Chapter 31

Heather banged her fist on the keyboard tray hard enough to bounce the mouse off its pad and send it sliding towards the edge. She grabbed the mouse by its cord before it could fall to the floor and slammed it down with an exasperated sigh. She hated giving up part of her lunch hour. It was the only time she had to share with Diane, and her stomach was rumbling loud enough to be heard over the whir of the PC cooling fan.

She stared at yet another page of fruitless search results. She did not think finding the address of a single location would be so difficult. While she realized that her mother's business existed in the days before the World Wide Web had become popular, surely there would be some record of the location?

She found many references to the business itself. It was unusual for a woman who was not a Witch to open one, especially with the intent to turn a more scientific eye towards the world of the paranormal.

She found a picture of the office. It had sat in the center of an otherwise unoccupied lot, with little more than bare dirt and native grass on either side. Not enough of the street was shown for her to recognize it. The only landmark was a huge cottonwood at the edge of the street, just to the left of the front door.

She considered approaching Jason. He could work magic armed with just Google. She had looked over his shoulder once when he was searching for something and saw him enter terms she would have never thought to associate with the subject of his inquiry. Heather had tried phrasing things differently until she grew so frustrated that it had devolved into "tell me the fucking location of my mother's old business you piece of shit."

The word "fucking" had brought up multiple links blocked by the school's web filter, and she had to close her browser and restart it before anyone noticed.

She closed her eyes and ran a hand through her hair. "Come on, think," she muttered. "Where else can I look? I just want a fucking location of a stupid building. What would Jason--?"

Her eyes flew open. She grabbed the mouse and after a few minutes found the website for Haven City Hall. She remembered how Jason often procured information from Haven government sites since they had digitized most of their older paper records.

Heather gasped when she finally found a link with the words "Haven Investigation Group" and "property tax records". She clicked the mouse hard on the link and waved her hand in a "come on" gesture when it seemed to hang a few moments before finally loading.

At which point she was presented with a login prompt.

"Oh, you've got to be fucking kidding me!" Heather cried, causing a few annoyed glances in her direction. The page was asking for a "Haven Department of the Treasury Employee Login." She tried a few combinations of username and password that Jason had once told her were often vendor software defaults, but none worked.

She flinched when she heard the bell ring. Had she been struggling with this through the entire lunch period?

"Shit," Heather muttered, trying to ignore her rumbling stomach. She closed the browser and fled the school library, fighting her way to the front of the throng leaving with her. Many of their faces wore similar masks of exhaustion and frustration, but most were directed towards their upcoming exams. Heather did not want to think about how terribly she was going to do.

Maybe I'll do so bad they'll have to expel me, Heather thought, but knew it was a vain hope. It would likely give Laura an excuse to demand Heather as her full time slave.

Heather ignored the warm tingle the thought left in her pussy as she broke free of the crowd and ran down the hall.

Cassie had intended to rest her forehead on the edge of the open locker door with her eyes closed for only a few moments to allow some of the cobwebs to clear from her sleep-deprived mind. Instead, the cacophony of conversation and clanging locker doors retreated to a soft drone, and a notebook slipped from her fingers. She jerked to attention only when her shoulder was nudged, the rest of the books spilling to the floor.

"What--?!" Cassie cried in a sleepy voice. She blinked awake as her eyes focused on Ned's face.

"You okay, babe?" Ned said.

Cassie heaved a sigh and rubbed her forehead where the edge of the locker had left an uncomfortable impression. She bent down to pick up the fallen books. "No, not really, to be honest." She paused, as the next words she was about to utter were completely alien to her. "I didn't sleep well last night."

Ned was equally shocked, his eyes widening. "Wow. You? Not sleep?"

Cassie looked into Ned's face and her next words were momentarily forgotten. She tilted her head. "You look a little tired yourself."

Ned rubbed his eyes and scrubbed his face. "Up to the wee hours with that blasted journal. Still nothin'."

"I'm sorry if it seemed like I wasn't interested this morning," Cassie said in a subdued voice as she put her books into her locker. "I was still in shock about something I saw in my mother's head last night."

