“We’re sisters. Family. Like copies of each other.”
“It’s not true. I’m nothing like you and Samantha. Go away.”
“We will never leave you.” Samantha’s cackling got louder and louder.
“Please, God. No.” She couldn’t take it anymore. She had to get away.
“We have work for you to do, Emma,” Lily said. “People that need to pay for their crimes against us. You can’t imagine how powerful you will feel the first time you watch someone die by your own hands.”
“Emma, you will know very soon how amazing it feels to kill,” Samantha said.
“Stop it. Get out of my head. I won’t. I couldn’t.”
“Yes, you will. Sam and I will make sure of it.”
“No. No. No. I will not hurt anyone. Ever.” She looked around the room, expecting to see wispy images of her two dead sisters. “I am not alone. Bane and Adam made you go away. They will again.” I need them.
“Those two idiots you’ve been fucking can’t drive us away,” Lily said. “We’re here to stay.”
Samantha mocked, “Forever and ever and ever and ever.”
Emma brought her hands up to her ears, but her sister’s chant never ended. In a complete panic and unable to stand another second hearing them, she ran out of the house and into Bane and Adam’s embrace.
* * * *
Bane and his brother held Emma tight between them. It was obvious by her tremors that something had scared her to death. “Baby, it’s okay. We are here.”
“You are safe with us,” Adam whis
pered to her.
“I–I…they were…inside…”
His gut tightened. Had there been an intruder? Other than being shaken up, Em looked fine. If anyone harmed a single hair on her head, I will kill them.
Adam released her and ran into the house. Bane knew he was going to check it out.
“Shh, sweetheart.” He cupped her chin. “You can tell us all about it once you catch your breath.”
It took several minutes of consoling Emma for her to relax enough to talk coherently. “I’m okay now, Bane.”
Clearly, she wasn’t. “Was someone in your house?”
“No.”
Adam came out and gave him the thumbs-up that all was clear inside. “Are you feeling better now, Em?”
She nodded. “Yes. They never bother me when you’re here.”
They?
Bane held her tight. “Who never bothers you, sweetheart?”
She closed her eyes. “I hear my dead sisters’ voices.”
Adam came up behind her, wrapping her up between them. “It’s okay.”
“I have been hearing my sisters’ voices ever since Mom and Lily’s funeral. Lily and Samantha say I’m just like them. Our father went crazy. They went crazy. Now, I’m going crazy.”