Page 69 of Eight of Swords, Part One

‘She went for a walk on her own yesterday!’ the nurse tells him. ‘It was such a nice day.’

‘A walk?’

‘I was following nearby,’ she adds in a whisper, dropping a wink while she makes coffee for him, ‘but oh, being outdoors did her a world of good.’

‘Wait, I don’t understand. She couldn’t walk last time I was here.’

‘Oh honey, this is how fast it can go into remission when you can afford the good stuff,’ the nurse tells him, stirring his coffee. ‘That new treatment did her a world of good. She—’

‘No talking about me like I’m not here,’ Jocelyn Tanner chides, walking into the room, albeit slowly, but very much unaided. She fixes Lachlan with a lukewarm smile in greeting, then says, ‘Would you make me a tea, darlin’? We can take it out on the porch. I know my son won’t be here long.’

Lachlan clutches his coffee, the cheap smack of granules wafting up with the steam. His mother sits on the porch swing, gazing at the trees and wildlife, a little sunshine peeking through the chilly sky. ‘Why are you here?’

‘To see you, Ma. No one told me you’re in remission.’

She shakes her head, lips pursed. ‘You didn’t ask. I told them all to wait until you asked, but I knew you wouldn’t. Am I supposed to wither and die because that’s easier for you? Hmm?’

‘No, Ma. I’m happy you’re doing better,’ he says, oddly defensive. She could always turn the tables so fast. ‘Sorry I haven’t called more.’

‘How’s that little girl?’

Lachlan resists the urge to rub the tattoo. He misses her.

‘She’s doing well.’

‘You should stay away from her, Lachlan,’ she warns, sipping her tea. ‘I don’t doubt how good you are at this job. I’ve always seen the… potential in you for that,’ she allows, the word wrapped in paper-thin distaste because not even Jocelyn Tanner is bold enough to call him out when it’s his “potential” that’s paying for everything. ‘But that little girl deserves to live a long, happy life.’

‘I’m her bodyguard.’ Lachlan swallows thickly, eyes stinging. ‘I know what I am, but I’d die to keep her safe.’

‘Hm,’ she huffs, like she wanted to say something else and bit it back out of kindness. ‘Well, regardless. Remember your area of expertise.’

‘And what is my area of expertise, Ma?’

‘Killing,’ she says boldly, no hesitation. ‘You’re a killer. You always were.’

A strange sense of violent injustice is cracking beneath the stone walls of his interior confinement, and Lachlan has never wanted to tell her the truth more than now. ‘You don’t even know what happened.’

‘I don’t need to. Your father wasn’t a perfect man by any stretch of the imagination, but he was a good man, a decent man.’

The stone is melting. Lava is pouring.

Lachlan’s ears are ringing.

Killer. He’s a killer.

Stone cold, not magma hot.

He’s a killer because killers cannot be touched or hurt.

Killers survive.

‘And you ended him in cold blood. My husband died at your hands. So yes, I know exactly what you are, Lachlan. I always have. Your expertise is death. Even when you were little, the crows used to find you. They’d always find you.’

Lachlan’s hands aren’t shaking because he doesn’t get tremors, they were shocked out of him years back, but he is unmoored by the heat of his anger, so much so it makes him want to fling the ugly truth at her just to break her heart in ways medicine can’t fix.

But she wouldn’t believe him anyway.

Lachlan shouldn’t have come.