Chapter Thirty-eight
We sped down the paved road, hitting the potholes caused by last year's frost and snowplows. The back roads outside of the Hollows didn't get much attention as the cities grew larger and the country grew wilder. Edden had called in support, and we quickly found out that Kisten's boat wasn't at Piscary's, but a FIB officer on patrol remembered seeing a boat matching its description downriver at an old warehouse dock.
That's where we were headed, lights on and sirens off, speeding through the outskirts of the Hollows and beyond until we were at the edges of whereever I would go after dark. It wasn't that the neighborhood was bad. It was that there was no neighborhood at all. Not after forty years of abandonment. Entire neighborhoods had been bulldozed under and left to go fallow when the survivors of the Turn fled to the cities. Cincy had been no exception.
Trees arched overhead, and I could tell that the river was close by the winding road and the occasional glimpses of silver water. I was up front with Edden, and Ivy was in the backseat with Ford. That she wanted to come had surprised me, until I realized her earlier words had been meant to quash her hope that Kisten might still be alive. Or undead. Or something.
Jenks was with her, working hard to keep her distracted and calm. It wasn't working, if her black eyes and Ford's growing nervousness were any indication. Putting them together might not have been a good idea, but I didn't want to sit next to him either.
"There!" I exclaimed, pointing to the outline of an abandoned brick building peeking from behind huge, ancient trees. It had to be the place. We hadn't seen anything but empty lots framed by large trees for half a mile. I tried to quell my nervousness even as I searched my feelings for having been here before. Nothing looked familiar. The hot morning sun glinted on the leaves and the river as we slowed and pulled in to the weed-choked gravel drive. My heart gave a painful thud when I saw Kisten's boat.
"That's it," I said, fumbling for the door even before the car stopped. "That's the Solans." Jenks left Ivy, hovering as I undid my belt.
"Rachel, wait." It was Edden, and I scowled when he hit the button and the lock engaged The Crown Victoria rocked to a halt, and he put it in park. Ivy tried her door, but it was a cop car and wouldn't open from the inside even if Edden hadn't locked it. "I mean it," he said as a stuffy silence filled the car, broken by the agitated hum of Jenks's wings. "You're going to stay in the car until backup gets here. There could be anyone in that building."
Jenks snickered and darted under the dash to flip Edden off from the other side of the windshield. I glanced at the two-way radio and the chatter coming from it. It sounded as if the nearest person was five minutes away. "If it's undead vampires you're worried about, they won't be coming out for a suntan," I said as I manually unlocked the door and lurched out. "And if it's anyone else, I'm going to kick their ass."
Ivy scooted into Ford's space, and while the man sat wide-eyed and scrunched in the corner, she kicked the door. The lock snapped, and she slid out, unruffled and moving with the eerie grace of those that belong to the night. Jenks was gone, and we followed him to the boat with a grim determination. We were halfway there when Edden caught up.
"Rachel, stop."
Ivy's expression was awful, and after a single glance that showed the depth of her fear, she continued without me.
"Get your hand off me," I exclaimed, voice loud with misplaced anger as I yanked away from his grip. "I'm a professional, not some distraught girlfriend." Well, I was that too, but I knew how to act at a crime scene. "You never would have found him if not for me. He might need my help, or are you admitting you manipulated me, knowing he was dead already?"
Edden's face creased up in the bright light, and it made him look old. Behind him Ford sat leaning against the front of the car. I wondered what his range for reading emotions was. I hoped it was less than the twenty feet that separated us now.
"If he's dead..."Edden said.
"I can handle myself!" I shouted, the fear that he was right making me reckless. "I'm going in there! It's not a crime scene until we know there's a crime, so get a grip!"
Ivy had reached the boat and swung up the four-foot height to the deck in an enviable motion. I jogged to catch up, my swollen eye hurting from under the complexion charm and my foot throbbing. "Kisten?" I shouted, hoping for his voice. "Kisten, you here?"
From the corner of my sight, Ford remained leaning against the car, his head bowed.
Feeling awkward, I levered myself up onto the deck. Different muscles protested, and I got from my knees to my feet, tossing my hair out of my eyes. Ivy was already below the deck. Jenks still hadn't shown, and I didn't know if that was good or bad. I shivered at the dampness of the dew-wet deck, trying to remember being here. Nothing. Nothing at all.
The boat hardly moved with my weight, and I half slid to the cockpit door, grasping for handholds. "Ivy?" I called as I went belowdecks, fear winding between my soul and reason when she didn't answer. The silence ate away at my hope like bitter acid, drop by drop, breath by breath. If Kisten was conscious, he would have answered. If he was undead, he would be dead from the sun unless he had made it to the warehouse. Either option was bad.
