No Peace for the Damned (11 page)

“Yeah, but if you knew what it felt like then maybe you could feel it too.” Everyone sat forward in their seats. Not a ringing endorsement, but I’d take it.

“I’m going to change something in the room,” I said, very businesslike. “But I want you all to close your eyes so you can’t see it.”

Thirteen smiled to himself. “Excellent,” he murmured.

“Close your eyes and let me know if you feel anything different.”

When all their eyes shut—Marie being the last to comply, of course—I conjured a crystal chandelier onto the ceiling. A beautiful antique, it had gold leafing intertwined with crystals in three descending layers. It was just like the one that had hung in my nursery when I was a baby.

As soon as it appeared, Theo and Heather shifted in their seats.

“You can open your eyes,” I said. Quiet gasps hissed through the room.

“Did anyone feel anything?” I asked.

Theo narrowed his eyes at me. Heather looked at the others.

“Heather?”

She jumped. “I, er, I don’t know,” she hesitated. “I don’t think I felt anything, but I don’t know.”

“The moment I conjured the chandelier you shifted in your seat.”

“Yeah, my legs started to fall asleep,” she explained. “But that’s not anything unusual. I’ve always had bad circulation, and my hands and feet fall asleep all the time.”

I shot Thirteen a look and met his knowing gaze. Heather had more power than she realized.

I turned to Theo and this time welcomed the dip in my stomach. “Um, what about you? You also shifted as soon as I used my powers. Did you feel something similar?”

“No,” he said after a long moment. “It wasn’t like that. But I knew that you had done something.”

“What did you feel?” Cordele asked eagerly.

Theo’s frown turned dark. “Nothing. I felt nothing. I just…knew.”

My heart stopped.
Oh my God
. Theo hadn’t felt the movement of power in the air, he’d felt
me
. He recognized the power only because
I
was the one who wielded it. I rubbed my face with both hands. This connection with Theo was getting intense. Dangerous.

“OK,” Jon said, dragging out the word, “but for the rest of us who didn’t
just know
, how are we supposed to figure out these illusions?”

“How about you all just try to see past the illusion I created?” I said finally. “Since you know it isn’t real, and you all certainly know your own minds better than I do, you can use your own defenses to push it out and see what’s really there.”

A few people nodded. Good enough.

“You know the chandelier isn’t real. So see what’s really there, then.”

Everyone looked at the ceiling.

My breath caught when Theo turned to me. It’d only been a few seconds. He didn’t say it out loud, but I knew. He had dissipated the illusion. Not because he had the ability to see past the
power, but because
I
did. Our eyes held and the butterflies in my gut grew into a painful swarm.

Silently he mouthed the words,
We need to talk
. Something low heated up inside me as I watched his lips move. So warm, so soft against the dark stubble along his jaw. He seemed to almost glow as the heat inside me spread. I nodded.

Heather gasped. I took a shaky breath.

“H-how did you do it, Heather?” I asked.

“I don’t know, really,” she said, practically bouncing in her seat. “I just knew it wasn’t really there so I thought about what
was
really there. Like the cracks in the ceiling that make out the shape of Bill Clinton’s head, and the cobweb that’s been hanging over the doorway to the kitchen forever.”
Man, I really needed to clean this place
. “And once I focused only on what was real, the chandelier was just, gone.”

“OK, good,” I said. “Now everyone else try to do that.”

They squinted hard at the ceiling this time. I made a point to focus on each one of them. “I did it! It’s gone!” Cordele yelled after another minute.

“Me too!” Jon said then sat back in satisfaction.

Another two or three minutes later everyone had erased the chandelier.

…

“OK, let’s try something different,” I said, fanning myself. We’d been practicing for over an hour. The house had turned into an oven and the warm cross breeze from the open windows felt more like the night’s sweaty breath than anything helpful.

I reached behind my ottoman to the floor next to me and conjured a stack of twelve-inch candles as if they had always been
there. I handed the stack to Charles, who took one and passed the rest to Marie, who did the same until everyone had a candle.

“These are fast-burning candles,” I explained. “They will be completely melted within a matter of minutes. Hold one tightly in both hands. You have approximately three minutes before the candles completely melt in your hands. I suggest you concentrate.”

This was a good exercise. Motivating and innovative.

“It’s going to
burn
us?” Charles asked.

“Not if you can recognize it isn’t there,” I retorted. Geez, if a little hot wax made them whine, what they hell were they doing going up against my family?

He growled low and shared a glance with Shane. Both men were especially frustrated. It made sense, of course. They were the executors of the group. Foot soldiers. Without a clear method to attain their goal, eliminating the illusions was a challenge.

Instantly, the candles were lit.

Theo and Heather vanished their candles immediately. Thirteen and Cordele in the first minute. I gave Thirteen a small smile. He didn’t usually participate in training, but I should have known he would be at the top of the class.

No one cried out when the wax began to drip, but those still holding their candles strained against the burn. Charles inhaled on a hiss as the hot wax coated his fingers. Everyone else had dissipated the illusion. I waited for the wax to harden on his hands, then vanished the illusion. He flexed and turned his hands slowly.

“It’s no big deal,” Marie said softly. Charles pulled away from her.

“This is insane!” he yelled. “How are we supposed to fight against pain that real? That pain was real! Anyone who felt the wax burn their skin knew the pain was real! If this is what we’re up against, it’s impossible—it’s suicide. They could throw fire at us, or run us over with a truck, and the pain would be real!”

“It’s only real if you let your mind accept it as real,” Thirteen said calmly.

“Yeah, well, when my hands are on fire, I’m sorry but that just seems real to me!”

