Born to Darkness

by Suzanne Brockmann

  Her eyes filled with tears and her face was filled with anguish and pain that she didn’t hide. “But it’s not. Real.”

  “I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again. I. Don’t. Care.”

  “You don’t understand,” she said, pulling her arm free. “You may think you don’t care. You may even really not care. You might honestly think you like it, but … I don’t! I fucking hate it, all right? I hate it because I could love you. I really could. But I can’t. I can’t do it. I can’t do this. I can’t.”

  “Wait,” he said, as she got out of the car, as he scrambled after her. “Mac. Wait. Why? You’re right—I don’t understand.”

  She stopped, but she didn’t face him. “You don’t love me, Shane—you can’t love me. You can say the words, you can say them constantly if you want to, but that won’t make them true.”

  “But if it’s what I feel—”

  Mac turned to face him, and the sadness in her eyes nearly did him in.

  “I was ten years old,” she said, “when my powers first made an impact on my life. My father, who was an asshole and a drunk, beat the shit out of me, and then told my mother that he had to do it—to keep himself from having sex with me. Apparently, I was irresistible.”

  “Jesus,” Shane said.

  “Yeah,” Mac said. “I’ve never told anyone that before, because it was just too awful. She kicked him out, but we didn’t press charges, because she needed the child support. My brother, Billy, had special needs, and … I spent the next four years dodging creepy old guys who would follow me around at the state fair, or at the mall. It got so that I just stayed home, because it was worse after I hit puberty. Except then, when I was fourteen, Billy and my mom were killed when the brakes in the car failed. There was a lawsuit that the lawyer was sure we were going to win, and she was right, but it made my father petition for custody, and he won, so I went to live with the asshole instead of my aunt.”

  “Oh, shit,” Shane said.

  “I won’t leave you in suspense,” Mac said. “He didn’t touch me. Although what did happen was worse. I would have preferred …” She cut herself off and got back to her story. “Dad was onto his third wife by then. Janice—she was a piece of work. He’d married her for her money, but blew through that really fast.

  “When I moved in, they had just downsized to a really shitty two-bedroom apartment. I had to sleep under the dining room table. I used sheets to make walls, for privacy, but I knew they wouldn’t keep me safe. You and I both know that the asshole didn’t touch me, but back then, I had no idea what was going to happen. Needless to say, I didn’t get much sleep. Not until he got a job overseas. See, Janice didn’t like the way he looked at me, so he went to work as a contractor in Libya, which paid really well, but somehow made her hate me even more.

  “The only one who seemed to notice that I was grieving and in shock,” Mac continued, “was Janice’s son. Tim.”

  She paused. And met Shane’s eyes.

  “I fell in love with Tim,” she told him. “He was almost eighteen, and I was only fourteen, but he was so nice and handsome and … nice. He really was. And that first summer, we were both living in a new city and we didn’t know anybody else, so we spent every day together and … He said he loved me, and I believed him. And I gave him everything. We made all these plans for the future. He was going to graduate and get a scholarship to college, and I was going to go with him, and work to help pay the bills. And then I was going to go to college, too, and when I got old enough, we’d get married.” She paused again. “He always used protection—I suppose I should be thankful for that …”

  Shane found his voice, but it cracked just a little as he asked, “Do you still love him?”

  Mac gave him a look that said Please. “He and a friend tried to gang-bang me.”

  “So, he was playing you.”

  “No,” she said, and her conviction rang in her voice. “That’s the really awful part. He meant everything he said—as long as I was in the room. As long as he was with me. See, my power—it was even more erratic back then. I honestly didn’t even know that I was doing anything. I didn’t … But my power made him think that he loved me. I mean, God, I was jailbait. He risked a lot to be with me. We had to hide our relationship from his bitch of a mother and … And I didn’t know it at the time, but I was manipulating him with my talent—the exact same way I manipulated you.”

  “Mac,” Shane started, but she stopped him.

