CHAPTER 15.

MOM WAS DEAD? This did not compute. At all. "There's no way! I just saw her last night! Is this some weird covert op?"

"No," Chuckie said gently. "I wish it was."

"Look, my mother is the head of the P.T.C.U. If she was dead, wouldn't the President have a problem with that?"

"P.T.C.U.?" Chuckie asked. He was clearly asking for everyone else in the room.

"Presidential Terrorism Control Unit. She's the head of it."

"Ah. There's no such unit, Kitty."

"Look, I realize that it's extremely covert. I mean, I didn't find out about it until I was freaking twenty-seven and discovered aliens were on the planet. But is now the time to pretend? Surely the kids are aware of what you do and I did for a living."

"Daddy works for a think tank, but only 'cause Papa Sol thinks he needs to make his mind available," Charlie said. Clearly he'd heard this a lot.

"How do we afford this house?"

"Charles made his money in convenience stores and then in the stock market," Pierre said. "As you proudly tell anyone who asks. You're multi-millionaires many times over, as the bank cheerfully tells me every time I pay our bills."

"Okay. What do you all think I do for a living?"

"You don't work, Mommy," Charlie replied. "You take care of us."

"She homeschools us," Max added. "Our real mommy, I mean."

"I told you to stop that, Maxwell," Chuckie said sternly.

"Uncle Peter, did Mommy go change clothes before we left this morning?" Max asked.

"Ahh . . ." Pierre looked as if he wished he'd been briefed on whatever story he was supposed to tell.

"She forgot our music and went back into the house after Daddy and Uncle James left," Charlie added.

"That makes sense." Now Pierre looked relieved. "I was on the phone dealing with the worst customer service in the world, so elephants could have gone in and out and I wouldn't have noticed. Speaking of which . . ." He took my jacket and made the tsking sound that indicated he felt this item was probably beyond repair.

"That's it, then," Chuckie said to Max. "Mommy decided to change to look nicer for Auntie Caro and that's why she's in different clothes than she was in at breakfast. Speaking of whom . . . Peter, did you reach Caroline?" He helped me sit down on a very lovely sofa. Had to admit, I liked the decor. Didn't mention it because I had a feeling everyone would tell me I liked it because I'd picked it out.

"Yes, she went to get Sol from the airport. She took a cab there and she'll drive them both back here."

"Why would Caro have to get my dad from anywhere, let alone the airport?"

Both men gave me the look I was becoming familiar with-the "oh dear, it's worse than I thought" look. Pierre cleared this throat. "Ah, your father went to meet up with your Aunt Carla during her layover today."

"Why?"

"Ah, so none of the rest of us would have to see her."

"Well, that makes sense. So, Aunt Carla's alive, well, and exactly the same as I remember, but you insist that my mother, her younger sister, is dead?"

Peter nodded sadly. Chuckie, meanwhile, was on his phone. "Caroline, hi. Are you with Sol? Great. Is Carla gone? Oh. Wonderful." He didn't sound like it was truly wonderful, which boded in the Aunt Carla department. "Well, the car's totaled but they're all amazingly okay. Kitty's. .h.i.t her head, though, and is having some, ah, memory issues. You're going to need to prep Sol, and probably Carla, too, I'm sorry." Aunt Carla department confirmed. "Yes. Ah, she remembers who you and I are, but, ah . . . yeah. She thinks she's married to an alien." He swallowed. "And until a couple of minutes ago, she thought Angela was still alive."

"I don't believe she's dead yet. I only believe that you've all told me she's dead."

"Yeah, you heard that right. Please. Thanks, see you soon. Drive safely, and I really mean that." He hung up and sat down next to me. "Caroline's got your dad and they're on their way here, baby. It'll all be okay, I promise."

"Aunt Carla's along for the ride, too, isn't she?"

"Yes." He said this with absolutely no enthusiasm.

"Truly, I cannot wait." Leaned against Chuckie. "I don't understand what's going on."

He put his arm around me and held me close. "I know. We'll get it taken care of."

"I want to know who's trying to kill us. Because in addition to the airbags not going off-meaning that car was tampered with-the people who ran us off the road had machine guns that they used on the car in a clear attempt to finish the job they started. And I didn't recognize any of them."

"Why would you recognize crazed killers?" Chuckie asked, sounding as if this was potentially the craziest thing I'd said so far.

"Um, by now I have a long history with hit men and women. Some who don't like us, most of whom are very dead now, and some who do. Speaking of whom, we should probably contact my 'uncles,' Peter the Dingo Dog and Surly Vic."

