“I’m not going to stand in your way. We need to leave people behind to get handcuffs on him without causing a scene in town. He’ll come home and get arrested in private. Simpler. I don’t like only leaving two of us, but we also can’t risk the sheriff bolting when he realizes his kids have been taken.” Vincent continued explaining his reasoning. This was the on the job training she needed. The understanding to protocol. “Four adults need to accompany the kids. We like a one-to-one with a spare to make sure every child has a guardian of some sort.”
“We’re stretched thin.” Sawyer frowned at him again. “I can stay alone. Elijah would be good for the kids to have.”
“You can’t make arrests,” Vincent reminded her. “You could keep Zander or myself here. Like you, Quinn can’t make arrests. He’ll need to come with us and the children.”
They stood in silence after that. Vincent was glad to have her on the team now. There was very little that the IMPO didn’t deal with, but for teams like his, this domestic sort of situation was just in training. This was something he’d never actually run into, and having her there, with some experience in the matter, was the best luck he’d ever had. He was confident his team could handle it on their own, but it was nice having someone he considered an expert there. She could tell them if they messed up.
“Here they all come,” Sawyer said, pointing towards Elijah leading out the two girls. Cara and Samantha held hands, as Elijah talked to them about something. Probably explaining to them where they are going and who they were going to meet.
“I’ll see you on the other side, Sawyer.” Vincent told her, watching her face soften at the sight of the children. In that rare moment, she looked stunning. Her face was always feminine, but it was normally hard. He knew when he saw her again, it would be a cold mask, like it was when she killed or went after abusers in New York. He hoped Elijah would keep her smiling, at least a little.
“I’m going to stay over here for a moment,” Sawyer replied as he began to walk towards the rest of his team. He knew why, so he didn’t ask. She wanted to mentally prepare herself.
“I’ll give your bag to Elijah.” He sighed, nodding.
When he made it to the team, Zander and Bucky were arguing about something.
“Look here, little man,” Zander moaned in frustration. “I need you to jump in and sit down so we can get moving.”
“But my toys!” Bucky whined, pouting and stomping his small foot. Vincent winced. Children. Zander and Bucky kept at it as Vincent just watched.
“Cara,” Vincent called out, hoping the oldest would talk some sense into the tiny child. She met his eyes and jogged over after helping Elijah put Samantha in the other Explorer.
“Bucky Stevenson.” Cara said his name like a command, and Vincent raised an eyebrow. “This is it. This is what Mommy wanted. You need to get in, and we need to leave before Daddy comes home. Okay?”
What their mother wanted. Vincent would remember that when they stopped for something to eat. Now wasn’t the time to interrogate the girl over what that might have meant.
“B-b-b-but my toys!” Bucky cried out. “I don’t want to leave all of them!”
“I’m sure someone will come back and get your toys,” Cara whispered to her younger brother, sliding a look to Vincent. Vincent nodded, keeping quiet. “See? Someone will come get them.”
“But-”
“No more buts, Bucky. Get in and put your seat belt on,” Cara ordered. Zander helped her put the child in and began to heal the boy gently, the bruise fading slowly as Zander worked carefully. Vincent redirected himself after that toward Elijah. He was holding a doll and smiling at Samantha.
“Elijah, can I talk to you?” Vincent asked, distracting Elijah from the game he was playing. Elijah nodded and handed the doll to Samantha, who gave a shy smile. They walked a few feet away before Vincent said anything.
“You are staying with Sawyer,” Vincent said quickly. He watched Elijah’s eyes go wide. “She asked for you.”
“I understand,” Elijah replied softly, nodding slowly. “I’ll get her bag and mine.”
“Thank you. We need to get moving,” Vincent sighed. “Quickly.”
“I know. Also, Cara told me something,” Elijah added, pausing as he turned to leave. “Their oldest brother? Nineteen, came into his abilities four years ago. He hangs out a lot with Sheriff Stevenson and his friends. That’s why he’s not here. Anyway, Cara made it clear that Cory wouldn’t want to come anyway. She promised her mother that if someone offered her and the two younger ones a way out, they would take it. And we’re the police, so she knows we should keep her safe. I showed her my badge and everything.”