"Yeah, I guessed right 'bout what bee got inta yer pretty li'l bonnet."

"I don't want to talk about it right now."

Ned rubbed the back of his neck, and Cassie suppressed another sigh. He was going to press the point. She did not need her empathic sense, just that gesture alone told her. "Can ya at least gimme a hint? Jus' so I don't conjure up something worse?"

Cassie shivered. "Frankly, I don't know how this could be any worse. All right. I entered a dream of my mother's last night, and it became a nightmare. Something started to happen with the playroom, and it triggered something terrible in another part of the mansion. And ... a-and James and my mother thought I was behind it. Or my invisible friend."

Ned whistled. "Huh, yeah, I can see where that would rattle ya."

"It did more than that. My mother said it was happening again, so that implies it had happened before. And ... a-and James ... when he looked at me, I-I never saw someone so terrified..."

Cassie's eyes blurred, and she felt rather than saw his comforting arms wrap around her. She clutched his shirt until the urge to burst into tears had passed.

"Um, not ta discredit yer abilities or nuthin' but ... ya sure it wasn't jus' a dream after all? Even ol' Siggie himself s'pposedly said sometimes a cigar is just a cigar."

Cassie closed her eyes and let out a shaky breath into Ned's chest. "God, I hope so. But if it was based on a memory, then what had I done that was so terrible?"

Ned hugged her. "C'mon, babe, ya would never do nothin' that bad. Yer mother would consider ya eatin' the main course with the salad fork a disaster."

Cassie knew he was trying to help, and she tried to find the humor in his statement but failed. She gently pulled herself from the embrace. "I'm all right, Ned," she said in a steadier voice. "I'm sorry I sounded so short with everyone when I cut the meeting in the parking lot short. I just couldn't get my mind on anything else."

"Yer fine, babe. If it took anyone's skin off their nose, I got some ta spare," Ned said, tapping the side of his nose.

Cassie managed a brief, tiny smile. "Right now, I'm dead tired. I think I was on an adrenalin rush since I woke up after my mother's dream, and now I'm crashing badly."

"Then I would suggest partakin' of some of Haven's High's mystery meat. What it don't cure it'll kill."

Cassie put the last book in her locker and closed it. "As long as I can get a soda with it. I need caffeine more than food if I want to stay awake for the rest of my classes today."

"So no Harbinger hoedown at Mrs. R's Pleasure Palace today?"

"I don't see the point if you didn't find anything yet," Cassie said, intending it to be a casual comment, but her tired voice made it sound too critical to her ears. She dropped her face into her hands and leaned against the lockers. "That came out wrong."

"Aw, no worries, babe," Ned said in a gentle voice. "I'm a worse critic of myself than you'd ever be."

She felt his hand squeeze her shoulder. She looked up and squeezed his hand in return.

"I thought ya might wanna tell Mrs. R. about this," said Ned.

Cassie shook her head. "Not yet. I want to give Mrs. Radson a break. She's been hosting us almost every day this week. From some of the tension and worry I sensed from Diane this morning, I want to give her more time with Mrs. Radson."

"Some of that may be 'cuz she's havin' Heather over fer dinner tonight."

"Really? Is there something wrong with that?"

Ned smirked. "I gather it's kinda the same as meetin' the daughter's new boyfriend, but adjusted fer her orientation, if ya know what I mean."

Cassie only had to remember her own experience bringing Ned to the mansion to sympathize with Diane's anxiety. She was about to say something to Ned when she paused. "Wait. I just sensed something. It's--"

"Heather?" Ned said, looking down the hall.

"Yes! I thought I sensed agitation, like she... " She noticed Ned staring down the hall and turned her head. "Heather! Is something wrong?"

Heather shuddered to a stop, panting. "No. Yes."

"Ah, the classic quantum female response," drawled Ned with a small smirk. "Where ya can be in two states at the same time."

"Cassie, didn't Jason give you a folder about hacking?" Heather said.

Cassie was surprised enough at the question that she hesitated in her response. She stepped closer and lowered her voice. "Yes, it was called 'hacking techniques, ' but I wouldn't go shouting about that in the school corridor."

