"Aw. Well, you're worth it,Gwen." She flashes me a grin and tweaks the end of my nose. "Besides, I'm sure you'll return the favor someday."
THREE
KAI
You want something done right,I guess you gotta do it yourself. Story of my fucking life.
I can't sleep. I haven'tbeensleeping, probably because every time I close my eyes, I see Alexei Moroslav's face with blood streaming over its lips and his long eyelashes fluttering and going still.
Fuck.And there it is again. I flop over in bed and scrub my face. Such a badass, I think. Such a badass I always thought I was. Can't even handle one little cold-blooded murder.
So I've barely slept. I am a shell of a human. Save for one marathon 14-hour session as soon as we were back from Russia—I’m sorry, Finland—where I woke up and genuinely thought I might have died briefly, I have hardly rested my brain at all.
Now it's Monday morning, and my bed's empty except for me. Far from ideal, but I'm not about to make anyone sleep with anyone they don't want to, and that goes double for the girl I murdered a Russian to protect. She never wants to touch me again, then that's her prerogative. It'd suck, but I'm down that bad, I guess. I'd accept my fate for what it is.
And yet. At the very least, if Gwenna were here, it would give me something todowhen it's 4 a.m. ticking to 5 ticking to 6 and finally 7. Something that's not just tossing and turning in my own rumpled bed sheets.
Something other than what I know I need to do, because apparently no one else has done it.
Go to Luther's office.
I give up and peel myself out of bed.
It's sunny, at least, even if it's cold, and I squint as I half walk, half skate across the icy sheen of campus, the weak morning sunlight somehow turning razor sharp when it glances off the snow.
Beautiful Easter Monday, I think. Cold enough to freeze your nose hairs. There's no class today: last day of spring break, religious holiday and all that. There are a few people milling about the campus, coming back from trips, or just getting some fresh air after seven solid days on campus, trapped indoors by inhospitable weather, so I don't look too out of place on my way to Luther's.
Not that I don't have a right to be there. Foster son. Absolutely nothing suspicious. All the also-ran, second-best shit went down behind closed doors.
I swiped the key from King's coat pocket. The massive door opens easily. I step in quick, before I lose my nerve, and the instant I do, I'm hit with a rippling, almost deliberating wave of discomfort, like being sent to the principal's office crossed with a combat flashback.
Because the last time I was here?—
I walk across the floor like an automaton, but my eyes see it without wanting to see it.
The stain. Drops of blood in the carpet.
My blood.
I clench a fist, clench my jaw, and keep going. My boots are leaving dirty snow tracks the luxurious Oriental plush, and for a minute I consider doing something really destructive, like standing on his desk and pissing on the damn thing, just because, but I think better of it. I'm not going to leave any more bodily fluids behind than necessary.
Instead, I make a beeline for the filing cabinet behind the desk.
There are photos on the shelves and cabinets, not many, and nothing candid or casual, but some. Kingston at Y10, Kingston at Y12. Trophies, medallions, smiles just restrained enough to avoid being called grins--nobody likes a gloater, after all. There's a framed one of Luther and Mallory, actually, which surprises me, and none of Morgan, which surprises me a little more.
Because thereisone of me.
Just one. Kingston's in it too, of course. But there we are, one and two on the podium. The first and only time I'd ever beaten him after Luther took me in.
Another wave of something hits me, not discomfort, but...astonishment. Pride. Disbelief. I touch a finger to the beveled black edge of the frame, as if I need to confirm this thing is actually real, despite the fact that I was literally there when it happened.
I was so fucking proud. You can see it in my face.
And King...
All at once, the warmth blasts out of me.
Of course. Of course this isn't some keepsake of Luther's to memorialize what a good job his foster son did. This isn't here to make me look good. This is here to make Kingston feel bad. To say,look what you let happen, look who you let beat you, be better, do better.
