Page 91 of There is No Devil

When it’s finished, Randall is nothing but meat on the floor. Those heavy hands can’t hurt anyone anymore.

I feel hollow inside, all the anger, all the pain, all the resentment scooped out of me.

It’s over now. Truly over.

I close the laptop screen and turn to face Cole. I can’t tell if he’s a monster or my savior. He looks the same as always: stark, beautiful, serene.

“Did it feel good to do that?” I ask him.

“Yes. It was deeply satisfying.”

“Why? I already won. I’m happy now. I moved on.”

Cole raises one black slash of an eyebrow. “There’s no moving on. I learned that with my father. If Randall died of old age, the anger wouldn’t die with him. You have to kill it. I killed it for you.”

I don’t know how I feel.

Or perhaps I feel everything at once.

It’s wrong, so incredibly wrong.

And yet … it also feels like justice.

I wanted Randall dead. Now he is. He made me suffer. And he suffered in return.

Cole plucks the flash drive out of the laptop and holds it out to me once more.

“You put your life in my hands once, the night you came to my studio. Now I’ll bet mine. Here’s the tape. You won’t turn it in. You know this was right.”

He pushes the flash drive into my hands, forcing me to close my fingers around it.

I could leave the house, and carry this directly to Officer Hawks.

But just as I knew Cole wouldn’t hurt me, he knows exactly what I’m going to do.

I walk into the kitchen and drop the drive down the garbage disposal.

* * *

The next morning,I wake up alone in the bed.

Cole is giving me space to process what happened.

I understand now that all of this was planned out by him, probably beginning weeks ago. All through dinner, he knew what he was about to show me. He probably knew how I’d react. Even what I’d say.

He once told me that there are very few surprises for him. In social situations, he always has a quick reply at the ready because he plays out the entire conversation in a fraction of a second, already knowing what he’ll say and what the other person will respond, back and forth a dozen times, before either of them ever opens their mouth.

Everything is chess to him, eight moves ahead.

When his opponent plays by the rules, he almost never loses.

I throw a spark of chaos into the game.

Perhaps, so does Shaw.

Or Shaw becomes less predictable when I’m in the mix, distracting Cole, forcing him to make decisions against his best interests.

We’re entering the endgame now. Am I a valuable asset—a queen to his king? Or only a pawn that Cole can’t bear to sacrifice?

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