I watched Tristen’s face and saw that his new peace was already shattered. I didn’t see the beast anymore, but something definitely haunted him.
He jammed the book into his bag and took over cleaning up the other papers, too. “I’m done mixing,” he said. “Would you mind decanting the formula into some smaller containers for me? I’m tired suddenly and want to get out of here.”
I wanted to leave, too. With every minute that passed since Tristen had tossed me off his lap, I felt more ashamed. I’d spun completely out of control. I’d been so pathetically desperate that he had stopped me. Had that ever happened to any other girl in the entire universe? And what had I been thinking? Would I really have had sex? On the floor?
No. Never. I would have stopped. Of course I would have stopped.
“Yeah, let’s get going,” I agreed, finding four smaller beakers with stoppers and pouring the formula into them. I wanted to get home and sleep. Tristen had been right. The whole night must have overwhelmed me. Made me crazy. “I don’t think I feel very good,” I said, wiping my arm across my forehead, which felt warm.
“I’ll hurry and take you home,” he said, looking at me with new concern. “I thought you seemed feverish.”
“Do you mind if I just go now?” I asked. “I really feel kind of queasy.”
He hesitated, wanting to be chivalrous but knowing that we couldn’t leave the room looking like it did. The place was a mess. “Are you sure you can’t wait?”
“I’ll be fine,” I promised him.
Tristen seemed torn. “If you’re sure you’ll be safe . . .”
“I’m sure,” I said, moving toward the door. I didn’t kiss him good night. I wasn’t sure if I was supposed to or if he’d want me to, so I took a path that would keep us separated by the rows of lab tables. But I paused at the door. “I’m . . . I’m happy for you, Tristen,” I said. It seemed like a lame thing to say, but nothing else came to mind. “I’m really happy.”
Tristen watched me, seeming disappointed at how the night was ending. He sounded almost sad as he said, “Thank you, Jill. Thank you for everything.”
“Good night,” I said, slipping into the dark hallway.
It wasn’t until much later that I wondered why Tristen had seemed so gloomy when I’d left him. As I rushed home in the dark, I was too busy searching my own soul. Trying to figure out why I’d filled four vials . . . and left only three on the lab table.
Yes, I really did feel sick that night.
Running up to my bedroom, I stood by my bed, untucked my shirt from my jeans, and let the fourth vial—the one I’d stolen—fall to the mattress.
If I hadn’t been so focused on trying to understand my own behavior, my own motives, maybe I would have figured out why Tristen had gotten so somber.
Maybe I would have guessed at what he was about to do.
And maybe I would have thought more about what I’d seen inside the novel that Tristen had snatched from my hands.
The bloodstain just under his name.
Chapter 48
Tristen
I WOKE EARLY from a sleep that was less troubled but still plagued by dreams. New nightmares in which I—not a faceless girl—suffered and died. And when dawn finally arrived, the sunlight filtering into my room didn’t reassure me at all. It only made the shadows—the foreshadows—of the previous night seem to grow deeper.
How many times would I need to face death—need to kill or be killed, perhaps—in the course one lifetime? In the course of one week? Not to complain, but didn’t I deserve a day or two without murder on the mind? Didn’t I merit a normal date with Jill?
And what had come over her the night before? The sweet, quiet girl I’d thought I might kiss for months before getting so much as a hand under one of those lacy shirts had all but attacked me. Had it just been excitement over my return from what must have looked—and what had definitely felt—like death? Or was Jill just inexperienced, not sure how to behave in a situation that might have been new to her?
That definitely seemed possible.
I stared at my bedroom ceiling, troubled by more than just Jill’s behavior as my eyes began to follow a familiar, long and thick crack in the plaster. A fissure I sometimes pictured as one line in a grand staff—the grid upon which musicians compose. My imagination could easily build the rest, and when I couldn’t sleep, I often amused myself by mentally arranging notes there, creating dark melodies in my dim room. But that morning all I could see was a crack that desperately needed repair. No melody came, and that made the fracture seem ominous somehow.
