He went to her, going down on his knees on the floor and taking her hands in his. She lowered her arms, gazing at him. She was so beautiful. He’d thought it when he’d seen her standing in the courtyard of the coffee shop in her striped blue shirt and white pants, hair pulled away from her face. She’d looked fresh then. Young, but also older than she’d been. She looked so vulnerable now, and he wanted to take the haunted look from her eyes, but even though he hadn’t meant it, it was there because of him.
They were like wounded warriors who had been through the bloodiest of battles together. They found refuge in each other’s understanding because in many ways their experience was unspeakable. Together, they required no words. But being in each other’s presence also brought with it visions and memories that were easier to bury when that person wasn’t there.
If he hadn’t known that before, he knew it now.
And it broke his heart. It did, and for the same reason it had the first time. He craved her. He needed the solace only she offered. But she also triggered him in a way no one else could. It had been easier to be away from her. And it ripped him in two.
He kissed her knuckles. He opened her hand and put his mouth on her palm. When he looked back up at her, she still wore that vulnerable look, but warmth had entered her eyes.
“We’re still a mess,” she said.
He sighed. “In some ways.”
“I’ll never regret this,” she said.
“You’re cutting me off,” he said. Again.
“It’s what we both need, Evan.” She lifted their entwined hands and kissed his scars one by one. He wanted to argue, but he really couldn’t. It hurt, but he knew she was right.
“I guess so. How do we know?”
“We know by living our lives.”
A fissure formed in his heart, fibers ripping. He felt it. No one could ever convince him those words didn’t alter his physical self in some measurable way.
He put his head on her knees, and she stroked his hair. “I feel empty when I’m away from you,” he said. “This last year, I’ve thought about it a lot.”
“Me too. But the emptiness is . . . important in a way too.”
“Yes,” he admitted. “But it also hurts.”
“That will fade.”
He felt that tearing again, his heart being stretched in two directions. He knew she was right, though. For now. Maybe forever. No future could be built on a foundation of trauma and nothing more.
But there is more. Was there? How could they know?
How would they ever really know?
Noelle lay back, and Evan crawled in bed beside her, spooning. They’d healed each other, and they’d hurt each other. They couldn’t do anything different. Fate had determined what their impact on the other would be.
As he lay there with her, he had the strange urge to cry when he couldn’t remember the last time he’d wept. Not even in that cage, not even in that upstairs room of horrors. He pulled her closer, holding on while he still could.
In the morning when he woke, Noelle was gone. Just as he’d known she would be.
PART TWO
He who fights with monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster.
—Friedrich Nietzsche
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Seven Years Later
Evan’s phone rang as he got out of his car. He clicked the lock on his key fob as he pulled the phone from his pocket and glanced at the screen. Dad.
He declined the call and returned the phone to his pocket as he headed out of the garage and turned in the direction of the Italian restaurant where he was meeting Aria.
He’d call his dad back later. These days, he ignored his call more often than not. He didn’t want another lecture on how disappointed he was that Evan was squandering his opportunities. He was a twenty-seven-year-old man, and his dad still couldn’t let go of the fact that he’d dropped out of Stanford’s business program seven years before and opted instead to study criminal justice. His father had refused to pay for it, which was fine. His mother had come back with her simple platitude of whatever makes you happy is fine with me. Which really meant, I’m busy living my life with my new husband and stepchildren, and I don’t really care. So Evan had applied to a couple of state schools and then gotten a job and supported himself through all four years.
A year after he’d graduated, he opened his own private investigation firm and had not one regret.
It wasn’t glamorous. It wasn’t even always interesting. But it fed that part of him that had gone without justice, to find closure for a client. Even a cheating spouse, though he rarely took those types of jobs anymore, the ones that he hadn’t had the luxury of turning down in the beginning. They were mostly thankless and always depressing, and in his experience, if a spouse suspected their partner of cheating, they were.
And of course, he had his pet project, too, if that was even the right term.
He’d made several contacts at the Reno PD, who he worked with on a regular basis, and he was meeting one of them now, an officer named Aria Dixon.
The hostess smiled as he entered the small homey-feeling restaurant, but before he could let her know he was meeting someone, he saw Aria stand and wave at him from a table near the back. He raised his hand, letting Aria know he saw her, and then nodded to the hostess, who’d watched the exchange.
“Have a nice meal, sir,” the hostess said.
“Thanks.”
“Hey,” Aria said when he’d made it to the table, standing and giving him a quick hug. “It’s great to see you.”
“You too.” He took off the light coat he was wearing, hanging it on the back of the restaurant chair. “How are you?” he asked when he’d taken a seat.
Aria shrugged, her honey-blonde hair brushing her shoulders. He was more used to seeing her with her hair up and in a uniform, and it was always a little strange to see her as a civilian. Aria was about his age, with deep-green eyes and a smattering of freckles across her nose. She looked more like a pretty midwestern farm girl than a hardened cop. “You know, living the dream, as always.”
He let out a chuckle as Aria shot him a smile. He could tell by the way she looked at him sometimes that she hoped to revisit the short affair they’d had about a year ago. It’d started when they’d gone out for drinks as a group and he’d ended up back at her place. They’d hooked up a handful of times, but it’d always been casual, and eventually he’d suggested they stop because he didn’t want to further jeopardize their working relationship, and regardless, he wasn’t in a place to focus on a romance. It wasn’t that he didn’t find her attractive and interesting. But he was busy building his career. She’d seemed to take it well, but he’d also noticed the quick flash of hurt in her eyes and regretted that he’d crossed that line in the first place and created tension with someone he valued as a work associate.
Because he was at a peaceful place. It’d taken a long time. Years. But he was good. He was damn good. He only woke from nightmares very occasionally. He could think about what had happened to him without breaking out in a cold sweat. He still experienced emotions relating to his victimhood, of course, but he was okay with that. He figured that should be the case. What had happened had altered him. How could it be any different? What he was finding, though, the more time passed, was that not all the change that had occurred was negative.
It had taken seven long years of healing, of on-and-off therapy, and of following the path that felt right inside his gut, to arrive at the place he was at. To risk that? In the slightest way? Well, Evan supposed he’d know when and if something, or someone, came along that made the risk worthwhile.
Aria had taken a sip of water and now set it down. “Thanks for meeting me here. I feel like I haven’t had a day off in weeks. There’s not a lick of food in my house.”
“Still working the task force?”
“Yeah. Gang activity has been off the charts lately. A four-year-old boy was shot in a drive-by on Saturday.”
He grimaced. “How is he?”
“It’s touch and go right now. Say a prayer if it’s your thing.”