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So, Wes lives to fight another day.
Unless he’s a zombie who died on the table then got up to amble away, he survived. I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel about that. Relieved? Afraid? I’m neither. But Remy knows how he feels. His face goes sharp, his rugged features turning severe as every part of him tenses. “You let him get away?” He’s grinding the words out from a clenched jaw, and I just watch him. My heart is racing, but I don’t know what is making it gallop harder—the impending explosion or the fact that, against all odds, Wes lived.
“I didn’t let him do anything, Boudreaux. I left because I have a family to get home to. I help you when I can, but that doesn’t mean I’m a babysitter.”
Remy doesn’t miss a beat… or explode. “You think your family would like to know you save the lives of murderers and criminals for enough cash to powder your nose?”
The doctor mutters something to himself before a hefty sigh issues from the other line. “No, I don’t want them to know.”
“That’s not what I asked.” Remy snaps. “I should have your fucking head for this. Maybe just a hand?”
My heart stills so suddenly my chest aches.
“Remington, I…”
“No excuses.” He shakes his head, though I’m not entirely sure it’s meant for the man who can’t see him. “You disappoint me, doctor. You know I don’t bring business to you because you’re the best. You just have the best fees of all of them. Of course, dead people are of no use to me, so I’d be forced to seek out your competition. Hector Valdez is worth the price he charges.”
The doctor’s shaky exhale reaches through the phone, and his voice wobbles when he says, “I—I’m sorry.”
“Mm.” Remy nods, noncommittally. “I don’t think you are. But you will be.”
He doesn’t offer a chance for response, ending the call and tossing the phone on the counter with a disappointed sigh before turning his eyes to me. “I…” My throat feels thick and tight, making words hard to come by. “That was cruel.”
“Cruel?” He chuckles, closing the space between us so that his body presses into mine, backing me against the counter. I grab hold of the edges, needing something to close my hands on, something to ground me. “You think it was cruel to warn a drug addict that I was going to cut him off? You think it’s cruel to take his life before the powder can?”
“You don’t get to decide.” I say, my voice surprisingly confident. It only increases when I clear my throat, square my shoulders, and tilt my chin up to look at him defiantly. “What makes you the man who gets to take other people’s lives?”
“Because I’m the man with the gun. Or the man with the plan. Or the one who pulls the strings. It’s quite easy to take a life, Claire. Messy, sure. Unpleasant, yes. But easy if you don’t let the guilt control you… but then you know all about the guilt.”
The guilt.
I’m sure it’s why I’ve been on edge, why I feel like I’m falling apart, why I want to cry. I’ve never known guilt like this, even though I was so certain at the time that what Remy and I did was justified. Now, I’m not so sure. Did the couple who brought me into this world plan for this to be my legacy? Is that why they abandoned me, dumping me in the lap of a broken foster care system so that they wouldn’t have to deal with it? Maybe that was their legacy, too. Maybe darkness is in my bloodstream, keeping me alive. Maybe I have to feed it to keep it alive because if I starve it, I’ll kill a part of myself I haven’t yet learned how to give up.
“He deserved it.” My voice trembles even to my own ears. Remy surely hears it, too. He only laughs at me, cold, distant.
“Deserved it why? Because you said so? Because I did?”
“Because he hurt innocent girls!”
Remy’s beautiful face is blurry with the tears in my eyes, but anger is igniting in my veins to chase it away. I’m so fucking tired of crying, of feeling sick, anxious, scared, nauseous. I’m sick of feeling anything but free because that’s what I am. I got myself emancipated so that I could get out of the cage I was kept in, and when I did, I learned how far my wings could reach, how high I could fly. But I’m not flying, not spreading my wings. I’m torturing myself because I did an unforgiveable thing. And part of me knows that trying to spare Wes’ life was just a Hail Mary attempt to clear my guilty conscience.
“Because I told you he did. I gave you a police file, and you believed me, as if it wouldn’t be hard to make that up. You killed him because I told you to… because I pull the strings.”
The damn tears won’t go away no matter how furiously I try to blink past them. “You lied to me?”
Remy’s lips curve into a smirk, so delicious I could close the space between us and cover his mouth with my own. But I’m too shocked, devastated. The fire in my veins seconds ago has turned so quickly to ice, that it’s visceral, painful. A cold chill runs down my spine, and a shudder follows it. “Maybe I did. Maybe I didn’t. Maybe those girls were just more of Davos’ victims.” He shrugs. “In the end, do you think that matters? We either just cease to exist, in which case, what does any of it matter? Or we get judged for what we did with our time. Do you think that the judge is really going to examine the circumstances before he delivers his verdict? Do you think his idea of right and wrong and maybe wrong and mostly right is going to align with what you believe?”
The betrayal I feel is unfounded, but it’s there anyway… sharp and cold like a knife between the ribs. Or a knife between the breasts, cutting just deep enough to mark. “If you want me to feel bad, I don’t.”
“Because I told you not to.” He challenges. “I gave you an excuse to feel justified in what you did. But if I take that reason away, what do you have?”
Anger.
Guilt.
Remy warned me it would stain my soul.
“Why are you doing this?” I swallow the tears, collecting myself enough to steady my trembling lip. I thought I was getting over the guilt. But all of a sudden, I feel like it’s eating me alive.
