“Only for some people.”
“They told me that they were using Tara to get to Christian. I didn’t know where she was then, and it never occurred to me that they would hurt her.” She saw Ryan’s disbelief and scowled. “I thought they were the good guys. Good guys don’t torture people. The following morning I got my security clearance and the colonel obviously decided I could be trusted at the interrogations. After that, it wouldn’t have mattered whether she was guilty or not. Nobody has the right to treat another human being like that. As soon as I could get away, I called you.”
He reached out and patted her hand. “I’m glad. It couldn’t have been easy going back in there and pretending.”
“It wasn’t too hard. The colonel tried to tell me that Christian had murdered my mother. I concentrated on that—”
“What?” Ryan’s voice held shock. She’d never told Ryan about her mother, never told anyone until Ash, last night. It was another of those things her mind skittered away from thinking about.
The cot was behind her, and she sank down onto it and hugged her knees to her chest. Even now, something inside her niggled that she shouldn’t talk about this. She blocked the nagging little voice out and forced herself to speak.
“My mother was murdered when I was twelve. I found her body. She’d been drained of blood.”
Ryan came and sat down beside her. “I didn’t know. You never spoke of it. Even when we found the murdered girl. Why didn’t you say something then?”
“I don’t know. I’ve never been able to talk about it.” She shook her head. “I don’t even think about it that often. It’s as though it’s a nightmare that slipped away. No, more than that. It’s like there’s something inside me that blocks the memory out. I don’t know…”
“But the colonel told you there was a link to Christian?”
She nodded. “He said he was a”—she could hardly speak the word—“a vampire and my mother had been drained of blood.”
“And you believed him?”
“No. I don’t remember much, but if I concentrate hard, I can see him, from the back and he was blond and not much taller than my mother.”
“Wait, you mean you were there in the house when she was murdered?”
“Yes. I told you, I found her. I went along with the colonel, because he was more likely to believe I was on their side.”
She thought about the file she had read on her mother’s murder, the pictures. Her hand went to her throat as she remembered the last photograph.
“What is it?” Ryan asked.
“On the file there was a photo. Of me. I had marks on my neck as though something had bitten me.” Panic rose up inside her. “But I don’t remember. How could I not remember?”
“Did you have any counseling afterward?”
“Only a little, because I remembered virtually nothing.”
“Could the counselor have done something—some type of hypnosis?”
“I don’t know. I just don’t know.” Could that be the answer? Had someone taken her memories, helped her build the wall? For the first time, she closed her eyes and tried to peer beyond the barrier. Her headache had faded, but she pressed her fingers to her forehead as though she could force herself to remember.
Ryan’s phone rang breaking her concentration. He listened for a minute his brows drawing together. “Christian wants to talk to me and you,” he said after the call ended.
Fear rippled through her. She didn’t want to die. Not yet. “What about?”
He shrugged. “Who knows? But I won’t let anything bad happen to you Faith.” He seemed unsure for a moment. “Ash made a point of telling everyone not to touch you.”
“Probably wants to kill me himself,” she muttered. But his words calmed her a little.
“No one is killing anyone.”
“Anyone else, you mean.” A whole load of people had already died that night. “Is Christian coming here?”
“No, we’ll go to them. At least it will get you out of here.”
She forced a smile. “It’s not so bad.” But it was definitely a relief to be out of the small space. She followed Ryan down a corridor. “What is this place?” she asked. On the drive over here, she hadn’t paid attentions to where they were going. She’d presumed that they were heading to the CR building, but she hadn’t recognized the underground parking area.
“We’re in the city in the SA International building.”
“I know it.” An office block in the center of the business district, but obviously, it extended farther underground that any normal building. They took the elevator one floor up, and Ryan led the way along another corridor and entered the room at the end.