Page 102 of Kill Me Again: Psychics

Lake would blame himself for being tricked so easily. Asher would shake his head and say he’d warned me. Calisto would get that sad expression he wore so well whenever my name came up. Leo, Silas, and Kendrick would forget me. Hell, they’d probably already forgotten me. I’d been nothing but a temporary blip in their working lives. Cade would probably be secretly relieved that he no longer had to deal with the problem of my employment. And my parents… nothing would change for them. I’d been dead for nineteen years. I’d returned for one short, acrimonious visit, and then gone back to being dead.

Owen laughed, the sound long and low. “You look like you’re going to shit yourself, brother.” He flung the knife backwards with enough force that it sailed straight off the roof. “Happy now?”

I forced myself to breathe. In. Out. Deeper. Slower. It took five breaths before I had enough composure to muster words. “Yes.”

He swung around, heading for the parapet and peering over it. “Do you think I hit someone?”

“I don’t know.” I was still working on my breathing, the whole interlude with him lunging for the knife having sent my system into overdrive. My heart pounded, I was drenched in sweat, and when I’d vomit had become the question rather than whether it’d happen. I realized then that I’d gotten what I came for. I’d discovered his reasons for killing me.

There was nothing stopping me from walking away. The bar across the door was on my side; I could slide it free and be back with Lake, safe in his arms. Ben would arrive soon with backup. Owen no longer carried a weapon, and it had been the threat of the knife that froze me in place—more than it should have, really—but that was the damn PTSD talking. It was a mistake on his part. He’d given away his advantage.

I took a few steps backward. Before I could turn, Owen hopped up on the parapet. Arms out for balance, he took a few experimental steps, wobbling slightly. Then he looked over the side. “Jesus! It’s high.”

“We’re six floors up,” I pointed out unnecessarily. “You should come down.”

“Should I?” He turned my way and deliberately lifted one leg in the air. “Have you ever done yoga?”

“No.”

“Me neither.” The leg was still in the air. He lost balance, almost tipping backwards, his arms windmilling before righting himself. “That was close.”

I battled with how I was supposed to feel. What was it to me if he plunged to his doom? I should be happy about it. Well, maybe not happy. I wasn’t a monster. But I shouldn’t have any strong feelings. It was human nature, though, not to want to watch someone play Russian roulette with their life, no matter what they’d done.

“I’m going,” I said.

Owen flicked his fingers at me. “Yeah, you go.”

I took a few more steps backward, my gaze still locked on him. “I wish things had been different. I wish you hadn’t done what you did. And I wish you hadn’t gotten Jamie involved in it.”

Owen took a few more teetering steps on the wall. “If wishes were fishes.”

“What?”

“It’s a proverb. ‘If wishes were fishes, we’d all cast nets’. It’s about the impossibility of making wishes come true.” The wind picked up, forcing him to still his movement to brace himself against it so it didn’t push him off the roof.

“Come down. We’ll…” We’ll what? Have a cup of tea? Share some stories? That wasn’t happening.

“You haven’t asked me about my childhood.”

“Whatever happened to you, I’m guessing it wasn’t good, and I’m sorry—but that wasn’t my fault. I was a baby. It could just as easily have been the other way around.”

“I thought when you were dead that things would be perfect, that your parents would be glad of a replacement. It didn’t work out how I thought it would. They were a disappointment in each and every way.”

I laughed. “I could have told you that. That must have stung, believing that I had a perfect life and discovering that wasn’t the case. Maybe you were the lucky one.”

Owen swung around with fire in his eyes. “No. No, I wasn’t. Don’t ever say that. Your parents might have been disinterested and not liked your choice of sexual partners, but did they ever lock you in a room for days with no food? Did they burn you with cigarettes? Did they treat the dog better than they treated you?”

With every word he spat out, the barriers came down, his innermost thoughts laying themselves bare. “No,” I said softly. “They never did that. They were just disinterested, exactly like you said. And homophobic.” I stepped forward again. I could do many things, but I couldn’t walk away from someone unveiling abuse. Lake and I might have guessed something dark in Owen’s past, but the words were uglier said out loud. “They stole you. How could they not have wanted you?”

“They didn’t steal me. Someone stole me to order. There’s a market for babies. I don’t know how much they sold me for, but I expect, given my age, I earned them a hefty amount.

“Do you know who it was?”

Owen shook his head. “I tried to find out. But it was too long ago. Even reading people’s minds, I met with nothing but dead ends. It’s possible they don’t do it anymore, that they’ve re-routed to something more profitable like drugs or weapons. Or that they do still peddle in children, but in another country.”

“So you came for me instead. Why me? Why not our parents?” Owen shook his head. The barriers were still down, his thoughts coming to me loud and clear. “You wanted them to love you.”

His expression turned ugly. “Shut up!”