“I didn’t know what you wanted, so I made a little of everything,” he said, and Kat didn’t miss the way he eyed the bits of bare skin at her shoulder and collarbones exposed by the T-shirt’s big neckline. “I’m going to shower off real fast, but if you’re hungry, feel free to go ahead and start eating without me.”
Kat considered nibbling on a sandwich while she waited but then decided she was too comfortable where she was. She relaxed back on the couch, figuring it wouldn’t take Connor long to get cleaned up. As she waited, her thoughts once again turned to Addy, Ben, and Cheyenne. She wasn’t sure exactly what Marko had in store for them, but there was no way in hell it could be something good. She hadn’t wanted to make any assumptions about the ritualistic murder in San Antonio, but she had a nagging suspicion the kidnapping of the three teenagers was somehow connected to that. She didn’t want to say anything until she was surer, though.
Connor came back into the living room less than five minutes later, which was technically impossible by the laws of showering physics as she understood them. He was dressed in a pair of jogging shorts and a T-shirt similar to hers but a lot tighter. And yeah, he made the outfit look good.
“You could have started eating,” he said as he flopped down on the couch beside her.
After picking up one of the glasses, he took a long drink, then gestured at the plates of sandwiches. Kat took the first sandwich off the top of the stack and checked the condiment-to-bread-to-meat ratio, happy with what she found. She hated dry sandwiches.
Kat didn’t realize how hungry she was until she started eating. She stifled a moan. Connor knew how to make a turkey and cheese sandwich, that was for sure. There was even the perfect amount of mayonnaise and a touch of mustard on it. After finishing the first, she washed it down with some soda, then helped herself to another.
Sitting there with a relaxed Connor, talking about everyday things like what constituted the perfect sandwich, reminded Kat of when he’d put his arm around her at the farm earlier. Those had been the best moments she’d experienced since first being turned into a cat, and she wanted more of that. But soon enough, they’d finish devouring the sandwiches he’d made, and she knew he’d suggest she get some rest.
She sipped her drink, desperately trying to think of something to say when she caught sight of the framed photos on the wall. Specifically, the pictures of his family and the sister who didn’t appear grown-up in any of them.
“What happened to your sister?” she asked before she even realized what she was saying. She bit the inside of her cheek the moment the words were out of her mouth as she realized how insensitive she was being.
Connor froze in mid-chew, his hazel eyes locking on hers and making her feel about two inches tall. She opened her mouth, ready to apologize and tell him it was absolutely none of her business, but he spoke before she could.
“How’d you know?” he said, sounding curious rather than upset. “I don’t remember ever talking about her in front of you.”
“You didn’t.” She pushed her hair behind her ear, giving him a sheepish shrug. “I noticed that all the photos of her were taken a while ago and that there aren’t any of her as an adult, like you have of your other sister.”
Connor regarded her for a long moment before nodding. “That’s pretty good. Not many people notice things like that.”
Being observant seemed to go hand in hand with being able to do magic. Maybe because witches and warlocks tended to be more aware of things around them. But something told her that she’d have come to the same conclusion about his sister even if she weren’t a witch. When it came to Connor, she wanted to know everything there was to know about him.
“Where were those pictures taken?” she prompted when he didn’t say anything, hoping maybe that would be a better way to ease into the conversation.
“In Los Angeles. That’s where I grew up.” He glanced over his shoulder at the photos on the wall, as if to remind himself of which ones she was talking about, then turned back to her with a snort. “Back when my big plan was to become an actor. All I wanted was to be an action hero and star in dozens of blockbuster movies.”
Kat smiled at the thought of Connor being a Hollywood celebrity. She could definitely see him in the heartthrob role.
“But that was before my sister went missing,” he said softly. “Acting and being a fake hero in the movies seemed kind of silly after that.”
“How old were you when it happened?” she asked.
“Eighteen,” he murmured, focusing his attention on the sandwich in his hand. “It was a month or so before graduation. Hannah and my other sister, Jenna, went with some friends to see a movie at the local theater. Hannah was sixteen, Jenna had just turned thirteen, and the two of them slipped in to see some scary monster movie that would have given my parents a hissy fit if they’d known. But Jenna loved monster movies, and Hannah loved her. So that’s the movie they went to see.”
Kat waited patiently, not wanting to push. This had to be hard for him.
“There was a glitch with the movie, and it ran late, so they missed their ride home. They didn’t want to call Mom or Dad or me, so they walked home.” He picked up his glass and took a long drink, then set it down on the table again. “It wasn’t that far from where we lived and we’d all made the trip before a hundred times, even at night. But that night was different. They never made it back.”
Kat had to force herself to keep from reaching out to take his hand. “What happened?”
He shook his head. “My parents freaked out when they realized Hannah and Jenna weren’t home, so they called me, and we all started looking. I got help from a bunch of my friends, while my parents got the cops involved. We found Jenna the next morning in a completely catatonic state behind a dumpster near the movie theater. There was no sign of Hannah.”
“Was Jenna ever able to tell you what happened?” Kat asked, aching for Connor and feeling his pain as if it were her own.
“She claimed that Hannah was kidnapped by a monster, but the way she described it was too outlandish to even fathom, and no one—not my parents, not the cops, not me—believed her,” he admitted. “Jenna took the fact that no one put stock in what she said really hard. She pulled into a shell and wouldn’t so much as speak to anyone for a long time after that. When the cops couldn’t find any signs of foul play and no leads on the kidnapping theory, they finally wrote the whole thing off as a runaway teenager and stopped actively looking.” He shrugged. “It wasn’t their fault. That’s how it works with missing kids. You try and find them at first, but there are so many that, after a while, they simply become another poster on a website.”
“Knowing what you know now about the supernatural world, have you ever thought that maybe Jenna did see something?” Kat asked.
“Yeah.” He nodded. “I’ve thought about that over the years, but you have to realize, Jenna had always been a little out there. Even as a little kid, her imagination frequently got the best of her, and it was difficult sometimes to tell what was real to her and what wasn’t. If you had heard what she said about that night, I’m not sure you would have believed her, either.”
Kat sighed. “I’m sorry. Not knowing what happened to Hannah must be tough.”
She expected Connor had heard lots of platitudes over the years. He didn’t need any more from her, but she would do anything right then to make him feel better.
