13. Claire
I do a great job maintaining my composure in front of Rhea, even managing a laugh. “ What a small world.”
My voice sounds fragile, like it’s about to collapse in a cloud of dust. It’s how I feel when she tells me she invited him to dinner, it’s how I feel the whole way back to Remy’s house the next morning after staying for observation, how I feel as I turn the lock and glance around the small space that I’ve come to claim. It’s how I feel until I sink down on the edge of the freshly made bed and force myself to breathe through my nose.
When I close my eyes, it’s to see Wes smirking at me with that cocky grin, dripping with condescension. He’s not a good guy—no good guy would let himself be wrapped up in what he did. No good guy would tell a woman she doesn’t belong to herself anymore, ask her to bare herself to strangers on the internet, demand her to tell her captors who they own.
Whatever Wes is, it’s not good.
It’s not redeemable.
I assume Remy kept him alive for a purpose, and I highly doubt that purpose is to convince Rhea that he’s a good guy. So why isn’t he dead yet, disposed of in the same trash haul as Eric Giante? Given the way he unilaterally saved me, the way he killed my captors and Jovich, I don’t think Remy has it in him to forgive Wes for what he did. If he’s alive, I trust there’s a reason for it.
Whatever that reason is, it’s not to victimize me. I know that well enough, even if I don’t have any concept of where I stand with Remington Boudreaux. He doesn’t trust me, but he wants me. Or, at least, he wanted me. Maybe it’s out of his system now. Maybe he worked through his lust for me after we committed murder together, and now we’re just going to awkwardly orbit one another.
It doesn’t matter, I tell myself.
I almost believe it, too.
We haven’t seen each other since we killed together. That was days ago. I don’t know how many, exactly, since I was out of consciousness for a while. The one night I do recall spending in the hospital – where Rhea slept in the chair beside me as I laid awake all night—had dragged on long enough to feel like multiple days. Despite not sleeping, I’ve been restless since leaving the hospital with the doctor’s phone number tucked in my pocket… just in case.
I made sure to eat before I left so I can skip dinner and I doubt anyone will question it. Remy will know I want to avoid Wes, Elaine will assume I need the rest, and Rhea would think I simply wasn’t feeling up to dinner with everyone. But Wes would know why I’m not there—he’d know that I’m scared of him, that I can’t stomach the idea of facing him after what he did to me. He would know that he won, whether because I’m too weak mentally or physically to drag myself to dinner in his presence.
If there’s one thing that I’ve learned about myself since leaving the states and getting swept into this chaotic world, it’s that I am not weak. If I was weak, I never would have made it out of Eric’s house. If I was weak, I never would have let someone pull me into the light so that I could heal. If I was weak, I’d still be in my head in that dirty warehouse, a prisoner of my own traumatized mind. And if I was weak, I wouldn’t have found the mental or physical strength I needed to end another person’s life.
Maybe that’s not an achievement I should be proud of, but it’s not something that the weak can claim to do. It took a lot of strength to drive that blade past flesh, through organs, and back out. It takes even more mental strength to look in the mirror every time I pass it with the realization that a killer is looking back at me.
I’m not weak, and I won’t let Wes believe that I am.
Whatever cocktail they gave me at the hospital has given me new energy. Either it’s a miracle drug or I just felt so horrible for so long that, by comparison, I feel like a new woman. I’m able to shower by myself, and while it takes a little while to gingerly avoid my stitches, that just offers me longer to relax under the gentle spray of hot water.
When I step out and brush the wet hair from my face, I smile at the girl in the mirror.
She may be a murderer, but she’s also a badass.