Chapter 7

  The hotel was one of those converted brownstones near the museum—high ceilings, crown molding, and too many mirrors. I didn’t trust any room with more reflections than people. It was very old and snooty.

  Richard had booked two rooms. Side by side. Same key card. Different doors. Which was fine. Good, even. The last thing I needed was to fall asleep to the sound of brooding Welch sighs.

  Getting in, however, had taken finesse.

  “Absolutely no pets,” the concierge had said with a smile so tight it could snap piano wire. “Good thing he’s not a pet,” I muttered, shoving the tote bag higher on my shoulder.

  Inside the bag, Tudor made a noise like a demon trapped in a throw pillow. I pinched the canvas shut and grinned at Richard.

  He didn’t even flinch. Just said, “Therapy animal,” and handed over his credit card.

  We made it to the elevator with only a few suspicious glances. By the time we reached the fifth floor, Tudor had clawed a small hole in the lining and was glaring at me like I owed him restitution.

  “I’ll get you tuna,” I whispered.

  Judging by his expression, it wasn’t enough.

  Richard excused himself with a quiet, “I’ll grab us something to eat,” and disappeared down the hall.Left alone, I finally looked around the room he’d booked—brown and cream toile wallpaper in tidy repeats, the kind of pattern that made you feel like you’d fallen into a period drama.A claw-foot tub gleamed in the corner, already stocked with a tray of neatly folded towels and little bottles of temptation.I twisted one open: Jo Malone, lime and basil.The scent was sharp and green, like summer gardens bottled for the rich and reckless.I ran the water hot and full, slipped out of my clothes, and sank into the bath with a sigh that might’ve registered on the Richter scale.For the next hour, I floated, steam curling around me while I tried to sort through the chaos of the last few days—break-ins, bloodlines, a stranger who claimed he was my supernatural bodyguard.The more I thought about it, the less real it felt, like someone else’s fever dream.But the warmth of the water made it easier to let my guard down, at least for a little while.When the water finally cooled, I stood and reached for the robe hanging on the back of the door.It was fluffy enough to double as a mattress topper, wrapping me in so much comfort a towel felt unnecessary.I cinched the belt tight, inhaled the lingering lime-basil scent on my skin, and felt almost—almost—human again.

  A knock at the door and then Richard entered and set a paper bag of takeout on the desk.

  “I got food. Chicken tikka, garlic naan. Nothing cursed.”

  “You say that like cursed food is a possibility.”

  He raised an eyebrow. “In this line of work, everything is a possibility.”

  Tudor prowled the perimeter, sniffing every baseboard like he was evaluating our odds of survival. I dumped my coat onto the armchair and dropped onto the bed. The mattress sighed under me, probably relieved not to be dealing with tourists for once.

  I peeled stretched my toes, and caught him glancing at the tattoo on my ankle—a Crow and an Anchor.

  “Symbolism?” he asked. “Spring break in New Orleans,” I explained, heat rising in my cheeks. “A mystic read my cards, muttered something about storms and survival, then insisted I get this exact tattoo.”I gave a half-shrug. “The tattoo parlor was right next door, so I figured they were probably in cahoots, hustling tourists.”But sometimes, when the light caught it just right, I couldn’t shake the feeling the crow was waiting for me to understand something I hadn’t yet.Richard’s gaze lingered a beat too long, and the easy air around him tightened.He schooled his features quickly, but not before I saw it—the flicker of recognition, maybe even alarm.“Interesting choice,” he said lightly, though his voice had gone a shade lower.I pulled my foot back under me, suddenly wishing I hadn’t explained at all.

  He didn’t press. Which somehow made it worse.

  I opened the takeout and immediately felt more human. The room smelled like warmth and spice and things that weren’t ancient bloodlines or glowing journals. For about five minutes, we ate in companionable silence.

  Then Richard asked, “Do you remember anything about your birth parents?” The naan froze halfway to my mouth.

  I chewed. Swallowed. Took a long sip of water. “No. I was a fire station baby.” He blinked. “Sorry?”

  “Dropped off. No note, no drama. Just… placed.”

  I shrugged. “Martha—my mom—is amazing. Raised me on casseroles, books, and unsolicited weather warnings. She thinks the best way to process feelings is with chamomile tea and old *Murder, She Wrote* reruns.”

