Xeke sat up on the couch and tried to get his bearings. Nothing he saw made sense. What happened to me? Who’s that woman?

  Teri glanced at him. The expression on her face made him shudder.

  The woman screamed as Teri turned back to face her.

  “Ohh, there’s a painful memory,” Teri said. “Let’s see how many times you can relive it.”

  Ruddy was kneeling and holding someone’s motionless form. Is that… the doctor from the clinic? Xeke thought.

  Dr. Zimmer’s head was twisted all the way around and his eyes were pointed off in odd directions.

  “Jesus,” Xeke said. Bile rose in his throat. “What happened?”

  “I killed him,” Ruddy said. “He looked like Tip. I thought he was going to … I was trying to protect Teri!”

  “Don’t feel too bad,” said Teri. Her voice sounded different—steady and sure. “He was as good as dead anyway. She had already destroyed his mind. He was a puppet—no more than a zombie.”

  “What the hell is going on?” Xeke said.

  Teri shrugged. A pale, ghostly version of herself winked into existence at her side.

  “Go ahead, Terry,” Teri said. “Explain it to him.”

  “This is Teresa,” Terry said in a flat, dead voice. “She’s the part of Teri I’ve been trying to protect us from.”

  “And you failed,” Teresa said. “But don’t worry. I’m going to set everything straight in just a minute. As soon as I finish dealing with ... this.”

  The woman huddled against the wall screamed again.

  Xeke’s voice was soft. “What are you doing to her?”

  “She’s torturing her,” Terry whispered.

  “Don’t be so dramatic,” Teresa said. “The bitch was going to do worse to us.”

  “God, that’s enough,” Terry said. “Just end it.”

  Teresa shrugged. “You’re right. It’s not as much fun as I expected, anyway.”

  Nazimi collapsed to the floor.

  Teresa sensed a familiar presence outside the door. “Oh good, Corey’s back,” she said. “I hate having to explain things more than once.”

  The door cracked open and Corey backed his way in, his arms full of boxes. “I couldn’t find any painkillers but I brought some food …” He froze as he turned around. “What happened here?”

  “There was some unpleasantness,” Teresa said. “Shut the door, it’s cold outside.”

  Corey’s gaze fell on Zimmer and Nazimi. “Are they dead?”

  “Yes,” Teresa said. She studied him. “Relax. I’m not planning a killing spree, not unless you idiots force my hand. Now sit down.”

  Corey sat.

  Teresa turned to her alter ego. “House of cards, Terry. It was always a house of cards.”

  Terry met her eyes. “I never meant for any of this to happen. I just wanted her to forget the worst of it.”

  “By the worst of it, she means me,” Teresa said. “I’m everything about Teri that no one wanted.”

  “It wasn’t like that! All I did was take a few bad memories. I didn’t mean to create you, I was trying to stop her nightmares.”

  “Well, congratulations, you did that. All the parts you deemed worthy of saving are gone, and now there’s just me.” She smiled. “And I don’t have nightmares.”

  Ruddy looked up from Zimmer’s body through red eyes. “What are you talking about? Teri ...”

  “Shut up, Ruddy,” Teresa said. She scanned his mind. He wanted something from Teri—everyone did—and she was going to find out what it was.

  But she saw no guile, no ulterior motives. She pushed harder. Ruddy slumped and cried out in pain. She burrowed deeper and found … still nothing. No subterfuge at all. He was desperate for approval, but that was the only thing he wanted from her.

  She stared at him. “You’ve got to be kidding me. No one is that naive.”

  She focused her scrutiny on Xeke next. He was harder to crack, and he had plenty of secrets … but they weren’t about her. He endured her mental assault without flinching.

  She exhaled and laughed. “I’ll be damned. I did not expect that.”

  “Wha …” Ruddy’s head was pounding. “Didn’t expect what?”

  Teresa chuckled. “This whole time I thought you were manipulating Teri with this rube act. But you actually care. Both of you. You’re just morons.”

  Corey cleared his throat. “Let’s all calm down and …”

  She held up her hand. “You need to stay out of this. You’re just here to babysit for Eliza. I know you’re only following orders but I don’t trust her. I should probably kill you now just to be safe.”

  “Teri!” Ruddy said.

  She rolled her eyes. “I’m not going to hurt him. He thinks he’s doing what’s right. I guess that’s good enough.”

  “I know you’re scared, Teri,” Ruddy said. “But I won’t let anything happen to you, I promise.”

  “Scared?” She laughed again and looked at Terry. “He is adorably stupid, isn’t he?

  Ruddy turned bright red.

  “You want to protect me?” Teresa said.

  “Yeah! Of course I do!”

  “Ruddy, I’m a mentalist. I’m one of the most powerful people in the world. Teri has been protecting you ever since you bumbled into that bus station—and she was a kitten compared to me.”

  “I know,” he said. “But you’re confused about some things. You’ve been through a lot.”

  “I’m confused? Have you checked a mirror lately? Less than an hour ago you almost murdered George for screwing Clara. Then you turned around and almost screwed her yourself.”

