Roses Manor, Weston Chapter 10
That night, Gabriella had hoped she’d fall asleep quickly. But she ended up laying awake for a long time, staring up at the worn ceiling tiles above her bed. How the hell was she supposed to find another code for this new level? And would there be another after that? And another?
And how did that tie into the GAME OVER screen that killed Ezekiel Thomas? Maybe that was the only magic one, and the victims had all triggered some kind of trap on it?
No, Ezekiel had been sick before then. That Game Over sign hadn’t been on his screen for days before he died. At least Gabriella assumed not. Unless it had been on in the background while he tried to recover from its influence. Or maybe he just lost the game outright, didn’t realize it, and assumed the message was just another puzzle as it slowly killed him.
That thought kept her up a little longer than she might have otherwise been before.
She did eventually get to sleep, and Amelia didn’t end up calling for backup. When Gabriella got back to work at six the next morning, she wasn’t surprised to see Amelia asleep on the living room couch, yet another horror novel with a drippy looking cover facedown on the floor beside her.
Gabriella moved quietly into the kitchen and made coffee, then started morning checks. She was well aware of how many hours Amelia worked yesterday. Gabriella could take a few of the morning tasks and let her sleep a little longer. Not that there was much to do. All the other branches in the region were also quiet for this split second in time, and her email only held one obvious phishing test and a few announcements.
She wasn’t quite ready to start back on the game, so she took some time to clean up the kitchen while Amelia slept. It was peaceful this morning, and the sleet had died down to slow, fat snowflakes. So she worked slowly, feeding Fang and putting away the dishes that had air dried overnight.
Around seven, Amelia stirred and sat up. “Oh shit,” she murmured, blinking at the time on the old clock hanging by the presentation screen.
“You’re good,” Gabriella said from the kitchen doorway. “There’s nothing yet.”
“Thanks,” Amelia said, rubbing her eyes. “Sorry, I thought I set my alarm.”
“Don’t be,” Gabriella said. “We’re fine.”
She was going for a coffee refill, so she made Amelia a cup too. “How was the night?”
“Boring,” Amelia said. “I did paperwork for most of it.”
“James offered to be on call so I didn’t have to,” Gabriella said. “He asked me to do it, then backtracked and said he would. I wouldn’t let him.”
“You know what’s funny about him?” Amelia asked, accepting the coffee from Gabriella with a nod of thanks. “You’d think he didn’t like Meredith, and that he’s trying to get out of hanging out with her. He’s crazy about her. And she’s leaving in a month and they’re both sad, but not to the point of, like, doing anything about it. Which makes total sense, obviously. But he keeps doing things like that. At first I thought maybe he was trying to separate some now and make things less painful when the time comes. But no, that’s just him. He’d do it if he wasn’t with her, he’d do it if he was married to her. I kind of had this weird thought that maybe…”
She trailed off abruptly. Gabriella waited to see if she’d finish what she was thinking, but apparently not. “Maybe?” she prompted.
“Nothing,” Amelia said. “None of my business. But yeah, that’s just him. Just keep refusing so he’ll actually spend some time with his girlfriend before she leaves.”
Gabriella had met Meredith a couple times, outside of her dropping off boxes of files from the Foundation. Which was something that had happened a few more times after Meredith and James had started seeing each other. And they’d all been very kind to James during that time, definitely not teasing him every time he went out to see her when she arrived with boxes.
Meredith was nice. She was friendly, genuine, and had a life outside of James and the Foundation. In fact, the vast majority of her life was outside of James and even more so outside the Foundation. Not that Gabriella would ever expect her to change her life plans for a new boyfriend, especially so close to leaving. But she couldn’t imagine getting into a relationship, getting emotionally involved with someone, and then moving across the world.
Of course, Gabriella’s last boyfriend had declared her and her entire team scam artists, dumped her, then joined the Foundation and started working for the branch that had been the bane of her fucking existence. And now she was talking to him again. And maybe not considering dating, but also maybe she wouldn’t say no? And if he tried to kiss her, she wasn’t sure she’d say no to that either. And she was also absolutely getting distracted from the actual topic at hand now.
But James seemed happy with the temporary relationship. And Amelia seemed happy, if a little tentative about her own situation. Gabriella had no clue about Bradley’s personal life, nor was she going to ask him about it. But Madelyn and Graham seemed healthy and happy together. All things considered. So things were going well.
