Chapter 69

Enforcement has released new information regarding the concealed Moscow Center, stating that the discoveries made there were as a direct result of the Marshall family’s cooperation.

“We want to make it clear that rather than hiding the crimes of former councilor Marshall Hyde, the head of the family unit drew our attention to them,” Commissioner Yaroslav Skryabin said in his statement. “Their integrity in this matter is beyond reproach.”

The alpha of the StoneWater bears, Valentin Nikolaev, confirmed that a senior member of his clan acted as an observer during the initial examination of the shuttered Center, and that the bears continue to be involved as the investigation progresses. “No one’s hiding anything here,” he stated. “Pax Marshall asked for the truth and made no attempt to conceal it even when that truth turned out to be ugly. That says a whole lot about the man.”

—PsyNet Beacon (15 October 2083)

IT HAD BEEN one month since the confrontation at the site of the facility.

In that time, Enforcement had done a major forensic dig there, found a large number of bodies—but less than if Keja had killed the vast majority of the patients.

It had taken a further two weeks from that discovery to crack open Keja’s finances, trace payments to multiple people who she’d set up with carers.

Fifteen.

Counting Santo and Janine, Keja had saved fifteen lives.

Theo hadn’t been able to see her aunt straightaway. At first because she was healing from her injuries, and later . . . because it hurt to think of Keja. There was a big part of Theo that didn’t blame her aunt for her crimes—she’d done what she had because of the damage to her brain.

If anyone could understand that, it was Theo.

But another part of her did blame her aunt. How could she not when Keja had been so rational for so much of their discussion? Surely Theo’s aunt must’ve not just realized but understood the murderous nature of her crimes when she emerged from the fog?

It had taken her this long to work through her complex emotions—with the help of her mate and the empath who was now family—and accept that no matter how rational her aunt might’ve sounded at times, she hadn’t been. The madness in her, the brokenness in her, it existed whether she was out murdering people or helping them.

That was who she was; she hadn’t chosen that life, however. And the latter was the reason she was still alive. It was also the reason why she hadn’t disappeared into the black hole of a prison, and was instead being held at a secure PsyMed facility meant to contain Psy.

Her mind had been locked down with a judicially mandated shield that meant she couldn’t telepath anyone, and she only had supervised access to a “fenced-off” section of the PsyNet, the fences shields created by guard minds of significant telepathic power.

Her physical guards were all changeling, or Psy with titanium shields. No powerful patient was going to escape by mentally overwhelming them. The medics who worked intimately with the patients couldn’t all be changeling—these were very Psy madnesses, very Psy problems. But the medics were always accompanied by a changeling. No exceptions.

Today, as Theo took a seat on the other side of a shatterproof glass partition, she saw two guards take position on the far wall as another guard led Keja into the room.

Theo appeared alone on this side, but her mate stood just outside the door.

Yakov had asked her if she wanted privacy and she’d nodded yes. “For her dignity,” she’d said. “I’ll give her that even if I can never undo what was done to her by the man who was meant to protect her.”

Her bear had cupped her cheek, kissed her. “That’s my Theo with her soft heart that the tiny gangsters take shameless advantage of.”

“They do not,” she’d said in affront.

“Ahem, do we or do we not have two dozen cupcakes in the car for the gang of cake bandits?”

When Theo had wrinkled her nose at him, he’d kissed it, then said, “Go see your aunt, pchelka.” A solemn tenderness to his expression, this man who knew all her complicated emotions when it came to Keja. “If you need me, I’ll be right here.”

Theo wasn’t expecting an attack. That wasn’t where the danger lay with Keja.

Her aunt wore pale purple scrubs. That was a special-order item according to the information that Pax had been sent as a result of his standing as the head of the Marshall family. Since Keja had never officially been cut from the family line, just listed as dead, responsibility for her fell to the family.

Theo knew Pax would’ve accepted that responsibility regardless.

Now he held power of attorney over her person, as she’d been judged unable to care for herself—and, as such, he had full access to her medical records. So Theo knew that Keja’s counselor had ordered the purple scrubs after Keja kept on going into psychotic meltdowns at being asked to put on the green scrubs that were the usual patient uniform at this facility.

She was fine with seeing others in them, but she would not wear a set.

Echoes of trauma. Memories of a brutal violation.

Now her aunt took a seat on the other side. Unlike in the old movie that Theo had recently watched with Yakov, they didn’t have to pick up devices to talk to each other through the glass. It wasn’t soundproof. Was designed to let them speak freely but without physical risk to Theo. “Aunt Keja,” Theo said. “You look well.”

No madness in her gaze today, Keja smiled that sad smile Theo had seen before her aunt shot her. “As we both know, looks can be deceiving.” Her next words held a sharp edge. “They tell me your brother holds power of attorney over me. Seems I’m unfit to care for myself or to make my own decisions.”

“You don’t need to be concerned,” Theo said. “Pax understands that you’re eminently capable the vast majority of the time, and he has no desire to contradict your decisions or micromanage your existence. However, there are times when you are . . . unreachable.”

Also in the medical records had been a notation about a recent incident where Theo’s aunt had attacked a fellow inmate: a slender blue-eyed blonde. Had the guards not pulled Keja off, she’d have broken the other woman’s neck.

“I’m in solitary confinement now for the safety of others,” Keja said, one eye twitching slightly. Raising a hand, she pressed her finger under that eye. “Side effect of the medication they’re testing on me. I asked to be part of the guinea pig group and I assume your brother must have authorized it, because they let me into the trial.”

Hope for her aunt had Theo leaning forward. “What’s it designed to do?”

