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“Why?” her arms were folded, her tone suspicious.

“Well, killing a whole family? Why? If it was about feeding, you would wait for someone to be alone. You don’t attack a whole family, especially if there is a man there. Bad hunting practice. You risk getting hurt.”

She leaned against the kitchen counter and crossed her arms, deep in thought.

“Maybe,” she conceded. “There are many things I have questions about,” she said. “Not only my family and how they died but also later. I was in a serious accident a few months ago. Actually, it was when I was looking into your case. It didn’t feel random.”

She paused. “I was very seriously injured, I had to quit my job to focus on my recovery.”

“You don’t think I had something to do with it?” This was a whole different turn of events. It struck me that Kaya and I could have met earlier. I may have even seen her before now. Our relationship was meant to be, it was destiny, I was convinced of it.

“That’s the thing,” she said, shaking her head. “I don’t know anything. My life is a mess and I have more questions than answers!”

Her voice broke and I wanted to take her in my arms but I had to be careful.

An idea occurred to me.

Before Charlotte, I had briefly dated an Argentinian model called Camila. She was volatile and unpredictable, and our relationship had not lasted, but she’d told me about a medicine man who had helped her work through some childhood trauma. I had to listen to her go on and on about this medicine man and how he had managed to get her to the root of her anger.

I wondered if this medicine man could help Kaya face her fear of vampires. I was pretty sure Kaya’s family was not killed by a vampire, unless it was both the stupidest and strongest of all of us, which I doubted. The world was full of idiots walking home alone at night. No vampire went into the mountains looking for an armed human family to attack all at once. Vampires were highly intelligent and calculated. They were about minimum effort and maximum results. But I needed Kaya to see that.

When I told Kaya about the medicine man, she stared at me, clearly unsure.

“I have Native American blood, actually,” she then said. “I don’t know a lot about my parents, though. I was traumatized by the attack and for years, I was quiet and withdrawn. The sheriff and his wife decided to raise me and we were quite isolated. I only came to the town after I was a teenager.”

She turned around and finished making her coffee.

I could sense the turmoil and confusion inside of her. So much emotion.

I couldn’t remember the last time I’d had so many feelings churning inside of me. It must have been around the time I had to make the decision to give up my human existence and truly join my father’s family. My mother had been human and I had lived my first twenty years as a mortal, when my father told me it was time to choose which side I wanted to be on.

My father told me that humans were wonderful but weak. Our kind was strong but had to watch for loneliness, he said. In return, we gained knowledge and wisdom and became superior beings on earth.

Not much of a choice, I thought. I had chosen my father, wanting to be like him.

“You’re not happy,” I suddenly said to Kaya. “You will deny it, of course, but it’s all over you, you are drenched in it; this anger, this fear, this uncertainty. All your attitude, your wildness, that is a defense. But it is keeping you from who you could be.”

It was a gamble, of course, talking to her like this but it was worth a shot.

I already knew roses wouldn’t win her heart, but perhaps this was how.

“Think about it, let me know.”

I turned to walk away but she called out to me.

“Wait a minute.”

I turned back.

“I’m thinking, okay? This is… hard for me.”

I nodded. “Change is hard. Facing the past, that is hard.”

She looked me in the eyes. “What do you know about change? And facing the past?”

I had to laugh. She was like a child sometimes.

“I have been on this earth for over one hundred years, Kaya. I have seen so many loved ones come and go.”