by Clara Kensie
Besides, my father’s eyes were hazel. Not black. Hazel.
I must have imagined the whole thing.
“Oh, yeah. It’s definitely broken,” Amy Van Der Sande said as I sat on a low table in the APR’s clinic. Amy was the healer who masqueraded as Tristan’s aunt while they were on assignment in Twelve Lakes. I liked her, but her cute pixie haircut and the bright polka dots on her scrubs didn’t do a thing to make this drab clinic any cheerier. The fog was so thick I was shocked that Dennis and Amy couldn’t see it.
“It’s bad, Dennis.” She hissed, as if it hurt to just look at my wrist. She’d had to cut the sleeve off of Tristan’s hoodie; I was in too much pain to pull my arm through. “If this was a hospital for neutrals, she’d have to have surgery.”
Dennis held his phone to his ear. “Yes, Tristan, Amy says it’s broken.” I could hear Tristan shouting through the phone.
“Is he coming?” I asked.
“Of course he is,” Dennis said, ending the call. “He’s already on his way.”
“He didn’t have a warning premonition,” I said. “He’s going to blame himself.”
“I know,” he sighed.
“So what happened, Tessa?” Amy asked. “Did you crush your wrist in something?”
“Just fix it, Amy,” Dennis said. “Please.”
Thank you, I mouthed to him. He knew I wouldn’t want anyone else to know that my own father did this to me. If Amy was truly curious, she could probably read it in the inevitable report. My family’s file was probably the thickest in the APR’s history.
“I can’t heal a bad break like this one completely, but I can get it started,” Amy said. “Hold still.” She held her open palm a half inch over my wrist, heat emanating from her hand.
We’d been in a similar position a few months ago, in Twelve Lakes. I’d had no idea she was healing my broken collarbone.
The swelling in my wrist lessened a bit, and then the pain. “This may take a few minutes,” Amy said. “It’s a really bad break. It’s like your bones were crushed, and then… ground against each other.”
My skin became very hot. “It’s burning,” I gasped, resisting the urge to move.
“That’s good. You’re healing.” She slowly waved her palm over the break.
“I don’t remember it burning when you fixed my collarbone,” I said through gritted teeth.
“That was just a tiny fracture. It didn’t require much effort. I basically looked at it and it healed.”
“Hey, can you heal scars?” I asked. Maybe she could heal the scars on my stomach. My permanent reminder of my parents’ crimes may not be so permanent after all.
“I can only heal injuries,” Amy said. “Scars are the result of injuries.”
“Oh.” The disfiguring marks on my stomach were there to stay. “How’s Heath?” I asked to distract myself from the pain. Heath was Amy’s husband, and he served as Tristan’s safeguard while they were in Twelve Lakes. The quiet, shy man had punched Kellan in the jaw in retaliation for hitting me during the kidnapping, and for that, I would love him forever.
“He’s good,” Amy said. “Kellan won’t let him safeguard any more investigators, but he doesn’t care. He’s safeguarding one of the board members now.”
“Tell him I say hi. And thanks.”
“I will, sweetheart,” she said. “There. I’ve done as much as I can do.” She lifted her hand away, and my skin cooled immediately.
My wrist still hurt, but it was no longer twisted or swollen. Still, I was surprised when Amy started wrapping it in strips of plaster. “A cast? I thought you healed it.” I moved my wrist up and down, but a jolt of pain shot up my arm. I bit my lips to keep from screaming.
“And that,” she said, “is why you need a cast. I’m a healer, not a miracle worker. You’ll heal much faster than if you were treated at a neutral hospital, but the bones are still weak, and you could break them again if you’re not protected. Go home and rest. No more school today.”
Before Dennis and I left, Amy gave me a pill for the pain. Being pulled out of school this morning by an APR employee, then returning with a cast tomorrow, would definitely be fodder for both Lab Brat and neutral gossip. It was my left wrist, too. I wouldn’t be able to paint my mural, and Tristan would have to help me do my homework.
