07 The Return_ Midnight - L. J. Smith

Matt cleared his throat as something occurred to him. “Uh—does Caroline have to kill
somebody to be a full werewolf, too?”
“I don’t think so,” Elena said. “Stefan says that having a werewolf litter is enough. Either
way, blood is spilled. Caroline will be a full werewolf when she has her twins, but she’ll probably
begin changing involuntarily before that. Right?”
Stefan nodded. “Right. But getting back to Klaus: What was it he was supposed to have
done on his first visit? He attacked—without killing—an old man who was a full hunter-slayer.”
“My grandfather,” Meredith whispered.
“And he supposedly messed with Meredith’s grandfather’s mind so much that this old
man tried to kill his wife and his three-year-old granddaughter. So what is wrong with this picture?”
Elena was truly frightened now. She didn’t want to hear whatever was coming. She could
taste bile, and she was glad that she’d only had toast for breakfast. If only there had been someone to
take care of, like Bonnie, she would have felt better.
“I give up. So what is wrong?” Matt asked bluntly.
Meredith was staring into the distance again.
Finally Stefan said, “At the risk of sounding like a bad soap opera…Meredith had, or
has, a twin brother.”
Dead silence fell over the group in the parlor. Even Mrs. Flowers’s Mama didn’t put in a
word.
“Had or has?” Matt said finally, breaking the silence.
“How can we know?” Stefan said. “He may have been killed. Imagine Meredith having
to watch that. Or he could have been kidnapped. To be killed at a later time—or to become a
vampire.”
“And you really think her parents wouldn’t tell her?” Matt demanded. “Or would try to
make her forget? When she was—what, three already?”
Mrs. Flowers, who had been quiet a long time, now spoke sadly. “Dear Meredith may
have decided to block out the truth herself. With a child of three it’s hard to say. If they never got her
professional help…” She looked a question at Meredith.
Meredith shook her head. “Against the code,” she said. “I mean, strictly speaking, I
shouldn’t be telling any of you this, and especially not Stefan. But I couldn’t stand it anymore…having
such good friends, and constantly deceiving them.”
Elena went over and hugged Meredith hard. “We understand,” she said. “I don’t know
what will happen in the future if you decide to be an active hunter—”
“I can promise you my friends won’t be on my list of victims,” Meredith said. “By the
way,” she added, “Shinichi knows. I’m the one who’s kept a secret from my friends all my life.”
“Not any longer,” Elena said, and hugged her again.
“At least there are no more secrets now,” Mrs. Flowers said gently, and Elena looked at
her sharply. Nothing was ever that simple. And Shinichi had made a whole handful of predictions.
Then she saw the look in the mild blue eyes of the old woman, and she knew that what
was important right then was not truth or lies, or even reckonings, but simply comforting Meredith.
She looked up at Stefan while still hugging Meredith and saw the same look in his eyes.
And that—made her feel better somehow. Because if it was truly “no secrets” then she
would have to figure out her feelings about Damon. And she was more afraid of that than of facing
Shinichi, which was saying quite a lot, really.
“At least we’ve got a potter’s wheel—somewhere,” Mrs. Flowers was saying. “And a