Had I ended more than just deviant desires when I’d banished the beast in me?
Down the hall my father stirred, his mattress creaking, and I rolled over to sit upright, thinking that I had no time for pointless worry.
I was the ward of a monster. I had more bloody work to do.
Standing, I pulled on a sweatshirt and went quietly down the hall to the kitchen, where I measured out three scoops of coffee, dumped them into a filter, poured some water into the reservoir, and turned on the machine. Soon the kitchen was filled with the strong aroma of brewing coffee—which effectively masked the fainter smell of the good-sized dose of formula that I poured into my father’s usual mug, glancing again and again over my shoulder, worried that the beast might pad silently into the kitchen and find me trying to slay him.
Oh, that would not go well for me.
“You’re up early, Tristen.”
I had just stashed the empty vial in a high cupboard—was still reaching up to close the door—when I heard him behind me, and I tensed. “Yes, I have an exam today,” I said. “I’m going in early to study.”
Look at him, Tristen. Act normally.
I turned slowly, relieved to find that he was still groggy, yawning in his robe and pajamas. Apparently neither soul, thank God, functioned well in the morning.
“I made coffee,” I said, knowing that I had just a few moments to trick him. He had to drink out of habit, without thinking or even looking. Although the formula was dark, it wasn’t as black as coffee. I handed him the mug, handle out, so he wouldn’t feel that that the ceramic was cool, lying, “It’s piping hot, just as you like it.”
He accepted the mug, rubbing his eyes. “Thank you, Tristen.”
Drink. Just drink. I turned away and reached for my own cup, not wanting to appear unusually eager to watch him. But my hand fumbled as I poured my share of coffee. Is he drinking? Is he?
“Tristen?”
My blood froze, but I set the pot back onto the machine. “Yes?”
“What were you reaching for up in that high cabinet? What do we store there?”
“I was looking for more coffee,” I improvised. “I thought we’d bought some, but it seems to have disappeared.”
“Oh.”
Had he still not taken a sip? Why wasn’t he doubled over in pain? I had to see what the hell he was doing . . .
I turned to face him, unable to bear the suspense any longer, certain by then that he was suspicious. That my plan had failed.
When I saw his face, I knew that I was right.
I was also, unfortunately, a split second too late.
Chapter 49
Tristen
“HOW DARE YOU?” the beast roared as the mug full of formula smashed behind my head, which I’d ducked just in time. But having my back turned for so long—it had put me at a disadvantage. Because my face had been averted, I hadn’t seen him silently withdraw the knife from the butcher block holder.
“Dad!” I cried as he slammed into me, shoving me against the cabinets with one powerful hand around my throat, banging my head so hard that I felt my skull crack the thin wood. “DAD!”
He wasn’t my father. And yet what other name could I use? I writhed as he crushed my windpipe and then shoved back against his shoulders. “Dad, don’t!”
The beast squeezed harder, pinning me with astonishing strength.
My father, I was fairly certa
in that I could have beaten him in a fight. I was younger and stronger. But this thing that I battled, it drew its power from pure evil and held me easily even as I struggled. A struggle that I abandoned entirely when he slowly, deliberately raised the knife, jabbing the point beneath my chin—using the tip first to subdue me and then compel me to turn my face so that we were eye to hideous eye.
Licking his lips, he slid the blade to the tender, defenseless spot close to my throat. A place where it seemed, if he thrust upward, I would feel the metal plunge all the way into my brain.
I remained as still as possible, watching him, battling my ragged breathing, afraid that I might slip and do myself in. But my eyes rolled wildly, looking at anything, anything other than his eyes, so fearful was I of what I might see there. Or what he might perceive as missing within me.
“Look at me,” he finally snarled, jabbing the knife deeper into my flesh.
Gagging from the pressure, enough that he relented a little, I forced myself to meet his gray eyes. His vicious gray eyes. And when I did, I could not look away again.
