“So you’re saying you’re Robin Hood?”
“No, I’m telling you that I stole from a rich asshole who cheated on his wife and treated her like a piece of art he could acquire and then hang up and forget about. And then I gave the cash that I would have gotten on the black market to an animal shelter that’s trying to take care of mistreated or abandoned dogs and cats.”
“Just like Robin Hood.”
“I’m not ever going to feel bad about it.”
Erika cleared her throat again. Like it was a nervous tic. “How many times have you done that?”
“Since I came to Caldwell? Or over the course of my life?”
“Either. Both.” She pushed some flyaways out of her face. “I don’t know.”
“It’s what I do. I’ve got a knack for getting into places that people try to keep others out of, and I have to do something with what I take. I don’t need the shit.”
“So it’s a game to you?”
“It’s just a way to keep up my skills. And not everybody can have six fucking watches that are worth, collectively, more than a lot of people’s houses.” He shook his head. “Like I said, I am never going to apologize for what I’ve done.”
“And you’re not going to stop, are you.”
“Nope. The proceeds always go to places that need it more.”
He met her right in the eye, but not aggressively. More so that it was clear he was telling his truth, and she was free to judge.
“You know,” she said in a lowered voice, like all her CPD colleagues might be listening in on a wiretap, “I wouldn’t feel bad if I were you, either.”
Balz smiled a little. “Thanks for understanding.”
Her boss-voice came back online. “It’s still illegal. And assuming the things you take are insured, it’s not a victimless crime even if the owners get reimbursed.”
“Still not sorry.”
“It’s wrong.”
“I don’t care. It feeds people or animals who are hungry. It gives unfortunates a place to sleep when they have none. And it keeps those who are desperately afraid safe.”
“True virtue doesn’t come with an asterisk.”
“And thieves can have morals—hey, is this our first fight?”
She blinked—and then seemed to be trying not to smile. “I’d call it more of an argument than a fight.” Then her brows twitched into a frown. “And you’re seriously just going to let me go? What about your buddies?”
“Don’t worry about them. They won’t come after you. And neither will I, Erika. You can trust me on that.”
She opened her mouth, but he went back into her brain one final time. Leaving her memories alone, he instead gave her a gift: He inserted the very clear cognition that it was in her best interests to never, ever come near him or this garage, and never, ever do any further investigating into any part of what she had seen, heard, or done tonight…
Due to the trance he had to put her in, all she could do was stare up at him, her eyes fuzzy, her mouth slightly parted, her body poised.
It would have been the perfect time to kiss her.
But he’d already taken too much without her permission.
And everything ended between them right now.
Everything.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE
And still Sahvage stared down the long white corridor at Rahvyn.
Whilst the Brothers around him displayed a masculine pattern of grieving, strong faces drawn tightly, eyes watering, but no tears falling, he faced her and locked her stare with his own, the demand not a call to action but a shout.
Opening up a communication link between them, she said unto his mind, You hated what I did to you.
He shook his head from side to side. Whether it was a denial or he was saying that none of that mattered, she was not sure—and meanwhile, on the other side of the closed door behind him, that mahmen’s weeping was a stain upon the air, seeping out and infecting all within its sorrowful earshot with a weighted sadness.
How could she not respond to such grieving?
Rahvyn’s body moved first, before her brain consciously instructed her legs to push her feet into the floor and her arms to steady her balance upon the bare, clean wall as she rose. On the vertical, she had an absurd notion to smooth out her clothes, and thus she did so, trying to ignore the red stains from where she had cradled Nate on the concrete outside of that club.
She walked forward in a daze.
Focusing only on Sahvage, the hall disappeared in her peripheral vision, and so too did the fighters who surrounded him. All was gone except for her dearest first cousin, the remnant of her family, the living, breathing symbol of what she had once been.