"Sorry, I just ... look, do you have it with you? Can I see it for just a few minutes?"

"Well, no, I keep all the stuff he gave me at home."

"Dammit," Heather muttered. "Okay, can you bring it with you tomorrow?"

"Why do ya want something like that?" Ned asked.

"I've been trying to find some information about my mother. I don't know if it'll be important, but there's information at city hall that I can't get to without a login."

Cassie had not wanted to confront a moral dilemma like this when she was so tired. She felt some of Heather's frustration mingling with her own feelings. "Heather, are you sure you want to do something like this?"

"Why the hell not?" Heather snapped. "Jason did it all the time."

"Yeah, but he's Jason," Ned said. "The uber internet ninja. Ya may not have the same jujitsu he's got."

"Can you tell us something of what this is about?" Cassie pleaded.

Heather's eyes shimmered. "All right ... I-I'm being told that my mother ... that she gave herself to the Darkness."

"Oh goodness," Cassie breathed, stricken.

Ned raised an eyebrow. "Oh yeah? Whadayer sources? Personally I don't believe nuthin' 'round here no more unless I see it with my own two peepers."

"I know," Heather said. "My mother has a pendant I can take, but I need a location."

"You're going to have Richie give you a psychometry reading!" Cassie said in a bright voice.

"Yes, but not unless I can find the location of a business my mother used to run."

"A business?" Ned said.

"Yes, Ned. A paranormal investigation business."

"A paranormal--?!" Cassie gasped before several odd looks from other students forced her to lower her voice. It was hard to contain her excitement, as it was her only bulwark against both exhaustion and despair. "Heather, I'll bring the folder tomorrow, but I haven't looked at it, so I don't know how useful it will be."

"I'll take my chances," Heather said, her voice gushing with relief. "Thanks, Cassie, I really owe you one."

"The only thing I want from you is to be careful."

Heather smiled. "I will. Oh, and can one of you please pick up a bag of chips or something during your lunch and hand it to me after next class? I haven't had a thing to eat all day. I'll see you later."

She waved at them as she retreated and fled down the hall.

"Her mother, involved in paranormal investigations," Cassie breathed. "Good heavens."

Ned nodded. "Ayup. This li'l venture jus' got a whole lot more innerestin'."

Richie slowed as he approached his locker, his gaze drawn to those just across the hall from his. Compared to the others, these gleamed as if brand new. The school had more lockers than students, and these were at the end of the assignment pool. They had stood empty for as long as any of the Harbingers could remember.

A closer look revealed they were not as pristine as they first appeared. Each handle of the upper row was scratched, but only on the right side. His gaze followed the line of marred metal until it was interrupted by two diminutive freshmen who leaned against the lockers and chatted.

Richie's lips twitched into a brief, tiny smirk as he recalled his favorite after-school pastime the year before: the "Freshmen Rule." He thought himself rather clever at the time for coming up with the name. He would withdraw a nice, solid wooden ruler from his pocket (which he often had to go to junkyards to find; plastic just didn't work as well), and run down the line of lockers, rattling the end of the ruler against the handles while giving a shout of "freshmen rule!"

Invariably, his victims would think him on their side and sometimes even return the rallying call. Their mistake became apparent only when Richie reached them and slapped the end of the ruler against their heads as if they were just so many more handles. He would reach the end of the lockers and spin around, holding the ruler aloft and crying, "Freshmen rule! Geddit?" and then laugh as if it were the funniest joke in the world.

Richie's grin was slow to fade. He realized how stupid and lame it was now, but it reminded him of a far simpler time.

You mean when you used to be an asshole bullying anyone weaker than you?

Richie's grin vanished at once, and he stomped over to his locker muttering "fuck you" under his breath. He banged a fist against the locker and forced himself to take a deep breath. "Not being a dick," he whispered. "Gonna call you later, and show you I'm--"

"Um, Richie?"

Richie flinched and spun around. "Fuck, don't sneak up on me like that!"

"Sorry," said Heather.

Richie glared at her, but it quickly faded. He dialed the combination to his locker and opened it. "Forget it. What's up?"

"I wanted to talk to you about something."

"Can't it wait for the bus?"

