Chapter 26 #2
“That's the problem with hiring people to hurt other people, Elliot. Sometimes they actually shoot them.”
His face tightened. “He got in the way.”
“Of what?”
No answer.
“Me?”
His silence lasted too long.
“Oh my God.” He really had lost it.
“This isn't about Carter.”
“No.” My voice went quiet. “It's about you.”
His expression changed. I looked at the gun. Then the warehouse. Then him.
All at once, the pieces stopped being pieces. They snapped into place, one by one. I’d put it together before, but then he’d—done whatever.
Guy. The missing records. The toxicology. The second sample. Elliot's name impressed into the page. His obsession with what Simon had told me. His questions about whether Simon had accused him. His fear every time I got closer.
“You killed Guy.”
His face emptied. It wasn’t confirmation, but it wasn’t surprise or denial either.
“Guy was already dying.”
“That’s weak.” I studied him. “He was in the hospital for his injuries because he survived the first attack. Saying he was dying then helping him along is still killing him.”
“You aren’t seeing the whole picture.”
I swallowed. “Then why did you need the toxicology destroyed?”
A muscle jumped in his jaw. I almost smiled, because the last piece was just there. “The first sample showed something. It was why you made sure it was destroyed.”
“He'd been medicated.” The cold air seemed at odds with the beads of sweat on his forehead. “We need to go inside.”
I ignored the last part. I would like to say I was being stubborn, but I needed to focus everything on this right now and my head hurt too much to split my attention. “The paramedic said he refused medication until they assured him it wouldn't affect the tox screen.”
“That doesn't mean—”
“What was in it?”
“Mallory.”
“What was in Guy's blood?”
Brewster looked away. I stepped closer.
“You didn't bring me here to protect me from Simon.”
His gaze returned.
“You brought me here because I found your name.”
“That isn't what happened.”
“Then tell me what happened.”
He looked exhausted. For a moment, I saw the man I'd known. Or at least the man I’d thought I’d known.
The profiler who had sat across from me in restaurants. Answered my calls at obscene hours. Argued with me about sources and evidence and whether curiosity qualified as self-destructive behavior.
I had trusted him and that was the part that hurt the most.
“I needed information,” he said.
“From Guy?” That actually surprised me.
“Yes.”
“About Simon.” That surprised me more.
A beat.
“Yes.”
“What did Guy know?”
“Not enough.”
“Not helpful.”
“He knew someone connected to the pattern. A name. Maybe an intermediary. I needed him lucid.” He grimaced. “If he’d just cooperated in the first place, I wouldn’t have needed to interrogate him.”
My stomach turned. “What did you give him?”
“It was controlled.”
“Elliot.” I gritted out his name. The excuses and deflections annoyed me.
“A stimulant.”
The word sat between us.
“You drugged an injured man.”
“He was slipping in and out.” A shrug. “He would have died anyway. I needed ten minutes. I needed what he knew.”
Brewster's expression tightened.
“If he’d only cooperated, none of that would have been necessary.” He gave me a pointed look.
I closed my eyes. There it was. Not I killed him. No, Guy hadn’t cooperated, Flint got in the way, I forced Elliot’s hand and what—Simon manipulated him?
Everyone else was apparently responsible for what Elliot Brewster chose to do.
I opened my eyes. “The toxicology would have shown it. So you removed it to prevent questions that you didn’t want to answer.”
Flint had been right. My throat tightened.
“What about Colin?”
Something changed. Not guilt. Calculation. My heart sank.
“Elliot…”
“We all make our own choices, Mallory. You made yours. Simon made his. You were beginning to trust him too much.”
Oh, fuck you.
“So you just killed him? You framed Simon for Colin’s death to make a point to me?”
“You wouldn't let it go.”
“And I never will.”
“I know.”
The answer was so quiet that every hair along my arms lifted. I looked at the gun again. Then at him.
“So now it’s my turn? That’s why you came for me? That’s why we’re here?”
“No.”
“You knew I'd find it.”
“Simon made sure you would.”
“But you knew.”
“I knew he was pushing you toward me.”
“And instead of letting me find out what you'd done, you took me.”
“I brought you here because this ends tonight.” He gripped my arm as his eyes moved past me toward the road.
I understood. “Oh.”
Brewster said nothing.
“You didn't bring me here to talk to me.”
“No.”
“You brought me here for him.”
Finally, something like peace moved across his face as he pulled me toward the warehouse. I stumbled on the cracked asphalt but he didn’t let me fall.
“Yes.”
The sheer insanity of it left me momentarily speechless. “I'm bait.”
“He'll come.”
“You don't know that.”
He sounded almost—beatific. “Yes, I do.”
“You've spent weeks telling me he's incapable of attachment.”
“He's not attached.”
I laughed once. “Then why would he come?”
