Scarlet Angel (Page 8)

“I actually expected you a lot sooner than this,” she says, her eyes watching me, as though she’s waiting on an excuse.

Remaining calm, I stare at her with my coldest expression.

“Logan wants to know if you’re up for a case. He’s waiting for your answer.”

“Don’t pretend that’s why you’re here right now,” she says, an edge to her tone.

“Why haven’t you told Logan who I am?”

She slowly backs up, and she gestures for me to sit on the bed closest to the door. I do as the gun-wielding girl silently beckons, sitting down, and she steps back, sitting across from me on the other bed, never lowering her weapon.

“I’m not here to hurt you,” I tell her, and she snorts out a laugh.

“I’ll be the judge of that. And to your other question, it’s because you told the Boogeyman you were killing him to keep Logan safe. You had no idea I was there, obviously, so that wasn’t a show. I believe you actually think you’re in love.”

“I am in love,” I immediately blurt out, then grimace. Didn’t mean to tell her before I told him.

Her eyebrows go up. “Psychopaths can’t love. They can only imitate.”

“You think I’m a psychopath? I mean, I joke that I’m psycho, but I’m not the true definition of the word.”

“Really? I saw a different story.”

I lean forward, and she wraps another hand around the gun handle.

“Easy,” I tell her, holding a hand up. “Just getting comfortable. You’re calling me names without knowing anything about me. A good profiler digs into the past.”

“I’m not a profiler. I’m a forensics expert and a tech genius. I saw what I saw. And I’m telling Logan. I just wanted you to know that first, since you killed my own nightmare and saved me from Plemmons. Call it a courtesy.”

Tears bubble up in my eyes, and the first one spills down my cheek. The air is sucked from my lungs, and my entire body feels like it’s dipped in a vat of ice.

She cocks her head, studying me, and I bat away a tear.

“Then give me a five minute head start,” I say quietly.

I start to stand, and she moves with me, keeping her gun trained at my head.

“This gun is the only thing keeping you from killing me right now,” she says randomly.

I spin so fast that I hear her hiss out a breath, and I snatch the gun from her hand, then completely disassemble it, all in less than two seconds. I toss the pieces to the bed, feeling broken and defeated.

“No. I’m not killing you because you don’t deserve to die,” I tell her as she stumbles backwards. “Guns don’t scare me.”

“But losing Logan does,” she says quietly, her throat bobbing.

“There are only two people in my life that I love. One is like a brother. The other is the first person I’ve ever been in love with. So yes, losing Logan terrifies me.”

“Revenge killers have had a psychotic break. They lose sight of their intended goals and their morals get skewed. Revenge becomes their sole focus, and anything or anyone that gets in the way becomes collateral damage in the name of revenge.”

“You’re profiling me, yet claim not to profile. You should stick to your day job, because you know nothing about me or what I’m capable of.”

I turn to leave, and she calls out, “Wait! It was a test.”

Confused, I turn around as she stands up, her body shaking a little bit.

“Care if I put my gun back together? Obviously you’re quick enough to disarm me, but it still makes me feel better to have it after what I saw you do to Plemmons.”

“Just use the one you have under your pillow,” I tell her, watching as she pales.

“How’d you—”

“You’ve gone through a lot in the past week. It’d make sense to sleep with one under your pillow if you need it to feel safe right now. You’d have more than just your service gun. I need at least two guns to feel safe when I’m at my most vulnerable.”

She sighs harshly before grabbing the gun out from under her pillow, and I sit back down, facing her, staying at the exact right distance I need to disarm her again if the need arises.

She doesn’t point the gun at me this time.

“Start at the beginning. Explain what could have turned you into this,” she says, gesturing toward me with her hand.

“They turned me into this,” I tell her softly. “They stripped away my soul and left me devoid of any empathy toward the monsters in the world. I’m not a psychopath. I know the truth from the lies. I know the reality from the delusions. In fact, there are no delusions.”

“We’ve found nothing in that town to point to this level of violence.”

I lean forward, but this time she doesn’t react. “Dig deeper.”

“Just tell me. I’m not deciding what to do until you tell me what could turn someone into a killer so cold that you didn’t flinch when you killed Plemmons. You wanted to torture him.”

“Just like he tortured those women. Don’t you think death was simply too easy?”

She stares at me with the eyes of an unscarred soul, despite the scars I know she bears.

“Fine. You want the story; I’ll tell you. But you can’t tell your team. They have to learn for themselves,” I bite out.

“Why?” she asks. “Why don’t you want them knowing?”

“Because I want the town to confess to the sins they covered up,” I say bitterly.

“Prove to me you’re not going to hurt someone innocent, and I’ll make that deal. Tell me the story.”

“I could have killed you several times, Hadley. From the day you walked into my house and called me out for stealing Kennedy’s identity.”

“Why did you steal her identity?”

“To survive,” I say quietly.

Her lips tighten, but she gestures at me, meaning she wants to hear what I have to say. Needs to know I’m not suffering a psychotic break. Needs to know that despite the brutal way I kill, that I’m in control of my mind.

So I tell her. I start at the beginning, telling her about my father. Tell her about how he died. Tell her about how small town justice works. I tell her every sick, twisted, demented detail until she’s pale and grabs the garbage can, heaving into it as her stomach loses the battle of control.

The vomit doesn’t bother me, so I keep talking as she retches. I tell her about Marcus, about his beauty, and how they stole it all away. About how they destroyed him in the last few hours of his life.

About how he was so desperate to save my life that he sacrificed his own by driving so far away from Delaney Grove while trying to keep pressure on his wound.

I tell her about Jake, and how his father was my father’s lawyer and best friend. We proved over and over that Dad couldn’t be the serial killer they charged him to be. I tell her about how they ran Christopher Denver out of town for trying to save an innocent man’s life.

I tell her about how Jake left before the town could turn against him, because he needed to be innocent for my sake. For the sake of justice—not just revenge.

I tell her about Lindy, and what Kyle did to her. About how even her husband believed a rapist over his own, terrified wife. I tell her about Diana, and the threats they made toward her son to keep her quiet. I tell her every dark detail that town covered up. Every dirty secret finally gets aired.

And though I feel free, knowing another person now knows the truth, Hadley looks like she may never recover.

At least I spared her one detail.

The name of the man who will die the most painfully.

The man who started the dominoes back then.

We sit silently for several long minutes, and I check my phone, knowing Logan is showing patience, even though he’s in a hurry. No texts.

“How did you survive?” she asks in a rasp whisper, tears streaming from her eyes when I look back at her. I have no tears left for this. I’ve cried them all already.

“No one knows,” I say honestly. “But my mother always believed in avenging angels. Marcus’s last words to me were that we’d come back as avenging angels, and we’d make them pay. We’d do it together. But he didn’t come back.”

My voice breaks on that last bit, but I force the emotion back. “Jake took his place. He loved my brother as more than just a friend, but was always too worried what the town would say or do if they came out about their relationship. It’s his deepest regret.”

She wipes away more tears, and she runs a hand through her hair.

“I won’t tell the team,” she finally says. “Unless someone innocent gets caught in the crosshairs, I owe you my silence. You saved the lives of countless children by ending a monster I let go free. You saved women all over, possibly even Logan, and saved me from Plemmons. Until you have that psychotic break, I’ll hold my tongue.”

That’s more than I expected. My entire chest feels like an anvil is being lifted off it.

“I’ve trained against the psychotic break. They turned me into a shell of a person. Now I use it against them. But my mind? My mind is whole, even if my soul is not.”

“How?” she asks, confused. “How do you train against the break?”