“Was it?”she asks.“Or is that what you’ve told yourself so many times that you’ve come to believe it?You were involved with that other man, the one she had the affair with.She caught the two of you fucking.She threatened to divorce you, tell the school, and you couldn’t have that so you killed her.”
My eyes pinch shut, blocking out the memories.“No, no, no.”
“You killed her and coerced that man, what was his name?The witness report said it was Ray.You coerced him to cover up for you, to tell the police it was an accident.You were going to blackmail him too.”
My heart is beating so hard in my head that I can’t even think.
“How would Katrina feel if she knew her lover killed his wife?”she goes on.
I glare at her.“She wouldn’t care because I’d tell the truth, I was going to tell her the truth.”
“No, you weren’t,” she says.“You wouldn’t risk it.You’re afraid that she’ll find out the truth anyway, perhaps by getting inside your head, or perhaps just by looking at you.You wear guilt so well.”
“It was an accident!”I shout, the chair toppling over as I spring to my feet.“It was an accident, that’s the fucking truth!”I lean over the desk and shove my finger in her face.“You’re trying to place false memories in my mind, I know what you’re doing, you witch!”
She stares at my finger, so calm, so poised, and for one horrible second I want to jam my finger straight into her eye, press it into her brain and make her stop, make her just fuckingstop.
“That rage inside you will break you until you face it, until you let it out,” she says smoothly.“And you’re already a broken man, Ichabod.You want to lash out, but the person you truly wish to hurt the most is yourself.”
“Fuck you,” I growl, turning around and striding to the door.
“Let me be clear here,” she says loudly.
But I don’t want to listen to any more of this.I put my hand on the knob and try to turn it.It won’t open.Of course I’m locked in here.
I pivot to face her but she’s already on the other side of the desk, hovering several inches above the damn floor.
“This is my school,” Leona says, and I can’t stop staring at where her feet don’t touch the ground.“It always has been and it always will be.My coven has more power in our fingertips than you’ll know in your sad, angry little life.You’re saying to yourself that you don’t want to give up Kat, that you’ll quit and give up being a teacher, because she’s worth it and this school is dangerous anyway.You would be right about that last part, of course, but you won’t quit.Because you can’t.Because you’re needed here.The students need you to teach them, to take care of them, and that’s what you want more than anything, anything tosoothe that guilt in your soul.You need to be here to protect them, isn’t that right?”
I try to swallow but can’t.
She goes on.“So you won’t quit.You will stay and you will teach and you will protect and you will keep your students safe in order to absolve your sins.And as for Katrina, you were going to tell me you’d break it off, but both of us know you’d be lying.So I’m going to tell you this instead: There is destiny in the works, Ichabod, something bigger and greater than you’ll ever be witness to.Katrina Van Tassel belongs to Brom Bones—it is written in the stars, scored in the earth, burned in the ashes, and the more you get involved, the more your life will be at stake.”
My muscles tense.“Are you threatening me?”I ask gruffly.
“Yes,” she says.“This is a threat.And it’s not the only threat.If you don’t comply, we are telling Katrina that you killed your wife and meant it.Don’t think you can bluff your way out of it when changing police records is an easy thing to do.It would be so embarrassing for a school to have unknowingly hired a fugitive from justice, but I’m sure the world would move on pretty quickly.You, however, would lose her…and go straight to jail.”
“And so that’s why you hired me,” I say slowly, becoming sick with the realization.“Not because I’m a brilliant teacher but because you had something on me.Something you could use and bend to your will.”
She smiles and lowers several inches until she’s back on the ground.“We call it collateral.It’s what smart businesses do to protect themselves in this day and age.So be a good boy, Mr.Crane, and stay and teach and keep away from those who aren’t meant to be yours.”
At that, the doorknob clicks and I turn to see it open by itself.
“You are a brilliant teacher, by the way,” she says as I step outside.“You’re doing what you’re meant to do.So keep doing it and don’t mess things up.”
Then the door slams shut behind me.
9
Brom
Insistent rapping at my door brings me out of my dark thoughts.Thoughts I’m not sure belong to me or someone else.Theother.
I get up and hurry over to the door, the knocking continuing, assuming it’s Crane, hoping it’s Kat.
I open it to see Crane on the other side, fist raised to knock again, his face contorted, hair wet and sticking to his neck.
I’ve never seen this man look like this before.Haunted, broken and wild, an animal torn between being predator and prey, and for the first time I see what it must be like to be him looking atme.
