the dark-haired vampire was a virtual stranger to her. It was as if he was someone she’d met long ago and could no longer recall his name.
She’d since learned he was Varik Baudelaire, Director for the FBPI’s Special Operations unit. Her mother had tried to explain everything to her—that she and Varik had been engaged and were blood-bound to each other. While Alex did sense a connection to him, any memory of sharing a life with him was gone, burned away by Peter Strahan when he held her down and mind-raped her.
Pain exploded in her head and she dropped the books she was stacking. “Damn it,” she muttered, massaging her temples.
“Come here.” Stephen’s gentle voice and hands guided her to a chair. “Sit.”
Alex sucked in a breath and waited for the pain to pass. She couldn’t predict when the false memories planted by Peter would resurface, but when they did, or if she thought of him, her head felt as though it were imploding.
Peter had wanted her to love him. As she sat doubled over in a chair, fighting back tears of pain, she felt only hate.
“Honey,” her mother whispered and knelt beside the chair, wrapping her arms around Alex. “It’ll pass. Everything’s going to be okay.”
“Is it?” Alex asked, a hard edge to her voice. “Half of my life is gone, taken by a fucking psychopath. How is that okay, Mom?”
“I mean the pain will pass.”
“And if it doesn’t? What then? What if I can’t reverse what he did?” Another stabbing pain pierced her skull and she flinched, closing her eyes.
“Look at me.” Emily cupped Alex’s hot face in her cool hands, encouraging her daughter to look into her clear blue eyes. “You’re going to get through this. Stephen, Janet, and I will help you. So will Varik.”
Stephen snorted at the mention of Varik’s name, and Alex pulled away from her mother. “What can Director Baudelaire do?” she asked. “I don’t know him.”
“But he knows you,” her mother insisted. “He may be able to help you recover your memories.”
“By poking around in my head!” Alex pushed to her feet and stalked to the opposite side of the room. “I don’t want another stranger in my head, thank you very much.”
“Varik isn’t a stranger. He loves you.”
“Yeah,” Stephen chimed in. “He loves her so much he—”
“Stephen,” her mother hissed in warning. “This isn’t the time.”
“Why not?” He gestured to Alex. “It’s her life, her memory.”
“She’s been through a lot. She doesn’t need to be reminded of certain events just yet.”
“Yeah, great idea, Mom. I’m sure that will win her a lot of points with the Tribunal.”
“She also doesn’t want to be talked about as if she isn’t in the fucking room,” Alex snarled.
“Oh, honey, I didn’t mean—”
“I think it would be best if you both left now. I’d like to be alone for a while.”
Hurt swam in her mother’s eyes, but after a moment, she nodded. “If you’re sure that’s what you want.”
Alex crossed her arms in front of her, eyes downcast. “It is.”
“I need to pick Janet up from class anyway,” Stephen said. He and Emily quietly gathered their things, and Stephen gave her a quick peck on the cheek and ruffled her hair as he passed.
Her mother wrapped her in a tight embrace. “I love you,” she whispered.
Alex didn’t return the embrace but nodded her silent acknowledgment against her mother’s shoulder.
They filed out of the apartment, and Alex closed the door, locked it, and slumped against it before sliding down to sit on the freshly installed carpet.
Outside, kids played in piles of fallen leaves. She listened to the sounds of life carrying on around her, lives untouched by violence and with promising futures. Fingering the scar she no longer remembered obtaining, she envied them.
Hot tears slipped over her cheeks and she wept until nothing remained of her envy but a cold, numbing hatred for Peter Strahan.
Varik held the ID card up to the electronic card reader. He’d stolen it from the same hospital orderly whose green scrubs he now wore. The system registered the valid card, issued a soft beep, and the doors to Jefferson Memorial Hospital’s intensive care unit swung open.
He entered the unit and confidently strode toward the nurse’s station. He slipped behind the empty desk and checked the chart detailing which beds were occupied and by whom. Peter Strahan was assigned to bed nine at the end farthest from the entrance.
Shift change gave him the best opportunity to carry out his plan. It’d been a