Endless (11 page)

And so it began.

Michael and Marly didn’t try to talk me out
of working for Carruthers when I showed up at Michael’s room after
leaving my parents. They listened to me without comment, and I
could hear only their normal loving, supportive thoughts. When I
finished explaining my justification, Marly stood up and gave me a
hug.

“Honey, you know what I think. Literally.”
She winked. “You have to do what you feel is right for you. I can’t
make the decision, and neither can Michael. But please, keep your
eyes open. Don’t let them make you into what you’re not, okay?” She
held my chin and looked into my eyes searchingly. I nodded, and she
hugged me again, harder.

Michael grabbed my hand and held it tight.
“You know I’m cool with whatever you decide, as long as I get to be
there with you. But I’m with Mom—be careful. That place. I know it
was beautiful and historic and all, but it kind of creeped me
out.”

I shuddered in agreement. “I know. Cathryn
fits right in there, doesn’t she?”

“And those servers. They reminded me of
robots or something.” Marly made a face.

I frowned. “The one who told Michael how to
get the veranda—she was okay. I think she was trying to tell me
something when we left.” I shook my head. “But maybe I was
imagining it.”

I called Cathryn on Monday after class. To my
vast relief, I got her voicemail and left a message, just letting
her know that after talking with my parents and Michael (I might
have given his name just a little extra emphasis), I had decided to
accept the offer from Carruthers.

I didn’t have to wait long to hear back from
her. My phone rang as I walked to dinner late that afternoon.

“Hello, Tasmyn. I was happy to hear you’ve
made the right decision.”

“Thanks.” I lost the attempt to the keep the
bleakness out of my voice.

Cathryn laughed, the tinkling brightness of
it irritating me even across the phone. “You know, Tasmyn, this is
actually a good thing. You’re going to thank me eventually, I
promise.”

“Hmm,” I responded. “I guess.”

“Well, your lack of enthusiasm aside, are you
ready to begin right away? I’ve been looking at your class
schedule, and I see that Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays are short
days for you.”

“Wait—you’ve been
what
? How do you
have my class schedule?”

“I work in the alumni office, remember. I
have access to just about everything I need. I was trying to work
out a schedule that wouldn’t be too arduous for you, since this is
your first semester of college. We don’t want to over-tax you.”

“Oh, thanks so much. I appreciate that.”

Cathryn ignored me. “So should we say
Wednesday and Friday this week? I’ll work on that schedule and give
you a copy when I see you. Some days we’ll work on campus, and
others we’ll need to drive up to Harper Creek. And eventually we’ll
be going on calls, but that will wait a few weeks.”

“Fine. Only this week, I can’t do Friday. I
have an appointment already.”

“Oh, right, with your witch shrink?”

My mouth dropped open, and I felt like I’d
been sucker punched yet again. How on earth could Cathryn know
about Aline?

“Who told you about her?” I hissed into the
phone. “And don’t call her that. She’s not. A witch, I mean.”

“I told you, we do extensive research before
we ever reach out to a potential asset. And then I picked it up in
Michael’s mind. He thinks about you, and everything to do with you,
so much that it’s really annoying. Oh, and your mother mentioned
the shrink on Saturday when she was talking with Harley and the
Landowers. So don’t blame me.”

I gritted my teeth. When had my parents
become so loose-lipped? “Whatever. Anyway, I can only work
Wednesday this week. Where do I go?”

“I’ll pick you up at your dorm. We have
papers for you to sign and some forms to complete. We can do that
at the same café where we ate lunch last week. I’ll give you the
schedule, we’ll go over some rules. Nothing too stressful for
you.”

I rolled my eyes and stuck out my tongue. I
had reached the dining hall and stood outside, waiting in the spot
where Michael and I always met. He rounded the corner just in time
to see the face I was making at the phone and gave me a quizzical
glance.

“Cathryn,” I mouthed, pointing at the phone.
Aloud, I answered her. “That’s fine. I’ve got to go now, Cathryn.
Michael is waiting to go to dinner. See you Wednesday.” I hung up
without waiting for her response.

Michael shook his head. “How are you going to
do this if you can’t even stand to talk on the phone with her?”

I sighed. “Not sure. I try, I really do, but
she always says something that just makes me want to scream.” I
told him about our conversation and Cathryn’s comments about
Aline.

“I just want to keep some things to myself,
you know?” I complained as we came through the line, choosing food
for our trays. Michael glanced at the salad I’d put together, but
he kept his comments to himself. I could ignore his rather loud
thoughts about my rabbit food dinner.

“Yeah, I understand.” We threaded our way
through to our usual small table in the corner. “I’m sorry I gave
anything away about Aline. It’s hard for me to remember that she
can hear me think, too.”

I shrugged. “You didn’t know yet when she
heard you, so don’t worry. Plus, apparently she found out about my
‘witch shrink’ in her research on me.”

Michael finished his taco and started in on
the chips and guacamole. “Tas, are you sure about this? I know your
parents are excited, but is all the stress worth it?”

I shook my head. “I really don’t know. But I
did promise them I would at least give it a try. So that’s the best
I can do. Try.”

I worked hard to hold onto that thought when
Cathryn picked me up on Wednesday. Her little blue convertible
purred to a stop at the curb in front of Rollins Hall. I climbed in
without saying a word.

“One of the first things I’m going to teach
you is how to block your thoughts.” Cathryn plunged in without any
preliminaries. “Believe me, it’s for my benefit as much as
yours.”

I smothered a smirk at that. So she didn’t
like being privy to my mind? Oh, I could make it even more
uncomfortable.

If she heard me—and I was sure she
had—Cathryn didn’t respond. Instead she went right on talking.

“I can’t believe that Romanian witch didn’t
teach you how to do it. It’s pretty basic.”