In the beast before me there was no trace of my father. No trace of sanity or humanity. How could I not have seen that before? How could the monster have fooled me in the months since my father had typed that last journal entry?
Already, though, I knew the truth. I hadn’t wanted to see the beast. I had, to some degree, fooled myself. I’d seen glimpses of the reality that stared me down in that kitchen and then, as I had just moments before, averted my gaze.
But the monster that threatened to impale my head on a short pike had no compunction about seeing into my soul. He stared hard into my eyes, realization dawning.
“What have you done, Tristen?” he thundered, his hot breath rank and sickening. He shook me with the hand that clutched my throat, allowing me just enough air to survive. “WHAT THE HELL HAVE YOU DONE?”
“You know . . . what I’ve done.” I gasped. “And I could help you, too, Dad.”
“Your father is GONE,” the beast spat. “Beyond help! I AM HIM!”
“I don’t believe it,” I said, looking deeper into his eyes, searching for any trace of my father, the slightest hint that Dad still existed, caged somewhere deep within the thing that held me. “I can help you! I’ve found the cure!”
Later, when the dust had settled, I would always wonder if I had somehow reached Dad and saved my life, because the beast hesitated for a split second, the blade at my throat withdrawing another fraction of an inch, and his eyes shifted, softening.
And then, with a mighty roar, he withdrew the knife completely, drew his hand back, and slashed the blade across my cheek, causing drops of blood to spatter on the white refrigerator before I could press my hand against the wound, nearly falling as he re-leased my throat—only to crack my wrist against the sharp edge of the counter so violently and efficiently that I heard bones snap, and dropped to my knees, forgetting my bleeding face as I clutched at my smashed arm.
How could he . . . ? To me . . . ?
I raised my face to his—the familiar yet completely alien features—betrayed by the obscene violence, irrationally thinking, But we’re blood.
But of course we weren’t blood. The monster that stood over me wasn’t my father. And I no longer harbored the beast that he had considered his son. His heir.
I had killed his child.
“Where is the formula?” he growled, glaring down. “Get it and drink it again! Undo what you’ve done!”
“I don’t have any more,” I lied.
“Make more!”
I shook my head. “No. Never.”
He still held the knife and drew back that hand, but it was the back of his fist, not the blade, that I felt against my face, snapping my head sideways.
For some reason that was the last straw. The final indignity. “You killed my mother, and I’m going to slaughter you,” I snarled, trying to rise to my feet. But when I placed weight on my shattered wrist, I nearly buckled, and he easily kicked me back to my knees.
“You’ll want the formula again,” he said, starting to smile: a warped, triumphant grin. “You’re a Hyde, and you will long for that side of you.”
“No. Never.”
“You will, Tristen,” he promised, crooked smile disappearing. “If only I could have fooled you a little longer. If only I could have lured you along until you felt the thrill of a trusting, innocent thing perishing in your arms. You were so close to killing her, Tristen. Killing that girl you love, just as I did kill your mother.”
Although I already knew that, I nearly puked to hear him finally confess—and with such satisfaction in his voice. I actually felt the vomit rise into my throat. I really had been living with my mother’s killer. “No . . .”
“Oh yes, Tristen,” he confirmed. “And had you experienced that just once, enjoyed the incomparable sensation of taking your lover’s very life, you would have joined me, willingly.” He scowled at me, dragging the sleeve of his robe across his mouth, wiping away some spittle that flecked his lips and beard. “You will join me . . . son.”
No. I wasn’t like that. I’d proven it with Jill. I’d stopped the beast and myself.
“Never,” I insisted again as the kitchen started to grow dim. I could feel the blood coursing down my face, and the bones grinding in my wrist as I struggled again to stand, determined to fight. “I won’t . . .”
“I’ll give you time to come to your senses, Tristen, because I have long held high hopes for you,” he said. “You are the best of our lineage, and I am as yet unwilling to give you up for lost. As yet.”
