Chapter Twenty-Five #2
‘It’s been creeping up on me,’ he says. ‘At first, I thought I was being crazy, that the job was getting to me. I didn’t think—’
‘You’ve been lying to me for days?’ I can’t catch my breath. My head is swimming. I squeeze my eyes shut for a moment, trying to slow everything down.
‘Not the whole time, and not exactly lying,’ he says. ‘I – I wasn’t sure. Like you and your dreams, I thought I was seeing something that wasn’t there. But then Jason—’
My eyes snap open again. ‘Jason knows?’
‘No. I mean, not really. Before he left, I said something to him, expecting him to tell me I was being an idiot, but instead, he told me that when Aideen was dying, she asked him to make sure I never looked into my family history. That I didn’t go searching for them.
He’d never told me that before. My guess is this is why. ’
I spring to my feet, my fists clenched tightly. ‘This is why you said it was all your fault, what happened to Jason and me. I thought you just meant because you took the case, but you meant because you were lured here, and you lured me and Jason here with you.’
‘I didn’t lure you, and I wanted to tell you everything yesterday, I said we needed to talk, but you kept fobbing me off and kissing me.’
‘Oh, so your lying is my fault? I was trying to be kind. I didn’t want you to feel bad about what you did to me at the house. I thought it was out of your control. But it wasn’t. It was why you were brought here. Because you’re one of them.’
‘We don’t know that for certain, and it was out of my control.
’ He moves towards me, and I shrink from him.
‘I’m sorry. I know I should have told you as soon as I suspected something wasn’t right, but I wanted to dig into it more, investigate it properly, see if there was anything in Aideen’s storage. ’
My body trembles – filled with rage and horror and excruciating heartbreak. ‘You’ve been in my dreams, right there, next to the Westerns because you’re one of them .’
His face pales. ‘You didn’t tell me I was with the Westerns in your dreams.’
‘I thought they were dreams, Callum. Because of everything that was being stirred up inside me. Because I’m falling—’ I bite my lip and take a shaky breath. ‘You think you’re related to a family that murdered women like me to somehow steal their psychic powers. Wasn’t that your theory?’
‘It was just a crackpot theory, which you told me can’t be correct.’
I think of the whispering men standing over the dead bodies of the girls. What if their whispers were some kind of spell?
‘The spirit in the cellar told me, “We will enjoy the taste of your power.” You delivered me to that thing on a silver platter, and you nearly got me killed.’
‘Holly, no, never in a million years could I have thought something like that would happen.’ He reaches out for me again. ‘I would never hurt you.’
I pin him with a glare. ‘But you did. You did hurt me, Callum. You laid your hands on me. Why didn’t you tell me what was going on?’
‘Because I wasn’t sure.’
‘That’s not good enough. We’re supposed to be a team. We’re supposed to be more than that, we’re supposed to be—’ My words catch.
He stares at me. ‘You haven’t told me everything either. My part in your dreams, and what really happened in the cellar. I saw the light coming out of you. I’m not the only one keeping secrets.’
‘Is this why you’re drawn to me, because of what I am? Is it some weird connection to my gift?’
‘Oh my god, no Holly, no. I’m drawn to you because of you.’
‘How can you be sure? How can I be sure? Oh no,’ I moan. ‘You are the handsome man I can’t trust.’ Tears well in my eyes, and I rub at them with my knuckles. ‘Oh god.’
‘You should sit down.’ He takes my hand.
I snatch it away. ‘Don’t touch me.’
‘I’m sorry.’ His voice is desperate. ‘I didn’t know for sure.
I had a feeling, a weird feeling, but I’ve never experienced anything like this.
I honestly hoped we could get the job done and just go home.
That we could be together. That I could look into it in my own time, or just bury it in another box inside me.
What’s another box, right? But I knew I wouldn’t be able to do that, not if there was even a chance.
It’s too big.’ Tears run down his cheeks.
‘If you’d have just told me, we could have worked it out together.’
‘I’m sorry,’ he says, ‘I didn’t want to hide it from you. But I also didn’t want it to be true. I don’t want to experience these weird sensations. I don’t want them to be my family. I don’t want to be whatever they are. I don’t want to be a supernatural fr—’
The last word is swallowed in a gasp, but I know what he was going to say.
‘A supernatural what?’
He drops his gaze to the floor.
‘A supernatural what, Callum? A supernatural freak, like me? Right. Got it. You talk a good game; I’ll give you that.
Pretending you’re fine with who I am, what I am.
But god forbid you should be anything like me.
’ I press my fingers to my temples. ‘You meant it when you agreed with Peter that I was a freak, didn’t you?
You weren’t just trying to shut him down. ’
He looks up, his eyes rimmed red. ‘No. I didn’t mean it, I swear.’
‘It doesn’t matter. Because it’s obvious now how you feel.’ I scrub my palms across my tear-stained cheeks. ‘I’m glad I found out who you really are. That you’re a liar and a coward.’ I pick up my bag. ‘You can find your own way back to the city.’
‘Holly, please don’t go. I didn’t mean for any of this to happen. I’m still trying to figure this all out – I don’t know who I am anymore.’
‘If you’d have told me, the one person who might have understood…’ I push my shoulders back. ‘But I can’t help you now. Goodbye, Callum.’