Page 178 of Brutal
And I do.
That’s not what this is. That’s not what any of this meant. But words aren’t enough here. I don’t have the words to say what I’m feeling, what she’s come to mean to me.
She watches me closely, as if she’s measuring something she hasn’t decided on yet.
I exhale slowly.
The truth is sitting there.
Waiting.
There’s no way around it now.
“You want the truth?” I ask.
“Yes.”
“That night,” I say, “I was told Halstead was the right man. I wasn’t given options. I wasn’t told to question it. I was told where to be and what to do.”
She swallows, and her eyes glisten a bit, but no tears fall. “Go on.”
“I got there and everything lined up. The access point. The timing. The way he moved. The way he positioned himself. I didn’t hesitate. I struck.”
She nods.
“I didn’t stop to confirm. I didn’t stop to question. I did what I was there to do.”
I pause. She inhales.
And I deal the final blow.
“I killed him.”
“I know,” she says.
“I can’t undo that.”
“I know.” She steps closer.
Close enough now that I feel her heat. That same pull.
Still there.
Still wrong.
Still unavoidable.
“I didn’t let myself say it,” she says. “I had pieces. Enough to see the shape of it. Enough to understand what it might be.” She swallows hard. “But I never put the word to it.”
“Why?”
“Because then I’d become a daughter.” She casts her gaze to the floor. “I couldn’t let emotion be a part of this. What I was trying to do. If I thought my father, I wouldn’t have been able to look at anything objectively. I wouldn’t have been able to build a case. I wouldn’t have been able to stand in it.” She shakes her head. “I would have drowned. So I kept it separate. Kept him separate. He was simply a name. A file. A case.”
Damn.
A name. A file.
Or in my case…a target.
