He leaned over to take both of the cups from my hands and set them on the roof beside him, and then he leaned over and reached down to help hoist me up.
It was chilly, and I wrapped the hoodie around me as I sipped on the steaming coffee.
“Thanks,” he said as he put the cup to his lips.
Silence fell between us before he spoke again. “They’re right, you know. If I were you, I would have just killed me by now too.”
“I can’t kill you, Michael,” I said quietly. “And I think you know that.”
He nodded his head as if realizing that we were both trapped by the same very inconvenient feelings for each other.
“Can I ask you something?” I said.
He shrugged. “Sure.”
“Why did you kill my mother?”
Michael took another sip of his coffee. His blue eyes looked heavier and grayer now. His hair had gotten longer over the past few weeks, and golden strands of it were blowing down into his eyes.
“I knew that I would have to answer that question from you someday,” he said. “I just didn’t think I would feel the way I did about you when that time came.”
I had always seen Michael as some sort of conceited monster, and now I saw him for what he truly was; a man caught in the middle of something that he hadn’t asked for.
“Your mother was a wonderful woman,” he said. “I’m not sure if you knew this, but our parents knew each other when we were kids. I can remember that there were a few occasions when we would be at the same events together, you and me. I used to be so jealous of you; you had the mother that I wanted. Pauline loved you so much. She would play with you and spend time with you; she taught you to be strong and kind. My mother didn’t care about any of that. She only cared about what our family looked like to others.”
I wanted to feel sorry for him, but I couldn’t. Not after what he had done.
“My mother didn’t deserve to die,” I said.
He shook his head. “No, she did not. And I didn’t want to kill her.”
Michael set his cup down and turned to face me. “Lisette, I know who the man is taking over as Headmaster at Lineage. He is a horrible, treacherous man that has threatened to kill anyone who got in the way of his plans. When he found out that your mother knew what he was doing, he was going to have her killed. But not just killed, he was going to do much worse.”
I furrowed my brow tightly. “What could be worse than being killed?”
“It’s not important,” Michael said as he veered back to his explanation. “The important thing is that there were two options for your mother: to either be killed or to withstand a lifetime of torture and to watch her daughter suffer as well. Your mother knew that. She knew those were her only options. She knew that there was nowhere to run that he wouldn’t come after her to silence what she had found out. So, she reached out to me.”
I felt my face pale. “What? My mother talked to you?”
Michael nodded. “Yeah. We wrote her note together in my handwriting. She wanted you to know that she didn’t leave you on purpose, and she knew that you would know it wasn’t her note. But the words in it were hers. They were a message to you.”
“But you killed her!” I started to sob so hard that I choked on my cries.
I hated him. I hated him so much for killing my mother. I hit my hands against his chest and screamed how much I hated him, and he sat there and let me. Then after a while, he grabbed my wrists and put his face to mine. I glared into his glassy eyes that were filling with tears as he looked at me.
“Yes, I did. And I am so deeply sorry. I know you hate me for it, and a part of you always will. I hate myself for it too. But I had no other choice. I saved your mother in the only way that I knew how: by giving her the quickest and most painless death I could. And she knew that by doing that—that by us doing that—she could save her daughter from what they would have done to you if your mother had stayed alive.”
I cried so hard that I thought I would drown in my own tears. “I want you to leave.”
I sobbed profusely as I buried my head against his chest.
“No, you don’t,” he said softly before he let go of my wrists and held me. “If I could have left you, Lisette, I would have already done it. Do you have any idea how much I hate myself for what I’ve done, and how much I hate you for being a constant reminder of it every single day of my life? You have caused me so much anguish. You’ve turned my life upside-down and tangled my emotions into a hopeless knot when all I have tried to do was hate you and stay away from you. I have struggled against myself and lost because no matter what I do, I can’t get away from you.”
I looked up at him and wiped my face with my sleeve.
“You can hate me; you should hate me,” he said. “But I will love you anyway.”
He leaned forward to kiss me, and I wasn’t going to stop him. But then, he suddenly froze.
“Get inside,” he said.
I could tell by the tone of his voice that we were in trouble. He jumped down from the roof and caught me as I followed behind him. We ran into the house, and he dead-bolted the door shut.
Julian and Adam were just waking up. however.
“Hey, we were wondering where you went,” Adam said groggily.
As soon as he caught the look on Michael’s face, though, he set down his cup.
“They’re here,” Michael said.
“How many are there?” Adam asked.
Michael shook his head. “I’m not sure, maybe a half dozen Lineage guys. Mostly students. I didn’t see any guards.”
Julian grabbed my hand and led me to his bedroom closet. “Stay in here and stay quiet,” he said. “Don’t be worried, we’re pretty good at hiding out in closets, remember?” he teased, hoping that it would make me feel better.
But, it didn’t.
