Read Online The Strangely Beautiful Tale Of Miss Percy Parker by Leanna Renee Hieber - Free Book Online Page A

and as it presented itself once again Percy groaned. It hurt. There were…spirits in the sky. Hungry and searching for something. These spirits, smoky tendrils on the wind, were part angel. Beautiful yet dizzying, they darted helter-skelter under a bloodred canopy, their pelting forms a wonder. They descended rapaciously, looking, careening about the streets of London. One by one, they found new homes. A jolt shook her, a deafening thunder both outside Percy and within. Something was about to merge…
    The vision faded and Percy collapsed onto her bed, gulping for air and drowning in yearning. It was times such as these when she needed to believe there was a God of love and comfort, a Being of peace and beauty who could one day offer meaning. Her body shook until sleep won out…but even in sleep there was no rest. Someone kept screaming her name, over and over, matching the rhythm of her heartbeat, and the person screaming was very, very angry. Just as Percy was looking for answers, someone else was looking for her. She prayed she found her truths before her pursuer found her.

C HAPTER S IX
    Headmistress Rebecca Thompson owed Professor Alexi Rychman a very expensive bottle of sherry. Luckily, spirits—liquors as well as ghosts—were in ample supply at Café La Belle et La Bête.
    The spectres came and went as they pleased, now and then troubling to adjust the glassware, to the owner Josephine’s unending irritation. One pair of Restoration wraiths kept to a corner, eternally interested in gossip divined from the living. One former army general never left his post at the end of the bar. And of course there were many, many others.
    Everyone inside, living and dead, turned as the door opened and the scowling Rebecca entered.
    “Good afternoon, my dear Miss Thompson!” hailed her jovial, rosy-cheeked friend in a modest suit, rising from a table by the window to press her hand. The other gentleman at the table, more finely dressed, waved a limp hand and resumed gazing out the window.
    “Hello, Michael…Elijah,” Rebecca murmured with a curt nod.
    Vicar Michael Carroll, maintaining his affable grin, pulled out a chair. “And what has you so flustered?”
    “Alexi, of course,” she spat, taking a seat between them, removing her hat and gloves to replace stubborn locks of hair falling from her coiffure. She failed to notice Elijah roll his eyes.
    “What now?” Michael asked, twirling his grey-peppered mustache.
    Rebecca sighed, adjusting the gathered folds of her navy skirt with a pronounced rustle. “Do you recall the trouble at Fifty Berkeley Square?”
    “What of it?”
    “Alexi seemed to think I was outmatched. But as we often perform alone, I never dreamed—”
    “Old Bloody Bones got the better of you, eh?” Michael grinned.
    “Yes,” Rebecca muttered. “What a horrid sight. And stench. It wouldn’t stay still long enough to bind properly! I’m afraid I made a mess of it.”
    “Alexi’s been hard on you, then? Did he come to your aid?”
    “Yes, yes. He was right. It took the two of us to dispel the bloody devil.” Rebecca glowered. “So, as was our wager, I owe him a bottle of sherry. His absurdly expensive label, of course.”
    “Ah! A bet against Alexi?” Michael shook his head. “While I admire your pluck, my dear, I must say I’d have foregone that temptation. Now he will be gloating and unbearable.”
    Elijah sniggered against the window.
    Rebecca turned. “Good afternoon to you, too, Lord Withersby. Your impeccable manners are always a balm.”
    Elijah turned, as if he hadn’t yet noticed Rebecca or heard her previous greeting, and inclined his head in an exaggerated bow. “Miss Thompson. Delighted.”
    Michael laughed. “You know, Elijah, you match the consumptive artwork Josephine has on these walls. You really should sit for Rosetti. Or…I suppose we could simply leave you in your seat and hand you a gold frame to hold over your face.”
    Elijah pursed his thin lips in