My brain whirred. I had to get her off Genevieve. I had to stop her. I had to
One second Locke was on Genevieve, and the next she ripped the knife out of my hand.
You cant do it, she spat at me. You cant do anything right.
Genevieve opened her mouth. Locke plunged the knife into her side. Id promised to protect Genevieve, and now
Now, there was blood.
CHAPTER 37
She was going to cut me.
She was going to slice me open.
She was going to kill me.
Youre a liar, she said. You couldnt do it. Do you even want to? Do you?
She was screaming now. I took a step backward. I opened my mouth to tell her what she wanted to hear, to tell her that I did want it, to stall for time, but she never gave me the chance. Looking at me over the blade, she took another step forward.
You were supposed to kill her, she said. I got her for you .
Im sorry
Sorry never did anything! Lorelai was sorry. She was sorry, but she had to go, and she left me there alone. Lockes voice broke, but the fury was still clear in every word. You were supposed to kill the girl. It was supposed to be us , Cassie. You. And me. But you left !
She wasnt talking to me anymore. She didnt see me when her wild eyes landed on mine. The blade in her hand gleamed. The blood dripped onto the floor. I had two seconds, maybe three.
What do you mean, I left? I asked, hoping my words would break through the fog in her brain, bring her back to the here and now. Left where?
Locke stopped. She hesitated. She looked at me. She saw me. She got ahold of herself, and with her voice still full of venom, she advanced. Lorelai left. She was eighteen, and I was twelve. She was supposed to protect me. She was supposed to watch out for me. At night, when Daddy went away and the monster came out to play, she made him angry. She made him angry on purpose so hed hit her instead of me. She said she wouldnt let anything happen to me. Locke paused. She lied.
Wed known that the UNSUB was fixated on my mother. We just hadnt known why.
She was my sister, and she just left me there. She knew what he was like after Mama left. She knew
what he would do to me once she was gone, and she left anyway. Because of you . Because Daddy was right, and Lorelai was a little whore. She did all the wrong things, and when I found out she was pregnant with that air force boys baby Locke was completely caught up in the memory. I eyed her gun on the floor, wondering if I could reach it in time. I thought that Daddy would kill her if he knew. I wasnt even supposed to know, but I found out, and he found out, and he wasnt even angry! He didnt slit her throat, didnt carve up her pretty little face until the boys didnt want her anymore. She was pregnant, and he was happy.
And then she left. In the middle of the night. She woke me up, and she kissed me, and she told me she was leaving. She told me she wasnt ever coming back, that she wouldnt raise a baby in this house, that our daddy wouldnt ever lay a finger on you . Lockes knucklesmy aunts knucklestightened around the base of the blade. Her hand shook. I begged her to take me with her, but she said she couldnt. That hed come after us. That she didnt have any legal right to take me. That it would be too hard . She left me there to rot, and once she was gone, the only person left for him to punish was me.
Dont do anything else that Ill be forced to make you regret .
Youll only be hurting yourself .
I wont have you sniveling on the floor like a common whore .
My mother had never talked about her family. Shed never mentioned an abusive father or an absent mother. Shed never mentioned a little sister, but now I could see their family unit: the bruises and the welts and the terror, the Daddy-monster, the little sister that she couldnt save, and the baby that she could.
When people ask me why I do what I do, the woman who was that baby sister said, I tell them that I went into the FBI because a loved one was murdered. Id finally gotten out of that house. I went to college, and I spent years looking for my big sister. At first, I just wanted to find her. I just wanted to be with herand with you. If shed taken me with you, I could have helped! You would have loved me. I would have loved you. Lockes voice got very soft, and I realized that this was a scenario shed played out in her head, growing up in that hellhole. Shed thought about my mom, and shed thought about me before she ever met me, before she ever knew my name.
She shouldnt have left you there. I braved saying the words because they felt true. Locke was just a kid when my mother left, and my mom had never even looked back. Shed raised me on the road, moving from city to city, never letting it slip that she had a family out there, just like shed never mentioned my dad.
My whole life, wed been running from something, and I didnt even know it.
She never should have left me there, Locke repeated. Eventually, I stopped dreaming about finding her and being a family again, and I started dreaming about finding her and hurting her, the way Daddy hurt me. Making her pay for leaving me there. Peeling her face off until no one thought she was the pretty one, until just looking at her made you scream.