Madelyn arrived shortly after and Gabriella updated her on the new level and the eerie song as Madelyn got herself situated on the couch with her heating pad and a thermos of tea. She was clearly not in great shape today, but pulled her laptop onto her lap and started her coursework anyway.
Then Graham walked in a little before ten. “Did James stop by?” he asked as he came up the stairs.
“Nope,” Gabriella said. “Was he planning to?”
“Shit,” Graham muttered. “I’m going to-”
He turned to go back outside, but then his phone buzzed. “Hey, what’s up?” Graham greeted. “Wow, way to go. No, it’s fine. I just got to work, but- yeah, I’m here.”
She could hear James faintly as Graham nodded. “He told me to go, since you said you were going to be there in a few minutes,” he said. “Yeah, in English. No, it’s fine. Isn’t he almost forty?”
Amelia rolled her eyes, but she was laughing silently. “It’s fine,” Graham said, his voice calm and comforting in a way Gabriella aspired to be. “If you’re that worried, I can go back, but he might kill me. It’s fine. Man, you didn’t hurt anyone. Everyone’s fine. Yeah, you’ll definitely hear about it. Alright, you’re okay? Alright, fine. Bye.”
He hung up. “James overslept at Meredith’s and he’s on his way home now.”
“The theme of the day,” Amelia said. “But he’s not on until tonight.”
“I know, but he has it in his head that Bradley won’t survive if one of us isn’t there.”
“He’s not bringing Meredith over,” Amelia said.
“No, she’s working and he wouldn’t. But he’s James. You know how it is. He worries about everything and builds it all up to be all his responsibility.”
Graham seemed to be back in psychology professor mode for the moment. But he also wasn’t wrong.
“And Bradley told me to go since my shift was starting and he’s fine,” Graham continued. “I think his exact words were, ‘I’m a fucking adult, don’t worry.’ But it also means that Bradley’s going to know James overslept, after getting mad at Bradley for being late for work last week. And if this starts another fight, so help me God, they’ll both be in the hospital.”
There didn’t seem to be anything to say to that, so Gabriella started telling Madelyn about her thoughts on the codes while Graham got his own coffee. Madelyn looked grim, but also slightly excited at the prospect of a treasure hunt.
“So the video game might be just the surface of the game itself,” Madelyn said after making sure Graham wasn’t in the room anymore. “These codes could be anywhere. And they could line up with any level. Which means that this just got a whole lot harder.”
“And these are the levels with the magic,” Gabriella said. “I have no idea what it is or where or how much. But this was the first time I saw the sensor flicker, and I’m definitely concerned about that.”
“Me too,” Madelyn said. “My thought is we keep going like we’ve been. I know the sensor seems like overkill, but-”
“Not anymore,” Gabriella said. “Definitely not. I’m… I was up last night considering the possibilities. There are so many variations. Like, okay, we have the codes now. This is what they’re talking about online. If that first one was the game giving us a hint, then the fact that that’s its easy mode has me wondering what the hell the more difficult ones will be. And it’s browser based, so are there more games somewhere else that we have to beat? If the hints are in other places, it’s a scavenger hunt. That’s a whole other game than we expected, and this could last for months. Charlotte Lau said that Ezekiel was playing this game for at least a month. And I don’t know how skilled he was or how many hours he put in. Or if he spoke with other players.”
“We need to get those newsletters,” Madelyn said when Gabriella was done pouring out the mess of her thoughts. “They’re the ones that can help us if their social media doesn’t. And as long as they aren’t purged.”
“And if they are purged?”
“Then it isn’t our first time doing a long, convoluted case alongside all of our other work.”
“Shit.”
Madelyn laughed. “I think we should try to hook up with James’s friend. I’ll text him and see if I can get her number.”
She walked out of the room and Gabriella went to get herself some water instead of the coffee refill she actually wanted.
It felt strange to technically be doing field work while sitting in headquarters. But the weather was lousy yet again, so she’d take it. Graham agreed to take the interview for the hotel case starting today, especially since it meant not going in the woods, which Amelia delayed after a single glance out the window. So she was out on comms with Graham while Gabriella uselessly scoured social media and Madelyn looked for a way to get into old email newsletters.
“Jessamyn said she can talk to us in a little while,” Madelyn said to Gabriella about fifteen minutes after texting her. “Does that work?”
“Yeah,” Gabriella said as she scrolled through another useless account. “I can be available any time.”
