Eric Jackson Evans, Chief of the District One Police Department in Malibu, strode through the halls of his family's mansion without seeing it. The huge place, all Gothic heights and spires and dark oak paneling, had been in the family for generations.

Ever since Angelica Thomas had had it built nearly one hundred and fifty years ago. Though the woman had lived to well over a hundred, Eric had never met her. His great-great-great-great grandmother was a legend, though no one quite knew why anymore. Angelica's daughter, Daemonia Thomas-Evans, died only five years before Eric was born--between Nia and her mother they'd had almost two hundred and fifty years. Nia's son Jackson had kept the place up, but the rest of the extensive family had spread out, mostly in government pursuits.

But now Jackson had been informed that he had lung cancer, and he was dying. As one of the only Evans still living in the Malibu area, Eric had been the one to answer his great-granduncle's call. Jackson had a secret, he said, that he'd kept for years. It had been entrusted to him by his mother before she died, but Daemonia had never known quite what to do with it. So she'd kept it to herself. Now, Jackson would pass it on to Eric, as he'd never had any children.

No, Eric thought wryly. That had been left to Jackson's only sibling, Erica. Her multitude of children, all of whom had taken either the name Thomas or Evans as their surnames, much to their father and husbands' irritation, were spread far and wide over the world. Eric himself was the son one of Erica's grandsons.

He strode into Jackson's study to see the elderly man sitting behind Angelica's cherrywood desk, staring at a small book on the table before him. He looked up when Eric entered, and smiled slightly.

"Welcome, my boy. Sit, sit."

Dropping his jacket on a chair, Eric sat, and waited. And waited.

And waited.

Finally he could take it no more. As Chief of police he'd learned patience, but it wasn't something he felt compelled to utilize when around his robust, loud, lively family members. "What goes, Uncle?"

Jackson smiled. "As I told you on the phone, Eric, I've something to share with you. Like my mother I've never been sure what to do with this information. But so many years have passed since these events took place that it seems rather silly to withhold it now. I think it's time for the family to know the truth."

"The truth?"

Jackson sighed and nodded, his long, pale fingers absently caressing the book before him. "Yes, Eric. The truth. The truth, about Angelica Thomas."

Eric began to get a bad feeling in the pit of his stomach. "What truth, Uncle?"

The old man sat there staring at the book for so long that Eric wasn't sure he'd get an answer. But finally, as if it pained him greatly to do so, Jackson Evans shoved the book across the ancient desk at Eric.

"Read it, boy. Then make your choice."

Eric didn't want to touch the book. There was something about it... he couldn't place what it was, but he didn't like it. "My choice?"

"Yes, your choice. Will you keep this knowledge secret, as I have, and Daemonia did. Or will you tell the family what they deserve to know, possibly tearing them apart forever. It is up to you."

With that the old man stood up, picked up his cane, and walked from the room, seeming oddly dignified for a man who was known to still romp about with his great-great grandnieces and nephews.

Eric sat and stared at the little, nondescript brown book before him. Then, taking a deep breath, he pulled open the worn leather cover.

There, inscribed on the inside cover, were two etched words that made his heart beat faster, and his breath catch in his throat. The letters were smooth, as if someone had rubbed their fingers over them a hundred times. As if to touch his ancestors' minds, Eric did the same.

The feel of the cool leather beneath his callused fingertips was curiously sinister to Eric. The words beat a refrain in his mind as he turned his eyes to the first page of what was obviously a journal.

It begins.

**__**

I guess I should start at the beginning, since I'm writing this account for the purposes of setting things straight. Of setting them right. My name is Christina Angelica Gracen. My father was Phillip Gracen, the head of Grace-Tech, which I'm sure you've heard of. However, he was also Nordic, the greatest hacker of his age. He could hack anything. Anywhere. Anytime. For anyone. For a price, of course. My mother was Kenna Gracen, his wife. She attended charities, kissed babies, tossed money into the streets. She was a saint, to all accounts.

All but mine, and the few others who truly knew her. Who knew that behind the happy facade was a woman every bit as ruthless and evil as my father. And even more deadly, for she was Blade, the most feared assassin of her age. It wasn't until after their deaths that the world found out about this, of course. Until the Gracen name became something to fear and hate, rather than respect.

In the nine years that I lived before they died, I was the world's golden child. I was brilliant—though they didn't know it, I would graduate high school at thirteen, and by twenty I would hold degrees from three of the most prestigious colleges in the world.

