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For the first time, I really got it. I wanted her—every part of her—and I would do whatever I could to keep her happy and safe and fulfilled. So if my incubus was a part of that? If it could bring her pleasure and offer her protection?
Well, it seemed like my other side and I could get along just fine.
Chapter Ten
Hera
Walking up to my old house kicked me hard. Somehow, it stung more than seeing Aaron, even more than having my parents reject me.
I think it was because I’d grown up in this house, because most of the memories of my life had occurred within these walls.More than anything else, this place felt like my childhood, like the physical representation of my past.
“I don’t sense anyone inside,” Kit said from beside me.I’d brought only Kit with me on this errand, since having only one person would make this stop faster and safer.
“I don’t hear anyone either,”I signed.“Moa said they aren’t supposed to be home for another two days, so they’d give the staff that time off.”
There was a party in another few days, one my parents were expected to attend. It was the sort of thing I would have gone to as well, where they’d have trotted me out like some trophy and made me talk to people I didn’t know, people who didn’t give a damn about me beyond my name. Just thinking about how they continued to live their life as if I wasn’t gone made me close my hands into tight fists.
Kit nodded as we walked toward the entrance. Cameras would catch our approach, but unless the alarms went off, no one would monitor the footage. And what did I care if later they realized I’d come? I’d be long gone by then.
We’d already watched the house for over an hour, checking for any sign of surveillance or trap. Between my hearing and Kit’s predatory sense, we could have identified anyone near the place, but nothing had moved. We just had to stay on our toes so we could bolt if that changed.
We went up to the porch, the massive front doors both reassuring and intimidating. It was a strange juxtaposition between who I’d been in the past and who I was now. Before, I’d have skipped into this house because it had been my home. Now, though? Now it felt strange, like some long-dead corpse.
Funny, since I was the only thing that had changed in the last year.This was the same door, the same landscaping, the same house.
I breathed in deeply before punching in a code. It flashed green and the lock clicked open.
“They didn’t change your code?” Kit asked.
“They probably did. It isn’t hard to guess my mother’s code, though. She always hated to remember passwords, despite my father lecturing her, so she always uses our first dog’s birthday.”
Kit set a hand on my shoulder and squeezed without saying anything. Why would he say something? It just was what it was. We couldn’t do anything about it. If I let every reminder of what I’d lost get to me, I’d never get a damned thing done.
So I walked into the house and closed the door behind me. I punched the same code into the keypad inside to deactivate all the security measures inside.
When I turned away from it, I froze. The house looked exactly the same. Worse, right there, on the opposite wall, hung a huge painting.
I still remembered posing for it, back when I’d been thirteen and my mother had forced me into an uncomfortable dress just so we could look like the family she’d wanted to portray. A stylist had come and curled my hair, doing my makeup to cover a blemish on my cheek, one my mother had made a big deal to the photographer about editing it out in the final product.
Along with the gray in her hair or any lines in her face that injections hadn’t fixed.
I sighed as I stared for a minute, lost in the past, in that day. I’d hated doing it, but I’d done it. I hadn’t complained when the dress had been too tight, when my feet had hurt, when my mother’s cutting words had nearly drawn blood.
And staring at the girl there, I didn’t think I knew her anymore. If I went through that now, I wouldn’t stand there, silent.
Funny, given I couldn’t actually speak, but I wasn’t the same push over I had been before. I wasn’t nearly so worried about looking a certain way, about being liked anymore.
I shook my head and pointed up the stairs. Kit and I didn’t need to stare at an old painting. We were here for a reason—to pick up a few things that I wouldn’t get another chance to grab. We had to run, but that didn’t mean I couldn’t try to take a tiny piece of my past with me.
Kit peered around the house as we went. “It’s hard to believe you grew up like this.”
“How did you grow up?”
“I honestly don’t recall much. Memories get difficult to retain as more time passes for shades who don’t age. Our brains simply aren’t made to recall so much information, so while the memories are there, they are difficult to thread together and access or recall. I know I wasn’t born privileged, that my family struggled, but that it was also a happy family.”
“Then you were better off than I was.”
“That painting showed a family who was happy.”