There I had to agree with her. I had even
asked Marica, but she had exercised her typical evasive ways.

“I think Marica didn’t want me to have the
ability to block
her
,” I said slowly. “Everything always
came down to her wants and needs, so that would make sense.”

Cathryn nodded thoughtfully. “Well, Tasmyn,
as reluctant as you are to trust all of us at Carruthers, I can
tell you that we do take your needs into consideration at every
turn. I won’t pretend we are completely altruistic, but I promise,
you’ll be consulted all along the way. You will always have
input.”

At the café, we sat at the same table and I
ordered the soup and sandwich again, as Cathryn pulled out a sheaf
of papers and a pile of folders. We spent the next hour reviewing
documents that I had to sign—things like non-disclosure and
confidentiality agreements—and filling out forms for mundane needs,
like tax withholding and insurance.

“Now,” Cathryn said when we’d finished eating
and the last of the papers was returned to her briefcase, “let’s
get to work on our other priority. Close your eyes, Tasmyn. I want
you to picture the energy that allows you to hear thoughts.
Visualize it. Got it?”

I had had some experience with this and so it
was easy. I saw the power, my most familiar ability, a swirling
purple mist. “I’ve got it.”

“All right. Now take that same energy that
flows out so easily, and make it solid. It might take a few tries.
Take your time.”

As soon as I heard her words, the mist began
to take a more opaque form, spreading out into a sort of wall. “I
can see it. It’s like a solid plank. . .a wall maybe.”

“Excellent. Spread it all around your mind.
Picture it protecting your thoughts.”

“I’ve done it. Now what?”

“Now I’m going to try to get through your
wall. And you try to keep me out.”

I felt Cathryn’s assault right away. I
envisioned the purple veil repelling each attack. After a few
moments, Cathryn said, “Good. Very good for a first try, actually.
I want you to keep working on it. Remember that you never know who
around you might have the same talent, and you could put
yourself—and Carruthers—at risk if you don’t guard your mind very
carefully. Understand?”

I nodded. I hadn’t thought it before, but
this whole operation was beginning to feel like a covert
mission.

“I heard that,” Cathryn said dryly. “You’re
not entirely wrong, but have you ever realized how often you jump
to dramatic conclusions, Tasmyn? I’m a vampire, Carruthers is a
black ops organization. . .really, maybe you should write
fiction.”

I concentrated on pulling the veil back over
my mind before I replied. “If you had been attacked by not one but
two deranged witches and almost drowned by an overzealous minister,
all over the course of less than two years, none of those would
sound so crazy.”

Cathryn laughed, and for once it didn’t make
me want to scratch her eyes out. “I guess you have a point. And
nice work. I can’t hear even one of your thoughts. Keep it up,
Tasmyn. You’re off to a good start.”

I always enjoyed my appointments with Aline.
She was so restful and so good at blocking her mind that I could
let down my guard. And the idea of being able to talk about
everything, every aspect of my life, was especially appealing to
someone like me, who had been forced to keep things to myself for
so many years.

I was anxious to speak with her as I pulled
into the parking lot of her office on that Friday. So much had
happened since our last appointment, and I really wanted her take
on everything to do with Carruthers and Cathryn.

Her office was in an older home on a quiet
street a few towns over from Perriman. She had turned the side lot
into a small parking area, and the huge foyer was now the reception
room. I met with her down the hall in what used to be a sitting
room. The rest of the house was decorated in keeping with the
historical period to which it belonged, but Aline’s office was all
blonde wood and soft colors. She didn’t have a desk, just a simple
table that held her laptop, a few piles of brochures and some
books. The lavender couch across the room was huge and soft, with
so many pillows that I often felt I might be lost among them.

Aline met me as usual in the reception area.
I thought that she had a part-time secretary, since I’d spoken to
another woman on the phone when I had to change an appointment, but
apparently she didn’t work on Friday afternoons, which was when I
always met with Aline.

“Hello, Tasmyn,” she greeted me, smiling.
“How lovely you look today. Would you like to come back to my
sitting room?” Aline always invited and left me options. I wondered
fleetingly what would happen if I had replied no.

But I followed her down the hall and into the
pretty room. I sank into the couch, slipping off my shoes and
curling my legs under me as I always did. Aline sat in the
overstuffed chair across from me, smiling benevolently.

“Tell me how your last few weeks have gone,”
she suggested, and I launched into a description of everything that
had happened: the party at Dr. Sorrel’s house, my outburst, hearing
Michael’s dream. . .my encounter with Cathryn and our subsequent
meeting at the Carruthers headquarters.

Aline listened with her typical reserved
“ahs” and “hmms”. When I finished, she cast her eyes up toward the
ceiling, and I sat expectantly, counting the ticks of the clock
above the door.

“Tell me, Tasmyn, how did Michael’s dream
about Rafe make you feel?” Her question surprised me; I had assumed
she would tackle the Carruthers issue first.

“I don’t really know,” I admitted. “At first
I was panicked. I mean, when I thought it was my dream. Because I
don’t dream about Rafe.”

“Don’t you?” Aline’s raised eyebrows added an
element of skepticism to her otherwise innocent question. “It would
be very odd if you didn’t. He was a huge part of your life for
months.”

“But that’s over,” I insisted. “I don’t have
anything to do with him anymore.”

“Of course you don’t,” Aline agreed. “Not
consciously. But the mind works in different ways. I still dream
about my mother, even though she’s been dead for nearly ten years.
I know that, but my mind is stubborn. Don’t you dream of
Marica?”

I shuddered. “Not for a while. At first, yes.
Lots of bad dreams. And I worried that she was doing what Nell had
done. You know, coming back to me that way. But it wasn’t. They
were just nightmares.”