Again, she closed her eyes, this time connecting to Matthew through the feel of his hand on her bare arm. She held onto that feeling, that anchor into the present, as she let her mind slip backwards into a time she tried so hard to forget that there were moments she almost convinced herself it wasn’t real. Almost. Then she heard his voice in her mind, telling her she’d never be good enough. Telling her that no one would ever love her except for him.
No, those weren’t the words he’d used. What he’d said was: You’re a slut, just like your mom.
Tears already prickled the back of her eyes; she started to force them away, to force the memories away...
“Let it out,” Matthew whispered. “You’ve let it fester, haven’t you?”
She didn’t know. She only knew it hurt too badly. There was a painful pressure inside her chest and she found herself gasping for breath.
He was right. She was a slut. That’s why she’d had a one-night stand and gotten pregnant. That’s why she had run off with a vampire. That’s why...
“Sh,” Matthew whispered, and his hand continued to move up and down her arm. “What did he do?”
I was twelve years old, Kaitlin thought. It was the day of the sixth grade Valentine’s Day Party and she had a new grown up secret to share with her friends. That morning, she’d woken to discover that she was a woman. None of her friends had started their periods so soon, which made her feel special. Grown up. Mature.
That’s how she still felt when she arrived home to find her stepfather waiting for her in the living room.
She saw her stepfather in her mind’s eye as he had looked that day – sleek and sophisticated. He always kept his face clean-shaven, his blond hair neatly trimmed.
Kaitlin hated blond hair now, even on herself, but she hadn’t had time to re-dye her hair lately. Was this why? She hadn’t thought about it. Hadn’t let herself. It was such a tiny detail, but she dwelt upon it for a minute or two, knowing it was safer than what happened next.
She more than half expected Matthew to urge her to let it out again, but he didn’t push.
You’re such a pretty little thing. Natural blondes are so rare.
He’d said it before, many times in the six months since he’d married her mother. It made her feel good; she’d received too few compliments in her life. Her only family was her mom, and she worked so hard...
But this time when he said it, he was looking at her oddly. She wasn’t sure she liked it; it was almost like he could tell she was bleeding. She hadn’t told him, but she had told her mom. Maybe he’d overheard.
All grown up now, aren’t you?
Yes, I am. She was proud of it, so why not say it? She pushed past him, into her bedroom, head held high.
He followed.
What happened next... she wasn’t sure. She couldn’t remember how it had happened. One second she was slinging her backpack onto her bed, the next he was behind her, his hands reaching up under her shirt.
You like it when I touch you, don’t you?
He wasn’t supposed to touch her like that. Fear paralyzed her as he continued to touch the parts her swimsuit covered and told her what a good girl she was.
She didn’t fight him. She thought she might have protested a bit at first, but she’d let him do those things to her. All of it. She’d hated it and it hurt and there was blood everywhere. And afterwards, when he’d called her a slut, she’d known it was true.
...just like your mom.
“Kaitlin.” She felt her hand slipping into someone else’s. Someone strong and warm. Someone who was not trying to touch her breasts or her... other parts.
“Kaitlin,” Matthew repeated.
She tried to withdraw from the memories, but it seemed that now she had opened the floodgate, she couldn’t close it again. She remembered... so many times over the next few months she couldn’t separate one time from the next. Sometimes she said no. A few times she’d even fought him. Once, she threatened to tell her mom.
What makes you think she doesn’t know?
Kaitlin hadn’t wanted to believe it, but then again, he was still there. Still living with them. And there were days it felt to her like she had a big letter “A” on her chest like in the book they were making her read at school.
She knows. And if you tell anyone else they’ll take you away and you’ll never see your mom again.
“Kaitlin, please come back to me.”
She should have told; she knew that now. He’d lied. Her mom had not known.
“When did your mom find out?” Matthew asked.
Kaitlin started to recall the day, but flinched backward, knowing that this was the worst secret of all.
“Tell me,” Matthew said gently.
Her mother had walked in on them. She’d come home from the diner early – Kaitlin had never found out why. Kaitlin had never asked, never wanted to know more about that horrible day than she already knew. The humiliation was bad enough. The knowledge of how it could destroy their family was bad enough.
“What did she do?” Matthew asked.
“I don’t know,” Kaitlin whispered. And it was true. She wasn’t entirely sure what her mother had done. She only knew that her mother had screamed loudly enough to wake the dead. Her stepfather had jumped away like he could somehow pretend it all away, and in that instant Kaitlin knew he’d lied about her mother knowing.
Then everyone was shouting. Her mother ran off, her stepfather followed, and they were arguing. She followed, just to the end of the hall, with a sheet wrapped around her trembling body.
Her body trembled now with the memory.
Then she heard her stepfather scream – a scream of pain. Kaitlin had started to rush forward but her mother stopped her. Get back in your room and stay there!
“What did she do?”
