Chapter 25
twenty-five
My dress is too tight and my heels are pinching my toes. There’s no way I would’ve ever picked this outfit. Cassius picked it. I hope this is for the plot and not because he secretly wants me to dress like this for real. The smile on my face feels like it’s been pinned there with needles.
I see her before she sees me, but only because Cassius sees her before that and points her out.
She’s sipping something cold and bright by the pool, sunglasses pushed up on her head.
The dress and heels make perfect sense looking at her.
Up close, the pretty starts to splinter.
Her wedding band is new-shiny but the pale groove beneath it is older, deeper—the ghost of a different ring.
Her manicure isn’t long and glossy; it’s practical.
She sips her drink and her laughter at whatever the young lifeguard is saying to her seems genuine, like she isn’t married to a monster.
Cassius leans in and kisses my cheek, placing a clear earbud and then pulling my hair over my shoulder to cover it.
He kisses my lips and says, “I have a quick meeting and then I’ll grab you for dinner, darling,” loud enough that anyone paying attention to us would hear.
After he walks away I stay planted, unsure how to approach this woman without being super awkward.
“Go slow,” Cassius says in my ear. I breathe a slow breath of relief at the sound of his low, steady voice. “You’ve got time.”
I nod, even though I have no idea if he can see me.
He’s hidden somewhere, watching. There’s a comfort in him always watching that probably shouldn’t be as calming as it is.
His voice is steady in my ear, but there’s a burr I don’t hear at home.
Metal under velvet. Someone says something on his end that’s muffled and close.
The line hushes like he’s palmed the mic.
I smooth the towel on my lounger in three strokes and align the edges of my tote.
Count the slats of the deck as I cross: twenty-one, twenty-three, twenty-five.
The ghosts drift with me like chaperones.
The alley man with the filmed eye leans on a cabana post. The woman in the red blazer sits on the pool lip and trails her toes through the water.
The kneecap ghost lounges on a chair, one bloody leg crossed neatly.
Gideon takes the shade of an umbrella. Watch the woman, kid. The silk of spiders is beautiful too.
I cross the patio, heart hammering against my ribs. You’re not doing this for you, I tell myself. You’re doing this for the people this man has hurt.
“Hi,” I say, pitching my voice just right, hoping I sound friendly, curious, someone who belongs at luxury hotels and chats with strangers. She looks up, blinking behind her sunglasses.
“Sorry to bother you,” I add quickly. “It’s just your swimsuit is gorgeous. Is that Dolce?”
Compliment first. I remember Cassius’s prep on the way here. Don’t be a threat. Come off na?ve. She relaxes.
“Oh! Yes, it is,” she says, smiling now. “I bought it in France last summer.”
I settle on the lounger beside her. “Do you stay here often?”
“No, this is only my second time. My husband’s on business.”
Right, business. I smile again. Sweat trickles between my shoulder blades. Behind me, past the hedge, past the cabanas, Cassius is moving. I can feel him, a second heartbeat under my skin.
She talks a lot more than I thought she would. She tells me about the spa packages and how fantastic the masseuse is. She asks if I’ve tried the cucumber water in the lobby. I lie and say yes. She waves a server over without looking at her. “Another. But colder.”
She asks if I’m also here because my husband is on business and for some insane reason, I laugh before saying yes. Cassius doesn’t scold me for laughing in the wrong place. Gideon does, with a small shake of his head. She asks if we have dinner plans.
“Tell her we already have reservations, darling,” Cassius says in my ear.
“Yes, my husband made reservations,” I repeat.
“My husband prefers room service,” she says. “I swear that man is gone at the weirdest times for his job.”
I don’t say anything to that, even though it takes me biting the insides of my cheeks not to ask what he does for a living.
“Good girl,” Cassius murmurs. “He’s still in the suite. You’ve got eyes on her. That’s all we need.”
Except it’s not all I need. I need not to throw up. I need not to run. I need not to remember what it felt like to be locked in a room with a man who’s probably not that different from this one. I take a slow breath.
“Do you have kids?” I ask, forcing the question out.
She shakes her head. “No. My husband doesn’t want any.” Of course he doesn’t. “It would be hard with how much we travel,” she adds. “Do you have children?”
“No. We haven’t been married long.”
“So you want them?”
“Yeah, Lindy girl,” Cassius’s voice finds me, “do you want children?”
“I’m not sure. I always pictured a life with kids, but I love my job, my husband travels a lot too, so maybe it’s not in the cards for us.”
“Anything you want, I’ll give you,” Cassius says before she answers me.
“Wise,” she says. “Children slow you down.”
Twenty minutes. That’s how long I have to keep her talking.
Long enough for Cassius to get in, get what he needs, and get out without being seen.
Long enough that she’s not suspicious tomorrow when I approach her again.
Long enough that she’ll talk to me without hesitating while somewhere else in the hotel my husband kills hers.
“You’re doing so good,” he says again. “I’ve got your back. Every second.”
I believe him. Even with panic licking the base of my throat.
Even with my skin crawling. Even with guilt suffocating me at playing a part in the death of this woman’s husband.
I believe him. Because I know exactly what kind of man we’re here to destroy.
And I know exactly the kind of man waiting for me when it’s over.
The candle on our table flickers. I nudge it to the center three inches and watch the flame decide what it wants.
The wine is red and warm in my chest, but I can’t taste it.
Cassius orders for both of us, his hand resting over mine.
L I N D Y /// G I R L presses gentle into my knuckles, and out of nowhere the image arrives: the same letters slick and red, bracketing my knees on tile.
It feels borrowed; a memory from a future I don’t want.