My parents loved nothing more than to show me off, their little angel. I was nine when they died. Well, when they were murdered. But we'll not get into that.

I'm not writing this to talk about me. No, this story is about a boy, a boy with blood as blue as mine was black. His name was Eric Thomas Jackson. His father was a cop, his grandfather a Fed. His mom was an ex-marine, and his big brother died in Iraq. His little brother was still skinning his britches in Military Academy when this story went down, but Eric himself was working as a narc. He'd graduated high school two years before, but even as big as he was he could pass easily as much younger than he was.

He attended Brithstone High, in East Philadelphia. My best friend Tiffany did, too. She'd just moved there, and I'd agreed to enroll with her, to help her through. It was her last year, and she didn't want to go through it alone. So even though I was fully twenty years old and had a ton of useless college certificates already, I agreed.

It was both the best and the worst thing I have ever done.

Looking back on it now, I should have known better. I should have hightailed it out of Philly the moment the first of the Slasher Murders popped up on TV. But I didn't. It was 2016, after all. My parents had been dead for almost eleven years, and the Gracen name was just old gossip. They thought I was dead, too, no doubt, or in hiding with my mother.

Her body was never found, though my father was fished out of the bay, stabbed to death. But we'll not get into that.

The second week of school, everyone was abuzz with the news: Hannah Hawkins, the news anchor for PPN, had been found dead in her bed, stabbed to death. I didn't think much of it at the time—people died in Philly every day.

Tiffany and I walked down the long hallway that separated the East Wing from the West. The school was built like a compass star—someone's idea of a joke, I suppose. Technically the East Wing was the History wing, and the West was Science. But no one ever called them that.

It had been seven years since I'd set foot in a high school, and it felt odd to actually be the same height as most of my classmates. I was used to the highschoolers towering over my thirteen year old self. But now I was on equal footing with my 'peers', and it was odd. I got used to it, though. I always was good at adapting.

The first time I saw Eric was about three weeks after the first murder. The papers had taken to calling the killer Slasher, and he'd struck twice more already. The populace was concerned, as you can imagine, I'm sure.

Inside the walls of Brithstone, though, the murders were little more than idle gossip compared to the more pressing concerns of History tests and prom plans, even though it was still early in the year. I breezed through my classwork, of course, but the social scene and I did not get along. Tiff and I were quickly pushed to the back burner of the hierarchy, doomed to sit by ourselves in the dreaded North Corner. It was right next to the trash bins, and I quickly mutinied against that idea.

Tiff wanted to make friends with the other outcasts, but I didn't like that idea, either. The less friends I made here the better off I'd be. Tiff was the only person who'd ever understood me, though if she knew the truth I doubt that she'd have been so kind.

If they knew the truth, they would all have hated me. I was, after all, a Gracen.

By now the stories and the hype have faded to almost nothing—it has been over ninety years, after all. One hundred and three, if you're counting from the year they died. Yeesh—I really am old, aren't I, Nia? But then, I suppose that's inevitable. You yourself are, what is it, ninety-two?

Life is so strange sometimes, my love!

At any rate—by now the hype is almost gone, but back then it was still fresh in people's minds and hearts. There were few people that the Gracens hadn't touched in some way, be it good or bad.

Many had died because of my parents, though, strangely, many were given life because of them, as well. Like the hospital in southern Madrid that my father founded. Of course, he only did it because my mother said he wouldn't.

They were always arguing, the two of them. But they really did love each other—you wouldn't think so, Nia, not them being who they were. But they did love each other and, in their own ways, me. It's strange to think, now, on what life was like back then. After all was said and done, they paid for their crimes with their lives, and now I am paying for mine.

Don't scrunch your eyes so, my love! Believe me when I tell you that I have many, many things to answer for. I am my parents' daughter, for all that I have tried to suppress their legacy.

If the people back then had found out that I was really Christina Gracen, they would have eaten me alive. I would never have had a free moment, and there were many who would have blamed me for the atrocities my parents committed on the world.

At any rate, back to Brithstone.

Tiff and I had an argument about what we should do—join the others or make our own way. Eventually we split ways—she made friends with a girl named Sarah, a drugged out Goth who was surprisingly nice. Though at the time I never would have admitted to either of them that I liked Sarah, I did. I, on the other hand, had taken to solitude.

