Chapter 10
Chapter Ten
Dante
Inside the room, Leigh releases a deep breath.
Finnic’s been in the room with her for quite awhile now. My shoulder is already starting to ache since I’ve been leaning against the wall beside the doorframe their entire conversation.
The faint vibration of their voices echo through the cheap wood.
My fingers work automatically, rolling a cigarette between them as I continue to listen on.
Inside, she replies to his question, “Time.”
I don’t hear anything for a good minute. Most likely because Finnic is in there trying to decide what she means.
“If you’re hoping that stalling will buy you time for someone to come crashing through that door to save you,” he scoffs, “It won’t happen.”
Leigh doesn’t answer immediately.
Silence is one of her favorite tools. If she allows the silence to hold enough weight in a moment such as this, it will make the other person, in this case Finnic, fill it with their own assumptions. They end up overthinking, which in turn gives the other person some type of power over them.
“I’m not stalling,” she chimes in.
“Then why not just tell him what he wants to know? This could be over as fast as you want it to be.”
A silent laugh escapes me, stripped of any real humor.
She responds, “Do you really think that brute of a man will just let me go if I tell him what he wants to hear?”
My weight shifts, careful not to let the wall creak.
“You don’t know him as well as you think you do,” he says with ease.
He’d be surprised at how well she knows me.
“I don’t?” I can feel the smugness in her voice.
“Tell him where the money is, or give us somewhere to start looking, and this ends with you walking out of here safely.”
Finnic says all of that hesitantly. I can hear the disbelief in his own words. He doesn’t really expect, nor believe that I will let her go that easily.
And if she were a actual hostage, I wouldn’t.
The old mattress coils creak faintly.
“You think so?” A humorless laugh escapes her.
“Stop.” He says with warning in his tone.
She says nothing for a moment. But then finally decides to speak.
“Why do you even care? Just leave me alone.”
She knows he won’t leave. She’s already pulled him in enough that he believes he can make some sort of difference.
I glance at the cigarette between my fingers. All I want to do is light the damn thing, but I have to make sure she’s safe at all times.
I honestly believe Finnic won’t hurt her, but that was why I felt an unease in my chest. He seems to be feeling entirely too much for her.
Thoughts run rampant through my head.
What if she feels something? No, she couldn’t possibly.
“You don’t understand how this works,” Finnic interrupts my chain of thoughts. His tone hardens as he continues, “You may not get another chance.”
“You’re right,” Leigh agrees. “I may not get another chance, but that in no way affects you. You don’t know me.”
The room falls silent for a second before Finnic’s steps get closer to the door. I can see the handle move, but he doesn’t go to open it yet.
“I don’t know you.” He agrees. “But I know someone like you.”
I still completely and halt moving the cigarette. The paper pinches tight enough between my two fingers that it nearly creases.
“Knew.” He corrects, “I knew someone like you,” he repeats again, slower this time, like it bothers him to say it out loud.
Leigh doesn’t interrupt him as he continues, “She was a big believer in all things turning out for the best.”
The bed creaks again and I picture her shifting just enough to remind him that she’s still listening.
“You said knew.. What happened to her?” She asks softly.
I can hear him exhale deeply on the other side of the door before leaning away from it, releasing the handle. “I thought you wanted me to leave you alone.”
I close my eyes briefly.
“I want you to leave me alone if you’re here to get me to fess up.” She admits, “But I’m fine with you being here if you just want to talk.”
I don’t move.
Neither does Finnic, from the sound of it.
At this point, I believe he’s now caught between obligation and whatever she’d just split open in him.
“I’m not here to be your friend,” he says finally, but the lie is obvious.
I remove my phone from my pocket, pulling up the camera feed from inside the room.
He stands just across from her.
She is leaning back against the wall, watching his every movement.
She shrugs, “You can stand there in silence. I don’t mind.”
Finnic releases a grim laugh. “Let’s just say her kindness destroyed her.”
She brings her hands up to her face, tucking a small piece of hair behind her ear. “That’s vague.”
“The rest doesn’t matter. It’s in the past.”
He’s trying to shut her out completely. I can tell he doesn’t want to talk about what had happened to his ex.
Leigh speaks gently now, like she is approaching a skittish animal. “If it’s in the past, why do you hesitate in speaking about her? I’d think you’d be able to talk freely if you were as over it as you say.”
