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“Can we not have this fight again? The one where you tell me all the things I did to wound you? I felt...guilty, after it happened, Rachel. That’s why I didn’t call. That’s why I didn’t storm your wedding. It’s why I came to see you and not him.”
She frowned. “You felt guilty.”
“It turns out that when you seek revenge on someone you hate...because of the way they treated women—the way they treated people in general—and you use someone in order to do it, you come out feeling a lot like the thing you despise.”
It was the truth. He’d never allowed himself to fully form the thought. To examine exactly why the whole incident with her left him feeling dirty. Empty. It was because it was another piece of evidence for the trial being conducted over his soul.
Innocent or guilty. Victim or predator. Which was he?
He didn’t even know the answer. And it burned.
“A conscience, huh?” she asked.
“I’m maybe not as bad as you think. I’m maybe not as good as I think, but...also perhaps I’m not completely amoral, either. Which is good to know.”
“Do you want to be...good?”
He frowned. “I don’t know. I know what I don’t want to be.”
“So you really... You really think you grew up in a brothel with Ajax.”
“I did,” he said, his chest tightening. “He wouldn’t remember me. I was a boy when he left. Maybe eight. But I remember him. And his father.”
A leaden weight settled in his chest. As it did whenever he thought too much about...everything. When he had moments of wanting to call Ajax’s father “my father.”
He swallowed past the bile that was rising in his throat. Bad blood, right? That’s the way it works.
It must. Except it didn’t seem to work that way for Ajax. Ajax, who’d acquired a family when he’d left the compound. Ajax, who’d had no trouble finding love.
He couldn’t think about it. It gave him a headache. It was too complicated. Too hard.
“He never told me about his life before he came to work for my family,” she said. “I mean...nothing. He never said a thing about it and now...now I think it’s a bit strange. But honestly, Alex, if you knew him...he’s so serious. He never does one thing out of line. I can’t even imagine the man you’re describing.”
“He was little better than a boy,” Alex said, his voice rough. “I suppose I imagined he hadn’t changed much as a man. That when I met you you would have stories of him in excess, and that he would be the same.”
“He doesn’t even drink. He’s the most outrageously decent man I’ve ever known, and no, he doesn’t inspire great passion in me. But he’s a friend. He’s not a bad person.”
“But he was,” Alex said, feeling the need to justify himself. “He was.”
“Or maybe he just had his moments? Like you said, what happened with me...it wasn’t your best.”
“No,” he said.
“It wasn’t mine, either. But I don’t think it was my worst. Well, it depends on how you look at it. It wasn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened to me. It was definitely the worst thing I’ve done. Because I didn’t keep my promises, and that was... That wasn’t right of me.”
