Arrival of the Traveler (Waldgrave Book 1) (35 page)

Lena snuck back up to her room, threw her drenched clothes into the bathtub after she changed out of them, and collapsed onto the bed.

Too early the next morning, there was a loud knock on her bedroom door. Knowing that Mrs. Ralston always let herself in, she rolled over, cracked one bloodshot eye, and saw that it was already nine in the morning. She was still asleep in her pajamas.

Who is it?
 She grumbled.

Open the damn door, Lena!

Lena sat straight up in bed. In an uncoordinated effort, she tried to make it to the door to lock it before Griffin burst in. She only made it halfway.

Spinning on her heel, she shot into the bathroom, slammed the door, and locked it just in time. She looked desperately around, willing an escape hatch to appear somewhere. She heard Griffin close the bedroom door and walk over to the bathroom; her heart shot into her throat.

“Lena, open the door.” He said in an acid tone.

“No.”

“Open the door now, damn it!” He yelled.

“No!”

She watched Griffin’s shadow pace back and forth in front of the door and sat down on the edge of the bathtub. Her clothes from the night before were still there and smelled heavily of pond scum. The jeans were probably ruined, but Mrs. Ralston was very good at getting stains and smells out.

“We need to talk.” He said, his voice sounding forcibly calm.

Lena swallowed, shaking. “Well, the only way that’s happening is through this door, or in the presence of…at least ten other people.”

The shadow paused before the door. “You are the most reckless, irresponsible, naive…disrespectful…ungrateful…”

“Is there a point coming?” Lena ventured.

Griffin smacked the door so hard that the wall shook and Lena jumped. “You can’t just go off like that!”

“Why the hell do you care! You said you’re done being my keeper, so I figured I might as well enjoy the freedom!” Lena turned around and turned the bathwater on. It was a good pair of jeans, and if she washed them by hand they might be salvageable. “Who told?” She asked.

“No one. I—today at breakfast, it was on a lot of minds. You remember the last time you went off like this? You remember the last time I had to 
save your damn life?
” Griffin hissed. His shadow was square in front of the door; Lena imagined that he had his arms crossed.

She dumped some lavender-scented shampoo into the water. “It wasn’t like that…”

“You know, I just want you to know that it’s very disturbing to me that you actually trust those…servants.”

She stood up and walked to the door. “
People?
 That I trust those 
people
, Griffin? You’re the thought sponge, you tell me if any of them have designs on my life!”

Griffin was silent for a few minutes. “I spent years with them. I know how they feel about people like us.”

“People like 
you
.” Lena accused. “You know they don’t want to hurt me. You know. You just don’t like that I went out and had fun.”

“I don’t like that you went out and 
broke the law, Lena.
 I don’t like that you put your life in jeopardy—“

Lena rolled her eyes. “My life wasn’t in jeopardy, you jerk!”

“Do you have any idea how much trouble you would be in if they knew? You sure as hell wouldn’t get on the Council—you’d be lucky if they didn’t remove Howard to instate a stricter guardian and put an ankle monitor on you!”

Griffin went silent. Lena turned the water off. “They don’t know?”

Griffin sighed, disgusted. “No one knows but me, and the 
servants
 downstairs who think you look like a drowned rat when you’re wet. Bury this one deep, and never speak of it again. I can’t believe you went swimming in a reservoir…disgusting. So, so stupid…”

Lena stood and opened the door. She half-grinned at Griffin, who was looking calmer, but still disgruntled. “I thought you were done helping me. If you don’t care, then why don’t you just turn me in?”

Griffin kept his distance. He looked at Lena, shook his head disapprovingly, then gave a small, defeated laugh. He turned and walked out the door. “Don’t let it happen again.”

Lena turned and waltzed back into the bathroom. She took her wet clothes out of the bath, wrung them out, and hung them on the towel rack. Then she climbed into the warm bath water to soak. She turned the hot water back on and started to scrub the crusted mud stains off of her feet. She knew something had been going on; it wasn’t in Griffin’s character to suddenly stop being a manipulative jerk. She wasn’t sure exactly what he had been trying to accomplish, but she was sure he would quit it now that she knew he was up to something.

Much later that day, after a long soak in the tub, a few hours of leisure reading, and a room service lunch compliments of the kitchen staff, Lena received a summons from Howard to meet him in his office down the hall. She gathered her notes and the current draft of her exposition and sauntered down the hall, expecting that Howard wanted to see her latest draft. Once she stepped into the office, she knew something was wrong. Howard was sitting behind the desk and had a very disappointed look on his face. Griffin was seated in an armchair.

When Howard looked up at Lena, Griffin smirked in a way that awoke feelings of vengeance in her so deep that she had never have thought such emotion possible. He had told, and she was going to kill him in his sleep.

Howard cleared his throat and reached up to scratch his ear. “Lena, did you leave the house last night to get drunk?”

He had it coming this time. She could play hardball, too. With Howard in the room, she felt safe enough to rip him to pieces, and she certainly had the will to do so at the moment. Lena slapped her papers onto Howard’s desk, glared at Griffin, and sat down in a chair across from the desk. She took a relaxing breath and started. “Yes, I did.”

Howard’s eyebrows raised. “You did. You know that what you did violated several laws and the rules I personally laid out for you?”

Griffin was enjoying this too much. What an ass…she was going to get him back for this. Lena kept her eyes on Howard. “Yes.”

Howard leaned forward in his chair. “Why would you do that?”

“Well,” Lena  took a moment, glanced briefly over at Griffin, sighed deeply, and then looked back at Howard. She made the saddest face she could. “It was complicated…I suppose it happened because I was in a state of emotional upset at the time.”

Howard was matching her expression. “Oh?”