“You were incredible today,” he says quietly, just for me. I stare at the candle between us. The flame flickers like it’s trying to whisper something I can’t hear. The ghosts crowd the glass, breath fogging reflections.
“I feel sick,” I admit. “I liked her. I really liked her. What does that say about me?”
Cassius doesn’t flinch. “That you’re human. That you’re better than me.”
“You’re not bad, Cassius.”
“I’m not good either,” he replies. “But you are. And what you did today will save lives. That woman might mourn a man who probably never loved her, but you helped stop the kind of hurt that never heals. Don’t forget that.”
I blink fast, the tears threatening again. I nod instead of speaking and tap the underside of the table with my ring. Three. Five.
“I can’t lose you to guilt, Lindy girl,” he says. “You’re stronger than that.”
The water in the spa pool is warm, too warm.
It’s supposed to be relaxing, but I can’t unclench my jaw.
She’s humming some song under her breath, something jazzy and low, and I want to scream.
The ghosts go alert, turning their heads the way dogs do before thunder.
Gideon’s brim tips toward the ceiling. Stay alert, Melinda, he warns.
Cassius didn’t give me the full play-by-play, just enough to know he’ll be killing a man today. A man I pray doesn’t join my Cassius killed us club and start hanging around.
“I think I’ll book a facial today,” she says, stretching her arms over her head.
Her hair is pulled up in a towel. She smells like eucalyptus.
A tiny matte-black spider dangles from her neck—so small I would’ve missed it if Gideon’s gaze hadn’t snagged there.
“You should come with me. It’s my treat. ”
“Go with her darling,” Cassius breathes in my ear. Even. Too even. “It’s the perfect way to make sure you two are nowhere near us.”
Guilt rises, hands on my throat. She’s a nice woman. Not stupid, just softened by privilege. She doesn’t know what her husband is. Or maybe she does, and she’s convinced herself it’s something else.
She glances at me. “You okay?”
I nod quickly. “Just got a little lightheaded.” I press two fingers to my temple, three slow presses, pause, five more.
“Let’s go sit by the cold plunge pool,” she says. “Vegas takes it out of you if you don’t know how to pace yourself.” She tucks a loose towel edge with precision. “But the city rewards stamina.”
I follow her to the other side of the spa and sit back down on a lounger while she slips off to the restroom.
“How’s our timing?” I whisper.
A hairline crackle licks the line. “On schedule. I’m still watching. Almost done, darling. Just keep her away from her room.” His words clip off at the end, like he’s talking through his teeth.
“Okay.” I press my fingers to my temple, trying to breathe through the tightness in my chest.
But something’s wrong. I count the tiles. Thirty-one. Thirty-three. Thirty. The channel fuzzes for half a second. Clears.
“Cassius?”
White noise nips my ear. Clears again.
“Answer me” I whisper. Then the floor drops out—full static, a swarm in my skull.
“Cassius?” I whisper.
No response.
“Cassius?”
Still nothing.
I reach into the tote bag beside me and double-tap the button on the communicator. Nothing but static. The ghosts tilt toward me, alert. Something in me swivels from trained to feral.
“Cassius, if you can hear me, I think something’s wrong with the signal. I’m going to come find you.”
No response.
I’m not supposed to leave her, but something in me shifts.
Instinct or dread, I don’t know. I move quickly, barefoot, drying off as I go, heart pounding louder with every step toward the suite where he’s working.
The ghost pace me. I don’t even look back to see if she ever came out of the bathroom.
Red-blazer keeps pressure with two fingers on my wrist, counting my pulse. Alley man points left. I turn left.
The door is cracked. The carpet changes underfoot from plush to practical. My soles squeak. My mouth tastes like pennies.
Blood hits me first. Not the smell. The sound. The wet, slippery scrape of a blade pulling through muscle.
I push the door the rest of the way open. Cassius is crowded over a man. Or what’s left of him. His face is slick with sweat, jaw tight, shirt soaked in blood. His knife in one hand, the other holding the man’s head steady while he, oh God, scoops out the second eyeball.
L I N D Y /// G I R L is lacquered in someone else’s life. The same knuckles that traced between my thighs are slick, red threading the letters like he wrote my name in blood.
I can’t breathe.
Cassius looks up, startled. “Lindy—”
I take a step back.
He drops the eye. It hits the tile with a wet click I’ll probably never stop hearing in my sleep.
He rises slow, hands open like he’s approaching a wounded animal. “You weren’t supposed to see this.”
“I know.” The ghosts flatten back against the wall.
“It’s not who I am with you.”
But it is who he is. Those are his hands.
My skin knows them. My bones do, too. The mind can lie; the body doesn’t.
I know why we came here. I know this was the plan the whole time.
I know that I helped give him the window for this to happen.
But staring at a man’s eyeball on the floor beneath his disfigured face makes what I helped him do way to real.
I can’t be in this room. “I need—” I swipe at my face, not realizing I’m crying until my hand comes away wet. “I need air.” I almost reach for him, automatic, then catch the shine on his palm and yank my hand back.
He doesn’t stop me. Doesn’t follow. He can’t, even if he wanted to. He’s covered in blood. I count the steps to the end of the hall, odd only. Thirty-five. Thirty-seven. Thirty-nine. I press my palms to the cold glass of the emergency stairwell and breathe until the numbers stop trying to eat me.
I’m not leaving him, just this room. I need to remind myself why I’m staying. I don’t hate him. I don’t even blame him. But I can’t unsee it. Can’t unhear the noise that came from that man’s eyeball hitting the floor or the look on Cassius’s face.
I need to breathe. To cry without him watching. To remember who I am when I’m not trying to be brave and strong. The ghosts go very still. The world does, too. And in the held breath between our heartbeats, I remember why I’m staying.