The Key to Fear - Kristin Cast Page 0,100

room, look up, up, up.” Her hand disappeared from view as she pointed toward the ceiling. “The moon is so bright you can see it through the roof.”

Denny let out a shaky breath. “Nuh-uh.”

Blair smiled and, for a split second, was his sister again. “Just try, okay? For me?”

Aiden crawled out from under the bed and followed his big sister’s red footprints to the door.

Blair sucked in shaky breath, her trembling hand hovering over the door’s keypad. “I’ll always protect you, Denny.” She typed in the code and the door hissed open. “Remember, look up, up, up.”

*

“Aiden!” Someone had grabbed him, stood right in front of him, shaking him free of his memories. But shock clouded his senses. He was there, in the room with the red and the cries and the scent of burned flesh. But he was also gone, a specter, a placeholder for the man whose life this was. It wasn’t Aiden’s. It couldn’t be.

Elodie filled his vision. Her hair stuck in untamed clumps against her crimson-splattered cheeks. Her scarlet-smeared lips moved as she spoke, but he could only hear the siren-like wails of his sister.

Elodie pressed something against his shackles and they popped loose. “Rhett will regain consciousness soon and the Key will be on their way.”

Aiden’s gaze swept around the room, pausing on the unconscious mound of Rhett Owens before settling on his sister and the petite woman next to her, frantically typing on her holopad. Blair rocked back and forth, her legs pressed against her chest, her face twisted by screams.

Elodie threw the handcuffs behind her. “They’ll kill us. Your mother wouldn’t want that.”

Then he saw her, Cath, his mother, in a pool of unending red. “Momma …” The word spilled from his lips with a sob so deep and raw he felt inside out. Enough love, enough mothers, for two lifetimes. And he’d lost them both.

Tears carved clean paths down Elodie’s blood-smeared cheeks.

He could save Elodie. Keep her safe, protected. Pour into her his everything. He wouldn’t make the same mistakes again.

Something within him clicked, and the well of pain that streamed into his heart ceased overflowing. It ceased to fill at all. He scrubbed away the red and blocked out the cries and the stench and stored those sensations in the farthest corner of his mind. Being a protector didn’t require sadness or grief. He stored those away too. Maybe he’d wrangle all of his emotions and stuff them into the dark as well. After all, hadn’t his emotions gotten him here?

The room was a blur as Aiden followed Elodie toward the exit.

“Brother!” Blair wailed, bloody arms outstretched.

Aiden flicked his eyes to the floor and the heap of shattered pieces disguised as his sister. “You did this.” His voice was even, firm.

The door opened in front of them and Elodie took Aiden’s cold, trembling hand and pulled him from the wreckage of his broken family. Aiden didn’t look back as the door hissed closed behind him.

Cath’s blood ran dark red against Blair’s wall of windows, as if the sprinklers had rained rusty water. It was a good thing Blair had replaced her skin with the gloves Maxine had provided. She didn’t have time to waste finding cleaning supplies. She had always been inventive, one of her best qualities, especially when she was under pressure. And look at how much pressure she was under now, bots buzzing around, a Key Corp soldier watching from her door. This was just another chance to shine.

“Just another chance to shine!” Blair bellowed as she balled up another clean corner of her plush throw rug and scrubbed at more rivulets of blood. She would return her office to its spick-and-span glory if it killed her.

“Blair?”

Blair’s breathy pants fogged the section of window she’d just polished as she stilled and closed her eyes. Was that Cath’s voice? Is that who was calling her? Had this all been a dream? Would Cath stand in front of her when Blair opened her eyes? Would she lean over Blair’s bed, her fingers plucking the air that way they did while her halo of golden hair framed her kind and loving features?

“Blair? ”

That was it. This had been a dream, a nightmare. It had to be. Blair would wake up and these false visions would fade into smoke and slip from her memory before she could even say what had happened. This wasn’t real. She dropped the rug and pressed her hands against the glass. None of this was real.

“Blair! ” Maxine slapped the