The Changeling (27 page)

“You’re right,” I whispered. I closed my eyes and clenched the hair on both sides of my head.

Telling Doug meant I had to ask Billy for help, and that would make him angry. A vision of his angry, disappointed face flashed through my thoughts, and I felt nauseated. If Cassandra was compelling Doug, it made matters worse.

“What’s wrong?” Candace asked.

I kept my eyes closed. “If Doug is being compelled, and Billy un-compels him…”

“She’ll know?” Candace whispered.

I nodded. “He’ll be in even more danger.”

“I hate them,” Rachel seethed.

“I feel so weak, so pathetically weak and helpless. Can Billy protect him?” Ronnie asked.

“She’s nearly half a million years old…much older and more powerful than Billy,” I said.

“Can you protect him?” Rachel asked.

“She’s far more powerful than I am…right now, at least. And if I interfere directly…”

Candace squeezed my forearm and I finally opened my eyes. “Mitch?”

“Yes,” I said, getting emotional.

“I hate them!” Rachel growled. “What about Sara?”

I shook my head. “She’s more powerful, but she can’t know that you are aware of the Fae, and she certainly can’t know that Doug is. She’s on our side, but the Council knows everything she knows.”

Rachel’s fingers slipped off mine and she balled her hands into fists, staring out the window.

“She doesn’t have to know, does she?” Ronnie asked.

Candace stared at him, the corners of her mouth pulling up in a slight smile. “What are you thinking?”

“Well, what if Billy fixes Doug like he did with Rhonda, but he doesn’t tell Doug about the Fae. Rhonda doesn’t even know Billy
fixed
her, right?”

Candace nodded her head, smiling more broadly.

“What? What would that do?” I asked.

Rachel shook her head. “If Doug doesn’t know about the Fae, or if Billy can teach him to hide it, like we can, then Sara can protect him and she’d never know. That doesn’t change the fact that he deserves the truth.”

“Rachel’s right. Besides, you had weeks to practice and you haven’t been exposed to twenty-four hour surveillance. It sucks. Trust me. Hiding the images in your mind, carrying on like normal is nearly impossible and it takes a lot of practice,” I said.

“Well, what if Billy compels Doug to hide the images? Can’t he just give him a boost or something?” Ronnie asked.

“I hadn’t thought of that.” I said.

Ronnie leaned back, crossed his arms, and seemed exceptionally proud of himself.

“That’s a great idea. I’m ashamed I didn’t think of it first,” Candace said.

In an exaggerated flourish, Ronnie wove his fingers together behind his head and crossed his legs. “Yep, leave it to the man.”

“Uhhck…” Candace said, rolling her eyes. “You didn’t really just say that.”

Ronnie laughed.

“Oh stop gloating. Like most men, you’ve had exactly one good idea in seventeen years.”

“Ouch, evil ingrate!”

“So tell us, mighty oracle, what next?” she teased.

“It’s simple—we go find Billy right now. Where will he be, Mags?”

“Turpentine Creek,” I said.

He smiled. “After we find Billy and convince him, Maggie calls Doug and tells him to meet her at Turpentine Creek.”

“I think that sounds like a plan,” Rachel said, smiling broadly.

“That would be two great ideas, two, if I’m not mistaken, in the last five minutes, would it not? Maggie, isn’t that two?”

I laughed and nodded, Ronnie smirked, and Candace shook her head trying not to laugh. “Ronnie, do you need a head start? It’s nearly fifteen miles round trip, you know. Do you need to get more coal for your dreadnaught before we leave?”

“Got a fresh load this morning. It’ll make it just fine, but do you need a minute to wind your Miata up?”

“Nope. Good to go,” she said, laughing.

“Rachel, you with me?” he asked.

“Umm…I think I’ll ride with Maggie.”

“Et tu, Rachel?”

***

In the parking lot, Candace and Ronnie were jostling with each other again.

“Thanks for the smoke screen, Ronnie. We slipped past the enemy U-boats completely unseen.”

