The Red Ledger_2

by Meredith Wild

  Finally an agonizing cry tears from my throat. I bring my hand to my mouth to muffle the screams that want to come with it. My fingers are lathered in red. Thick, warm red.

  “Tristan,” I sob.

  “You’re okay. Just breathe, Isabel.”

  The car jerks around a turn. Then another. We’re going fast. The windshield is splattered with Brienne’s blood and brain matter. Through it I can make out the sky and the blur of passing buildings.

  This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening. This isn’t happening.

  The mantra runs on a loop in my brain. Then I’m whispering it. Praying it’s true each time it passes my lips.

  Brienne didn’t just die in front of me.

  We didn’t just leave her in the street.

  No one wants me dead.

  Tristan didn’t try to kill me.

  I’m safe.

  I roll the tape backward, further and further, until I’m home. Young enough to appreciate all the attention my parents gave me. Ignorant of the desire to leave and brave the world on my own.

  I don’t know how much time has passed when the car finally stops. Tristan puts it in park and gets out.

  Don’t leave me.

  I can’t seem to speak. I reach for the empty seat and skim my palm over its warmth.

  Need you.

  A gust of cold air rushes over me. I’m shaking all over. Tristan pulls me straight again and lifts me into his arms through the passenger side.

  “Come on. You’re okay. I’ve got you.”

  His voice is soothing. So kind and reassuring, I’m tempted to believe my mantra. We’re safe. I collapse against him.

  “What the fuck happened?” Makanga’s in the doorway of a house I don’t recognize, stepping aside as Tristan takes us inside.

  “I need to get her cleaned up.”

  Makanga doesn’t answer, but Tristan follows him through a bedroom and into a bathroom. He sets me down on the toilet seat and turns on the shower. The flimsy yellow shower curtain billows gently as the water heats up.

  “Tristan. What the fuck?”

  “Not now,” Tristan snaps.

  Makanga’s eyes are wide, his warmth and humor gone. Nothing seems real right now, but he doesn’t feel like a friend anymore.

  “You blast in here with no warning, and your girl is covered in someone’s vital fluids. You want to hang here, you have to tell me what’s up.”

  Tristan closes his eyes for a brief moment and then opens them. “Give me five minutes. Can you wait five fucking minutes so I can get her cleaned up?”

  Makanga disappears, closing the door loudly behind us.

  I don’t want to be here.

  Tristan lifts my shirt over my head. I let him undress me the rest of the way. I’m shaking so badly, I’m not sure the warm water will even help. Tristan helps me into the shower, steadying me with his strong hands. I suck in a breath as the sharp sting of the spray hits my skin. I’ve never felt this numb, but the water feels like daggers all of a sudden.

  “You okay?”

  I look up from the pink water pooling around my feet and into Tristan’s eyes. Silvery blue and round with concern. His lips pull taut, like he already knows I can’t possibly be okay. I may never be okay again.

  He pulls his shirt over his head and goes for the button on his jeans.

  “No.” The single word croaks past my lips.

  He stills.

  “Talk to him. I’ll be all right.”

  “Are you sure?”

  I nod, reach for a bottle of shampoo, and squeeze some ivory liquid into my palm. I want Tristan with me, but I don’t want to linger here. It doesn’t feel right.

  “I’ll be back in a minute with some clothes.”

  I duck my head under the water, appreciating the harsh water pressure now that it’s coaxing the debris out of my hair. More pink swirls. More evidence of Brienne’s life-force gone. She’s gone.

  Just like that.

  I wash quickly, scrub my skin and scalp and close my eyes so I don’t have to see what’s breaking loose and swirling down the drain. But closing my eyes brings the horror of what happened flashing behind my eyelids.

  The nausea hits me fiercely. I wring my hair, turn off the shower, and find a towel below the sink to wrap myself in. Seconds later I’m kneeling in front of the toilet, letting the sickness take hold of me. I heave and heave until my stomach finally expels its bile.

