Tabula Rasa (28 page)

I picked the gun up and pointed it at the bathroom door in time for
Shannon to emerge from the mist.

“What are you doing, Elodie? I thought we trusted one another.”
His voice was calm and steady, and I knew he wasn’t even a little
worried I’d shoot him, which only made me want to pull the trigger
more. I inched my finger closer to the small lever that would end
him.

“Do you even know how to use that gun?” he asked. “The safety’s
on. You might want to take care of that.”

I was afraid to look too closely at the gun, afraid Shannon would
rush and tackle me. And then what? I flicked the safety off with my
eyes still on him, the barrel of the gun still pointed at the center
of his chest... the chest water was dripping off of down into the
folds of the towel secured around his waist, while he stood serene.
Confident.

“Is it hot?” he asked.

“What?”

“Hot. Is a round chambered or do you need to rack the slide? You
don’t know, do you?”

I didn’t. And I wasn’t sure how to find out. I could just pull
the trigger and if nothing happened, then I’d know.

“What’s your plan after you shoot me? You want to go to prison?
Haven’t you been in enough of those lately?”

“I already figured that out. I’ll tell them who I am. I’ll tell
them you were holding me prisoner. They’ll find all your weapons.
They’ll believe me.”

Shannon nodded. “Very good. And the questions? The media? I thought
you didn’t want that.”

“I’ve got my memories. I can handle it now.”

“Can you?”

My arm was starting to feel weak from holding the gun up, so I
steadied my grip with my other hand.

“I don’t think you can pull the trigger. You don’t have it in
you. You already proved that once tonight while I cleaned up your
mess.”

“I was protecting you.”

“Great job,” he said. The sarcasm dripped off him as he stared
bluntly at the gun. He sighed. “Well, do it if that’s what you
want.”

Did he have no self-preservation instinct? I knew he did. He wouldn’t
have been so careful, so meticulous if he didn’t care about his
fate. But I knew why he wasn’t troubled. We both knew. I couldn’t
shoot him.

I turned the gun on myself, and for the first time since this drama
had started, Shannon looked scared.

“Elodie, point the gun back at me,” he said urgently.

“So you know I won’t shoot you, but you’re not so sure about
whether or not I’ll shoot myself.”

And then it happened. Shannon cried. They were silent stealth tears
creeping down his cheeks, but I knew he felt them drip down and fall
off his face.

“I can’t lose you, Elodie. You’re the only thing human I have
to hold onto. If I don’t have you, then I don’t know what
anything feels like. I need you with me. I need you to translate all
the things I can’t feel.”

“What good could that possibly do? You couldn’t even process my
guilt over killing an innocent person.”

“I’m not stupid, goddammit! I know how you felt. I just can’t
feel the same thing directly.”

An unjust mercy. I should be the one who could happily skip along
without a ripple.

“Maybe you will if I pull the trigger. Maybe this is the final
lesson in how to be a real person. How to feel actual pain and
empathy.”

The expression on his face was like a wounded animal, looking at his
attacker in disbelief. “You knew what I was. I never lied or
pretended with you. I let you see it all.”

And then, against all I thought I was capable of, I pulled the
trigger. Instinctively I flinched, but nothing happened. The chamber
had been empty. Shannon lunged for me, and the gun slipped out of my
hands as his full weight settled on top of me on the bed.

“Is this how it’s going to be now? Am I going to have to keep you
on suicide watch?” he asked, his breathing coming out wild and
heavy.

“I can’t live with what I’ve done. I can’t stop seeing the
things you’ve done.”

“I won’t involve you ever again. I shouldn’t have brought you
along this time. I thought I was doing something good for you so you
could get your revenge.”

In fairness to him, I’d thought it was something good for me, too.
I’d thought I needed to not just be told or hear that Stevens was
gone, but to see it happen with my own eyes, to watch him struggle,
to absorb his fear out of the air as if it might energize and sustain
me. To watch the light go out of his eyes and see for myself that he
couldn’t hurt anybody else again and that he’d gotten what he
deserved. But the actual cold reality of death and murder wasn’t
the glamourized fantasy of the movies with no emotional consequences.
It was harsh, brutal, awkwardly violent, and poisonous to all who
participated.

Except that Shannon didn’t seem affected. How could he be? I was
sure he didn’t have a soul to damage. He was impervious to all this
inconvenient humanity.

“But you’re not going to stop doing it,” I said.

“Of course not. I told you... everybody I kill deserves to die.”

“But not that woman,” I said.

“I didn’t kill her.”

“But you would have. She would have been collateral damage.”

“I was too focused on the results and not focused enough on the
planning. It was because I cared more this time. But yes, I would
have done what was necessary. Whatever you believe, I’m sorry you
had to make that choice tonight. But I’m glad you made it. Aren’t
you glad you made it? Would you rather I go to prison?”

“I don’t know anymore. I don’t think I can live with who you
are. Or with who I am now.”

“You’re the same. One moment doesn’t change that.”

“It changes everything.”

