And her silence, and captive interest, gives me permission to do that.
It’s nearly dawn when I finish.
Time to face the day.
We order room service. Small talk as we eat breakfast. Then she excuses herself to get dressed.
McKay and I lock eyes from across the dining table. “What are you doing?” he asks.
I shrug with my hands and say, “Starting over.”
When Perrine comes back out, fully dressed and ready to move on, she gives me her number. Says, “Call me,” as she kisses us on the cheek.
Then she leaves without another word.
“We’re never gonna see her again,” I say, turning back to McKay.
I want to tell him more. I want to say all the things rolling around in my head.
And then I think—why don’t I?
What’s stopping me?
“McKay.” I turn to him in the foyer. But I don’t know what to say next, so there’s a silence.
He places a hand on my face and looks me in the eyes. “What’s going on in there?”
“Do you ever—” But then I stop. If I start this way, it puts him in the middle. So I try again. “I wish I had done it different. I wish it was just you and me. I wish there never was an Indie or a Donovan. We should’ve run away when we had the chance. We should’ve gone places together. Done things together. Learned things together. We should’ve resisted.”
He sighs, drops his hand from my face, turns, and walks towards the massive windows overlookin’ the Mississippi River.
I follow him. I’m breathing hard for some reason. My heart pumping. Like telling the truth—no. Admitting to the truth—is something that requires effort. “What are you thinking?”
“I’m thinking…” Core McKay lets out a long breath, then looks me in the eyes. “How would we even start to untangle this mess? How could we walk away from Indie?”
“You’re the one who said she’s not my responsibility, remember?”
“Yeah. For a night. So we can have some fun. But just lettin’ her loose on the world, Adam?” He scoffs. “How?”
I don’t have an answer for him, so I say nothing.
“And what about Donovan? We’re just gonna let him die?”
Now this, I have an opinion on. One I can even say out loud. McKay isn’t attached to Donovan the way he is Indie. In fact, there’s always been a little bit of competition between the two of them. Donovan wasn’t Indie’s first boyfriend, obviously. But they fucked around and we all knew about it. He wasn’t that much older than her and by the time it started happening, Indie wasn’t taking direction from anyone.
“Let’s just be upfront about Donovan, OK? Do you really think he’s gonna make it?”
McKay sighs. “I don’t know. I guess it’s possible. Maybe Merc is the answer to all our problems.”
“And then what? We’re gonna let Donovan stay in our house knowing that his evil double personality is lurking just below the surface? Never mind the fact that we’ll never sleep with both eyes closed ever again, but what about Maggie? He could get to her the way he got to Indie.”
“We don’t know he got to Indie.”
“McKay.”
“What? We don’t.”
“He did. He’s the whole fuckin’ reason she’s crazy. He’s the whole reason she went missing. She doesn’t even know where she was, McKay.”
“So what are you saying? We just… give up on them?”
I let out a long, tired breath. “I have regrets. I wish I had never bought her. I wish I had never brought her home. We gave up everything for that girl, McKay.” I hold up a finger. “One life, OK? We get one. Life. Even if there is some… fuckin’… heaven, or whatever. We don’t know if we get another round in a body.”
McKay laughs.
“What?”
“You and your church. You know it’s just a way to control the masses, right? I know your father told you that, because he told me that.”
“It’s not about control. And anyway, this isn’t about religion. It’s about living.”
McKay narrows his eyes at me. “You don’t think we’ve lived enough? Adam, we’ve lived a hundred fuckin’ lifetimes in the last fourteen years alone.”
“Not our lives. We lived Indie’s life.”
Now he’s catching on because his already narrowed eyes take on a menacing quality. “What are you saying?”
“I already said it. I regret buying her and bringing her home.”
“Too late. It’s done.”
“But it’s not too late to start over.”
“You want to kill her?”
“Not exactly.” I kinda expect McKay to punch me here, but he doesn’t. He just stays silent, waiting for me to explain exactly what I mean. “We just stop picking her up when she falls, McKay. That’s all I’m saying. We stop enabling her.”
This was the best I could come up with. I kinda do want to kill Indie, but I know, in my heart, I won’t be able to go through with it. And if I’m gonna take that girl out, it has to be done by one of us. I will not put a hit on her head. She’s certainly no angel, but she deserves better than that. And McKay sure as fuck isn’t gonna do it. So. This is the best I can do. Walk away from her. Let her make her own decisions. Don’t interfere.