Judging by the looks on their faces, it was plain to her that they weren’t prepared for her questions. But she needed to know the truth. Her father cleared his throat, looking into her eyes while her mother could only hang her head.

“What do you know already?” Her father asked solemnly. This was hurting him, but Rogue knew all too well how pain can heal.

“I know what my father, my real father, did to me. I know that Momma used her mutation to clear it and that you made him disappear. I know that Momma used her mutation on me a couple of times after that, and that you only did it to protect me. What I don’t know is what happened to my father and my mother. Why didn’t you tell me anything when I got older?”

“Because you were happy, Marie. And we didn’t want to take that away from you,” Ray replied sadly. “And, by the time you were old enough, we weren’t sure how to tell you. The next thing we knew, you were gone.”

“Can you tell me about them, at least?” Marie asked quietly.

“You mother was my sister,” Leah began, tears slowly crawling down her cheeks. “She was my best friend. That is, until she met Owen, your father. No one liked him from the beginning. When your grandfather met him, he said he saw the devil in him. The first time Priscilla brought him home, he made the man leave. Prissy was forbidden from seeing him, but she was sixteen and rebellious. She started sneaking behind out father’s back.

“She became withdrawn and secretive. She wouldn’t even tell me what was going on. I thought she might have started using drugs, but she swore it wasn’t that. The next thing we all knew, she was a month away from turning seventeen and pregnant. Daddy hit the roof when she told him who the father was. He and Momma told her they would help her with the baby and that she wouldn’t have to worry about anything as long as she left Owen alone. She refused and left. A week later, they were gone. No one knew where they went and I never saw my sister again.”

Leah paused looking to her husband. “I was only nineteen when she left. Ray and I had been childhood sweethearts, and it wasn’t a shock to anyone when we decided to get married. I wanted Prissy to be there, but we couldn’t find her. It took us six years to track her down. Only, she had vanished and left her daughter behind with a man who should have never been allowed to be around children.”

“Did you ever find out what happened to her? Did you ever look at his memories and figure anything out?” Marie whispered; her back rigid, her neck tense.

“My mutation doesn’t work that way, Baby.” Leah took a deep breath, knowing that she would have to explain. “I don’t actually see the memories. The person who wants the memory to disappear has to just think about it while I touch them.”

“Leah and I continued to search even after we started to take care of you, but it was like she just vanished,” Ray said solemnly.

“And Owen? What happened to him? Don’t tell me he just disappeared, too.” Marie was beginning to get angry. There was just too much that she didn’t know, too much that they could keep from her. “Is he dead?”

Leah and Ray looked at each other, communicating with only their eyes.

“I need to know the truth. I have a right to know. Did you kill him?” She felt Logan’s hand squeeze hers, trying to calm her down.

“He’s alive.” Ray looked away as Leah spoke. “He’s in The Mississippi State Insane Asylum down in Whitfield.”

“I wanted to kill him,” Ray interjected. “Prissy was a good friend of mine, too. And when you told us about what he did to you, well, I don’t know how I controlled myself. But Leah stopped me. She made me promise that I wouldn’t do anything. Said she would take care of it and make him wish that he were dead.”

“How did you take care of it, Momma? What did you do to him?” Marie asked sadly.

“I took his memories. All of them,” Leah replied icily. She held her head up high, and Marie knew she was proud of what she had done. “It wasn’t what I had planned to do, but it worked. I thought that if I concentrated hard enough, I could see his memories and find out what happened to my sister. Instead, I erased everything. And it made him go crazy. He was sent to Whitfield after pushing a boy and breaking his arm. As far as I’ve heard, he hasn’t regained anything.”