Blood Moon (Book Three - The Ravenscliff Series) Read Online Free PDF Page B

it.”
    “I won’t let her fire you,” Devon assured his friend. “I’ll take all the blame.” He forked some eggs his mouth. “So why didn’t Crazy Lady have access to the secret panels inside the walls before? Why wasn’t she always running so freely through the house?”
    “Somehow, whatever spell was put on that room was broken when you smashed your way through,” Bjorn said. “There was a hex on wherever they kept her imprisoned, but you’ve destroyed it.”
    “It’s inhuman the way she kept her prisoner,” Devon said. “I have a mind to report Mrs. Crandall to the police. If she tries to fire you, that’s what I’ll do.”
    Bjorn sat down beside Devon. “Oh, she was really very kind to her. She and the late Mrs. Muir both. They’d spend long sessions down there with her, or up in the tower when she was kept there. They’d read to her, or play games with her … she loved playing cards. Crazy Eights was her favorite.”
    Devon smirked. “Why am I not surprised?”
    “And they’d go for long walks in the courtyard or in the woods when you kids were at school.”
    “But to keep somebody imprisoned like that, Bjorn …”
    “It was for her own good,” the gnome insisted, “her own protection.”
    “Protection from what?”
    “I don’t know.” Bjorn sighed. “They never told me.”
    “Mrs. Crandall only does what’s good for her ,” Devon said bitterly. “She thinks of her own welfare first. Whatever reason she kept poor Crazy Lady locked up was purely selfish, I’m sure of that.”
    The gnome was staring into Devon’s eyes. “What has turned you so hard against her?”
    “Look, Bjorn, ever since I came here to Ravenscliff, she’s fought me. You know that. She’s tried to keep the truth of my Nightwing heritage from me.”
    “That’s because she fears the return of the Madman,” Bjorn reminded him.
    Devon couldn’t eat any more. He’d lost his appetite. He pushed his plate away. He didn’t have the heart to keep up this conversation. “I’ll be in the parlor,” he told Bjorn, standing. “Call me when it’s time to leave for school.”
    Devon headed out of the dining room and through the foyer. He passed the tall paneled windows that looked out onto the front driveway and spied D.J.’s vintage red Camaro. Devon was glad; he could use a friend. He hurried to the front door and threw it open.
    “Hey, Deej!” he shouted. “Man, I’ve got to talk with you! You here to give us a ride to school?”
    His friend, sitting behind the wheel of his car, rolled down his window. “Hey, dude,” D.J. said, the early morning sunlight glinting off the metal piercing in his upper lip. He was wearing a Red Sox baseball cap low on his eyes, and his voice was a little less exuberant than usual. Most mornings D.J. would greet Devon with a hail and hearty clap on the back. Today he seemed quiet and reserved.
    Devon immediately saw why. In the passenger seat next to D.J. sat Cecily. She abruptly turned her face away, long hair flinging, when Devon approached the car.
    “Listen, dude,” D.J. said, looking up at him plaintively from the car window, “Cess—well, she called me—and well, you know, she asked me to come by and give her a ride to school.”
    “I see,” Devon said. “So she didn’t have to ride with me.”
    “Well, uh, I just, well, you know, man, I just figured I, well, that—”
    Devon let out a long sigh. “It’s okay, D.J. It’s probably just as well.”
    “See you at school, man,” D.J. said. “Still friends, right, dude?”
    “Yeah,” Devon said sadly. “Still friends.”
    Before Devon had arrived on the scene, D.J. and Cecily had been an item. Cecily had always been toying with him, and Devon was sure she’d start doing so again. It made him angry, the idea that Cecily would use D.J. to get back at him.
    So he made his way over to Bjorn’s old Cadillac and climbed in the backseat. Alexander sat up front, chattering all the way to school about the