During lunch I'd grab a tray from the line and then head for one of my 'spots'. Sometimes it was the library, others it was the computer room or the band hall. Once it was a supply closet in the North Wing, because I got lost and was too hungry to try and find someplace else.

On that particular day, I'd already finished my lunch, but was too restless to stay in the darkened library alone. So I set off to explore, intending to get a better understanding of the school than I already had. Lunches were odd in Brithstone, because rather than the usual forty-five minutes or an hour, we had two hours. Most of the students there were rich, and the story was that they'd campaigned for longer lunches and won, thanks to some sizable donations from somebody's daddy.

But that's another story.

I ended up stumbling upon a dusty passage that day—the story is long and tedious, so suffice it to say that I was where I shouldn't have been, and needed an escape. I was lucky to find the door in the closet of one of the chem labs.

I was luckier that it wasn't locked, and that it actually led somewhere.

The passage was just a long hallway, really, dusty from disuse, and muggy to boot. I loved it instantly. It let out in the South Wing, the mathematics section of the school. But that's not what's important. No, what's important is what I saw when I stepped out of the little-used supply closet and into a classroom; while it was obviously unused, it was also obviously occupied, and in a manner that no one was supposed to see...

**__**

Eric sighed, rubbing his face. Only two pages in and already his mind was blown. He sat back in the chair, absently flipping through the worn pages of the journal. He almost couldn't believe what he'd just read. He couldn't quite take it in. Was it really possible that this was the journal of Christina Gracen? She was supposed to have died long, long ago, shortly after her parents. Her parents, the two most feared and hated people in history. He frowned his eye caught something and he flipped back a little more, to a page not far from the end of the book. There were several sentences in all caps, and though he wasn't usually one for reading ahead, his interest was caught immediately. It coudn't say what he thought it said. It couldn't say that... that Christina had...

**__**

I stumbled back, shocked to see him standing there. My voice came out harsher than I meant it to. "You shouldn't have come."

He shook his head, his dark eyes raking me ruthlessly. "I had to come. You know I did."

I turned away, hating that I had to. "Go. You shouldn't be here."

"I won't."

I could feel him stepping closer, closer, until the heat of him was right behind me, calling to me. I wanted to curl up in his warmth and never, ever leave. But he had to go. It wasn't safe. I wasn't safe.

"Go! I don't want you here!"

He put his hands on my shoulders, turned me around so I was facing him. There was nowhere to look. If I kept my eyes on his chest I would want to touch him there, run my hands over the smooth muscle that I knew lurked beneath his black t-shirt. If I met his eyes I'd burst, and then... I didn't want to think about what would happen then.

I couldn't stare over his shoulder because I couldn't see that high—he was too tall, and I was too short. I couldn't look down, because that would be awkward, and I didn't need to remember... those things. So I closed my eyes, deeming it best not to look at all.

He tilted my face up with his knuckles, but I kept my eyes stubbornly clenched shut. I couldn't do this. I couldn't.

My voice was a whisper. "Please go. Please. If I mean anything at all to you, go!"

I shook my head, dislodging his hand. I tried to shove past him without looking at him, but it was impossible. He was a wall of muscle and bone. I'd have had to hurt him to get past him.

And I wouldn't hurt him. Not that way.

"No."

"WHY?" My sudden shout echoed in the near-empty apartment. I only went back for my hoodie. I couldn't leave without it.

I didn't expect him to show up.

"WHY WON'T YOU JUST LEAVE ME ALONE!"

"BECAUSE I LOVE YOU!" His shout rivaled mine, and I winced. He was only making it worse. "It doesn't matter! Can't you see that it doesn't matter anymore? Please, please, just go! GO!"

"Why? Open your eyes, blast you, LOOK AT ME!"

"NO!" I shook my head wildly, trying to rid myself of him, of his scent, of his heat, of his nearness. He grabbed my face in his hands, holding me still. A part of me wanted to fight him, but the other part, the part that loved him, wouldn't let me.

He started to shake me, so hard that my sunglasses fell from my black hair to the ground. My teeth began to rattle and my eyes flew open, shooting daggers at him. "STOP IT!" I shoved him, hard. He didn't move except to sway a little.

He stroked his hand across my cheek, brushing stray strands of my hair from my eyes. His touch was nothing but gentle, at odds with the pain and fury in his dark brown eyes. "Why? Why are you leaving?"

"You know why!"

"You're the one who said what people think doesn't matter! Don't give me that crap, Chris! Tell me why!" He shook me again, for good measure, I imagine.

