Chapter 34
Chapter Thirty-Four
REBECCA
My watch vibrates. Somehow, I force my eyes to open. Six a.m.
As a mother, I’m used to operating on a few measly hours of sleep, but not after a night like last night.
When Christian relayed what had happened with Tony in hushed tones, while Grace, Imogen, and Vicky all crowded around me, holding me up, I expected to feel some semblance of shock that the man I married had taken a life and intended to take more.
To take the life of every man who took turns on me that night.
I didn’t even spare an ounce of regret or guilt.
The only feelings I had were relief that I wouldn’t have to go through life fearing I’d bump into them unexpectedly like I had with Tony, as well as pride that my husband was willing to end their miserable existences to keep me safe and take the revenge I couldn’t.
Tobias is still crashed out beside me. The cuts and scrapes on his hands have already scabbed over. It’s hard to believe those hands took lives last night, then came home and touched me with the kind of tenderness I never thought I’d be lucky enough to feel.
Being a De Vil comes with the kind of benefits I wouldn’t have guessed if I’d been given a hundred and one guesses.
“What time is it?”
I roll my head toward my husband. “Six.”
He groans. “I feel like I’ve been run over by a truck.” Pushing himself upright, he rubs his eyes, yawns, then picks up a glass of water from his bedside table. He downs the entire thing. “Do you need to check on Isla?”
I shake my head. “I have an hour yet. Maisie is still with her. I asked her to stay so I could be here when you came home.”
“Right.” He pulls in his lips, avoiding my gaze. “I know what you said last night, but things can look different in the morning. If what I did has made you scared of me or something, I’ll understand.”
Is he kidding? He’s kidding, right? Even though I know there is logic to his statement. With my father, I suffered abandonment. With my mother, neglect. And with Marcus, abuse. I understand why he might think that way.
Gently, I touch his jaw, coaxing his head around until he faces me. It takes a couple more seconds before our eyes meet.
“There is nothing you could do that could ever make me afraid of you. It’s the opposite. You make me feel safe, protected, important.” I hesitate. “And loved.”
The relief that washes over his face would be funny if this wasn’t such a serious conversation.
“All those things are true,” he whispers. “Especially the love part. I don’t even know when it happened, but I do. I love you, Wren.”
My breath catches, and for a moment, I can't speak past the tightness in my throat. I press my forehead to his, letting the words sink in, letting myself believe them. “I love you, too.”
“You do? Because you don’t have to say it just because I did. I don’t ever want you to feel like that.”
“Shush.” I press my lips to his, lightly, all too brief.
Sex with Tobias is new and exciting, and we’re both discovering all kinds of things about ourselves and each other. Which means it’s easy for it to be a distraction, and we still have to talk about last night.
Except as that thought comes to me, I realize there’s only one thing I need confirmed.
“Are they all dead?”
He nods. “Every one.”
I pause, waiting for remorse to land because people have died because of me. It doesn’t come. I’m glad they’re dead. It means they’ll never be able to hurt anyone again.
“And are you in danger from the police? Or from anyone else?”
He chuckles. “No. Call it a perk of being a De Vil. We’re…”—he twists his lips to one side as though he’s searching for the right words—“above the laws regular people have to follow. There won’t be any fallout, I promise.”
Wow. That’s some kind of power.
I slide my arm around his middle and rest my head on his shoulder. “I’m glad they’re dead,” I whisper.
“After it was done, and I was on my way back here, it occurred to me that I should’ve asked you what you wanted to happen rather than deciding for you.
It’s just… the way you froze when you saw him and then began to tremble.
Once you confirmed he was one of them, I saw red. I’m sorry if I took away your power.”
I squeeze his waist, and our eyes lock. “You didn’t take away my power. You showed me that my safety and my feelings come first. Besides, I’m not sure I could have asked you to kill them and put that weight on your shoulders. I wouldn’t have wanted to go to the police, though.”
He nods. “Same as me with the Southalls.”
“Exactly. The thought of being dragged through the courts, having to relive and relay to a bunch of strangers what they did to me.” I shudder. “No. It’s better this way, and if that makes me a bad person, I’ll live with it.”
“There isn’t a bad bone in your body.”
“Oh, I don’t know. I’ve left Felicity hanging. Some might say that’s bad.”
“And some might say it’s deserved. Let her sweat. Whatever you decide, I will support you.”
Tobias brushes a thumb along my jaw, his expression one that makes my insides twist and something warm unwind in my chest. For a long moment, we lie there listening to the birdsong out the window, absorbing the events of the last twelve hours in our own way.
Eventually, reality nudges its way in.
“I should go before Isla wakes up and wonders where I am.”
Reluctantly, I peel myself from his body and swing my legs out of bed. Picking up my dress from the floor, I toss a glance over my shoulder.
“Does it count as the walk of shame if it’s in your own house?”
He smirks, his gaze traveling slowly down my body, inch by inch.
“Don’t,” I warn, trying not to smile. “If you start something, Maisie will take one look at me and know I’ve been thoroughly compromised.”
“You have been thoroughly compromised.”
