Chapter 149: Was It All Part of His Plan?

Chapter 149: Chapter 149: Was It All Part of His Plan?

Chapter 149: Was It All Part of His Plan?

Cyrus Calder adjusted his expression before opening the door.

As expected, Daphne Whitlock stood outside with food in her hands.

Her eyes were lowered, making her expression difficult to read. Otherwise, everything looked the same as it had on the previous nights. She held out the container without explanation.

"Thank you for bringing this over."

"You do not have to thank me every time."

Daphne’s voice was unusually even.

After speaking, she finally raised her eyes.

Cyrus noticed the difference immediately.

The intensity he had grown accustomed to seeing in her was absent.

Before he could decide whether that mattered, Daphne asked, "How has your memory been lately?"

Cyrus paused.

"It has been getting worse."

He shook his head lightly.

That answer required no performance.

If Vera had not drained enough blood from him to make him pass out, he might have been able to call the situation relatively stable.

Instead, twelve years were gone now.

Only a little more than five years of memory remained, and Cyrus had no idea how long they would last.

He opened his mouth to continue when his phone vibrated inside his pocket.

Cyrus took it out in front of Daphne.

Another unfamiliar number appeared on the screen.

He declined the call without answering.

When he looked back at Daphne, a subdued expression had settled over his face.

"Still, I think things will probably work out somehow."

"They will."

Daphne answered immediately.

This time, the faint warmth in her expression looked genuine.

"You will be all right."

Cyrus watched her return to the neighboring apartment.

Only after her door closed did he allow the small feeling of unease to surface.

For an instant, Daphne had seemed different.

Almost as if she knew something.

Cyrus stood there for several seconds before dismissing the thought.

He was probably being overly cautious.

Nothing she said had directly challenged his story.

Even if his memory truly disappeared, he did not need Daphne to remain reliable forever. If she could help him through the dangerous period immediately afterward, that alone would make the work he had put into their relationship worthwhile.

Cyrus returned to his small table and opened his diary.

Over the past several days, he had tried learning more about Vera’s bloodline.

The rare-blood material he could access offered some basic information about Bloodborn appearance and habits, but almost nothing about their abilities.

That was not particularly surprising.

Rare-bloods had little reason to publish detailed explanations of what they could do.

If every supernatural ability were neatly cataloged in books, sooner or later someone would decide those abilities needed to be tracked, controlled, or collected.

Cyrus lifted one hand.

A small piece of ice formed in his palm.

It looked almost identical to ice from an ordinary freezer, except for the unusual clarity running through it.

At the same time, his dark hair gradually lost its color.

White spread through it until the black disappeared completely.

Frostborn could do things that ordinary humans would consider impossible too.

Cyrus himself simply did not consider his abilities especially impressive.

He had little experience using them deliberately, and most remained undeveloped.

After examining the ice for another second, he tossed it into his mouth.

The cold bothered him less than the snack value justified.

Then Cyrus picked up his pen and recorded the events of the day.

Next door, Daphne lay across her bed with one arm covering her eyes.

She was exhausted.

The doubts Vera had planted during lunch no longer felt like doubts.

They had become evidence.

Two hours earlier, Daphne had stood inside Cyrus’s apartment alone.

The room had been plain enough that nothing immediately demanded attention.

A bed.

A small closet.

A nightstand.

A few practical possessions.

The closet had been fuller than she expected, which reassured her in a strange way. Cyrus really was building a life for himself. He had clothing, school things, work clothes, and enough personal belongings that the apartment no longer looked temporary.

Daphne had even caught herself wondering whether, as his landlord, she should provide something else for the unit.

Then she opened the nightstand.

A notebook sat inside.

Its purpose was obvious because Cyrus had written Diary across the cover.

Daphne had stood beside the bed staring at it.

She knew she should close the drawer.

Instead, her hand reached forward.

The first entries confused her.

There were notes organized around memories beginning at age eleven.

Later pages showed marks beside eleven and thirteen, almost as though those sections had been crossed out because they were no longer accessible.

Daphne continued reading.

Repeated lines appeared throughout the newer entries.

Today’s memory remains intact.

Then, several days ago, the wording changed.

Today’s memory is missing.

The discovery stopped Daphne cold.

So the memory loss was real.

At least part of it.

Cyrus had not invented everything.

