Salvation (The Protectors 2)

I couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, couldn’t do anything. I felt Hawke come up behind me but I couldn’t take my eyes off the man in front of me who even now was begging me for mercy with his eyes. I had none. Not a speck. Just like he’d had none for me as I’d pleaded with him for Trace’s life.

“How?” I managed to ask Hawke.

“Overheard him telling some of his buddies that he and his guys had fucked up a couple of faggots at Bagram two months ago. His words, not mine,” Hawke added and I assumed he meant the slur. “A friend of mine was an MP at that base. He told me what they did to you and Trace and the cover-up that happened afterwards. When I found out you were one of the victims, I thought you might like to do the honors yourself,” he said. “Or at least even the score a bit if you want to keep your hands clean.”

Hawke held out the gun. “Your choice,” he said. “You want him to walk, untie him and we’re done here.”

The man on the plastic began sobbing at Hawke’s words, but the pity the doctor in me should have felt didn’t exist. The hate and rage weren’t there either. All I felt was an overwhelming warmth settle in my chest as I stared at the man. Maybe if the man and his friends had waited until Trace was dead before coming after me, I would have felt something different. Maybe I would have been able to call on some last shard of decency to spare his life.

But they hadn’t. Just as I’d had to watch the man shove a metal pipe inside of Trace over and over while his friends held Trace down, he’d had to watch the same thing happen to me even as his body began to fail him. And I’d known that had been the hardest part for Trace – that was when he’d truly suffered. Because while I’d been the healer, he’d been the protector. And they’d stolen even that from him.

I wasn’t interested in making the man suffer and I wasn’t interested in prolonging the moment. And I didn’t need my hands to be clean – they’d hadn’t been clean since the first time I’d dreamed of this moment. I took the gun from Hawke and without hesitation or doubt, I strode up to the man, aimed it at his head and pulled the trigger. No final words, no wishing him to hell – I’d given him a much better death than he’d given Trace.

That was enough.

The second I closed the door leading to the patio behind me, I yanked out my phone and dialed even as I began walking through the house. I didn’t bother to check the driveway to make sure that fucker Barry was gone because the fact that the guy had pissed himself as he was running to his car was reassurance enough that he wouldn’t be coming near Seth anytime soon.

“Hey, I was just about to call you,” Mav said when he picked up. “This Fields guy is a piece of work.”

I managed to keep my cool as I said, “How so?” I’d reached the door I was looking for just before the kitchen and tore it open. I flipped on the light and started down the stairs into the dimly lit room as Mav spoke.

“I’ve found restraining orders in three different states. All from former patients who claimed their one-time psychologist, a one Dr. Barry Fields, was stalking them.”

“Any violence?” I asked. For once, I was hoping the answer would be yes because it would be the excuse I needed to end the bastard.

“No. Lots of phone calls, harassing them at their place of business, that sort of thing…it seemed to have stopped each time the RO was issued and then he’d start on the next guy.”

“Ruin him,” I ordered as I reached the bottom of the stairs.

“What?” Mav asked in surprise.

“Take it all. His license, his money – all of it. Make sure he can’t pick up in another state either.”

I was glad when Mav didn’t question me but he did say, “It will take some time.”

“Make it your number one priority.”

I knew it wasn’t fair to dump the shit on Mav since he was just standing in until I found a new tech guy to replace Benny, but seeing Barry holding Seth down on that desk while he’d violated him had stolen away what little reason I had left.

“You got it,” Mav responded quietly and then he hung up.

It didn’t take me long to find what I was looking for in the chilly wine cellar and I sent a little prayer of thanks to Seth’s father for keeping what was probably some very expensive whiskey in addition to the countless bottles of wine in the wine cellar. I also sent Trace a thank you for having the foresight to make me aware of the wine cellar’s existence, by bringing me down here on more than one occasion when we’d needed some privacy for a hot and heavy make out session while we’d been visiting his family.