34 - Jocelyn
~ 34 ~
JOCELYN
My head was still spinning when Andre stood up, chest heaving, blood streaming from the wound in his side. He offered me his hand, but I pushed it away.
“Andre, you’re bleeding!”
Wearily, he looked down at the wound and shrugged.
“It’s nothing.”
“Nothing?” I cried, leaping to my feet. “Andre, you got stabbed! I saw the knife! It’s—”
“It’s superficial,” he cut me off. “He didn’t nick anything important.”
“But…”
“I’ve had a lot worse than this,” he assured me. “And in much more inhospitable places.” He let out a deep breath, while looking me over carefully. Eventually, he set his hands on his hips.
“I didn’t know you had that in you,” he said admiringly.
“And I didn’t know you could move that fast.”
I tried dusting myself off, and realized I was no worse for wear. Everything else was a lost cause, though. The clothing I was wearing was utterly trashed. I was lucky I hadn’t been wearing my server’s outfit.
“How’d you know I was out here?” I asked.
“Bruschetta Joe. He came and found me. He said you came back here with Victor.”
“I did,” I replied. “Victor dragged me out here and served me up like fresh meat to this asshole.” I pointed downward. “Before I knew what was happening, he disappeared.”
Andre looked up at the sun and squinted. “Yeah, you’re not Victor’s type.”
“I know that now.”
“He was most likely trying to keep Jacob busy,” Andre went on. “We’re pretty sure he’s planning something. We just don’t know what.”
The wind swirled, blowing my hair around my face. I tucked it back, ignoring the bitter taste in my mouth.
“He’s dead, isn’t he?” I choked, trying not to look down again.
Andre’s eyes settled back on me. There was compassion in them now, whereas before they’d been swimming with adrenaline.
“Yes,” he said simply. “You okay with that?”
I shrugged. “I guess I’ll have to be.”
“You know what he would’ve done to you, right?” he asked. “If I hadn’t showed up?”
I nodded, trying to swallow. The taste in my mouth only got worse.
“It’s okay to feel something,” Andre conceded. “You wouldn’t be human if you didn’t.” He took a step closer; his very presence was reassuring. His hand was warm, as it slid perfectly into mine. “But don’t you dare feel bad.”
It was surreal, standing there over a corpse, holding the bloody hand of a man I’d met only a week ago. But somehow, it also felt like the most natural thing in the world.
“Men like this would kill you, in the span of a heartbeat,” he said coldly. “You mean nothing to them. They’d do it without even thinking about it.”
Abruptly he kicked the body lying between us. His lips curled back in a snarl.
“You see this animal? He killed a man by the name of Shane Driscoll, a good friend of mine. Blew him up during some botched operation, with an anti-personnel mine.” His snarl turned into something worse. “It got back to me that he even laughed about it.”
“Oh.”
“I drove a day and a half to be at Shane’s funeral,” he went on. “His twelve-year-old daughter sobbed for three straight hours in the pouring rain. No umbrella. Wouldn’t let anyone near her.”
I didn’t have to imagine the scene. I could read it in the pain on his face, commiserate with the agony in his eyes. Andre hadn’t just lived through that day, either. He’d relived it, over and over, in the most haunted recesses of his mind.
“You ever see a little girl cry for three straight hours?” he asked abruptly.
“No.”
“It’s heartbreaking.”
I nodded slowly. “I— I guess, I—”
“So fuck this guy,” Andre spat, kicking him again. “This man was a piece of human excrement. I’m glad he’s dead, and my only wish is that he suffered more. He deserved a lot worse death than this.”
He walked a few steps, stooped down, and grabbed what looked to be a small boulder. He did it again, and again after that. Eventually he looked up.
“Better help, because we don’t have much time. It won’t be long before they’ll be looking for one or both of us.”
It was a strange request, but I did as I was told. Only when Andre began dragging the body into the water did I realize what we were actually doing.
“Here,” he said, holding out both hands. “That should be enough.”
We were chest-deep in the lake when Andre finished weighing the body down with stones. Somehow I found the strength to help him push it under, and shove it all the way to the bottom. Surprisingly, I felt nothing. Not even when I was tasked with holding it in place, while he pinned it there with three or four giant rocks.
Together we let go. Jacob Foley stayed exactly where we needed him to be, at least temporarily. Or perhaps even, forever.
We ended up face to face, bobbing silently in the water together, when Andre gave me a nod.
“See?” he said softly, adding a half smile. “This is why you don’t kiss your brother’s best friends.”