Old Habits

Stefa: a heart attack

Stefa

Jackson looked like he wanted to force me to leave, but nothing short of picking me up and tossing me outside was going to work. I may be at the lowest point in my extended life, but I certainly wasn't going to let Jackson persuade me. He ran his fingers through his blonde hair and paced the house.

I ran my fingers over the needlepoint pillow on the couch, wondering if this was one of Mel or Susie Lynn's projects, or they had been gifts. The purple flowers and their tidy green stems seemed so absurd given their location in a werewolf pack's home.

The door opened. I couldn't hear any footsteps. Either I was about to die in my ex-boyfriend's house surrounded by needlepoint or Jackson had become much stronger in my absence. Either way, I wasn't sure I cared.

"Jackson. I might have known."

Helen's voice sent shivers up my arms. I focused the tiny stitches of the many shades of purple, the rough bumpy texture under my fingers.

"Helen, you've left quite a body count. I'm surprised you made it all the way up here; you're a little far from North Carolina."

He sounded calm, which was good. Helen would kill both of us if he sounded worried. I didn't look up.

"I see you managed to find your paramour before she expired," Helen continued. "And I am also intrigued as to how you managed to find this...quaint farm in Montana. Certainly a distance from your beloved New York."

I could tell that Jackson was staring at me, but I didn't move. I knew that if I saw Helen, I wouldn't be able to keep composed.

"My paramour seems to be missing an appendage after her time with you," Jackson observed. I could hear that he was amused by the archaic term Helen used for me. "And yes, Montana is not on my way. But Stefa wanted to see Conor, before we took the Canadian route. After what you did in Chicago, I have no intention on setting foot in the Midwest. What you did was madness, Helen."

Madness that I had given her access to. I would have never guessed that I would feel guilt the deaths of the hunters, but if they had suffered half as much at Helen's hands as I did, I wouldn't wish such treatment on my worst enemy.

"So? We weren't overwhelmed by lupine idiots upon entry. Where are the werewolves?"

"I don't know," Jackson said. "No idea, actually. We were going to search the property, but it's daytime now, and I just don't care that much. I didn't like Conor before; I don't really want to interact with him now."

That was the least true thing he had said so far. I could tell that Conor was growing on Jackson. He had been genuinely concerned when Conor had fallen ill. He had confided in Conor when he hadn't talked to Mike or me. Jackson and Conor had more in common than either of them wanted to admit, though Jackson had better practice at tamping down his conscience.

Helen laughed. "You have always been absurd, Jack. Are you then going to keep Stefa?"

As if I was a pet. I supposed in my current state that was what I basically was. Jackson had come for me because of his affection. I wasn't going to be able to do anything useful for him not for a while.

"I was planning on it," Jackson replied. "Not if it means you're going to rip me to pieces over it. Certainly not if you are planning on wiping out my clan. Were you following me?"

My breath caught. All the bodies, all the blood. The cinderblock making screams echo even after they were dead. Sunlight searing my arm off slowly had been excruciating, but not even close to the pain of losing everyone.

"Of a sort. Cameras picked you up in St. Louis. And then we had access to all sorts of things in Chicago to find you. Hunters have all sorts of toys."

Cameras. Then they knew about Conor and Tish. Helen was playing Jackson, seeing how far he would take the lie. I blinked, wondering if Jackson had also caught that.

I heard Jackson stop pacing. I dared to look up at him and then over at Helen. Her hair was neatly pinned and she was wearing a smart navy pantsuit, like a business woman from the sixties. I didn't hear anyone else in the house, but I highly doubted that Helen had come by herself. She would kill Conor, I realized. Or, if she had found out more about him in Chicago, she had come to take him with her.

Either way, I couldn't let that happen.

"I wondered what kind of lie you'd tell me to explain yourself," Helen continued. "If I hadn't seen you and Conor myself I would have questioned my own clan. Even so."

She darted forward, slamming Jackson to the wall and holding him high so he couldn't fight her. I rose from my seat.

"Don't bother, Stefa dear," Helen remarked at me while Jackson struggled to free himself from her grasp. She was much stronger, had fed more recently, and was a century his elder. "Just think of him as another person you can watch die."

Jackson choked, trying to say something, to tell me to run. I had never been certain of the feelings Jackson had for me until this moment. I had never seen him do anything unselfish. And I wanted to run, sprint out the back door and never been seen again. But if I did, Helen was right. Another person would die because of me.

"No," I said, as forcefully as I knew how. "Let him go."

The only thing that gave me an edge was Helen's surprise. Her hand went slack for the briefest of moments and Jackson used that time to drop to the ground and plunge his hand into her chest, ripping through her blouse, breaking ribs. She gasped as he retrieved her heart in his hand. She felt to the ground, blood pooling around her.

I stared at the blood and my legs gave way. Jackson dropped Helen's heart on the carpet to catch me.

"Hey," he said softly. "You're okay. We're okay."

"She's....she's got....there'll be...."

"I can take care of them," he told me, smoothing my hair and helping me to the couch.

He kissed my forehead. I closed my eyes, but I could hear him leave the house, and then, through the open door, hear the sound of Jackson breaking glass, and the screams of the others. I curled up on the couch, unable to move as memories of that cursed basement flooded back. I could hear Jackson's footsteps come back in the house, his shoes wet with dew and blood.

"It's over," Jackson said, soundly oddly exhausted.