"No, I don't want Melinda to hear." She paused and glanced behind her. "It's what I talked to you about the other day. I think I found something of my mother's, and I'm close -- I hope -- to finding a location."

Richie frowned. "What kind of location?" he asked in a wary voice.

Heather rolled her eyes. "Not a cemetery, okay? My mother ran some sort of business back in the eighties having to do with investigating the paranormal. Maybe if we can go to that spot, you can see something."

Richie nodded once. "Okay, fine. When do you want to do it?"

"That's the problem, I'm not sure," Heather said, leaning against the lockers. "My mother has a pendant my father gave her a long time ago. She wears it everywhere. I'm not sure how to get it from her."

Richie rolled his eyes. "You're getting like Jason, you think too much. Just sneak in and take it when she's not looking."

"Did you listen to me? She wears it everywhere."

"She wear it to bed? In the shower?"

"She did take it off when she came home from the Inn yesterday, but that was right before dinnertime. I don't know if she put it back on again." Heather sighed. "I'll have to figure something out. You have to be home for dinner, right?"

Richie snorted. "You think I give a flying fuck anymore what my mother thinks? She's just a fucking mouthpiece now for the Dark bitch."

Heather's eyes widened. "Oh, I didn't know ... I mean ... she hadn't been that far gone when..."

"Fuck all that, okay?" Richie snapped. He paused to put out the fuse on his temper and was only partially successful. As if sensing his father's rebuttal, he pleaded practicality; it was easier to think of his mother in such terms than what the Darkness wanted him to think. He would not played for a fool again. No matter how much it tried to make her act the part of a real mother, she was still just a puppet on strings. Until he could figure out how to cut those strings, this made it easier to cope.

"Okay," Heather said in a cautious voice. "So when I find this place, I'll get the pendant somehow and we can meet over there."

"Yeah, that's fine," Richie said as he slammed his locker shut. "That all? We have to get to the bus before the driver dies of old age."

Heather nodded and smiled. "Thanks, Richie, I really owe you one."

Richie managed a tiny smile in return before they both headed out of the school. See, Dad? I'm helping her. I'm doing what Jason wanted. I've stopped being a total dick.

Yet he heard nothing in response but the tumultuous chatter of his own tormented thoughts.

Jason had no idea how to approach it this time. Everything he had tried had failed. Either Elizabeth really had been on the wrong track, or no means existed to set his mind into a state immune from the Darkness' influence. Awareness of the inner workings of his own mind was little help if he had no means to affect them.

So what should he be thinking when he stepped into the Inn? Could he accept the enjoyment of manipulating Cindy despite the guilt it induced? Acceptance had not worked before; he was always maneuvered into the mistake which left his mind wide open.

It says it's using my own desires against me, but it's twisting them to a degree I would never--

There! Did he just fall into the trap again? Is this where his moral censor put on its blindfold and refused to see what came next? Try as he might, he could not imagine ridding himself of the guilt, which he was sure was the next step. He could not alter behavior whose existence his mind refused to accept.

There has to be a middle ground, dammit! Jason thought as he walked inside. There has to be a happy medium between--

His thoughts trailed off as his eyes fell on Cindy. He let out a slow sigh as his cock swelled. He had not stopped thinking about this moment all afternoon. He was eager to take her into Stacy's office and command her again.

Yet he approached slowly, his desires tempered by the anticipation of the guilty stain it would leave on a conscience already tainted by what he had done the day before. Cindy, however, seemed to be enticing him, wearing a more low-cut and tighter shirt, as if she anticipated serving his sexual needs. He saw it in her eyes, despite how she wrung her hands.

Or is that the tack she intends to use? Jason thought, hope rising along with his desire. To make me think she likes to be manipulated?

"Um ... h-hello, Jason," Cindy said in a small voice.

Jason smiled in return, more naturally than he thought he should. His cock grew hard at the thought that she would strip naked for him if he so desired. As he entertained the notion, he thought he saw her hands flutter to her waist as if to grab the bottom of her shirt.

"Hi, Cindy," Jason said.

