Chapter 60 - The Husband I Buried

Now

Luis took my hand in his, his fingers closing around mine, anchoring me in place. I didn’t know whether I wanted to let go or hold on tight.

‘Silas used to say that blood carries purpose,’ he said. ‘That what’s inside of us can’t be escaped, only transformed.’

‘Fuck that,’ Thomas said, folding his arms across his chest.

I barely noticed, because Luis was looking right at me, and I couldn’t read his expression. He was looking at me like he needed me to not just listen, but to really hear what he was saying.

‘Have you ever wondered why you enjoy your job so much? You like winning. You enjoy the fight. It’s in your blood.’

A flicker of anger cut through the unease.

‘Don’t,’ I said.

He didn’t stop.

‘You don’t do it for justice,’ he continued. ‘You do it because you love the thrill of winning.’

I looked away. I’d wondered that many times, why I chose to become a defense attorney and not a prosecutor. Finally, I’d settled on an answer I was comfortable with. Because I don’t believe innocent people should lose their freedom, even if that means a guilty person goes free.

But I wasn’t so sure anymore. About any of it. Did I really believe what I’d told myself, or was Luis right? Maybe my purpose was to win and that was all I really cared about, just like he said. My parents had been so critical of me while I was growing up that I’d felt like I didn’t have room to breathe. My almost perfect grades were not perfect. My wavy hair was unruly, a far cry from the smoothed-out life they wanted to curate.

So, I did what teenagers do, and rebelled. Everything I’d pushed down to make them happy, I let go of. Compliance turned into contempt. I stayed out late. I let my grades slip. I stopped trying to tame my hair.

And then my mom got sick, and somehow that was my fault, too, because of the added stress I’d caused her by allowing myself to live a little. My life was her death, and my father never forgave me. He never said that out loud, but he didn’t have to. He stopped asking how I was doing and withdrew into his own world.

‘We give people a second chance here, too, just on a different scale,’ said Luis, clearly proud of the Institute and their work. ‘We give them purpose.’

I laughed, ironically. Not because he was right, but because he thought he understood me.

‘This isn’t purpose,’ I said. ‘It’s control.’

Something shifted behind his eyes. I’d hit something deeper. He stopped, and I could see the doubts he’d had too.

Good. Let him see it.

‘You don’t think I know what you’re doing?’ I said, stepping closer. ‘You take the worst parts of people, things they’re ashamed of, and you dress them up and use them as bait.’

Silence fell. Even Thomas stopped moving.

‘You don’t give people purpose,’ I said. ‘You give them permission.’

That landed. Not with Luis. But I saw Rebecca’s expression change. They weren’t saving her, they were manipulating her into doing their ‘reconnaissance’ work. Risking her life by sending her into dangerous situations, instead of doing it themselves.

Luis’s grip tightened slightly around my hand. Not enough to hurt, but enough to remind me he was still there.

Still in control.

‘Do you know why she didn’t run when Brad died?’ he asked.

I let out a short, humorless laugh. ‘Because she’s exactly where she wants to be.’

His eyes held mine. ‘Because she knew we wouldn’t leave her,’ he said. ‘That she’d be taken care of.’

‘That’s not loyalty,’ I said. ‘That’s conditioning.’

‘Is it?’ he asked.

They were all watching us now. Waiting for him to make the call.

‘I want to tell you something else,’ he said, stepping closer, the moment intimate despite the others in the room.

I didn’t flinch.

‘You knew,’ I said. ‘The car. The accident—’

He didn’t look away. He stood closer, lacing our fingers together. ‘I should have trusted you with my secrets,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want to implicate you. I thought I was doing the right thing, keeping you safe.’

My pulse spiked. ‘You let me think I killed you.’

‘I protected you,’ he whispered.

I held his gaze. ‘You didn’t protect me,’ I said. ‘You screwed up, then when things got tough, you ran. I needed some time to figure out the extent of it, to see how much of a mess you’d gotten us into. So I pulled something loose in your car. I thought you’d be going to work and straight home, not driving on the freeway.’

‘You reacted,’ he said, like he didn’t believe I ever really wanted to hurt him.

‘By the time I changed my mind, it was already too late,’ I said. ‘I needed to know how much you’d figured out about what I did because it seemed like the only reasonable explanation for making me think you were dead.’

But then I dug deeper into what his business was mixed up in. It went beyond embezzlement and fraud. Sometimes, along with large sums of cash, people went missing too.

‘You weren’t responsible for the crash, not entirely,’ said Luis. ‘I handed Silas the keys.’

Rebecca’s eyes lit up with sudden interest. Like she’d just been given confirmation. ‘You knew he might crash,’ she said, almost to herself. ‘You knew Mackenzie had done something to the car, but you let him drive it.’

I didn’t give Luis a chance to respond.

‘But why disappear?’ I asked. ‘Why not come back? You could’ve faced it.’

Luis smiled. ‘My wife tried to kill me, but I didn’t know why at the time,’ he said. ‘And if there’s one thing I’ve learned about you, Mackenzie Morgan . . .’ his thumb brushed lightly against my hand ‘. . . it’s that once you decide to do something . . .’ he leaned close enough to kiss me, our lips almost touching ‘. . . you finish it.’

A flicker of fear cut through me, sharp and unwelcome.

Because he wasn’t wrong.

‘That’s why you stayed away?’ I said. ‘You thought I’d try again?’

He held my gaze. ‘I knew you would,’ he said, looking at me like he used to, like he couldn’t wait to get me alone. ‘But it doesn’t have to end that way.’

How did he think this was going to end?

‘You could stay,’ he said.

‘I don’t think so,’ said Rebecca, pushing forward.