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“Don’t get ahead of yourself there, killer.” I said with a face that hopefully came off as stern. “Here’s the thing. Ireallydon’t feel good about taking him out before we can give him the chance to change course. Call me crazy, but I doubt this is a pleasure cruise for him..”
Ruse shifted from the image of a bumbling Ted to the slinky black cat he chose so often and wove himself in a figure-eight around my ankles.
“Well,” he said with an air of smugness. “I suppose we can see howthatconversation goes, then take it from there. I have a feeling you’ll decide my way is the way to go.”
I walked over to my laptop and slammed it shut before looking out the window once again at an unsuspecting Ted. If I was going to give him this chance, it had to be soon. With Jonas beginning to contact me more and more often, I knew my time to act was coming to an end.
Before I could even come up with a script for myself, my legs were carrying me across the living room floor, through the kitchen, and out to the backyard. The screen door smacked shut behind me and I stood there barefoot on the back patio for a moment, trying to think of what to say to begin the awkward conversation I had committed myself to having.
“Hey there, kiddo!” Ted called to me from the shed before I even gathered my thoughts. His friendly greeting cut deep, and reminded me just a touch of my dad. Just enough to make me feel really shitty.
You have no reason to feel shitty, I reminded myself.He’s the one helping Jonas get away with everything. He’s the one preventing all those families from getting any peace or closure. He’s the one who was going to be entirely fine with leaving me to die here and then clean up the mess afterwards.
“Hi,” I said flatly, absolutely unwilling to match his cheerful face.
Ted’s cheer quickly evolved into confusion as I stood there with my fists clenched, staring him down.
“Can I, uh, help ya’ with anything?” He asked with raised eyebrows. “Or are you just enjoying this beautiful day we’re having?”
“I know what you’re doing. What you’ve done,” I said firmly. The words just fell out of me before I was ready, and I watched as sheer panic flashed across Ted’s face. I doubted he had ever been confronted with any of the atrocities he’d helped come to fruition, and the reality of what I’d said caused his entire persona to melt away.
“Well, I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Ted lied. “Care to shed a little more light?”
The groundskeeper was trying to pull the information from me, rather than admit to anything and risk the possibility of talking his way out of this. Even with his back against the wall, he was unwilling to fold. Jonas Silver must have really had this guy by the balls.
“Everything,” I said with a snarl. “I know about the monsters. I know about the girls. I know about your weird little role in Jonas’s quest for money or power or whatever the hell. I knoweverything.”
“You do, huh?” Ted scoffed. “And what are you gonna do? Save the day?”
I genuinely wanted to offer him a chance at redemption. I knew he had a family, kids at home, and a wife who loved him. I wasn’t out to have a man killed without reason or remorse, but Ted’s tone was making it very hard for me to be sympathetic.
“I’m just trying to end the cycle of death and greed,” I shrugged. “If that’s ‘saving the day’ to you, then I guess that’s exactly what I’m doing.”
Ted chuckled darkly. “I’ll give you credit where it’s due. You’ve definitely got moxie, but damn, you’re remarkably stupid if you think you’re going to ‘save’ anyone. Mr. Silver’s going to be the most powerful man in the world when all this is over.”
“Wait.Stupid!?”I barked. “You think I’m stupid? That’s rich. Last I checked, I wasn’t the one doing bitch work for a selfish man-baby who somehow thinks an endless stream of murder is going to,what, make him wealthy? Immortal? Give him a solid gold dick?” I shrugged and threw Ted a venomous look, begging him to see reason. “He’s been fooled, and you’re going to be dragged down with him if you think there’s a single grain of truth to any of his bullshit.”
“I hope those creatures inside take their sweet, sweet time with you,” Ted responded with more bite than I imagined he was ever capable of.
“You and me both, asshole,” I bit back as I turned on my heels and headed back inside. The one-eighty in Ted’s personality was so swift, sothorough, that hot tears pricked my eyes, though I didn’t let them fall. My heart hammered in my chest as I teetered somewhere between sadness, frustration, and white-hot rage. I hated being fooled by anyone, but the man’s little act had really gotten to me. Hell, I’dlikedhim.
I felt the tiniest tickle of a bug crawling on the back of my neck and went to smack it away. “Watch it!” I heard Ruse whisper into my ear. The moment we crossed the threshold into the kitchen, he shifted into a mouse and moved to my shoulder.
“Were you listening to that!?” I hissed quietly at the tiny creature.
“Of course I was!” Ruse responded. “I wanted a front-row seat! You know what they say… Curiosity killed the, uh… mouse.”
I ignored him as I stomped up the stairs to my bedroom, though he followed me the whole way.
“Are you perhaps seeing things my way now?” he asked with his tiny mouse voice the moment I sat down on the edge of my bed. I pondered his question for a moment, turning the option over and over in my head.
I’d given him a chance, and he’d spit in my face. Any illusion I had in my head of Ted being an innocent, blackmailed accessory to Silver’s plot was squashed the moment his first and only reaction was to mock me and wish me harm.
“I think perhaps I am seeing things your way,” I finally responded to Ruse after several moments of silence, my voice quiet and heavy
The shifter leapt off my shoulder as a mouse and hit the ground in the form of a massive mountain lion. “Great.”
“I don’t know how you can so easily kill someone,” I said with a lump in my throat, turning away from the sleek, muscular creature.
