Lethal Legend Read Free Page B

windows was sufficient to light her way as the last of sunset’s rosy glow was swallowed up by the night sky.
    Peaceful quiet engulfed her as she moved away from the house. For a time her thoughts roamed as freely as she did, but she was not altogether surprised when her ramble brought her to the carriage house. Aaron Northcote’s studio was on the upper level and Aaron, for all his peculiarities, was exactly the person she needed to talk to. However strange it might be to seek out Ben’s brother as the voice of reason, at this moment that course seemed to make perfect sense.
    Diana smelled the distinctive scents of linseed oil and turpentine even before Aaron opened the door to her tentative knock. “If you’re working, I can come back another time.”
    “My muse! Don’t you know you’re always welcome?”
    The studio was a single large room, sparsely furnished. Aaron offered her the one comfortable chair, an overstuffed behemoth that was sinfully soft and yielding. He seized the bentwood chair off the small pedestal, where it usually served to seat artist’s models, turned it around, and straddled it, leaning his elbows on the curved back and fixing his intent gaze on her face.
     She wondered what he saw in the half light. In contrast to the level below, here only one lamp had been lit and the room was deep in shadow. The finished canvases piled against the walls, many of them face out, created an eerie atmosphere, for the majority portrayed fantastic scenes of mermaids and monsters. A number of the former had Diana’s face.
    “Be quiet!” Aaron spoke sharply, but not to Diana. His focus had shifted to a point beyond her right shoulder.
    She ignored the interruption. She knew no one was there. Ben had warned her it was best to let Aaron deal with his voices as he saw fit, rather than try to convince him that they were imaginary. They were real to him.
    After a strained moment or two, Aaron smiled at her as if nothing odd had transpired. “What brings you to my lair? No, let me guess. They’ve murdered each other and you want my help to dispose of the bodies? Or perhaps you’ve murdered them both. Yes, that’s more likely.”
    Shocked and amused at the same time, she found herself returning his engaging grin. Like his mother, Aaron enjoyed saying outrageous things. “They were both alive and well when I retreated from the field of battle,” she assured him.
    “I like your mother,” Aaron said. “She speaks her mind. When I met her earlier in the garden, she asked me straight out if I was the madman in the family.”
    “Oh, Aaron, I—”
    He cut short her apology with a dismissive wave of one hand. “Better she knows all, don’t you think? Besides, I had a comeback ready that put her in her place. I said I was one of them.”
    “How can you joke about it?”
    He shrugged. “How can I not? But that’s not why you’re here. What is it, Diana? You haven’t ventured into my studio alone since Mother locked you in the crypt and I had to rescue you.”
    She couldn’t control a shiver at the memory, but if he was able to speak so calmly of events that had almost led to his death, then she could do no less than answer him honestly. “What do you know about Graham Somener?” she asked.
    “Is that where big brother’s gone? To Keep Island?”
    “So it seems. Not that he bothered to tell me that was his destination. Or let me know he’d reached there safely.” She’d believed she and Ben had the best of relationships. That they were friends as well as lovers. But friends didn’t keep secrets from one another or fail to send a reassuring note or telegram.
    “You could go after him,” Aaron suggested. “It’s no great distance. Eighteen miles to Bucksport, then another twenty or so across the waters of Penobscot Bay.”
    “Is there a ferry?” Her eyes narrowed as the expression on his face deteriorated into a smirk. “What?”
    “Some might say this is divine retribution,” Aaron murmured.