And what would Jillian and Logan think, if Tristan or Aaron found them in the next few days? What would I tell them—that our father had broken my wrist?
Well, our mother had given me the five scars down my stomach. I could tell them that news at the same time, right after I told them that our parents had killed dozens of people.
Outside, Tristan was rushing up the pebbled path, carrying an enormous teddy bear, just as Dennis and I were walking down it. I gave him a weary wave with my casted arm. The pill Amy had given me was taking effect, eliminating the pain but making me woozy. All I wanted to do was crawl into bed, use Tristan’s chest as a pillow, and sleep. Dreamlessly.
He greeted me with an anxious kiss. “Tessa, I am so sorry.”
“It’s not your fault, Tristan.” My eyelids were so heavy. “My father broke my wrist, not you.”
“It is my fault,” he said fiercely. “I didn’t have a premonition. Again. I don’t understand what’s wrong with me.” He took me under his arm. “I’ll take her home, Dad.”
I waved a wobbly goodbye to Dennis, then leaned on Tristan as he walked me to his car.
He placed me in the passenger seat and buckled me in. I held the teddy bear on my lap and laid my head on it. So soft. My left arm was tucked safely between myself and the bear. I couldn’t stay awake any longer. “My dad had Nightmare Eyes,” I slurred to Tristan.
If he replied, either telepathically or aloud, I was asleep before his words reached me.
Deeming me healthy except for my broken wrist, Dennis and Deirdre let me go to school the next day. Ember told everyone that I’d gotten it caught in the elevator doors, but of course the Lab Brats already knew the truth: that my own father, one of the Kitteridge Killers, had broken it.
Unable to paint my mural, after school I went back to the Connellys’ house. Ember had gone to volunteer at the animal shelter, Deirdre had a meeting with the parents of one of her preschool students, and Tristan was still in class at Heron University. I called Aaron to ask if he needed anything, but he said no. He didn’t have any new leads, either.
So I cleaned. As best I could with one hand, anyway. I moved all of the items that were cluttering the bathroom counter back to the cabinet, I cleaned the mirrors, I sprayed and wiped the kitchen counters. I went to the living room to dust the knickknacks and picture frames. Dennis was there, glasses low on his nose as he read through a pile of green binders on his desk: evidence binders from the Investigation unit of the APR. My parents’ names were printed on one of them: Andrew Carson - Gwendolyn Carson - Case #CARS5020. That binder was the thickest in the stack. “What are you doing with that?” I asked.
“Oh, you know me,” he said. “I’ve never been able to fully settle into retirement, so sometimes I consult on the open cases. Jillian and Logan’s case is at a standstill, and I thought I’d take a look at your family’s file. Would you like to see it? The others are confidential, but you can look at yours.”
“No thank you,” I said as Marmalade tapped me with her paw. I picked her up awkwardly with my one good arm. “I’ve already seen my file.” Tristan and I had pored through every word in that file, multiple times, back in our Underground cell. I did not want to see the photos of my parents’ victims again. I already saw them every night in my dreams.
Dennis returned to the file he’d been studying. “So how is our Tessa adjusting to life as a Connelly?”
I was a Carson, not a Connelly. I could only shrug in response.
He chuckled. “You still don’t think of this house as home yet, do you?”
“Not really,” I said honestly.
“I know how you feel,” he said. “I was shuffled between my mother and
various foster homes for years. Even after I was permanently placed somewhere, it took me a long time to think of it as home.”
At that, a vision appeared in the fog. A young woman, just a teenager. Scrawny and dirty, hair stringy and eyes sunken from drug use. Pamela Connelly. A small boy with dark hair and wise, sad, blue eyes. Dennis. Even at that age, he wore wire-rimmed glasses.
“My mother loved me, but she was relieved when the state finally terminated her parental rights,” he said. “She didn’t admit it out loud, but I knew.” He tapped his head—he was able to read her mind. “I was ten years old, resentful and rebellious. She was twenty-five, overwhelmed, a high school dropout and addicted to crack. We had a very tumultuous relationship.”
Oh, poor Dennis. “I am so sorry.”
