Page 46 of The Darkest Half

The atmosphere in the room changes dramatically. Victor Faust is the leader here, and while Lysandra Hollis has been his voice in the past in all matters of love and emotion when it came to me, she is not his voice here and now or any other time. And he means to make that fact perfectly clear. To everyone.

“What was the reason for everything, you ask?” he says. “I will tell you.”

“Von—Victor, what are you doing?” Lysandra appears worried suddenly; her brows have drawn inward sharply. And she had started, I think, to call him Vonnegut instead of Victor.

Without looking at her, he says, “Questioning me, Hollis will only serve to sign your death warrant.” He turns his head slowly, threateningly, to look at her. “Is there anything else you’d like to say?”

Lysandra pauses, wanting, more than anything, to say something, but in the end, she chooses life.

Victor turns to me again. Those eyes look just like those I’d stare into when he was fu—making love to me, yet they now appear to be lacking something. Oh, yes, the fucking love! The subtle lines on his face are the same as I remember when I’d brush my fingertips down his smooth skin. The curve of his lips, the same ones I used to kiss with my own, is the same but seem so cold and uninviting.

I feel dizzy all of a sudden and lay my head back down on the floor. Victor’s face fades in and out of my vision; the room spins; voices sound so far away. Voices? But no one else is talking…

Is this real? No…maybe it is all just in my head.

I want to believe that so desperately, and I convince myself for a moment, but not long enough.

“You had to be tested,” Victor says, and his voice is what takes my hope of a hallucination away. “And this was the only way.”

22

Izabel

“Tested?” I grit my teeth, and it hurts my gums. “All of this…was just…a test? When…did it start?” I can’t catch my breath, and I don’t know how much longer I can do this; how much longer until I pass out or die. I think the only thing keeping me awake or alive is burning anger.

Victor glances over in James Woodard’s direction.

Why is he looking at James? It’s as though he’s searching for something—but what?

And Lysandra appears more worried than before when she spoke out against Victor explaining anything to me. She sits on that chair, shoulders rigid, the inside of her bottom lip tucked between her teeth, her legs crossed.

Victor turns back to me.

“It’s not important,” he says. “What’s important is that you decide now what path you’re going to take.”

“Path?” I blink, stunned and offended even. “You really think…after everything…you’ve done to me, to your brother…that I’d ever choose…to follow you?” I glare at him icily, and at the same time, my head spins, and I feel like I’m going to throw up, but there’s nothing in my stomach to purge.

“Not even to save your own life?” he asks.

“No! Fucking no!” I answer quickly, not even having to think about it. “I could never…work for…someone I can’t trust. And you—”

“What about someone you love?” Victor asks.

My mouth snaps closed, and I hear a sharp breath intake, realizing it is my own.

“You’re…talking to me about love?”

“Yes.”

“Tell me, Victor,” I spit his name out like something bitter on my tongue, “why in hell would you…want anyone working for The Order…who has been compromised by love?” It wasn’t the question I had been about to ask; I was going to ask him if he loved me, but at the last second, I realized I don’t want an argument like that to be on display for everybody else in this room. And truthfully, I’m afraid to hear his answer. Because no matter that he betrayed me, I still love him. Love doesn’t just vanish into thin air no matter what the other person has done; it takes time. But love him or not, I’ll never forgive him for what he did, and I’ll never follow him, or…be with him again.

Victor slides his hands into the pockets of his dress pants and paces a few times.

“Hollis was wrong,” he begins, not looking at me, “when she said she spoke for me because I don’t know what love is.”

Lysandra’s head snaps around; her eyes blaze at him, but he’s not looking at her.

“She did speak for me,” he goes on, “helped me to know all the right things to say to a woman, but she couldn’t keep me from the inevitable.”

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