Page 99 of What's Left of Us

I rub my arm. “Damn, Marissa. Are you hitting up the gym? If I’d known you called me to come over just to abuse me, I would have stayed home.”

“Are you out of your mind?” she asks, fury narrowing her slitted eyes at me.

I hold up my palms in surrender. “It was just a question. I didn’t know the gym was such a sensitive top—”

“I’m not talking about the damn gym!” She cuts me off in exasperation, pulling me inside and toward the kitchen, crossing her arms over her chest. Conklin used to say he loved what pregnancy did to his wife, and I knew what he meant whenever we’d all have dinner together. The guy could barely stop staring at her tits.

“Jakob Volley,” Marissa says. I force my eyes to stay on her face and far, far away from her boobs.

Did Beaugard talk to her? “What about him?”

“I know what you’re doing, and I’m not okay with it. Don’t you think you’ve sacrificed enough thanks to guys like him? Come on, Lincoln. Think with your head for once.”

So that’s why she made it seem urgent when she left me a voice message to come over as soon as I could. “I am, Riss.”

“No,” she argues, lowering her voice so Cooper can’t hear us from wherever he is in the house. “You’re thinking with your dick and your male ego. You wouldn’t even be on Volley’s trail ifit weren’t for Michael Welsh. And the only reason you care about Volley is because of Georgia and her father. I already lost one person thanks to them. Irefuse—” Her voice cracks. “—to stand around and watch as I lose another.”

Her broken tone has my shoulders dropping a fraction as I step toward her shaking body. “I don’t think that’s fair. You know I can’t just let it go. Matt deserves justice.”

“At what expense?” she asks me, brushing my comforting hand away from her arm. Her eyes become glassy. “Where is the line, Lincoln? When are you going to realize that it’s not worth constantly putting your life at risk? Matt is dead. My husband, my soulmate, and best friend is gone forever. We can’t do anything about that.”

“We can make sure the person responsible gets locked up,” I counter, watching as she shakes her head and swipes at a fallen tear rolling down her cheek.

“Volley is already locked up.”

“Marissa, I can make a difference. I know I can. I’m close to the truth. I can feel it. You and I both know he didn’t willingly pull that trigger without being told to. Somebody let him know we were coming.”

She sniffles, anger growing on her face. “He knew you were coming because he missed his court hearing and had an arrest warrant. Lincoln, you said you were close before. When you went to that house, Matt told me he’d stop obsessing over the case when you two got Volley. But what if you get killed too?”

“I won’t.”

“You don’t know that,” she whispers, angrily wiping her damp face off with the back of her hand. “We both know that anything can happen out there. These people aren’t just your everyday users. They’re not out there smoking weed or snorting coke or shooting up heroin for the sake of their fix. The peopleyou’re going after are so much deeper than that. You know what they’re capable of. You’veseenwhat they can do.”

Swallowing, I look down. I can practically hear the gun go off. Again. And again. And again. I hear it every goddamn night I lay down.

Smell the gunpowder and the blood.

Feel the piercing pain and hot lead as I try getting to Conklin.

“That’s why I need to make sure they don’t hurt anybody else,” I tell her as softly as I can.

“They’ll get caught with time,” she pleads. “You don’t have to be the vigilante. It’s not only up to you to stop them.”

She’s wrong. “There’s a reason I have a badge. If I can’t be the one who ends this, then what’s the point of having one?”

Her eyes dim. “Do you care that little about your life that you’re willing to put it on the line?”

“Would it really matter if something happened as long as I got what I needed?”

She closes her eyes, clenching them to fight off the tears, and then lets out a long breath before opening them to look at me. “Stop doing that.”

“Doing what?”

“Stop acting like you have no one!” she yells, wincing when she looks into the other room. She squeezes her temples and walks away from me, putting the kitchen island between us.

“You have Cooper to worry about,” I remind her. “It’s not the same for me. I go home to an empty house. I’ve got nobody who depends on me. Who’s waiting for me. Who—”Loves me.

She tosses her hands in the air. “You have people, Hawk! You have family and friends and coworkers who would miss you if something happened. Cooper loves you. I love you. Your mom and dad and sister all love you. Why do you always insist that your life matters less than Matt’s or anybody else’s? It matters just as much.”

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