  Then all I can do is cry.

  TRISTAN

  My fault. All my fucking fault.

  I can’t dwell on all the missteps that brought us here. All I can think about is our next move. Jay knows way more than I thought she did, and that changes everything.

  I bring Isabel’s bag inside. Makanga is sitting in his lounger, pinning me with a hard stare.

  “What?”

  “Five minutes are up,” he says.

  “I need a night here to regroup. She just saw her friend get murdered.”

  “Since when do you care?”

  “What’s your fucking problem?”

  Makanga stands up abruptly. “My problem is that you’re changing the game. The people who come into my life may not be noble, but they’re consistent. You? You’re getting soft over some girl, which is dangerously inconsistent with the guy I used to know. And that tells me that you’re getting into something that maybe you don’t have much control over.”

  “So you’re saying you won’t help me because I’m not consistently heartless enough for you? She’s in shock, for Christ’s sake. I can’t bring her out like this. You want to cut me a break?”

  Makanga’s expression softens a fraction. “Listen, Isabel’s a nice girl. I don’t think she’s headed down the right path getting mixed up with you, but that’s not my business. Her friend getting murdered? Not my business either. I deliver shit and do some light babysitting, but you’re bringing heat to my house. That’s my business.”

  He might be right. About everything. My contacts here are few, and I may have pulled my last favor by showing up here. I also don’t want to bring trouble to his door.

  “I’ll get her calmed down and we’ll go,” I finally say.

  We both turn when sounds of her agonizing sobs carry down the hallway.

  Makanga’s shoulders slump. “Listen, you can stay tonight…”

  I don’t let him finish. I’m moving toward her, ready to fix this however I can.

  It takes two more hours for me get Isabel dry and dressed, hold her until she stops crying and shaking, and clean all the evidence of the horrific act she witnessed off my car. We don’t speak on the drive to the hotel. I park in a nearby garage since a valet’s likely to be concerned about my missing driver’s-side window and the bullet punctures in the side door.

  We cross the street to the hotel, walk through the automatic doors, and enter the St. Regis’s luxurious lobby. Isabel looks like hell, and I’m not sure I look much better, but thankfully my money’s as green as everyone else’s.

  I walk us to an empty sitting area. “Wait here, all right?”

  She clutches my hand in a death grip.

  “I’m going to be right over there checking us in. I don’t want anyone to think something’s wrong, okay? Can you wait for me?”

  She swallows hard, slowly releases her grip, and drops on the pale-blue velvet couch. Her red-rimmed eyes remain locked on me.

  I give her an extra few seconds before I leave, to make sure she isn’t going to freak out. I wouldn’t blame her if she did, but this hotel has to be our sanctuary for the next couple of days at least. I don’t want to raise suspicions right out of the gate.

  At the front desk, the concierge upgrades us to an executive suite that will give us some room to move around. With Isabel’s fragile emotional state, I don’t want her to get stir-crazy and bolt. She doesn’t know it yet, but I’ll have to leave her at some point. I don’t know how I’m going to pull that off yet. I manage a smile when I look her way as the man hands me the k
ey cards and rambles on in his best customer-service tenor about the amenities I don’t especially care about.

  I hand him a hundred-dollar bill when he finishes.

  “What’s this for, sir?”

  “I need a bottle of Leblon and a bowl of limes delivered to the room as soon as you can.”

  He lifts his eyebrows. “I will do my best, sir.”

  “Do better than your best,” I say before turning back for Isabel.

  After a short elevator ride to our floor, I get her settled in the room. She says she can’t sleep yet, so I run her a hot bath using the hotel shampoo to make bubbles. The bathroom is muggy and smells like lavender when there’s a knock at the door. Room service brings in a bucket of ice, an unopened bottle of my favorite cachaça, and an ample serving of sliced limes as requested. I tip the man and turn to Isabel sitting on the edge of the bed.

