Eva turned to her friend and cocked her head. “Why does everyone seem to know my name?”
Well, she might not know me, her friends, or New York City, but at least she knew who she was. Right now, that seemed like a win.
Anya wrung her hands and shot me a glare. “What the fuck is going on?”
“It seems.” I let out a heavy sigh and closed my eyes. “The Cult of Lilith has erased some of her memories.”
Sarah’s mouth dropped open. “They can do that? That’s an actual thing that can happen? Demon death cults have the power to erase memories? Can we put them back? How do we fix this? Can we fix it? Why—”
“Sarah,” Anya hissed, fear and worry churning in her eyes. She took two big steps forward and grasped Eva’s hands. Dropping her head in close, she searched Eva’s gaze for the very thing I had tried to find. A hint of her. A flicker of warmth. Of familiarity. Of hope. I didn’t have the heart to tell Anya that she wouldn’t find a damn thing.
“Eva,” Anya said, her voice wobbling. “Look at me. I know you don’t understand what’s going on, and that’s okay. Someone has erased your memories. Do you understand me?”
Eva blew out a breath, and then nodded.
Relief shuddered through me. This was enough. All we needed right now was for Eva to understand what had happened to her and to trust that we could fix it. If she ran, she would have no idea where to go. I didn’t want to think about what might happen to her if she tried to survive on the streets.
Anya smiled. “Good. Now, I want you to answer a few questions for me. Does my face look at all familiar to you?”
Eva stiffened. “I’m...I’m not sure.”
She pressed her lips together, and then turned to Sarah. “And her face?”
A strange emotion flickered in the depths of Eva’s eyes. It was almost like...anger? But that didn’t make sense. Suddenly, she ripped her hands out of Anya’s and stepped back toward me.
“I think you need to leave,” Eva whispered, her bloodshot eyes wide, her cheeks pale. “You need to get out of here. Now.”
Anya’s face crumpled, and a tear slipped down her cheek. When she turned toward me, my heart shattered. “What have they done to her, Caim?”
“Don’t worry,” I said, though my heart still pounded like a warning drum against my ribs. “I know how to get her back. There’s a device that can restore memories. We just need to—”
Before I could tell the girls about the memory fix, Eva stumbled sideways and slammed into my chest. I caught her waist just as her knees buckled and her eyes rolled back into her head. My breath tightened in my throat.
Eva went limp against me.
The cult had gone too far. Eva’s body wasn’t built for this. Her bones were rebelling. Again.
Hefting her into my arms, I barked at Anya and Sarah, unable to keep the fury out of my voice. “Where’s her doctor’s office?”
Sarah’s face went stark white as she swiped through her phone and then held up the screen so I could read the address. And then I shot out into the night, Eva’s limp body tight against my chest.
7
Eva
The scents of the hospital were as familiar to me as my own home. Disinfectant, metal, air freshener. And underneath it all, the cloying staleness that no amount of cleaner could fully erase.
Dr. Wilkes had tried to make my room as homey as possible. The bed was packed full of plush pillows, and the wide-screen TV flickered with the latest Netflix show. The dim lighting did its best to chase away the sense of being trapped inside a sterile environment where needles and beeping monitors were a constant presence.
My ribs twitched painfully beneath my thin, cotton shirt when Dr. Wilkes poked his head into the room. His kind smile sent a flurry of whiskers out from his grey eyes.
“How’s my favorite patient?” he asked as he eased into the room and shut the door behind him. He glanced at his clipboard. “The nurse says you’ve been having more rib pain.”
As if to answer his question, my ribs flared with an unyielding heat. I winced. “It’s been worse since my mom...” I cleared my throat. A month later, and I still couldn’t speak about it. The words always died before they hit my tongue. “Anyway, I know that doesn’t make any sense, but even the scar feels fresh.”
The jagged scar that ran along my chest had always been painful to the touch, but it had faded over the years. Now, it was as red and as angry as it had been the day I’d had surgery. A life-saving operation to remove my inflamed appendix. There had been complications. Hence the terrible scar.
The same complications my mother had once had. Our bodies rebelled against us, rejecting our bones. Surgery was always a dangerous option because of it.
