Page 69 of Oathbreaker

When the silencer goes off with a quiet snick, I inhale and exhale, letting the frigid night air cool my nasal passages. A thought teases the back of my consciousness that maybe I’m just like my father: toying with my prey before ending their life.

But my father kills for fun. For sport. He killed innocent people.

But so have I. Just because it was against my will, does that somehow make it acceptable?

I shake my head to pull myself out of the memory.

Anyone who dies by my hand will have deserved it. They more than deserved it. I’m killing for love. They kill for greed.

I look down at the remnants of Buck’s bloody skull, thinking of the deplorable abuse he kept on his computer.

I will hunt them all down for you, Sunbeam.

“Well, that was slightly less dramatic than slitting someone’s throat and letting them bleed out like a stuck pig,” Leo says. His voice is hard and serious despite his quip.

“Yeah, I guess,” I say, pressing my smartwatch to summon Rio and his cleanup crew. Two minutes later, Rio’s shaved head comes into view, and I step away from Buck Fitzgerald’s body.

“You got this here?” I ask Rio.

He nods and gets to work. I like Rio. He’s a man of few words, and he understands why I’m doing what I’m doing—not just for getting rid of the cancer that is my father, but for getting rid of the people who hurt Winter too.

Rio snaps a picture of Buck Fitzgerald’s corpse.

Leo and I leave the alley as planned, and a few minutes later, I’m in Leo’s new Tahoe. I pull my phone out of my pocket, staring at the picture of Winter on the screen.

I changed my screensaver to the picture of Winter at La Maison. I think I fell over the precipice and into true love with her while sitting at that table outside the small French-themed restaurant. I just couldn’t define it then.

I run my thumb over the picture before the screen goes dark again.

“Got plans for today?” Leo asks, cutting through the thick silence of the evening.

I look at him out of the corner of my eye.

“Maybe you should do something with her,” Leo adds. I drop my head back to the headrest. Ever since my meltdown over, well, everything, I’ve been steering clear of Winter.

Not because I don’t want to be around her. I need her presence like I need my next breath. But because I don’t think I’ll be able to manage my emotions. The more threads I pull at with this shit around my father and the Winthropes, the more complicated things become. It feels like I’m nowhere near close to resolving this mess so I can move on with my life.

And that realization fucks with my brain in a serious way.

I want to be able to control myself.

She doesn’t need to deal with my bullshit.

“What do you suggest?” I reply, rolling my neck to look at the side of Leo’s face.

He gives a half-smile. “Well first, stop avoiding your woman. Everyone can see it and it’s awkward and hurtful.”

Dread settles in my chest.

“I haven’t been?—”

Leo’s lifted eyebrow forces me to cut off.

“It’s complicated, Leo.”

“Well, explain it to me then,” he replies.

I open my mouth to respond but snap it shut when the words in my brain coalesce into a ball. “My presence in her life has done nothing but cause her pain. And I’m afraid that—what if we can’t...” I run my hand through my hair, gripping the strands in a tight fist at the crown of my head.

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