The Dark Glamour (666 Park Avenue 2)

least go looking for a cure.’
    ‘You could just go live in the jungle or the desert somewhere,’ Anne pointed out mischievously, sweeping up the smaller pieces.
    ‘Mine
is
an avoidable problem,’ Jane admitted, ‘or it would be if no electricity didn’t also mean no ice cream.’
    Anne laughed, a golden, musical sound that reminded Jane intensely of Malcolm. ‘I don’t think I could give up my telly, personally,’ she offered, and then blushed a little. Jane vividly remembered her vision of the girl’s small, sad apartment with its old-fashioned television tuned to the BBC.
    ‘I haven’t owned one since my last one blew up a few years ago,’ Jane admitted, taking a sip of her lukewarm coffee. It tasted even more like bitter water than the last cup had, and she grimaced.
    Anne’s mouth bowed into a puzzled frown. ‘Are you
really
cursed, too, then?’ Her dark eyes searched Jane’s face eagerly.
    Jane tore open the sugar packet on her saucer and grinned. ‘I really am,’ she confirmed brightly, ‘so the plates just now must have been my fault. Let me get you a coffee, to make it up?’
‘A coffee,’ just like Elodie says it,
she thought proudly.
    Anne hesitated, her eyes darting around the room. ‘Okay,’ she agreed in such a strange and noncommittal tone that at first Jane thought she had declined. ‘I’ll grab one. And a refill, if you want.’
    I just asked a barmaid to get herself coffee,
Jane told herself, mentally rolling her eyes.
I’m pretty much a social genius.
But Anne was back quickly, and seemed almost happy to be sliding into the booth across from Jane.
Lonely,
Jane remembered with a rush of compassion.
    ‘Although,’ Anne continued a little more animatedly as she passed the second coffee across the table, ‘if we really are
both
cursed, it’s probably tempting fate just to be in the same pub. But at one table? One of us should watch out for falling rocks.’
    Jane smiled tentatively. ‘I think we can risk it for a little while – maybe we’ll even cancel each other out.’
    Anne turned out to be pleasant company, if a bit awkward. Jane sketched Ella’s biography for her, enjoying the freedom of it. She had purposely made Ella’s background ambiguous and confusing in case anyone decided to check it out, but Anne had no reason to do that. So Jane invented details with cheerful abandon, mixing her English title, Brazilian name, and hybrid accent into a seamless – if long – life story. As she worked to keep their conversation lively, Jane wondered again how much Anne even knew about her own early life. Although she seemed open enough about current things, she showed no inclination whatsoever to delve into her past.
    Jane left longer and longer pauses after her own made-up stories, but she didn’t risk pushing any more than that.
She feels weird talking about her history at work; who wouldn’t?
    ‘Would you like to get tea sometime? While you’re here, I mean,’ Anne asked abruptly, and Jane jumped slightly.
    Witches,
she thought exasperatedly, even though she knew there was no way Anne could literally have read her mind. ‘I’d love to,’ she hurried to reply. ‘Tomorrow, maybe?’
    Anne nodded enthusiastically and dug around in her half-apron for a pen. When she found one, she reached shyly for Jane’s hand, spelling out an address on it in cramped blue letters. Jane, thinking of Lynne’s elegant ivory calling cards, suppressed a smile: Anne was in for some serious culture shock when she got to New York. ‘Come by around four,’ Anne suggested quietly, her voice turning up at the end to make it sound like a question.
    ‘I’ll be there,’ Jane told her emphatically. Anne was guarded, but Jane suspected that she probably didn’t have a lot of friends. Guilt turned her stomach for a moment, but she quickly decided that it must be the coffee.
I’m giving her answers,
she told the guilt.
She deserves to know who she is, and that’s why I’m here – it’s perfect.
    Then her brain whispered viciously,
André would probably kill me over this alone,
and she felt the fine brown hairs stand up on her arms. He hadn’t knocked on her adjoining suite’s door since their disastrous dinner the night before, but it was impossible that he would leave her alone for long.
Her sake, my sake – I’m here for a lot of reasons. I have to get this right
.

Twenty-eight
    T HE HALLWAY OF Anne’s building had an industrial quality to it that might at some point have