“Anything to camouflage that annoying yellow roller skate.”

“What enemy U-boats?” Billy said, appearing in the middle of us.

Rachel nearly hyperventilated.

“What are you doing here?” Billy asked. “I heard the commotion from that…hideous thing…a mile away.” He stared disapprovingly at Ronnie’s Buick.

Ronnie blushed. “Sorry.”

Candace smirked. “I told you…”

“Shut it,” Ronnie snapped, cutting Candace off. “It’s all I can afford.”

Billy scanned the parking lot, looked sympathetically at Ronnie, and placed his hand on the back fender. Within a few seconds the old Buick looked brand new—gleaming paint, perfect chrome, shiny interior, and it no longer sagged in the rear end.

“What…? How…?” Ronnie sputtered, wide eyed.

“Call it an act of mercy,” Billy wrinkled his nose. “Now, at least, you won’t wake the dead—or destroy
as much
of the ozone. Why are you here?”

I quickly explained what we feared about Doug. Billy’s expression didn’t change. Then I gingerly told him our plan. He wasn’t angry. He was worried.

“Are you sure he’s being compelled?” Billy asked, staring at me.

While Rachel told him what she’d noticed, with Ronnie and Candace adding bits and pieces of detail, I simply wrote,
Yes, I’m sure—almost positive,
in my head.

“Call him, now,” Billy said.

“
Make sure you want to do this. If it’s true, I’m not certain telling him will change anything. Putting him beyond her reach might just shift her focus to one of them,”
he said silently, his eyes shifting to my co-conspirators.
“If, however, we reverse the glamour but keep him in the dark, we could inform the Council.”

I honestly don’t know anything except that Rachel is right. If it were me, I’d want to know,
I wrote in my mind.

“
Very well. Call him. I’ll do what I can.”

Billy left after telling us that he would make certain Doug would show up. He told us to meet them at Pivot Rock, where we could talk privately. Doug was all too eager to talk to me. We rode with Ronnie, who babbled on about Billy’s overhaul. Candace crafted a story to explain the transformation of the Riviera to everyone else. In thirty minutes, Doug pulled into the parking lot at Pivot Rock, with Billy stowed away in the Jeep. I could tell immediately Doug was different—visibly calm for the first time in months, he shut the door behind himself and smiled at the three of us.

Wearing a ball cap pulled on backwards, black gym shorts, a wrinkled white Razorback t-shirt with the sleeves cut out, he looked as if he’d jumped in the Jeep in the middle of a work out.

“Thanks for coming,” I said.

Tears welled up in his eyes. “I don’t know why I’ve been so…I’m sorry…” he pleaded.

“Don’t apologize, just listen, please. I have something I need to tell you.”

He wasn’t in the mood to argue. He just stood there quietly. “
Thank you, Billy. Has he been compelled?”
I wrote.

Billy’s voice sounded in my mind.
“Yes. From what I can tell, Chalen and Cassandra have been compelling him for more than a year. They implanted the infatuation with you, the anger, the jealously…and Cassandra has done…other things to him. His emotions are a mess. Tread carefully.”

Guilt and anger forced tears over my eyelids and down my face. I couldn’t talk. Doug sauntered over to me, a big frown on his face, and cupped my elbows in his hands. “Shhh, shhh, forgive me, Havana. I’m so sorry for the way…”

I gently put my hand over his mouth. My voice cracked as I said, “No Doug, please don’t talk. None of this has been your fault. None of this.”

Rachel understood my reaction and began crying herself. Doug stared at her. He was confused.

“Doug, there’s something we have to tell you. Something you’re going to find…you’re going to think we’re crazy.”

He gently, slowly embraced me, like he expected me to lash out.

“Billy,” I said, “it’s time.”