“Never!” I vowed one last time, even as the room grew black around me. “I’ll die before I drink it again!”
“You will drink again,” he said, actually starting to laugh. “And of your own desire and your own free will.”
I felt myself swaying on my knees, losing my bearings. “And if I don’t?”
I heard him stop laughing, and although his reply seemed to come from far away, I didn’t miss the warning, just before I blacked out.
“I will finish what I started here. ”
Chapter 50
Jill
“JILL, I JUST ASKED YOU what I’m supposed to do with this stuff,” Becca nudged me, holding up a beaker. “You’re, like, in a fog today.”
With effort I dragged my gaze away from Tristen’s empty lab station and tried to remember what Becca and I were doing. “Just pour that into the other flask,” I said, too distracted to care about being precise.
I couldn’t help looking at Tristen’s table again. Where was he? Obviously something had gone wrong . . .
“Jill, will you turn around and help me?” Becca asked, sounding irritated. “Tristen’s not here, okay? Just let it go. I’m doing everything, and it’s not fair!”
“Sorry,” I said, but absently and without moving to help her. I kept staring at the empty spot where Tristen should have been standing, imagining all sorts of awful possibilities. Like Tristen waking up from a nightmare to realize that the beast hadn’t really been defeated and stumbling to his bathroom, getting a razor, and holding it to his wrist . . . Oh, the blood-soaked scenes that I couldn’t stop imagining . . .
Yet I was still unprepared when the whole class gasped, and Becca blurted out, loudly, “Oh, my god! What in the world happened to him?”
Chapter 51
Jill
TRISTEN STRODE THROUGH the classroom in the heart of a silence that rang louder than applause. It was an ovation of shock as he walked toward his lab station with complete self-possession, like he was oblivious to the stares.
I stared, too, in horror at the wide gash across his cheek and at his arm, which was wrapped in what looked like a torn T-shirt. Although his wrist was bound tightly, his hand hung crooked, like a mad doctor had sliced it off and botched its reattachment.
“It’s about time somebody finally beat the hell out of him,” Flick muttered under his breath, breaking the silence. “I wish it ended his
damn season.”
“Shut up,” I snapped, wheeling on Todd.
Flick reared back, seeming more surprised maybe by my outburst than Tristen’s injuries. I saw him start to reply, and I kept glaring at him, not caring for once that he was the most popular guy in school. Eventually, Todd shut his mouth, and it crossed my mind that I’d wasted so much time taking crap from him when all along I could have silenced him just with a look. I thought I was smart, but even after months of watching Darcy Gray control Todd like the pretty, plastic Ken doll that he was, I hadn’t learned until that moment that I had the same power.
Unfortunately, though, Darcy had to have her say, too. “I told you he was violent,” she said to me, sounding like she didn’t care about Tristen at all. He might as well have been a broken burner at a lab station. “I warned you, Jill.”
I glared at Darcy, too, thinking that she had no idea what had happened to Tristen. He could have been in a car accident for all she knew. But Darcy Gray was so sure that she knew everything that she took her assumptions as truth. I hated that, hated that she was right and hated myself because, even though I’d just snapped at Todd, I still couldn’t bring myself to contradict Darcy.
I turned around to watch Tristen as he took his seat, wincing when he rested his wrist on the table.
His dad had hurt him; I was sure of it. The whole story seemed so obvious as I looked at the dark slash across his face. Of course Tristen had tried to cure his dad when he’d gone home last night. And somehow it had gone wrong. How could I have not foreseen that? I’d been too busy worrying about my own strange behavior . . .
“That’s enough,” Mr. Messerschmidt announced, starting to walk toward Tristen. “Stop staring and get back to work.”
Following our teacher’s instruction, I turned back to my experiment. But I couldn’t stop glancing over my shoulder to watch Mr. Messerschmidt conferring with Tristen.
What were they discussing? What in the world would Mr. Messerschmidt say that would actually cause Tristen Hyde to look interested?