Cindy hesitated before she stepped out from behind the counter. She was wearing shorts, leaving her legs bare and unadorned, her feet wedged into heeled shoes. Her eyes flicked down to his crotch. Her nipples appeared as two tiny but swelling bumps on her shirt.

"I have to talk to you, Jason," she said in a low and urgent voice. Her eyes flitted to his crotch again. "In private. Please."

"Um, okay. Can we use Ms. Missen's--"

Cindy shook her head. "No, not there." She reached into her pocket and pulled out a room key. "There's an unused hotel room just around the corner from her office. Just don't tell her since she hates the employees taking liberties like this."

Jason nodded and followed, and tried not to let his gaze linger on her swaying ass. Cindy glanced behind her and down the hall before sliding the card through the slot and opening the door. He stepped past her, glancing around the room. The drapes had been drawn, blocking out all light as good as if it were a brick wall.

Cindy closed the door behind them and let out a quick sigh. She marched up to Jason and said in a quavering voice, "Jason, I ... I feel strange having to ask this, but ... can you stop whatever you're doing to me?"

Jason resisted the urge to tell only the brutal truth, but his mind was racing so fast with too many half-baked ideas that it was too easy for order to be imposed upon the chaos from without. Why does she feel I have to stop?

"Just why do you want me to stop?" Jason asked before he could even attempt to stop the words from marching to his lips.

"Because it's making things terribly hard for me with my boyfriend! It's making it so I can't ... can't go down on him."

"I know, you like my cock too much."

Cindy uttered a ragged sigh. "It's not that I don't want to, I just ... I-I want to keep my boyfriend."

Jason hesitated when he stumbled over his guilt. He wanted to apologize for what he was doing to her, but maybe she would be doing her boyfriend a favor by driving him away.

"Maybe it would be best if..." Jason trailed off as he became conscious of the words he was about to say. He didn't mean that! He was not even thinking ... well, he was thinking it, but it could not have been...

"He's better off without you," Jason said before he could stop himself.

Cindy's eyes widened. "Wait, what?!"

She cheats on him anyway, so why would he want her? But how would I know something like that?

The two colliding thoughts brought Jason to a stop.

"That's not fair, Jason," Cindy declared. "You don't have any right to judge."

Jason exercised the curiosity anyone else may have done and entertained the notion that she had done something worthy of judgment, and the words slid into his mind and out his mouth like silk. "What have you done that you think someone would judge you?"

"I only ... it's just that when he's ... stop trying to change the subject!"

I need to know what this is about. "But this is obviously upsetting you. What is it?"

Cindy glared at him and uttered a frustrated sigh. "Okay, fine, I cheated on my boyfriend a bit. I was just really horny and Jack had to work late, and I'd known Greg for years." Cindy sighed. "I really felt bad about it, so I want to do my boyfriend more often. But now I can't do the thing he really likes."

Jason nodded, his thoughts settling, and he could find nothing in his head which he could not be thinking himself. He was glad he was not like her, cheating on a girlfriend or boyfriend and having to cover it up.

"I just keep wanting to do you," Cindy said in a husky voice. "And I will. I'll suck your delicious cock, Jason, and I'll keep doing it. Just make it so I can do my boyfriend, too."

I'll bet she does this a lot. She cheats on boyfriends all the time. I guess this isn't so traumatizing to her after all. "So I guess I'm only making you cheat with a different guy."

Cindy sighed. "Stop making it seem like such a big deal. It's not like I do this all the time."

"You've done it before?"

"Why do you want to ... I ... y-yes, sometimes I ... play the field a bit." Her lips twitched into a tiny grin, her eyes turning sultry. "I can't help that I like sex so much. It's not like I'm settled down with anyone yet."

"But do you tell your boyfriends you play around?"

Her smile faded. "Well, no, of course not."

"Don't you think that's a little unfair to them?"

"I-I guess, but ... I mean ... I'm not hurting anyone."

Jason hesitated, as if one part of his mind had finally caught up with the other. He was on the verge of determining where this was going, but something blocked him from making the final leap to realization. He admitted to feeling some indignation over Cindy's attitude towards her relationships. While his own friends tended to "play around" with one another, part of this was based on necessity, and they never hid it from each other, not like her.

