“And you,” Helena said. “Your posture is atrocious. That hair has a mind of its own, and your face gives away absolutely everything. Still, you don’t mind being underestimated, and there is a power in that.”
Gigi felt like a frog that had just been dissected in biology class, but that didn’t stop her from smiling at her new, elderly, merciless BFF. “I am a cuddly, over-caffeinated wrecking ball in human form. Let’s discuss your grandson Orion’s secret love child.”
Gigi knew she was taking some creative liberties with that description, but she had a stubborn song in her heart and a knife in her pants, so oh well.
“Let’s not.” Helena took a sip of her coffee.
Gigi was not deterred. “A Woman in Red told me Orion isn’t Calla’s father, but that hedoeshave another child.” When that got no reaction, Gigi took another liberty. “A daughter.”
“I think not,” Helena said. “Had Orion ever attempted to keep a daughter from me, he would not be the Thorp family heir.” The woman turned her head back toward Savannah. “That necklace. Where did you get it?”
Savannah lifted her hand to the fleur-de-lis. “I don’t recall.”
Nothing ventured, nothing gained, Gigi thought. “A woman named Zella gave it to someone to prove that she knew what happened to Calla.” Helena Thorp showed no reaction to those words at all, so Gigi kept going. “And apparently what happened to Calla is that she fell in with some questionable characters and joined some kind of cult where she’s known as The Watcher. The Lily.”
Gigi watched for any indication that Helena Thorp recognized those terms, but the woman’s poise was bulletproof.
“I see.” Helena took another delicate sip of her coffee. “ThisZellawho had Calla’s necklace. She was in her twenties, I imagine? Quite beautiful?”
“Quite,” Gigi confirmed. “She said that she and Calla were sisters, once upon a time.”
Helena’s poker face wavered—just barely, just for a moment, but Gigi saw it. The old woman set down her coffee. “I do not wish to discuss Calla.”
“Calla’salive,” Gigi insisted. “And possibly evil. Were you the one who named her Calla?” When in doubt, omit all possible segues. “Because if so, you basically named herLily.”
Helena arched a brow.
“You waited generations for a Thorp daughter to be born.” Savannah seized the reins of the conversation like they’d always been hers.“The one to whom it was promised. The girl who would be queen.”
I had this, Gigi thought.I was handling it.
Helena’s violet gaze made its way back to the fleur-de-lis. “Give me my necklace, child.”
“Answer my sister’s questions,” Savannah replied. “And perhaps I will.”
I can do this without your help, Gigi thought.I excel at interrogations!
“Yes, I was the one who named Calla,” Helena Thorp said after a moment, addressing the words more to Savannah than to Gigi. “And yes, the name held meaning to me.”
Yes, you know something, Gigi translated. “When a person of a certain sort is being watched, they’re sent a calla lily as a warning.” Gigi leaned forward in her chair, which was a real mistake, knife-wedgie wise. “But what good is a warning if the person being warned has no ideathatshe’s being warned? Or what the heck she’s being warned about?”
That was objectively far too many uses of the wordwarn, but Gigi didn’t care, and Helena didn’t seem to mind.
“Those who are warned,” the old woman said after a moment, “have generally discovered enough to know quite well what that flower can mean.”
“Beg to differ,” Gigi said.
“You’ve received one, I take it?” Helena replied. “Both of you or just—”
“Just me,” Gigi said, but the second she said it, she wasn’t sure. The first calla lily had definitely been hers, but the second one—itcouldhave been for Savannah.
“And so it begins again,” Helena murmured.
“What begins again?” Savannah beat Gigi to the question.
“I am an old woman,” Helena told Savannah. “I am tired—of this life, of these games. And I just want what is mine.”
The necklace.Gigi caught her sister’s gaze.Please, Savannah.