

  “What’s that?” I asked, trying not to breathe too deeply, because he smelled so good.

  Fortunately—or not—he went to the bookcase and pulled down a hefty tome. “Hermeticism is an occult tradition, based on the writings or teachings of the god Hermes Trismegistus.”

  “Like the Greek god Hermes?”

  “Sort of. Hermes rolled up with the Egyptian god Thoth. Both were bringers of knowledge to their cultures.” He set the book in front of me, pointing to a bunch of symbols that looked like the ones on the chapter’s brassware.

  “Except that the only thing fraternities have to do with real Greeks is their letters.” I looked up at him. “So what’s this got to do with the Sigma Wicca Phis?”

  He flipped a few pages, to a grainy picture of a guy dressed in a strange robe holding a staff of some kind. “Hermetic occultism had a renaissance in the nineteenth century. This guy, Aleister Crowley, formed a group called the Hermetic Order of the Golden Dawn. Huge influence on twentieth-century mysticism. Their ritual drew from everybody: Kabbalah, hermeticism, Egyptian paganism, alchemy, astrology …” He made an “and so on” gesture. “Some people think hermeticism also inspired the Illuminati, Freemasons, groups like that.”

  “More secret societies,” I said, half to myself.

  “Right.” He scanned the thumbnails of the rest of the pictures, and pointed to one of the book. “What’s this?”

  “That”—I tried to keep my voice even—“feels like bad news.” I clicked and brought the image up front. Foreign words and strange symbols crawled across the screen, and I shuddered.

  He leaned closer than before, peering over my shoulder. “Oh my God.” Reaching around me, he took over the trackpad and clicked through the first few pages.

  “What is it?” I asked, knowing I
wouldn’t like the answer.

  “It’s a … Well, it looks like a grimoire.” I could feel the tension in him, despite his attempt to keep his tone academic.

  “A grimoire is like a spell book, right?”

  “More or less.” He pushed away from the desk, paced a little, came back to look again. “You said this thing was old?”

  “Really old. And very creepy.”

  “Authentic grimoires were written in medieval times as kind of magical primers. Some contain astrological correspondences, recipes for mixing medicine, instructions for making talismans …”

  “That doesn’t sound too bad.” It was a feeble attempt at hope; I knew it couldn’t be that simple.

  “Others have instructions for spells and potions, information on angels and demons, and directions on how to summon them.”

  The bottom dropped out of my stomach. “Oh.”

  “Very.” He stared back at me, past traumas looming large and dark in our shared history. The air thickened with dreadful possibilities.

  Someone pounded on the door. Justin jumped, and so did I, with a girly squeal to make it worse. He gave a shaky laugh, breaking the tension. “Pizza’s here.”

  While he paid the driver, I turned back to the computer screen. I couldn’t make anything of the book pages. I recognized the Latin, but even the diagrams were esoteric and uninterpretable.

  I drummed my fingers on the desk, thinking about rituals and artifacts. I tried not to think about summoning demons. But that was like saying “Don’t think of a purple elephant.” So I thought of a purple elephant, and picked up my phone.

  Justin came out of the kitchen with a plate full of more pizza than even I could eat. “Who are you calling?”

  “Lisa. We need a witch on our side.”

  “No.” He took the phone from me. “We don’t.”

  I stood, followed his retreat. “Maybe she can figure out what this stuff is supposed to do.”

  “I can figure it out.” He held the plate in one hand, and the phone easily out of my reach.