The diary did not explain what caused the losses. He had written around that part with enough care that Daphne could only tell something was happening to him repeatedly.

She skipped past ordinary school notes and mundane pieces of daily life.

Then she found entries about his work.

The new phone appeared there too.

That expensive device he had suddenly brought home after going out with Helena was documented plainly enough to make the surrounding entries harder to dismiss as fiction.

The diary was real.

Cyrus used it because he was genuinely afraid of forgetting.

Daphne kept reading.

Then one line made her eyes tremble.

Daphne Whitlock may become a major safeguard, provided she does not have other intentions.

She stared at the sentence.

Other intentions.

There was little mystery about what Cyrus meant.

Her fixation on his vulnerable Frostborn form.

The impulses she had already acted on.

The reason he had once looked at her and asked whether he could trust her if his memory disappeared.

Daphne turned another page.

A list of names appeared.

Several people had marks beside them.

Her own name had two small stars.

Daphne did not know what the stars meant.

She could guess enough.

Were these all people Cyrus was managing in different ways?

People he had lied to, tested, reassured, or carefully positioned so they might become useful if something happened?

Had she become one of them?

The emotional story Vera told at lunch came back with uncomfortable precision.

Someone acting vulnerable.

Someone encouraging guilt.

Someone carefully turning another person’s remorse into better treatment.

Daphne had closed the diary eventually and returned everything exactly where she found it.

Cyrus’s apartment had one advantage for someone invading his privacy.

There was so little clutter that leaving no evidence behind was easy.

Now, lying on her own bed hours later, Daphne let out a heavy breath.

Cyrus had lied to her.

He had also told the truth.

That was what made the situation infuriating.

His memory really was disappearing.

His fear was not invented.

His lack of family support appeared genuine.

Yet somewhere inside those truths, he had also recognized her guilt and deliberately used it.

Daphne no longer cared whether Vera’s cousin story had been true.

The similarity had done its job.

Anger rose again.

She wanted to drag Cyrus over and force him to explain every line in that diary.

She had actually felt guilty.

She had lost sleep wondering whether she had permanently damaged his ability to trust her.

She had spent extra time preparing his food and worrying about what would happen if he forgot everything.

Meanwhile, Cyrus had been quietly rating her usefulness.

Was all of that inside his calculations?

Daphne lowered her arm and stared at the ceiling.

Then another thought came.

Could he predict what she planned for tomorrow night too?

Friday was convenient.

If a teacher and student both disappeared from school on the same weekday, somebody might notice.

Beginning after classes on Friday avoided that problem.

The weekend gave her two full days.

Cyrus was not going to enjoy them.

Daphne wanted everything he had hidden from her.

The memory loss.

His bloodline.

The ring.

The people on that list.

The reason he thought of her as protection while continuing to keep her at arm’s length.

And if his Frostborn body entered that vulnerable childlike state again, she would make sure he could not use it to evade the conversation.

This time, she would control the situation from the beginning.

The next morning arrived without incident.

Cyrus woke after a dreamless night and immediately checked his diary.

His memory remained intact.

That improved his mood.

When he stepped into the hallway, Daphne appeared from the neighboring apartment almost perfectly on cue.

Her expression was warm again.

She handed him breakfast and a packed lunch as though nothing had changed.

Cyrus accepted both without hesitation.

His two-star safeguard was functioning normally.

Excellent.

His mind moved to another person.

Rhea had remained absent from The Full Moon Lounge for several days.

Cyrus still had no idea whether she was embarrassed, busy with police work, or reconsidering their strange arrangement.

That made it difficult to improve things with her.

He had even spent some time reading about the restraint scene she seemed interested in.

Enough to learn that the entire subject had considerably more rules than he realized.

Cyrus had already prepared what he considered a very reasonable speech.

Having an unusual preference was not shameful as long as everyone involved kept it safe and within reasonable limits.

Perhaps Rhea had simply been curious.

Then Cyrus had appeared at exactly the wrong time, and curiosity had overwhelmed her judgment.

She was normally a responsible detective.

Maybe all she needed was a little guidance.

Cyrus carried breakfast downstairs, completely satisfied with the explanation he had built for her.

Behind him, Daphne watched until he disappeared from sight.

Her expression remained gentle.

Friday night was not far away.