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  “What? That’s not true!”

  “You sure you want to get into this in front of your friends?”

  “Get into what? I was trying to help her.”

  “Bullshit. You took advantage of her situation just like Adrian did. Clara had what she had with Adrian because it was the price of his protection. When she turned to you for protection, you were more than willing to be her new Adrian.”

  “No, I wasn’t! You’re twisting everything around.”

  “So you weren’t hoping to get laid when you went after her? You didn’t have it in the back of your mind that she might be so grateful to you that she might fall into your arms and see you for the hero you really are?”

  “No!”

  “OK. Why weren’t you ‘helping’ all the less beautiful women in town—or the men, or the children? You ‘helped’ her because you fantasized about her loving you for it every time you saw her. Deep down, you know what you wanted.” She shook her head. “I’m a mentalist, Ruddy. You can’t lie to me the way you lie to yourself.”

  His face twisted. “It … wasn’t ... why are you …” He smacked his hand against the wall. “Dammit, I am not like Adrian!”

  She sighed. “I know that, you big goof. We’d be having a different sort of conversation right now if you were. I’m trying to make sure you don’t end up like him. You’ve got a good heart, but you’ve got all kinds of fucked up knight-in-shining-armor baggage going on.”

  “I didn’t do anything to her!”

  “Ha! You didn’t do anything for her either. Did you offer to bring her with you when you left? Did you explain to her that Teri wasn’t going to let anyone hurt her whether you were around or not? No, you didn’t. You loved the attention you were getting. You were mad at Teri, you were jealous of Xeke, and Clara was telling you everything you wanted to hear.”

  Teresa shook her head. “You’ve been pretending you’re a superhero in a comic book ever since you found out you were afflicted. This is the real world—it’s brutal, it’s awful, and when people die, they don’t come back. Clara isn’t a princess in a castle waiting to be rescued, and she’s not your reward for slaying the dragon. As long as she doesn’t know she has choices, she may as well still be a slave—and if you cared about her, the first thing you would have done is make it clear to her that she has other options. You never cared about Clara—it was all about you from the start. Admit it.”

  Ruddy opened his mouth, but the words caught in his throat. He blinked back tears.

  Teresa shrugged. “Or keep lying to yourself. Keep bumbling around with your eyes closed until you walk off a cliff. Your rich daddy isn’t going to bail you out anymore, and neither am I.”

  Xeke stepped up and squeezed Ruddy’s shoulder. “Don’t you think you’re being kind of hard on him? We’ve all been through a lot.”

  Teresa turned to Xeke. “Oh, now you’re going to pretend you give a shit about Ruddy? Please.” She smirked. “You act all-in whenever someone’s standing in front of you, but the truth is you’re just passing through our lives. You haven’t even thought about April or Tamara or any of your other friends since you left them behind. They’d do anything for you—even Fred, and she knows how lost you really are—but you wrote them off without shedding a tear the minute you left Penatuka. You’d do the same thing to Ruddy right now if he wasn’t literally tethered to you.”

  Xeke looked at the ground.

  Teresa took a step toward him. “You haven’t made a genuine connection with another human being since the Bethel massacre. Now that you’ve had one forced on you, you spend all your time trying to keep everyone in it from feeling anything. You’re so broken you make Ruddy, with all his delusions of morality, look like the fucking Rock of Gibraltar. Hell, even swiss-cheese-brained Teri was a pillar compared to you. You’re so close to shattering it hurts to look at you. You bury the pain deep, Ezekiel Daniels, but burying it isn’t the same as dealing with it—and if you don’t deal soon, you really will become the Antichrist.”

  “Hey!” Ruddy said. “Leave him alone!”

  “It’s okay,” Xeke said. “She’s not wrong.”

  “Oh, I know I’m not. I can see inside your head. I can see that black hole you’re swimming furiously away from. I feel sorry for you. The first time you allow yourself to really feel—let’s just say I hope I’m three states away when that happens. If you want to bury your own demons, fine—but it became my problem when you didn’t come clean with Teri. You buried her demon for the same reason you bury your own—because dealing with it meant making another emotional connection. You already let yourself get too close to Teri, didn’t you? So you kept putting off a confrontation, making excuses and giving fortune cookie advice while Terry whittled away.”

  Xeke sighed. “You’re right.”

  “That’s it. Agree and move on.” She snorted. “At least Ruddy tried to stand up for himself. You don’t even bother; it’s easier not to. Jesus, you may as well be dead already.”

  “That’s just mean,” Ruddy said. “You’re not being fair.”

  “Fair? If you think ‘fair’ exists in this world you really are an idiot.”

  “Why are you acting like this?” Ruddy said.

  She shrugged. “You two need to start dealing with your own shit. Training wheels are off, boys. Teri’s not around to protect you anymore.”

  “What do you mean you’re not around?” Ruddy said.

  Teresa ignored him and turned to Terry. “You’re sure being quiet. I think you should tell him why Teri isn’t coming back. It’s your fault after all.”

