Chapter 17
SILVER
This day has been a rollercoaster, and I have a suspicion that the biggest drop is still to come.
I’m not sure how to feel. I was feeling good and optimistic about Grady’s response to my demands, and ridiculously happy with what I thought was Lee’s gift.
I couldn’t wait for him to get home and see me wearing it.
Disappointment battles with anger now that I know it wasn’t from him.
It was a weapon aimed at him. One that hit the mark.
As much as I need to know what’s going on, I’m half terrified of what Lee’s going to tell me. All I can think about as I change into some leggings and a sweatshirt is the horror in his expression when he saw me in his wife’s dress. His dead wife’s dress. God, no wonder.
He perches on the edge of the couch, a glass of bourbon in his hand. The bottle and another glass wait on the coffee table. I grab a cold Coke from the fridge and take a seat in the chair across from him. Neither of us speak while I mix my drink and sit back.
His dark eyes land on mine. “I would never hurt you.”
His vehement statement catches me off guard. “I know that.”
He runs a hand over his beard. “Just remember it.”
“Lee, whatever it is, you can tell me. It’s okay.”
He spits out the words like they taste bad. “Someone started texting me about Isla, anonymously. Messages that claim to know where she is. Landon is a hacker who’s been helping me try to figure out who it is. We haven’t had any luck so far.”
“Where she is?” I ask softly. “I thought she was killed years ago. Are you telling me she’s alive?” Celia said there was no death certificate. Shit, was she right?
“No.” He shakes his head emphatically. “She’s not alive, but her body was never found. They’re claiming they can tell me where her remains are.” He swallows the rest of his drink and looks at me. “But they want me to kill someone in return.”
Oh fuck. So many questions slam into my brain at once that it takes me a moment to choose. “Why…why would they think you’d be willing to kill someone?”
He scrutinizes my face as he replies. “Because it wouldn’t be the first time.”
My stomach hits the floor. This is why he assured me he’d never hurt me, because I’m learning what he’s done, what he’s capable of. He must’ve killed the man who murdered his wife. “Lacey told me the man who killed Isla was never caught. That he’s still missing.”
“He’s not missing but he’ll never be found.”
I take a big swallow of my own drink. He stares at me, his eyes pleading with me not to run away while I let the information sink in.
I’m sure he expects me to be shocked, but that’s not how I feel.
Anyone can kill if they’re put in a situation where they’re pushed too far, in self-defense, in rage, or for justice.
“You killed your wife’s murderer. Did you really think I’d be afraid of you because of that? Or that I’d even disapprove?”
“I don’t know,” he confesses.
“I’m not afraid of you. I’m only glad you didn’t get caught.
” There’s so much I don’t understand. “So, you knew who killed her, and then found them before the cops could? But that doesn’t mean you’d kill for some anonymous asshole.
Why would they assume that you’d do that, even to find her remains?
And who do they want you to kill?” All the questions in my head stream out.
He refills his drink and sits back. “When Isla went missing, I knew it was my fault. I wasn’t sure who got to her, but I’d just retired from a network that hunted human traffickers.
There are multiple organized groups of sex traffickers who sell women and children all across the US.
A few underground groups exist who fight back against them to rescue victims and take out the perpetrators.
I worked for one of those groups.” His gaze locks on mine. “As an exterminator.”
His wife’s murderer isn’t the only man he’s killed. That’s what he’s saying. He used to kill people on a routine basis. “You were a vigilante?”
He nods. “I quit when I got custody of Lacey.”
Rogue starts barking and scratching to be let inside.
“I’ll get her,” I volunteer. I’m glad to have a minute to process his confession.
You never really consider the lives people led before you knew them.
I’ve never given a lot of thought to who Lee was before his wife’s death but even if I had, I wouldn’t have seen this coming.
Maybe I should be scared. A smart person would be. A normal person would probably run like hell from this whole situation, especially considering I have a mountain of my own problems I’m still sorting through, but I’ve never considered myself normal or particularly smart.
As I let Rogue in and dry off her muddy paws, I try to wrap my head around everything. I still have more questions than answers, but there’s one thing I know. This doesn’t change how I feel about Lee, not for the worse, anyway.