Doug didn’t react like I expected as Billy appeared. He silently shifted his stare between all of us as Billy began explaining and showing him that what he said was the truth. Doug closed his eyes and appeared to get angry when we told him that he’d been compelled. Then, an hour into the explanation, Billy asked him the important question: “Do you want me to make you forget, or do you want to know?”

“Do I have to decide right now?” Doug asked.

“No. You can decide any time, but I do need to teach you how to hide the images in your mind until you decide. To prevent any of this from happening again, one of my kind will watch over you. She must not know that you’re aware of us.”

“What’s to prevent her, or any of you, from doing this to me again?” he asked

“She would never. Sara finds it appalling,” Billy said.

“Sara? Maggie’s friend, Sara? The tiny pixie?”

“She’s capable of turning boulders into dust,” I said.

Doug nodded at me, and turned to Rachel. “Thank you for standing up for me, for insisting they tell me. I’m so sorry for how I treated you. I’ll never forgive myself.”

“I knew it wasn’t you. You’re not the type,” she said, blushing.

He grinned at her. “You always believe the best about people.”

He meant it as a compliment to Rachel, and it was certainly true, but I also read it as a swipe at me. Deserved as it was, it stung. Over the last hour, he had stopped making eye contact with me, and turned slightly so I stared at his shoulder.

“Am I still under
her
influence?” he asked, turning back to Billy.

“No. I’ve corrected that. What you feel now is
mostly
you. The images she implanted, and the feelings you felt, still affect you, and I can get rid of them, but you’re no longer under her influence. Give it time—you’ll recover on your own. Do you want me to speed up the process?”

Doug shook his head. “No, I want them for right now. It’s the first time I’ve actually felt like me since…I’m not sure. Can I talk to Maggie now…alone?”

“Yes, of course,” Billy said before disappearing.

“Do you want us to come back in a few and give you a lift back to your car?” Ronnie asked me.

“Doug, can you give me a ride?”

He thought about it for a second. “Do I have to go near your house? Her?”

“No, my car’s at Turpentine Creek,” I said.

“I’ve got her,” Doug said to Ronnie.

We sat in his Jeep in silence until Ronnie’s car glided through the parking lot and out of view. Doug started the Jeep and slowly pulled onto the highway.

“I’m sorry about all of this,” I said, trying to break the ice.

He didn’t look at me, but kept his steely gaze on the road. “I don’t blame you for what they did to me, Maggie.”

Oh great. It’s Maggie now.

“I know you’ve been consumed by what’s happening with Mitch. And now that I know he’s been kidnapped, it makes even more sense. I honestly can’t imagine what you’re going through.”

“But…”

“Yeah, that. You’ve always said we’re friends, but you didn’t trust me with the truth. Do you know how that makes me feel?”

“I couldn’t tell you the truth with the potential of Cassandra finding out.”

He looked out the driver’s side for a second, and then turned his focus back to the road. “You see, I get that, but if it weren’t for Rachel’s insistence, I still wouldn’t know, would I?”

There was only one answer. “No.” His knuckles turned white as he gripped the steering wheel.

“Doug, I didn’t know how to tell you and protect you at the same time. I was afraid of what they might do.”

“What changed?”

“Ronnie figured out how to do it, how to tell you and protect you at the same time.”

“I owe him a big thanks too, I guess.”

“I’m sorry…” I said.

“Stop saying that, Maggie. I don’t want to hear it again. You did what you thought was right, and I will respect that.”

“But you’re still angry.”

“Wouldn’t you be?” he asked, finally glancing at me for a second. His eyes, blue as the Caribbean, were bloodshot. Though he sat just inches from me, he seemed miles away then.

I nodded and stared at the passing trees.

“Maggie, I just can’t get over the fact that you seemed willing to let me go it alone. I love you—I would never do that to you.”

“You were compelled…”

He huffed and jammed the brakes hard enough to stop me mid-sentence. “Don’t even go there. Billy told me when they started the mind tricks. They didn’t create my feelings, Maggie. They just played with them. I fell in love with you by the pool the day I met you, when you were such a …”