***
Gabriella liked Jessamyn immediately. The other woman was a few years older than her and Madelyn and had the air of a captain still, though Gabriella knew that was no longer the case. She grinned at them both as they got settled on Madelyn’s phone screen.
“I looked over the notes you sent,” she said. “And talked to my parents about it, actually.”
“Wait…” Gabriella started, but Jessamyn nodded, still smiling. “Yeah, we’re all in the field,” she said.
“That’s wicked cool,” Gabriella said. “I mean, my mom and her siblings are clearly doing this stuff too, but nothing official and not out in the open.”
“No?”
“No,” she said. “Like, okay, my grandmother had charms all over the house and we still keep them there now that she’s gone. And my Uncle Tommy fought a vampire once. Maybe more than once? And he’s got a buddy in New Hampshire that I know he’s definitely intentionally hunted with. And my mom’s other siblings, I think they’ve all been involved and still put up charms too. And now that I’m saying this all out loud, I’m realizing a few things about my family.”
Both Jessamyn and Madelyn were laughing, but it was kind, not mocking. “My family believes, but they’re staying the hell away from it,” Madelyn said.
“Mine worked for the Foundation for a while when I was younger,” Jessamyn said. “And then quit too. I don’t know what James mentioned, but my history with the Foundation isn’t great.”
“That entire case was bullshit,” Gabriella said. “When I saw the sales information for that apartment led back to the Foundation, I was just like…”
She paused, unable to think of the word to describe her feelings. On screen, Jessamyn was looking intently at her and she knew she must have just made a fool of herself. There goes Gabriella, making the case about her in front of the person affected by it the most.
“You figured out the apartment was Foundation?” Jessamyn asked.
“I mean, James asked me to look into it and I just…”
“No, no, that was really solid detective work,” Jessamyn said. “You helped a lot.”
Her face was burning, but pride was rapidly replacing the embarrassment. “Thanks.”
“So, no one in the Foundation is an expert on the paranormal in the digital realm,” Jessamyn said. “I haven’t been gone long enough that I figure they’ve built an entire wing devoted to that.”
“Oh, complete opposite,” Madelyn said. “It’s getting worse.”
“I saw that coming,” Jessamyn said bitterly.
Gabriella didn’t know all the details of why Jessamyn left the Foundation, just that the case had gone horribly, even if they did end up solving it. Both James and Bradley had refused to talk about it in more than a few snippy or sarcastic statements. But Gabriella was also Foundation, so she knew it had to be worse than they said.
“So I talked to my parents,” Jessamyn said a little later, after Madelyn and Gabriella had filled her in on what was happening and what they were looking for. “And they know a guy, Teddy, out of Norfolk – UK, not the Norfolk County branch – who’s done some research into this stuff. I can talk to him if you want.”
“If you don’t mind doing the initial introduction, we can take it from there,” Madelyn said. “Thank you so much.”
“Of course.”
She wrote down a few notes on her end. “So, you’re freelance?” Madelyn asked.
Jessamyn smiled. “I am,” she said. “I took a few months away from the field after I quit the Foundation, but I’m getting back into it now.”
“Are you working with anyone?”
“Off and on,” she said. “There’s so much that falls to the wayside with the Foundation that you could have your own business just picking up people who are frustrated at how long the Foundation takes. Like, there are people who will pay good money to get someone out there faster. I’m leaning toward establishing myself in something like that, but for now I’ve been doing some simple cases on my own, or working with my parents. They’re retired, but still do it for fun.”
“You like it better than the Foundation?”
“Yes.”
Jessamyn didn’t hesitate for even a second before answering Madelyn’s question. “I am so much happier,” she continued. “Having the support of the Foundation was good, but when it stopped being available, then what’s the difference? It wasn’t a permanent injury, but when I got hurt at the apartment, it wasn’t the Foundation that helped me. It was Rita, my teammate. And James and Rosa, and Bradley and Tim. Not fucking Harding or whatever. I miss my team, but Rita put in her two weeks’ notice, so I’m looking forward to just having a cup of coffee with her after she’s done.”
Madelyn’s face was unreadable, but she was gripping the handle of her cane in a way that made Gabriella take notice. “I should let you guys go,” Jessamyn said. “I’ll email Teddy and get back to you.”
“Thanks again,” Gabriella said.
They hung up a moment later, Madelyn still looking thoughtful. “What’s up?” Gabriella asked.
“Nothing,” Madelyn said, shaking her head. “I mean, nothing new.”