I glared at him, but I knew he wouldn't back down. Fed up, I pinched the nerve cluster at the base of his right wrist. He sucked in a breath and I shoved past him, coming up against the marble countertop. I pressed my palms into its edge, hoping that the pain would restore my senses. It didn't.

"Why?" His voice was whisper quiet again.

When I rounded on him, mine was not. "BECAUSE I'M A MONSTER!"

Monster! Monster! Monster!

The word echoed around the room, mocking me.

Eric's voice got loud again. "No, you're not! Since when do you let other people tell you what-"

"No! You don't get it, Eric! You- you're so- aarrrg!" I let out a little scream of frustration. I didn't know how to tell him what he needed to know. But I had to.

"They tell me I'm a monster because I am, Eric! I killed them. I killed them, Eric!"

He shook his head, confused. "What? What are you-"

"I killed my parents."

He stared at me, no expression on his face. But I didn't see him, anyway. I was drifting back, and back, and back—back to over eleven years ago, back to when life was simple. Back when I knew who I was. What I was.

Back to the memories that I swore I'd never dredge up again. He needed to know the truth about me.

**__**

They trusted me. Why wouldn't they? I was their little angel, after all. I did what they wanted, when they wanted. I didn't cry, at least not in front of them. I didn't talk back, or throw tantrums. I was a perfect child. I responded eagerly to the lessons they taught me—how to fight, how to kill. I was their angel. Their Christina—their perfect little everything. Why wouldn't they trust me? Why shouldn't they?

Mama used to give me long baths, scrubbing the sweat and dirt away after our fighting lessons. I always loved it. It was the only time she seemed really human to me. It was a week after the party. Everyone who'd attended was dead, except Daddy. Mama never could see past her love for him. Sometimes I think he was the only thing she ever really loved. I told her I wanted to wash her this time, instead of the other way around. I said it was so I could learn to do it as well as her. So I'd be a good mama someday, too. She didn't see anything wrong with that. She said it'd be an adventure. She loved adventures, Mama did.

We always used her and Daddy's bathroom. They had a huge clawfoot tub, leafed in gold. It was beautiful. Mama was beautiful in it. There was central lighting in the room, but we'd never used it. Mama'd put a huge gold and red lamp next to the tub—it was one Daddy'd bought her from someplace in Europe. It made the water glow gold and glimmer red. We laughed for awhile. I scrubbed her back, her arms. I dotted her nose with soap bubbles, and she splashed me in retaliation. Then, I couldn't stall any longer. I had left the other washcloth near the door, on purpose. I 'accidentally' dropped the one we were using into the water. It was so perfectly innocent when I went to get the other one, and 'accidentally' tripped on the chord that connected the lamp to the wall. The bathroom didn't have any windows, so it was pitch black.

Mama never saw me drop the end of a second chord into the water behind her. Its other end was clipped to the lamp's chord, where I'd cut off the rubber. I went and turned on the big light, made a show of laughing. She smiled and said 'see, that wasn't so bad. Our first adventure, and already you're brilliant.' I walked over to her lamp and put my fingers on the switch to turn it back on. She smiled at me, so brightly. I smiled back. I said, 'sure, Mama. We'll have lots of adventures.' That's when she knew something was wrong. She started to get up out of the water, concern written all over her face. I turned the little knob. The sound was horrible, like lightening and the pop of a fire rolled into one. She jerked, just once. Her hair stood on end—jagged spikes of black sticking every which way.

She didn't die right away. The current wasn't strong enough. She could have gotten out. But she didn't. She just looked at me, with those eyes of hers. I expected pain, or hate, or anger. But she just smiled at me as I turned the knob a second time. She opened her mouth, but I will never know what she was going to say. When she fell, most of the water sloshed out of the tub. Electricity still sparked through it and it shocked me, but I didn't bother to jump back. I couldn't.

I sat by the tub for hours, staring at her body. I was so used to the smell of burnt flesh that I didn't notice it. The lamp died, flickered out. Eventually the blue sparks dancing across Mama's body did, too. And then it was just me and the silence, and the harsh white light. I remember the light. I remember thinking it was going to swallow me for what I'd done. I wanted it to swallow me.

Daddy got home and found me there. He went into a rage. He swore he'd find whoever did this, he'd make them pay. He'd kill them, and their family, and their family's family. Even their pets. I thought it was ironic that he was threatening to kill himself. And me. But he never suspected—it never crossed his mind that it was me who killed Mama. I don't know what he did with her body—but I don't remember a funeral. I don't remember much of what happened in between.