  “No, let me finish. Because maybe you’ll understand, at least as much as you can.” She took a deep breath. “School finally started, and Tim was going to this private academy, and I was jammed into the local bullshit public school, but we still saw each other every night. I mean, I slept with him. Every night.

  “And one day, I don’t really remember what happened, but I got the brilliant idea to go meet him at his school, instead of waiting for him to get home from basketball practice and … I saw him with this girl. She was beautiful. She looked like she belonged with a boy like Tim, and … I saw him kiss her.”

  Mac paused, and in that moment, her fatigue and her sadness overpowered the current of attitude and anger that always lurked just below her surface. “The next two months were hell—a lot of fights, a lot of begging my forgiveness, a lot of e-mails and texts and phone calls where, because he wasn’t with me, he’d break up with me. But then he’d come home and I’d be there and he’d cry and … We had a lot of makeup sex, too. But then, the next day, it would start all over again with the texts and calls.

  “See, when I wasn’t with him, he didn’t love me. And he knew at those times that he shouldn’t be screwing his fourteen-year-old stepsister, and it really messed him up. On top of that, he really was in love with this other girl, Heather. It wasn’t until years later, until I learned more about my power, that I really understood. It wasn’t his fault. He wasn’t lying to me. When he was with me he thought he loved me.”

  Shane felt sick—not just that this had happened to her, but because he now, absolutely, understood. “I’m not a seventeen-year-old boy,” he told her.

  But Mac ignored him. She just kept going. There was more to the story—it apparently wasn’t over yet. “Finally, I had enough, and I broke up with him. And he kinda went crazy. Being around me all night, every night, was … My powers made him want me, right? Really want me. And since I didn’t know what I was doing, I certainly didn’t know how to dial it down.

  “One night, Tim’s friend Ty came over, and Janice was out.” Mac paused. “And shit happened. At the trial, Tim provided video of me coming to his room at night. Willingly. Eagerly. I had no idea that he’d taped us, probably with his webcam. But the lawyer used it at the trial as proof that I was giving it away.”

  “Proof of statutory rape,” Shane pointed out, unable to keep silent.

  Mac smiled, but it was sad. “We’re so different, Navy. You live in a world of right and wrong, black and white. The world I live in’s not like that. Tim’s not to blame for what he did to me. If it was anyone’s fault, it was mine.”

  “No,” Shane said. “Nuh-uh. You can’t blame yourself. He should have stayed away from you. You were fourteen. Besides, you had no idea—”

  “But I do now,” Mac interrupted him. “Now? I know exactly how my power affects men. When I aim it, and turn it up? I know. I knew in the bar, when you sat down next to me. And I should’ve stayed away from you.”

  “No,” Shane said again.

  “Yes,” Mac countered. “Just like Tim, you don’t love me. Just like Tim, it’s not real.”

  “I’m sorry that happened to you,” Shane told her, talking fast because she was glancing now toward Old Main, and he knew she was going to walk away. “I’m sorry that Tim was a dick—”

  “But he wasn’t,” Mac said. “I mean, yeah, but not at first.”

  “Yes, at first,” Shane insisted. “If he didn’t really see how incredibly special you are—”

  Mac closed her eyes. “Please do
n’t,” she said. “God, Shane, if you only knew how many men have told me just how special I am …”

  “I’m not like them,” Shane said, and even as the words left his lips, he knew that Mac had probably heard that before, too. And he felt tears of frustration and anger and God, desperation fill his eyes, and he forced them back, because he was not defeated yet. “Mac, I honestly don’t care—”

  “But I do,” she said again. “Shane, please, listen to yourself. And tell me how is it okay for me to continue to manipulate you? What does that say about me if I’d be willing to do that?”

  He had no answer for her, and she nodded.

  “Yeah,” Mac said. “Try, if you can, to put yourself in my shoes. Try to understand how I feel—how awful, really awful, it would be to let myself love you.” She was crying now. “I’m not going to do it. I don’t want this. I don’t want you.”

