Alex's body tried revolting, like always. His hands grew damp and the skin under his arms itched. At the end of a short, dark stretch of hallway came the glow of the kitchen. He approached cautiously, hoping to ride his nervousness like the wave of useless energy that it was. There was a hiss coming from inside the room – low enough to be a vent fan, or even the gas on the stove. Water heater-like crackles and pops. The shadow of his target stretched toward him across the wooden floorboards.
He waited, breathing shallowly. Take the shot and go. Take the shot and go. The sooner you leave, the sooner you might get to see Octavia again. On the next breath he rounded the corner, the Walther out in front, and fired.
Something was wrong. The men's robe was right; they'd seen that part from across the street. Only, a woman was wearing it. She'd spun to see the intruder and tugged the robe closed with both hands, eyes wide.
Something let out a thin, piercing yell in his head. Was it her? Was she yelling? Her mouth was closed, he could see that, but the sound didn't stop and it was climbing, becoming louder with each passing second. It was shrill as a bullhorn. Alex needed it to stop, but he could only stare at the woman in her husband's robe.
Her hands released the fabric and the robe fell open, revealing a pink cotton nightgown. Blood, streaming from the entrance wound. She looked ready to hyperventilate. Her mouth opened and the sound kept on shrieking.
Time. There was no time.
Alex turned, realized a kettle sat screaming on the stove.
#
When it was over, Victor reached gingerly for the laptop. His hands hurt. On his first attempt to pull the computer closer, his fingers slipped off the corner. Thankfully, the screen hadn't fully closed before he'd made his move, and that meant he could access the CCTV footage Dominic had been showing him. The playback had run its course over the last several minutes, and Victor was relieved to find a dark screen – whatever had happened between them was over, and they had gone to sleep.
The software was user-friendly: all he had to do was navigate a calendar in the lower right corner, and a list of available cameras on the left. He found what he wanted in a matter of seconds. Once the date was selected and he'd located the camera for her room, he dragged the marker back and forth over the timeline until he found two people onscreen. At first, he stopped at a frame in which Octavia had been forced over the side of her bed in front of Dominic. The image hit him like a boot in his chest, even more so than the footage of her cheating on him. He dragged the marker back to where it started, watching the entire event from start to finish. He had to. She had told him the truth.
Seventeen minutes.
Victor had never cried so long in his life.
#
Alex tripped over Nick in the garage. He hip-checked a metal trash can, vanished through the side door they'd come in through and raced Nick to the car, which was parked at the end of the block.
Houses went by in muted blues and grays, the whole subdivision wrapped in winter's blanket, asleep. Alex panted, his footfalls thudding, the rush of his arms and legs pumping wildly. He crashed into the side of his car, unable to decide if his body was going to sob or vomit. He braced his hands against the door and steadied himself by focusing on the asphalt. Nick's footfalls approached at a steady clip. "He's going to make me kill her," Alex moaned. "I can't kill her. I can't...we have to get back."
"Give me the keys," Nick said. "You can't drive like this." He too was out of breath, but he managed to take the ring in Alex's pocket and push him around the front of the car.
Alex got in. When he was able to take a deep breath, his smoker's cough started and didn't quit until everything was scratching and painful, but he was relieved when nothing came up.
Nick gunned the engine, throwing them both back against their seats. He didn't put the headlights on until they'd reached the highway overpass that marked the entrance to the subdivision. "What happened in there?" he asked.
She'd just wanted a cup of tea.
She'd just wanted a cup of tea.
She could have stayed in bed. What drove a person to get up so late? Most teas were caffeinated, anyway. Maybe her stomach had been upset; maybe she couldn't sleep. Sometimes I think they feel it, Nick had said. Could she have known on some molecular level that death waited in the mud across the street?
She could have stayed upstairs, forgone the tea, and she would be alive right now. Was her life worth that cup of tea? She never even got to drink it. Alex reasoned with her in his head, talking her back to bed so he could abandon the job. He would have told her to stay in her room, that she was going to die if she came down. She understood him immediately, the way he imagined it. Thank you. She tiptoed up the steps, praising him. You saved my life.
He lost track of how long they'd been driving, and now it looked like they were nearly back. Nick was asking more questions: should they tell Dominic right away? How long could they keep it secret? Neither of them had ever hit the wrong target before. What was the punishment?
Alex glanced over at the driver's seat, but he only heard noise, obstacles.
Then Nick said, "My car's gone."
#
No one at the security desk. Alex sprinted past, taking the stairs down double-time.
"Alex?" Nick called after him.
He didn't know where to look. It had been so easy before; if it wasn't mealtime or a training session, Octavia was in her room. Some part of him wanted to look there, to find her as he had come to know her – studying or sleeping, too much or not at all. Cobbled together from extremes. Either she obeyed men or fought with them; either she'd feared Alex's attraction to her or she'd hounded him.
"Alex!"
He'd hit the platform at the end of the stairs to the second floor when Billy's voice boomed from the hallway. Alex thrust the door open. "Where is she?" he asked.
"He took her," Billy said. "He left this." In his thick fingers, a folded square of copy paper.
"Does Dominic know?"
Billy's gaze diverted.
"What?"
"You got to see for yourself. He in his office." Billy pressed the note into Alex's hand. "I tried to stop him – Victor, I mean – but he too dangerous. There's a difference between a surgeon and a guy who can cut you up real good, but Dominic didn't see it that way."