"Some of your boyfriends may think otherwise," Jason said.

Cindy rolled her eyes, but her voice was shaky. "I can't believe I'm debating this with you. Look, it's not like they don't get something out of the deal, okay? I'm rather good in bed. You ... you saw that for yourself. I don't think you have the right to judge me."

Her last statement triggered two things at once, and they became so entwined that his mind was seized with a brief paralysis. First was the thought that he had every right to judge her, as he would never be so callous with other people's affections. The second was the realization of what emotion was being manipulated with such aplomb.

He broke out of the paralysis, and the remaining doubt was swept away. He had the moral high ground; it mattered not how he got here.

"Cindy, take off your clothes," Jason said.

Cindy's eyes widened. She backed up a step, despite her hands grasping the bottom edge of her shirt as if ready to obey. "Jason, w-what are... ?"

"You want to take off your clothes for me. You want to show off your body to me."

Cindy swallowed and tugged her shirt up. "P-please, don't do this," she said in a small, quavering voice.

Her pleading tone gave him a moment's pause, but the sympathy it would have garnered was lost to the need to be right, the need to be in control, and the arousal both had generated. He loved manipulating her, and now he had a solid reason why he should not feel guilty about it.

She deserved it.

"You always want to be naked for me, Cindy," Jason said in a low voice. "Naked and horny."

Cindy swallowed and pulled off her shirt. By the time she stripped down to her underwear, she was trembling with need. When she stepped out of her panties and stood nude before him, she panted softly, and her pussy glistened.

Jason's cock was rock-hard, and he saw no reason to leave it confined in his pants. He stripped off his own clothes, watching Cindy's widening eyes as the prize was revealed.

"Now show me how good in bed you really are," Jason said.

Heather had idled away the time that afternoon playing video games, keeping the volume at an attempted happy medium between soft enough to avoid disturbing her father and loud enough to drown out any noises she might hear from upstairs. Aunt Jo had an annoying habit of leaving the door open, either in brazen defiance of David's ability to perceive the truth or because she knew it disturbed Heather.

Only when it came time for Heather to get ready for her dinner with the Woodrows did she realize her dilemma: she would have to enter her bedroom if she wanted to change her clothes.

Had she been thinking clearly, she would have done it when she had first arrived. She considered going as she was in her jeans and plain shirt, but she wanted to make a good impression on Diane's parents. She would not dress flashy, just a little less casual. She had a nice dress she used to wear to family functions. She had not worn it since spring, but it should still fit.

Heather sighed as she turned off the video game console and glanced up the stairs. She heard a faint rhythmic metallic squeak emanating from the open door to the bedroom. "Shit, does she have to come over every day?" Heather muttered as she climbed the stairs.

Her heart pounded as she reached the top. Seeing her little sister being used by Aunt Jo reminded her too much of her Mistress' wishes, and she tried to resist feeling aroused by Melinda's plight. She stepped up to the door and peered inside.

All Heather could see of Melinda were her stocking-clad legs and writhing hips. The rest was blocked by Aunt Jo's large frame. Jo's hips rocked back and forth, and Heather caught a glimpse of the top of Melinda's head, the rest buried between Jo's thighs. Jo faced Melinda's feet, her ass jiggling with each slide of her pussy across Melinda's helpless face. One of her hands was thrust between Melinda's squirming legs.

Heather swallowed and stepped over the threshold. She saw Jo clutching the end of a huge dildo, pumping it hard into Melinda's slick depths. "Feel that, my little slut?" Jo cooed. "Feel that nice cock fucking you? Oh, yes, slutty girls just love this."

Melinda whimpered, and Heather's heart fell when her little sister lifted her hips in a silent plea for more. Jo slowed her thrusts and turned her head towards Heather. "Come here to watch?" Jo asked in a sly voice.

Heather forced herself to take a deep breath, but it did little to calm her thundering heart or her oozing pussy. "I'm going over to my girlfriend's house for dinner and wanted to change."

"Oh, how quaint."

"I suppose it would be too much to ask you to stop for a little while?"

"Oh, yes, quite too much. But please, don't let me stop you."