Midnight Games(23)

“That pendant,” he said, pointing. “Where did you get it?”

My hand went to the necklace. “I made it,” I said. “Why? What’s wrong with it?”

He didn’t answer. He grabbed it gently and smoothed his hand over it. The pendant was made of silver wire with blue glass cut to look like jewels.

“It’s not old?” he asked finally. He let go of it and took a step back.

“No. I told you. I made it,” I said.

It was a cold, blustery kind of night, black storm clouds low in the sky. Nate stood there with his denim jacket open, a black T-shirt underneath. “Aren’t you cold?” I said.

I stepped aside and motioned for Nate to come into the house. I closed the door behind him. He was still studying the pendant.

“It just looks old,” I said. “I copied the design from old photos of Angelica Fear.”

He swallowed. “You did? You have photos of Angelica Fear?”

I nodded. “Well, yes. I told you I’ve studied the history of the Fears. It is my family, after all.” I tugged his arm. “Want to see the photos of her?”

“For sure,” he said.

I led him up to my room in the attic. He looked around, ducking his head under the slanting ceiling. “Cozy,” he said. He grabbed my arms and tried to pull me on top of him on the bed.

“Hey, I thought you wanted to see old photos,” I said.

He kissed me. We kissed for a while. I held the sides of his face, held him there, needing him, needing someone to care about me.

Then, breathless, I pulled away and dropped down to my file drawer. He sat on the bed and watched me as I searched for the Angelica Fear photos.

“Here.” I handed both of them to him. “The date on the back says eighteen ninety-five. They’re pretty faded. I had to tape that one back together. It kinda crumbled.”

He studied the first photo for a long time, then moved to the second one. “That’s the amulet,” he murmured.

“Do you know about it?” I asked.

He didn’t answer. Just stared from one photo to the other.

“Angelica Fear was obsessed with immortality,” I said. “I read a lot about her. She was one of the most interesting Fears—and one of the most evil. She was into all kinds of witchcraft and sorcery. She did a lot of experiments, trying to bring dead people back to life. She said she would live forever. She told people she had found the secret.”

Nate finally put down the photos. He gazed at me. I didn’t know if he’d heard a word I said. “Why did you copy her amulet?” he asked.

I shrugged. “I just thought it was kinda cool. You know. Mysterious looking. I was really into jewelry-making for a while. Jamie isn’t the only artistic one in the family.”

He turned back to the amulet. “Did Angelica wear it because it had magical powers? Was that her secret for living forever?”

I shrugged. “Beats me. Maybe she thought it had powers. I didn’t read about that anywhere.”

I turned the amulet over in my hand. “Do you believe in that supernatural stuff, Nate?”

He snickered. A strange smile spread over his face. “I may know more about the amulet than you do, Dana,” he said.

I stared at him. “Excuse me? What are you talking about?”

He let out a sigh and leaned back on my bed. “Can I trust you? I’ve been dying to tell this to someone.”

“Of course you can,” I said. I dropped down beside him on the bed and took his hand. “What’s wrong, Nate? What is it?”

“This is a secret,” he said, lowering his voice. “I know how Candy died. I mean, I was there. It was because of this amulet.”

I grabbed the amulet. “Not this one.”

“No,” he said. “Another copy of it. A plastic copy of it. Candy wore it all the time. Shark and I—we didn’t know it was plastic. We thought it was really Angelica Fear’s amulet. And we thought Candy was using it to put a curse on us.”

I squeezed his hand. “A curse? You mean the cockroaches? The blood spurting from your ears?”

He nodded. “There’s more. One day my car drove into the river with four of us inside it. We almost drowned.”

I shook my head. “Wow. And you thought Candy . . . ”

“Yes. We thought Candy was doing it. You’ve got to swear not to tell anyone, Dana. I’ve had this secret inside me for weeks. Late one night, Shark, Nikki, and I sneaked into Candy’s house. We knew she was all alone. We wanted to steal the amulet. But . . . ”

“But what happened?” I asked.

“We took it from her room. But she woke up. She tried to grab it back. And . . . and she fell down the stairs. She broke her neck. She was dead. We knew she was dead. And we just ran. And then . . . then we found out her amulet was a fake. Just like yours.”