  She’s little more than catatonic, her eyes glossy and far away. She’s propped up with her hands as if she can barely support the weight of her own body. I coax her into the bathroom and undress her again. This time she’s not shaking. We’re not in a hurry, so I go slow, whispering my lips over her skin every once in a while. Her forehead, her palms, the place above her knees, silently kissing the wounds she’s sustained on the inside.

  Even in this traumatic state, she’s still beautiful. Soft and warm. Delicate and full in all the right places. I resist the urge to drag her into my lap and kiss her until she’s breathless and thoroughly distracted from all this misery. God knows I could use a diversion too, but she’s undeniably fragile. The rum will have to do.

  She submerges in the tub and closes her eyes with a sigh. I leave and return with two tumblers of rum on ice, three juiced limes floating in each.

  “Here.” I offer one to her.

  She clutches the cool glass with both hands and takes a swallow, exhaling softly. I arrange myself on the floor, my back to the wall so I face her.

  “Thank you,” she says.

  She drapes one wet arm on the lip of the tub. I take it and slide my fingertips from her palm up her forearm. The simple touch holds so much. Forgiveness, solidarity, regret…

  “You don’t ever have to thank me,” I say. “For anything ever again, actually.”

  “This isn’t your fault.” Fresh tears gleam in her eyes. “I insisted we stay there.”

  “Isabel, no. Don’t do this to yourself.”

  In no way was today’s bloodshed her fault. I sent her to DC to keep her safe. I promised to protect her, which I barely managed to do today. I’m damn lucky she’s alive.

  I clutch her hand tightly and slug down a mouthful of rum, eager to take the edge off that unsettling thought and this whole day.

  I learned to let go of my guilt a long time ago. For the people I was hired to kill and for anyone else who got in the way. But the vision of Isabel meeting the same fate as Brienne has me faintly nauseated. I can’t lose her. I refuse to accept the possibility.

  “I miss Rio,” she whispers, sidelining my thoughts. With one finger, she dunks her limes under the ice in a hypnotic rhythm.

  “Me too.”

  I’ve never missed a place. Never found myself in a new city that made me want to uproot and start over. But now I miss the island-dotted view of the ocean from my abandoned apartment in Ipanema. I miss the heat, even the chaos in the streets.

  “We can’t stay in DC much longer.”

  She nods, sad understanding in her eyes.

  “Where do you want to go?”

  This hunt for a phantom enemy isn’t leading us in any particular direction. If we need to disappear, at least we have an open road in front of us. Whether we like it or not, we’re in this together for the foreseeable future.

  “Someplace warm, I think.” She finishes her drink and looks up at the ceiling. She seems more relaxed now.

  “That sounds good to me.”

  Our fingers lace and stroke lazily against one another. When her eyes start closing for longer stretches, I pull the plug to the drain and get her dry and into bed. Tucking her close to me, I hope for dreams to quell the nightmare we survived today.

  CHAPTER NINE

  Isabel

  Harsh sunshine pours in through the window. The golden rays glint off the handgun set on the small table in the corner of the room. Memories rain down, funneling into my sharpening consciousness. Brienne. The explosion of blood. Makanga’s wary face as we left the brief haven of his place. I press the heels of my hands against my eyes, refusing to let the agony take hold of me. I’m not sure my heart can survive another day of it.

  Now that the shock has finally worn off, staying steeped in my anguish isn’t possible. Mourning Brienne’s death will have to fit into the empty places between seeking out the truth and running for our lives. I can’t wallow like this for days. Friends won’t bring casseroles to the house. No one will give me time and space to process this new emptiness.

  This is my life now…

  I get up and go to the chair beside the table and stare at the weapon. I study its dark metal tones and mold my hand around its cool, textured grip. Its heft alone is intimidating, never mind its purpose.

  I think back to when Tristan pushed a gun into my hand with his blessing to use it against Mateus if I needed to. Everything was happening so fast, but even in the milliseconds between dodging Jay’s henchmen and speeding toward town, I recognized that I couldn’t do what Tristan expected me to. I was more likely to let myself be killed than put myself to the test of taking someone else’s life.

