“So am I.” She looks away and shakes her head. “You best leave before I really get angry.”
Chapter Nineteen
Without another word, I slip off my stool and gather my messenger bag and slink out of the kitchen. If this is semi-angry Miss Delia, I don’t want to be here when she blows for real.
I duck through the living room. “Come on, Jack.” Then push open the screen door and run out onto the porch.
“What’s going on?” Within seconds he’s followed me outside, down the steps, and through the garden.
I jump into the golf cart. “I don’t want to talk about it, okay? Let’s just go. Now.”
He stands beside the passenger side of the cart. “Huh? I don’t understand? Did you see something weird in the vision? Was it Claude? Did he do something to Missy?”
“Will you just shut up and drive?” I snap, sick of hearing his annoying voice and dumb questions.
He throws up his hands. “Whoa. Back off, sis. I’m just trying to find out what happened.”
“What happened is I totally screwed something up and now Miss Delia hates me and Cooper’s probably going to lose his soul. Oh, yeah, and Claude is probably a total master hoodoo psychopath but I’ll never get to find that out either, all because I. Screwed. Up.” Tears stream from my eyes and sear my already scorching cheeks. “There, are you happy? Now will you get in the frigging cart and drive?”
“Uh. Okay.” Jack races around to his side and climbs behind the wheel. He turns the key, starting the silent electric engine and clicking the headlights on.
Slipping the gear into reverse, he backs up under the bottle tree, then heads down the long driveway to the main road. A full minute of blessed silence elapses during which I meditate on my colossal transgressions.
Jack clears his throat. “At the risk of getting hit, can I say something?”
Oh my God. I swear, if it’s got anything to do with being emo, I’m going to push him out of this moving cart.
“What?”
“I don’t exactly understand what happened in there or what the heck you mean by all that stuff, but I’m reasonably sure you’re wrong about Miss Delia. She could never hate you. Whatever is going on, it must be some sort of mistake.”
“There’s no mistake. I did something bad. And now there will be horrible consequences.”
“Come on. This is you we’re talking about, not me. You don’t do bad.”
A bitter laugh leaps from my lips. “Well, I didn’t mean to, but I did.” I stare into the dense live oak forest. The Spanish moss casts creepy shadows on the ground but even they don’t scare me as much as what might happen thanks to my adventures in brewing energy tea. I force those truly horrific thoughts from my mind.
“Aha! See? I knew it. You couldn’t be bad if you tried. Even the museum robbery was for a good cause. Face it, Em, you’re just not hardcore enough to do hard time. And Miss Delia knows that, so there’s no way she hates you.”
“If only that was true.”
Jack stops the cart. “Hey, listen to me. Miss Delia loves you. You know that. Whatever it is, she’ll get over it.”
I’m about sick of his optimism. Maybe he’ll change his tune if he knows the truth. Crossing my arms, I cock my head. “I went behind her back and brewed a potion I shouldn’t have. Then because I messed up my body’s natural balance, I screwed up the Psychic Vision, which screwed up the ancestors’ mortar so we might miss the deadline to save Cooper’s soul. Oh yeah, and I’ve totally destroyed Miss Delia’s trust in me.”
He whistles. “Yup, that’s pretty bad.”
“You’re such a jerk.” A strangled mixture of crying and laughter blurts from my lips as I swat his shoulder.
He laughs. “Hey, what do you expect? You want me to lie and say you’re perfect? Guess what? You’re not. But here’s a news flash: Miss Delia knows that too. You’re a teenager. And an apprentice. You’re going to screw up once in a while.” He presses the accelerator pedal and continues down the road.
Since when did my brother become such a sage wise man? Still, it doesn’t change the outcome.
I sniff my runny nose. “There’s screwing up and then there’s dooming your boyfriend’s soul for eternity.”
“Possibly ex-boyfriend,” he corrects me.
I gape and fresh tears sprout. “Wow, way to kick a girl when she’s down.”
He shrugs. “Just for now. I’m sure everything will go back to normal when the Beaumont Curse is broken and he comes to his senses about Taneea. Which is going to happen because ancestors’ mortar or not, you and Miss Delia have mad hoodoo ninja skills.”
Though I’m not sure I deserve it, his confidence perks me up.
Near the end of the long road leading from Miss Delia’s house, Jack prepares to turn onto the paved side road that will take us to Sea Island Parkway.
A dark, foreboding feeling creeps across my chest. I glance over my shoulder at the forest behind us. My ears fill with the sound of the night—crickets, cicadas, frogs—and something else, not a whisper exactly, but a faint, dissonant chord that echoes deep my head.
I grab his wrist. “Wait. Do you hear that?”
He holds his foot on the break and listens. “No. What is it?”
The chime heightens and intensifies, like an orchestra tuning up. It crescendos, growing until it crowds out all other noises. “That. It’s like music, but not,” I nearly shout to hear myself over the din.
Jack look at me like I’m crazy. “Why are you yelling at me?”
“Huh?” I ask, shoving my fingers in my ears to block the ringing that’s blaring so loud it’s vibrating my eardrums.
Suddenly, the sound shatters into a thousand individual tones that cascade and carry on the wind like notes in some weird, harmonic minor scale.
“Are you okay?”
The freaky feeling crawls across my chest and then down my spine. I know the sound. I’d recognize the tones from Miss Delia’s bottle tree anywhere. I’m just not sure how I can hear it from this far away. But my spirit guide must think it’s important. “We’ve got to go back to Miss Delia’s. Now.”
Jack spins the steering wheel, jerking the cart around.
The scent of burning wood wafts toward us.
No! Miss Delia’s house must be on fire! The sound must have been some kind of spiritual fire alarm in my head.
“Hurry!” The eerie sensation crawls down my arms and legs.
“The pedal is on the floor. These things only go so fast you know.”
He whizzes the cart back down the dirt road, dodging the pock holes and overgrown lumps of vegetation as best he can in a golf cart with dinky headlights.
Finally, we approach the bend in the road just outside of Miss Delia’s house. The smoky aroma hangs thick. A low, ghostly moan resonates through the forest. It’s the familiar sound of wind passing through the bottle tree. Through the dense forest and sheets of hanging Spanish moss, I catch a glimpse of fiery red flames.
Jack stops short.
“What are you doing? We’ve got to get to Miss Delia’s. Her house is burning down.”
“No it’s not. Look.” He points toward a space between two trees.
He’s right. There’s a fire all right. But it’s not in her house. Instead, Miss Delia’s seated in her wheelchair under the bottle tree, warming herself by a gigantic bonfire.
The eerie sensation evaporates and my heart slows to a trot. “What the heck is she doing?”
“Beats me. You’re the root worker.”
Remembering her extreme displeasure, I suddenly feel weird being here. “Maybe we should leave.”
He turns to me. “You sure?”
The bottle tree’s strange music jolts my ears again, this time sounding like someone blared the volume and then cut it just as suddenly. Nope. My spirit guide wants me here for a reason. I know Miss Delia doesn’t appreciate me being clever or headstrong, but this really isn’t up to me. My spirit guide’s got an agenda. “No. We’re supposed to stay and watch whatever’s going to happen. Turn off the headlights.”