“The first thing I did once I was hired by the APR was try to find her,” he said.
“Did you?”
“Yes. She died two years after losing custody of me. She was under the influence and got in a fatal car accident.”
“How awful,” I said.
He looked at me over his glasses. “She used to tell me she could hear animals think.”
“Like Ember?”
“Ember inherited her ability to communicate with animals from her. But my mother never knew she had a psionic gift. She thought she was insane. That’s why she turned to drugs. They impeded her ability to hear them think.”
My heart ached for Dennis. And for his mother. What a sad, lonely life she’d had.
My mother had a sad, lonely childhood too.
“What about your father?” I asked.
“My mother never knew who my father was, but with the help of the APR, I was able to identify him, eventually. He was her dealer. A neutral. He never knew about me. He died in prison, a few years after my mother died.” He turned back to the binder.
“Ember looks like your mom,” I said. “If Ember left her hair blond.”
Dennis perked up, his blue eyes suddenly bright. “You think so?”
“Kind of, yeah. Ember looks healthier than she did. Happier, too.”
“It’s nice that you know what my mother looks like,” Dennis said. “I don’t have any pictures of her. No one else in the family has ever seen her.”
In the family. Dennis said it so casually, like he truly considered me to be part of his family.
“Did you love her? Your mom?” I asked. “Even though she was a bad mother?”
“I loved her very much,” he said. “I was also angry at her for a long time. But now I just feel sorry for her. If she’d grown up in Lilybrook, her life would have been completely different. That’s why, when the APR found Deirdre and me, I chose to be on the recruiting team. I wanted to bring psionic families to Lilybrook, so no child would grow up feeling lonely or scared because of their abilities.”
How different my mother’s life would have been if she’d grown up in Lilybrook. She could have used her psychokinesis to help people, not to kill people. Instead, she’d grown up in a rickety old trailer with an overburdened mother and an abusive stepfather. When she finally came to Lilybrook as an adult, it was only to spend the rest of her life in a gray Underground cell.
My mother had brought tragedy to so many people, but her life was tragic as well.
❀
Sleepy-eyed, Tristan leaned on the bathroom door frame as I tried to brush my teeth with my right hand. “Why are you up so early on a Saturday?” he asked through a yawn. “Another nightmare?”
Of course I’d had another nightmare. But that wasn’t why I was awake. “I’m going to the APR to visit my mother.”
He jolted upright. “What?”
“I’m going right after breakfast.” Marmalade purred from the counter. I put down the toothbrush and scratched under her chin.
Tristan rubbed the heel of his hands in his eyes, like he was trying to wake up from a dream. “She almost killed you, Tessa. She tried to kill me. Twice. She tried to kill my dad. She’s killed dozens of people. How can you want to see that woman?”
The venom in his tone hit me in the core. He hated my mother as much as Nathan did.
Understandable. I hated her too. I did. My hatred for her crawled around inside me like insects. But I needed to see her. Today. Right now. “She’s my mother,” I said. “What other reason do I need? Besides, maybe she has an idea where Jillian and Logan are. Maybe she can give us a lead.”
He shook his head. “You can send her a note, then. Or have the warden ask her, or one of the investigators. You don’t have to go see her yourself.”
“Tristan, I can visit my mother if I want to,” I said.
“She’s going to hurt you.”
“Are you getting a warning premonition?”
“I don’t need a premonition,” he said. “It’s not a psionic thing. She’s going to hurt you. I know it.”
“She can’t hurt me,” I said. “She’s been neutralized.”
“Your father’s neutralized, and he hurt you,” he said. “From his hospital bed. While he was restrained.”
“This is different.” Why was he being so difficult? “My dad’s not lucid. Mom is.”
“I’m just trying to keep you safe,” he said, lightly running his fingers over my cast. “It’s my job to keep you safe.”
A detonator went off inside me and I exploded. “Your job? I’m your girlfriend, not your assignment.” I flung my casted arm away from him, and Marmalade bolted. “In case you haven’t noticed, Tristan, even with your premonitions, you can’t fix everything bad in my life.”