How could it? Of course he rescued exploited women and children.
He rescued me from the fire, then from the struggle that came afterward by having me stay with him.
He rescued his little sister from going into foster care.
Rescuing is who he is and there’s not a trace of me that cares about what he did to monsters who shouldn’t even be considered men.
Rogue bounds into the living room, and Lee absently scratches behind her ears, but he isn’t looking at her. He’s a million miles away in his head. The despair on his face breaks my heart. There’s nothing I want more right now than to understand what he’s dealing with and help him.
I grab my glass and sit beside him on the couch. “It was one of the traffickers who killed Isla?” I ask.
“Joss Wynne, a low level piece of garbage who was trying to work his way into a trafficking gang that called themselves The Jackals. The group I’d just stopped working for was targeting them.
To join, they require their people to kidnap a woman or child and deliver them to the leader.
I’m sure he thought it’d earn him extra points to take the wife of one of the gang’s enemies.
But Isla must’ve fought back too hard or something.
“They found…” He trails off and pauses with an audible swallow.
I scoot over until our thighs touch and slide my hand into his.
He squeezes it and continues. “The cops found Joss’s car, abandoned at the edge of a small retaining pond.
They said it looked like he intended to push it in, but it got stuck in the mud on the bank.
The inside was soaked in blood. They suspected more than one person had been killed in that car, but when the DNA came back, it was all Isla’s.
” Haunted eyes land on mine. “It was far beyond a survivable amount.”
“I’m so sorry,” I breathe.
“The cops were looking for him, but I found him first. I knew the Jackals had a little hideout in the woods not far from where he ditched the car. He was fucking stupid. There was nobody around when I dragged him out of the little shed. He wouldn’t tell me what he did with her body, just kept denying it was him.
I should’ve kept going, tortured him to find out, but my anger got the best of me.
I killed him too quick. I should’ve dragged it out. ”
The words are pouring out of him now and he freezes like he’s just realized what he’s saying. “Shit. I don’t mean…I didn’t get any kind of thrill from killing the men I did. I wasn’t doing it for me. But he knew where she was.”
“Lee.” I don’t know any other way to make him see that nothing he’s said has made me upset.
Not at him, anyway. I climb into his lap, straddling him, and cup his jaw with my hand.
“Listen to me. I’m glad you killed the bastard.
I’m sorry you didn’t get to lay her to rest, but you made sure the man who did that would never hurt another woman.
I know you aren’t some sadist who enjoys killing. You’re a good man.”
His strong arms wrap around me and I hug him back, squeezing him tight. He holds onto me like I might disappear. For a few minutes, we stay like that, silent, holding each other. I rub my palm up and down his back, trying to comfort him the same way he does me.
Rogue finally breaks the moment by leaping on the couch and sticking her nose between us. “Alright, jealous girl,” he chuckles, petting her. “We see you.”
I scoot off of him, and he puts his arm around me while Rogue sprawls across our laps. “Do you believe the one texting you knows where her remains are?” I ask. “Or do you think it’s a lie to get you to do what they want?”
“I don’t know, but I know they were involved. They sent me her ring, and that dress was the one she was wearing when she went missing. They’re proof that they were with her on her last day.”
My stomach turns at the thought. “I’m sorry. I never would’ve worn it if I knew.”
“Stop. It’s not your fault.”
“It’s not yours either. None of it.” He presses his lips together and nods, but it isn’t convincing. “Who’s the guy they want you to kill?”
He sighs and rubs Rogue’s head. “Nobody as far as we can tell. He isn’t connected to any group of traffickers or vigilantes. He’s just a single dad who works as a tattoo artist.”
“Have you told him?”
“No. We can’t risk him going to the cops like any reasonable person would.”
Goblin leaps onto the couch and walks over my legs to curl up on Lee’s lap. “Well, I’ll just go fuck myself then,” I snort, reaching over to pet her.
A small grin tilts Lee’s lips and it’s good to see. “Don’t be jealous.”
“Cats have good instincts. She knows we’re safe here with you. Do you know what you’re going to do now?”
“You said the dress was brought to the diner? Was it a delivery service?”