Page 61 of The Professor
“He was.” Andrew tucked his phone away. “You positive you’re okay?”
“I just escaped being brutally raped and murdered and then I shot a man, but yes, I’m okay.”
“Fuck, this is all my fault. You should never have got caught up with me.” He rubbed his forehead. “I should have been stronger, kept saying no to you. Resisted you.”
“No, no, don’t say that. I want to be with you. I didn’t want you to resist. I need to be with you, don’t you see?”
“And I need to be with you.” He was walking faster now. “But I never wanted you to be a killer, Chelsea. That was never my plan. You’re too perfect to be a killer.”
“I’m not perfect, and besides, I’m like you now. We’re both killers.”
He frowned. “It’s a heavy burden to carry each day, I know, I do it.”
“You think I’m not strong enough to cope with the load?”
He turned onto Clifton Street, and we hurried past a hairdresser’s and dry cleaners, both closed. “It’s impossible to know until the load is there.”
“I can carry it,” I said. “It was me or him. He was going to kill me, but I turned the tables.” I paused. “And he deserved to die. You knew that. Galahad knew that. That man didn’t deserve to live another day.”
Andrew said nothing.
“Were you going to kill him or turn him into the police?” I asked. For the first time I felt panic about what I’d done. About killing a man. What if I’d read the scene wrong? “Andrew?”
A dark-blue Merc drew up. Jamie was behind the wheel and wearing a black baseball cap.
Andrew opened the door.
“Tell me?” I asked, not getting in. “What were you going to do? I need to know.”
“He’d confessed to three murders,” Andrew said stiffly. “And the criminal system had let him go once, lack of evidence.” He frowned. “So we would have killed him, three bullets, fired at the same time, within the next ten seconds if you hadn’t.”
I nodded. “So he was never going to walk away from that alley?”
“Not a fucking chance.” He bundled me into the car and scooted in next to me. “He was a walking dead man from themoment he got out of bed this morning.” He clasped Jamie’s shoulder. “Drive, it’s a mess back there.”
“Dalton is on his way, to help Phil.” Jamie sped off. There was very little traffic around.
“Good. We can’t afford to miss a thing on this one, my woman is involved,” Andrew said gruffly. “And there’s no way she’s going to lose a moment’s sleep thinking the law might connect any dots, no matter how small.”
“Hey, we’re pros.” Jamie chuckled. “Don’t worry about it, you just take care of her.”
“I intend to. Oh, I intend to.”
Chapter Fifteen
Chelsea
Jamie dropped us off at Rose Cottage then sped away with the tires spinning. We went around to the back of the house with the light of a half-moon showing us the way.
Dalton was at the door puffing on a smoke. It seemed there was always someone there keeping an eye on the working women.
“Bloody hell, I just heard,” he said, ushering us in. “You okay, Chelsea?”
“I’m fine, thank you for asking.”
He shut the door and flicked on the kettle. “Cup of tea, that’s what you need.”
I laughed, a tight sound, and sat at the big table. “A cup of tea fixes everything, right?”
