The bruise around her eye, the split skin at her lip, and the split at her eyebrow weren’t visible in the dull light of the lounge, but here, in the kitchen, it’s as clear as anything.
It dampens my anger faster than any Scotch, and a different anger begins to curl in my chest. It’s darker, heavier, and more dangerous than the rage I felt when thinking Evelyn was some kind of spy. Listening to her outburst didn’t make the truth any clearer and all the evidence points to her being some kind of plant or mole. The Russian connection seen leaving her apartment is the biggest evidence of this.
Suddenly, it doesn’t matter as much. At least not right now. The wounds are fresh and the bruise around her eye is still pink and purple. In a few hours, it will darken. Evelyn lifts one hand and attempts to push me away as she turns her head, but I don’t move and I prevent her from looking away.
“Tell me the truth,” I say firmly.
Evelyn rolls her eyes and jerks her chin out of my grip. “Oh, now you care about the truth. What does it matter what I say if you’ve already made up your mind about me?”
I catch her chin again, tilting her face back to me and studying the split on her eyebrow. It doesn’t look deep enough for stitches but it still needs some kind of treatment. “Sit down.”
“Don’t tell me what to do in my own home.”
“Sit. Down.”
Evelyn finally relents with a grumble and she drops into the rickety wooden chair by her small, circular table. I move past her to the sink and rummage through a few cabinets in search of a medical kit, but there’s nothing. I’ll have to do this old school. As I’m searching, Dale appears at the door and clears his throat to catch my attention. I look him in the eye and he shakes his head just once.
He found nothing.
Shit.
Hank appears next, moving around Dale, and his eyes widen at the sight of Evelyn’s beaten face then he looks at me. “You need anything?”
“Yeah. Go and get some food. She’s been drinking heavily, by the smell of the place. And bring the kit from the car.”
“I’m right here, y’know,” she mutters grumpily, picking at some of the white paint peeling off her table.
“And Dale, I want eyes on Harry.”
“On it.” Dale leaves without questions, but Hank lingers.
“Hank. Go.”
“Boss.” He still refuses to move. “Leaving you alone wasn’t part of the plan.”
“I have a new plan,” I say, setting the kettle to boil and finding some cotton balls in a top cabinet. “Go.”
Hank’s uncertain gaze moves to Evelyn, then he finally nods and disappears from the doorway. He’s back a few minutes later with the medical kit and after another wary glance at Evelyn, he leaves.
“Does he think I’m going to kill you the moment he leaves or something?” Evelyn mutters, her tone still irritated, but at least she’s not screaming at me right now.
“Probably,” I reply. “Are you?”
“If I have to tell you I’m not a spy one more time, then yeah, maybe.”
“It doesn’t look good for you, Evelyn.”
“Nothing else does. But God forbid we have an actual conversation. You’ve already got me at the gallows.”
“Fine.” Pouring the warmed water into a cup, I sit next to her at the table and fight back a wince as the chair creaks loudly under my bulk. “Let’s talk.”
Evelyn glares at me. “Maybe I don’t want to now because you’re a fucking asshole.”
“Fine. I’ll talk.” I pull the kit toward me and pop it open while soaking some of the cotton pad in the hot water. Then I catch her chin in one hand and tilt her head to the side. She doesn’t fight me, but she’s visibly irritated. “Russians are claiming credit for Brenden’s death. A man on the Russian payroll is seen leaving your apartment. A man you’ve had a lot of contact with these past six months. He was even a guest at the motel at one point.”
Evelyn shifts under my gaze and winces as I start to clean the split wound at her eyebrow. “How do you know all that?”
“One I have a name and a face, there’s nothing I can’t find out.”
She rolls her eyes but remains silent.
“Do you see how it looks?”
“Maybe,” Evelyn mutters. “But I don’t really care because you already decided I was awful the moment you kicked in my door.” Evelyn groans. “Do you even know how much that will cost to repair? My landlord will flip out.”
Dabbing gently at her eye, I clean away the dried blood around her eye, then down to her lip. We remain silent. Each stroke of warm cotton against her lower lip pulls the flesh slightly, parting her lips. It’s difficult not to think about how good she tasted when I kissed her or how I’d happily leave a wound like that on her lips with my teeth.
It’s different, though, knowing someone else did this to her.
“I’ll fix your door.”
“I don’t need your help,” she mutters darkly.
“You do. Because I’m not the only one who thinks you had a hand in killing Brenden. So you wanna talk yet or should I just continue down this path and kill you?” Releasing her chin, I turn to the medical kit and seek out antiseptic wipes.
“Does it even matter?” She sighs, pressing her palms flat together. “You already made up your mind despite everything.”
“Everything being the fact that we’ve only known each other a handful of days?”
Evelyn blinks owlishly at me, then nods. She closes her eyes as I wipe at her wounds with the antiseptic wipe, and when she hisses in pain, my gut tightens with unexpected guilt.
“If I wasn’t injured,” she asks quietly, “would you have just yelled at me until you killed me?”
“Maybe. I don’t know.”
“Then why did you stop?”
“Same reason you stopped yelling at me,” I say, discarding the antiseptic wipes. “I took a breath and my focus shifted. I don’t know what would have happened if I didn’t suddenly want to clean you up because I’m angry. Everything reads like you’re secretly the enemy, and if you can’t convince me otherwise, then I guess we’ll find out.”
Evelyn sighs deeply as if the exhaustion came from the depths of her soul. “I’m not a spy. I’m not Russian. I didn’t even know Harry was, okay? He’s just a loan shark and I owe him a load of money.”
“You owe him money?” Selecting some butterfly stitches, I use my fingers against her jaw to encourage her head to the side so I can close the small wound on her eyebrow.
