Page 130 of Remy

“It’s okay to have second thoughts.” He diverts to the basin, his gaze meeting mine in the mirror’s reflection while he cleans the blood from his hands.

I agree. But those thoughts should’ve taken place before I climbed behind the wheel of his car. Before I rushed from my house just to catch sight of him.

“I can handle it.” I step inside the room, closing the door behind me.

He shoots me a curious look. “You caging me in?”

“I thought it best to have another barrier to the screams you’re going to make once I start my handiwork. We wouldn’t want your neighbors calling the cops.”

He huffs a hollow laugh, the agony of it squeezing my insides. He shucks his jacket and throws it to drape over the edge of the extravagant bathtub, exposing a mass of dark blood stained into the front of his white shirt.

Panic floods my veins.

“You have other injuries.” I rush forward, scanning the button-down, searching for more bullet holes. “Why the hell didn’t you tell me?”

24

OLIVIA

I dump my cell on the vanity and reach out, cautiously exploring.

“No” is all he says.

“But the blood.” I keep up the frenzied search as bile climbs my throat. There’s no way I can fix a bullet to the chest. He could die. He would die.

His cool palms clasp my wrists. “It isn’t mine.”

My panic transforms to anguish at his guttural tone.

I stand straight, meeting his gaze.

This man is no heartless criminal. Pain swims in those eyes.

He must’ve held that boy while he died. Must’ve clung to him so tight.

“I’m sorry,” I whisper.

He releases me with a wince and turns to the supplies. “How do you want to do this?”

By comforting you.

“I don’t know.” Nervousness bubbles in my belly as I move to the vanity and look through all the things he’s pulled from the drawer. The sterile bandages. Tweezers. Staple gun. Antiseptic. Gauze. Cotton swabs. “You could start by showing me the wound.”

I picture him lowering his zipper, removing his pants, exposing the outline of his crotch through whatever bloodstained underwear he must be wearing, and my heart palpitates.

Only that’s not what he does.

He moves to sit on the vanity and grabs a pair of scissors to hack at his pants above the wound. The sound of grating material fills the room, fighting for dominance over the loud thunder of my pulse in my ears.

I don’t look. Not yet. I clean my hands instead, working up a thick lather of his sandalwood-scented soap, making sure I scrub every nook and cranny meticulously.

I’d love to admit the impressive sanitation technique is only due to an enviable hygiene ethic, but the reality is that my fingers are trembling and I don’t want him to notice.

He cuts off the entire right leg of his pants, then discards the scissors for the liquor bottle and takes a long pull. “If all this is too much I’ll drive you home.”

It is. Way too much. But I can’t walk away. “Nothing inside those pants of yours has been, or ever will be, too much for me. I can handle it just fine.”

From the corner of my eye I see his lips twitch, yet his gaze remains haunted.

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