It was quiet as I passed through the kitchen, only the sounds of my heartbeat and a plane high overhead. Ivy would have said something if she'd found him. The smear of blood on the high window looking out over the far shore shook me. A handprint.
"Kisten?" I whispered, but I knew it wasn't his. And it wasn't mine. It was his killer's.
The tears pricked. I couldn't remember anything. Why in hell had I done this to myself?
The sight of the splintered door between the kitchen and the living room brought me to a breathless halt. My foot started to throb, and my heart raced. I couldn't look away. I knew...
My breath came back in a gasp when Edden's bulk landed outside the window, jarring me. The boat scarcely moved under his weight either. As if in a dream, I stepped to the door, reaching to touch it to make sure it was real. Sharp, smooth slivers brushed my fingertips, and I felt dizzy.
The light was eclipsed, and I didn't turn when I felt Edden and Ford fill the doorway.
"I did this," I whispered, my hand falling. I didn't remember it, but my body did, my foot throbbing and my pulse fast. I stared at the shattered frame. My foot had broken the doorframe.
Gaze unfocused, I leaned against the cupboard for balance as remembered panic took me. I remembered crying. I remembered my hair in my mouth, and trying to escape. My arm had hurt so badly I couldn't manage the door, so I'd kicked it open. My eyes closed, and I felt it all over again. Scattered images were all that was left. I had kicked the door in, and then the back of my head had met a wall.
I touched the back of my head as it began to throb. There had been someone else here. And at the faint hint of unfamiliar, vampiric incense that still lingered, I knew it had to have been Kisten's killer. It had happened here, and I had been a part of it.
"I did this," I said, turning to the two men. "I remember doing this."
Edden's face was tight, and he held a drawn pistol pointed at the ceiling. Ford was behind him looking like the professional psychiatrist he was, out of place and gathering information I wouldn't want his opinion on.
The soft sound of dragonfly wings brought my tear-streaked face around to see Jenks, his wings sparkling in the light coming in the low windows.
"Rache, you better come in here."
Oh, God.
"Ivy?" I called out, and Edden shoved his way into the cramped space.
"Get behind me," he said, face grim, and I pushed through the broken frame before him, desperate to find her. Either Kisten was dead and no threat or he was undead and destroyed from the sun, or his killer was still here, or Ivy had found Kisten and she needed me.
The living room was clean and empty, smelling of water and sunshine through the open windows. Pulse fast, I followed Jenks into the hall, past the bathroom, and to the back bedroom. The rasp of Ivy's ragged breath sent a chill through me, and I jerked from Edden's grasp only to stop dead just inside the door.
Ivy stood alone with her back to the dresser, arms over her middle, and her head bowed. Before her, on the floor slumped upright against the bed, was Kisten.
My eyes closed, and a lump filled my throat. Grief slammed into me, and I staggered to stand against the doorframe. He was dead. And it hadn't been easy.
Edden's soft curse behind me cut through my awareness, and I took a gasping breath. "You son of a bitch," I whispered to no one. "You son of a bitch bastard." I was far too late.
Kisten's barefoot body was dressed in a clean pair of jeans and a shirt I'd never seen. His neck and body had been savaged, and his arms and torso were torn as if he had tried to defend himself. Silvered blue eyes told me he had died undead, but the blood pooled in his legs and heels said that he hadn't been drained, simply killed twice. Dark blood matted his once-bright hair, and his smile was gone.
I took another breath, trying to keep upright, though the room was starting to waver.
"I'm sorry, Rachel," Edden said softly, his hand landing on my shoulder in a show of comfort. "I know he meant a lot to you. This wasn't your fault."
At that the tears started to dribble out, one by one. "Kisten?" I warbled, not wanting to believe he was gone. I had been here. I had tried to keep him alive. I must have. But I hadn't been able to, and the guilt must have been why I'd tried to forget.
I took a helpless step closer, wanting to fall on my knees and pull him to me. "I'm sorry, Kisten." I started to cry in earnest. "I must have tried. I must have."
From behind me in the hall, Ford said, "You did."
Both Ivy and I turned. He looked ragged as both of our personal hells resonated in him. "It's in your thoughts," he said, and I just about lost it. Giving up, I sank to my knees before Kisten, the tears flowing unchecked as I tried to arrange his shirt collar to hide his ravaged skin.
"I don't remember," I gushed. "I don't remember any of it. Tell me what happened."
Ford's voice was strained. "I don't know. But you're feeling guilt and remorse. There's hatred, but not at him. Someone made you forget."
I looked up, wanting to believe. Everything was blurry, unreal.
"You didn't forget because you couldn't handle it," he said, guilt in his voice for having labeled me weak. "Someone made you forget against your will. It's all there in your emotions."
Blinking fast, I tried to clear my sight. The pain in my chest wouldn't go away and let me think. Someone had been here besides me. Someone else knew what had happened. Someone had forced me to forget? Why?
