Chapter 25 #2
“No. This is for Sienna. No debt is incurred.” And with that, the phone line goes dead.
I quickly send Bob and Gavin a message, telling them to expect adangerous guest at the warehouse shortly. When I look up, Sienna is eyeing me skeptically.
“What’s wrong?” I debate whether I should tell her now or later, but luckily, that decision is taken from me as the best man announces that the newlywed couple will be taking to the dance floor for their first song.
Sienna gives me a look that tells me this conversation isn’t over before turning to face the dance floor set up in the hall's center.
The lights have been dimmed, and soft music fills the air as Mr. and Mrs. Holloway start dancing.
They look like they have taken professional lessons.
When other couples start joining, I hold my hand out to Sienna.
Her smile is so wide, and her eyes dance with joy.
I know she loves dancing. I watched her enough times dancing alone in her home when I stalked her to know how much.
I place my hand on her waist, drawing her closer as she rests her hand on my shoulder. If home were a feeling, this would be it—the warmth of having her in my arms, the pull of being in her orbit.
Her beautiful green eyes stay locked with mine as we move to the music.
“I love dancing.”
“I know.” Her eyebrow lifts at my words, and then some of her humor fades.
“I didn’t know you were looking into my father's murder. Thank you, Damon.” She is thanking me when I am the one who feels indebted to her. She who has given my life meaning.
“Don’t thank me, Sienna. I would do anything for you, but it doesn’t require your gratitude. I want to.”
“But I do nothing for you. Not really a symbiotic relationship, now is it?” she jokes, but I can see she means it. She still doesn’t see all she gives me, which is so much more than I give her.
“You see it from your side, which is fine, but if you could see it from mine, you would see how wrong you are. Before you, there was only darkness. There still is, but it is interspersed with colors. A rainbow in the dark. It is like giving a blind man the gift of sight. Can you even imagine how priceless that is?”
She shakes her head and smiles.
“For someone who uses words so sparingly, you always arrange them so beautifully. You missed your calling as a poet.”
“The greatest poets in life are inspired by others or by feelings evoked by others. You are the muse behind them. If not for you, they would be meaningless.”
Her smile is like a fucking Arora Borealis, and I hate that what I have to say next will snatch it away. But I was running out of timeandneeded to tell her what was coming.
The song ends, and I lead her away from the guests mingling around the center towards a secluded spot at the rear of the hall.
“We need to talk.” She looks concerned but nods as we sit at a table.
“It’s about your father and The Reaper.” I wait, letting my words settle in so she can somewhat brace herself for what I am about to say.
“I have found your father's murderer.” Her eyes widen, and shock swims in their depths, followed by a glassiness that tells me of her emotions. Fuck, I hated that she was going through this. But I couldn’t go through this for her.
I could carry out the revenge, but her feelings were her own to bear.
“Your father was investigating a massive fraud case involving acouple of high-profile figures who were cashing in on insurance monies by either staging robberies or undertaking arson on properties that were worth more destroyed.
One even staged a kidnapping of their son to cash in on the ransom money.
Your father's investigation and the evidence he collected played a role in putting away several of these figures, including the one carrying out these scams. A guy by the name of Lowrens Briar.”
She nods, moving forward so she is just about sitting on the edge of her seat.
“He has a rap sheet and has been in and out of prison since the age of eighteen. Because of your father's evidence, he was convicted and received a five-year sentence for his involvement.”
She nods slowly, my words pulling the color from her face as she processes what I am saying.
“He was released on the 20 th of November last year.” She frowns, piecing the dates together.
“That was close to when you and I met at Nero's,” she says, as I nod in confirmation.
I fish out the picture I found at his house, the one he had obsessed over in prison, and hand it to her. She shakes her head in disbelief as she looks at it.
“He came to Nero’s that night to find you. He took that picture the day he murdered your father and came looking for you when he got out. It was that drunk guy that approached you when you came out of the ladies.”
Her eyes flare with shock as she looks up at me and then back at the picture. If this was shocking, the rest was going to downright destroy her.
“Where did you find this picture?” she asks, her voice thick with emotion.
“At his house yesterday. It was the first of many.” She shakes her head as if that will stop what I am about to say.