  He smiled faintly. My phone buzzed.

  **Martha.**

  I stepped out into the hallway to take it. “Hey.”

  “Sadie?” Her voice was calm, but I knew that tone. She’d read something between the lines of my last text.

  “Hey, Mom. I’m okay.”

  “You sure? You sound off. And I had a weird dream. You know how I get.”

  I smiled despite myself. “Was I in danger, or just dating someone with a neck tattoo?” “No, you were six and hiding under a pew in a church full of fire.”

  That shut me up.

  “Well, text me when you’re back above sea level.” “I will.”

  After I hung up, I leaned against the hallway wall for a moment. Just breathing. Then I went back inside.

  Richard looked up. “Martha?” “Yeah.”

  He didn’t say anything. Just handed me another piece of naan. We didn’t speak for a while.

  If you spot this tale on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

  Tudor curled into the windowsill, eyes glowing faintly as the city buzzed below us. The journal was still in my bag.

  Waiting.

  The Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum looked like it had been plucked from Venice and plopped into Boston by someone with far too much money and just enough madness.

  Three stories tall. Ivy on the walls. Iron gates dusted with snow. The kind of place that didn’t just house secrets—it curated them.

  We stood outside for a minute while Richard locked the car. Tudor, regretfully, had to stay behind. He stared at me through the passenger window like I’d betrayed the blood oath of catdom.

  “I’ll bring you sardines,” I promised.

  Inside, the air was warm and still. Incense lingered in the corners, faint and floral— something like lily and moonflower I stepped through the entry hall and into the main courtyard, and my whole body went cold.

  It was too quiet.

  The stone path led through tropical greenery and Roman columns, up to the mosaic- patterned floor that wrapped the entire first level. Sunlight streamed down from the glass ceiling three stories above, and for one flickering second, I thought I saw someone in white at the top of the stairs.

  A tall woman. Red hair.

  Watching.

  Then she was gone.

  “Sadie,” Richard said beside me. “This is Corwin Thorne.” I turned.

  Corwin was tall, slim, and careful. A charcoal-gray blazer over black. His tie bore a faint pattern of gold crows. He had pale eyes, a clean stubble line, and a voice that sounded like it

  had been trained to carry through candlelit rooms. A long scratch marred his right cheek.

  “You must be the girl with the dangerous book,” he said. “I prefer ‘woman of academic interest,’ thanks. And no, I don’t have it, it was stollen. Do you have it?”

  He chuckled. “Richard told me you had a sense of humor.”

  Corwin led us toward the east wing—past tapestries, Flemish paintings, and rooms named after countries that had no idea they were being referenced. We stopped before a linen- draped object in the corner.

  “We retrieved something from the final gallery,” he said. “it’s a personal correspondence between Isabella Gardner and the crowned heads of England. Ms. Gardner fancied herself quite the Anglo-phyle – even though she was related to Mary Queen of Scotts.”

  He peeled the cloth back.

  Another book sat nestled in a velvet-lined glass cradle. Different binding, same vibration

  “I’ll bring it to the archival room for review,” Corwin said. “It deserves quiet and contemplation”

  He lifted it—barehanded, I noticed—and carried it through a side hall marked STAFF ONLY.

  As soon as he disappeared, I let out a breath I didn’t know I was holding.

  I followed the echo of his footsteps until the sound faded, then slipped closer to the velvet cradle. The diary was open to a page dated 1899, written in looping ink that shimmered faintly, like it had been mixed with gold dust—or blood. I leaned in and read: “The guests grow restless. The mirrors must be veiled again. One walks the halls at dawn, leaving ash upon the lilies.” A chill ran down my spine. Names filled the margins—foreign nobles, art dealers, and a few that didn’t sound human at all. Beside one, someone had drawn a tiny crow with a crown. I copied it into my notebook, heart pounding. The more I read, the more it felt like Isabella’s famous soirées had been less social gatherings and more…summonings. Upstairs, a floorboard creaked, and for a moment I could swear I smelled smoke and old perfume.

