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“You made your brother work on these overnight, just so we could bury one?” Rory closes her hand and presses her fist to her cheek. “You’ll literally throw money away like that for someone you don’t know?”
“It’s not throwing money away.” Carefully, so fucking carefully, Aubree opens the bracelet catch and threads the chain around Eleanor’s wrist. “It’s love,” she reasons. “It’s connection. And when you’re feeling all alone in a really big world and missing your mom,” she fastens the clip and fusses with the charm until it sits flush against the woman’s flesh. “Maybe you could look down and see her message for you.”
“It says ‘not alone’,” Rory whimpers. “She knew.”
“It won’t be the same as having her in the flesh and blood,” Aubree admits sadly. “Not nearly as good as the real thing. But I thought maybe—”
“It’s good,” Rory nods, fresh tears squeezing from her eyes. “It’s a connection. Thank you so much.”
* * *
“Do you need a minute?” While the doctors put Eleanor’s body away, and Kane’s men fan out to make sure the building has remained secure in the hour we’ve been inside, I lead Rory closer to the elevator doors. But I don’t press the button. And I don’t let anyone else see her. I don’t allow Malone to witness her puffy eyes. Or the pure and complete devastation in her expression. I don’t let Detective Fletcher angle closer and listen to our words. And if Jay Bishop sits atop the building opposite ours, his hands wrapped around a rifle, and his eye pressed to a scope, then I stand between him and her, too. “Do you need the bathroom?” I murmur. “Or time alone? We can get you into an office here for a bit. Or down into the parking garage?” I fold my arms, purely to stop myself from reaching across and holding her. “I’ll take you anywhere you’ve gotta go. You’ve just gotta tell me what you want.”
“I want to go on to the next step.” Sniffling, and so fucking brave, she abandons her ring and fusses with her new bracelet instead. Standing tall and broadening her shoulders, she looks up at me with wet eyes, but steely determination. “I want this all to stop. I want Vallejo to go away and leave me alone.”
I study her splotchy cheeks, and quivering jaw. The bags beneath her eyes from too little sleep and far too much stress, and the line already formed between her brows.
Twenty-one-years-old, and already, she’s given herself a tension line that’ll never go away. But she’s steady and sure. Her stare, certain and unshaking.
“Alright.” I close my eyes for just a moment and drop my head back to face the ceiling. Because I’m at the end of my rope. I’m done with this mess and ready to put it behind us, too. But for as long as Vallejo is alive, Rory’s in danger.
Her life will always be under threat. Her wellbeing, not promised.
“Okay.” Swallowing, I flicker my eyes open and bring my focus down until I look into her stunning mixture of green and blue and gold. I never stood a chance of meeting this woman and just walking away again.
I saw her on a hill in a town thousands of miles from here, and already, I knew she was special.
I followed her ambulance all the way to the hospital, and I demanded updates on the surgery that would put plates and pins in her leg.
After that, I watched her sleep. And when she was discharged from the hospital and slowly made her way to Copeland, leaving me behind like we never met, I kept watch then, too.
Being me, with the connections I have, made it easier to keep eyes on this woman just to make sure she was okay. Sore, I concede, especially as she learned to walk again. But alive and safe.
It was working all the way up until she witnessed a murder she was never supposed to see.
“I’m ready to go,” I tell her on a quiet rasp. “When you are.”
“I’m ready.” Steelier than me, she steps away from the elevator and heads across to shake Mayet’s hand. They exchange polite thank yous and sweet goodbyes. Condolences are offered, and Rory’s eyes continue to swell with emotion.
But she repeats her steps with Doctor Emeri as well, though the second comes with a hug that Mayet doesn’t offer.
They talk bracelets for a moment, and kind brothers, and while they do that, I take out my phone and dial a number I haven’t had to call in a long time.
“Yeah?”
A soft breeze moves around on the other end of the line. Birds squawk, and a man’s breathing is even and sure.
“Are you ready?” I swallow the lump in my throat and wish things could be different. I wish this never had to happen, and above all, I wish I didn’t have to organize an innocent woman’s assassination.
But she saw things she shouldn’t.
She was in the wrong place at the wrong time. And Vallejo’s reach stretches too far.
“I’m ready,” he responds. Unfeeling. Unemotional. “Call it.”
“Drake?”
“Yeah.” I tug the phone from my ear and kill the call between me and another man. Then slipping the device into my pocket, I offer my arm and wait for Aurora to wrap hers around mine. She gives me her weight to carry, leaning on me when I’m not sure she’d hand such weakness to someone else.
