Chapter 16
Indigo
I woke up before him.
I lay there for a long minute, staring at the ceiling. Maya’s words were still rattling around in my head. “You came back here for a reason, Indigo. Figure out what it is before you burn the whole house down trying to prove a point.”
She was right.
Three years ago, I wasn’t this hostile. Malachai went out of his way to make sure I had everything I needed—everything I wanted.
Some part of me even understood the Sasha thing from his point of view.
Maybe if I chilled out and acted more like I did before she came along, he’d be more inclined to let me have some kind of life outside these four walls.
I turned my head. His arm was still heavy across my stomach, warm and possessive even in sleep. His breathing was slow and even. For once, he actually looked like he was sleeping—jaw relaxed, those sharp lines in his face softened.
I studied him. The scar I’d given him on his chest rose and fell with every breath. I wondered how many more Russians were still breathing. I could be nice to him for that one kill. Sprinkle a little sugar on him. Get more information and hope it matched what Cooly found out.
I stretched, letting my body press into his.
His arm tightened around me instantly.
“You’re awake,” his voice was rough.
“So are you,” I replied.
I ran my fingers down his chest, tracing the scar I’d left. “What are we doing today?”
His eyes narrowed slightly. Suspicious. “What do you want to do?”
I smiled, soft and sweet. “Cook me breakfast. The good kind—with the potatoes in the omelet. And then we can talk about it.”
He studied my face for a long moment, searching for the trap. I kept my expression open, almost innocent.
“Okay,” he said finally.
We sat across from each other at the marble island. He slid a thick manila file toward me without a word.
I opened it.
Photos. Reports. Dates.
My stomach dropped.
“Dame and his father were a job,” Malachai said quietly, voice calm. “I wouldn’t kill your friend over jealousy. He wasn’t as innocent as you thought.”
He flipped a page. The image hit me like a slap—Dame in the back of a warehouse, surrounded by tied-up, frightened girls. Some of them couldn’t have been older than sixteen.
“He was helping his father traffic them,” Malachai continued. “Using his dancing career as cover to move girls across state lines.”
He pointed to one of the girls in the photo. My breath caught because I immediately recognized her.
“Peta-Gaye Williams. You know her.”
“Yeah. We’d taken a few summer dance classes together as kids when she visited.”
Kimona was this female Jamaican crime boss. Peta was her only daughter.
“She’d been on vacation in Miami when she got caught up with Dame. Her mother was the one who put out the hit after she escaped and made her way back home.”
I stared at the pictures until they blurred. All this time I’d thought he’d murdered my friend in a jealous rage. But he’d been… working.
The taste of omelet in my mouth turned sour.
I looked at the photos, then up at Malachai’s calm face.
The weight of the time I’d spent hating him for this specific death started to crush me.
Especially when it was over someone who was helping to ruin women, I felt even less bad about what happened to his sister now.
“You let me stab you though,” I whispered, feeling so bad about it.
“I wanted you to feel better,” he said simply. “You needed someone to blame. You did it. You felt better. I lived.”
What kind of crazy, romantic, toxic shit was that?
It made something click in my head in a way I didn’t like.
Maybe he didn’t understand where he’d gone wrong with Sasha.
Not really.
Not the way a normal person would.
His mind didn’t work like that.
Everything was a system to him. Cause and effect. Action and outcome. If something didn’t break the structure, then it wasn’t a problem.
Sasha hadn’t crossed his line.
Not until she did.
And by then… it was already too late.
Maybe I was the bad one for getting mad at him.
He told me what he was from the beginning, and I tried to make him something else.
I wanted him to feel things the way I did. To understand hurt the way I understood it. To choose me the way normal men choose women.
I could have put a bullet in Sasha’s head myself and Malachai wouldn’t have blinked. That was my bad.
My throat tightened. “Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“I couldn’t,” he said simply. “I never reveal a client while they’re alive. It could have been dangerous for you.”
He paused.
“As of about midnight though…”
He leaned back slightly.
“She isn’t alive anymore. A car bomb in Kingston took her out. I found out last night and went by the old house to grab these files but fell asleep.”
I sat there in silence.
I could hear him eating again. I wondered what it would feel like to be like him for once. Not to feel so much of everything.
I looked down at my hands. They were shaking. For three years, I had held that murder over his head like a crown of thorns. I had used it to justify a lot of screaming, fighting, and venom I’d spat at him. And he had just taken it. He’d bled for a lie because he thought it would help me heal.
I felt small. I felt sick. I’d been loud and wrong.
“I’m sorry,” I whispered. The words felt pathetic and hollow.
He nodded. “Eat your breakfast, Indigo.”
And I remembered those were almost the exact words he’d said to me back then. Except it had been dinner, and I’d been sad. Now guilt was threatening to swallow me whole.