  There was nothing he could say to that.

  “Just stay away from me,” she said, wiping her eyes and her face on her sleeve. “Go back to the barracks and leave me alone.”

  And with that, she walked away.

  Bach’s carefully ordered world was falling apart.

  Not only was Stephen Diaz showing signs of prescient ability, but the man that Bach thought of as the most thoughtful and steady member of his team had announced simultaneously that he was gay and that he was in love with Bach’s Research and Support Department Head. Oh, and now? After a seven-minute courtship, Stephen and Elliot had decided to get married.

  Speaking of prescient ability or lack thereof, Bach hadn’t seen that one coming.

  And then there was Anna Taylor. With her ultimate trust and strength of will, she’d done everything Bach had asked of her, in order to help him make that connection with Nika.

  Everything he’d asked—including everything that his dream self had asked, which was to have sex with her.

  He’d returned from the incredible strain and difficulty of navigating through Nika’s unbelievably complex and barrier-filled mind, anticipating the quiet comfort and warmth that he felt with Anna. It was similar to the way he looked forward to a hot bowl of chicken soup and a soft bed at the end of a hard day.

  At first he couldn’t find her.

  And then?

  He found her.

  The fact that she was having a sex dream about him shouldn’t have surprised him. He’d felt her attraction. He knew that she admired him.

  But it did surprise him.

  What surprised him even more was his reaction. He’d had a lot of options to choose from besides standing there, watching, with his mouth hanging open.

  He could have immediately withdrawn from her head. He could have backed away and then clouded her memory, so that when she awoke she’d remember little more than the fact that she’d had a vague but lovely dream.

  Instead, he stood there watching for far longer than he should have, not just because she was beautiful—although that played into it, too—but because he knew that she was on the verge of orgasm.

  And he wanted to let her come.

  Although okay, yeah, watching her do that—and watching his shiny and extra-buff dream self do the same—that had been freaking weird.

  Was that really how she saw him? Did he really smile at her like that? And yeah, okay, the fact that Anna was naked and in his arms would warrant a smile of that magnitude from any man, to be sure.

  But … Oh, my God.

  He’d been so stunned by both the experience and his lack of judgment, that he made the mistake of speaking aloud, which made her turn and see him.

  And even then, if he’d been thinking clearly, he still could have backed away and clouded her memory.

  Instead he’d yanked himself out of her mind, which brought them face-to-face in his office.

  And hadn’t that been awkward.

  Anna was sitting now—fully clothed—beside him in the OI Security lobby. She was waiting, just as he was, for Mac to appear.

  Bach’s initial trip inside of Devon Caine’s ugly-ass mind had been even less successful than his visit to Nika’s. He was really striking out all over the place, today, and he needed Mac’s help.

  He needed her empathic skills to navigate the murky depths of the serial killer’s mind. He needed her to help him feel his way past the delusions and fantasies to the real memories.

  They’d gotten word that Mac was finally in the building, but she’d no doubt stopped in the ladies’ water closet to freshen up.

  The door opened, but it was only Elliot. “Got a sec?” he asked Bach.

  “Until Mac gets here,” Bach said. “Sure.”

  “Stephen thought it was important that I fill you in on what’s happening with Edward O’Keefe,” Elliot said. “And I agree. This is big. We’re keeping him alive.”

  “That’s good news,” Bach said. He could use a little more news of the good variety today.

  But Elliot tempered his positive words. “Although, before we get too excited, we still may lose him—he was in terrible health to begin with. But the important thing you need to know is that he no longer has any trace of oxyclepta di-estraphen in his system.”

  “Oh, my God, that’s huge,” Anna said, and Bach glanced over to find her paying close attention.

  He looked back at Elliot. “No trace of the drug?”

