Amora came downstairs for a rare occasion of spending breakfast with her father. “My dear, you look absolutely transformed!” Ethan Rathbone gasped with an alarmed expression.
She threw back her straight black hair, then reached for a small bowl resembling a dark-red aspic. She laughed and spoke through her apparent frivolity, “I took a break from my usual fare to partake of a man’s type of sweetbreads.”
Her father winced in sudden repulsion. He knew the hidden meaning of that bragging statement to be something unconscionable to imagine. He put up his right hand, like a road cop stopping a vehicle in downtown city traffic. “Amora, you know how I abhor your secret words that only Wesley and I can translate.”
“Father, you asked. I thought you would be used to my lot in life by now.”
Ethan clapped, as if to magically erase his queasy stomach by his hands making that loud repetitive sound. “Change of subject. Let’s talk about Divinia. Any progress?”
“I’m going in today to test it.”
“I hope you aren’t going to use yourself as the guinea pig! Let’s not entertain the same action from the classic, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde.”
“Father, time is of the essence. Hyde comes to the fore more often than I like. The list is getting longer, and those law enforcement ladies are not going to go away!” Amora said. She ate the dark red jellied substance and slithered up from the table.
As she walked out of the formal dining room, Ethan Rathbone buried his head in his hands. In a jerk of his neck, he shouted out, “Wesley, I need you in the dining room!”
Wesley possessed a monitoring device he had placed very close to him in the kitchen. In a matter of minutes, he showed up at Ethan’s side at the head of the dining table. “What’s your need, sir?”
“I’ve had a bellyful of these non-ending killings. Get ahold of Luana Barba. Make sure you tell her this is for the process of annihilation. Otherwise, she will hang up on you. I can’t go on like this!” Ethan told the butler, then went into a state of complete sobs, a display of hopelessness Wesley had not seen before.
Amora stood by the stone staircase. She possessed the gift of long-range hearing. She had heard every word her father uttered. The staircase was located many feet from the main foyer where the dining room was located at the right side of the massive estate. Not totally without feeling as she listened, a line of tears rolled down her left cheek.
***
Wesley did not waste any time in contacting Luana Barba. She knew his name very well; she said nothing only breathed heavily in the long distance connection. “Luana, don’t hang up. This call is to solicit your help for the total end of Amora Rathbone. Master Ethan and I have been party to her attacks for years since adolescence. Now, Ethan found out from this morning’s breakfast conversation that she has gone onto a form of ghoulish behavior.”
She asked a pertinent question, “Are you and Mr. Rathbone sure her finality has to be? What you want will take effort.”
“From what was brought forth this morning, she acted rather cavalier. She admitted to going under dosage tests herself for this new drug she has developed, Divinia. We both believe her behavior is not improving, but getting much worse. In the past, Amora showed so much pathos and sorrow. She would spend days in one of the more empty rooms in the upper level of the Tower after some of her killings. I thought it was because she destroyed babies, so I would leave her alone.”
“All right, you are to send me a parcel of the developing drug, Divinia. It will take some research on my part to find the proper lethal mixture to stop her heart. In a timely manner before the sun comes up, you are to dismember her, then incinerate the body parts. This will take a strong reserve,” Luana instructed.
“I believe all the leg work will depend on me. Master Ethan has suffered so much anguish for years. I will do anything to give him peace,” the butler said, reassuring the shaman all her instructions would be followed.
For years, Wesley was aware the many magical powers Amora had been given as this curse came into maturity. She could read fear in someone by visualizing their eyes and feeling the acceleration of their breathing many feet away from them.
He made a search of her Tower quarters to find a bottle of Divinia in her bathroom. He looked at the number prescribed, then counted the pills left in the bottle; only two taken. He decided to make a trip to the Saxony facility to pay a friendly visit to Amora’s secretary.
The secretary, an attractive middle-aged woman with shining blue eyes, held a noticeable crush on Wesley. He walked in, dressed in a gray suit that accentuated his blue eyes. “Clarissa, is Miss Amora in?”
“No, Wesley. She’s in a meeting at the main office,” Clarissa told him, smiling and leaning in where he sat on her desk.
Wesley took her hand. “I’m in a dilemma here. Our gardener was caught pilfering the last of her Divinia prescription. Could you get me a refill so her monthly dosage will not be interrupted?”
“Yes, but shouldn’t we wait until I let Amora know what has happened?”
“Clarissa, you well know any hiccup in Amora’s routine can send her into a seizure,” Wesley said softly, stroking her hand.
The secretary let forth a heavy sigh, then picked up the phone. After hanging up, she said, “One of the research assistants will bring it to this office in a few minutes.”
Wesley smiled and laid on the charm thicker, “Well, gorgeous, let’s talk about where I’ll be taking you to dinner.”
After he had the bottle in hand, he promised to pick up Clarissa at 6; every move was orchestrated. He evened out the bottle in Amora’s bathroom and drove off to the closest post office to send the parcel to Luana with overnight delivery. He was able to get the night off from Ethan to make his dinner date. He used the secretary, but he thought a dinner with someone who adored his company was an adequate trade-off.
***
For all installments from The Islands Tell of It, click here.
Previous installments:
- Chapter 1: The First Victim
- Chapter 2: Four Months Before October
- Chapter 3: Bobber’s Café
- Chapter 4: Heat Wave
- Chapter 5: Deep-End Dining
- Chapter 6: Rathbone Estate
- Chapter 7: Althea’s Run
- Chapter 8: Emergency Interrupts
- Chapter 9: Girls Talk Turkey
- Chapter 10: There Came a Lull
- Chapter 11: Dangerous Mind
- Chapter 12: Luana Barba
- Chapter 13: Trip to Milwaukee