Vincent didn’t like the sound of that.
“Quinn, what the hell?” Zander yelled from his spot next to Bucky. “I’m trying to heal him!”
“Who did this?” Quinn snarled. Vincent looked over and so did Elijah. Quinn was pointing at the nearly gone, yellowish bruise still left on Bucky’s cheek.
“Fuck,” Elijah mumbled. “Quinn! Come here!”
Vincent waited as Quinn swung around to look at them, glaring. Vincent could see from his posture that their oddest member was riding his temper. That didn’t bode well, they needed the children to feel safe, and Quinn had a tendency to make everyone around him feel the opposite. Quinn stomped over to him and growled.
“Sawyer and I are staying to handle the sheriff,” Elijah growled low at him, pulling Quinn closer. “Leash the anger. You need to be gentle with these kids. They’ve probably been through hell.”
“Sawyer is going to stay?” Quinn asked, trying to confirm what Elijah had said. He turned those haunting blue eyes on Vincent. Vincent just nodded. “I’ll be right back.”
“Okay,” Elijah sighed, letting Quinn go. Quinn jogged off in Sawyer’s direction.
Vincent watched Shade and Scout jump into different Explorers. Shade nosed Bucky, who giggled and called Shade a ‘big doggie’. Only children could get away with that, Vincent knew. Scout put his head in Samantha’s lap. Vincent was pleased to see Quinn had put those two to work. A couple of fluffy, soft animals always worked with children.
“That’s not good,” Elijah muttered, glaring towards where Sawyer was. Vincent frowned and followed his gaze. What wasn’t?
Sawyer and Quinn were shaking hands.
No, that wasn’t good.
The last thing anyone needed were those two making some sort of pact about anything. Vincent had the distinct feeling it had something to do with the injured children and what Sawyer would do to their father.
20
Sawyer
She watched the Explorers drive off with the precious cargo, standing on the front porch of Stevenson’s small ranch house.
Rage curled around her heart. The promise for violence beat like a drum in her blood.
She was furious. And patient. She would wait. Then she would turn his home into the most dangerous place he would ever walk into. Like he had done to his own children.
“Sawyer, come inside,” Elijah called to her from the living room. She turned and walked through the front door. They left the door on the floor, broken off its hinges. A sign. Something he would want to investigate. He wouldn’t be able to resist coming inside to find out what had happened.
“Anything to drink in here?” she asked, watching Elijah go through his bag. He pulled out a couple sets of handcuffs, backups to the set he carried on his belt.
“Check the kitchen?” Elijah answered, frowning at her. “And here. You aren’t legally allowed to do this, but I trust you not to put them on me and run.” He tossed something at her, and she caught it without a thought. The cool metal was noticeable. She looked down to her hand to see her own set of handcuffs to carry.
“Thanks,” she mumbled, hanging them from her belt. She stepped into the kitchen and found a glass, filled it with water, and took a couple swallows.
They stood in silence for a moment until Elijah frowned at her again.
> “Why me? I would have been better with the children than someone like Vincent or Zander.”
“Because you also have a bone to pick with Stevenson,” Sawyer answered him, giving him a cruel smile. She wasn’t feeling very nice. She chose him, hoping he wouldn’t try to hold her back. Zander, for all his rage and temper, needed to stay with the children to heal them. She wouldn’t need a healer for this. Not unless she busted open a knuckle on Stevenson’s face.
“Ah.” Elijah sighed.
“Yup,” Sawyer huffed, still smiling as she took another drink. She gave him a small toast in silence. “I needed someone to stay, so I chose you. Let’s hope you hate this guy as much as I now do. Because he’ll be leaving to go to a hospital when I’m done. If he’s not in a body bag.”
“I understand,” Elijah said calmly.
“Can you?” she said and purred dangerously. Elijah had no idea what she was feeling, none.
“I have a bone to pick with the sheriff because he knows who I am,” Elijah told her mildly. “He knows why I can’t and won’t go home.”
