Chapter Thirty-Two
Jill
I’ve never been this calm before.
Sitting here in Gage’s chair behind the desk in his office, staring at the door while I wait, my body and my mind are still. I feel at peace with what’s about to happen. There’s no doubt or turmoil in my soul for the first time, maybe ever. Only resolution. Knowing the truth—now, finally, after all this time—the chatter in my head is finally quiet.
If this is what being calm feels like, I’ve never been truly calm before. But I am now, in this moment. It’s not going to last very long, but I’m soaking it in while I have it.
The last four days have been spent pretending and planning. Pretending that I don’t hate Gage with every fiber of my being and planning my escape. I’ve come to terms with what I have to do, and I’ve meticulously organized my exit strategy. And with a little help from my best friend, I’m about to cut all ties with my life—and maybe gut a liar in the process.
The door to the office opens and a large figure steps through. Gage walks in, head bent as he types on his phone. When he looks up, and his eyes land on me, he halts mid-step in surprise. The way his eyes light up at the sight of me has anger chipping away at my calm.
Here we go.
“What are you doing in here, baby?” Gage asks, stepping into the office and closing the door behind him. When his gaze connects with mine, he stills. He can sense the dark storm coming.
“I’m sitting here thinking about how, out of all the piece-of-shit men I’ve dealt with in my life, you take the cake. Hands down.”
“What the fuck are you talking about?” Gage’s expression darkens until the room around us seems to dim. Anyone else would be scared shitless, I’ll admit he’s got the intimidation factor. But I’m not afraid of the dark.
“I’m talking about this.” I stand from my seat and toss the bracelet onto the desk between us. The gold hits the wood with a heavy metallic thump that rings in the silence. When Gage’s eyes land on the jewelry, tension ripples through his body until he turns to stone, some of the color draining from his face.
“It’s not—”
“It’s not what I think?” I cut him off bitterly. “All this time, I’ve been crying about the monster who killed my brother and how devastating it was that I’ll never know what happened to him. Turns out that not only did I seek comfort in the arms of the monster I was hunting, I even let him fuck me.”
“Baby—”
“Call me that again, I dare you.” The threat in my tone couldn’t be more clear, or less empty.
“Jill,” he growls, frustration evident, “let me—”
“Another word, and I’ll cut out your fucking tongue!” The rage in my voice builds with my volume until the last two words lash out violently, punctuated by my hands slamming down on the desk between us. Anger surges through me until I’m shaking. I suck in a harsh breath and close my eyes.
Taking a moment, I force myself to reign in the fury engulfing my entire being. The potent need to see the life draining out of him, to feel his last shuttering breath, is all-consuming.
Desperately needing something to ground me, I reach into my back pocket and pull out my knife. The sound of the blade clicking open is calming enough for me to see through the blinding rage and shelve my lethal urges.
If I kill Gage, this will be over way too quickly. As much as I want to—and I really want to—I have other plans for him.
Letting out a calmer breath, my body shifts from fiery hostility into cold contempt. When I open my eyes, I settle my frigid glare on him. The arctic breeze coming from my icy death glare could give the man frostbite—and I hope it does.
Gage’s gaze on me is swimming in such deep yearning that it threatens to swallow me whole. The muscle in his clenched jaw ticks tellingly in his tortured silence.
“I don’t know what’s more disappointing—the fact that I let you convince me that I could trust you, or that you turned out to be the worst life lesson I’ve ever had to learn.”
“You don’t know what you’re talking about. This changes nothing.”
“This changes everything.”
“Your brother wasn’t who you thought he was.”
“Tommy was flawed and fucked up, but he was my brother—my family.” I raise my knife and point it at him. “You’re the one I got wrong. You were my mistake.”
“Hit me,” Gage demands, tossing his phone onto the desk. His large hands fist the material of his shirt and, with one hard pull, he tears it down the middle until it hangs in nothing but tatters before spreading his arms out wide. “Punch me, cut me. Slice me open and gut me until I’m nothing but a pile of skin and bones. Destroy me.” He takes a step forward until the tip of my knife is pressing into his skin.
I inch closer, allowing the tip of the blade to pierce the skin of his chest. Watching the bead of blood spring to the surface has me pressing harder, dragging the blade across the brawny flesh. Gage stands still as a statue as I carve my initials over his heart. I don’t stop until I’ve left a permanent mark, ugly and twisted, on his heart.
Just like he did to mine.
Blood drips down his ink-covered chest, but it’s not enough. Not even close. I pull my gaze away from the carnage to the eyes that have been burning a hole through my skull. Gage’s dark gaze stares down at me, eyes trying to suck my soul straight out of my body. I stare back, unmoved and unblinking.