Shannon eased off me, and pulled me into his arms. I thought at first
he might squeeze me to death, he was holding me so tight.

“I wish I could take this for you,” he said, quietly. “I could
handle it. I would take the guilt and pain so you wouldn’t have to
feel it.”

“I wouldn’t have to feel anything if you’d let me...”

“No. We’ll go to Paris. Everything will be better there. You’ll
see. A trip is what you need. You can see your friends. You can show
me the sights.”

“You’ve never been to Paris?” I asked.

Shannon shook his head.

“But you speak fluent French.”

“No. I’ve been learning it ever since I found out you spoke it. I
have CD’s in the car. I know just enough to get by.”

His mouth found mine, and despite what I wanted to be true, I still
wanted him. Sex with Shannon that night wasn’t the victory fuck
after a fresh kill that I’d feared it would be. And it wasn’t
ropes and whips and power games. It felt like making love. And I
wanted to believe it, that this was real, that it was something he
was capable of feeling with me. Even seeing him cry wasn’t enough
to fully convince me that I was some magical exception to the cold
deadness inside him.

Afterward, he held me for a long time until I had almost drifted off,
surrendering to dreams to make me forget for just a little while how
badly everything had gotten fucked up.

But then, moments before I reached that happy release, he got up,
unzipped a bag, and pulled out a coil of rope and tied me to the bed.
My heart rate picked up. “Shannon?”

His answering expression was grim. “I don’t trust you with loaded
guns lying around. This is for your own safety.”

When he’d secured me, he got back into bed beside me and pulled the
covers over us. “Go to sleep. Things won’t seem so bad in the
morning.”

Whoever had first coined that phrase was an idiot.

***

A week later, we were in a hotel suite in Paris. Shannon seemed
weirdly happy traveling with me, as if he could tick off the box
marked
romantic vacation
on his normalcy checklist. I sat up
in bed and drank coffee and ate pastries off the room service tray.
Shannon stood beside the window looking out at the breathtaking view
of the Eiffel tower.

“Do you want to go to the Louvre today before we meet your friends
for dinner later?” he asked.

“Yeah.”

Shannon had taken a softer turn with me since the night we killed
Stevens and his TA. As if almost losing me had snapped something into
focus for him. At least where I was concerned. Or maybe it was that
he thought I was too fragile to handle anything that would remind me
of who and what he was. Or what I’d become in his care.

“Shannon?”

“Yeah?” He still stared out the window.

“Why did you stop? The kink stuff?”

“I don’t know.”

“Can we go back to it?”

He turned sharply from the window, his gaze now intently focused on
me. “You want that? After...”

“I need it. I mean... if you want...” More than ever, I needed
that release from everything that those games brought. I couldn’t
say it out loud, but I needed to be punished, no matter how hollow
the effort.

That dark intensity came back to his eyes. “Yes. When we get back
home.”

I let out a long breath. “Good. Thank you.”

“Sir,” he corrected.

Despite everything I was dealing with and all the things I thought
I’d never get over, the feeling of safety and security wrapped
around me again like the warm, inviting smell of the coffee on the
tray in front of me.

“Sir,” I said.

I went back to my breakfast. I’d momentarily forgotten the previous
night’s dream, but now it rushed into my mind with the force of a
typhoon wind, practically leaping into vivid color right in front of
me. I was back in the theme park with Trevor. The dream replayed that
last day before Shannon had shown up. Yet somehow, the dream version
of me had seen the future already. Half of me lived the reality as it
was, knowing nothing of myself or the truth, and another half of me
seemed to be off to the side watching, already knowing everything
that was to come.

Shannon’s dark clad figure filled the doorway. Gunfire sounded.
Trevor crumpled to the ground, blood spilling out of him. I ran to
him on autopilot, trying to stop the blood, trying to keep him there,
trying to hold the lie of our life together, all while trying to
remember I’d already done this, and Trevor wasn’t the good guy.

But neither was Shannon. I watched it all play out again. And then,
the choice... do I go back out into the world not knowing who I am,
or do I go with this man?

Shannon held his hand out, and all the knowledge of everything that
was to come flooded into me, and the two parts of myself merged. And
once again, I knew everything. I looked at him for a long moment,
frozen in this space, this fork in the road. Finally, I took his
hand, and we walked out of the castle into a future that only felt
real with him.

Author's Note

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kittythomas.com
.

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Thank you so much for reading and supporting my work!

Kitty ^.^

Acknowledgements

Thank you to the following people for their help with Tabula Rasa:

Amy Martin for her help with French translation.

Robin Ludwig @ gobookcoverdesign.com for the fabulous cover art!

Thank you to Cathy for copyedits!

Thank you to Michelle and Karen for their great beta read suggestions! Special thanks to Michelle for all the body disposal help. Who knew getting rid of bodies was so much work! ;)

And thank you to M for digital formatting! Love you!

If you enjoyed Tabula Rasa, you may also enjoy these other
titles by Kitty Thomas:

Comfort Food

Mafia Captive

Blood Mate

Broken Dolls

For
full title list please visit kittythomas.com