Unsuitable

I lift a trembling hand and press it to his cheek.

He opens his eyes. The shine of tears in them nearly kills me.

He gently brushes his thumb over my swelling eye from where Damien hit me.

His eyes lower. Rage flares in his face as he takes in my half-naked state.

“Jesus.” The word is an agonized sound coming from him. “Did he?”

“No.”

“Thank God.” He pulls me into his arms.

I bury my face in his chest. His hand grips the back of my head, holding me to him.

Unwanted images flash through my mind. I shiver in his arms.

“You’re cold.” He releases me and takes off his shirt.

He holds it up for me to put on. I slip my arms into the sleeves. I don’t bother to button it up. I wrap it around me, keeping it in place with my arms, and I just breathe in his scent surrounding me.

He steps close to me and cradles my face in his hands, handling me like I’m precious goods.

He tilts my face up to his. “I love you,” he says.

I blink, surprised, my heart stilling in my chest.

“What I said last night—that it wasn’t in me to love anyone—I was wrong. So fucking wrong, babe.” He leans in and kisses my lips. “I love you like I didn’t know possible.”

I feel him move away a fraction.

I open my eyes. His are on mine, soulful and filled with so many other emotions that I almost can’t take it.

“I couldn’t save Haley that night,” he whispers. “But I can save you now. Let me take the blame for killing him. Let me do this one last thing for you, babe.”

I feel overwhelmed. My chest is so full with my feelings for him that I can barely breathe.

“You don’t have to—”

“I want to. I need to, Daisy.”

I stare into his eyes, understanding what he’s saying to me.

“Okay,” I whisper. “Okay, Kas.”

Forty-One

Seven days.

Seven days since I shot and killed Damien Doyle in my living room.

Seven days since Kas told the police that he was the one who had killed Damien.

Him.

Not me.

And it’s been seven days since I last saw him.

After Kas convinced me to let him take the blame, I guess I was in some form of shock.

I mean, I had just killed a man. I guess it would have been weird if I hadn’t gone into shock.

Kas sat me on the sofa with Cece. Then, he went about setting his scene.

I sat there with Cece on the sofa, holding her in my arms, while she sobbed quietly. And I watched, almost abstractly, as Kas wiped down the gun, removing my prints from it. Then, he put it in Damien’s hands, putting his prints back on it. Then, Kas held the gun in his own hand, putting his fingerprint on the trigger, incriminating himself.

He came over and knelt in front of Cece, and he recounted the story to her, the one we were to tell the police.

After he was sure we both had it straight, he called the police.

And we sat there, Cece and me on the sofa, while Kas stood, leaning against the wall across from us, his eyes never swaying from me. And Damien’s body was on the floor between us.

Then, there was a hammering at the front door. A voice yelling that it was the police.

Kas pushed off the wall and calmly walked to the front door.

And that was when all hell broke loose.

The instant the policeman saw the gun on the floor where Kas had placed it, he started yelling at us to get on the floor.

Kas was pushed to the floor by one of the officers, hands behind his head.

Cece and I slid off the sofa and got to our stomachs on the floor.

Then, we were handcuffed and separated.

As if we hadn’t been through enough already.

But I got that the police didn’t know the facts of what had happened. All they knew was that a dead man was in our living room.

They had to be cautious.

Kas was taken from the apartment. I saw him being led away. Our eyes connected for the briefest moment, and I said a hundred things to him in my mind.

Then, he was gone.

I was taken into the kitchen and put in the chair where I sat every morning to have my breakfast. Cece was kept in the living room.

The officer took one look at me, with my beaten-up face, wearing only Kas’s shirt, and he removed the handcuffs. He sat opposite me and started asking questions.

I answered every one.

For the most part, it was the truth. About how I’d come home and Damien was here, and he had Cece tied up with a gun pointed to her. I told the police everything.

The only difference was the ending.

I told them it was Kas holding that gun.

I felt sick about lying. My body shook. The policeman thought I was just in shock.

I was. But I was also a liar.

I am a liar.

Clearly believing me and feeling sympathy for me, he then made me a cup of tea.

“For the shock,” he said.

I didn’t bother to tell him that I didn’t drink tea. When he put it in front of me, I just held the cup in my hands and lifted it to my face, letting the steam warm me.

A paramedic was brought into the kitchen to check me over. She cleaned up my eye, which was swelling up big time.

She asked me if I’d been raped. I glanced down at Kas’s shirt that I was still wearing.

I shook my head. Then, I remembered how close it had come to happening.

If Kas hadn’t come when he did, I’d have been raped…or dead by now.

Cece, too.

He saved us.

I might have pulled the trigger that killed Damien, but Kas was the one who charged a guy with a gun in his hand.