Kaitlin shook her head. She hadn’t seen. She didn’t know for sure, and she’d never asked so she couldn’t get her mom in trouble. She only knew she’d never seen her stepfather again – and neither had anyone else.
“You think he’s dead?” Matthew asked.
Kaitlin nodded. That had been the most frightening night of her life, and she’d spent all of it in her room hiding under the covers. She wished she could do that now, but there was no bed and no covers here.
Her mom had killed a man, she was almost sure of it, and it had been entirely her fault.
“It was not your fault.” Matthew’s voice wasn’t gentle now.
“I let him do those things to me, and then I let my mom–”
“It was not your fault! If he wasn’t dead, I’d kill him myself. If we get out of this alive, I’ll make sure he’s dead and if he’s not...”
Kaitlin’s heart was pounding wildly, and she suddenly wasn’t sure she wanted Matthew’s arms around her. Instantly, Matthew drew himself away, putting the distance between them that she’d thought she wanted. She wasn’t so sure she wanted that distance now; she missed his heat and she was amazed that he hadn’t pushed her.
“I have never felt so useless!” Matthew said. “If you weren’t immune to mind magic, I could fix this. I could make you forget or help you heal or somehow convince you that you’re a good person!”
Kaitlin reeled. Now it was her turn to scoot back a few inches. Her eyes flew up to his face and she saw something in his eyes that made her truly afraid of him for the first time.
“I’ve done it before,” Matthew went on. “When you’re a telepath, it’s hard to miss that people out there are hurting. Sometimes it’s not even their fault, like with you, but I can’t–”
“You want to fix me?”
“I want to help you.”
Kaitlin gaped at him. Okay, so yes, she was broken. She could admit that, but to have someone root around inside her mind against her will and cha
nge her...
“No, that’s not how it is,” Matthew said. “There was a... a girl who was suicidal and I convinced her to see a therapist. And there was this girl in high school whose uncle was... a little like your stepfather... and I just cleaned the memories away.”
“Is that what you want to do with me? Clean the memories away and make me see a therapist?”
“I can’t erase old memories, but yes, you do need to talk to someone who can help.”
“I talked to you, and you want to fix me.”
“I didn’t mean it like that.”
“Yes, you did.”
Matthew opened and closed his mouth a few times, but he finally nodded. “Yes, maybe I did. But you have no idea how hard it is to see you hurting, to know you judge yourself for it, and to know beyond a shadow of a doubt that it wasn’t your fault. None of it.”
“He didn’t rape me,” Kaitlin said. “I let him–”
“You were a child!”
Kaitlin looked away as tears began to fill her eyes. She could scarcely see. Her thoughts were scattered on the wind, leaving her feeling hollow and exposed, like someone had carved out all her internal organs and put them on display.
“I can’t do this right now. I’ve got to...” Kaitlin didn’t know what she had to do, but she climbed the ladder down from the loft and stumbled out of the barn, just needing some distance. Needing to be alone. There were people out there hunting her, but at the moment they didn’t matter as much as the demons inside her, tearing her apart.
She broke into a run, not stopping until she reached the shade of the forest. There she stopped, using the trunk of a tree for support, literally hugging it. And she cried.
“Is there anything I can do to help?” asked a nightmarishly familiar voice from behind her.
Jason.
Chapter 27
KAITLIN FROZE, HER SHOULDERS TENSED, HER tears stopping as if someone had shut off a faucet.
He leaned against a nearby tree, looking for all the world as if he were just an old friend stopping by for a chat. He wasn’t. Oh, how he wasn’t. Kaitlin forced herself to look him in the eyes, but she didn’t breathe a sigh of relief when she saw they weren’t yellow.
She was caught. She tried to say something, but her heart was in her throat and she couldn’t form words. After everything, this was how it would end.
At least Jay was safe. She hoped. Prayed.
“You don’t look happy to see me. Strange, since the last time I saw you, you agreed to join me in eternity.”
“I-I-”
“It’s okay. I knew you were lying.”
He had? That didn’t make sense. If he’d known, why hadn’t he ended it?
“We let you get away, you know,” Jason said. “Did you really think you could escape us otherwise?”
Kaitlin shook her head, but not in negation. She was simply... overwhelmed. She couldn’t think. She could barely breathe.
“Breathe,” Jason said. “Come on, I seem to recall it being important for mortals.”
Had that been a joke? It couldn’t be. He hadn’t joked the entire time she’d been with him.
She wanted to ask what he was doing there but the words wouldn’t form. After a few moments of trying, she let herself slide down the trunk of the tree to sit at its base.
“Am I going to die now?” she finally asked. She wasn’t trembling. She felt simply numb.
“Not right now.”
“Planning to torture me first?”
“That’s what Xavier wants me to do. He’s furious that Jay’s not with you and thinks torturing you will help us find him.”
She felt a small moment of triumph that Jay had gotten away, followed instantly by the realization that she would never see him again.
“I don’t know where he is,” she said hollowly.
“Obviously. Which is why I’m not torturing you, despite Xavier’s orders.”