I throw a pillow at him.
He palms it away and laughs. “I’ll get a dressing gown for you.” He climbs out of bed and pads into his adjoining bathroom, returning with a dark blue robe. He swaddles it around me and ties the belt. It’s far too big, but it’ll do the job. “Go, before I convince you to stay.”
I cup his jaw, stealing one last kiss. “See you later?”
“Count on it.”
With a final glance at my husband, I slip out of his rooms and make the short trek to mine. Both Maisie and Isla are already up, watching TV. Isla’s tucked into Maisie’s side, dressed in a pair of plaid leggings and a black T-shirt with a picture of a cat on it.”
“Good morning, pumpkin.”
“Mama.” She slides off the couch and toddles over to me, flinging her arms around my thighs. “Paw Patrol.” Taking my hand, she tugs me back to the couch.
“Thank you, Maisie. You’re a lifesaver.”
“Of course, Mrs. De Vil. Anytime. She’s already had some cereal and a glass of juice.” She flicks the end of Isla’s nose. “See you later, sweetheart.”
“Isla, Mama’s going to brush her teeth. I’ll be two minutes, okay?”
She nods, attention absorbed by her favorite show.
I strip off Tobias’s dressing gown and hang it on the back of the door.
And yes, I do bury my nose in it and breathe in deeply.
I shower quickly, conscious of Isla in the living room.
I know she’s safe but old habits die hard and loosening the apron strings, while getting easier, is still something I have to consciously force myself to do.
I get dressed and wander back into the living room.
Isla’s sitting on the floor with her back to me, legs crossed, shoulders hunched. Her beloved backpack lies next to her, and she’s reading something that has a flowery pattern on the cover. I don’t recognize it.
“What have you got there?”
Isla hugs the book to her chest. “Mine.”
I grin. So possessive. “Yours. Can I see, though?”
Reluctantly, she hands it to me. It falls open somewhere around the middle to a handwritten page.
It’s done. It had to happen. There was no other way. I cannot let her take what is mine.
I frown. “Isla, where did you get this?”
She turns bright red. Ah, that means she knows she’s done something wrong.
“Isla, answer Mama. Where did you get this?”
“Alice.”
“Alice gave it to you?”
She hesitates. “Alice,” she repeats.
I’m not going to get anymore out of her by berating her. “Okay, pumpkin.”
I take a seat on the couch and turn to the front page. It’s a diary, but there’s no name, no clue who it belongs to. Ooh, maybe it’s from one of the De Vil ancestors. I mean, no one keeps a diary these days. Everything’s digital.
The urge to take a peek into the past is too much to resist. I begin to read. The first few pages contain day-to-day things, nothing earth-shattering or intriguing. I come across a pressed flower, a rose, its petals preserved through time. Careful not to dislodge it, I keep reading.
George wants to go home. To Oakleigh. I’ve told him I don’t want to go, but he’s insistent.
George… so this is Alice’s diary, not some long-dead ancestor’s. That changes everything. I can’t, in all consciousness, read Alice’s diary.
I close the book.
Open it.
Close it again.
Oh, what the heck. Just a peek. I’ll ask for forgiveness later.
I hate it here. Everywhere I go, there she is. I see him watching her. It tears me apart. If he knew what I know, he’d leave me.
Who was he watching? I presume the “he” in this case is George. I feel bad for prying into Alice’s private thoughts, but I can’t stop. I keep turning the pages, caught up in Alice’s backstory.
Those kids. Those fucking kids. I hate them. They remind me of my failings as a woman. George can never find out. If he did, it’d all be over. I won’t lose him. I can’t. He’s my entire world. Something must be done.
Kids? Is she talking about Tobias and his siblings? That makes no sense. She adores them. I keep reading, my guilt quashed by curiosity.
The plans are in place. God forgive what I’m about to do, but there’s no choice.
The next few pages contain no new revelations. I speed read, anxious to get to the next part. What was she about to do? Did she go through with whatever it was?
Everything’s gone wrong. It’s a disaster. He wasn’t supposed to escape. It would be him, wouldn’t it? Golden fucking boy. I hate that child, but there’s nothing I can do now. They’ll watch him like a hawk. She’s gone, though. That’s something, I guess.
Who is she talking about? The more I read, the less I figure out what’s going on. It’s like one of those annoying series on TV that keep throwing in Easter eggs that mean nothing until the final scene.
Can I get to the final scene already?
I turn the page, and there it is. The final scene. The answers I’ve been waiting for.
Breath punches out of me. My hands start to shake so violently, the diary slips into my thigh.
Alice.
Sweet, gentle, kind Alice.
A murderer.
The room tilts. The walls close in. I squeeze my eyes shut even as the words tattoo themselves inside my eyelids in scorching ink.
She killed them.
She killed Annabel.
She killed Tobias’s mother.
The despicable truth crashes down on me, ruthless and suffocating. I stare down at the diary in my lap, innocent looking, but also a weapon. One that could shatter the family I’ve grown to love apart, and with it, the man I love, too.
What the hell do I do?