  I bring the gun into my lap, supporting its weight with my other hand. I trace its lines and mechanisms, delicately familiarizing myself with it as if it were a wild creature that could turn violent on me at any moment. Inherently, I know I have to push my fear of it away if I’m to ever wield its power to my own benefit.

  But to what end… To protect? To kill?

  The pad of my index finger rests on the curved trigger. A smooth, almost welcoming resting place. Pull and release. Done.

  Emotion clogs my throat. I flinch when the bathroom door opens. Tristan stands frozen before me.

  His dark hair is slicked back. His lips are parted, eyes fixed on the gun in my lap.

  “You okay?”

  I move my finger away from the trigger, not trusting my nerves. He walks over to me, his bare feet soundless on the hotel carpet. The towel wrapped around his lower half splits over his thigh as he crouches in front of me.

  “What are you doing with that?”

  I shake my head and swallow hard. I have no business with this gun, but I feel so powerless over my life, a part of me wonders if making this weapon an extension of myself could change that.

  Tristan eases the gun out of my hands and places it back on the table.

  “Is that what you use? You know, when you kill someone?”

  His brows draw together slightly. “It’s quick,” he says, his voice low. “I’m not into prolonged torture.”

  I nod as if I get it, but I don’t.

  “The names in your book… Are they all dead?”

  He’s silent a moment. “Yeah.”

  “I want to know who killed Brienne.” My voice breaks over her name. “Then I want to find that person so I can see how it feels to balance the injustice of an innocent life being taken.”

  “Are you in the revenge business now?”

  A hot tear travels down my cheek. “Why shouldn’t I be?”

  “Because it’s not who you are.”

  I straighten my shoulders. “It’s who you are. Or have you grown a conscience since you decided not to kill me?”

  He sighs and takes my hands in his, massaging them. “Sometimes people get caught in the crossfire, Isabel. I know that better than anyone. We need to focus on who hired me to kill you.” He hesitates, looking down a moment before meeting my eyes again. “I need to talk to Jay. I looked her up. It’s definitely her.”

  More tears fall. Hateful, angry tears. I cover the tops of his
hands with mine and squeeze. “She’s a monster for what she did to you.”

  “But she’s a monster I know.”

  “She wants us both dead. Why would you go to her?”

  The corner of his mouth lifts into a wry grin. “You walked right into the dragon’s lair, Isabel. Why can’t I?”

  “I’m so scared,” I speak through my tears. “I can’t lose you.”

  Something shadows his eyes. His smile fades. His lips part slightly. I want to touch them, trace their etched fullness with mine, drown in his kisses that feel like so much more than the melding of mouths.

  “You won’t lose me, Isabel. We’re in this together now. Just you and me.”

  Just you and me.

  His gritty words are a touch of salve on what feels like never-ending pain. I close my eyes, letting the tears cool on my cheeks. I tunnel my fingers into his damp hair as he feathers warm kisses across my bare legs and our intertwined hands.

  When the brush of lips gives way to his teeth and tongue, I let my head fall back with a sigh. The sensations spider out, creating a heat that’s almost painful in its intensity.

  “Make me believe it, Tristan.” I whisper the plea. “Make me feel it.”

  He nips at my inner thigh. I gasp and look down to where he’s soothing the same place with his flattened tongue. Our gazes lock. Suddenly the desire we’ve been feeding and tempting and sidestepping all this time feels different. Like we’re not fighting what could be but denying what simply is.

  I’m done with denying. Done with fear. My heart knocks against my ribs, hard enough that I feel the pulse of it everywhere. He rises and brings me up with him. As we move together, I slant my lips over his, moaning into the contact. His answering kiss isn’t patient or careful, as if something’s unleashed in him the same way it has in me.

  I’m overwhelmed with a sudden frenzy to take this further. To find a place safe from the passing of time and the danger that seems to close in on us every day. To be consumed by this unstoppable desire.