“He has been following you since then. Taking photos of you. Sending you torn-out pages from books. Stalking you, Sienna. Waiting for the right moment,” I pause, hating what I am about to do, “like Lady Chatman's party.”
She stands up abruptly, her eyes wide as saucers as she realizes what I am saying. There is a panicked look on her face, and I bet if I placed my hand on her heart, it would be trying to escape her chest.
I stand up and step towards her.
She shakes her head wildly in an attempt to deny what this means.
“You’re saying…” The words die on her lips as she tries again.
“You’re saying that the man who killed my father, the man who destroyed my life back then, is the same man from Lady Chatman’s? The Reaper?”
I nod, placing my hands on her shoulders as her eyes lock with mine.
“No. No, Damon, this can’t be.” Tears rise and then fall down her face, reminding me of the promise I made when I saw the tears streaming down her face in the video of The Reaping—a cut for every one.
I pull her towards me as she releases her emotions, her sobs loud enough to draw the attention of a few guests nearby.
They can go fuck themselves.
It takes her ten minutes for the tears to subside, both destroying me and adding to the fuel for what is to come .
When she finally pulls back from me, her eyes are puffy, and her nose is red.
I hand her a handkerchief and then lead her towards an exit on the side, out into the garden area.
It is dark outside, with only a few stars in the sky andsolar lights dotting the garden beds.
“There is a bathroom there,” she says, pointing to a small structure on the other side of the property, close to the chapel.
She doesn’t even say anything when I enter after her, my lesson learnt at Lady Chatman’s. Unless it was our bathroom at home, there was no way my rainbow would be going in alone.
Sienna splashes water on her face and then dabs it dry with tissue paper before peering in the mirror. Her eyes meet mine, and a slight smile pulls on her lips.
“How do I look?”
“Always beautiful,” I respond as she turns to face me while leaning against the basin.
“What happens now? Do we hand him over to the police?”
I shake my head.
“He is already hanging in my warehouse, ready for his punishment. Handing him over to the law would be too easy. You understand? I can’t go back on my promise. Do you remember what it was?”
She nods, reciting the words I said back to me, word for word.
“So we will. I will be your tool for vengeance, Sienna. I will make him beg on his knees before you for mercy and then show him your wrath. My hand will be yours. My darkness will do the bidding of your light.”
I nod, and she smiles a sad smile.
“The benefits of having a photographic memory.”
What, how the fuck did I not know this. Then it dawns on me .
“That means that that night of The Reaping…Fuck, Sienna.” I step towards her and pull her into an embrace, the realization of what she must have gone through still goes through, hitting me like a fucking sledgehammer.
To be able to remember every detail vividly must be torture.
Fuck! I will make him pay. I'm so consumed by rage that when Sienna's hand caresses my back, the gentle contrast to what I feel inside makes my stomach coil.
I want to throw up. This gentle woman has been subjected to this.
It makes me madder than I have ever been.
“I remember that night, yes, but I also remember our time. When The Reaping happened, I cursed my gift. But you brought me out of that darkness, Damon. I wouldn’t trade it for a second.
Not even to have The Reaping never happen.
I can remember our first touch, our first kiss, and our every interaction like a beautiful and vivid photograph.
It makes those images appear sad and washed out, so I’m not sorry for my gift. ”
I hug her tightly, using her words to pull me back from the edge, back to control.
This also changed things. I couldn’t expect her to watch what happens tonight only to replay it in her mind like a goddam movie later.
I pull back, creating some distance between us.
“I was going to give you a choice, Sienna. A choice to see or even take part in what I have planned tonight. I will have vengeance, you understand?”
She nods her head slowly.
“What will you do?”
“The worst. Worse than you can imagine. And there is no talking me out of it.”
She stays silent for a long time, eyeing me as she reads between the lines. She knows I am a dark man. She knows I have killed. She knows this is as personal for me as it is for her because of my obsession.
“I want him to suffer.”
She says the words softlyand carefully, afraid thatsaying them attaches some sort of retribution to them.
“I want to face him before you…you know, do whatever you are going to do.”
That was doable.
“Okay. We need to go now. My…activities have a time limit, unfortunately.”
She dips her brow in confusion but nods, pushing away from the basin and taking a large breath.
I take her hand in mine, our eyes locking.
“I won’t let anything happen to you, rainbow.”
She nods and smiles.
“I know.”