“Yes. I guess they always did. I know I killed to survive. I know it was a child, striking out to save herself. But I know, too, I felt . . . joy in the killing. In driving that knife, that little knife, into him again and again and again, I felt euphoric.”
“And why shouldn’t you?”
In absolute shock, Eve stared at Mira. “I’ve killed since, in the line. There’s no joy. There can’t be.”
“But this wasn’t in the line. This wasn’t a trained officer acting in the line of duty. This was a child, one who had been continually, systematically, brutally abused, physically, mentally, emotionally. A child in terror and pain, killing a monster. And that joy, Eve, didn’t last. It’s only part of the reason you suppressed. It frightened you, that joy, because of who and what you are. He couldn’t make you an animal, couldn’t make another monster out of you. You killed a beast, and felt glad. You took a life, and punished yourself.”
“If I ever felt that again, ever felt glad again with blood on my hands, I couldn’t come back from it.”
“Is that what frightens you?”
“It . . . disturbs me to know that’s in me.”
“In all of us,” Mira said. “Most are never put in a position where they experience, or choose to experience it. Some who understand it become monsters. Others who understand it become the ones who hunt the monsters, and protect the rest of us.”
“Most times I understand, and accept that. Here, it blurs.
“I attacked Roarke when I had a nightmare here.”
“It was nothing,” he began, and she rounded on him.
“Don’t say that! Don’t protect me. I clawed, and I bit. I drew his blood, for God’s sake. If I’d had a weapon, I’d have used it. I’m afraid to sleep.” It jerked out of her. “I’m afraid I’ll do it again.”
“Have you?”
“No, but I looked into my mother’s eyes this morning, and I knew her. I stood over her body this afternoon, and I remembered her. Some. I remember some.”
“And you’re afraid, with those emerging memories, you’ll become more violent when your defenses are down in sleep.”
“It follows, doesn’t it?”
“I can’t promise you there won’t be more nightmares, or that they won’t become violent. But I can tell you what I believe. Your first night here, under such strain, with your past so close to the surface, you . . . overloaded.”
“Is that a shrink term?”
“It’s one you understand. You couldn’t hold any more, couldn’t contain any more. You weren’t attacking Roarke, but defending yourself against the person trying to hurt you.”
“I did hurt her,” Roarke admitted.
“And with the physical and psychic pain merging, you fought back.”
“What’s to stop me from doing just that again?” Eve demanded. “How long are either of us supposed to lie down at night and wait for the battle and the blood?”
“I could give you medications for the short term. Or,” Mira continued, “you could consider something you haven’t yet spoken of. If you recognized your mother, isn’t it possible your subconscious already had when you studied the photos of the woman you suspected was McQueen’s partner?”
“Yeah. I knew there was something, but I couldn’t get down to it. I couldn’t reach it.”
“Consciously. You’re not only trained to be observant, Eve, you’re naturally so. Often uncomfortably so. If you recognized her, added the strain of that to the rest, it’s hardly a wonder it manifested in a traumatic and violent nightmare. She was part of what you hadn’t yet come to terms with, what you continued to block out. The mother, the symbol of everything intended to nurture, to tend, to love and protect.”
“She hated me.”
“Why do you say that?”
“Because I saw it, I felt it. I knew it even when I was—who the hell knows? Three, four, five. She liked to knock me around. She had me because he got the bright idea to breed their own moneymaker. I was less than a dog to her, and the reality of me was more than she’d bargained for. She wanted to sell me, but he wouldn’t. The investment wasn’t ripe enough, not yet. She’d hit me when he wasn’t there, or just shove me in a closet. It’s dark, and there’s nothing to eat. She didn’t even give me a name. I was nothing to her. Less than nothing.”
She took a shaky swallow of wine. “She didn’t know me. When we were face-to-face again, and she looked right at me. She didn’t know me.”
“Did that hurt you?”