“Yeah. I…” Evelyn groans. “Suppose it doesn’t matter now, does it? I was in debt. A lot of debt because I like credit cards. Stuff made me happy because I had nothing else. Anyway, my spending habits didn’t match my income and I was losing everything to so many companies, so I just found a loan shark, borrowed some money, and then paid them off.”
Evelyn is in debt. Is that really all this is? Everything points to something else—led by my anger, it seems. I struggle to wrap my head around it as I apply the stitches and she continues to talk.
“Only, Harry ended up putting a lot of interest on what I borrowed. Like, insane amounts of interest, and I was working it off slowly, but then he heard I was at the police station and he thought I was reporting him or something. He got angry and…” She waves one hand loosely up to her face.
The strange anger inside me grows as I place the last stitch. I’m going to find Harry, and I’m going to kill him.
“So I don’t know anything about what you are talking about, okay? And you’re a fucking asshole for not just coming here and asking me about it.”
She’s right.
It pisses me off, but she’s right.
I get up slowly and clean away the blood-stained cotton and wipes, then stand by the counter and grip the edge with one hand. I got this wrong. So wrong. I was completely blinded by the thought that I’d fucked someone tied to Brenden’s death and that the woman I was rapidly becoming infatuated with was the enemy. I almost wanted her to confess so I could attribute my feelings to grief, kill her, and move on.
But she’s innocent. Harry’s being on the Russian payroll could just be a coincidence, but it’s almost too perfect. Who knows what else will go wrong if I take my eye off the ball now?
“So?” Evelyn asks as my silence drags on. “Aren’t you going to say anything?”
I look over at her. “How much do you owe him?”
She winces faintly and looks away. “Two hundred and fifty thousand.”
“Oh.”
That’s nothing, at least to me. A quick glance at Evelyn’s apartment and that’s likely more money than she’s ever seen in her life, beyond her credit cards. “I…” Pausing, I search for the right thing to say. Maybe there is no perfect way to say it. “I understand. And I believe you.”
“You’re not acting like you believe me,” Evelyn says with a pointed glance at the hallway leading to her broken front door.
“Harry being with the Russians and their trying to claim credit for the kill is…” I shake my head. “It’s too much for me to get into with you, but if you really are as innocent as you say, then there’s a chance Harry marked you.”
“Marked me?”
“Yes. Brenden was at that motel a few times and you work there. Getting into debt with Harry puts you on a list of people they can use to get what they want. Maybe you were their way into the motel to get to him.”
“But I–I didn’t do anything, I swear. Harry never mentioned the motel and he’s never been violent until tonight when he thought I was handing him over to the cops.”
“Doesn’t matter. It could have been something small you did that helped them unknowingly, or you were just a backup plan.” Rubbing my jaw, my beard scratches at my palm as I try to decipher their plan in my mind. Without Harry, though, all I can do is guess.
“So you burst in here thinking I’m a spy, then patch me up, and now you’re on my side?” Evelyn narrows her eyes. “I don’t think I believe you.”
“Then don’t,” I say. “I’m… sorry about your door. I was furious because I thought I’d let you get close to me when really, you were a culprit.”
“Close to you?” She tilts her head in a way that reminds me of a curious puppy.
“Do you think I fuck everyone in the back of my car?”
Her cheeks flare pink immediately and she looks away. “I don’t know,” she mumbles. “I’m sure you fuck a lot of people.”
“No.” For some reason, it’s very important to me that she knows that. “I’ve never fucked anyone in my car except you. In fact, I haven’t fucked anyone in way too long.”
“Really?” The coy way she glances at me suggests she likes hearing that, but given how I’ve interpreted things so far, I’m not sure I can trust myself.
“Really.”
“Well…” Evelyn moves on her seat and brings her hands to the table, twisting her fingers together. “At least I got to see you again, one last time.”
My full attention locks on her immediately. “What do you mean, one last time?”
She looks at me with those gigantic doe eyes. “I’m sorry for yelling at you. Everything just got on top of me and I got so angry at what you were saying. It feels like I’m out of control, and everyone is making these assumptions and choices about me without listening to me, and now—”
“Evelyn.” I move to sit next to her and place my large hand over her clasped ones. “What are you talking about?”
“Harry wants his money now. As in, he’ll kill me in forty-eight hours if I don’t have it ready for him. And I don’t have that kind of cash so…” She shrugs and her eyes sparkle with tears. “I thought drinking would help me feel better, but…” She trails off, shaking her head.
For me, though, this is perfect. “I’ll pay for it.”
“What?” Her head snaps up.
“I’ll pay it. That’s barely anything. Plus, it saves me from working out how the hell to get my hands on Harry before he runs back to the family.”
Evelyn’s mouth drops open. “You’re not serious.”
“Deadly,” I say, then pull my hand away from hers. The contact is almost too much, like her touch is searing into me, and I can still feel it even as I rub my palm against my thigh. “Call him. Tell him you have the money and want to meet.”
Despite the soft surprise across her face, her eyes narrow. “So that’s it. I’m just a tool for you to use again.”
“Does it matter?” I reply. “I’ll pay your debt and get my hands on the little rat. It’s a win-win.”
Evelyn’s face twists into a frown and she nods. “So just a tool.”
“A debt-free tool,” I joke, but it’s clearly too soon for humor, so I rise and take a few steps away lest I get overcome with the urge to touch her again. “Evelyn, if you were just a tool, I wouldn’t be helping you.”
“Helping me gets you what you want,” she replies, looking up at me. “So just a tool.”
“All I need is a name and a face, and I already have that for Harry. I can get to him without you, so no. I wouldn’t be helping you if you were just a tool.”
“Then why are you helping me?”
I stare at her, and my mind goes blank as my heart skips a beat.
That is the one question I can’t answer.
