“Whether you do this or not is your choice,” I say to the ginger. “But it seems like your friend here is going to find someone else regardless.”
“We’re not friends,” Talon interrupts.
“Your acquaintance, then.” I turn to Cassian. “If the experiment is inevitable, better it be done properly. I want to be the one to conduct it.”
Talon lets out a thin, incredulous laugh. “Fucking hell.” He starts pacing. “Here I was, for the first time in a long while, wondering what might happen if I take care of this good oldnoggin.” He knocks the side of his head. “Apparently this whole thing is a sign it can only get worse from here.”
“Grief counseling is not a good place to take care of your mind,” I say.
My eyes trail his pacing figure, but my mind is somewhere else. On Cassian.
He said the system needs to be fixed. But I wonder.
“What did you do with your sister’s killer?” I ask.
A fissure of something raw flashes through his eyes. I mean the question in good faith. Or in as good a faith as my morals allow. Which is quite far from most people’s.
I did not allow my mother’s killer to live. Could someone who has seen the other side let the killer of someone he loved walk away?
Curiosity makes me ask. But I know the question is nearly impossible for him to answer. We just met. I ambushed them. I positioned myself as someone who holds a solution to his problem. But if he did what I think he did—if he killed his sister’s murderer and then became fixated on changing the system of life and death—then I am nothing but a liability.
What stops me from going to the police and turning this hallway into evidence?
Nothing.
Nothing except the same thing that brought me out here. Curiosity. And curiosity is not a virtue. Something tells me this man is more careful than he is curious.
So it’s up to me to take the risk.
“I murdered my mother’s killer,” I say, still looking into his eyes. “Left his body to look like the booze did it.”
What is he going to do now?
Talon is the first to react. He stops pacing. Looks around to check if anyone heard us. To be honest, I don’t know if anyone could have. I didn’t check.
“Jesus,” Talon mutters. “Are you out of your mind?” He looks at Cassian. “You met your fucking match.”
“At least whisper shit like this, man,” Talon tells me.
Cassian inhales and breaks eye contact to check the surroundings too.
If someone did hear me, that would be unfortunate. But I covered my steps well enough. Words muttered outside grief counseling are not a confession. I could have been so grief-stricken I ventured too far into my own mind.
“You don’t seem surprised,” I say.
“I knew you were listening,” Cassian replies. “Talon admitted to having killed people. So have I. You stood there through all of it before you showed yourself.”
“Figured I’m like-minded?”
“Figured you’re a freak,” Cassian says.
I smile. “Isn’t that the same thing?”
Talon doesn’t smile. I watch it happen in real time. Gone is the man who came here to grieve. Something sharp and brutal takes his place.
“Don’t do that,” he says.
I turn to him.
