41. Burn-Induced Hearing Loss
Burn-Induced Hearing Loss
“My eldest what now?” I better be mishearing things, because there can’t be another explanation.
Situational trauma.
Hallucinations.
Burn-induced hearing loss.
“We should get your grandmother and Hazel back inside.” With that, she stands up and walks from the room, leaving me with a bombshell the size of a human.
A sister-human.
“Did I hear that right?” Ash asks as he comes in.
I groan. “You’re such an eavesdropper.”
“You weren’t exactly being quiet.” He pssts to Belle as he sits down, and she hops up on the bed and snuggles into my other side. “Who do you think the surprise sister’s baby daddy is?”
I groan again, closing my eyes. “While I’m normally a slut for some good tea, I am not emotionally equipped for this right now.”
He chuckles, the sound drawing my gaze to his clean-shaven face. That’s going to take some getting used to.
I have no idea how to process this—if I’m even understanding it correctly. I’ve been through too much and I can practically hear my brain screaming for a break.
Even after the few days of unconsciousness.
The door bursts open in a torrent of wind with Hazel close behind. “Laura!”
Her relief—her genuine happiness—slices through me like a knife. I never want to make her worry like this again. I never want to make any of them worry like this again.
Ash’s hand squeezes mine, compounding the guilt tenfold. I will be better for him.
Noah offers his own concerned grin, but it’s Grandma who captures my attention. She drags her feet in a way that would’ve earned me a cutting remark like ‘Ladies don’t shuffle’ only days before.
She never wore a lot of makeup, but her skin is bare now. Fatigue imbedded in every wrinkle. She hasn’t slept since the ritual to save Mom, that much is certain.
While there is relief in her eyes, it doesn’t fill her with light like it does Hazel. It’s as if she is the husk left over after souls dragged her down to Hell instead of me.
“I’m so glad you’re okay,” Hazel continues, sitting on the foot of the bed. Her hand rests on my knee, bringing with it the calming sweep of her magic.
I shoot a glare at Mom. “Not as okay as I should be right now.”
Both Hazel and Grandma turn to Mom without saying a word, their eyes questioning.
The silence hangs like a weight over the room, heavy and thick. Suffocating like smoke. Smoke I’m all too familiar with.
“Draven is stronger than we ever imagined,” Mom says, standing close to the door.
As if she knows we’re all going to hang her out to dry when she’s finished.
She needs the escape route. “He’s made a second home in Hell for his more unsavory actions, and already had a cage set up for me.
It’s as if he knew I would sacrifice myself to save my family and planned for that exact scenario. ”
No one replies. We all simply wait for her to continue in stony silence.
She exhales, shaky, as if she’s on the verge of tears.
“It’s there that I learned he captured your dad’s soul and was holding it as some sort of trophy.
That’s when I started calling for help. If it were just me, I would’ve stayed there for an eternity to keep him away from you all—but I couldn’t do that to Peter. ”
Nice to know her love for Dad is still more important than the rest of us. She’s nothing if not consistent.
“In the time I was there, I realized that the four of us witches—”
“Five.” Ash’s voice shatters silence and trembles the ground. “Five of us witches.”
Mom visibly retreats into herself. “Five. The five of us witches can’t defeat him alone. We need all the Pruitt witches we can find. We need . . .”
She trails off. As if admitting whatever this sister thing is to Hazel and Grandma is worse than admitting it to me. I’m the one who led the charge to get her back. I’m the one who actually went to Hell, but she’s still treating me like a little kid. It stings.
If I were standing, I would stomp my feet. “Just spit it out!”
“Your sister. We need your sister,” she whispers.
A beat of quiet. Two.
“We need who?” Hazel asks from her perch on the bed. More confused than angry. If this conversation goes where I think it’s going, the anger will come swiftly.
Grandma’s as stiff as a statue.
“Before I met your father, I . . . I had a little girl. And I gave her up for adoption.”
Hazel’s mouth drops so low I swear it’s going to hit the ground. “Before Dad. That means she’s our half sister.”
“And I have one guess as to who the baby daddy is,” I say. It’s obvious.
“No.” Hazel shakes her head. “No, no, no. Nope. No. Nuh-uh.”
Denial is a river in Egypt, and Hazel is happily sailing away.
“How?” The quiet word comes from Grandma. The first word I’ve heard her say since I woke up. It’s small, heartbreaking, and so unlike her.
Mom stands up straighter and lifts her chin in the air.
“Draven and I were friends, but sometimes things happened. And when I got pregnant, I knew better than to tell him. I cast a glamour and stayed at my apartment as much as I could. I wasn’t coming home that often those days anyway. It wasn’t that hard to hide.”
It wasn’t that hard to hide. What a line.
“So we’re on a mission to find our half sister to get her to help us kill her dad. Because that seems absolutely logical and likely to happen. What could possibly go wrong?” I throw my arm over my eyes. “Can I go back to being unconscious now?”
Ash snickers from my side for a second before trying to hide it behind a cough.
“We’ll lose without her. We have no other choice,” Mom says, full of that arrogance she’s basically famous for.
“What exactly happened in Hell? What were you and Draven doing down there for so long?” Hazel asks in a way that makes me peer out from underneath my arm.
She’s staring at Mom with accusations I have no words for. With implications that I have no interest in addressing right now.
Mom sniffs, refusing to make eye contact. “Nothing. What matters is that I’m back, and he is going to be furious once he realizes what we’ve done. We have to focus on protecting ourselves.”
As contrite as Mom appeared to be initially, she’s certainly back to her usual defensive, non-committal self. She’ll never change.
“Once I’m back on my feet, I’m going to be moving in with Ash.” I may not have asked him if I could move in, but I can’t imagine he’ll say no. And honestly, there’s no way I’m staying in Mom’s house after this.
She and I are done. I’ll help protect the family when the time comes, and I’ll continue being close with Hazel and Grandma, but that’s it.
“What a coincidence,” Hazel says, smiling at me. “Noah and I have been talking about renting our own place. I think we’ll finally take the plunge.”
Looks like times are changing.
Mom finally gets exactly what she wants. To be alone in that house with only the memories of Dad to keep her warm.