Two days after Mama died, Daddy went to the docks to talk to a man he knew. He was still trying to find Mama's killer. I told him I wanted to go—I didn't want to be alone in the house, I said. He believed me. Why wouldn't he? I was his daughter. I loved him. Before we left I went to Mama's office, and took her knives from where she kept them.

I hid them behind my back like I'd seen Mama do. When we got to the bay, it was late. It was dark, but the moon was full. I remember thinking that the moonlight suited Daddy so much better than sunlight. Daddy stood staring out over the water. His back was to me. It was the perfect opportunity. I pulled out Mama's knives—she'd taught me how to use them. I remember thinking that that was ironic, too. But right then Daddy's man arrived, and he saw me. He opened his mouth to shout, but I jumped on him. The first knife hit his shoulder and stayed there. The second one hit home, slicing into his heart. His eyes died, but all I could see was red. There was so much blood—I hadn't expected there to be so much blood. It was all over me. My hands. My clothes. My face. Me.

Daddy ran at us. He shouted at the man to let me go. He thought that the man had grabbed me, that it was my blood. I didn't think. I pulled the dagger out of the man's shoulder and threw it at Daddy. It hit what I aimed it for—my throws always did, even then. Daddy stood there, just stood there. He seemed more shocked than anything. The knife in his throat stopped him from saying anything, but he opened his mouth anyway. Blood poured out, but I still remember what he tried to say. Kenna. That was all. Just my mother's name, and then he fell. His knees hit the ground first, cracking on the concrete. I remember that the sound of that was worse than the squelch of my knife leaving the other man. Maybe because it was Daddy.

I cleaned my knives and put them back. It took forever to roll them both into the bay, but I did it. I watched Daddy sink to the bottom of the bay and I didn't cry. I never cry. I left after that. I ran home. I took my mother's necklace, the one with the half-moons, the one her mother'd given her, the one she never took off except when she went on jobs or was going to get wet. And I took my father's favorite black hoodie, the one he always wore when we went jogging, early in the morning. I don't remember much after that. It gets fuzzy when I try to think about it. I just remember running. There was a bus, and an old lady. She held my hand, and gave me Skittles. That was the last time I set eyes on San Fransisco. I've never been back. I'll never go back. Never.

**__**

When I woke up, Eric was holding me. I must have passed out after telling my story—I don't remember. I don't remember what I told him, I'd buried the memories again. Until now I have never dredged them up again.

You may wonder, my love, why I did what I did. Me, an advocate for there always being a better way. I have always believed that death is the last possible resort. That people can change. But there are some people, Nia, who can't change. Who won't. Who are so powerful, so evil, that no matter how many times they are locked away they'll get out again, they'll hurt more people. Who are so strong, so smart, that even the Justice System can't touch them. For people like that, there is no other way. They will keep on hurting and killing and taking, simply because they can, because it's what they want. Those people have to die. It's the only way to stop them, once and for all. The only way to make them pay for their crimes.

My parents were two such people, Daemonia. I loved them, and I think that they loved me, sometimes. When it was convenient for them. No—no, that's not right. They loved me in the only way they knew how to love me. I was a child, an innocent. I was something completely foreign to them—they had no idea what to do with me.

But they did their best, Nia. They really did. I loved them. They were evil, and dangerous, and terrifying. But they were also strangely charismatic, and beautiful. They were beautiful together, Nia! I wish you could have seen them. Then perhaps you would understand what my words cannot express. Sometimes I hated them. My father especially.

But sometimes—sometimes I loved them so much that I couldn't stand it. What kind of monster am I, I wondered, that I can love both the monsters and the people they hurt? I've tried to forget the bad things, Nia. The evil things they did cannot be undone. Neither can mine.

But I remember clear as day that every Friday morning my father would creep into my room and pounce on me, tickling me until I couldn't breathe from laughing so hard. And then we'd go running, just the two of us, along a route he'd marked. It was always the same—down around the house, past the little pond with the duck that bit me. The duck wasn't there after that, of course.

Past the ice cream stand on the corner and around the block, through the field that used to be our neighbor's place before the fire burned them out. Across the street through Falkner's alley, scaring the cats and rats that always snuck around in there. And then back, across the field again, back up the front walk and onto the porch steps, where Mama would always be sitting, watching us.