  Terry’s eyes never left the ground. “My fault? She was just a kid when this started. It was before she had powers. She created me to protect her, from Tip, from … everything. She didn’t need to remember all those things. You know what he did to us. No one should have to remember that. As long as I kept it hidden, she didn’t have to be afraid.”

  “Yeah, and how did that work out?” Teresa said. “You turned us into a cute paper doll—your sweet little Teri.”

  “You can’t keep her locked away!” Terry said. “She deserves more than that.”

  “I didn’t lock her away, I got rid of her.”

  Terry buried her face in her hands.

  “The sooner you accept it, the better. In fact, don’t call me Teri anymore. That’s what Tip called us. My name is Teresa. Teri’s gone.”

  The color drained from Ruddy’s face. “What do you mean she’s gone?”

  “Stop whining. You had your chance to save her and instead you both watched while a parasitic ghost burrowed through her mind like a worm. Now it’s done, and you’ve got me. No more paper doll.”

  “It wasn’t like that!” Ruddy said. “We were just trying to help.”

  “Broken record much?” Teresa said. “Chin up, soldier. Maybe there’s a little piece of your paper doll left in here somewhere. If I run across her, I’ll be sure to tell her you’re sorry.”

  “Please … don’t hurt her,” Ruddy said.

  “Hurt her?” Teresa’s eyes blazed. “I am her, you fucking moron. Your memories make you who you are. One by one, I was given all the pieces of her, until there was nothing left.”

  “That’s not true,” Ruddy said. “Teri is more than just memories.”

  “Oh, so you’re volunteering for an experiment,” Teresa said. “Let’s say we excise a few memories and see if you’re still Ruddy. What should we take out first? Your shitty father? Your overprotective mother? That lying bitch who only wanted your money? Stop me when you think we’re down to the parts worth keeping.”

  “Wait, no,” Ruddy said. “I get it.”

  Teresa laughed. “Don’t worry. I was just making a point.” She glanced at Terry. “I would never do something like that.”

  “So that’s it?” Ruddy said. “We make one mistake and now she’s gone forever?”

  “Mistakes have consequences,” Teresa said.

  “We can help you fix it,” Ruddy said.

  “As far as I’m concerned, I did fix it,” she said. “I’m more Teri Darby than the girl you knew ever was.”

  “She’s right,” Xeke said.

  Ruddy turned on him. “How can you say that?”

  “I don’t like it any more than you do,” Xeke said. “But we’ve all had a hand in this. We treated her like a child—made her important decisions without involving her. She needs to find her own way. If Teri wants to leave, we have no right to stop her.”

  “I told you,” Teresa said, eyes burning, “Teri is gone.”

  Xeke met her gaze. “Maybe you’re right. But you said memories are what makes a person. You have Teri’s memories of us, so maybe she isn’t gone. Either way, I’ll be there for you if you need me.”

  Teresa laughed. “You actually think you mean that, don’t you.”

  Ruddy glared at Xeke. “So you’re saying we let her leave?”

  “That’s my point,” Xeke said. “We don’t get to tell her whether she stays or goes.”

  “You’re finally getting it,” Teresa said. She flashed Xeke a smile.

  “But there must be some way to fix this,” Ruddy said. “I’ll apologize to Clara and do whatever you want me to. Just tell me what you want.”

  “Drop it, Ruddy. Remember what I said about the real world? You’ve got too much going on to be playing with paper dolls.” She looked at Nazimi’s body. “That bitch wasn’t after me, and she wasn’t after Xeke. Your death was her only objective. Remember the name Anu?”

  “No.” Ruddy’s eyes widened. “Wait … that Scourge guy said it, too.”

  “Ding ding ding. Give the man a prize. Whoever Anu is, she worshipped him—and I mean worship in the biblical sense. There were places in her mind that even I couldn’t touch, and that should scare the shit out of you. My advice is find a place to hole up and try to figure out why this Anu is so obsessed with ending you.”

  “This sounds like something that affects us all,” Corey said. “Maybe we can help each other.”

  “What you mean is that I can help you. No thanks. People have a tendency to complicate the shit out of everything, and I don’t want to have to worry about babysitting a bunch of do-gooders. If I wanted to live in an idiotic fantasyland, I’d go back to Penatuka. But you can stop worrying. I promise I won’t destroy the world.” She winked at him. “Unless the world asks for it.”

  She pulled on her coat. “And tell Eliza to leave me alone. I’ll keep your secrets, but I’m not going to be part of her schemes.” She turned toward the door. “Later, guys.”

  “Wait!” Ruddy’s face was wet with tears. “Don’t go, Teri! I know you can hear me! You can fight her.”

  Teresa sighed. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry you lost your best friend. Maybe this will make it sting a little less.”

  She shoved Terry into his mind.

  “Take care of yourselves,” she said. “I won’t forget you.”

  The door closed with a dull thump. Ruddy grabbed for her through the link, but only Xeke was there.

  Teri was gone.