In the peripherals of her vision, she saw Griffin stir uncomfortably.

“It was late, I needed a friend, so I went down to what I thought was going to be a yard party. It wasn’t, but I really needed someone to talk to after everything that’s been happening.” Lena said, raising her hand to partly cover her mouth.

Howard glanced over at Griffin, and then his eyes went back to Lena. “You were upset? What happened?”

Lena leveled her gaze on Griffin, who was now glaring at her as sternly as she was at him. “Oh yes. Griffin’s been pursuing me quite aggressively these past few weeks—you know, while we were reading over the collection of family journals—and it’s been very upsetting. I’ve been afraid to say anything because he threatened my chances of getting into the Council.”

The silence was thick. Griffin had gone red in the face. Howard’s eyes had narrowed; he watched them both closely.

Griffin finally burst. “That’s a lie! Master Collins, you can’t possibly—“

Lena dropped her pretense. “And I went out to get drunk?! That is such—“

Silence!

Griffin and Lena looked back at Howard, who was remaining very calm through all of this. “I’m trusting we all have motive to keep this between the three of us. Griffin, you’re excused. I’ll handle the situation from here.”

Griffin walked over to the desk, shaking his head. “I promise you, I never—“      

Howard waived him off. “Just go. I’ll handle it.”

Griffin stalked out of the room, glaring heartily at Lena on the way, and Howard sighed. “The two of you act like children. I’m waiting…”

Lena took a deep breath; she knew she only had a few seconds before Howard pounced. “I was upset. I know Griffin and I are supposed to have an entirely professional relationship or whatever, but we are friends. That’s all, it’s nothing else, I swear. We got in a little fight yesterday right before I went down, and I swear I didn’t know they were planning to leave. I made a really stupid decision, and I’m sorry.”

Howard was quiet for a few minutes as he thought. “Does anyone else know?”

“Not unless Griffin told. The kitchen staff—“

“How many were there?” Howard pressed.

“Twenty. Ish.”

Howard sighed; he was worried. “Can they keep a secret?”

Lena rolled her eyes. “You have no idea, thank God, Howard.”

Howard went quiet again. “You’re grounded.”

He’d spoken so softly that Lena wasn’t sure if she had heard him correctly. “Excuse me?”

Howard stood up and paced to the other side of the desk. He remained standing in front of Lena’s chair. “You’re grounded.”

Lena eyed him suspiciously. She’d never seen him like this before. “How do you propose that’s going to happen? I’m an adult now, and you’re not my mother. Besides, I think I’m grounded already. What exactly are you planning to do to make my life worse than it already is.”

Howard raised his eyebrows again, clearly undecided on what ‘grounded’ really meant, but determined to make it a worthwhile punishment. “I’ll be discussing it with Mrs. Ralston and Master Daray. You’re grounded, effective as soon as the guests leave.”

There was a crazed look in his eye, and Lena decided she wasn’t going to push the issue further. “Okay.”

“You can leave now.” He said.

“Okay.” Lena stood up and went back to her room. When she went down to dinner that night, things were surprisingly normal—Bianca Channing went back to sitting at her usual table, Lena sat next to Howard with a group of Council members, and Griffin, though still very somber, knew he had managed to get her into trouble and seemed rather pleased with that fact. He was sitting without Master Daray, who had taken to eating in his room again on the pretense that he was working out his will. Everything was so surprisingly normal that Lena should have seen it coming.

In the middle of dessert, a shriek issued from the kitchen, silencing the dining room. As the screams continued and multiplied, Howard excused himself from the table and ran to the kitchen. Mrs. Ralston, white-faced, met him at the door. They disappeared into the kitchen together as Marie, crying and hysterical, issued forth into the dining room with a handful of other frightened kitchen staff. As Lena stood up to get her, she saw Devin pull her aside and out into the main hall.

Seconds later, Howard asked a few other Council members to join him through the kitchen doors and the whispers started. As Griffin stood and left, Lena excused herself to find Devin and Marie. They were huddled in a corner together near the stairs; Devin was holding her close and consoling her quietly.

“What happened?” Lena asked, bewildered. “Marie, are you okay?”

Devin looked gravely up at Lena, still holding Marie’s head to his shoulder. She was shaking. “A guy hung himself out in the covered parking—Council member from the looks of how he’s dressed, too. She found him.”

Lena stared around, unsure of what to do. There was a sinking feeling in her stomach. She walked towards Devin, then stopped. “Are you…”

Devin nodded. “We’re fine. We’ll be fine here.”

Lena nodded and walked briskly to the kitchen via the living room. As she neared the side entrance, she slowed down. There was a great deal of commotion in the laundry room, but Griffin was sitting on the floor with his back to the wall and his head in his hands. As Lena approached, he turned his head and looked at her out of the corner of his eye.

Don’t go out there, Lena.
 He ordered firmly.

There was a brief opening in the chaos at the side entrance, and the noosed body turned just as it was cut down. Master Corbett was dead.

*****

CHAPTER
17

There was a brief memorial the next day, and then the Corbett servants took the body back to California and a pregnant Mrs. Corbett. Lena wasn’t sure what was going to happen to her; Griffin had gone into seclusion to grieve, and she couldn’t ask him. From the old wash bucket that had been kicked out from under his feet, it had very obviously been a suicide; most people were of the opinion that the disgrace of losing a daughter and being politically outpaced by his son had been motivation enough, without recently having fallen out of Master Daray’s good graces. Hesper attended the memorial, though she wasn’t nearly as upset as Griffin was. She had never gotten on well with either of her parents—Griffin had been their star production, and she was just extra expense. She paid her dues but refused to be upset about the loss.

“Serena’s taking me shopping. Think you can come?”