  “None whatsoever,” Elliot confirmed. “Now, to be fair, we don’t know whether or not he jokered. I suspect he didn’t. We do know, from JLG—the drug testing lab’s records—that he was given a significantly large dose of Destiny about an hour before he went into cardiac arrest. So he has the drug, right? And that makes him instantly addicted. But then he has a massive coronary, to the point that his heart actually stops. The clowns at JLG use a defibrillator to jump-start him again. And somehow—I still don’t understand why it happened—those two events, his heart stopping and then being restarted, while under the influence of this drug, stimulated the self-healing centers of his brain. He’s currently in a coma, and most of his organs appear to be in some kind of stasis. But that small part of his brain is, as far as we can tell, not only working overtime on repairing his heart, but it’s burned up all traces of the drug, detoxing him and put him in a place where his body no longer requires more Destiny to stay alive.”

  “So he’s been essentially cured of his addiction—at least the physical side of it,” Bach said. Anna was right—this was huge. Provided it worked on anyone besides Edward O’Keefe. Provided O’Keefe came out of his coma. Provided his heart hadn’t been irrevocably damaged. Provided his body was able to get his other organs working again. Provided there wasn’t a lingering psychological need for the drug.

  “Problem is,” Elliot said, “his self-healing abilities are slowing down, and his heart’s still not repaired, not enough to function without some serious open-heart surgery—which will kill him in his current condition. I’d like your permission, Maestro, to give him small doses of Destiny as we continue to stimulate his brain’s healing center—with hope that it, too, will burn out of his system as he continues to self-repair.”

  “And if it doesn’t?” Bach asked.

  “Then we stop and start his heart, all over again—and rinse and repeat if we have to.”

  Bach was silent. “I don’t know, Doctor,” he finally started.

  Anna spoke up again. “If I were dying,” she said, “I’d want you to try it. And if that were Nika? I’d say do it.”

  “Definitely do it.”

  Bach looked up to see Mac standing just inside the door. It was odd that he hadn’t felt her come in. He was nowhere near the empath that she was, but he could usually sense and find her anywhere in the building, because she used her anger as a fuel. She reminded him of that character, Pig Pen, from Peanuts. All he had to do was find the black cloud of rage, and there she’d be.

  But right now, she had some significant emotional shields up and in place, and all he felt from her was …

  Sorrow.

  “Plea
se,” she said to Bach. “I liked him. O’Keefe. He really loved his dead wife. I think you’d like him, too. A lot in common, right?”

  She was trying to be her usual irreverent self, but it came out forced.

  Bach turned to Elliot. “Try it.”

  “Thank you, sir,” Elliot said and turned to go, but then stopped to look hard at Mac. “You okay?”

  “I’m great,” she said. “I’m so ready to go spelunking inside the horror-filled head of a psychopath—because my day just hasn’t been shitty enough.”

  “You don’t have to do this,” Bach told her.

  “Oh, yes,” Mac said, “I do. We’re going to find this girl.” She turned back to Elliot. “I understand congrats are in order. Good for you, bagging Diaz, and okay, that came out wrong, I didn’t mean it that way. Although, good for you, too, if that happened because, shit, life’s too short, right?” She looked from Elliot to Bach and then over to Anna, then back to Bach, then to Anna, then Bach.

  And Bach knew that Mac had picked up on the extra-charged emotional vibe that was still connecting him to Nika’s older sister.

  It was only dream sex, he had the urge to say. Fortunately, he had control over his urges. Most of them, anyway.

  And, wisely, Mac didn’t comment. What she did say was, “Let’s do this thing, shall we?” But then she looked at Anna again. “I’ll bring him right back.”

  “So …” Mac looked at Bach as the door to the cell that held Devon Caine was unlocked. “You’ve been busy.”

  Bach didn’t beat around the proverbial bush. “I like her,” he said, and yes, he was talking about the very lovely Anna Taylor. “She’s quickly become a good friend.”

  “Your friend wants to screw you blue.”

  Don’t.

  Okay, she’d hit a nerve, if he was making the kind of mental proclamation he usually reserved for his communications with jokering drug addicts.