"Why are you calling Uncle Peter a dog?" Charlie asked.

"I'm not. Different Peter."

Chuckie put his finger to my lips. "Kitty, you need to stop, baby. You're babbling and you're frightening the children."

"Not just the children," Pierre said quietly. He was texting. "Kitty, darling, we don't a.s.sociate with paid killers."

"They prefer to be called a.s.sa.s.sins. And yeah, actually, we do."

Pierre's phone beeped. "James is on his way. He should arrive when Caroline and Sol do, if not before."

"Fine. Look, the car was clearly tampered with. a.s.sa.s.sins went out of their way to kill us. First by trying to drive us into a head-on collision, then by actually driving us off the road, and then by shooting us and blowing our car up. I'd sincerely like someone to take this seriously and stop acting like I'm crazed or concussed."

"Let me worry about that," Chuckie said.

"Not just no but h.e.l.l no. People tried to kill me and these children today. As far as I'm concerned, that makes it totally my worry. I'm used to people trying to kill me on a regular basis, but it never stops being annoying."

The "oh dear" looks were on everyone's faces. "Mommy," Charlie said, "no one ever tries to kill us."

Jamie nodded her agreement. "We've never gone through this, Mommy." Again, everyone looked shocked. And again, there was something in the way she said this-something off. I needed to figure out what was going on with her and I needed to do it soon.

"She's not our mommy," Max said, stomping his foot. Just like I did when it got to be too much and no one was paying attention to the obvious. "Listen to her! She talks wrong, just a little, but it's wrong. She looks wrong, just a little, but it's still wrong. Daddy said that's her wedding ring, but it's not. It's just a little different, but it's still wrong. She knows she's not our mommy."

"She is," Jamie said strongly.

"She isn't," Max retorted. "Ask her who she thinks she is."

Chuckie opened his mouth, probably to tell Max to behave, but I put my hand up. "Until I believe it, stop telling Max he's being inappropriate. Because right now I feel like he's the only one listening to me."

Chuckie took my hand and looked at the wedding set more closely. "Max is right," he said slowly. "This isn't the set I bought for you. It's close, but not quite the same. Where did you get this?" He sounded jealous and suspicious again.

"From my husband. My actual husband."

"Tell them," Max pleaded. "Tell them who you think you are."

"I know I'm Katherine Sarah Katt, only I'm married to a man named Jeff Martini. He's an alien from Alpha Four of the Alpha Centaurion solar system. The positives are that they're here to protect and serve, and have given us a tremendous amount of technology. Oh, and they're all, every one of them, drop-dead gorgeous. And they think brains and brain capacity is the be-all, end-all, and, lucky us, they therefore feel that humans are da bomb, which is kind of a super bonus."

"Kitty," Chuckie said patiently, "there are no aliens on the planet. It's a hoax. I'm sure they're out there, somewhere, but they're not here."

"Yes, actually they are. Aliens have been on the planet, en ma.s.se, since the nineteen-sixties. You, Chu-, ah, Charles, are part of the C.I.A. As I told you earlier, you head their Extra-Terrestrial Division. This has made you a target because we have a lot of enemies and you protect us. You were recruited by my mother."

"Your mother wasn't in the C.I.A." He was lying. Again, I could tell, but the unsettling thing was that this was, so far, the only thing he was lying about.

"She is or was, and my father is a cryptologist for NASA, specializing in alien languages."

"Sol is a history professor."

"Yes, but that's his cover. We aren't married because I thought you were joking when you proposed in Las Vegas and I found out you weren't after I'd already met and fallen in love with Jeff. You've been married, to a half-alien named Naomi. She died due to one of the many megalomaniacs that are constantly trying to destroy the A-Cs and take control of our world."

"I don't know anyone named Naomi," Chuckie said gently. "I've told you many times-I've never cheated on you, Kitty. Is that what this is all about? That old fight about why I'm occasionally gone for long periods where you can't reach me?"

"No, because I know nothing of that old fight. Let's move on, but I'll be happy to revisit that later. James is the Head of Field for Centaurion Division, the military branch of American Centaurion, which is the princ.i.p.ality or whatever all the aliens fall under. He, like me, killed a parasitic superbeing-basically an alien monster-which was our introduction to our new supersecret lives. Following me so far?"

"Not at all," Peter said. "I mean, I can't speak for anyone else, Kitty darling, but this sounds like you're trying to pitch a new TV series for the CW."

Heard a step and turned to see Reader enter the room. "I'm following it," Reader said. "At least, I think I am."