She'd be cleaning her knives, or Daddy's guns, or drawing. Mama loved to draw—she'd draw anything, everything. She was very good at it. I remember once she drew a picture of me and Daddy dancing, on my sixth birthday. I was wearing a red dress, and Daddy was laughing in the picture. His eyes were so bright—I thought they were twin suns. I wonder sometimes if that picture isn't still hanging in the entryway of Gracen House, or if someone took it down, covered it, burned it. Maybe just locked it away to gather dust. Maybe they couldn't stand to think that Phillip and Kenna Gracen were human, too. I will never know, my love. Somehow that makes me sad.

I have written this here so that the world will know what I am. So that you will know, my darling Daemonia, who you are.

I'm an old woman, Nia. I've made many, many mistakes. The only one I do not regret is never telling you who you are. The legacy of the Gracens ends with me—I've made sure of that. You are a brilliant lawyer—you fight for good. Your blood is as blue as your father's was. It always will be, no matter what anyone says, my love.

I never saw Eric again after that night. He was asleep, probably from sheer exhaustion, when I woke. I took my father's hoodie, the one I had worn ever since that night when I was nine, and left. You wear your great-grandmother's necklace. The half-moons represent balance, my love, never forget that. Balance is everything.

The thing I regret the most is never telling your father about you. He would have loved you. I have kept an eye on him—you'll find everything I compiled in my files. In the locked drawer—I've put the key in the Cheerios box. Just think, Nia, after all these years you'll finally know what I keep in that drawer!

I'm sorry that I wasn't a better mother to you. I did the best I could. I am sorry that you never knew your father—he still lives, you know. He is older than me, which makes him slightly older than dirt, but he's still strong as ever, even with his fading eyes and failing heart. We're a hardy bunch, those of us with colored blood. If we live, we live long, as you well know, my Nia.

You don't have to go to him, though I cannot tell you the joy it would bring him to know you. I wish he had. I wish—I wish a lot of things, my darling.

I am not long for this world, I can feel it. Another day, maybe two. I'm going to drink too much coffee and eat the last of the donuts! My last act of rebellion, if you will. You have become more than I ever could have dreamed—I am so glad you have found happiness. Don't mourn me, my love. I had a good run! I have lived more than most, and died more, as well. My life wasn't perfect, or even happy, really. Except for the years I spent with you, and the few weeks I had with your father.

I did love him, you know. I wish I'd told him that.

But, alas, the past cannot be changed. Only learned from.

I beg you, Daemonia, learn from my mistakes. Don't be afraid of life! Live it, love it, but never fear it. Even if there is anything on the other side (which I still doubt, love), I doubt that I will see you there. I was born as the devil's own, so don't fear for me. I leave this journal in your capable hands, to do with as you will.

The last of the Gracens die with me. You share my blood, but you are your father's daughter, a fact which I have thanked God for every day of your life.

I am not going to ask you to forgive me—I know how much you've longed for a 'normal' life all these years, and how hard it was for you without a father. I know well that Eric has never forgiven me. Though, as my last request (since I believe that everyone should get one), if you do decide to see him, tell him I love(d) him. That's all I ask, though God knows I've little right to ask even that.

I will leave you now—I can almost taste those donuts!

All my love, always,

Christina Angelica Gracen

AKA Angel Howard

AKA Christie Cook

AKA Angelica Thomas

P.S. There are more, I'm sure, but I cannot recall them now. It doesn't seem all that important right now.

**__**

Slowly, ever so slowly, Eric put the book down. His hands shook and his breaths came fast. It was insane. Impossible. He rose his eyes to the place Jackson had sat before, and marveled that the old man had kept this under his belt for so long.

Eric half wished he hadn't answered Jack's call, that he'd stayed at the station that morning.

Now he had a decision to make. A very difficult one. Jack was right--this journal would tear the family apart. Their heritage was important to them, their blue blood a well respected and cheirshed trait. Eric thought of his little sister, his mother. This would kill them.

Slowly, he stood. He tucked the book into his pocket and left his family's mansion behind. He got into his umarked police car and drove away.

The book burned a hole in his pocket--but Eric ignored it.

The knowledge was heavy in his mind and heart, but he ignored that too.

When he got home, he stoked up a fire, even though it wasn't cold outside.

And when it was burning hot and bright, he threw the book to the flames. Some secrets, he thought as he scattered the ashes on Christina's grave that night, should stay buried.