Midnight CEO

37

"Ebony, please," Carter called to me. "I'll do anything."

I turned to look at him. "Anything, Carter? Bring back my family." I snapped at him. "I remember what you did to me, Carter, and I remember the night you took me from my parents. The pain you caused me and how much you enjoyed it." I had flashbacks of Carter cutting my flesh and laughing as I squealed in pain. I remember his pleasure at seeing me cry out for my mother and begging him to stop. I remember him drinking my blood as I lay there terrified.

"That wasn't me." Carter protested, taking a step toward me.

"You told me you would always own me and that if I escaped, you would find me," I looked up into his lifeless eyes. "You left me in that cave for months on my own. I was alone, scared, and an inch from death when you returned to me."

He nodded. "You were so weak that I couldn't even hear your heartbeat," he said with tears in his eyes. "I was amazed that you even survived. That's how I knew you were special. You were surrounded by death and misery, but you wouldn't give up on life, and that is when I knew you were different."

"Don't listen to this bullshit, Ebony. Let's go," Edward pulled me away.

"I suggest you let them talk this out so I don't have to hurt you," Jake said, cutting off Edward and pushing him back.

"Try me fuck Witt," Edward growled in Jake's face.

"You took me to the hospital," I continued ignoring Edward and Jake. "You left me at the doors in the night with my name written on my arm." I pointed to my forearm. "The only memory of my past was written on my arm."

Carter just nodded and hung his head in shame.

"I was given a blood transfusion that night. Human blood then raced through my veins, not wolf. I was transformed into one of them with no family, no friends, and no past. I was alone in this world with nothing more than the clothes on my back," I held back my tears as I stared at him. "I was nothing to anybody, Carter. I was even a stranger to myself."

Carter looked away from me as a tear fell from his eye. "I thought you had died that night. I thought for sure you would give up the fight and die, but you didn't. You just got stronger and stronger. It was a miracle, Ebony. I ran to my mother and confessed everything to her. She put a memory spell on you, and by the time you woke up, you had no memory of yourself, your family, or me, and so I walked away convinced I would never see you or hear from you again," he shook his head slowly going over everything in his mind.

"See, that's the thing, Carter. You got to live this wonderful guilt-free life while I grew up in foster homes and adoption houses. Nobody wanted the girl with no past. That was until I met Harry, the sweet old janitor of the local school library. He didn't care that I had no past; he only cared that I had a future. He adopted me and raised me until ....."

"I did not kill him," Carter said abruptly, holding up his hands. "I never went near him, I swear."

"No, you didn't, but Leon did, didn't he? He found me, and he found out you hadn't killed me. He knew the truth, so he killed Harry and made it look like an accident so I would have no choice but to move in with my only friend Janet the girl who just happened to work for Midnight Industries. He knew I was your weakness, and he knew this was his opportunity to attack you."

Carter nodded. "He told me he had found you, and I couldn't believe my eyes when I saw you in that office. In fact, I was convinced you were a demon or some kind of witch. I spent weeks just watching you, stalking you in the shadows, just like I had so many years ago."

The tears fell from my eyes as I remembered, "You were the thing I saw in the darkness outside my window, weren't you? You were the monster I saw in my dreams."