32 Family Secrets #2
“I’ve shown nothing but loyalty to you,” Zara hisses at Adele.
“How could you accuse me of that after everything I’ve done for you?
Did I run like Reggie the first chance I got?
No. Do you have to keep me locked up so I can never leave like Meredith?
No. I’ve stayed here. I’ve stayed loyal when no one else has. ”
“Then why didn’t you tell me when you found her? When you spoke with her?”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“You expect me to believe that you were on her tail for days and were simply so incompetent that you couldn’t find her?”
“You try keeping track of a magical Winnebago that doesn’t want to be found,” Zara complains. “It’s harder than you think.”
“Why didn’t you come back here if you were having such difficulties? Was it just coincidence my guards captured you within a mile of Regina’s hiding spot?”
“I mean, her story tracks. When has Zara ever been competent?” Meredith says.
Zara rounds on Meredith and me. Staring us both down. “Am I really the only one here who remembers the most important thing? Loyalty to my sisters. Loyalty to my family. I would never betray our family like that.”
“We’re not even related,” snorts Meredith.
“Don’t get all sentimental about blood ties like all that bullshit matters to you, Zara.
Not like we made a blood pact or anything.
” She smirks, her sarcasm thinly disguised in the snide remark.
“Don’t listen to them, Mom. You know who’s the most loyal.
Me. It’s always been me. Let me out. But I’m not wearing that ugly thing. ”
My heart is pounding as I take in the carefully coded bits of information they pass me right under her nose.
I’m not watching my sisters argue and betray each other.
I’m watching them work together to try to claim my place as sacrificial lamb.
They’re trying to remind me of the promises we made to be on the same side, the three of us against her.
All the hints and clues that slid by unnoticed over the years click into place like puzzle pieces.
I’ve never been gladder for a mask in my life.
I know which sister sent the emails with cryptic references.
Meredith’s singing that damn lullaby I always sang to her because I didn’t know any others.
Eldi’s humming the same lullaby. Who else could she have heard it from but my sisters?
Eldi didn’t find me by chance; she was sent to me.
Because, of course, Zara has always followed my example.
She watched me free a werewolf and the boy; she must have smuggled Eldi out, staying only to protect Meredith.
I definitely know which sister betrayed us all.
The only disloyal sister here is me. Something I should have seen before.
The only one who ran away and abandoned the rest of the family was me.
Now, to hedge my bets, I must trust one of my sisters to save us all.
I don’t know if I have the strength to fight the collar when it’s around someone else’s neck.
But I have to try. It’s the only option.
I don’t know which one of my sisters to risk.
I can’t pick because it isn’t a fair choice.
“Tell me, Regina; I’m tired of waiting.” Adele raises her arm, the Gauntlet an obvious threat. I can’t afford to waste my strength resisting, but I’m so tired of her forcing me to choose.
“Why does it matter if you can force one of them to obey you with the collar?” I say dully. “Pick one and be done with games.”
“Oh, never mind. I’m sick of this bullshit,” Meredith says, striding over and reaching a hand through the bars. “I’ll wear the stupid thing if it means I get out of here. Hand it over.”
“No, Meredith, don’t,” I say sharply. It’s an old protective reflex.
“Trying to protect Meredith?” Adele says to me, then glances swiftly at Meredith. “You’ve been passing Reggie information?”
I realize I’ve inadvertently picked Zara for the collar.
“No.” Meredith rolls her eyes, the exasperated teenager. She lies well, but I see the paranoia creep over Adele anyway. How Adele doesn’t realize I’d protect my sister even if she weren’t lying, I will never understand.
“It was definitely Meredith,” Zara immediately says. “I said it wasn’t me.”
“Well, thanks for throwing me under the bus,” Meredith says dryly.
“It wasn’t either of them,” I say.
“You all are lying,” Adele snaps. “Fine, last resort it is. You want the truth, Regina? You want to save your sisters and that wolf? I’ll make a trade.”
“What are you even talking about? You have us all here at your mercy. You have Eldi caged right there; I can’t give you anything.”
“The collar doesn’t work,” Adele snaps. “I can’t make it work.”
“It was an empty threat? The collar doesn’t work?” Zara says suspiciously.
“Of course not!” Adele snarls. “I keep giving you chances to side with me, to show me you deserve to be my family. And none of you care.”
Turning suddenly, she grabs the collar from the table and hurls it toward us with all her might.
It smacks into the bars hard enough to make me flinch, spins in several wide circles like a top before coming to rest in front of the cell, within easy reach.
Meredith creeps forward with deliberate slowness, reaches through the bars and picks up the collar, never taking her eyes off Adele as she twists it, slides it sideways to bring it inside the cell.
“It really doesn’t work, does it?” Meredith says. “That was all a trick to get us to betray each other.”
“And it worked in a way, didn’t it?” Zara laughs bitterly. “Now none of us are leaving this cell.”
“When this failed me”—Adele holds up the Gauntlet—“I tried, again and again, to create a similar object. I can’t make it work.
” She looks at me. “You might have a hope of succeeding. If you willingly help me, I will tell you everything, and the creature can stay with you until the rest of her kind arrive.”
“My sisters?” I say. “Calvin?”
She assesses them. “I suppose it doesn’t matter. They can go after you help me.”
“Not good enough. They go now. Eldi too.”
“No. We are out of time. I need to create a gate to bring them back. The rest of her kind”—she points at Eldi—“are coming, and I must be ready.”
Meredith and Zara have fallen into absolute silence.
“Bring who back?” I ask.
“My family. Your family. She”—again she points at Eldi, who looks utterly baffled and terrified—“is responsible for innumerable deaths.”
“No, that’s not possible. Eldi hasn’t . . . she wouldn’t—”
“It is time I told you the truth, Regina, but I will not do it here. Come with me. I’ll explain, and I promise you, you won’t want anything to do with that creature anymore.
I have the weapon almost ready, but I need you for the last step.
There’s no alternative. I promise I tried, for your sake, though I know you won’t believe me. ”
I hate that there’s even a piece of me willing to pretend, a piece that wants to hear her out.
“I was going to let you go. I was going to figure it out on my own. But you came back anyway. That has to mean something.”
“You baited me, locked me up. Don’t pretend I’m here by choice.”
“I wanted to love you, but you make it so hard,” Adele says. She speaks so quietly, a quaver to her voice I’ve never heard before.
“That’s not how love works,” Calvin says coldly, earning a glare from Adele.
“Help me,” Adele says, returning her gaze to me.
Memories, my sisters’ baby faces, Eldi asleep in my arms, all the moments they looked to me to protect them. I didn’t want to love them. I tried not to. And I did anyway. Voices echo inside my head.
I would rather die than let her make me into a weapon.
Mama.
Do something besides play her little games.
Ma.
You are your choices; you are good.
Clone, same, one.
“No.”
I shake the voices and memories loose and meet her gaze again.
Her face is unmasked, yet I watch as something shutters closed in her eyes.
A beast wearing human skin, just as that boy so long ago called her.
A chill runs down my spine as I see it, too, a human mask shielding something dark and damaged.
“I have to deal with the mess you’ve made of the front gate,” Adele says. “When I come back, you’ll either come with me willingly, or they won’t leave this basement alive.” She walks out of the room, heels clicking. The door closes with a snap.