She pauses a beat too long, and I know that I’ve hit on the truth.
“Aunt Penny, you have to tell me what you know.”
“I don’t have to tell you anything,” she retorts. “I’m the adult here. I’m your guardian, not the other way around. It’s time you started acting like the kid in this relationship.”
“How can I trust you when I know you’re keeping things from me?”
The hypocrisy of my words hits me. But if Aunt Penny recognizes it too, she doesn’t show it. She puts her head in her hands, and I can’t be sure that she’s not crying. I wait for her to look up.
I wait a long time.
When she does, her eyes are filled with remorse. Suddenly, I’m not so sure I want to know what she has to say.
“Gwen and I,” she starts. “We were so different in so many ways, but one thing we had in common was bad taste in men.”
I sit up straighter, my throat going dry at the mention of Mom. “What does my mom have to do with this?”
“No…,” Bishop says. I look across at him, then back at Aunt Penny, my chest constricting with panic.
“What?” I ask, feeling like I’m missing something important.
And then it hits me.
I shake my head.
Aunt Penny’s face is full of apology. “Indie, the Chief is your dad.”
21
The ground sways violently under my feet.
She’s lying. She has to be lying. The Chief is a sorcerer; there’s no way he could be my dad.
But even in my haze, the devil on my shoulder asks, “Why not?” My dad’s been gone since I was three, and Mom never kept any pictures of him. I don’t have a single memory of the man, and I never really cared until now—I had Mom, and she was all I needed. I could never understand why some people would go to such lengths to find a person who’d dumped them like week-old trash.
I think back to the day I met the Chief in Los Demonios. To his calculating eyes and too-large teeth. Besides the blond hair—his straight, mine fiercely curly—we look nothing alike.
“You’re wrong.” I send Aunt Penny a challenging glare. Bishop rubs my back, but I shrug off his touch. “She’s wrong! You’re wrong!”
But Aunt Penny just gives me this infuriating apologetic smile. All of the fears I’ve had about myself in the past few months, that I’m a bad person, ugly in some deep, fundamental way, come crashing back into my mind. Could it be that I’ve been fighting against my true nature all along, that the black parts of myself are just the real me pushing through?
I get up and walk away from the table, my fingers trembling at my temples. “I would know my dad if I saw him. And that monster is not my dad.” Of course my argument is ridiculous. I don’t give her a chance to say so. “How can you be so sure? You’ve always said you never met my dad.”
Aunt Penny drops her gaze into her lap.
I give a snort of derision. “Oh, so you were lying about that too?”
“It was just easier than answering questions about him,” she says. “Your grandma thought it was better if you didn’t know about him.”
I swallow the panic rising in my throat, hot tears blurring my vision.
“Nothing you’ve said proves he’s my dad.”
Aunt Penny gives a resigned sigh. “Your dad is a sorcerer. He’s cruel and has no regard for anyone besides himself, and his nickname is the Chief because he killed dozens of humans and carried their heads around on staffs, which got him tossed into Los Demonios. What are the chances there are two people who meet all those descriptions in the world? What more proof do you need?”
I can’t pull in enough oxygen.
“We look nothing alike,” I whisper. But even now, I have to admit there are similarities. The light eyes. The fine bone structure and full lips.
“And what about Rowan?” I ask, remembering the Chief’s speech about his sister.
“Rowan’s there too?” Aunt Penny gasps.
“She’s been to visit him.”
“God,” she says. “That woman is vile—nothing but a troublemaker. Constantly stirring up problems for the Family. It doesn’t surprise me that she’s part of this. You need to stay away from her.”
Acid burns my throat. This can’t be happening to me. This can’t be true. Yet more and more, it seems impossible to deny.
I’m part sorcerer.
A moan escapes me. Bishop pulls me back into my chair, and I bury my face in my hands. I can feel the weight of their stares on me as I cry.
I’m made of evil.
“Indie,” Bishop pleads.
I wish he would just leave. Doesn’t he get it? What it all means?
He pulls my hands from my face. “Indie. It doesn’t matter if he’s your dad. All of that—it’s just biology.”
I take a shuddery breath, but I won’t look at him. I’m so ashamed.
“Who you are isn’t about your DNA,” he continues. “I mean, it is, but it’s not what makes you you. You’re nothing like him—you’re good.”
I look at him then. I don’t know what I expected to see in his face, but it wasn’t this deep understanding, like he gets just what’s going through my mind, like he can see every dark part of me and he doesn’t think less of me for them.
Like he loves me.
Instantly, I remember crashing upstairs after Aunt Penny told me about her love affair with a sorcerer. I hadn’t said so, but I’d thought it was vile that she’d considered one of them worthy of her. And now here was Bishop, accepting me without batting an eye. I could probably announce I was also one-quarter alien and he’d be cool with it.
Bishop brushes his fingers over mine. I’m so sorry about Cruz in this moment that I almost break down and tell him everything. I don’t deserve him.
“Bishop is right,” Aunt Penny says, interrupting my train of thought. “Me and your mom, we’re your family. Not him.”
My throat constricts at the mention of Mom. I want so badly for her to be here right now. I need answers. I need to know why she kept all this from me.
“How?” I start. “How could she?” Bishop rubs my back in small circles. This time, I don’t shrug him off.
“Haven’t you always wondered how Gwen could possibly know nothing about witches?” Aunt Penny asks.