When Lightning Ignites [COMPLETED]

Chapter 15: A Normal Island

"I didn't have a choice. It was to protect Jamie." His eyes narrowed. "Now it looks like it was good that we did come here. Can you imagine revealing yourself out there? With no training?"

"Just saying," she mumbled. "I don't want to talk about this with you. Let's go back to my friends' visit."

He opened his mouth, blinked, and then nodded. "Fine by me."

"So, off the island, or we need to modify even more memories." She gulped. Did she want to do that to her friends, even a little—mess with their heads because she missed them and wanted to see them? Did that make her much better than the rest of them? "So if I see them, their memories may be modified anyway?"

Lir nodded.

"If I don't see them, then they won't be?"

He shrugged. "Probably not. We may still have to do something to make sure they don't worry or suspect something if you cancel. We may have to make them forget about you."

Julie slumped. Either way, her friends would be tampered with. Awesome. If she saw them or not—it didn't matter. She had been tampered with for months and was okay. So her friends would be as well. If she was in the same situation, she would still want to see her friends, right?

Screw it. She missed them. That didn't make her like the other Fey. She didn't gain anything out of this but continuing friendships. Her eyes widened as she realized that this was her life now. She would have to lie to any human friends and acquaintances for the rest of her life in order to protect them. She didn't relish what the Fey would do if she revealed anything to her friends.

She didn't ask for any of this. She wanted a normal life—or a normal life as a famous dancer. With normal people around her. Normal friends who went out to get their nails done and went shopping, who talked about normal things like boys and music—and not which family line they needed to marry into to make crazy powerful Fey babies.

"Fine."

"So what about Hilton Head?"

"Really?" Somewhere so normal?

"Sure." Lir shrugged. "It's an island. It has a reputation for wealthy people living there."

"It's not like here. It's not snobby enough for what I've described. This takes snobby to a whole other level. I remember it being a bit more relaxed."

"Nowhere is like here." He shrugged. "It's close, so our drive wouldn't be bad."

Did it matter? "Fine, whatever."

Julie agreed to have her father mess with her friends' minds a bit because she missed them and wanted to see them. It had messed her up when she figured out it was happening but didn't know what was going on. Of course her friends wouldn't stand a chance of even figuring out that much. They were human.

"Oh, no, what about Kara? I told her my friends were coming and she could hang out with us." Crap. She didn't want to leave out her only friend on the island. Kara was already left out of so much.

Lir shrugged. "I'll talk to her parents. I'm sure they'll let her come with us. What's one more mind to mess with anyway?"

Yeah, just one more mind. Surely Kara would want to go either way. Julie narrowed her eyes at him. He didn't seem to notice. He had already started looking for a house to rent on his computer. Stuff like this was easy for him, she reminded herself. Look at what he had done to his own daughter.

"What about this one, honey? It looks a bit like the one we are living in now, so we may not need to modify any memories about how the house looks from your texts and stuff." He pointed at the computer.