Page 61 of Pure Killers

He's blurry in front of me. My knees wobble, like they're going to let me down. "But he didn't. So why tell me?"

"Because of the copycat. I've been trying to t-tell you. It’s too close to what Caleb did- what they do. They had to of learned from him, firsthand."

"What, some kind of…" My lip curls—I might vomit. "Apprentice?"

"I've been trying to find them. But now, they're almost there, the last piece to make. I'm trying to save your life, Eleanor."

I shake my head, forcing down the lump in my throat. "I have to tell them who you are. Who Seb is."

“Who? The cops? Tawill?” Tristan shrugs. "Go ahead, I’m not going back."

“But they… they can find you.” But they can’t, even as I say the words, I know that. Because they never knew him to begin with. “The background checks? Your fingerprints,” I try grasping at anything.

The corner of his mouth quirks. He holds his hand towards me, palm up, and I see now, the burned pads of his fingers. The burned body comes to mind. “Happy accident, I suppose. I wore false ones when they did the interview. It’s not hard to get a completely new identity in Tregam.” I blink, letting go of his hand. His smile is somewhat consolatory. “We’ve all got histories, Eleanor, even Tawill can’t be so thorough. Look at Caleb… there had been suspicions, in the sweet rich town he grew up in. You know them now, those unopened cases of his schoolmates going missing… But those concerns could all be- and were all- paid to go away.”

I was married to him in that sweet rich town, among canapes and garden teas. No one ever mentioned anything of that sort of controversy, of course, as though any black mark on the town’s history couldn’t be stood to exist or be spoken aloud.

Tristan pulls my mind back to the present, “And your friend Dirk was a street fighter for the better part of his teenage years, did you know that? He hides it well, but the whispers still linger in Tregam’s underground. He’s one of their own, now wearing a badge.”

I nod once, still stunned. “I knew,” I say softly. He told me. In his way, casually and offhand, as if he was telling me something no more interesting than where he went to school.

“Even me, a foster home kid, royally fucked by the system and they knew it, yet I was allowed to be a detective. You only need to clean up so well here. Tregam is desperate for anyone on their side of the law.”

Yet the odds stay stacked against us. Not feeling any better for that insight, I stare back at him. I don’t know who he is anymore. I never knew.

After a pause, he takes a breath. “I’m sorry, Eleanor.” He turns to go.

"My husband killed your sister," I say before I've had time to think it over. He turns back. "I'm sorry that happened."

A suggestion of a laugh. "He liked to go after people he knew. Or ones important to the people he k-knew."

I wince.

"Cass had some problems but… she was getting better." He meets my eye. "I hope on some level you can understand why I went this way."

"I don't know if I understand anything anymore."

"Well, that’s a start."

I don’t say anything, but when he turns away from me to leave, I find myself stopping him again. “Is Seb gone now? Just a part of your past? Are you more Tristan? Or the other one.”

He tilts his head as though in thought. “They’re all me. Just d-different parts.”

“Can I ask for one?”

His lips twitch. “Which would you want?”

I bite my lip. I thought I knew which, but now, faced with the offer, I don’t. “Tristan.”

He seems surprised by this, as much as I’m surprised to say it.

“Why didn’t I know you?” I ask. “You were Caleb’s partner.”

He spreads his hands. “He was always closed off about his home life, the t-things he did in private. I didn’t ask. I started after you left. I think…” Tristan pauses, then goes on. “He didn’t want you knowing anyone, really. To be kept, isolated, pure in a way.”

“Right.” The word chokes in my throat a little. I blink away tears, then lift my chin. “Well, fuck what he wanted.”

Tristan chokes out a laugh, then sobers, “It was never you that I meant to hurt. He was the only one I wanted to hurt.”

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