“That’s why we’re practicing, Charles,” Thirteen said, his voice rising. “Why we’re so grateful to Magnolia for demonstrating, once again, the level of power we are up against.”

“Grateful,” Charles snorted. “Yeah, let me just give the girl a fucking hug for kicking my ass and frying my hands. Again!” He stood abruptly and ran a frustrated hand over his buzzed hair. “This whole thing is bullshit!” He plowed out the front door, slamming the screen in his wake.

Marie sighed. “Maybe we could take a break?”

Her concern for her husband raised my respect level to the point of actually having some. Charles, on the other hand, was pissing me off. Pain was part of the territory when it came to my family. Surely they all knew that by now. Even more, he had totally doubted himself after our little standoff back at Batalkis’s. There wasn’t room for second-guessing when it came to the Kelches. A lack of confidence would get you killed.

The moment Thirteen agreed to a break, the cell phones came out. No one but Thirteen ever called me, so I fixed another drink.

I leaned against the sink, dropped some ice in my glass, when suddenly every molecule in my body started heating up.
Theo
. Glass in hand, he walked toward me. I averted my eyes and shifted out of his way. He stumbled. The glass in his hand slipped. We both moved to catch it. His arm brushed mine.

Instantly, a current of energy opened between us again. Sizzling, intense. Just like when we’d been training with that stiletto. Only this time, Theo was ready for it. He grabbed hold of my arms before he could be thrown back. The power reacted, shifted direction. Instead of throwing us apart, energy began holding us together. Like a thick cord, it wrapped around me.
Oh God
. I couldn’t move away. Then I stopped trying. A vibrant image flashed in my mind.

His body, sculpted muscle rippling under soft masculine skin, pressed down on top of me. His weight heavy and warm. Flesh on flesh, his dark, gentle eyes boring into mine
. Was this memory? Fantasy? I couldn’t tell. And I didn’t care.

Then came the feeling. Warm and wonderful—peace. The comfortable calm I’d felt that day in the bathroom transformed, became so much more. A powerful serenity settled into every part of me.

My mind pulled back.
NO! Impossible! Not real! Never real!

With a flex of power, I leaped away in a blur. My heart pounded. My breath struggled in my throat. “What the hell are you doing?” I screamed.

“I didn’t do anything!” he yelled back. He braced himself on the counter, panting.

“Bullshit!” I shouted again. “You’re trying to get in my head!” But that was wrong. He didn’t have supernatural powers. Something else forced that image and those feelings inside me. “Leave me alone!”

I ran to my bedroom, my legs trembling. I slammed the door. Locked it. Then barricaded myself against it. My arms clutched at my stomach. Theo’s beautiful face, poised above me, tight with intent—it was all I saw when I closed my eyes. The comfort in that moment, the peace…it was agonizing.

I knew pain. I knew fear. Those feelings were constants and could be trusted. Moments of quiet or warmth—they only meant that punishment would be coming soon. I’d had months to adjust to Thirteen’s kindness and I still didn’t trust it all the way. Everything with Theo was so fast, so intense. There had to be something wrong with it.

Images flashed in my mind. Father’s hateful mask. Mallroy’s terrifying mind. My brothers—so handsome, so horrible. The red
of my dreams, so much like blood it frightened me. The tranquility that wrapped around me at Theo’s touch—I couldn’t feel this way. It was too dangerous; it made my guard drop, shifted my focus. My knees buckled and I slid to the floor. I knew where my thoughts were headed, and I didn’t want to go there.

But it was too late. Memories assaulted me.

…

Something covered my face. I sucked it into my mouth when I tried to inhale. Netting? A thin cloth of some kind? I went to remove it but my arms were bound tightly to my sides
.

Insects burrowed into the earth around me. The smell of dirt and sweat and dried blood filled my lungs. Buried. I was in the ground, tied, and left for dead. Again
.

I wrestled myself free from the binding and dug my way to the surface. Ten feet. I clawed through ten feet of packed dirt and mud and mulch before gasping the cold winter air
.

Father’s imagination was waning. He should have used chains
.

For several seconds my eyes adjusted. I shivered in the cold. I had on nothing but cotton yoga pants and a sports bra, both shredded and crusted with dry blood. No wonder I was freezing. It took a few moments more before I recognized my tomb. Uncle Mallroy’s ancient tool shed. I was on the far west acres of the estate. With a brief look around, I began the long trek back to the main property
.

Keeping to the woods, I used the trees to block the icy winter winds. Dusk was near. When darkness fell the temperature would follow so I moved as quickly as I could. But my muscles were tight and sore. How long had I been down there?

I’d managed about twenty acres when I heard the deep, accented voices of two of the maintenance crew. I crept closer. They were loading debris into the back of a work truck
.

“…days and nothing,” the first one said. “I think they might have really done her in this time.”

The second scanned the darkness while he spoke. “I heard the older son, the one with the eyes, bragging to the animal brother that he had bested her in some duel—took off her head.”

“Yeah, right,” the first scoffed. “None of them could take her and they know it. She probably escaped.”

Escaped?

“No, no,” the second argued, still looking over his shoulder, “the snotty one, he took the brothers to where they buried her. Said he and the other one sliced her head off. Brothers must’ve had proof because Celia heard them talking about using staff soon.”

Both men shuddered, and then they hopped into their truck and drove away. My mind worked furiously, replaying their words and thoughts again and again
.

My father thought I was dead?

I had been buried for days. Days. I looked down at my clothes again. I’d worn this the day Father had me in one of the old grain silos. He’d hung me upside down from chains before searing my stomach and back with a serrated horse whip and then burning me with a cattle prod
. Gotta love farm life.
But I’d freed myself from the chains and walked back to the far wing of the main house
.