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‘That’s the difference between you and me,’ I said to her, as she clawed at my hand and sucked against my palm for air. ‘I’m old enough to know better.’
She struggled some more, her face turning a dirty shade of grey as her eyes bulged with effort, then finally dulled and froze open, unseeing.
I took my hand away from her mouth, noticing her blood all over my palm. I wiped it against my side, reasoning that the rain would wash the rest away soon enough. Fuck. I’d just killed somebody with my bare hands. I was turning into someone I didn’t even recognise. The terrifying part was the complete detachment I felt. Of course I killed her, I reasoned to myself. She was going to kill me. She shot Dornan.
And that was that. No guilt and long-winded self-searching. No beating myself up about taking another life. No, I took one look around to make sure I wasn’t being watched, grabbed Allie’s ankles, dragged her over to the side of the wharf and rolled her into the fast-flowing water below.
It sucked her down in a second.
And then she was gone.
* * *
I vomited beside the car, the act somehow cleansing me. That last vestige of doubt gone. Replaced by numb victory, by indifference. I was exhibiting all the classic symptoms of shock, but I didn’t feel shocked. I felt like a fucking lion who’d just protected her cub. Allie had tried to fuck with someone I loved and I had put an end to that.
Dornan.
He was bleeding. He needed help, and quickly. I raced back to my side of the car and yanked the door open, sliding in and assessing how much worse he’d gotten since I’d been gone. He looked bad. His skin was so white he looked like he’d just fade away.
I remembered what he’d said to me. I do what I do, and I get what I get.
The knowledge of what he’d done – what he was still doing – slammed home that night. The fact that he was here because of me, that I had somehow caused this just by existing, just by being with him. He had wanted me back then, nine years ago, and he was still paying the price. I saw the souls of every life he’d trafficked in his grief-stricken gaze when he’d told me, and now I might have to live with the fact that we’d never get to say anything to each other again.
The only thing worse than finding out that the man you love has been dealing in innocent lives, buying and selling them and sending them to their deaths, is knowing that he did it for you.
On the floor at my feet, I saw the discarded baby bottle, the tin of infant formula, all covered in a thick sheen of his blood, and I began to shake.
CHAPTER THIRTY-ONE
MARIANA
I struggled to get Dornan out of his seat and into the passenger seat. He was two hundred pounds of solid muscle and rage.
Please don’t be dead. You’re not dead. You can’t die.
You can’t die.
I finally got him across the seat, first pulling his upper body across into my seat, and then hoisting his legs over one by one.
I started the ignition. ‘Dornan,’ I said. I could barely see, with the rain and my tears, but somehow I made it onto the road and towards the hospital where we had dropped the baby off. I prayed that they didn’t have cameras. I prayed that they didn’t know it was Dornan.
I prayed that this wasn’t going to be the end for us.
Ten minutes later, I was back at the hospital, John opening my car door, worry plastered across his features. He’d finally answered his phone, and he must have broken several laws speeding to get to the hospital before me. On the other side of the car, two Gypsy Brothers – Jimmy and some other dude – were pulling Dornan out of the car and onto a gurney. The shock on Jimmy’s face was evident as he saw his VP’s blood all over the passenger seat. Wait until he got a look at the backseat.
Once Dornan was on the stretcher, some nurses raised the sides and whisked him away. Everything was moving too fast for me, and I felt like I was drowning.
‘Get rid of the car,’ John roared.
Jimmy moved into action, grabbing my waist and hauling me out of the way. He got into the truck, which was still running, and took off before he’d even closed the door.
I looked down at what was in my hand. My coat, the one that I’d wrapped the baby in. The one that I’d used to try and stem the flow of blood from Dornan’s bullet wound.
Life begins, and life ends. So fast. So fleeting.
John grabbed my elbow. ‘Hey,’ he said gruffly, tugging me into the hospital. Dornan was gone, stretchered away somewhere into the labyrinth of hallways that faced us in the entrance, maybe gone forever.
There was somebody else with us. I couldn’t remember his name. Which was bizarre, because I’d seen him enough times at the clubhouse that we were practically acquaintances. But my brain had frozen, stuck on a loop of horror – I heard the baby’s pitiful little cry and saw Dornan stroking the mother’s hair so tenderly, so softly, before he planted a bullet in her skull.
