Page 72 of Under a Wicked Moon
“It’s best I don’t tell you, since you don’t seem to remember. I don’t want you to remember what they asked you to do. Roman worked a forget spell on you to see if that could buy us this time. It’s temporary. I’m glad it seemed to work.”
Vivi cradled her head in her hands. “It’s my head…my life. Not theirs. They don’t get to do this to me. I don’t want to be this way.”
Nova stared down at her empty hands. “Anyone who knows the words that can be used to turn on their programming can make it happen at any time. There’s really no choice in what has to be done.”
“I’m scared to forget everything…the family, all that’s happened…Ky.”
“Did you love him?”
Do I?
She’d never been in love for real. She trusted him, needed him, and wanted him here. She didn’t want to be alone without him,memory intact or gone.
The reality of losing him was slowly shattering her. She’d have been better off to never have known him and died in the prison than feel this loss. And face the terror of erasing her entire life…even him.
Now that she realized she loved him, she didn’t get to be with him, which sucked. No storybook ending for the knight who saved her from hell. She wanted to crawl into bed in a dark room and lie there for a century.
With a fortifying breath, she threw back her shoulders. “We have so little time. Back to important stuff…things I want you to remember and be able to tell me. My name is Vivienne Cora Kinley, but I go by Vivi. I’m the daughter of Clara and Edwin Kinley. The magic comes from our mother’s side. Her great-grandfather was a mage. Not a witch, but an original mage like Dom. So we’re not full-blood lycan. Our father just went with the wildness of our household because he loved Mom so much. He learned some magic but wasn’t very good at it. You are Nova Ada Kinley. You hated your middle name, which came from our great-grandmother who was a real pistol, according to Mom. Powerful.”
“I need to know about the magic. As much as you can tell me before we have to make decisions. Is there a book?”
“There is a book, but not a classic spells book. It’s more a family history of some of the loricas. It’s in the house it sounds like you found.”
Nova nodded. “I got through the gate, but we didn’t stay there very long.”
“Then you felt that the house is bespelled. It keeps secrets like the book, which it will give back to only one of us if we ask it. Listen, no one, I meanno oneoutside our family can get their hands on the book. It goes back for generations, back to the original mage. It’s our legacy and our responsibility to protect.”Tightness settled in her chest. “I’m sorry for getting us into this mess. Getting us incarcerated. I was the reason Mom and Dad died.”
Nova frowned. “I don’t understand.”
“There was this lycan asshole who charmed me. He moved in up the road. Named Simon Lees. He seduced me, which was stupid, but I let him.” She rolled her eyes. “I made bad choices, but no one as handsome as him ever showed me…” She tapped her chest. “Me,not you, any interest. That alone should’ve been reason enough to question. He charmed me into telling family secrets. Well, the magic. I didn’t even tell him all of it. Just that we did bits and pieces. He reported our parents to the Council for practicing magic. They were executed on the lawn in front of the house while the house kept us hidden. It was awful.”
“How was that your fault? Sounds a lot like it was all him.”
“If I’d been smarter, it wouldn’t have happened. I’m the one who can read people, but I thought I loved him when he seriously wasn’t all that. I didn’t follow our parents’ rules to tell no one about the magic. I was so naive. Now that I’ve met Ky and have seen what lycan males should be like, I’m so sorry. I got us captured. I had tracked Simon to Belfast and confronted him. Of course, you followed. I was pissed and not thinking clearly. It was a trap. He knew I’d tracked him. I don’t know how he knew. I moved in to attack him, and we were both darted and dragged into one of the prison facilities. Again, I’m so sorry. If I’d been smart, I wouldn’t have done that.”
Nova held up her hand to silence her. “You got pissed after this asshole seduced you and had our parents murdered? You tracked him down to kick his ass, only to find out he sold us out to humans, and you think all that’s your fault? That sounds a lot like you being a badass and him being a dick. He used you. How did this lycan even know about the human facilities?”
“I don’t know.” Warmth spread through her at her sister’sforgiveness.
“Simon Lees. I’m going to research him. But tell me everything you remember about him. Everything.”
Vivi gave her details of his appearance and what she could remember. She glanced at the clock on the wall. Time was up. She nibbled on her lower lip and sighed. “What do you think? Should I be allowed to live and forget everything or die?”
“It’s not my choice. It’s yours,” Nova said gently. “We are too powerful to be able to be controlled by humans.”
“I’m afraid,” she whispered.
Nova didn’t give her any comfort. She got up to remove a small box from a drawer, from which she withdrew a syringe that held three CCs of off-yellow fluid.
“I’ll remember nothing?” Vivi stared at the syringe, unable to believe its contents would end her life, even though she would still breathe. How could she be in a situation where her only option to survive was to forget her life permanently on purpose?
Nova shrugged. “It worked on me. We assume it’ll work on you.”
“If it doesn’t, you’ll have to…stop me. Will you do that or have Roman do it? I don’t want to hurt people ever again. That’s not me.”
Nova nodded.
She cradled her face in her hands as tears ran unchecked again. “I don’t want to forget Mom and Dad. Or Gary. If I do, then there will be no one left to remember them. No one left to visit their graves by the water near our house.”