He flinched like I’d punched him. “I need to do this, Tessa. Please. I need to keep you safe.”
“And I need to see my mother,” I said, and stormed past him out of the bathroom, almost bowling him over.
I marched downstairs, only to see Deirdre on the sofa, sorting through a storage container of Valentine’s Day decorations. Half the room was already covered in red and pink hearts. She gestured for me to come sit with her, but I stayed where I was. “So,” she said, “I hear you want to visit your mother.”
“Are you going to tell me I can’t go too?” I asked crossly. “It’s a prison cell, not a silver room.”
“I’m not going to stop you,” she said. “I think it would be good for you to see your mom. But don’t be angry at Tristan. He can’t help wanting to protect you.”
I snorted. “He didn’t even have a warning premonition, but he thinks my mom is going to hurt me.”
“It doesn’t matter,” she said. “Tristan has always taken care of the people he loves. Even if he wasn’t precognitive, he’d be that way. But precogs like Tristan and me, when we see something bad in the future, we feel it’s our responsibility to prevent it from happening. Tristan defines himself by his warning premonitions. When he fails to prevent something bad from happening to you, whether it’s because you ignored his warning or he didn’t have the premonition at all, he blames himself. He feels worthless.”
Tristan wanted to be a hero. He needed to be a hero. His entire self-worth was tied up in being a hero.
If Tristan needed to be a hero, then he should go back to slaying dragons for Melanie Brunswick. Because my dragons were indestructible.
“You’re sure?” Tristan had his arm around me as the elevator took us down to the Underground. “You’re absolutely sure you want to do this?”
“You don’t have to come with me if it bothers you this much,” I said.
His only response was tightening his arm around me.
The elevator doors opened to reveal Mr. Milbourne waiting to escort us, arms crossed, chomping on gum. “Let’s go,” he said. “I don’t have a lot of time today.”
We followed him into the labyrinth of the prison. He didn’t look back as I thanked him for allowing this unscheduled visit with my mother. As we neared the cell that served as my father’s hospital room, I stopped. “Can I see my dad first?”
“No change in his status,” he grunted. “Still unconscious.”
> “I still want to see him.”
He slid a glance at my cast. “Fine, but for the record, you’re doing this against my recommendation.” He slid his badge through the keypad at the door.
Mine too, Tristan said silently.
I lingered in the doorway, leaning against Tristan. My father looked exactly as he had when I left him earlier this week. Sleeping, apparently at peace. Wrists in restraints. An IV needle piercing his arm. The only noise was the occasional beeping of his breathing and heart monitors, their screens reflecting the fluorescent light from above.
Are you going in? Tristan asked.
Not yet.
I watched my father from the doorway for a long, slow minute. He didn’t move. Neither did I. I willed him to open his eyes.
“If you’re not going in, then you need to leave,” Mr. Milbourne said.
His words spurred me to my father’s bedside. Tristan held my right hand. You’re too close, he warned me silently. I stepped back, suddenly fearful my father would spring to life and attack me again.
“Dad,” I whispered.
As if on cue, my father moaned. The monitors beeped faster.
“Dad,” I said again, louder.
His head turned to the side, facing me. His eyes were still closed, but his breathing started coming in short, shallow gasps.
The beeping was faster now, almost frantic. A white-clad nurse rushed in and checked the monitors. “You should leave,” she said to me. “You’re disturbing him.”
“Is he waking up?”
“No. Just go, please.”
Gingerly, I stepped closer and reached out to him, but Tristan pulled me back. “Tristan, please. I need to see his eyes.”
The monitors beeped faster, louder.
“Please leave,” the nurse said again, insistently. Mr. Milbourne marched in, ready to take me out by force.
At that, Tristan stepped between us. “She wants to see his eyes. That’s all. Then we’ll leave.”
The warden sighed and nodded to the nurse. “Do it.”
The nurse, lips in a tight line, put her fingertips lightly on my father’s eyelids and pulled them open. “Quickly,” she said.