A new fear, pulled my attention to Ivy, still standing apart and miserable as Kisten lay cold and dead between us. She hadn't wanted Ford to help me to remember. Had she... had she killed him because he'd bitten me?
"I don't remember," Ivy whispered as if knowing my thoughts, her head bowed and arms wrapped around herself to keep from falling apart. "I could have. I don't remember."
Edden put his weapon back in the holster, snapping it shut. Arms crossed aggressively, he took a firm stance. I stood, torn between anger at him and fear for Ivy.
"She wouldn't do it," I said, frightened, and I went to give her a shake. "You wouldn't do that, Ivy. Look at me! You loved him!"
She shook her head, her black hair hiding her face.
"She was Piscary's scion," Edden said. "She would if he told her to."
"She loved Kisten!" I exclaimed, appalled and scared. "She wouldn't do it!"
Edden took a harder line. "Word on the street is she'd kill him if he touched your blood. Did he?"
Guilt seemed to stop my heart, and I looked frantically for a way out. Jenks stood on the dresser, miserable. We were in the same room where I'd bitten Kisten in a blood passion I scarcely knew how to comprehend. He hadn't bitten me, but it didn't seem to matter now.
Ivy brought her head up at my silence. Her beautiful face was twisted in pain. "I might have done it," she whispered. "I don't remember. Everything up to Piscary attacking you is a... a jumbled nightmare. I think someone told me you tasted Kisten. I can't remember if someone told me or if I made it up." Tear-wet eyes rose to mine, framed by black hair iced in gold. A terrible fear lay in her gaze. "I might have. I might have done it, Rachel!"
My stomach was in knots, but the terror was gone, and in a sudden surge I understood. She hadn't wanted to come out here, afraid she might find she'd killed him. She hadn't wanted Ford to help me remember for the same reason. Someone had killed Kisten, but I knew to the bottom of my soul that it hadn't been Ivy, though centuries of evolution and conditioning made her want to.
"You didn't kill him," I said, putting my arms around her to help her believe. Her muscles tensed, and she started to silently tremble. "You didn't. I know it, Ivy. You wouldn't."
"I don't remember," she sobbed, admitting her fear. "I don't remember anything but being angry and confused and out of control." She moved, and I let go so she could pull her head up. "Did you bite him?" she whispered, her eyes begging me to say no.
I was glad I wasn't wearing that amulet so at least I could pretend Ford wasn't watching the drama play out. If I said yes, she would assume she had killed Kisten. But to lie was not possible. "I bit him," I said, the guilty words coming quick so I could get it out before she decided she'd killed him to end the pain inside her. "He gave me a pair of caps for my birthday. He knew you'd made a pass at me. Looking back on it, I'm sure I did it to convince him that I wasn't going to leave him. That he was important to me."
Ivy moaned and pulled away.
"Damn it, Ivy!" I exclaimed, wiping at the slowly leaking tears. "You wouldn't kill him for that! You loved him! Piscary never touched that part of you. He couldn't! You were never his. He only thought you were! Kisten said Piscary never asked you to kill me, but Piscary did, didn't he?" I said, watching her. I could hardly breathe, and her misery hesitated as she tried to remember. "He told you to kill me, and you said no. You wouldn't kill me for Piscary, and you wouldn't kill Kisten for him either. I know it, Ivy. That's why you shut yourself off. You didn't kill him. You didn't."
For six heartbeats she simply stared, thoughts sifting through her. Behind her I saw Ford drop his head into his hand, trying not to eavesdrop - but hell, that was his job. She took a deep breath, and all her muscles went limp. "Kisten," she finally breathed, falling to her knees to touch him, and I knew she believed. Her hands went to his hair, his and she started to cry.
The first heavy cry was her undoing, and proud, stoic Ivy finally let go. Huge, racking sobs shook her shoulders. Tears for his death, yes, but for herself as well, and I felt my own eyes fill and spill over as I dropped down to hold her beside his cold stillness. Kisten was the only person who had known the depth of depravity to which Piscary had sunk them, the heights of ecstasy. The breath-stealing power he had granted them, and the terrible price he extracted for it. The only one who had forgiven her for what she was, who understood who she wanted to be. He was gone, and there'd be no one else who could possibly understand. Not even me.
"I'm sorry," I whispered, rocking her while her ragged sobs broke the silence as we sat on the floor of the tiny bedroom in a backwater tributary of the Ohio River. "I know what he was to you. We'll find out who did this. We will find out, and then we'll track them down."
And still she wept, as if her grief would never end.
And then grief came for me as well, cold and hard, grief defined by bright blue eyes and the smile I loved so much and would never see again. As my hand found his, bitter salt tears spilled from my eyes, in sorrow and pain and regret that I had so utterly failed him.