“Eva, I—”
“I remember this day,” she said in an eerily calm tone, holding a photo in her hand. “He was the keynote speaker, and since he and Pam had already separated, he asked me to go instead. It was a great night.” A frail smile pulled at her lips as she recalled the memory. “We took this picture after dinner, and he put it on his mantle the next day and promised to make me a copy. But he never did.” Her eyes snapped up to mine.
Black streaks of makeup carved her cheeks, and her red-rimmed eyes lanced through me as she got to her feet, the weapon still on me.
“This photo was still on his mantle the day he died. I know it was. I saw it. How is it that you have it?”
“Listen—”
“Shut up!” she yelled, dropping the photo and steadying her grip. “I’ve been racked with guilt, so much fucking guilt about what happened that night. I blamed myself for not picking up on his distress cues—You were there, weren’t you?Why?”
“Angel…”
“Don’t call me that. Don’t you ever call me that.” Her voice was strangled, her lips trembling, and I only wanted to hold her.
Fuck.
“You killed him? You killed your own father.”
“He was never a father to me.”
She let out a loud shriek. “You’re a murderer, Derek. A fucking psychopath. Is that what all this is?” she asked, motioning around the room. “Never misses a mark. Is that what you do? Kill people?”
“It’s more complicated than that.”
A humorless laugh left her throat. “Complicated? There’s nothing complicated about the fact that you kill people for a living. The fact that you killed your own father, a man I loved as if he was...”
Her chest shuddered as a sob robbed her words. She lowered the gun and slumped forward, crying with her head bowed and her dark hair falling around her like a curtain, obscuring her beautiful face.
“You can hate me, Eva. Hate what I did. Hate who I am, but don’t you dare shed a tear for that son of a bitch. You have no idea of the man he truly was and everything he was involved in.”
I dared to place a hand on her shoulder, but she ripped away from my touch.
“Who the fuck are you to judge anyone’s morality?”
“I don’t claim to be a saint. But I don’t hide my demons either like he did.”
She scoffed and shook her head.
“Oh, really? Why did you seek me out? Why were you following me?” she asked, pointing at the pictures on the shelf. “Was any of this real, Derek?” Her voice was broken again, and her pain was like a gash to the heart.
With a hand over my chest, I fisted my shirt. “I didn’t plan this, Eva. I didn’t mean to—”
“You absolute bastard.”
“Please, let me explain.” I tried to reach out, but she recoiled, raising her weapon again.
“Don’t fucking touch me.”
I loathed the way she was looking at me. In some ways, I preferred her hatred over the fear reflected in her eyes. She was staring at me like everyone else, and I couldn’t stand it. Not from her.
“You can yell, scream, hate me, Eva, but don’t be afraid of me. I’m a monster. I know that. I’ve killed in cold blood, and I won’t deny that. But you, I would never hurt you.”
She squeezed her eyes closed and cried, the gun dropping to her feet. I moved in and cradled her face. “Baby, I’d never hurt you. Please, believe that.”
Her hands wound tightly around my wrists, and her eyes flew open.
“You’re wrong,” she said in a whisper. “No one has ever hurt me more than you. You fucking broke me, Derek.”
