A Necessary Evil (Book 1)

Chapter 29

It was dark and very, very late. I didn’t remember what compelled me to get out of my bed, all I knew was that I could no longer sleep. The way Andreas had accepted Izzy so easily into his home… it confused me. Everything I thought I knew about him was called into question yet again. I walked down the stairs, my arms tightly wrapped around myself and wandered around with no destination in mind.

I froze in my tracks as I started to make out voices, male voices. Andreas and Kalen were locked in conversation. I knew I should turn and go the other way, but I needed to know what they were saying. My curiosity got the best of me.

“It has to be her,” Andreas said, his voice agitated. I paused outside the door, careful not to look inside so they wouldn’t see me.

“So you are just going to disregard my ability entirely? Pretend like I have no idea what I’m talking about?” Kalen fired back in an equally agitated tone.

“You have been wrong before.”

There was a bang, presumably from Kalen hitting a table. “No, I haven’t. You have denied my warnings before and look how those turned out!” Kalen was yelling, losing his patience.

A pause followed before Andreas spoke again. “Don’t you dare. You have no right!”

“I have every right! I was there! I even helped clean up the mess! And now you are going to tell me that the one thing that I have been relying on my entire life, the one thing that has never failed me is wrong? I’m not wrong, Andreas. Not about this.”

There was a hard smacking sound and I flinched. “What was that for?!” Kalen demanded.

“You can be glad it was only one punch. I have more than enough reason to hit you again.”

“Bringing up your past can hardly be one of them.”

I could feel the darkness where I was standing. They were really mad at each other, but about what?

“Both our pasts are something we agreed never to talk about!” Andreas yelled. It was then I realized that I had never really heard him raise his voice. What was going on?

“Well, what if I have changed my mind? What if I think that finally talking about it might be exactly what both of us need? Are you just going to continue lying to Lana? Keep her in the dark about everything?” Kalen demanded. The conversation was taking an interesting spin. They were talking about me. My attention was suddenly acutely focused.

“As opposed to you laying your entire history bare? Tell me Kalen, have you told her everything, or did you leave out the parts that make you look bad? Have you told her about Mary? Janelle? What about that village of people you wiped out without even flinching? Do you really think she’ll still be on your side if she knew the truth about you? You criticize me for hiding my true feelings, yet you pretend to be someone else entirely.” I would’ve hated to be on the receiving end of his tone. Who was Mary and Janelle? And why had Kalen killed a village? Something was telling me that I needed to stop listening, but I couldn’t. If this was the only way I was going to get any information from them, then I needed to hear more.

“Yes, I may have done some bad things in fits of rage before I could control myself, but I never claimed to be a saint,” Kalen replied through clenched teeth.

“Perhaps not, but you pretend to be one. When she finds out who you really are, she will run in the other direction.”

“What? To you? You couldn’t even hold on to her the first time. What makes you think she’d come back to you? I may be bad, but you are a thousand times worse.”

I could feel the tension radiating out of that room, curling around me.

“I do not disagree, but I do not pretend to be good. I don’t pretend to be a hero.”