Slow Agony (Assassins, #2)(79)

*

“So, spill,” said Sloane from the driver’s seat of the car. “Something’s not right.”

I turned away from the window. I’d been watching the headlights on the interstate, my mind blank. I wasn’t sure what she was talking about. “Everything’s fine.”

She snorted. “Yeah, right. Look, if Griffin didn’t come around, maybe you should think of moving on. There are other men out there, you know.”

We’d split up into two cars, ostensibly because it would be harder to track both of them. But I had a feeling it was mostly because no one liked sitting in the back seat. I’d volunteered to keep Sloane company since we hadn’t seen each other in weeks. I wasn’t avoiding Griffin. Not really. “Actually, we’re engaged,” I said. “I think.”

“Engaged?” she said. She glanced at me, grinning. “That’s good, right?”

I smiled. “Yeah, it’s awesome.”

She faced forward again. “You’re not excited. And why don’t you have a ring?”

“Oh.” I dug it out of my pocket. “I took it off. It was getting... messy, and then I just didn’t put it back on.” Which didn’t mean anything. I slid the ring back on my finger. I’d scrubbed it as best I could. The red stone winked at me. Would I be able to tell if it still had Marcel’s blood on it?

“I can’t really see it, but it looks pretty,” said Sloane. “So, you guys are back together. Really together?”

“Really together,” I said. Hell, the couple who tortures together, stays together, right? I grimaced.

“So, then, what’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I said.

“Okay, then, don’t talk about it,” she said. “You can let it fester and boil inside you and overtake everything. That’s cool with me.”

I sighed. I toyed with my engagement ring. “You ever torture anyone, Sloane?”

She shot me a sharp glance. “Why would you ask that?”

I looked back out the window. “Just... have you?”

She hesitated. “Silas usually made me stay back. I’m a good sniper, and he liked to have me as backup. You know, out of sight. I didn’t do a lot of up close and personal stuff. But I watched Silas do it.” Her voice had changed. It sounded farther away and higher pitched. She sounded younger and more vulnerable.

“Did Silas do it a lot?”

“Only when he had to,” she said. “Op Wraith forced us to do stuff like that, you know. We didn’t have a choice.”

“Right,” I said.

“Look, I do my best not to think about things like that. Why are you bringing it up, anyway?”

I twisted my hands together in my lap. “Don’t worry about it.”

“Did Griffin tell you something about me that made you not feel comfortable around me or something? Because what I had to do wasn’t torture. Not really. I made sure it was over quickly, and I don’t think it’s fair—”

“No, Sloane.” I reached over and touched her arm soothingly. “I don’t know anything about what you’re talking about. This isn’t about you.”

“Oh,” she said, her voice tiny.

“Griffin and I... We were pretty thorough with Marcel,” I said.

“Oh,” she said. She took a deep breath. “That’s what’s bothering you.”

“Yeah,” I said.

“Well, that would make sense, then,” she said.

“I keep thinking about it,” I said. “Not all the time, but just out of nowhere. I remember things he said or the way he was screaming or—”

“That’ll happen.”

“And... what? I’m just supposed to deal with it?”

“Well, what else can you do?” she said. “You can’t bring him back to life.”

“I don’t want him to be alive,” I said. “He was pretty much the worst person I can imagine. The things he did to Griffin. To me. To people we cared about... well, he deserves to be dead. I’m glad he’s dead.”

“Yeah,” she said, “but it would have been easier if you hadn’t been the person who killed him, right?”

“I... I liked it,” I said. “It was a game. When we were doing it...”

“It’s better if you don’t think about it too much,” she said.

“But you haven’t done anything like this. You killed people for Op Wraith. You were following orders. You didn’t choose it. You didn’t enjoy it. Do you even understand how I feel?”

She shrugged. “I don’t know. Maybe not.”

We were quiet.

When she spoke again, her voice was so small and soft, she sounded like a little girl. “Silas and I have done... stuff together. We were recruited into Op Wraith because of what we did. We didn’t have very nice parents. They were going to do... things.” She tightened her grip on the steering wheel. “We had to...”

“Sloane,” I said, suddenly realizing she was confessing something to me. “You don’t have to tell me this.”

A tear streaked out of one of her eyes. “Trust me, Leigh, it’s better to bury it.” Her expression grew fierce. “He deserved it. Someone had to do it. That someone was you.”