Forgotten (23 page)

“You would be surprised. He does what I need him to and shouldn’t be crossed. Speaking of doing what I need, did you give Katrina the note?”

“Of course. And I called too. Don’t worry, I made sure to disguise my voice. She is freaking out and I don’t think she was very stable before it. I still don’t see the point of this though. Don’t get me wrong, it’s
fun
, but you told me you’d found out that she’d got amnesia so she won’t remember what happened before her accident anyway, so why are we trying to frighten her?”

“She won’t have amnesia forever, and when she remembers she’ll run off to tell Anton. I want her so terrified that she’ll block that part of her life from her mind. One of my informants told me that Katrina suspects she has a sister called Suzanne so there was never any point hiding that from her and the knowledge that she’s a vampire she’ll end up finding out naturally, but she has never mentioned Anton or what she knows about me so if I can keep that from her then I will do everything I can to keep it that way.”

“What is so important that she can’t tell Anton? It would be just easier to get rid of her at this point.”

“That’s none of your concern. And no, it wouldn’t. Anton will look for her and if she can’t be found then I’ll be the first person he’ll suspect. If she is alive, loss of memory or not, he’ll be too busy tending to her to consider me. Although, we wouldn’t be in this mess if you’d done what you were supposed to! If you’d done things properly she would have been badly beaten and would have taken it as a warning not to get involved in my business. It would have been sufficient enough to get her to back off.”

“You told me to attack her before she next got home, which I did. You told me to use a baseball bat so it wouldn’t be traced to a vampire or a werewolf, and I followed your instructions. How was I meant to know she’d go into a coma due to her injury? If Jonathan is so capable, why didn’t you make him do it?”

“It was too risky doing it myself, or using Jonathan. I suppose there’s no use thinking of what went wrong now though, just don’t mess up again. We need to ramp up the scares for both Katrina and Suzanne. Can you manage to handle Katrina or do I need to look for someone else to follow what I tell them to?”

“You can’t talk to me like that! I can tell Anton what you had me do to her!”

“Threaten me all you want. I’m well aware of what I’m getting myself into, but don’t think for one moment that Anton won’t turn on you after dealing with me. You’re in too deep now to implicate me and, compared to Katrina, you mean nothing to him.”

In an instant Starr was up and next to Marcus, a snarl escaping between her lips as she punched the tree behind him, inches from his face. “No! You’re wrong. You don’t know him like I do, he cares about me. He’d never hurt me, not even for her!”

Marcus smiled for this first time since he had met with her, “Maybe you’re right, Starr. We’ll see, won’t we?” He sidestepped away from her and straightened his jacket. “I think we’re done here. I’ll be in touch.”

Before Starr could even turn her head to face him he had already disappeared from view, leaving her alone and left to ponder which one of them was right about Anton.

The sound of Anton’s car windscreen wipers coming on and making their quiet swish-swish made Starr come back from her thoughts and back to the present. She blinked a few times and realized that it was lightly raining, the raindrops rolling down her window like silent tears. Turning her attention to Anton, and stealing another quick look at Katrina, Starr yawned before she impatiently grumbled, “When do you think she will wake up?”

“Hopefully not until we get back to the house,” Anton replied, looking over at Starr briefly before glancing in the rearview mirror to check on the unconscious form of Katrina on the back seat of his cyclone blue metallic 1997 Honda Civic LX.

“I didn’t even know that vampires could faint. I mean, is it common?” Starr asked, turning in her seat to look at Katrina. “She could be faking.”

“She isn’t faking.”

“How do you know? You haven’t seen her in nearly a year. She could have changed. Besides, you don’t even know the reason why she disappeared in the first place.”

“Starr, she isn’t faking! So either drop it, or get out and walk,” Anton said through gritted teeth.

“But …”

“
Drop it.
”

A seemingly endless, uncomfortable silence descended upon the car. It went on for several long, tense minutes, until Anton finally broke it.

“… anyone around the house earlier?”

“Huh?” Starr uttered, startled by Anton’s voice.

Anton glanced over at Starr, her ice blue eyes showing surprise in the darkness of the car. “I said, did you see anyone during your watch?”

“Nope.” Starr paused and got more comfortable by putting her feet up on the car’s dash. “Well, I didn’t see anything out of the ordinary at the back of the house, but around 8 p.m. I went around to the front. I had just positioned myself across the street in the bushes when something strange happened.”

“Strange? Just how strange are we talking?”

“It’s hard to explain, but I think I lost five minutes …”

Anton glanced over at Starr, who was looking out of the window at the night sky. Her reflection in the car’s window and the look in her eyes told Anton that Starr was keeping something important from him, but knowing from past experiences that werewolves were secretive and unpredictable, especially rogue werewolves, it was better just to let the subject drop. And besides, there were more important things for him to focus on – like the unconscious vampire on his back seat.

Anton let a slow smile tug at his lips.

Katrina’s safe now and when she wakes up she can explain everything. The truth will come out,
he thought.
I’ve waited this long, I can wait a little longer. After all; that’s what you do for the people you care about. You wait.

*

Suzanne looked back at the house and noticed that the night’s breeze was gently blowing at her bedroom curtains through the window she had left open.

Marcus should have found Emily’s body by now
, Suzanne mused, looking up at the open window.

Seeing a figure pass by the other side of the billowing curtains, Suzanne shrank back into the shadows and turned away. Tears of guilt started to sting her eyes and Suzanne wiped them away with the sleeve of her sweater.

From her shadowed hiding place, she took a final look at the house she knew she could never return to. Everything she knew, everything she loved … all were in that house. Even her beloved pet, Flopsey.

But there was something more important right now. Katrina was alive and in Sycamore Heights, and Suzanne just had to find her no matter what the cost.

I can never come back here, well, not until I know the truth
, Suzanne thought sadly.
I hurt Emily. I don’t belong here anymore. I’m a monster and the next time that Marcus sees me, he will have to kill me.

Suzanne shook her head mournfully and disappeared into the fast approaching night.

Catherine Gardiner was born and raised next to rolling green meadows in Yorkshire, England where she resides with her beloved border collie. When she is not writing she is either researching for her upcoming novels, taking photographs, cooking or going for long leisurely walks along a nearby river. She first conceived the idea for her novels when she was doing a creative writing course in college and had to walk home alone through a wood where she often imagined what might be in the shadows. She also thinks her love of writing and her passion for all things creative is due to her Irish roots.

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:
http://www.catherinegardiner.com

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:
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