He doesn’t respond and continues to stand there. I don’t think he wants to analyze the question because if he does, he’ll despise the answer.
“Maybe I’m not over it, but I know I did right by her. That’s all that matters.” He states truthfully.
“Are you saying that out loud to convince yourself of something?” Leigh asks.
He glances over at the door, “I don’t need to convince myself of shit. I killed the bastard that-”
She tilts her head as he halts mid-sentence.
“That what?”
I can feel the change in the atmosphere through the door. There is a sudden drop in the air, like something dangerous has almost been admitted aloud.
My thumb hovers over the phone screen, the camera feed frozen on Finnic’s rigid frame. His shoulders are locked and his jaw is clenched. The conversation seems to be getting to him.
Finnic drags a hand down his face. When he speaks again, his voice is rough and stripped of that practiced detachment he tries to wear like armor.
“The bastard who hurt her,” he finishes. “The man who thought he could take something and walk away like she didn’t leave someone behind.”
My grip finally tightens enough on the cigarette, crushing it in the middle, snapping it like a twig.
What he says is pretty close to the truth.
Leigh nods once, as if she’s fully understanding why he’d do something like that. “You killed him.”
He shakes his head.
“I stopped him.” Finnic corrects.
It was a lie he told himself. Finnic didn’t stop him. He hadn’t saved her like he wanted to. He was trying to rewire himself into thinking that killing the guy had saved her, but it didn’t.
Sure, he helped others in the future. But he doesn’t care about that.
Only her.
The conversation continues as I watch the footage.
“You’re choosing your words carefully,” She says, “People do that when the real version hurts too much to say out loud.”
Finnic’s laugh comes out cynical. “You don’t know anything.”
“I know you don’t look like someone who found closure,” she murmurs. “You look like someone who found revenge and realized it didn’t fix what was truly wrong.”
I watch as his shoulders dip slightly, like something inside him has finally decided to give up the pretending.
His next words come fast now, like if he doesn’t say them all at once, he’ll never mention it again. “By the time I got the call, there was nothing left to save. He was the only thing to take care of.”
My chest tightens and I lean my head back against the wall, staring at the stained ceiling like it might settle my nerves.
Truthfully, I would’ve done the same thing he did.
If it were Leigh. I’d destroy the motherfucker who touched her. I’d fucking torture him till the end of his days.
“She didn’t deserve that,” he went on. “Not when out of every single person I knew, she was the most positive. She was someone who believed the world only had bad people because they weren’t taught differently. She was always saying something about giving kindness to the next person.”
Leigh doesn’t interrupt him. She just watches as his story unfolds right in front of her, just as she intended. He trusts way too easily.
Yet again, I am proving my point of how ignorant he can be. I am proving just how big his heart is. Which was like ten times the normal size in terms of emotions.
He glances up then, eyes flicking toward the camera like he could sense me there. “It didn’t bring her back. It didn’t make me feel better.”
Leigh sits quietly as she fiddles with her fingers. Finnic takes a few steps toward her before kneeling down in front of the mattress.
Before he can say what he’s about to say, she interrupts him.
“So when you tell me to give you all of this information,” Leigh utters softly, “you’re actually hoping I’ll take your advice and save myself.” She leans forward closer to his body, “Because if I don’t, it’s just another woman you couldn’t save.”
She presses into the deepest parts of his subconscious with that one sentence.
“Stop fucking with me,” he snaps.
Her gaze doesn’t waver as she looks him dead in his eyes. “I’m not. I’m telling you that playing savior now won’t resurrect the dead.” She leans in even more, “I’m not her, stop trying to save me.”
Finnic’s hands are now shaking.
I crush the entire cigarette in my fist, fully destroying it.
Right before I go to erratically open the door, footsteps move towards it, causing me to toss my phone into my pocket and back away.
I position myself back against the wall casually yet again.
The door swings open, revealing Finnic, who is breathing out heavily as he stands in the doorway.
I raise a brow at him, “You done?”
He gives me a once over before shaking his head, leaving the hallway right after.
A smirk makes its way onto my face as I glance into the room.
Leigh already had a big smile plastered on.
Her and I both know that she’d won him over in that instance.
He is breaking, piece by piece.