“I did.” The others, armed to the teeth and scouring the barren land for any trace of the preacher, didn’t witness his end. It was only him and Elias, and the last woman he’d tried to destroy.
The only man I never regretted putting an end to.
Decker would have killed Elias even if his blood was wasted.
Laurie’s teeth worried his bottom lip, words hesitant like they were plucked from his lips against his will. “What happened to him?”
Decker considered lying. Telling him Elias escaped, disappearing across the hills to Amaretto, never to be seen again. Decker didn’t make a habit of lying.
“I killed him.”
The confession hung between them as potent and stifling as the oily smoke that once shrouded the plateau.
Laurie stiffened, heart thudding against his ribs so viciously Decker thought they might shatter.
You wanted to know me, and here I am. Do you still want to know me, preacher? Do you want to know where I buried the broken body of your uncle? Do you wish to know the look in his eyes before I struck?
“I’ve trusted you with this. You’re different from him. Not cruel or vengeful,” he said quietly.
Laurie flinched when Decker reached for him.
His pulse fluttered like a wounded bird under his shirt cuffs. The wind curled around them, ruffling his curls over his face.
“Look at me,” Decker said.
He caught a glimpse of Elias’s last moments in his eyes. Distress. Negotiation.
Fury was absent.
Laurie was nothing like his uncle.
In the calm of the night, Decker could believe he made the right decision. Elias’s sins hadn’t crawled back to haunt him, but this preacher came as a new beginning, radiant in the moonlight.
Laurie’s lips parted, and Decker smoothed a thumb over the inside of his wrist, gentle encouragement to speak.
“Don’t kill me.” Barely a whisper. Laurie’s face was like terror etched in stone.
“Laurie.” His name slipped from him like smooth liquor with a note of admonishment. Intoxicating how his pulse jumped under his hand.
Keep your head, Decker.
The scent of blood rushed downwind with the dying screech of a rabbit.
Laurie’s hand trembled in Decker’s, hot against his cool skin. “Let go.”
Decker startled, hand falling away. Fangs pricked at his mouth.
I forget myself.
Safine tells me I’m careless.
Laurie ran. Snatching his arm away and turning on his heel, he bolted for the woods.
Stop.
Stop.
Decker didn’t realize he’d snarled until Laurie glanced back, face white as bone. A whip-thin branch slashed across his cheek, cutting a line of blood.
