Total pages in book: 47
Estimated words: 43912 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 220(@200wpm)___ 176(@250wpm)___ 146(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 43912 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 220(@200wpm)___ 176(@250wpm)___ 146(@300wpm)
Blunt, but fair.
“I just have one question,” he says, his tone heavy.
“Ask it.”
“Where is the body?”
“Oh! Uhm.” I hadn’t actually thought about the logistics of all that would follow confession. “I can show you. It’s safe.”
“Good. I would like to take him home. Give him a proper burial.”
A proper burial is a good idea, and it will ensure that nobody stumbles across a disfigured but undeniably monstrous corpse. If anybody were to find Rage’s body, shit would certainly hit the fan.
Now that I am no longer absolutely frozen with fear at the prospect of Justice discovering my crime, I find myself able to think more clearly. Colors seem brighter. The world is less threatening. Things are going to be okay, maybe.
“I need to make a call,” I tell him.
“Okay.” He gives me a squeeze. There is nothing like a comforting hug from two sets of arms at once. He holds me very close, for a long time, until I exhale and relax against him. “There is nothing I could not forgive you for,” he says. “Some things I may need to punish you for, but you will never be unwanted. Do you understand that?”
“Mmnghh,” I answer. My face is pressed against his neck. I don’t want to say any more than that. I don’t know how to take that kind of a declaration of devotion. I don’t feel like I have earned it, and there is a part of me wondering if this is actually real, or if it is like it is when we are wanting to recover a body from a murderer. Everybody is friends until the location is confirmed. That’s when the Mrs Nice Lady act drops.
If that is what he is doing, there’s nothing I can do. I’ve accepted my fate. Time will tell if Justice truly feels love for me, or if he just wants to recover the body.
He watches and listens to me as I make the call.
“Yeah?”
“Hey. Hank. Do you still have the, uh...”
“Yeah,” he says. “I’ve got it. Had it sitting in the warehouse since you called. Been waiting for instructions.”
I completely forgot to get in touch with him. Or maybe it wasn’t so much forgetting as it was a refusal to deal with the reality of my actions.
“Alright. Can you load it on a truck. Just a general flatbed. You didn’t open the container did you?”
“I don’t open nothing I’m not told to open.”
I believe him. Hank is a man who has seen enough things that cannot be unseen. He’s not going to play peekaboo with a body in a dumpster.
“Alright. See you soon.”
“I need to go get, everything,” I tell him. “I can meet you at your shipping containers, or…”
“I am not letting you out of my sight,” he growls. “Not after the last week, thinking you were forever gone.”
Now I feel guilty for a whole other reason. It’s like there’s no escape from the burden of feeling once you get involved with someone.
“Listen. I thought there was no way you’d ever want to see me again. I thought I’d done something so heinous I was never going to be right with you, or the law, or whatever passes for a god around here again. What I did was wrong. No matter how many people tell me it was reasonable or even a good act, I know it was wrong. I know…”
He grabs me again as my voice starts to crack.
“This is the problem when good girls go bad,” he says. “It’s not easy feeling outside the law when you’re used to being inside it. Those rules don’t just protect the public. They make you feel safe too. But now you know you don’t always play by those rules. You thought you had a limit, but limits are always moving. I never thought I’d love a normal woman. I never thought I’d encounter anybody as strong as you, as defiant as you, as beautiful as you. But I did, and so my limit changed.”
“You are equating me killing Rage to you falling for me.”
“In a way,” he says.
“It’s not the same thing. It’s wrong to kill.”
He pauses, the corner of his lips twisting wryly before he replies.
“Do you want another spanking? How about a whipping? I can entertain your desire for punishment, Sally. I can put you in a cage of my own making and you can serve your sentence on your knees.”
My jaw drops. I’m not sure how to respond to him. I feel my face flushing bright red. He’s right, this guilt is making me yearn for punishment. Going over his knee isn’t enough to atone for taking life the way I did, in a fit of temper and righteous grief.
“I think you do,” he chuckles. “Let’s go get this vehicle.”
“I trust Hank with a lot of things,” I say. “But I don’t trust him with seeing you. I should go on my own. Don’t worry. I’ll be fine. I can come back here when I’m done, and you can sneak down into the cab.”