“I don’t want us to be on bad terms, but I also can’t have you hurting people, because then that’s on my head too.”
“How?” he asked, turning back to me.
“I’m responsible for what you do.”
“Why? Because you won’t trade your life to stop me?”
“You won’t kill me.”
“If it’s me or you, you know I would. I only do not because you allow the charade of power.”
“The whole ‘you holding a gun on me that I know you won’t fire’ thing.”
“Unless, of course, you come at me with some kind of murderous intent.”
“I have confinement intent,” I admitted and couldn’t help chuckling.
“Yes,” he agreed, unable to keep from smiling in return. “But you know the rules, and we both play by them.”
We did, it was true. I didn’t push; he offered me no real peril.
“But see, I can’t have you out there killing people again.”
He thought about that before saying, “I have no intention of killing anyone at the moment. I think it was a phase that ran its course, but I’ll make you a deal.”
“G’head.”
“If I get any new homicidal urges, I’ll call first and tell you where I am, and you can hop on a plane and try to stop me.”
“From halfway around the world?”
“This is your issue, not mine; don’t make it an annoyance simply because you don’t have a valid passport.”
“I’m a federal marshal. Of course I have a passport.”
“Well, then,” he contended like it was a done deal. “I’ll alert you, and you can come try to stop me. It will be just like old times.”
“I’m going to put out a red notice on you, you know.”
“Do what you feel you must.”
“You don’t sweat Interpol, huh?”
“Not ever, no.”
“All right, so I have your word? No one dies unless you call me?”
“Absolutely.”
“Okay.”
He held out his hand. “Let’s shake on it.”
I rolled forward to my knees and stretched for his hand, not about to crawl over to him.
His hand was warm and dry, and he wrapped his long, elegant fingers around my hand as he stared into my eyes. Unlike Kelson, Hartley’s eyes were clear, intent, and showed his happiness at having made a pact with me.
I squeezed tight and would have let go, but he held on.
“Whyever did you squeeze my hand?” he asked, lashes fluttering as he smiled, bemused.
“I have no idea,” I sighed, shaking my head.
“You know, I suspect this will be the last time we’ll talk, maybe ever.”
“I would agree,” I said softly.
The van stopped then, and he rose to slide open the door.
I moved quickly, hopping out, and when I was standing on the side of the road, I looked up at him.
He breathed in deeply. “Leaving Chicago is so odd. I never thought I would.”
I nodded.
“I’m glad I was able to see you.”
“So am I,” I whispered, and I realized a part of me was happy because this, right here, was finally closure.
“That’s it?” Kelson gasped, scrambling out of the van, charging up on me, his Glock 20 leveled at the center of my chest. “You’re just going to let him go?”
“Of course,” Hartley replied smoothly but snidely, the disgust on his tongue and all over his face as he stared down Kelson. “I’m not a barbarian.”
“But he’s an idiot, and he thinks he—”
“He doesn’t think anything…. He knows,” Hartley corrected, turning to smile at me. “He’s my oldest friend.”
“Friend.” Kelson heaved out the breath, and I saw in that instant, with those last four words, that Hartley had broken him.
Completely, utterly, annihilated him.
Kelson had been so clever. He’d planned, done everything to impress the man he so desperately wanted to be. The problem was, though, I’d gotten there first.
It was simply a matter of timing.
I was the one who saved him.
I was the one who visited him when he was locked up in Elgin.
I was the one who sat and listened for hours on end to his thoughts, to the why of what he’d done and became his witness—the voice in his head, he’d told me once—and eventually, after he saved my werewolf, a man I didn’t break out in cold sweats over anymore.
We weren’t friends, it wasn’t that, but we were… something. I’d have to figure out what at some point.
But Kelson didn’t have the benefit of knowing our history and was instead hampered by his own jealousy and hatred and bitterness. What he thought would never matter more than what I did, and it was killing him. His face said everything. Where I couldn’t read him at all the day before, now I saw his intent clear as day as he squinted at me and pulled the trigger.
I didn’t have time to yell. I didn’t think about Ian and how much he’d miss me. I didn’t see Aruna or Catherine, Janet or Min. I didn’t regret all the kids I wouldn’t be around to help, or even think if Redeker would pull his head out of his ass and tell Callahan that, fuck yeah, he wanted him too.