“Oh.” Kaitlin tried to clear her mind. It wasn’t easy. “Have you known where I was the whole time?”
“Yes. I’ve been watching you sit in that barn for a night, steal food, flirt with the mortal.” Jason began to circle her, not touching her but keeping her in his sights. Letting her know there was no escape.
“Why did you leave me there?” Kaitlin asked.
“Now, there’s an interesting question.” He continued to circled, but didn’t look at her. He seemed busy with his own thoughts and she left him to them. “I didn’t think it would actually work.”
“What would work?”
“Driving you off to Alexander’s compound. I convinced Xavier to let you go, that your immunity to mind magic would help you see Alexander’s secrets. Maybe even help take him down.”
Her mouth fell open slightly. “I was a mole?”
“That’s what Xavier thought. I just wanted to get Jay away from him.”
Kaitlin’s mind flashed back to that frantic night, to the horrible moment when she’d fallen asleep. She shouldn’t have been able to get away, but she hadn’t let herself think about the how. Only the what.
“Why am I immune to mind magic?” Kaitlin asked. “Did you do something to me?”
“Me? No. Xavier. He’s been studying mind magic for longer than either of us has been alive.”
“Why me?” Kaitlin asked. “I thought...” She trailed off, not sure how to say what she’d wanted. What she’d stupidly dreamed.
“You thought we’d be a happy family?” Jason’s words were a taunt that scraped open old wounds. “I wanted Jay. You just came with him. But Xavier was curious how a mundane like you managed to have such a powerful baby, even if I was the father. He took blood samples, found what he thought was latent magical DNA. He spent months figuring out how to activate it.”
Kaitlin shuddered at the idea of being a vampire’s medical experiment, even if she had survived. Stronger, apparently.
“You don’t know who your father is, do you?” Jason pushed.
“I don’t care!” She really didn’t. And she didn’t want to talk about it. “What about the other people? I thought Xavier was making a vampire army but he wasn’t, was he?”
“He was trying to reproduce your abilities in others. He’d love to be immune to mind magic.”
“What happened to them?” Kaitlin begged to know.
He shook his head; if he’d been human she’d have thought he meant, You don’t want to know.
“As you emerged from the thrall,” Jason continued, and if she hadn’t known better, she would have said sadness lurked in his eyes, “you pulled away from me.”
“Why do you care? Didn’t I just come with Jay?”
“My human host was sentimental. It thought we could be a family.”
“You’re a monster,” Kaitlin whispered. “Inhuman. It got worse as time went on.”
Jason shook his head, and again she thought she detected something like sadness.
“I don’t understand you. What do you want?”
“So many things.” Jason stopped circling and simply stared at her, unnerving her with his eyes. “I want Jay.”
“You can’t have him,” Kaitlin said fiercely. “But why would you want him? You never looked at him when we were living together.”
“I was up with him every night at three in the morning while you slept.”
Kaitlin blinked in surprise. He had? Then she recalled that Jay had been getting up at three in the morning every night since she’d started living at the compound, when she thought he had been sleeping through the night. Was it possible that Jason was telling the truth?
“I still don’t understand,” Kaitlin said. “You changed. You...”
“Yes, I did,” Jason said. “But not as much as I made you believe. I scared you away to make sure
you went to the hunters.” He paused. “I did an excellent job.”
Kaitlin tried to recall the last few months she’d spent with Jason, but it was all a blur of images and feelings. The one thing that was beginning to dawn on her was that this Jason, the one standing before her now, wasn’t acting like he had the last time she’d seen him. Or at least, not exactly. She wouldn’t say he was acting like a human either.
“What are you?” she asked.
“I don’t know. When I first turned, I was a newborn babe with the memories of a grown man. Now... I’m not sure what I’m growing into.”
There was something almost human in his voice, but Kaitlin refused to believe he was vulnerable in any way.
“Have you asked Xavier?”
“Yes.” Jason’s eyes darkened. “Which brings me to the other thing I want: Xavier dead.”
Kaitlin’s eyes widened in shock. She had definitely not seen that one coming. She was torn between why and how, but finally settled on the latter. “An entire heptade of hunters couldn’t kill him.”
“No, they couldn’t. But maybe I can.”
Kaitlin shook her head. She didn’t believe it. And from the sounds of it, his delusions would get her killed.
“I need your help,” Jason continued.
“My help? Why would I help you? You want my son!”
“My son, too.”
“Your host’s son. Jason is dead.” Kaitlin stared at him, challenging him to deny it. But he didn’t.
“Yes, I think so.”
“He would have told me never to trust you.”
“I would tell you the same. But you’ve got three choices here: Me, Xavier, or Alexander. Which is it going to be?”
Kaitlin closed her eyes, but she couldn’t deny the truth of Jason’s words. “If I help you, will you leave Jay alone?”
He hesitated. “I won’t hurt him. But I’d like to see him. Maybe every other weekend.”
Kaitlin's Tale Page 24