Brewster's face hardened. Exactly.
“He'll come because he needs to control the narrative.”
That word again. Narrative. Everyone wanted one. Look at Elliot, he’d manufactured one that he even believed. I was suddenly very tired of them.
“What if he doesn't?”
We were at the door to the warehouse and he shoved it open and pulled me inside before he answered. “He will.”
“And if you're wrong?”
He paused to look at me as the door shut behind us. The gun remained loose at his side. I didn't like the answer I found in his eyes.
Before I could respond, a voice came from the shadows ahead of us.
“You were always more comfortable when your conclusions didn't require verification.”
The gun came up.
A man stood near an open door just—fifteen feet away.
I stared. That was Simon? For all the mythology we'd built around him, I expected—I didn't know what I'd expected.
Something more John Wick than Better Call Saul. But there was almost nothing remarkable about Simon.
White. Somewhere in his late forties, maybe early fifties. Average height. Average build. Brown hair touched with gray at the temples. Clean-shaven. Dark trousers. Plain shirt beneath an equally plain jacket.
He could have been an accountant. The thought struck me hard enough to snag on memory.
Reardon's office.
The memorial.
Hallways.
Faces.
Had I seen him?
I tried to fit him against the man I'd spoken to briefly in Guy's office, the one I'd dismissed almost as soon as he'd left my line of sight.
Maybe.
Or maybe Simon simply had one of those faces that just seemed familiar. Nothing about him demanded attention.
If I passed him on the street, I wouldn't have looked twice. If he stood behind me in line for coffee, I wouldn't have remembered him by the time I reached the door.
Then he glanced at me as he took two steps out of the deeper shadows. His eyes were pale brown. So pale that where the weak warehouse light caught them, they seemed almost gold.
Those I would remember. His eyes were distinctive.
He studied me and something changed in his strange eyes.
“Mallory.”
My stomach tightened. I knew that voice. Not from the computer. I had never heard him speak. And yet somehow—
It was him. “Simon.”
Brewster laughed. The sound contained no humor. “Simon.” He looked between us. “That's what you gave her?”
Simon continued watching me as though Elliot were of no concern. “She asked.”
I almost laughed.
Brewster raised the gun higher. “Look at me.”
Simon did. The change was extraordinary precisely because nothing visibly changed. His face remained relaxed. His posture easy. But the man who had looked at me disappeared.
It was the Auditor who stared at Brewster. “Hello, Elliot.”
Brewster's breath shuddered in satisfaction. Years of pursuit condensed into that one moment. “I knew you'd come.”
“Yes.”
“For her.”
Simon glanced at me. “Yes.”
Brewster's jaw tightened.
“You've killed people for less.” The Auditor returned his attention to Brewster.
“You manipulated investigations. Destroyed evidence.”
“Yes.” No denial at all. “Then so have you.”
“You interfered with federal operations,” Brewster countered.
Simon—The Auditor—both of them maybe? smiled. “Repeatedly.”
Apparently we were going with radical honesty.
Brewster took a step toward him, gun unwavering and he dragged me with him. “You think this is funny?”
“No.”
“You think you're smarter than everyone.”
“No.”
“Bullshit.”
Simon tilted his head. The gesture seemed familiar, natural, just like I’d imagined each time we’d “communicated.” It was eerie and unsettling.
“You spent years constructing a man who could justify what you wanted to become,” Simon said. “I imagine meeting the actual person is disappointing.”
“You murdered them.” Brewster's face went white.
“Some.”
The ease of his confession in that one word chilled me.
Brewster stared.“So you admit it.”
“I've never denied it.”
“To her?”
Simon looked at me. “No.”
I held his gaze. He was right. He hadn’t denied it. He only denied the two he hadn’t committed.
Brewster laughed again. “There. You see?” He was talking to me now. “That's what he is.”
“I see him.”
“No, you don’t.”
“Elliot—”
“He chooses what you see.” He shook me, his fingers biting into my arm. “That's what he does. He gives you just enough truth to make you believe you're finding the rest.”
Simon said nothing, which—weirdly at this point—irritated me. “Feel free to defend yourself.”
“No.”
I looked at him. “Why not?”
“Because Elliot is correct.”
Well, that shut me up.
Brewster blinked.
Simon continued. “I gave you information selectively. I withheld other information. I anticipated how you would respond and used that response.”
“Manipulated me.”
“Yes.”
The answer hurt more than I wanted it to. Simon saw that. He didn't apologize. Oddly, I respected that more.
Brewster gave me another shake. “Now do you understand?”
I looked at him. “You had Flint shot.”
His expression cracked. “That's different.”
“No.”
“Mallory—”
“You killed Guy.”
“He killed people.”
“Guy?”
“No.”
“Colin?”
Silence.
So, I looked at Simon. “Did Colin kill anyone?”
“No.”