Chapter 24

Chapter

Twenty-Four

"Ego sum avis stultus." I stare at my hands as I sit on the bed. Paul is close enough that I can feel his heat, but we're not touching. He put on boxers but nothing else. I know he's giving me time to process what he's concluded. I don't want to believe him. I mean, it's Conrad.

Conrad. My brother. My family. Out of everyone in my life, he knows what our childhood was like. He knows the isolation and fear we grew up in. He understands the burden of not being extraordinary.

"What does that mean?" Paul asks.

I give a small, humorless laugh. "I'm a stupid bird."

"I don't understand." Paul lifts his hand as if to touch me but holds back.

"You're not meant to. It doesn't matter. It's just a thing we used to say as kids." I touch my arm, remembering what it felt like to be broken, as I stared up at the empty high balcony where Conrad had given me the fake fairy dust. Then, the vampire Costin appeared.

I think of Costin turning to ash under my hands. If I let myself, I can still feel the pressure releasing against my fingers as he poofed into his eternal rest. The guy could come off as a creeper, but I didn't wish him dead.

There are so many memories. My brain can hardly sort through them. I see all these moments—young Conrad putting his arm around me when I'm crying, him tormenting the staff, staring into bonfires, endlessly reading on the couch. And then I see us older, standing quietly under Lady Astrid's inspections, holding my hand while I dangle from the balcony as we sneak out of the country estate, holding the elevator outside the Manhattan penthouse as I run toward it. Arguments. Make ups. So many moments. So many tiny things build to create a relationship between two people.

Standing, I find my shirt and tug it on before retrieving my shoes and socks. I move because I don't know what else to do.

Conrad? There must be another answer.

I can't think of one that makes as much logical sense. There are things about my brother's personality that I don't want to see. I always forgive them because I know what our lives are like. He's not perfect, but he's not a killer.

He can't be.

"You're wrong about Conrad," I say, hoping my firm tone will convince Paul I'm right. "You don't know him."

"I don't know your brother, but maybe that means I can see things you can't. You're too close to?—"

"Shut up. Just shut up," I command, practically yelling. My hands are shaking, and my entire body feels tight. "I know my brother is not perfect. I know he has his issues. Who doesn't? I mean, look at his childhood before he came to live with us."

Paul stares at me but doesn't comprehend what I'm talking about. Of course, he doesn't. His parents are normal, and his family is uncomplicated compared to mine.

The truth is that Conrad never talks about his childhood before he came to live with us. I know he was adopted. I know he bounced around foster homes before my father found him. I've seen scars that look like old cigarette burns. I met his drugged-out wreck of a birth mother. He has reasons to be messed up.

Have I been blind when it comes to him?

Conrad has always craved power. He has a desperate obsession with being what we are not. He wants to be supernatural, wield magic, and have the kind of fearful respect that comes with the greatest of authority.

I never thought he'd turn that obsession against me.

Maybe he hasn't. Paul could be mistaken.

This is my world. Not Paul's. He must be wrong.

I hate this. We should be cuddling on the bed, basking in the aftermath of pleasure. I don't want to be thinking about any of this.

"We should go." I look around the room. It no longer feels like a sanctuary. "You need to be with Diana."

"You didn't text your brother that we're here," Paul says, getting dressed. I hear him moving, but I keep my gaze averted. "I didn't give you my parents' address, so he shouldn't have that."

I finally look at him. "That's why you had your dad meet us at that restaurant instead of at his house. You didn't want me to know where they lived."

"She's my daughter, Tamara." It's not an apology. I don't expect it to be one. "And to be clear, I don't want your brother to have the address or any other information about us. I might be wrong about him, but I'm not taking that chance."

I nod. "You're a good dad, Paul. That's why I know you'll let me go. You have to protect Diana."

He wants to protest. I see it in his face.

"You know I'm right about this." I try to smile, but I'm not happy. I hate this.

"And you know I'm right about your brother." He reaches for me, and I step back. If he touches me, I'll find myself back in his arms. I need to hold on to my sanity. "I don't feel right abandoning you to deal with all of this. You shouldn't be alone."

My loyalties are torn. I hate him for saying that stuff about Conrad. I don't want to believe any of it.

"You have no choice." I pull on my shoes and look for my phone before realizing I left it in his car. It doesn't take a master manipulator to figure out his weakness, but it does take a bit of an asshole to exploit it so bluntly. "If you love your daughter, you'll protect her and forget all about me. Diana just lost her mother. Do you really want to risk her losing her father too?"

The words have their desired effect. I see the shock. It's worse than if I had just slapped him. Then comes the doubt and guilt, crossing over his features in predictable waves. It's almost too easy to get him to do what I want. I guess I learned more cruelty from Lady Astrid than I thought.

Resignation radiates from him. "Promise me you'll be careful."

"Sure." I try to smile but soon give up the effort.

Something has shifted between us, and I know I caused the wedge. I finally did what was right, but the loneliness of that decision looms over me. My family is dead. Conrad can't be trusted. Everyone else in my life is supernatural, and they look at me like a pet human.

I'm not just losing Paul in this moment. I'm losing the secret wish he represents, that hope of family and normalcy.

I feel it hardening me. I've been locked under a haze of grief and depression since before the funeral, but now I feel anger peeking through at the injustice of it all. The ground beneath me had been shaken the night of my birthday party. I've been a broken version of the woman I fought so hard to become.

"We should go." I look around the room but don't see anything else that is mine.

Paul is dressed, and I catch him doing the same before he looks at me like he can see through me and all my posturing. "I feel like we could have been something."

The words are so surprisingly honest. They shake me to the core, and I can't answer.

He sighs and goes to the door. I can't be sure, but I think to hear him whisper, "I'm sorry you're determined to throw that away."

The details of the hotel no longer glimmer with the promise of anticipation. I see it for what it is—a sad place filled with miserable lives.

I can't judge those around us. I'm here, too, aren't I? This place now keeps the memory of my broken dreams forever within its walls. They're as real as the stains on the carpet.

It occurs to me that endings are always unhappy, and my life currently feels like a series of endings.