“And why’s that, Cowboy?”
“Because I put four guys in critical condition by setting their houses on fire after they killed my boyfriend when I was seventeen. They had beaten him to death, so I nearly killed them.”
Sawyer coughed out the water she was in the middle of swallowing. She kept coughing as she nearly dropped the glass onto the counter. A couple thumps to her back meant Elijah must have realized he shocked the shit out of her.
“They weren’t Magi. No charges were pressed against me out here in the middle of nowhere. Local law enforcement wasn’t going to fuck with me,” Elijah continued, sounding serene. “So, yes, Sawyer. I do understand. Better than you think.”
“Who?” she choked out, hitting her own chest with a fist as she tried to clear the water.
“I told you my dad kicked me out for sleeping with a guy? Him. His name was Taylor. He was non-Magi, too, like his killers. The local law enforcement didn’t want to press charges, so I took it into my own hands.”
She looked up at him. She was beginning to realize she knew very little about the cowboy, the jolly giant with a constant hard-on.
“Do what you need to do, Sawyer.” Elijah sighed, looking down at her. “I’m not going to stop you. I do need to put handcuffs on him though, so don’t break his arms into angles I can’t manage.”
“Jesus, Elijah,” she mumbled a bit airily as her lungs stopped hurting. “Why haven’t you ever told me this?”
“I don’t like to talk about it,” Elijah said, shrugging. “There are deep prejudices out here. This kind of stuff… it happens. I grew up in it.”
“Yeah…” Sawyer said slowly, leaning against the kitchen counter. She figured they could be waiting for hours, so she watched Elijah pick up her glass and refill it. Then she decided to start questioning him. “How do you keep going on so happily? I mean, I can put one foot in front of the other but… I’m not always happy like you.”
“I wasn’t, when it happened,” Elijah informed her, not looking her way. “Then I met Vincent in training and realized that everyone has something wrong with them, something they would rather hide, bury, or forget holding them down. He was a Castello trying to get on the right side of the law. I was a big burly kid who was cast aside by my community, ridiculed, and had lost something important to me. We both went to the IMPO looking to change the world for the better from vastly different backgrounds. Maybe in this job, we could change the way things worked, so no one else had it happen to them.”
“And that made you happier?”
“No, but in time, I realized I couldn’t bring him back. I couldn’t come out here and raise the dead. And I found happiness elsewhere. The team. My friendships with them. My pride in the work I do, in the field or in my workshop.”
“Do you regret it?” She continued asking him questions, hoping to get deeper inside his head.
“Not for a damn minute,” Elijah growled. Sawyer saw the fire light in his eyes.
He really did understand, she realized.
“That’s one difference between me and you, Sawyer,” Elijah finally said. “I don’t regret it. Any of it.”
“Excuse me?” Sawyer snorted. “I don’t regret anything-”
“You regret every minute of everything you ever did as Shadow,” Elijah cut her off. “It’s in the slump of your shoulders, as if you’re weighed down by the guilt. It’s in the hard set of your jaw, as if you’re waiting for another blow to land.” She winced. He was right. “And you shouldn’t.”
“Yes, I should,” Sawyer snapped, not missing that last part. “I killed people, Elijah. Brutally.”
“And just like this, you did it for someone else,” Elijah whispered. “What’s so different between what’s happening here, or in New York, and what you did for Axel?”
Sawyer glared at him. Everything was different. She was helping a mad man ascend to become one of the wealthiest and dangerous criminal masterminds on the planet. Here and in New York, it was simple. She chased away the bad guy, not helped him.
“Axel wasn’t some victim-”
“Henry and Midnight were,” Elijah snapped back at her. Sawyer seethed. He did not just go there with her.
“Don’t even begin to think you kn-”
“You didn’t do it for Axel, so stop holding that title and beating yourself up for it. You know you didn’t do it for him.” Elijah pressed, stepping back into her space. “You weren’t Axel’s Shadow. You were Henry’s and Midnight’s. And while you never killed Axel himself, you killed others, just to protect him and your animal bond. That’s who you are, Sawyer, and you shouldn’t regret that. You shouldn’t feel guilty about it or ashamed of it. If anything, we should all be looking up to you like a goddamn hero, willing to go to the darkest of places to do good.”
