Cursed (Book # 3 of Hunted)

Trigger

"You made it look like an overdose, but won't the coroner or whoever wonder why her blood is gone?" I asked as I approached them, my voice too quiet for the surrounding humans to hear.

"A girl like that in a place like this with a needle full of heroin sticking out of her arm. I doubt they'll even do an autopsy," Keegan muttered in response. I didn't want such a thing to be true. Surely that woman had someone somewhere who cared about her.

Zane drifted down the aisle, slowly, but not quite human. His expression remained hollow. I didn't like it. But his eyes, lightened to dark grey, scanned the scene around him. The happy faces glistening with sweat and sand twinkling like diamond dust in the light of the fires and lanterns and battery-powered lamps. He watched them like they were something new. Like he wanted to fill himself with the sight of them.

"Do you want another?" Keegan asked eyeing the crowd.

"I want them all," Zane replied and I was startled. There was no more reason to pretend, so why would he give an answer like that? His head turned, his gaze almost meeting mine before he faced forward again.

"You can take as many as you like," Keegan said and again I caught a giddiness in his voice that had nothing to do with the feed. "But try not to kill them. Two dead homeless people are negligible. A whole camp full would make the World News." So he had killed his as well. It hardly shook me. I was becoming used to death.

Zane was silent for a moment as we continued back towards the car. Then he shook his head and mumbled, "It's not worth it if I don't get to feel the heart stop." I froze dead in my tracks and watched them pass the last tent out of the light and into the dark.

...

We were back on the road, driving down the coast. I could hear the ocean crashing against the rocks below. No one had said a word since we left the shantytown. The silence was killing me.

"I knew you were still in there," Keegan murmured. My muscles tensed and I looked at the back of Zane's head.

"He's not," he replied after several seconds.

"Don't lie," Keegan said, "You would've gouged that whore's eyes out if I hadn't stopped you." 

More silence.

"Force of habit," Zane finally answered. They didn't look at each other as they spoke.

"A habit you broke nearly two decades ago. Please stop lying." Keegan's voice was soft, but the force behind it was undeniable; as if he were trying to compel Zane to tell the truth.

"Fine. You're right. He's still here. Imprisoned as he has been for the last eighteen years."

"That means you can let him out. I know all your triggers. We can—"

"It doesn't work like that anymore."

"Because of the curse?" Zane nodded and Keegan shook his head.

"But with that woman. You were almost yourself. I saw it. You can—"

"I don't want to talk anymore," Zane said rolling down the window, so everything was muffled by the ripping wing. Keegan sighed and I saw him roll the tension out of his shoulders. I wondered briefly if they were ignoring me on purpose.

Zane turned to look at me and a small smile pulled at his lips. A sound sort of like his voice, but somehow more echoed in my head.

I'm sorry.

For more than just ignoring me. For everything. I felt tears warm in my eyes and my heart stuttered. I knew he could read minds but I didn't know he could make his own thoughts knowns to others. It was an unbelievably intimate experience.