  Richard and I wandered the long hallway toward the Dutch Room. It was cold there— emotionally, not just physically. The walls held ghosts in gold frames—paintings stolen in the infamous 1990 heist, now left blank, like wounds preserved under glass.

  “They never replaced them,” I said, staring at the empty frame where The Concert by Vermeer had once lived.

  “No. Gardner’s will said the museum must remain ‘as is.’” “So she preferred a haunted gallery to a lie.”

  Richard said nothing.

  We walked further. Near the Yellow Room entrance, I stopped again.

  A Holbein sketch labeled *Unknown Tudor Subjects* hung near the threshold. “That’s not unknown,” I said. “That’s Kat Ashley. And Thomas Parry.” Richard leaned closer.

  “Elizabeth’s nanny and steward,” I clarified. “They stayed with her after her mother was executed. When she was just a child. When everyone else abandoned her.”

  He glanced at me, his eyes unreadable. “They look kind.”

  “They were. Fiercely. And they never asked her to be anyone else.”

  I hesitated, then leaned in a little. “I’ve been digging into the research more. There are connections—like, actual threads—between Hever Castle and Hatfield. Anne of Cleves spent time at Hever, and Elizabeth lived at Hatfield. Two women, contemporaries, navigating courts and cages, each finding ways to survive on their own terms.”

  My words started tumbling faster. “And the way their lives brush up against each other in records—letters, household accounts—it’s like echoes bouncing down a hallway. I can’t wait to map it out properly. It feels like standing on the edge of a discovery.”

  Richard’s lips curved faintly, but there was weight in his eyes. “Sadie… do you realize what that—”

  He cut off as we moved deeper into the Dutch Room. The atmosphere shifted, cooler here, shadows bending differently across the ornate frames. And there—commanding a patch of dim light—hung the engagement portrait of Queen Mary I.

  Her eyes seemed to follow us, heavy with judgment, the kind of stare that reminded me she’d been both sister and jailor to Elizabeth. Another echo. Another cage. I felt the chill of it in my bones, as if the room itself wanted me to remember.

  We turned into a dim side gallery and my breath caught.

  Two portraits, nearly faded.

  “Robert Dudley,” I whispered. “And Amy Robsart.” “His wife?” Richard asked.

  I nodded. “She died at the bottom of a staircase. Broken neck. No witnesses.” “You think it was murder?”

  “I think it was... convenient.” The silence between us stretched.

  “They all look so lonely,” I said softly.

  “Being powerful doesn’t mean being loved.”

  The archive room was cooler than the museum floors. Darker, too.

  Corwin stood beside a velvet-lined table where Isabella’s grimoire now rested, open to the center. Light glinted off the glass display and the seal of the Vatican glimmered beneath the spine—twin keys and a sunburst, pressed into aged parchment.

  “May I?” I asked.

  “Carefully,” Corwin said. “It’s sensitive.”

  I pulled on the cotton gloves and opened it fully.

  My journal was moody. Temperamental. This one was furious.

  Words covered the pages—dense lines in every direction. Latin, German, English. Some pages written backward, others in tiny, repetitive slashes that looked like they’d been scratched in under duress. Fingerprints in red ink. Diagrams. Pentagrams. Warnings.

  BLOOD.

  She waits to be ended. Not destroyed.

  Tudor growled behind me from the doorway.

  Corwin watched silently, his hands still, his gaze unreadable. “This is wild,” I said. “It’s a crazy rambling

  Or maybe… a map.

  Oh, and when the hell did the cat get in here?

  That night, the hotel room was too still.

  Tudor curled beside my ankle like a furry warning system. I pulled out my Journal. The original.

  It had gone blank days ago. Now? I compared photos I took of the Gardner journal. I compared entries to the sheef of research letters I had in my bag. No matches. I was frustread. What were we supposed to understand from this?

  The Journal pulsed under my fingers. A single line appeared:

  He watches you with his father’s hunger.

  I reread it.

  Again.

  And again.

  My chest felt tight.

  Tudor hissed and bolted to the window. I followed.

  Across the street, under the flickering streetlamp, Corwin Thorne stood. Not looking at me.

  Just… there.

  Then he stepped backward into the dark. Gone.

  “He said his name was Corwin,” I whispered. “But that’s not what the journal means, is it?”

  What do you think of Corwin?