“Sit down.” I gesture to the chair behind his desk.
“I was going to tell you everything.” Gage says, and his words have white-hot anger flashing through me.
“Sit. Down,” I seethe.
He obeys without another word, sitting in the desk chair. His unrelenting eyes track me as I walk over with the zip-ties I pulled out of my bag. Using two ties per arm, I cinch his wrists to the arms of the chair—pulling the ties so tight that they dig into his skin.
I don’t want him getting out of these too soon, and I want them to hurt until he does.
“I can only imagine how dumb you think I am. You didn’t even bother to hide the bracelet in the safe. Not like all that cash you have piled up in there.”
“Take it, all of it,” Gage’s voice is so rough with desperation that I almost don’t recognize it.
“Oh, I’ve already helped myself. The contents of the safe are the least you can do. But don’t worry, I left you a little something to remember me by,” I say flatly. “Figuring out the combination was too easy—the day we met? Not very original. Then again, I fell for all of your bullshit, so you never expected me to figure anything out, did you?”
“This isn’t over, Jill. Don’t for a second kid yourself thinking it is.”
I ignore his statement, watching as the blood drips from my mark on his inked chest until it disappears into the waistband of his pants. I could kill him—right here, right now. It’s what he wants. But that would be an act of grace, and I have no intention of showing him any mercy.
None.
“You know what the only consolation in all of this is? That you had it. You finally got what you really wanted in the deepest part of you. You had me. Because I fell for you, so hard, and so completely—without abandon. I fell for you in ways you could have only dreamed about. You had me.” The malice in my tone is almost palpable. “And now, that’s gone. Done. You’ll go the rest of your life knowing exactly what it felt like to have everything you wanted and then lose it. Forever.”
“It’s not done. We’re not done. Not ever.”
His words slide right off me, my body going still as I let the finality settle through me.
“I regret ever loving you.”
Gage reacts like I’ve hit him with a sledgehammer. The devastation on his face would be enough to break my heart if he hadn’t already ground it into the dust.
“Any last words before you never see me again?”
Gage leans forward in the chair until he’s pulling against his restraints, his eyes spearing me with conviction. “Wherever you go—it better be far, and you better go fast. Make yourself invisible while you’re at it. Because I’m coming for you, little devil, and there’s nowhere on earth you can run that I won’t find you,” he says. “We’re forever, Jill. There’s no getting rid of me. Even if you kill me right now, my soul will find yours in every lifetime. I’m your shadow under a never-setting sun.”
My gut clenches, and my heart threatens to pound right out of my chest. Ignoring my visceral need to collapse into his arms and let him make everything okay, I lean down until I’m just out of his reach. My soul tears in two as I gaze at the man who I thought was my forever.
Using the painful ache in my chest where the love used to be, I allow my voice to shake with all the anguish that’s ripping me to shreds. “Shrivel, wither, and rot in hell. Just like the rest of them.”
When I grab the bag of loot from the safe off the floor next to the desk and turn around to leave, I don’t look back. But I do lock the office door behind me. It won’t stop Messer or Anders when they inevitably come to let Gage loose, but it’ll slow them down.
I stride through the club with a purpose, evading every familiar face as I make as fast an exit as possible. A large black luxury SUV waits in front of the building for me. As soon as I climb in and close the door behind me, the vehicle is pulling away from the curb and weaving into traffic.
“How did it go?” Lana asks from the seat next to me. I toss the duffle bag onto the floor at my feet and clench my shaking hands. There’s blood on them—it’s not much, but it’s there.
His blood.
I’ll have to scrub my hands when I arrive at my destination.
“I almost killed him. I could have, but I didn’t.” My voice is trembling, and I hate it. I feel like I want to laugh and cry at the same time. Maybe I need to scream or punch something.
“I’m proud of you,” Lana’s tone gets softer, and it makes tears mist in my eyes. But I force back the waterworks. I can cry later. “Are you okay?”
I look over at my best friend, and I know she can see that I’m absolutely devastated. I give the slightest shake of my head no, and that’s all she needs.
“We’ll be at the marina in seventeen minutes,” The driver informs us from behind the wheel. Lana’s hand creeps across the back seat to intertwine with mine and gives it a reassuring squeeze. I glance over at her but quickly avert my eyes to look out the window. If I keep looking at her, I’m going to lose my shit. I can’t be a mess right now, not yet.
Soon, this will all be behind me, and that man will be nothing but a rancid memory.