Page 4 of Velvet Chains
“Oh, I don’t know,” I said. “I expect some parts of him are somewhere and some parts of him are somewhere else. He’s very…distributed.”
“You dismembered him?” Alek asked.
I heard Ruby audibly swallow.
“Well, I didn’t do anything,” I replied. “I outsourced. And he was dead before any modifications to his body were made.”
Alek pinched the bridge of his nose like he was trying to physically ward off a migraine.
“Ruby,” he said slowly, like he was coaching himself through it, “you could’ve called the police.”
“I was going to die,” Ruby shot back, her voice tight. “Russell had me in a chokehold on the stairs, called me a bitch, and the last thing I saw were his eyes. I thought about Rosie… about the bill for therapy she’d need if she walked in and found the walls painted with me. And then Kieran stepped in.”
A beat passed. Alek’s jaw flexed.
“Because he had been watching you,” he said.
Ruby didn’t flinch. “Because he had been watching me.”
“I killed him with my bare hands,” I added, like it needed saying. “I had a gun. I didn’t use it. I just… punched him until he stopped moving.”
Alek stared. “You didn’t stop him?”
Ruby shook her head, slowly, like the memory was still settling behind her eyes. “I couldn’t,” she said. Then, after a pause, “I mean—I maybe could’ve. I didn’t want to.”
“You couldn’t have,” I said, and I meant it.
Alek’s mouth opened, then shut again. He raked both hands through his hair like he was on the edge of either screaming or praying.
“Jesus Christ, you two.”
He didn’t sound angry. Not anymore.
Just scared.
“There’s something else,” Ruby said, leaning against the side of the bed.
Alek snapped his head up to look at her. “The punching the guy to death wasn’t enough?”
Ruby sighed. “He knows.”
It took a second for him to process this. “About…her?”
“Yes,” Ruby said. “He put it together. He knows Rosie is his daughter. By blood, if nothing else.”
“That is all she needs to be my daughter,” I said.
Alek blinked at me like I’d slapped him. He waved me off as if I hadn’t said anything.
“You didn’t tell him?”
“I wouldn’t have,” she said quietly. “Then Russell showed up. Then I almost died. Then Julian and Rosie showed up. Then he put it together.”
Alek started to pace. “Fuck,” he said. “This is—this is a lot. Legally, ethically, professionally—”
“I don’t give a fuck,” I said, crossing my arms over my chest. “I want access to my daughter.”
“You going to sue me for custody?” Ruby said, no humor in her voice. “Like I said, try.”
