Part 64 (1/2)
15.
Gia clutched her abdomen as the horror of what Tara wanted seeped through.
”My baby? No... you can't mean that.”
Tara nodded and started floating toward her. ”I do. I want that baby. I need that baby.”
Gia spotted the cross that had fallen from Charlie's hand. She stooped, grabbed it, held it up. She couldn't believe she was doing this. Like playing a scene from one of those corny old vampire movies Jack liked to watch.
Tara stopped. ”Put that down.”
”You're afraid! Afraid of the cross!”
”I'm not afraid of anything!” she said a little too quickly. ”It's just...”
”Just what?”
”It's just that the crosses that were in these stones stayed too close to the wrong thing for a little too long. Centuries too long. They absorbed some.”
”What does that mean? Absorbed what?”
Tara shook her head. ”I don't know. Poison.”
”Poison for you, maybe, but churches aren't poison to me.”
”Church?” Tara's brow furrowed. ”What makes you think that was in a church? It lined the wall of what you might call a prison.”
Gia didn't understand, but at least she had a weapon, or at least a defense. She took a couple of deep breaths and tried to calm herself. She was only partly successful.
Gia took a step toward the stairs. ”I'm leaving now. I'm going up those steps and out the front door.”
And never coming back. Dear G.o.d, why hadn't she listened to Jack and stayed away from here?
Tara shook her head. ”No, you're not.”
Her calm confidence shook Gia, but she kept up a bold front.
”Watch me.”
Keeping the cross straight-armed before her, she sidled to her right toward the stairs. Tara watched her calmly, making no move to halt her. When Gia reached the steps she stopped-she could go no further. As before, something like an invisible wall of cotton was blocking her. She thrust out the cross-that went through fine, but no matter how hard she pushed after it, she couldn't follow.
She turned and gasped when she saw Tara directly behind her. She held up the cross and Tara backed away.
”Let's be fair,” the child said. ”You can have other babies. I can't have any. Ever. Let me take yours and-”
”Don't even think about it! You're not even ten years old! What could-?”
”I'd be in my twenties now!” Anger distorted her features. ”I want a child! I can't have one of my own, so I'll adopt yours!”
”How?” Gia cried. ”This is insane!”
”No. Not insane. Very simple. If the baby dies here, within these walls, among these stones, she'll stay here. I can keep her.”
”But she's not yours!”
Tara's voice rose to a scream that shook the earth beneath Gia's feet. ”I DON'T CARE!”
Gia was finding it harder and harder to breathe. Tara... the s.h.i.+fting dirt... Charlie... the granite blocks... the strange cross in her hand... her baby...
”Tara, this isn't you.”
The child face contorted. ”What do you know about me? Nothing!”
”I talked to your father.”
”He gave up on me, just like my mother.”
”No! Your mother-”
”I know about my mother. She gave up first!”
Gia tried to think of a way to reach her. If not through her family, then what?
”Tara, you were loved. I saw the family pictures. You with your horse-”
A quick smile. ”Rhonda.”
”-and your brother.”
A frown. ”Little brat. What a loser he turned out to be.”
”Tara, how can you be like this?” Every humane impulse and emotion seemed to have leached out of her. ”Losing you destroyed their lives. That's how important you were. I can't believe you mean this.”
”Believe it!” Cold rage disfigured her features. ”I was ripped from my life and brought down here to this place where I was surrounded by thirteen men. One of them cut out my still-beating heart while the rest watched.”
Gia's free hand flew to her mouth. ”Oh, dear G.o.d!”
”Not one of them moved to stop him.” Her tone was frigid, flat. ”No one came to save me. After that they sliced my heart into thirteen pieces and ate them.”
The horror of it pushed bile to the back of Gia's throat. ”And you were awake... through it all?”
”No. I was drugged. But I know what was done. So don't tell me what's me and what's not. You may think you know me but you don't. I was a happy girl. I had my whole life ahead of me, endless opportunities. Now I have none.”