"How long have you been here?" Chuckie asked. He didn't sound angry. He sounded like he was verifying that Reader had been backing him up.

Reader shrugged and pa.s.sed one of those little signs to Chuckie. "Long enough." Chuckie looked relieved, but only for a fleeting moment. I only saw this exchange because I was pointedly looking for it. "Based on what you and Peter have told me, something's very off, more than a concussion or the confusion of the Traveler game and real life. Based on what I just heard Kitty say, she has an entire life that she feels she's lived that is completely different than the one we know of."

"And whoever you think I am, she has no knowledge that the two of you are in the C.I.A., or similar, does she?"

CHAPTER 16.

THE KIDS LOOKED CONFUSED, Pierre looked suspicious, and Chuckie had heard this from me already so he had his poker face on. But my C.I.A. accusation caused Reader to jerk. He pulled it together quickly and slapped an innocent and confused expression onto his face, but his reaction was the final proof I was looking for.

"No idea what you're talking about," Chuckie said.

"Bunk. How did my mother die?"

"She was in an accident-" Chuckie started.

"Bunk again. If she didn't die of a disease, and I didn't witness this death-and based on you saying that you hated having to tell me that she was dead again, I didn't know about her death until you broke the news-then she died on a covert op. One I'd imagine she had both of you working."

Both men were ready to lie to me, I could tell. But Dad, Aunt Carla, and Caroline entered the room, forestalling the fibbing.

The kids ran to our new arrivals and got hugs and confirmation of their well-being. Chuckie helped me up from the couch-I didn't need it, but he seemed to think I did, and I didn't want to have an argument or the discussion we needed to have in front of Aunt Carla.

I examined the three newcomers. Each looked slightly different than the last time I'd seen them-mostly hairstyles and clothing choices. All off, just a little, but off from what I knew to be reality.

True, I didn't see Aunt Carla a lot, but she was wearing a wedding ring-the ring I remembered was from her third marriage, indicating she was still married, which wasn't the case as I knew it.

Caroline looked happier than I'd seen her since Michael Gower had died. Not that she'd spent the past year and a half moping but still, some of the light had gone out of her eyes when she'd lost the only man she'd found that she'd wanted to marry, and that light was still in those eyes here.

And Dad . . . Dad looked like he'd been heartbroken and trying to hide it for a long time. Had no idea what was really going on, but whatever it was, it hadn't been good for my father. Meaning that Chuckie's insistence that Mom was dead had a lot more weight.

Dad came over and hugged me tightly. He was shaking. "To think we almost lost all of you . . ."

Decided that, regardless of what I was thinking, my father needed comforting and rea.s.surance, not me to sound crazy. I could save that for later. "It's okay, Dad. We're all alright."

"You're a wreck, Katherine," Aunt Carla said as she extracted me from Dad and hugged me as well. "Why haven't you all had her get cleaned up?" she asked the men chidingly.

"We were waiting for you and Caro to get here," I replied quickly. "So you two could help me."

Caroline looked confused by this, but Aunt Carla beamed. "I'm happy to cover what Angela would have, dear."

Saw Chuckie wince out of the side of my eye, and felt Dad stiffen next to me. Chose to use the diplomacy I'd been forced to learn these past several years. I hugged Aunt Carla again. "Thanks. That means a lot to me."

Every jaw in the room dropped, other than Aunt Carla's-and I knew that because I didn't feel her jaw hit my shoulder-and Jamie's. Even the boys looked shocked. Jamie, however, looked pleased.

"Okay," Caroline said, sounding as confused as she looked. "Normally you want Charles to help you."

"Not today. He has to figure out who ran us off the road and why." Figured now was a terrible time to say that I didn't think he was my actual husband and wanted to avoid intimacy, because that was only going to lead to bad things.

Chuckie sighed. "She's. .h.i.t her head, as I keep on saying. Right now, Kitty doesn't remember us correctly. She doesn't think I'm her husband. In fact, she believes she's married to a s.p.a.ce alien and has a completely different life." Apparently Chuckie felt the Full Disclosure Option was the way to go. Nice of him to cover that for me. "Until proven otherwise, I still think her concussion-which I'm certain she has-caused her to mix up our Traveler game in her mind." He was set on this one.

"Wedding rings," I reminded him.

"You lost your set and got one to replace it without telling me," Chuckie said. "You've done similar with other things we like that got lost or broken. That's just one reason, but it makes sense."

"Does it?" My head throbbed, which it shouldn't have, since I was basically all healed up. Of course, there was always the nagging possibility that he was right and I just had a major concussion and wasn't as healed up as I thought I was. "My head hurts again."