My hands start shaking again, and I have to turn and watch Abby’s chest rise and fall a few times, making sure she’s okay. Lucifer healed her, just like how my father healed me when I was sick. She made a complete recovery, and it was like the bullet never entered her body.
The bullet.
It’s still on the floor next to Abby. Standing, I take a step to get it but see something out of the corner of my eye. I turn and see Easton bound up the porch steps. I telekinetically open the door and slam it shut behind him once he’s in the house.
“Callie, what’s—holy fuck.” His brown eyes widen, and he looks at Abby lying on the floor. “Is she—”
“She’s fine,” I rush out. Tears spring to my eyes, as the fear of almost losing my sister crashes down on me all over again. Easton shifts his gaze from Abby to the blood on my hands.
“What the fuck is going on?” he asks slowly and looks around the foyer. “Where’s Roger? Did he get away?”
“No,” I say with a shake of my head. “I’m pretty sure I killed him, but I told you, he’s gone and won’t be found.”
Easton looks at me unblinking for a few seconds, and then goes over to Abby, dropping to his knees and checking her pulse.
“She’s asleep,” I start. “Obviously. I cast a sleep spell on her.”
“It looks like she’s been shot.” Easton carefully pulls up Abby’s shirt. “But there’s no wound.”
“She was shot, but…but…” The less people who know the truth the better, I know. But how the fuck am I supposed to explain this to Easton? I need his help, and I know he’s stubborn enough to refuse to help until he hears what he wants.
“She was healed.”
“By magic?”
“Yes,” I say, and it’s not technically a lie. It is a type of magic. “I’ll explain it all later, I promise.” I actually don’t promise. “But Abby’s husband and daughter could be home any minute now and I don’t want them to walk in and see this.”
“Okay.” Easton stands, holding his right hand out in front of him. His fingertips have Abby’s blood on them from when he checked her for bullet wounds. I rip off another paper towel and give it to him. “Should you wake her now?”
“No.”
He tips his head. “You’re going to take away her memory, aren’t you?”
“Yes, there’s no reason she has to remember this,” I repeat Lucifer’s words. “She’s already been subjected to so much because of me and who I am. This…she doesn’t need to remember.”
Easton swallows hard, Adam’s apple bobbing up and down. “Are you sure it’ll work?”
“Taking away her memory?”
“Yeah. Being brain-raped isn’t something I’d usually support, but if you’re going to do it, make sure she doesn’t get flashes. No dreams about getting shot and waking up wondering if it actually happened or not.” He looks at the broken ginger jar on the floor. “You need an explanation for all this.”
“Thanks, Captain Obvious,” I snap. “And I know. It’ not my first time changing someone’s memories or being brain raped as you so nicely put it.”
“Hey,” he spits right back. “You don’t know what it’s like having someone get into your head like that.” He jams his finger into his temple. “To have pieces missing that you know are missing yet you can’t for the life of you make sense of it. You feel like you’ve lost your shit.”
“No, I don’t, and you hunters really need to let that go. Witches can’t be held spellbound, and when you finally admit you’re jealous, maybe it’ll lead you in the right direction and you’ll stop hunting us.”
“That has nothing to do with this, Callie.”
I set my jaw and glare at Easton. We’ve come a long way from the star-crossed teenage lovers he tricked me into believing we were. I’ve moved on and have truly forgiven him, and now I feel confident trusting him.
I think. Maybe? Shit. I really need to trust him right now.
“Fine,” I sigh. “I’m sorry you were held spellbound and felt like you had someone pry their way into your mind and take away your memories. It does sound kind of shitty.”
“Kind of?”
“More than kind of then, happy?”
“I don’t want to fight. I’m sorry too.”
“Thank you.” I take in a breath and my stomach flip-flops again. I’m certain there’s nothing left to come up but bile at this point and thinking about it burning my nose makes me feel even more sick. “I don’t want to do anything that would hurt Abby, and I think removing this from her memory is the lesser of two evils. She’s been trying so hard to hang out and reconnect.”
“I agree with you there. But what are you going to do? Strip her down, scrub the blood from her skin, and change her clothes?”
“I hadn’t thought that far ahead, but a glamour would be easier than doing all that. She’ll think her clothes look like they did before she got shot.” Saying the words out loud are like a punch to the face. I close my eyes, trying to keep tears at bay.
“Hey,” Easton says gently and steps over. He puts his hand on my shoulder. “It’s okay.”
“But it’s not.” I open my eyes and blink rapidly, failing at keeping the tears from rolling down my cheeks. “I hate that she got involved. I hate that she got shot. Shot. She got shot and was dying before my eyes and then…” I trail off, voice thin and throat tight.
“You healed her?”
“I had help.” I wipe my face with the back of my hand. “I’ll explain later,” I repeat. “We need to clean this all up and then somehow figure out how to remove the footage from her security system.” I point to the camera in the corner.
“I can do that,” Easton tells me and lets his hand slowly slide down my shoulder. Lucas told me months ago that he thought Easton was still in love with me. I dismissed it at the time, and I don’t have the luxury of mulling it over now. Besides, what does it matter? I’m very happily married with a baby on the way.
“You can?”
“Yeah. And if I can’t, I can call Melinda for help. She was always the go-to when we needed to hack into traffic cams. And we’ve needed to remove our fair share of demon-related killings too.”
“I have no idea what kind of security system she has, but I think she can access it on her phone.”
“Do you know her password to get onto her phone?”
“No, but it has facial recognition.”
“Good. Where is it?”
“The kitchen,” I tell him and point through the foyer.
“Are you okay to handle this?” Easton asks before he takes a step forward.
“Yeah. I’ll get it. Thank you again.”
He nods and hurries into the kitchen to get Abby’s phone. I go back to the door, spraying it down with cleaner again. The smell chokes me, and I get up to open a window. The less I have to alter in Abby’s mind the better, and explaining why her house suddenly smells like the cleaning crew had just been here is one less thing to worry about.