Heather sat up and turned her head again, her eyes wide with wonder as she stared at Brandon through the darkness. “You know Mina?”
“I did. I’m pretty sure I told you earlier that we met someone who mentioned you to my girlfriend, right? She said her name was Mina, and Cass got the impression she was related to you somehow. Was she?”
Heather didn’t say anything for a long time, but when she did, her voice broke slightly. “She was my sister.”
He nodded. Cass had gotten the impression they were related one way or another, though she wasn’t exactly sure how.
“I’d seen ’em in the woods, a few weeks earlier. Told my folks. They didn’t believe me. You see, my pa said he never believed in none of that mumbo jumbo. He got mad at my ma for even talkin’ to anyone about it. Back when we lived in Virginia, even before I was born, up until we moved west, my ma had sidled up to a neighbor man who was big on all a this. Pa thought they got a little too close. Maybe he was right. This feller had blond hair, and both my ma and pa was darker.” She ran her fingers through the end of her blonde ponytail. “Anyhow... I seen ‘em in the woods. One of ‘em chased me. Somehow, I managed to get away. But after that, I didn’t feel right for a long time. Then, one night they come in.” She shook her head slowly, and Brandon could see her reliving the situation in her mind. “Mina and my older brother’s daughter was the only ones they left alive. ‘Cept they weren’t really alive, now were they?”
“That must’ve been horrible,” Brandon said, stopping short of reaching out to physically comfort her.
“It wasn’t no picnic, that’s for sure. Next day, I felt even more different than I had before. Mina, well, it was certain right off the bat what she was, and the baby. The others came back for her pretty quick after that. Made them part of their little clan or whatever you call it. Me, I was on the outs. They didn’t want nothin’ to do with me. So I went lookin’ for someone like me. Weren’t no one, though. The Hunters and Guardians tried to kill me and couldn’t. Eventually, I went back to the Vampires. They let me in for a bit, thanks to my sister. But in the end, even she couldn’t save me. They tried every way imaginable to try to knock me off, too. I been bitten, beaten, stabbed, shot, ‘lectricuted, drowned, you name it. I been through it. So... to get rid of me, they put me here.”
Brandon let that sit for a minute, his eyes wide in astonishment and not sure how to respond. No words would really come to mind, so he said, “That really sucks.”
“Sure does,” she agreed, having picked up on the vernacular from the amount of times Dax and Brandon had used the expression recently, no doubt. She let the topic of her own demise go. “I guess yer sayin’ Mina’s dead then?”
“Yes. Aaron dispatched her a few months ago, right before Holland—the Vampire Queen—called the group Mina was with into action to raid our headquarters.”
Heather nodded, but she didn’t look particularly sad. “She coulda tried harder to save me. I don’t think she ever thought of me as her sister again after seein’ what I become.”
“I’m really sorry you were treated that way, Heather. I guarantee it won’t be like that when you come out of the portal. We’ll welcome you into our group.”
She raised an eyebrow, like she wasn’t sure if she could trust him, and Brandon didn’t blame her. “Reckon we’ll see.”
They sat in silence for several more minutes as Brandon listened to the rise and fall of discussion from the other end of the tunnel and the soft howling and hissing in the distance. Imagining his life back at headquarters, his group of friends, hanging out at the pizza place, with Heather alongside them, didn’t quite seem right. But then, he was sure she’d calm down once she saw he was correct, and they really could be friends.
“Do you know what happened to the baby?” Heather asked, breaking the silence. “Guess she weren’t really a baby, but that’s what Mina always called her. She was a little thing. Mean as hell, though. Mina and her husband took her in as they’s own.”
Brandon shifted to look at her, pretty sure he had the answer she was looking for. “What was her name?”
“Bonnie.”
Mean as hell didn’t quite cover it. He let out a slow breath as he contemplated how to tell her what had become of the little cherub. “It took three or four Guardians and a couple of Hunters, I think, but she died. Right after she tried to kill Dax’s girlfriend.”
Heather’s head rocked back and forth. “Good. I seen her destroy a whole camp of Apaches one time. All by herself. Crazy little bitch. I been killin’ Vampires for a century. Ain’t never come across one as evil as that little devil.”
Brandon nodded in agreement. “I wish we’d had you with us when we found them in the first place. You could’ve saved us a lot of trouble.”
For the first time since Brandon had met her, a smile spread across Heather’s face. “Maybe I’ll be useful to you after all then.”
“I think you will. And Cassidy is going to be so relieved to know she’s not the only Hybrid anymore.”
A shadow passed across Heather’s face, and he could see her identifying with the emotions Cassidy had felt since that day in Philadelphia when she’d been changed into something none of them had even known was possible.
“It’d be nice not to feel all alone for a change, I reckon.” Heather swallowed hard. “I reckon it would.”
