A Villain for Christmas (The Holyoake Christmas Series, Book 2)

Digital Intermediate

When Billie arrived at Nidhogg, Bondarenko was already pacing the hall, an unlit cigarette pressed between her fingers. Nada stood aside, car keys in her hand.

"Finally!" Bondarenko barked and rushed by Billie towards the entrance door. "C'mon, Ms. Harewicke! Apparently I'm not supposed to roam without you, and I'm dying! I need my fix! First, Eric disappears somewhere for god knows how long. And then I thought I heard him come back, but he's nowhere to be found again! Coffee, Ms. Harewicke! Now!"

Billie threw Nada a questioning look. Lady Bjornsson's PA shrugged. Billie turned around, adjusted her tote on her shoulder, and followed the director. Bondarenko was already greedily inhaling the smoke, just a few steps away from the entrance doors.

"Ms. Bondarenko, I've got something I wanted to share with you," Billie started.

The Russian pushed the fag butt into a portable ashtray and stuck the next ciggy into her mouth.

"God damn aristocrats," she muttered. "No smoking anywhere. What is it, Ms. Harewicke?" she asked in a disgruntled tone.

Her gaze brushed at the white landscape in front of them, her face scrunched in an irritated grimace.

"I've looked into the script for your film, and I've got a couple of ideas that I think you might find–"

The director gave out a dismissing huff, interrupting Billie.

"Don't bother," Bondarenko scoffed. "I really don't think it's going to work. This whole place is just too cosy and healthy! It's sucking out all of my creative juices! I'm a creative prune now. There's no edge, no perverted depravity... and it's so freaking boring!" She flailed her hand, dropping a bit of ash on the ground. "And it's getting into everyone's head! It's messing up with Archie, who's being annoyingly mopey, and can't focus shit! Eric is all of a sudden a family man, and a freaking prince charming! That's the dude who once killed a man on screen by driving an electric drill into the guy's eye socket, then pulled out, and did the same on the other side!" Bondarenko made a buzzing noise and poked the air with her index and middle fingers, the cigarette between them. "He played one sick psychopath after another, and the audience bought it every time! And look at him now! He's playing Clue with the baronet's daughter; half the town is related to him; and he's childhood friends with the local ice-cream maker or some other crap like that! And Laura is all over him now! Laura, who once told Johnny Depp he needed to get his shit together if he wanted a piece of her sweet ass! Some Greek billionaire tried to buy her favours with a yacht, and she said it wasn't big enough! And now she's cuddling with Eric, her former friend with benefits, on a sofa, watching cartoons! Damn this place! It's like Wakanda meets Yefremov's Andromeda Nebula. Instead of banging his maids, your baronet courts his wife with bouquets and makes heart eyes at her at breakfast! The local padre should be hosting Queer Eye. I need to get out of this place, and I need a different stately home to film at!"

"There's an abandoned pseudo-Gothic manor on the hill in the centre of the county, and allegedly there was a triple murder there in the 1930s!" Billie hollered in despair.

The Russian's hand with the fag froze without reaching her lips.

Billie gathered her will and ventured into her explanation, rushing as much as her normally underemployed oratory skills allowed, "There's a manor on the Fleckney Hill. It's called Bran House. It's a Georgian manor house, very similar architecturally to the Nidhogg Hall. It belonged to the Ravenscrofts. In the 1930s the members of the family started dying in batches, all around the country; including the head of the family, a textile industrialist Arthur Ravenscroft; his wife; and their daughter. The three of them were found dead in the house. There was only one Ravenscroft left, an orphaned boy William Ravenscroft, who was six at the time. He was taken away to London, by some distant relatives. No one has been in the house since then. It's under the patronage of the Fleckney Historic Society. The best part of it is that the library of the Bran House was moved to Nidhogg! The Bjornssons purchased the books, the shelves, even some of the furniture pieces; and paid generously to support the Ravenscroft boy's future. Whether the money actually reached him is unknown. No one knows what happened to him afterwards."