23. Max
23
MAX
M ax waited patiently as Jasmine and Ell-rom engaged in small talk with Boris, using the opportunity to take light reconnaissance dips into the man's mind. The surface memories were mundane—fragments of television shows, an argument with his current wife about his increasing alcohol consumption, worries about a failing investment.
Beside him, Brundar maintained his characteristic silence, present but unobtrusive. They'd agreed to follow Syssi's intuition about Max taking point on the thralling, with Brundar as backup if needed.
As the whiskey level in the bottle dropped, Boris grew increasingly animated, his words beginning to slur. Max hoped that the man didn't have any hunting plans for the day. Mixing firearms with this much alcohol would be dangerous, and he was quite sure it was also illegal.
"You know, Dad." Jasmine's voice carried a forced casualness that made Max wince internally. She either wasn't that good of an actress, or her father was stressing her out. "Eli asked me about my mother, how she died, and where she was buried. I was so embarrassed because I couldn't tell him a single thing. Don't you think it's time you told me what really happened to her?"
"No." Boris's response was sharp, and he emptied his glass down his throat and reached for the bottle again.
The question should be enough to bring old memories to the surface where Max could take a peek at them. He seized the opportunity and delved deeper into the man's mind.
The first memory hit him like a physical blow—raw anguish and panic as a younger Boris frantically called the police about his missing wife, then the desperation in his voice when they told him he had to wait twenty-four hours to file a missing person's report. The image of him rushing out of the house with little Jasmine and driving around with her in the back seat, then running around with her hugged to his chest while showing Kyra's photo to anyone who might have seen her.
The memory of little Jasmine crying for her mother twisted something in Max's chest. Then came the scene of Boris clutching Kyra's photo at night and sobbing into his pillow.
"They took her!" The words echoed through the memory, repeated desperately. "She said that they would come for her. What am I going to do?"
"Max?" Jasmine's worried voice pulled him out of Boris's head. "What's going on?"
He met her concerned gaze, then looked at Boris with newfound compassion. "Someone took your mother. Who took her, Boris? Who took Kyra?"
"Her family." The words seemed to be torn from him. "She said that they would come looking for her and that if they found out that she had married a Christian, they would kill her."
"But they didn't," Jasmine protested. "She sent you signed divorce papers from Iran."
Lost in the haze of whiskey and old grief, Boris didn't notice his daughter's inexplicable knowledge of events he'd never shared with her.
"They must have forced her to do that and then killed her. She said they would." Tears tracked down his weathered face. "They killed my Kyra."
Max felt his own throat tighten as Jasmine moved to embrace her father. The man folded into her arms, decades of grief pouring out in harsh sobs.
The scene shifted something in Max.
He'd come prepared to find a difficult man, perhaps even a cruel one, based on how Jasmine had described him. Instead, he found someone broken by loss, someone whose harshness might have stemmed from the pain of unhealed wounds.
When Jasmine turned to Brundar, her own cheeks wet with tears, Max already knew what she would ask. "Can you make him forget?"
Brundar nodded, understanding what she was asking. Taking away those old memories of pain was impossible, but Brundar could erase the memory of this meeting and of Boris telling his daughter about her mother.
Max studied Boris's face, seeing now how the years of carrying this burden had carved deep lines around his mouth and eyes. The man had lost his wife and had probably lived in fear of her family coming after Jasmine. He had pushed his daughter away not only because she reminded him so much of Kyra but also because he was afraid that if she was taken from him, he would break apart and never come together again.
It was a cowardly notion, and Boris should have been stronger for the sake of his daughter. He should have showered her with love to compensate for the mother she'd lost. Instead, he had remarried and hoped his new wife would fill the void Kyra had left behind.
He could have done better, but he was just a flawed man, and Max still felt compassion for him.
The revelation that Kyra's family had taken her changed everything they'd thought they knew. If her relatives had initially taken her against her will, perhaps she had later chosen to stay with them to protect Boris and Jasmine.
As Brundar moved closer to Boris and started whispering soothing words that Max was surprised the Guardian was capable of, Jasmine walked over to her mate and sat down beside him.
When Ell-rom wrapped his arm around her, she turned her face into his chest and cried.
It seemed that Kyra's story was much more complex than they had expected. More pieces of the puzzle had been discovered today, but, regrettably, none that pointed toward where she could be found.