“The situation with Carly… it’s super complicated and fucked up. Completely dysfunctional. Fairly codependent. Borderline toxic. There are reasons for all that, but before I go there, I need you to know one thing—to believe it, even if it’s the only part of this whole story you believe.”
Stevie nods. Then, clearly sensing my nervousness, she smiles her sweet smile and says, “I’m here, Baz. I’m not going anywhere.”
“Carly and I… this thing between us… it’s not sexual or romantic inanyway. Not even close. I have never lied to you about that, Stevie.”
Stevie brings her mug to her lips, blowing a breath across her tea. Steam dances before her eyes, obscuring them for just a moment.
“Okay,” she finally says.
“Okay?”
“If you say it’s not like that with her, I believe you.”
“But?”
“It’s just… For whatever reason, Carlydoesn’tbelieve that. I don’t know if it’s because you haven’t made that clear enough to her, or if she’s just super hung up on you, or what the deal is there, but as long as she thinks she has a chance with you—real or imagined—she’s going to see me as the enemy. She’s going to make my life hell.”
“I can’t even tell you how many times she and I have talked about this. She knows there’s no chance with us. I’ve never led her to believe otherwise. I couldn’t possibly be any more clear about it.”
“Yet she’s super possessive of you.”
“Like I said, it’s complicated.” I take another sip of tea, then set the mug on the table, knowing that this is it. Once the words are out, I’ll never be able to take them back. Stevie will know the most significant part of my history, and in the retelling of it, she’ll become a part of that history. Even if she kicks me out of here and never speaks to me again, we’ll always be connected to this moment.
That’s the thing about sharing secrets; it bonds us in ways that can never be broken. Not by time, not by distance, not even by hatred.
But Stevie has a right to know. She’s earned that much.
“When I was ten,” I say, forcing myself not to break our gaze, “I witnessed a murder.”
Stevie gasps, and I watch the horror cross her face. “Baz, my Goddess. I’m so sorry.”
An unexpected wave of emotion rises inside me, and I clear my throat, trying to stave it off. I can’t go a day without thinking about this shit, but it’s the first time I’ve said the words out loud to anyone, and seeing her reaction shakes something loose inside me—a rockslide that could very easily become an avalanche.
But I have to keep going.
“They were both mages. The killer… he was stronger than the other mage, and after a brief fight, he knocked the guy unconscious. He tied him to a post, carved up his body, bled him…” I close my eyes, fighting off the movie flickering behind my eyelids, a thousand frames of torture from the past superimposed onto torture from the present, the body switching between the dead mage and Stevie, tied to a tree in the Forest of Iron and Bone. “In the end, he doused the mage with gasoline and burned him alive.”
I open my eyes as a tear tracks down my cheek, but I don’t bother wiping it away.
“This happened in a field behind my house. I had a little tree fort out there, some crappy thing my dad built years earlier. I was just inside the tree line, maybe fifteen feet off the ground. Bird’s eye view of the slaughter. I watched the whole thing, too fucking scared to move. I kept hoping he would tire out and leave, that it would end, but the torture just went on and on. The screams… I’ve never heard a sound like that, not before or since. I don’t know how long it took him to die, but by the time the noise stopped, the sun was rising. The killer just sat down in front of the charred body and looked up into the trees. I swear he saw me.”
“Holy shit,” she breathes. “Did he come after you?”
“Nope. Just smiled. Something about him… he was so unhinged. It kind of snapped me out of my trance, and I remembered I had my phone on me—this cheap little thing I had for emergencies. I called 911. They showed up in minutes—cops, FBI’s magickal enforcers, you name it. The guy didn’t even move. They cuffed him, dragged him away. Someone got me out of the treehouse—brought me inside the house to answer a million questions. The killer—still cuffed—was sitting on the steps out front with one of the cops. I could see him out the window, still smiling that deranged smile. His eyes were black. Everything human about him was just… just gone.”
Stevie inches forward on the couch, her knees brushing against my thigh. The contact steadies me, and I grab my mug, downing the rest of my tea.
“They sent him straight to Bone Hollow,” I continue. “It’s a maximum-security magickal prison.Themagickal prison. Worst place any mage or witch can imagine. He’s on Death Row, too—worst place of the worst place. Sometimes I wonder if the torture he suffers there is worse than the torture he inflicted on the mage.”
“You feel guilty,” Stevie says gently, her hand on my knee, and I don’t bother denying it. “But it sounds like he got what he deserved. And that’s a good thing, because myGoddess, Baz. What if he were walking around free? Free to kill again? Free to track you down and get revenge?”
“If he were, he’d know right where to look, and I’d probably be dead by sunrise.”
Her eyes go wide. “You said he’s on death row, though. When is he being executed?”
“That’s not happening. See, he was supposed to be executed immediately. But the bribes kept coming in, so they kept postponing the date. It’s gone on like that for fifteen years, and will go on for fifteen more, I’m sure.”
“But… bribes? What kind of a person would pay to keep a killer like that alive?”