Her chest hurt, and she rubbed the scar on her chest with her right hand. She closed her eyes for a moment. He was saying something she’d heard before. Charlie tried to say it to her, several times. But she hadn’t believed it. She was a monster and all she could do was hope to be good, try to be better. She would strive for that, as she had for the last four years.
“If Vincent and I are good enough for the IMPO, then you are, too,” Elijah hissed out, getting closer to her. “Sawyer, stop feeling guilty.”
“I am guilty,” Sawyer mumbled.
“The only thing you’re guilty of is having too big a heart,” Elijah growled softly. Sawyer realized he was suddenly much closer. She opened her eyes and found those hazel ones looking down into hers. She was backed up into the counter and Elijah’s hands stretched to the countertop on either side of her. “A heart that’s willing to kill for love. A heart willing to take the damage so others don’t need to.”
“Let’s not get into talking about my heart.” Sawyer growled. “It causes enough problems.”
“Doesn’t it?” Elijah chuckled. “You seem to give away pieces of it like candy on Halloween. Charlie, the kids in New York, the kids here, Zander, Jasper, and Vincent. I’m certain you’ve even thrown a piece at Quinn, doing what you did for him. But, this guilt that rides you… Sawyer, you don’t think you deserve love back, do you? You throw away your heart on a whim to others, but… you don’t want a piece of theirs back, do you?”
Sawyer let the question go unanswered as Elijah’s eyes searched her face. The answer was clear.
She didn’t.
Sawyer didn’t want others to love her. She didn’t deserve them. She wasn’t good enough for Jasper and, in turn, Zander. Those two would always come as pair, she knew it. She wasn’t even good enough to be a night of pleasure and memories, and ghosts for Vincent, considering she had tried to kill him afterwards. She didn’t deserve the friend that Elijah was, the one who always saw the good, who took people in no matter what was wrong with them or how the world judged them.
She didn’t want to break their hearts. She didn’t want to hurt them. She didn’t wan
t to fail them like she had Henry. She couldn’t take another failure like that. She couldn’t take the love of someone else and fail them again.
“You do deserve it,” Elijah whispered, and Sawyer watched him lean down further. Another inch, and their lips would touch. She should shove him away. She didn’t want to, though. “Why did you feel so adamant about helping Quinn?”
“Because I knew I could,” Sawyer answered with a half-truth.
“Because you want to earn it,” Elijah corrected her. “You want to do anything you can that’s good, so you can one day feel like you earned this or someone’s love.”
“Yes,” Sawyer snapped. Damn him. “You’re right, Elijah. Is that what you want to hear? I’ll go out of my way to do good things, so I can feel, even for a moment, that I deserve what I have. Any of it.” She pushed him away. He wanted to call her back, so she was going to give him what he wanted. The truth. “You all went against the fucking WMC to keep me out of prison, even just fucking alive. Why? I haven’t done anything for you all to earn that. You’ve put me in your debt, and before I’ve had a chance to try and earn it here, doing the job, half of you are trying to convince me to give relationships a chance.”
“Sawyer,” Elijah tried to keep talking, holding a hand up to quiet her, but she waved her own hand at him to shut him up.
“So, yeah. I learned Quinn was having a hard time with learning how to read, and I decided, right then and there, that I could do something truly good for him. For all of you. Something that has nothing to do with violence, and blood, or criminal activities. Something good I could give him.” Sawyer began to rant. “Because, maybe if I do that enough, I’ll go to sleep at night thinking I deserve this. This chance at a better future. Your friendship. Jasper and Zander’s love. Vincent’s…” She began to shake her head and closed her eyes, thinking about it.
Vincent’s love. When had he gotten on her list of men she knew she cared for? The moment she got possessive that night in bed? The moment he admitted to her that he knew what it meant to be used by Axel to kill for him?
A Heart of Shame (The Redemption Saga Book 2) Page 26