“She was a human,” I answer defensively. “She wasn’t supposed to know.”
“But her own mother was a witch. Her sister too. Don’t you think she’d have caught on that something was up?”
“She did own an occult shop,” I spit. “She practiced Wicca.”
“She had her memory erased,” my aunt says.
“Wh-what do you mean?”
Aunt Penny takes a big breath, as if about to tell a long story. “Your mom, she was always so trusting. So open-hearted. Ivan would do the meanest things to her and she’d always take him back. When our mother found out Gwen was pregnant with Ivan’s child, she was so worried he’d harm her that she moved us across the country, here. But he found us, and Gwen took him back again, just like she always did.” Aunt Penny shakes her head. “She thought she could change him, that you guys would be this nice, happy family. She couldn’t believe it when the Family found him guilty of murder and threw him in Los Demonios. She cried for months after he was gone. We all thought she’d get over it eventually, but she just didn’t get better. Our mother had to do something. Gwen had you to look after….” She trails off, leaving the implication hanging in the air.
“So she erased her own daughter’s memory?” I ask, incredulous.
“It was the only option,” Aunt Penny answers quickly. “If there had been any other way, she wouldn’t have done it.”
My heart aches suddenly for my mother, for her violation. I can’t believe they did this to her. I press the backs of my hands into my eyes, the promise of another headache throbbing against my skull.
“You make it seem so bad,” Aunt Penny says.
“It is bad.”
“She didn’t know the difference. She was cured!”
I feel sick. Overwhelmed. Exhausted.
I put up my hands. “Can I just—can I just have a minute to digest this?”
The room falls quiet, and there’s just the sound of the grandfather clock ticking away.
My thoughts speed in so many different directions I don’t know how to start processing them.
Mom’s memory was erased. I hate that so much that it hurts in a physical way, but there’s nothing I can do about it now.
The Chief is probably my dad. Bishop says it doesn’t matter, and I desperately want that to be true. Maybe I could shrug it off if I’d discovered my dad was some deadbeat living off welfare in Illinois, but my dad is an evil sorcerer bent on killing people. A murderer. And I can’t help asking myself, can evil be inherited?
Finally, I allow myself to think of the scariest part, the part that sends a cold shiver straight down into my bones: if I’m going to save Paige and the rest of the teens, I’m going to have to go up against my dad. The only parent I have left. Could I kill him if it came to that? The thought makes me sick, but I know one thing for certain.
“I have to go back,” I say.
Bishop speaks first.
“Indie, I know this is shocking, but you can’t seriously be talking about going to Los Demonios again. We can work out a plan that doesn’t put you in mortal danger.”
“Listen,” I start. “I know you guys think I’m just saying all this because I have some vendetta against the Chief—I don’t. I don’t care if he’s my dad. I mean, yes, it’s shocking, but who he is isn’t what’s important right now. It’s what he’s doing. Something is going on in Los Demonios. Something big. And it’s not just Paige who is in trouble. There are dozens of kids in there, and something really bad is going to happen to them if we don’t stop him.” I take a measured breath. “I know it would be easier and safer if I just forgot about what I saw in there and let someone else worry about it, but I can’t do that, okay?”
I look from Bishop to Aunt Penny, waiting for the onslaught of arguments to fly at me from both sides.
“You’re right,” Aunt Penny whispers.
I lean forward, sure that I misheard her.
Aunt Penny covers her face with her hands. “I can’t believe I’m saying this.” She sighs, then drops her hands back into her lap. “Look. I don’t want you to go, but I don’t want you to live the rest of your life full of regrets because I stopped you from doing this. If you listen to everything I have to say and still feel like you need to go back there”—she shrugs—“then I’m not going to stop you.”
“You’re joking, right?” Bishop says.
“No.”
“Hello? Human heads on staffs? Didn’t we just talk about how sick the Chief is? And you want to let her go straight to him?”
“I can’t control her for the rest of her life, Bishop. I think the two times she managed to go to Los Demonios behind my back—behind both of our backs—are evidence of that.”
“And if she kept sneaking away to shoot up heroin you’d say the same thing? Oh well, can’t stop her! That’s some twisted logic you have there.”
“The last time I checked, you weren’t her guardian,” Aunt Penny retorts.
Bishop gets up so fast his chair crashes to the ground. A moment later, the front door bangs shut.
I desperately want to go after him and tell him that everything is going to be okay, but I can’t make that promise, and I can’t let an opportunity like this one slip away. Aunt Penny could change her mind any minute.
We’re quiet a moment, the weight of our situation sinking in.
“We better get some sleep,” Aunt Penny says. “We’ve got a long day ahead of us.”
“We?” I ask, surprise written all over my face.
“Well, you’re not going alone. I’ll have to cancel drinks and apps with Chels, but I do what I gotta do.”
“You can’t come to Los Demonios,” I say. “You’ve got that AMO tracker thing.”
She shrugs nonchalantly, but she can’t hide the fear in her eyes. I won’t let her come—I won’t let another person I love get killed because of me—but the idea that she would bring on the wrath of the Family to help me makes me smile. In this moment, I feel the invisible wall that’s been between us since Mom died break down, and I’m suddenly looking at the old Aunt Penny again.