“Regulate certain processes in the brain. I can’t give you all the technical specs but they’ll be in my medical records. Irritation at the twitch aside, I feel calm most of the time.” Humor lit up the blue, a hint of the woman she could’ve been had Marshall Hyde not savaged her. “Or I think so, anyway. I might be the crazy person who doesn’t know they’re crazy.”

Throat tight, Theo pressed a hand to the glass. “I don’t know how to feel about you.” It came out raw, drenched in pain. “You saved fifteen lives, and then you took the lives of innocents whose only crime was to look like me.”

Like version 2.0.

“I love you and I understand you,” Theo continued. “I also hate you for what you did . . . And I hate myself because I was the second subject. I’m only mentally better than you because you went first, took the first hit.”

Keja pressed her hand against Theo’s. “Don’t, little niece.” Severe words belied by the strange tenderness in her expression. “We are neither one of us the worst monsters. That title goes to the ones who made us.”

Her eyes grew hard, black bleeding in from the edges in a creeping tide. “The counselors and shrinks want me to accept fault, but I see doing that as capitulating to what he did to me, as shifting blame from where it rightfully lies. He killed those women—because he created me.”

Theo didn’t know what to say to that. The counselors were right in that Keja couldn’t move forward until she accepted culpability for her crimes. But Keja was also right—she wouldn’t be this damaged being if her father hadn’t mangled her brain.

“Not that it matters.” Dropping her palm from the other side of the glass, Keja sat back. “I’m in this facility for the rest of my life.”

She looked around. “I thought I’d hate it, but it’s not so bad. The staff are kind. I heard it’s because Es are the ones who do the hiring interviews. We can choose activities or a subject to study. They say I can have a garden plot in spring, can plant whatever I want. I think I’ll plant flowers. Bright, pretty, happy.”

Theo’s soul hurt. “I’ll look forward to my bouquet.”

Keja smiled. “And since it’s only slender blue-eyed blondes who trigger me to homicidal violence, they’re working on a plan to let me out of isolation by juggling the schedule so I’m never out at the same time as any of them.”

“I’m glad you won’t be locked in your room.” Her aunt had already suffered far more than any person should suffer.

“It’s a very humane facility—especially given that so many of its residents are murderers.” A shrug. “That’s enough about me. How goes life with the bear?” A sparkle in eyes that had morphed from obsidian to blue once more.

“Loud, affectionate, overwhelming in the best way.” Theo squeezed her hands into fists in her lap. “I wish you could have that. I wish you could know what it is to be loved exactly as you are. To have a person who sees all of you—and loves all of you.”

Keja’s smile was that terrible sad one. “Live for both of us, Theo. It was too late for me the first time they operated on my brain. But it’s not too late for you. Forget about me and go on with your life. Live that life as a glorious insult to the man who tried to take it from us.”

Theo held her aunt’s gaze, her spine straight. “I will live my life,” she said. “But I’m never going to leave you behind. I’ll visit twice every month, and if I’m out of the area, I’ll call. You’re an important part of my life and my family. The only person who is like me in the entire world.”

Keja blinked rapidly. Then she gave a jerky nod.

Theo had never had any intention of abandoning her aunt, not even when she was at her most confused about her emotions where Keja was concerned. That was why the other woman had been placed in a facility a mere two-hour drive from Moscow. It was the closest specialist hospital of its kind in the region.

“Before the fall of Silence,” Theo told Yakov as they left the facility a half hour later, “Keja would’ve vanished, never to be seen again. Her life ended without discussion or consideration.”

Yakov wove his fingers through hers, her bear holding her safe while she walked in nightmare.

“All because my grandfather wanted a slave.” Theo lifted her face up to the cool autumn sun. “Well, fuck him.” Hard words, but she felt them in every fiber of her being. “Keja isn’t going to be executed, isn’t going to be ignored, all memory of her buried.”

Breaking their twined grip on that defiant declaration, she gripped Yakov’s T-shirt with both hands and hauled him down for a kiss wild and passionate, skin privileges with her mate. “And I exist. I thrive.”

Yakov grinned and stole another wet kiss, the bear’s pleased rumble a vibration against her breasts. “That’s my Theo,” he said, before stepping back to open the car door for her. “Come on. We can’t be late for lunch with your brother. Pretty sure the man thinks we’re all insane, but he’s polite and always turns up on time.”

Pax’s relationship with the bears was a work in progress, with both parties side-eyeing each other . . . but there was goodwill on both sides, too. Her brother would do anything to make her new life easier, while Yakov’s entire clan had hearts generous and wild. Though poor Pax probably needed forty-eight hours to recover from every bear-related interaction.

Last time around, Babushka Quyen had patted his cheeks and said, “Would you like to meet a nice bear girl? My cousin Maggie, her granddaughter just made senior soldier. You two would make pretty cubs.”

Theo. Help.

Laughing inwardly at the memory of his telepathic request, she jumped into the vehicle with her bear. Their life would always be complicated. Her twin fought a deadly battle day after day. Her own rages seethed on the periphery of her life. The PsyNet continued to fragment and weaken, even as Pax told her he’d heard whispers of a Ruling Coalition plan to create a second island.

The entire world was in flux.

But one thing Theo knew—she stood on solid ground with her mate by her side. He would always be by her side. Her love. Her Yakov. “Yashin’ka?”

He merged into the main flow of traffic. “Hmm?”

“I love you more than donut holes.”

His cheeks creased, the dimple she could see mischievous and wicked. And then they were both laughing, delighted with each other, Theo and her bear.